Shanara, welcome to the boards 
Are you originally from Spain? Where in Spain? I fell in love with the country when I visited in 2002 and I’m meaning to visit it again this year if at all possible. And I understand that trans people in Spain are supposed to be getting a little present from the Zapatero government, true?
BTW, it’s not permitted to join the boards again multiple times. You should email the mods and I’m sure they’ll be able to help you out
Yup, I’m originally from Spain, exactly in Seville. My country, and my city suck bad time, and Zapatero is just supporting gay/lesbian people, but ignoring trans people. So it’s just a missconception. We can wait eons for a government helping trans people, but IU (United left?, Izquierda Unida), are the only ones trying to help us.
Also… I have access to 8 or 9 ips, and 10 or 12 mails… so… 
All due respect, you don’t want to play “chicken” with the SDMB staff. They do not take kindly to such flaunted disregard for the rules. Plus, if you’ve lurked here much, you know we have a (mostly;)) lovely crowd here, and you wouldn’t want to leave over something as silly as this, right?
Yeah, right… anyway… I’ll just wait for my credit card :Pand maybe ask my brother to reply for me… or lend me his credit card
Really? Jeez, that’s too bad. I thought they were bringing in a policy to allow trans people to change legal gender without needing SRS first (which we need here, dammit).
I was ready to let the thread die a natural death, it having done it’s purpose, but my wife (I really need to pick an SO name for her) read the thread last night and told me that I’m not really showing a balanced picture. She told me that, from reading the thread, people might come to think that all the big problems were caused by other people, or that I’m happy about all of the physical and emotional changes that make me more feminine. “If only everyone would accept me as a woman, the big problems would be solved,” I seemed to be saying.
Getting a warm fuzzy from the feedback is nice, and educating people who are honestly curious is important, true, but those things aren’t going to help me deal with the issues that are still causing me problems. She’s right. I’ve avoided talking about the problems caused not by people’s reaction to my status, but by the changes themselves, and my sometimes inadequate way of dealing with them.
She suggested I tell you the convention story.
So here it is.
First, a bit of background. Among the purposes of hormone therapy and orchiectomy is the reshaping of the body into a more feminine form. I began with an unusually low level of both androgens and estrogens in my body, which for hormone therapy is a good thing. Some of my secondary sex characteristics never fully developed to the point that they would have in a male with a normal hormone level. I had, in essense, an incomplete puberty. I looked like a guy when I wore guy clothes, sure, but I could also pass as a woman before any treatment was done.
Because of this starting situation, my body responded both more fully and more quickly than that of someone with a more normal level of androgens. My skin softened and thinned, developed a thin layer of fat underneath, fat began to accumulate in my breasts, hips, but, and thighs, I lost a little fat from my belly and my facial features softened and became more feminine. My body hair thinned, my skin cleared up, and my scalp hair actually thickened and softened a bit.
My chest lost much of it’s width, depth, and my shoulders rounded out. My upper arms, forearms and fingers became noticably thinner and my hands shrank just slightly (the bones remain the same size, but the loss of muscle mass can cause a slight bit of shrinkage of the space between them). This process has taken years so far and is not yet complete, but I’m much closer to what my stable female body will be than what it was when I started.
Much of the feminization of the upper body is due to the loss of muscle mass. The ability to build muscle mass is directly related to the level of androgens in the body, and the initial suppression of those male hormones and later absense of them due to ther removal of my testicles caused a massive loss of muscle mass in my upper body.
While I love the more feminine appearance caused by the loss of muscel mass, it comes with a big price. Loss of muscle mass means loss of muscular strength.
I am much weaker than I was, and that really, really sucks. I understand that I wanted a woman’s body, and that women are typically weaker physically than men. Being physically weaker is actually a feminine property, and as someone who craved, even needed to be more feminine, I’m supposed to welcome all physical changes that make me more feminine.
