I will continue to post to my thread discussing my transition from male to female. Lately, though, I feel like I have less to write about there. The excitement of the first few weeks of transitioning is over. I remain very happy and calm. I remain surprised that I have arrived at this wonderful place in my life. Even now, about six weeks after my transition at work, I get occasional comments about how happy I am compared to the way I used to be as that other, male person I was.

Jesus made the suggestion that I start a new thread describing my childhood identity development as 'not male'. Back when I was a kid, I thought of it more as 'I am not a boy'. Jesus pointed out, and he is absolutely correct on this, that I have never stated that as I child I felt that I was really a girl. I have written about some of my childhood feelings and experiences in blog postings and elsewhere.

What was going on in my life as a child that might indicate that I was a developing transsexual, which is different from 'not male'? Male to female transsexuals are 'not male but female'. From extensive research and reading, I can look back at my childhood and identify patterns of behavior that easily fit the MtF identity. There are many transsexuals who never clearly understand their gender identity as children.

It won't be possible for me to limit my writing to my childhood if my goal is to trace my development to where I am today. I did not identify, consciously, as female even at the end of childhood. My understanding of who I am, my 'true self', has evolved over many years. Part of the process has been letting go of a constructed identity I used to make it through life as a male when I knew with certainty that identity did not fit.

I hope, then, this thread will be a place for me to discuss my life as it relates to the development and understanding of my gender identity. Along the way, I may wander from that path and even get lost now and then!

Ideally, I want to cite references in my posts that are pertinent to transsexual development. I may not have the time to do that consistently.

With a scientific education and research experience, this kind of writing appeals to me and I really enjoy it. My science background explains the thread title. That background is in what some would refer to as 'hard science', not meaning difficult but perhaps describing areas more amenable to controlled experimentation. My studies and work experience were in evolutionary biology and chemistry. This is my first attempt at a social science type of analysis. The more I read about sociology, psychology and anthropology the more fascinated I become.

At its best, this thread has the potential of being a case study of transsexual development in one individual - me! How well I succeed at this remains to be seen and is in part dependent on time limitations. Anyway, the truth is I miss writing research papers.

Of course, it is not possible for me to write a completely non-biased study about myself. We'll see how it goes and perhaps some of those here that know me will help keep me honest.

I wanted to change the title of this thread because it promises more than I find I can deliver. I can edit the title that is shown in the first thread post. Turns out, though, that the original title is retained in the thread listings which indicates there is a titles pointer in the Archive database that I do not have access to. That is alright, I will leave the original post title (editable by me) so as not to confuse members.

This morning, I wrote this post to explain my reasoning for wanting to change the title. I am leaving it as an FYI explaining my need to change the type of thread this will be. That is, I will not quote and cite many references. Here is the original post:

>>>>I have changed the title of this thread because I realize there is no way to find the time and money to develop it the way I had hoped. Right now, I do not have the time and money to find enough relevant references for what I write. I cannot spend much to purchase online research articles, I do not have the time to go to libraries to either find journal papers or order copies of those and I do not have the time to read all that information. Doing research is enjoyable but I have to be realistic.

I have used both Google and Google Scholar to search for online articles on transgender and transsexuality papers. Last night, I tried Google first. With my initial search phrase, I found that this thread, with the original title, was in position six on the first of many pages of results. That bothered me because the title is misleading if I will not be able to deliver on what it states. Its position in the list very likely indicates a relative lack of web resources on this topic.

I know this thread will continue to show up someplace on Google. For all I know, the original title will remain in search results but that is beyond my control. This is the most I can do.

As it is, if someone does a 'quick reply' or uses the 'Post Reply' button , the original title is carried forward. If you use the 'Quote' button, that is not the case.<<<<

I was in the middle of cleaning the kitchen as I thought of things to write here. The need to write them down gave me a good excuse to take a work break.

I have mentioned before that my life is much more full and rich now that I have not only accepted but embraced my true gender identity as a female. As a complete person I am more open to new possibilities in life. Pretending to be someone you are not, regardless of whether this is a conscious decision, takes a lot of effort and leads to unhappiness.

