Oh my God, what an AMAZING day!
I took everyone's advice, and decided that it was time to do some more soul-searching and look to see what others who were once in the same position as me were thinking, and what they decided. Because I realized, I've pretty much been completely going this alone for my entire life. And aside from a few news stories, I've never really seriously looked into discovering what leads most transsexual women to finally go for it in the first place... never really looked into how to know if I really am transsexual or not. And because of this, I allowed constant doubt to get the best of me, because I never had anything to compare it to other than a few brief interviews where the now-girls always said something along the lines of "I always wanted to," or "I always knew." So for the longest time, I was so confused because I wasn't sure if, maybe because my transsexual thoughts really didn't start until I was a teenager, or maybe because I actually was able to successfully ignore them for a period of several year
or maybe because I was still having doubts in the first place, that this meant I was somehow less of a transsexual than the ones who I always hear about actually going through with it.
I spent all night last night doing all the research on the topic that I could possibly cram into my confused little brain. The most amazing article that I found on the matter was the following one:
http://heartcorps.com/journeys/beginner ... o-tell.htm It was so reassuring to know that no, just because I hadn't done anything about it, that didn't invalidate my feelings, and no, just because I was successful at hiding it for many years, that does not mean anything either. Because there are actually quite a number of people like me who live relatively normal lives, and only later in life finally get the drive to follow their desires after a life long of questioning it. That was a big relief.
Later in the article, there was a series of questions. A checklist, if you will, of common thoughts and behaviors that transsexuals report having. And this absolutely opened my eyes, so I'm going to reprint them one by one here, and respond to them. I was shocked when I matched not just a couple of them, but ALL of them.
1. For kids with serious gender disorders, they usually feel that other kids of their sex think in ways they can't comprehend. This usually gets worse throughout the school years.
-Check. As a kid, I always had girls as best friends. And when I watched the video tape of my 9th birthday a while ago as research for my "Me and My Best Friend" story, I vividly recalled how little I understood a lot of the boys' behaviors, especially the more rowdy and aggressive boys like Seth from the story. And I never understood why other boys had such a severe aversion to girls. I didn't quite "get" the girly-girls either, but I really did "get" the more girl-next-door types, which was the realm where pretty much all of my best friends from childhood came from. And it did get worse and worse as the years went on, escalating to the point where I finally started feeling more like a girl than a boy in middle school, to downright bitter hatred of members of my own gender by high school.
2. Can you recall times in which (in retrospect) you naturally acted more like a member of the opposite sex when you were a child?
-Check. Especially verified after my recent conversation with Mom, where she told me that I was always more like a girl than a boy behaviorally. I did like boyish things (not counting uber-boyish things like war games and action shows,) but my actual behavior was unmistakably much more feminine... Mom's friend Karen, who had a boy the exact same age as me, was always surprised how much more well-behaved I was than her son. My problem was never mischief like the other boys, it was being bratty. Overall, I had closer friends, I engaged in quieter more intricate play rather than being wild and rambunctious, I never had that much boyish energy, and I was much more reserved and well-behaved than other boys. This question, admittedly, isn't quite as pronounced for me as the first one, but these things were definitely still there.
3. As a child, did you ever yearn for things appropriate to the opposite sex?
-A few times, although again this wasn't quite as severe as I would normally think would be associated with someone actually being "a girl trapped in a boy's body," which was what I assumed transsexualism had to be. In my case, the things that were "appropriate" for the opposite sex that I wasn't allowed to do were: the "ribbon dancer" toy. I loved that thing, and I was completely shocked when I found out that it was supposed to be a girls' toy. Also, gymnastics. Even as a little kid, I always was fascinated by women's gymnastics, and imagined myself doing what they did, while I thought that men's gymnastics just looked painful.
What really shocked me about this question, though, was the following quote which was in the description: "And while we're on the subject, ask yourself if you ever lost the urge to cross dress for perhaps years at a time. Most cross dressers never lose the urge. Many transsexuals do lose the urge if their lives are going well. Makes the role fit better, so the dysphoria diminishes." YES, YES, YES, that is EXACTLY what happened to me! When I started getting into religion, and
my life started going well, and so I actually was able to stop doing things like penis-taping and using female names on the internet. So I'm not crazy! Yay!
