I’ve been questioning and curious, and I wanted to talk to some people about my experience, who know more about being trans than I do.
I am almost 30, I’m bisexual, and I was assigned male at birth. I was raised in a very Catholic household (and went to Catholic school from elementary through high school), so it wasn’t exactly an environment that was going to give me the language to understand who I was, or encouraged to explore my sexuality and gender identity.
I was always more emotional than my peers - my parents put me in wrestling and karate during elementary and middle school to “toughen me up”. Although that may have had to do with my RSD (rejection sensitive dysphoria) from my ADHD.
I never really enjoyed sports like wrestling or football - I ended up liking volleyball and distance running. I preferred hobbies that are more traditionally feminine, like baking and sewing. Don’t get me wrong, I also liked camping and stuff with Boy Scouts (not that camping and hiking are inherently masculine) but I definitely never felt like a super masculine as a kid.
I would get in trouble for growing my hair out as long as I was allowed to, and then some, and I got in trouble for wearing more jewelry than a Catholic school was appropriate for boys too (too many rings and necklaces). I was made fun of in middle and high school for wearing pink, or liking things that were too girly.
About 5 years ago, I started to identify as nonbinary, as I learned more about queerness and started to find the language to describe what I was feeling. When my wife came out to me as bi, I finally felt comfortable coming out as nonbinary to her. And since then, I’ve started to feel more confident expressing my gender differently, mostly in small ways, like growing my hair longer and painting my nails. I’ve still only come out as NB to a small handful of people, and day-to-day I probably present more as “eccentric guy” than anything else.
The thing that I’ve noticed, though, is that the less masculine I look, act, and present, the more I feel like myself. I feel like men’s clothing is so limiting, and I always feel out of place when I’m in a group of otherwise all guys.
I feel like If I had been born as a woman, I would prefer that to having been born male. And if I could flip a switch and instantly be a woman, I would. But I don’t experience the sort of revulsion at my genitals that I hear some trans people describe (although I do hate being so hairy).
All of that said, I don’t know what exactly it feels like to be trans, or be a woman, so I don’t know how to compare my experience to how I “should” or “shouldn’t” feel.
And obviously right now is a scary time in the US to be queer of any kind, so there’s a part of me that’s very scared about what if I am trans - what that would entail in terms of how people/my friends and family would react and treat me.
Anyway, I’m not trying to presume anything about the trans experience, and I apologize if anything I said seemed ignorant. I guess I’m just confused and looking for some insight and support, since there aren’t many people in real life that I can talk to about these things (wife and therapist aside).
Haha, yes. Listening to my colleagues talking about Cialis and thinking "why on earth would you want more erections?" was possibly a sign.
haha, same; I will say also that the testes and scrotum created so much more dysphoria than the penis, and the penis causes the most dysphoria when erect (but when it's small and cute it's not a problem). In fact when I realized I was trans, I felt a huge kind of relief about my genitals, it's hard to describe but it felt a bit like I no longer had to feel insecure about my genitals as being male, the standards changed in a way that made me feel really happy, even though they are clearly so far from being "right" by the new standard 😅 It's like the new standard was always the right one.
Also, like OP, body hair bothered me a lot, even before I realized I was trans, I always felt happy I had less hair than most men, but once I transitioned the body hair became much harder to bear. I suspect it's a combination of suddenly applying female standards to my body (which I previously didn't do actively, since I wasn't expected to be female in social situations), and the loss of strong dissociation and denial as coping mechanisms when I transitioned. Anyway, dysphoria for me changed a lot and continues to change. Even as improvements are made, my standards just get higher and I become less tolerant of what remains in the way.