These are merely a few memories to get my thought process going for this thread. I realize now that I have persistently, from a very young age, had doubts about my gender identity. As a child, and unlike some other trans kids, I never announced to anyone 'I am a girl'. There were signs along the way, though, that this was the case even if I was not fully aware of them.

Some of my memories and life experiences could apply to young boys who grow up with a same sex erotic attraction but do not identify as transgender. This outcome is described in books and literature on transgender identities.

Other memories I describe may have no clear tie-in to gender and sexuality. They help complete the picture of who I am, though, and that is important to me.

I will undoubtedly repeat some things I have posted on other threads and in my blog. What I am doing here is starting over from my earliest memories and moving forward. It is the nature of memory to be haphazard so I will not always remember things in chronological order. At times I may not know the correct order.

It is not my intention to get into debates about alternative viewpoints on what my individual experiences could mean. I welcome comments, as always. My ultimate goal is to present a fairly thorough description of how I arrived at where I am today. That is, a very happy transsexual woman.

I have few memories of my life until a month or so before I turned nine years old. That is when we moved from our home in a very large eastern city to the suburbs. What I do remember from that earlier period seems likely to be very significant in understanding who I am.

Some memories:

- My earliest memory may be from a spring season when I was perhaps 3 or 4. Our small row house lawn had purple and white crocuses blooming and I remember sticking my face in them to get a better look! I have always traced my interest in macro photos of flowers to that time. This also seems to be the start of my lifelong interest in gardening.

Over the years I never gave up the habit of doing whatever it took to get my nose and eyes close to blossoms. Neighbor children would often find it strange when, even in high school, I could be seen at our suburban home sticking my nose in the flowers. I was never embarrassed to be seen on the ground getting a clear look at low-growing plants and flowers.

When we lived in the suburbs and spring arrived, I would check on the growth of budding trees, shrubs and other plants every day after school in decent weather. This was not a quick look around, either. I methodically went from tree, bush and so on until I had looked at every one.

- I know I was 5 years old when I had my first small garden planted with easy to grow zinnias and gourds. This is a very vivid memory and I view it as an important event in my young life. Years later my parents confirmed my age when this happened.

My little garden did very well. My father had prepared the soil on the tiny plot of land on the side of our row house, which was on the end of the block. I planted the seeds and nurtured them. My plants did very well without any adult oversight, to my parents surprise.

Then there was the morning I woke up and went out to see if my plants needed watering. I found all the blossoms had been torn off the zinnia plants and tossed in the street. I was devastated and I am crying as I write about it now. This surprises me a bit since this was so very long ago. There was no way I could understand why anyone would do such a thing. I assumed neighbor boys were responsible. This was undoubtedly a relatively early, although not the first, signal to me that I was not like other boys.

By the time we moved to the suburbs just as I was about to turn 9, my father was telling neighbors and friends that I was his gardener. This is a good memory of my father that is important to me.

I had large vegetable gardens and many large flower beds that did well. More than once, cantaloupes were stolen by neighbor kids. This made me sad and, just as when I was 5, I had no understanding of why boys would do this kind of thing.

- Another early memory was playing house and with paper dolls with a neighbor girl who lived at the opposite end of our city street. I look at this as one of the happiest times of my entire childhood. I think I was about 4 at the time. More on this another time.

- My middle brother's need to compete with me became intense after we moved to the suburbs. He is not quite two years younger than me and I am the oldest of three brothers. I have no sisters.

I am going into this now not because I have unresolved issues with him. I would not be surprised or disappointed if I never hear from him again. Our interactions over the years do shed light on who I am and so I will include these.

If my brother saw me doing well at something, he wanted to do the same thing. I am sure this is natural sibling rivalry.

So he decided he wanted a garden of his own. He seemed content to have a small area to work in compared to the large areas I was cultivating. His garden did not thrive and was soon overtaken with weeds.

