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stella40 -> RE: cross-dressing (7/14/2007 7:09:38 PM)
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ORIGINAL: DSwriter
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ORIGINAL: stella40
This isn't about wanting to change my sex...
This isn't a case of me going into a doctor's surgery one day and announcing "I want to be a woman."
My gender is female...
I am a 'primary' transsexual female and suffer from what is known as 'gender dysphoria' - 'primary' along with 'secondary' denotes the degree to which I am suffering from the gender dysphoria, i.e. it is acute...
I am female, but was born with enough physical male characteristics to qualify for me being sexed as a boy at birth...
So far it's taken me 9 years. I lived for 32 years predominantly as a male, but never feeling male, always with this inner conflict inside...
At the time I found out the truth that I was actually a transsexual I was a successful playwright and stage director in Polish theatre and married...
It took me another two years to come out, and I came out publicly, with the support and promises of friendship from people who knew me, and the majority of who turned away from me when I did actually come out, losing my career, work, job, home, reputation, friends, most of my family, to become homeless, destitute, living on the streets...
...will a vagina change that much in my life? Probably not...
Stella, not to cause you grief, but i find some of your statements contradictory. I am not picking on you, just trying to understand. I feel for your plight. You have not chosen an easy life.
I live in an alternative lifestyle town where there are several pre- and post-op transsexuals. I am always interested in the human condition and have spent a good deal of time talking to them about their situation. The common thread that links them together is that they KNEW they were a "woman trapped in a man's body" from the time there were young children. They spent their entire lives trying to reconcile their body with their spirit, and got SRS as soon as it was financially possible. Most get it in their 20s or early 30s so as to prevent the masculinizing effects of testosterone that you mentioned.
I have the same knowledge, I know who I am, I know I am female, and this to me is something which is beyond discussion. It is fact. I am a woman with male physical characteristics.
This gender issue came out when I was 13. My psychiatrist at the time said that I was a transvestite, not a transsexual. It was an erronous diagnosis which had a major impact on my life.
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On the net i've seen more and more transgendered people getting reassignment surgery in their 40s, 50s and 60s. Why spend so many years hiding? The post-ops that i know - everyone around them, friends and family, knew they were female. It's simply the way they behaved. They didn't get married. They didn't drag a wife through the entire ordeal. They didn't pretend to be something they were not.
I'm going to be 41 this next week, so I was aged 13 in 1979, almost 30 years ago, before the time when there was the Internet and so much information. I was wrongly diagnosed.. I and my parents were told at the time that I could be cured and become a 'normal male'. It was suggested that I masturbate to soft porn magazines, later I went for counselling and ECT - electroconvulsive therapy, which only made my condition worse.
You have also got to consider the reaction of my parents and the way I was brought up... I was a freak, a 'problem child', a misfit, and this confirmed my parents' assumptions that I would grow up to be a deviant, a loser, a misfit and a pervert. I was emotionally abused and beaten as a child, I didn't have much self-confidence, in fact I didn't have any self-confidence, and the best thing I ever did was to leave my family home at the age of 16.
This took me years to overcome, I had to try and develop some sort of self-confidence, for years I believed that i was a loser, a misfit, a deviant, a pervert, and this was eventually only overcome when I began working in theatre and gained public recognition for my plays and my work in theatre.
Speaking from my own personal experiences and knowing those of other transsexuals I know there is a vast difference between knowing that you are a woman trapped in a man's body and knowing what to do and actually doing something about it.
The differences between a transvestite and a pre-op transsexual or a transsexual contemplating gender reassignment can be very slight, and it all rests on the motivation as to why one wants to wear clothing of the opposite sex. From a doctor's point of view it can be very hard to differentiate between a TV and a TS, and it has only been since the late 1980's or 1990's that a set of criteria was worked out to diagnose a transsexual as someone with 'long term difficulties of living in one's own birth-assigned gender'. I can refer you to a report from the Royal College of Psychiatrists which is dated in 1998:
http://www.symposion.com/ijt/ijtc0402.htm#Guidance%20for%20the%20management
To be able to successfully embark on a transition and go through gender reassignment therapy you need three things (1) a supply of reliable information backed up by supportive medical opinion, (2) a well-established support network of friends, family and others who you can turn to for support and (3) a secure and stable living environment and an understanding employer or a reliable means to be able to live whilst transitioning.