I hate this one. Hate it, hate it, hate it. I hate having to make twice as many trips to the car to carry in the groceries. I hate needing to have a stockboy load a bookcase into the back of my car and then waiting for my wife to get off of work to unload it because I can’t do it myself. I hate having to ask her to open bottle tops that I can’t get open. I hate having to call for roadside assistance when I get a flat tire because I can’t loosen the friggin lug nuts by myself anymore.
Now, I do like having the bagger carry my two heavy bags out to the car for me, the service is nice, but I hate that I no longer have that option for myself.
And the worst part about it is that I keep forgetting, until I try to lift something much too heavy for my newly reshaped body.
I collect comic books, and I handle and store them properly. This means using bags and boards. When I buy a set of comics off of eBay, the first thin I do with them is put them in new bags and boards. I buy my bags and boards a thousand at a time so that I don’t have to get new ones more than about once a year.
The supplier I order from sends the supplies by UPS. Before my transitioning process, when the UPS guy arrived with the box, he’d put it just inside the doorway as I signed for it. If neither I nor Mrs. Six was home, he’d leave it on the porch. A thousand bags and boards is heavy, something like 80 or 90 pounds. When I got home and found it there, I’d just pick it up and carry it into the room where my comic books are and unpack it there.
The first two times I got supplies after I started hormone therapy and had the orchiectomy, I was home when the UPS guy got there. I was dressing female full time at home by then. The UPS guy, instead of leaving the package just inside the door as he usually did, asked me where I wanted it, and wheeled it into the room for me where he then picked it up and put it on the table I indicated.
Again, there was the weird conflict of enjoying the extra service while resenting that I needed the extra help. Then came this summer. I get back from running errands, and theres a big UPS box sitting on my porch. Without thinking about it, and purely out of habit, I bend down to pick it up and take it in. And I couldn’t move it. It’s not just that I couldn’t pick it up, it didn’t move at all.
It wasn’t the first time something like this had happened, so I shouldn’t have been surprised, but the combination of surprise and the feeling of helplessness overwhelmed me. I tried to lift one end to slide it in, but I couldn’t even get it up over the step in to the entry. When Mrs. Six got home about 20 minutes later, I was still on the porch, sitting on the porch, crying softly. She asked me what was wrong, concerned that something really bad had happened.
And she laughed at me. This was, to say the least, not the reaction I expected. She was supposed to comfort me, tell me everything was going to be alright.
Instead . . .
“Sweetie, you want to be treated like a real woman, don’t you?” I nodded yes. “Real women don’t sit on the porch crying because they can’t lift a heavy box. It just comes with the territory. Did you try to do anything besides carry it?” I shook my head no. “Did you try to think of another way to get it inside?” I shook my head no. “Well, let’s see if we can figure something out. What’s the problem?” I looked at her as if she were insane. Hadn’t I just told her the problem? “It’s. Too. Heavy.” I said this in between those wracking sobs you get when you’ve been crying intensely for a long time. “Is there a way we can fix that?” I thought about it and nodded yes. “How?” By this time, I had calmed down a little and was talking more normally. “Open it here.” So I went and got a box cutter, opened the box, and we carried in the packages a couple at a time, walking past the dolly that was stored in the hallway closet on the way.
Parents or teachers reading this probably noticed she was talking to me the way you talk to a 5-year-old to calm her down. This was entirely appropriate for this situation, as I was acting like a 5-year-old. There were three or four things I could have done to better deal with the situation, but instead I did nothing but pity myself for being like every other woman in the world who is my size an physical fitness. I was expecting to be treated differently from other women because of my situation, rather than the same.
It’s sometimes difficult to admit when I do this.
[Aside]
Mrs. Six just wandered in and read what I’ve written.
Her: Uh, Sweetie, it’s nice that you decided to share one of the difficult times like we talked about, but that’s the UPS story, not the convention story.
Me: Why shouldn’t I tell the UPS story?
