This is complicated, but I need answers

I am a 22 year old female. Since I was able to pick out clothes for myself, I've always chosen jeans and boys t-shirts, boys sneakers. Wearing girls clothing makes me severely uncomfortable. I feel over-exposed and like everyone is staring at me. I've always wanted to be accepted more as a boy than as a girl. Like my life would make more sense that way. I identify better with boys. I think like one, I act like one. Most of the time I feel like I am one, or that I was supposed to be one.

I am attracted to both men and women. However, I know I prefer men but at the same time, It feels wrong for me to be with them as I am. It has always clicked in my head that it would feel more right if I were a guy, too. I don't think this makes any sense.

I've never heard of a transgender case where a girl is a boy, but she likes boys.

I am a girl who feels like she's supposed to be a boy, but I like boys.
I just feel like I'm supposed to be a boy who likes boys.
That feels right to me.

I don't know what I am?
Sorry...

It is very common for FTM (Female-to-Male) transsexual people (they typically call themselves transmen) to be a gay man. "T r a n s f a g s" as they call themselves (as a term of endearment) might be as many as 50% of FTMs.

What you do next, if anything, depends strongly on where in the world you are. and your profile offers no clue, not even which hemisphere you are in (Australia, Austria, I have no idea).
You might want to start some soul searching. For if you go seeking help you are sure to be asked "Do you want a deep voice, facial hair and a male chest or not?". You surely should think about that and form some idea as to how you feel about it.

"It is very common for FTM (Female-to-Male) transsexual people (they typically call themselves transmen) to be a gay man. "T r a n s f a g s" as they call themselves (as a term of endearment) might be as many as 50% of FTMs. "

I'm from the United States. Louisiana, to be exact.

As soon as I read that, I started crying. I've always felt like the only person in the world who is the way that I am. It's my fault for not bothering to do the research, but I always felt that it didn't make sense for me to want to be a guy to be with guys when I can be with one as a girl. Like I didn't know what I was talking about, and I was already normal. But I always felt like I was wrong.

Like I'm all wrong and it would be RIGHT to be the other way. To be a boy. Who likes boys.
Like inside of me, who I am is a puzzle piece and it just doesn't fit at all with the piece that is what I am. Does that make sense?

And it feels wrong all the time.

Do all Transsexuals, or Transgenders (I'm honestly not even sure about the classifications) get sex changes? I feel like it's too late. And I honestly don't think I'd be able to afford it. And my Fiancee accepts how I feel about myself, but if I were to become a man, I would lose him romantically. I won't ever feel right as a female, but knowing now that I'm not a freak, and that I really do have cause to feel like something is wrong is so freeing. Knowing that it's much more common than I thought... That I'm not alone.

Well, put simply, if you decide you do want testosterone, facial hair, deep voice, male chest and you come out to your boyfriend then yes, you will lose him (unless he is bisexual and hasn't told you (don't dismiss that possibility, you may be surprised to discover your very male aura appeals to him)). Just be glad you don't have a marriage to tear apart.

Briefly you have a lot of reading and self-education to do. I suggest you start here
http://ai.eecs.umich.edu/people/conway/ ... nsMen.html

Do not assume you already know whether you do want testosterone, facial hair, deep voice, male chest, it takes a lot of time to come to understand and decide about those things.

You might want to consider relocation to somewhere that is FTM friendly. San Francisco and Santa Cruz, California are probably the FTM capitals of the world.

Good luck on your adventure, it is very early days for you.

Thank you very much. I appreciate all the help and information you've provided. I'm going to keep researching. I know that if I suddenly woke up one day as a man it would be the happiest day of my life, but that won't happen, and I'll have to do the research and work with what is out there.

pessimisticgiraffe wrote:I'm from the United States. Louisiana, to be exact.

Hi, I'm also in Louisiana. I'm male-to-female, but I would think it would probably be easier for a female-to-male to live more socially-integrated anywhere that he wouldn't have to move to San Francisco, or some other location. I'm always reminded of the great documentary "Southern Comfort" about a female-to-male living in rural Georgia. He loved it there. On the other hand, I think MTF's only live in small towns out of neccessity rather than desire.

It has been tolerable for me (I'm not in a small town, though), I think, because no one I work with knows about me. I'm not so sure if it would matter anyway. However, incredibly, an (tranny) admirer once told me his brother was a police officer in New Orleans and he was kicked off the force when they discovered he was in a relationship with a MTF. This happened in New Orleans of all places!!! It was over 15 years ago, though, not recently.