4. Looking back, have you been closer in your feelings toward your male or female relatives?
-As a kid, not really. Both Mom and Dad had their moments, but I really can't say that I was closer to either of them. I pretty much had no close relatives aside from them, though, so this question mentions "mother, aunts, and grandma," the later two of which I only saw once or twice a year. Plus I didn't have any brothers or sisters, so I'm not sure if my family situation is quite right for what this question's asking. In recent years, though, this is definitely true. I have become so close to my mom in recent years that it shocked me. We talk about EVERYTHING now, and when I'm talking to her the conversations just naturally flows and feels "right." While with my dad and my uncle, the most I ever get out of them is maybe like a 10-minute conversation with a lot of awkward silences because I just don't know what to talk to them about. I just don't feel close to them at all compared to Mom.
5. Have you had lifelong fantasies of becoming female?
(If so, you are either a cross-dresser, transgendered, or transsexual. All people occasionally fantasize about being the other sex. But for it to be a lifelong fantasy, especially to the exclusion of other sexual fantasies, well that pretty well speaks for itself, especially if the fantasies started before puberty. In such a case you are far more likely to be transgendered or transsexual than anything else.)
-Yes. My envy for the female gender started when I was 13, about a year before I really entered puberty full-on. And ever since then, it has indeed been a lifelong fantasy, even to the exclusion of actual normal sexual fantasies (to this day, I don't quite get what most men define as normal attraction... it's imagining that I AM that girl, and what she's feeling, rather than looking at her and imagining having sex with her as a guy, that gets me turned on.) And also no, this is not just something that I think about now and then, it's something that I have ALWAYS thought about, even during the period that I stopped actually allowing myself to indulge the fantasies by tucking and cross-dressing.
6. Do you have to be on guard all the time to prevent yourself from falling into feminine poses and movements?
(Crossdressers tend to naturally move, pose, and act masculinely. When dressed, they have to make an intentional effort to act in a feminine manner. Men who are transgendered tend to fall automatically into feminine poses and movements all of their lives, even back in school.)
-YES! This part of the question specifically mentioned constantly putting your hands on your hips, which is something that I do all the time, and many people have called me out on. I also was a big leg-crosser in 7th and 8th grade, which my peers in TBCC constantly bothered me about because "guys aren't supposed to do that." I've also definitely noticed that my walk is much more upright than most guys. I don't lumber around quite as much. And my hand gestures are much more introverted, demure, and limp-wristed rather than broad and powerful like most guys'.
Here is what was the biggest one of all for me:
7. Do you have any physical characteristics that are far too female to be normal?
a.) Smallish hands
-YES. I'm 6'2" tall, and a guy, but my hands are the same size as my girlfriend's, who is only 5'6". When I was working as a prep cook at TGI Friday's, I wore a freaking medium-sized glove. And again, I'm over 6' tall. Compared to anyone else my height and gender, my hands are absolutely TINY.
b.) Narrow delicate bones overall
-This one completely shocked me. I have assumed for my entire life that I was big-boned, mainly because of how stocky I look on my top half, but I had actually never looked into this before. So I decided to do an internet search to see how I could find out whether I was small-framed or big-framed. The answer, it turns out, is in the wrists and the elbows. And wouldn't you know it, after a lifetime of thinking that I was big-boned, it turns out that I'm not. My wrists were only 7" in circumference, while the average guy's my height is 7.45." And my elbow breadth was only 2.75 inches. Both of these numbers put me on the cusp between "small-framed" and "medium-framed." I was absolutely shocked. So it turns out, this really is true, after a lifetime of assuming that a gender transition would never work because I had always assumed that I had big bones, I really don't. All of my heft is muscle and fat. And that means that, with hormones and some SIGNIFICANT weight loss, I might actually have the potential to not just look passable, but actually have a rockin' bod! Seems impossible from my current vantage point, but... wow... it's possible!
c.) Wide pelvis compared to shoulders
-Check. My pelvis measured 18" from bone-to-bone, while my shoulder bones measured about 17". Not a huge difference, but it is indeed wider.
d.) Narrow shoulders compared to men
-Check. Average male shoulder width is about 50 cm, or 19.7". Mine measured just over 18", which is definitely small when you consider that I'm 4 inches taller than the average man.
e.) Ring finger and index finger same length (Men generally have a longer ring finger.)
