Advice for a young transsexual

In My Humble Opinion
1

Well so a friend of mine revealed herself to be a “male-born bisexual submissive transexual” and was hoping that I had advice for her, particularly in how to act like a woman.

Being male with no interest in acting like a woman, and living far away from her, I had very little advice but to make some female friends who would want to teach her.

She’s 19, in college, living in the Scandinavias. She doesn’t yet own any female clothes, possibly because she’s shy or because it’s been only recently that she’s decided what she is, I don’t know. And I don’t know how certain she is that she is correct about herself–though she said that she had given mind to having a sex change some day.

The questions I, as her respected advisor, would be more interested in would be more in terms of things like dating and practicalities.

Where, practically speaking, if she’s bisexual then to me that seems like regardless of whether there is sex change surgery, you’re still better off to keep the working bits just because, well, women like dick and sexual compatibility isn’t a non-issue for relationships. Getting rid of what lots of women will want is shrinking your dating pool by a bit. But, I don’t know if saying, “Don’t get a sex change” would simply end up as being oppressive and confusing and end up causing more problems than its worth.

Again, practically speaking, how feasible is it for someone who is cripplingly shy to find dates as a transsexual? Do you need to be outgoing, or is there really a decent sized number of people who couldn’t care less about a person’s born-sex?

Ultimately, just what all advice is there for someone young, with zero knowledge of what to do, and too shy to look for help?

2

Most straight women aren’t into women with a penis. If a bisexual trans women dates another woman, her partner will often be a woman who identifies as lesbian as the understanding is the trans partner will get the surgery at some point.

Finding a date as a transexual is very difficult and a lot of the people (amel and female) who pursue trans women can be very predatory.

A very good internet resource is http://www.tsroadmap.com. However, I suggest she work up the courage to get involved with her school’s LGBT organization and see a therapist.

3

As 2ply pointed out, women who like women don’t generally care for dick. Any potential partner your friend is going to hook up with is going to fall into one of three categories: straight man, bisexual, or gay woman. Two of those groups are likely to see a dick as a deal breaker, and the bisexuals aren’t going to much care either way. So if she wants surgery, if anything it’s going to help with sexual compatability. The only people its going to turn off are people (mostly men, from what I understand) who have a “chicks with dicks” fetish, and it’s questionable whether she’s going to want to date from that pool in the first place.

4

My gut response to this is that she should act like herself. If she needs advice on how to act female, then is she truly trans? (I admit I’m pretty ignorant about such things – that’s just a gut response.)

5

Tell her what you want to tell her. Don’t get a sex change.

6

Depends. You could make a good argument that society/parents/peers spends years educating/“brainwashing” people on How One Should Act, and that what you feel like deep down inside is different from what you’ve been taught to do or be.

For instance, the bad side of learning to be a woman, from birth - hit any thread on this board that mentions the book The Gift of Fear and you’ll see comments about how girls/women are socialized to not make a fuss, even in situations where you might start worrying, so smart manipulators can push and push with little demands and potentially get the woman in a bad situation. (One example from the book was a woman carrying groceries into her locked building, where the guy insisted on making conversation with her, IIRC holding the (locking) outer and inner doors for her, badgering her into letting him carry her groceries up (using ‘what, do you think there’s something wrong with me/you’re not a very nice person’ manipulation) and finally carrying them into her apartment. Where he attacked her.

The better side - you’re more likely to pick up things like how to sway your hips when you walk, how to walk in heels, how to pick up more ‘empathetic’/stereotypically female means of communication (cf. Deborah Tannen’s work) if that’s something desired, how to wear clothing that fits your frame properly, fashion info, putting on makeup, caring for hair that’s long. How to wash your underwear so it doesn’t disintegrate/break down within a short period of time. Good depilatory methods. She may choose to be the tomboyish woman ever, she may not, so this may be useful.