Anyway, I wish you much luck and happiness in your journey. It's good to have someone speical in your life, too. That is always very helpful.

Hi Giraffe,

No you're not alone there are plenty of FTM transmen, and i'm sure there are enough who prefer guys to girls, (tho i haven't done a survey so i can't say how many!)

what i have to say is very different... but i want to share to give a different viewpoint - something from a perspective that is not gender-dysphoric but also at odds with a lot of things about society's ideas of gender, so it shows you options are there right across the board, and that you aren't limited by certain choices.

i had a bit of a crisis about gender identity once myself, lol... part of it was cause (I had DID) one of my alters was actually a little boy ( - for loved ones reading, sorry about not mentioning - would probably have made the DID clearer as DID LOL, but my system wanted to keep those details quiet i think cause of things they might have implied. -) but i definitely decided if i had been born a bloke i would be gay! part of that was just that i knew some gay blokes i got on with, (they weren't so much the camp sort) the other part... well i just like men .

i think what you need to work out is whether its your personality, self-expression e.g. clothes, how you are as a person etc. that its about, or whether its your body that bothers you. - if your body bothers you, then you sound gender dysphoric, if its other things, you might just decide you identify as "genderqueer".

Personally i just decided everyone else was ######6 queer (meaning odd, not meaning gay!) I'm happy with my body, and I'm happy with being a woman... I am feminine, as i define feminine. i don't identify as "girly" AT ALL. but i do identify as "woman", and there are things about me that i see as feminine, both in my personality and in my tastes. i'm not all jeans and guys tops & stuff, for casual/practical i tend to wear stretch jeans and girls tank tops, and for other more dressy variation ...right through to dresses & stuff, lol - as long as its not pink, frilly and flared with polka dots ugh!

the way i see it its mostly practicality. shorts & jeans are practical for living in. good for being active. as far as i'm concerned, skirts & dresses are good for one thing, - attractiveness. so mostly i don't wear them much. if i have a boyfriend around from day to day, i'm far more likely to wear them out. i also don't like going out "ultrafeminine" but only if i'm on my own. people treat me differently - in a way i don't like or feel comfortable with.

i guess my point of view is more typically male than female there - for most women dresses & feminine clothes probably have a lot more significance of a different sort. i've heard other women say things make them "feel like a woman". i don't need to "feel like a woman" - i AM a woman LOL. i do have my own sense of what i like, and attractiveness does figure in it. but i'm not interested in dressing to please/compete with other women like a lot of them are. if i choose stuff, i will go with what i like, and if i dress to please i'll have my boyfriend in mind, not any female friend(s)!

In one way, i am feminine. In another way, i am quite a lot of a tomboy. And in none of the ways that would make a man miss out! (unless he wants pink polka dots and a little pink bow on top of my head and that is just not gonna happen without rope or rohypnol... )

but when it came down to it, i realised what i needed to change, was whether i viewed some of society's expectations of me as appropriate templates for how a woman "should" be. so i just rejected them, seeing i didn't really fit a lot of them so well anyway.

i came to realise society's views of what you "should be" do not define what you are. whatever you feel comfy in is most important. you need to be able to feel comfy in your own skin - exploring yourself and figuring out whether that means either figuring out independantly what feminine is to you, or maybe whether you identify as "genderqueer" or whether its your body you're unhappy with and want to change it.

the important part is to know you have all those options.

katana i like how you have broken this down into parts. This is really helpful. As repressed things spill to the surface it is hard to know what to do with all of the parts. I used to smirk to myself in my 20s when my friends would take time to "find themselves" now I am wishing I hadn't made so many assumptions. Now I feel im stuck between a rock and a hardplace which is ok sometimes because it can still be comfortable. it is justoverwhelming and your advice to Giraffe presents a new perspective. sam

I'm glad it helped you find a new perspective too. i feel the same way about friends finding themselves and not being sure, i thought i knew who i was because i didn't need to do all that, but really i just didn't know how to know myself. i thought i was ahead when really i was behind. so i think i understand that too ? yeah, like a lot of other places, i guess it can be quite cosy between the rock and the hard place, but i guess once you've tried somewhere else you sometimes realise that cosy little space was cold and hard and a bit damp too!

you nailed it. I too thought I was ahead, thought I knew myself. maybe i did, maybe ive changed, maybe I was trying to be who I wanted to be (and career wise it worked out) but now I see I was behind too or completely focused on the wrong parts. Right now Im just peering over the rock to see what is out there, but when I look around to see where i am i feel isolated because in fact I just found a great place to hide. thanks for writing, i don't feel completely alone.