Around this same period, I became very interested in astronomy and got a refractor telescope of several inches diameter. I would spend hours looking at the planets and moon. Brother then decided he had to have a telescope of his own. My parents got him a smaller one and he seemed happy. Soon he gave up, though, and never developed a real interest.

It was probably in senior high school that I took the National Educational Development Test (NEDT). For all I know this is no longer administered. At any rate, my score was 98th percentile. My brother took the test two years later and got 99th percentile.

I had completed high school, and I may have finished a year of college, when my favorite high school English teacher visited to look at my gardens. My brother walked up to her and asked if I had told her he had scored better than me on the NEDT. I was totally baffled by his behavior and basically thought he was a jerk, although I did not say anything then or later.

What I now think was part of the relationship dynamic with my brother is his conviction that I was not providing everything he wanted from an older brother. I certainly was not a role model of manly behavior and he has recently stated how embarrassed he was to have me as an older brother. He soon amended that statement to say he was not merely embarrassed. He thought my behavior through my teens was strangely odd and feminine. I agree my behavior was odd relative to the culturally expected standards for teen males. This is another indication of how different I was from any boy or young man I had ever met.

I remember more than once sitting in the high school library with my brother in the room. He and his friends would sit at another table and point at me and make deriding comments. I sat there silently and pretended not to hear. His behavior hurt me because I had no understanding of why anyone, let alone my own brother, would want to treat me this way.

He would make the same types of comments to others our age in different settings, too. This never made sense to me as a child. I have no recollection about treating him badly, with the exception of not sharing my toys when I was maybe 6!

Years later, at my youngest brother's wedding, a relative of my sister-in-law asked me what was wrong with my middle brother. He seemed to have an attitude problem and was not coming across as very friendly. I refused to say anything bad about him, simply stating I did not know what was going on. At other points in our younger years, I would even defend some of his behavior even if only half-heartedly.

ASIDE: This is getting way too long for one post so I am going to briefly mention a few other memories than take this up another time.

- I am not sure of my exact age, but I was probably around 6 when my parents drove my brothers and me several hundred miles to my grandparents' house. We had no relatives within a short driving distance. They were to look after us for a few weeks while my mother was in the hospital.

My mother told my grandmother that we boys could run around without shirts to cut down on laundry. I stated out loud to my parents, and in front of my brothers and grandparents, that I should not be expected to do that because girls do not do that. I have described this elsewhere.

I did not go without a shirt the entire time we were with my grandparents. I only rarely went without a shirt as a child, no matter what the temperature was. The only exception was when we went swimming. Even then I was not happy about going around without a shirt and would often wear a white undershirt into the water.

More than enough said for now.

Thread title has been amended

Is gender identity a social construct? I would have to say that the expression of gender identity is, in part at least, a social construct. Gender expression for men and woman varies among cultures and at different times. Men and women are typically expected to dress in different ways, they sport different types of hair styles and so on. Cultural expectations clearly play a role in how men and women present themselves.

The role of culture and social influences on the development of Gender Identity, though, presents a less clear picture at least initially. One can say very young male and female children are treated very differently by their parents. That has a powerful influence on the developing child's perception of what it means to be male or female, boy or girl, man or woman.

The question is, do environmental factors such as differences in parenting styles for male and female children play an absolute role in settling the child in a comfortable gender identity? From my own experience, I would say no. I can feel reasonably confident that it was not my parents' intention to raise a male sex child who would later decide he was not a 'he' at all. To the best of their abilities, they would have followed the 'normal' script for the proper raising of a male child.

It is my belief that my own 'brain gender' was an inherent part of who I am from before birth. I base this conclusion on extensive reading of the latest thinking on gender identity development.

I have no way of proving my conclusion and in the end it really makes no difference to who I am today. Even if I were somehow to be shown irrefutable evidence that my gender identity is based entirely on environmental factors affecting me when I was a child, it would make no difference to who I am today. Nonetheless, I firmly believe knowledge is power and I want to be in a position where I can speak with some authority. There are many people who seek to discredit trans people in any way they can. It is important to me to be able to refute their claims firmly with a clear understanding of the issues.