7

I think she may be looking for advice on how to behave in order to be seen as female – aka what social cues do people raised as female learn to pick up on that people raised as male don’t. And this goes as far as “how do I carry myself ‘like a lady would’?”

Sage Rat, hopefully your friend doesn’t expect too much in the way of advice from you, since you have no experience with being female or transgender. She should get professional guidance of some sort. If she isn’t all gung-ho about needing surgery RIGHT NOW then she probably is being as cautious as she needs to about making sure she’s comfortable in her female identity, but it still would be helpful for her to talk to someone who has a deeper understanding of her situation.

8

Non-transexual, hetero non-girly girl here, so my advice may be worse than useless. Well, here goes.

If she is in Scandinavia, and in a largish city, then there will be a local support network of some sort for people with non-traditional sexual-orientations or the differently gendered. Her college should have such information available, possibly on a website. There may even be some sort of “gay students network” or some such for her particular college. They might not be right for her, but should have contact information or resources she can use.

If she is in Norway, she should get in touch with LLH (Landsforeningen for lesbiske, homofile, bifile og transpersoner). There will be similar organisations in other Scandinavian countries, but I don’t know what they are called. If she is in Oslo, there is a Youth Information Office in Møllergata (I think), between a computer shop (Datakjeden) and Games Workshop. This office more or less informaly specialises in LGTB kids - not sure why.

You say she is submissive, does this indicate an interrest in BDSM, or something else I’m not grasping? If the former, than she should get on touch with the BDSM comunity in her country (in Norway, they are called SMIL, I have no idea what to do in other scandinavian countries. I also don’t know how easy they are to get in touch with, I only know a couple of members and am in no way a member myself.).
Anything to widen the dating/friendship pool is good thing, right?

She should also start deciding on what sort of female look she likes. If she has a general idea of what style she likes, than clothes shopping will be easier, and a clear goal is also good for her peace of mind.

Point out to her that she doesn’t have to wear frilly pink skirts and three tons of makeup just to look like a woman. Most teenage girls wear jeans and t-shirts, just like teenage boys.

She could start with simple things that won’t in themselves cause much comment, like grow her hair out (very common in teenage boys as well as girls here).

Well, that’s it. Take it with a bag of salt or two.

9

I have a friend who is M2F trans, and just completed her surgery. There are lots of options with surgery - she chose to to laser hair removal, breast implants and castration (orchidectomy NSFW). So, she still has a penis but no testicles. She also has a girlfriend, who, I THINK she has been with since before her change or at least since she started merely “presenting” as a woman.

I don’t think she really got any transformation help from any straight folks, girly or not. Her biggest support group has been other trans people and people in the gay community. She made a huge network of friends on LiveJournal and is very close with them.

If you want a link to her LJ page for your friend - which doesn’t go into every minute detail but is fascinating reading just to see what steps she had to take - PM me.

10

I agree with the folks who say she should act like herself. I’d recommend voice training (They make educational audio tapes for transwomen who want to sound more feminine). Surgery is not something to worry about right now. Unless care standards are different (and I doubt that they are), your friend will have to have a therapist and live as female full time for at least a year before surgery will be authorized.

11

I don’t know how exactly this was presented to you, and what I’m about to say may well elicit a “Well duh, I know :rolleyes:” type response from her, but one piece of advice I’d give is to leave out the sexuality stuff when presenting her gender, particularly the submissive bit. It may all feel related because it’s all stuff she’s been hiding/denying, but it’s not going to be relevant in the same sorts of situations, and I doubt it would be helpful in convincing people to take her gender identity seriously.

In Sweden, it’s RFSL (Riksförbundet för sexuellt likaberättigande).

12

She would likely be interested in joining the BDSM scene so, from the side of gathering advice, it was relevant.

13

Oh, good. I’ve encountered a few people suffering from what I like to think of as “here’s a string of words that categorizes me according to everything important” syndrome, and may be oversensitive :).

14

Really? This was not in the handbook! I just toss it all in the laundry.