-Check. And in fact, my index finger is actually about a millimeter longer. This one was really shocking when I researched it. I'd never heard of this before, but apparently it's been confirmed in peer-reviewed studies that this 2D:4D finger ratio correlates perfectly with testosterone levels and penis size.
f.) Elbows. If you let your arms hang down by your sides and face your palms forward, male physical arms will be almost straight line from shoulder to wrist. Female arms will be straight down to the elbow, but then the arms angle outward, away from the body at about a thirty degree angle.
-Wow... I could never have imagined this. But it turns out, my arms fit this absolutely perfectly. Not only did they angle out, but it was at almost exactly a 30-degree angle, and I couldn't make them go straight no matter how much I tried to. Apparently this arm configuration is what makes women "throw like girls," and take their t-shirts off in a different way than men, and able to hold babies against their breasts while still supporting the head. And apparently I've had this feminine arm configuration my entire life, and never even knew about it. It all makes sense now. No wonder I could never throw a baseball right.
g.)Crossing of legs. We can all cross our legs, but can you double-cross them? In other words, after you cross your legs, can you then tuck your ankle around again, under the ankle of the leg on the bottom?
-Yet again, check. I really can do this, despite having very large legs that you wouldn't think could contort like that. Good God, so that means I fit the description of EVERY SINGLE ONE of the body parts that are "too female to be normal." Freaking hell...
Also, thanks to this research binge, I learned the difference between transsexual and transgendered. (Transsexuals are those who feel like their body should be the one of the opposite sex, while transgendered individuals are the ones who feel like their mind is that of the opposite sex. I hadn't known before that you could be one but not the other.)
So with all of this in mind, I know who I am a lot better. And with every single account of transsexual people that I've been reading, where the trans-girls are talking about what their lives before transition were like, the more I realize "Oh my God, that's me!!!" And so I have reached an official determination. I now know for sure, I am indeed a transsexual. Because I have ALWAYS felt like my body should be a girl's, and felt like having a male body was wrong. This has been going on continuously, and has never stopped, and has never had any doubt whatsoever in my mind, as long as I have been conscious since the age of about 13. So now I know that for sure. What I still don't quite know, though, is whether I am also transgendered or not. Because that is what I am having doubts about, and although there are definitely a lot of elements of the female gender role that I know I would absolutely love better, I do still have a lot of masculine tendencies in my mind too, and there are some things that I might miss. So in regards to transsexualism, I am now 100% sure that I am indeed a transsexual. The sooner I can have feminine skin and curves and breasts and a vagina, the better, and I would have no regrets or doubts about it whatsoever. That matter is settled. I'm doing it. But I'm still only about 60% sure that I'm transgendered. Maybe the hormones will finally help me determine this, but for now I'm still having some reasonable doubts that are keeping me from fully embracing it.
Also... UPDATE!!! I officially just got my first shipment of pills, androcur and finasteride, in the mail today! And that means that the E patches will probably be arriving tomorrow. So guess what? It's time!!! As of tomorrow, my new life is officially going to begin! It's finally time!!!!!! I'm so excited!
(Side note: I felt MUCH, MUCH, MUCH, 100% better today. I was right back to feeling transcendentally happy, on cloud nine, my brain feeling happier and more alert and awake than it has ever been. I had such a sense of inner peace, and such a sense of self and knowing who I am, it just made this entire day an absolute delight. So whatever it was that was making me depressed and uncertain for the last 2 days, I'm over it now. I finally feel like I know who I am and exactly what I want. I am a transsexual, I want a female body, and whether that means officially changing genders or not in order to get it, I don't care anymore. It's worth whatever consequence if it means getting a body that I'd actually be comfortable with for the first time in my entire life.)
That's all for now, and this is officially the last significant post that I'll make in this thread. Tomorrow, I will be launching a brand new "Cheetaking243's Official Hormone Trial" thread, since it will no longer be "considering" taking a huge step, it will be about actually taking that huge step.
Thank you so much... SO SO much, to everyone who has been reading this thread, putting up with my constant over-indulgent bitching and violent mood swings on the matter, and gave me the advice that I needed to finally reach this conclusion, and know who I am, and know for sure that I am indeed a transsexual. I cannot express my gratitude fully enough!
-Much love, from Carrie/whatever.