This is from the superb Lynn Conway web site on transgender and transsexual people. Lynn transitioned (MtF) in the late 60s and was then fired from IBM despite having made quite a name for herself there as a computer scientist and engineer. The link for this information is The Theory that Gender Identity is Socially Constructed is Finally Shattered. (http://ai.eecs.umich.edu/people/conway/TS/TS.html)

I am including this to serve as a reference for future discussion of my own gender identity development. I suspect many of you are already aware of what Lynn reports here.

The theory that gender identity is socially constructed is finally shattered:

The breakaway from John Money's paradigm escalated rapidly after the scientific community learned that Money had suppressed for many years clear evidence that his theories were wrong. The final straw was the highly publicized case of "John/Joan", presented in the book As Nature Made Him: The Boy Who Was Raised as a Girl, by John Colapinto.

Decades ago, John Money had advised the parents of an infant boy who had lost most of his penis in a medical accident to have the boy surgically changed into a girl - under the theory that "she" would then grow up to be a normal girl instead of an "abnormal boy". This was a very noteworthy case for scientific researchers because the child was born with an identical twin who could serve as a basis of comparison in the study of gender development. As a first step, the child was castrated and the rest of his penis removed. He was then raised as a girl. However, clearly exhibiting an innate gender identity as a little boy, "she" began to declare that "she" was "really a boy" and rebelled against efforts to make "her" behave like a girl. At puberty, still unaware of "her" childhood surgery, she resisted her parent's and physician's efforts to feminize her with estrogen and further surgeries. Eventually, she underwent gender transition to become male, much as would an FtM transsexual. In this case, raising a boy-child with apparently female genitals as a girl clearly did NOT alter the child's inborn sense of his own true gender.

Over many decades, John Money continually referred to the John/Joan case as a victory, fabricating facts to indicate that this case had been a "complete success". Money never "allowed" anyone to get close to "Joan" to learn more details about her life, begging off any contact in the name of "privacy". The case gradually became so legendary that it became the cornerstone of support for Money's entire theory of gender.

And then the shattering news came down, in the revelations that John Money knew full well that the infant's reassignment had not worked at all. And worse yet, he had deliberately concealed this counter-evidence to his theories for decades - decades during which thousands more infants had been subjected to infant intersex surgical maimings. Fittingly, it was Professor Milton Diamond, the scientist who'd bravely challenged Money as a young graduate students decades earlier, who uncovered the deception.

Professor Diamond had always been suspicious of Money's results. Over the years he had tried in numerous research studies and papers to persuade others to at least consider the possibility that gender identity was inborn. However, his efforts were to no avail, given Money's intellectual dominance of the field.

Finally, in the early 1990's, Diamond managed to track down the child "Joan", now presumably a grown woman, whose case had been the foundation of Money's entire viewpoint. Wanting to simply confirm what had or had not happened to her, Diamond had stumbled into the incredible fact that "she" had never felt like a girl at all, and was now a married man!*

[*The story later came to a very tragic end. Although "John" had been able to socially and surgically reverse his childhood reassignment and become a male, "he acknowledged a deep well of wrenching anger that would never go away. "You can never escape the past," he told the Seattle Post-Intelligencer in 2000. "I had parts of my body cut away and thrown in a wastepaper basket. I've had my mind ripped away."" "John" committed suicide on May 4 2004.]

Diamond and a colleague, Sigmundson, then worked tirelessly to document what had happened in this case, and they wrote a journal paper to reveal the results. The paper was so controversial that many research journals simply turned it down! So great was the influence of Money and the knee-jerk buy-in into his now established paradigm of thought about gender identity. The various journals simply could not believe the evidence that was staring them in the face!

The paper, "Sex Reassignment at Birth: Long Term Review and Clinical Implications" by Milton Diamond & H. Keith Sigmundson, was finally published in 1997 in the Archives of Pediatric and Adolescent Medicine. There was a firestorm of reaction in the media and the research community to its astonishing news. John Money was publicly revealed to have falsified evidence and suppressed counter-evidence in the case that was the cornerstone of his entire theory of gender identity. Within two years the writer John Calapinto published a detailed account of the overall story, bringing it to the public at large.