Not every transsexual has access to all of these three things, which is why you find some transsexuals living lonely lives, some turn to prostitution, and so on. Social attitudes towards transsexuals have changed in the last 20 years to become more accomodating and more accepting, but this doesn't mean things have become that much easier.
You ask the question why hide and why pretend to be someone you're not. Well in an ideal world where everyone is accepting and understanding and supportive of transsexuals I agree there would be no need to hide or pretend. But I live in the real world and although social attitudes have changed and it's become much easier to be a transsexual, this doesn't mean that ignorance and prejudice against transsexuals doesn't exist - it does, and it exists on many different levels.
It's much easier to transition and go through the whole gender reassignment process when you have a supportive network of family and friends. I didn't. Much of my transition has been done without much of a support network, my transition isn't typical and I wouldn't advise anyone to go about gender reassignment in the way I have done.
I have made a lot of mistakes, and I will always hold my hand up and admit to making these mistakes. But you know, I made these mistakes out of ignorance and stupidity, not out of a conscious and premeditated attempt to deceive anyone or pretend to be who I wasn't. Everyone who I've ever been in a relationship with knew right at the start of my gender issues, it was unfortunate that I chose to get married but it wasn't a conscious need to 'drag' someone through all of this to pretend to be the honest, 'normal' upstanding male, but through my own ignorance. I am far from perfect as a person, and just as far from perfection as a transsexual. And by comparing my transition with more successful transitions of other transsexuals I'm sure you're going to find many imperfections.
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Why go on hormones, but be unsure about actually having the surgery? If you truly are female, i would think it would be an extremely powerful motivating force. At least it was with the post-op transsexuals that i know and who now live as women.
I am not unsure about having surgery, I plan to have surgery, I am truly female and I am motivated towards completing my transition just like anyone else. But you know, in my situation you have to strike a balance between going through your transition and actually living as you are at this moment in time. Sure, I could go private, I could order hormones off the Internet and go off to Bangkok and go for surgery and go through the entire transition within six months. But I'm not fixated on my operation, I don't need to have a vagina to validate myself as a female, having the operation isn't going to make me any more female than I am now, it's just going to give me my correct genitalia.
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I ask these things, because as you pointed out in an earlier post, a lot of people go down the gender path, when very few are actual 'classic' transsexuals. The true transsexual is like a white tiger. Extremely rare. Most seem to need a good counsellor, but from what i understand a lot of the transgendered counsellors out there are merely staging points for the gender reassignment doctors. Like a lot of things, it's a racket. They tell you want you want to hear, rather than truly trying to help you find the right path. In our community i know of one transsexual that went through the surgery and committed suicide afterwards. It's not uncommon.
Here I agree and disagree. I'm writing here as a 'white tiger', a genuine transsexual who has the most important stages of my transition behind me - the coming out, the living, the self-awareness and the diagnosis. There are fewer 'primary' transsexuals than 'secondary' transsexuals, and not all go through the whole gender reassignment process. It's easier to go private, because there's a lot of money to be made from transsexuals, not just through surgery and hormones, but also removal of facial hair, laser treatment, beauty treatments, and so on. But there is a marked difference between the way transsexuals are treated in private healthcare to the way they are treated in public healthcare.
I am transitioning in public healthcare, where gender reassignment is a low priority and where they certainly don't tell you what you want to hear and they make sure that there are clear grounds and reasons established for supporting gender reassignment treatment before going ahead with it. I am strongly supported by my GP or family doctor and also by my specialist. I can refer you to a paper published in 2006 which accurately describes how transsexuals are treated under the NHS in the UK:
http://www.pfc.org.uk/files/steeple.pdf
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Another post-op transsexual i know and have spoken with, who is married, went through the change, then after living as a woman for 2 years decided it was a mistake. "She" now is taking testosterone, has a beard, and lives like a man - but has an artificially created vagina. The one i really feel for is his/her wife. The poor woman looks shell-shocked, but i give her credit for standing by her husband through everything.