After reading about some of your childhood, I have realized that it is quite similar to mine in many respects. The playing with girls, the relationship with my brother, and yes, even the love of gardening

Like you, I think the reason my relationship with my brother has become sour is I cannot be the masculine older brother he is looking for. We never have gotten along very well, and this is probably because even as children are interests were remarkably different. I do feel sorry for him at times and also upset with myself because I cannot be the older brother he is looking for. I do think he deserves that sort of older brother, and I wish I could give it to him, but I know that I can't.

As for gender identity being a social construct, I cannot say I believe that is true, but then again, I really don't know. I mean, why is it that so many gay men and transgender women had distorted relationships with their fathers? That is something that turns up repeatedly, though some have proposed the cause/effect is the reverse, that the inherent gayness or femaleness causes the father to treat the child in a less than ideal manner.

In my case I know that I am male, but I also know that I will never relate to other males the way most do, and that I will always relate to females the way most can't. I am not necessarily happy with the circumstances, but what can I do, given that I am undoubtedly male?

This is an excellent thread. Thank you.

plix (imported) wrote: Mon Jul 14, 2008 11:38 am After reading about some of your childhood, I have realized that it is quite similar to mine in many respects. The playing with girls, the relationship with my brother, and yes, even the love of gardening

Hi plix,

Yes, we have posted elsewhere about some of our similarities. I found that kind of neat!

plix (imported) wrote: Mon Jul 14, 2008 11:38 am

Like you, I think the reason my relationship with my brother has become sour is I cannot be the masculine older brother he is looking for. We never have gotten along very well, and this is probably because even as children are interests were remarkably different. I do feel sorry for him at times and also upset with myself because I cannot be the older brother he is looking for. I do think he deserves that sort of older brother, and I wish I could give it to him, but I know that I can't.

As f

ar as my middle brother goes, the fact that I was never the older masculine-type brother he would have wanted is simply a fact of life. I fully understand how my clear femininity was an embarrassment to him when we were teens, still children. It is now roughly 40 years later and well past time he got beyond that. I do feel sorry for him but only because he is stuck in the past. He needs help in moving on and dealing with the current reality so he can live a fuller life. There is nothing I can do to help him there.

I in no way blame myself for his feelings when we were teens. I was simply being myself in that I never fit into the masculine role. This was not something I was deliberately doing and it while it made life more difficult for my brother, it made it hell for me.

Some in a similar situation try to be one of the guys despite the self-knowledge that they are not. That can be a viable option in order to survive growing up. There was no time when I tried this, though. It would have been an act that I was incapable of pulling off. I had no desire to be a guy and the thought of fitting in with them was not pleasant at all. I was horrified when I looked at what was happening to the bodies of older boys going through puberty and realized I would become one of 'them' when I grew older. That was a living nightmare.

If my brother does not get help with his issues, I will protect myself from him by staying out of touch. He was an abused child and, while I absolutely know he does not intend this, he is continuing a pattern of verbal and emotional abuse of family members. I have seen this dynamic at work in his interactions with my other brother and his wife, too. At this point in my life, he is an emotional danger for me. I have been the only one in the family to call him up short and let him know his behavior is not acceptable. The rest of the family wants to pretend that we all get along fabulously and everything is just fine. They will put up with any behavior to avoid destroying the illusion. Things are not fine at all. This does not mean that love is not there.

plix (imported) wrote: Mon Jul 14, 2008 11:38 am As for gender identity being a social construct, I cannot say I believe that is true, but then again, I really don't know. I mean, why is it that so many gay men and transgender women had distorted relationships with their fathers? That is something that turns up repeatedly, though some have proposed the cause/effect is the reverse, that the inherent gayness or femaleness causes the father to treat the child in a less than ideal manner.