This supports my argument that a transition or going through the whole gender reassignment process shouldn't be rushed and should always be done under expert medical supervision. You can find other such similar stories, and many of them, you will find, will have 'gone private' and gone through the whole treatment process without actually living as a woman or socializing themselves as a woman. I've been living in my true gender now for over 3 years and couldn't be happier.
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I sometimes wonder if people who take hormones or think they are female are just trying to be something they are not. Perhaps they are not women, so much as a failed man. Of course, yes, there are some who go through all the changes, and live happily ever after. I can think of three that i have met that are that way - but they are the rarity rather than the rule.
I guess you could wonder that, because I reckon it must seem that way sometimes to someone who isn't transgendered when they see what appears to them a man who is seeking gender reassignment therapy and living as a woman. How do you differentiate the transvestite from the pre-op transsexual at the start of their transition? Appearances can be deceptive after all.
And you know I've always wondered why some people point out to me the amount of post-op transsexuals who have committed suicide, but nobody ever speculates on just how many pre-op transsexuals commit suicide. I guess it's because it's easier to find and collect data from post-op transsexual suicides where it can be assumed that the reason they committed suicide is because they regretted going through gender reassignment and much harder to deduce from someone who is physically male or partially so as to why they committed suicide.
In my opinion the truth comes out during the transition and going through all the stages of gender reassignment, which is why I fully support the views of medical professionals to place the burden of proof on the transsexual themselves. For those who think they are female the transition gets harder the further it goes, often to the point where it all falls apart and goes pear-shaped. However for others, myself included, the further you get through the transition the easier it gets and despite all the difficulties and challenges I face I'm happy with the way I am living and with who I am. I am not a failed man, I was never male, I was a female who failed at living in the male gender role.
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To me, it is a fascinating subject. Hormones are powerful, and not to be taken lightly. Not when you are making such permanent changes to your body. If you're on hormones and not going through gender reassignment, you end up half male/half female. Sort of like a centuar, half man, half horse. How many women do you know that are looking for a centuar? It could become a very lonely life.
Okay DSwriter, now this is where I am feeling a little bit lost, being honest. You've picked up on what I've posted in this thread, and you've asked me some very personal questions, which I have answered, and in doing so have laid bare quite a lot of personal information about who I am and my life here on this thread.
And yes, you've asked some critical questions and made some critical references, which I don't mind, in fact I'm quite used to having to reveal very private information about myself and my life to others just so as they are able to gain an understanding as to who I am and what I'm all about. I'm being open, honest and I'm writing it as it really is, but also as it is from my own perspective. I'm also admitting to various mistakes I've made in my life.
But here I come across the contradiction in what you have posted. You have written presenting yourself as someone with intimate knowledge of transsexuals, that you live in an 'alternative lifestyle town' and have spent a 'good deal' of time talking with them about their condition, and then you make reference to another married transsexual you know for whom it hasn't worked out.
But then we come to this last paragraph of your posting, and your perception of someone who is on hormone therapy and is 'half male half female' and 'sort of like a centaur'. And this makes me wonder exactly as to how much you know about the actual issues concerning transsexuals and gender reassignment and how much you understand from this. Is your concern and sympathy for my plight real or are you trying to cross-examine me and make a surreptitious challenge to my gender and who I really am?
This doesn't really bother me, it isn't the first time I've been challenged as to who I am and my actual gender and it certainly won't be the last. I've decided to answer the questions you raised honestly and have posted so much about my life here as a way of helping people reading this thread gain some sort of understanding, whether they be transsexuals, transgendered or non-transgendered. Read from it whatever you like, I'm not here to prove anything to anyone but to write what I think and feel from my own perspective and experience and from what I know from my contact with other transgendered individuals.
I am who I am, and I am who I am openly and honestly, I am female - irrespective of where I am in the process of gender reassignment - I am living and working as a female 24/7, I have friends and have developed a support network, I am also in a relationship with a Domme, albeit currently a LDR but it's a very strong, successful relationship and I have doctors who strongly support my gender reassignment. My relocation to be with my Domme is complicated because of my gender reassignment process, the establishment of a support network, employment (yes, I already have a job to go to in the States), the completion of work which I am doing here in London, and ensuring a continuation of the process and a transition between two very different healthcare systems but be sure everything is as it should be and I'm happy and this should be beyond discussion in this thread, which if I'm not mistaken is actually about 'crossdressing'.
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