I believe gender identity is not a social construct. Whether it is entirely inborn or not, for all individuals, may be open to question. There is certainly evidence, as in the quoted material from Lynn Conway, that even extraordinary efforts to alter an individual's true gender identity can meet with complete failure.

plix (imported) wrote: Mon Jul 14, 2008 11:38 am In my case I know that I am male, but I also know that I will never relate to other males the way most do, and that I will always relate to females the way most can't. I am not necessarily happy with the circumstances, but what can I do, given that I am undoubtedly male?

We all must find our own paths and you have been traveling down yours for a time now. On your journey, you have learned some very important things about who you are. That is terrific. You are young and still have years to discover more about yourself.

Hugs,

Danya

Blaise (imported) wrote: Mon Jul 14, 2008 4:25 pm This is an excellent thread. Thank you.

Hi Ted,

I appreciate the feedback very much. It is at times emotionally draining for me to write about my past. I have dealt with it about as well as anyone can, I suspect. I very much live in the present. Nonetheless, describing my childhood memories tends to bring up the feelings that went along with them many years ago. That is the hard part. The reason I am writing this thread is to more fully understand who I am and how I came to be where I am today. There is also the thought that I may in a small way help others.

Hugs,

Danya

My gender identity is still coalescing as I travel on this transition adventure. At times I feel as though everything is clear to me: I have arrived, I am living my life as a woman and that is wonderful. There are other times when my existence as this woman seems not completely satisfying. This periodic unease has not interfered, so far, with my general happiness. What it comes down to is, how far must I go to feel truly fulfilled in life as a woman?

I never imagined that I could have a life this full. For the first time, I feel genuinely connected to people. I am now one of the group. As a male and through decades of depression and overall unhappiness, I always was more of an observer of other people. I did not relate so easily to them as fellow humans. I could be very sympathetic and compassionate, but I still felt apart, alone and different.

What I want now is even more connectedness with others. How do I get that? Do I have have to be 'more' of a woman, physically, for that to occur? I know the answer is 'probably not'. Jesus (not That Jesus, btw) responded to my comment "who I feel I am is the critical part" with "it is the only part" that matters. Intellectually, I cannot deny he is correct. Doubts still creep in because I exist in a physical body. That body is a reminder of a disconnect between my feelings and my physical reality.

The problem can come in several ways. When I look in the mirror before applying makeup in the morning. I see some beard growth and, although I can apply makeup well and people will not notice this through an entire day, I know this sign of masculinity is there. I love the way I look with no visible beard and I long to have a man caress my body and face. How does my remaining beard work into that? With the right man, if there is one, it won't matter.

Every day I see wrinkles on my face. When looking in my magnifying mirror as I apply lipstick, I notice wrinkles on my neck. I do not like this! Can I be truly beautiful with this 56 year old body? Why should I care at my age? The reason I care is because this is my first chance to experience life as a woman and I fear as I age further people will see me as less of a woman rather than a developing one.

For some reason I don't quite understand, I usually feel I am indeed beautiful. In fact, I sometimes feel I am more beautiful than many natal women around me. I cannot begin to explain this to myself, let alone anyone else. It doesn't even matter to me if others view me this way. So perhaps this is very dependent on the fact that I do feel very feminine and I accept that I am in my thoughts, besides.

I feel totally at ease in my body but, strangely to me, that is based in large part on what is going on in my head. It is something people notice, though. Monday after work, I went to a bar with a young gay friend and a straight woman from the office. This other woman and I have never had a chance to talk much, although I have known her several years. I have always said 'hi' to her as we passed. Monday evening, we spoke at length for the first time.

She started out with what others have commented on. That is, how happy I am and how obvious that is. She went on, though, to describe how naturally I move as a woman. The way I carry myself is also very feminine, she said, along with some similar comments. She was clearly very happy for me as she spoke.

For the first time, I have had some real regrets that I did not transition earlier in life. I suspect I would have taken different paths in my career(s) and been much more successful there (however I would want to define success) and in life generally. So I mourn a little for years spent acting out the role of a male while not fully participating in life.

Despite this, I know I might never have reached the wonderful place I inhabit today if it had not been for exactly the life I have already experienced. All in all, things have worked out remarkably well for me. I just don't have all the answers.