Her: Well, you can, but up top there you say it’s the convention story.
Me: It’s background. It helps establish my state of mind for the convention story.
Her: Ok, you’re the writer. I’m just saying, I’d have been finished by now.
[Aside 2] Yes, my sweet, wonderful, supportive wife actually gives story titles to the incidents where I make a complete fool out of myself and try to blame it my situation, rather than my own foolishness. She does this so that she’ll have a shorthand way to refer to them when I engage in some new brand of foolishness.
Back to the story.
I love comic book conventions. Mrs. Six loves Sci-Fi conventions. These two often go together. I went to every one possible before meeting her, and she was an enthusiastic partner when we were dating and after we were married. I usually went in costume, rangin from a Superman shirt, and sometimes going as far as a complete TNG uniform. Nobody really notices a geeky looking guy in ST garb at a genre convention.
We had stopped going during the intermediate stages of my transition, but after I fully transitioned, I wanted to go to one nearby.
I wanted to go in costume, and this time really do it up right. If I was going to one of my favorite activities for a girl for the first time, I wanted to go all the way. I was still the phase of overcompensating for the years of having to wear guy clothes all the time by always wearing skirts and dresses whenever I went out of the house (I’m still in that phase–my therapist tells me I may eventually relax and come back towards the center a little after a whille, or I may not be overcompensaiting and may just naturally be a little more towards the feminine end of the specturm than most other women).
Mrs. Six thought this was not a good idea. A girl in costume at a convention doesn’t blend into the crowd the way a guy does (she knew from experience), and may attract some unwanted attention from certain types of guy. I assured her that I could handle that, because she’d be with me and besides, when I’d been to more than one convention as that type of guy. I told her this, but I didn’t really mean it. I just wanted to go in costume, and was saying what I needed to say to convince her I was ready. I wasn’t. I knew intellectually that a pretty girl in costume gets some attention, but I didn’t really believe it. I believed, I felt I 'd be able to just wander the floor like I usually did.
So the day after the UPS incident, we got dressed up and went off to the big city in costume. I went as Yomiko Readman from Read or Die (and was cute as a button), and she went as Hoshi from Enterprise–for those not familiar with those characters, neither has a costume even remotely revealing. Hoshi wears a jumpsuit, and Yomiko’s outfit is very similar to a that of a Japanese schoolgirl. My feeling was that we could have fun playing dress up, but because we weren’t in the skimpy costumes the booth babes wear, we’d be able to go about relatively anonymously, just like I did when I went as a man. My problem was that I was still thinking like man in a situation where a nerdy young man and a cute young woman are treated very differently. I was applying my previous experience to a situation where it was no longer relevant. Mrs. Six had warned me about this, but I didn’t listen.
We’re at the convention, wandering around, and within minutes, we’ve attracted a lot more attention than I’m used to. It seemed like every single male (and we were outnumbered rougly 10 or 15 to 1) within eyeshot was checking us out, and for long enough that it was already making me a little uncomfortable. I should have been prepared for this, and I should have expected it, if only because I did the same thing when I went to conventions as a guy. Of course, I was watching the girls with envy rather than lust, but there’s no way they could have known that.
The feeling of being weak and helpless was still lingering in the back of my mind from the UPS package incident the previous day, and I’m a little uneasy because of the attention we’re getting, but at the same time, it was a little fun to be the center of attention–it made me feel pretty–and being with Mrs. Six in a place that was a former comfort zone took a little of the edge off of my discofort.
I was looking through a display of some DC Direct statues, while Mrs. Six was a booth away, about ten feet down the aisle, when I heard a voice from one side say, “Oh this is so cool,” and turned to see what was going on. Walking directly towards me was The Comic Book Guy. Well, not really, but it was a guy in his late teens or early 20s. He had a couple days’ growth of beard, stood a good 6’ 3" or 6’ 4", and must have weighed easily 250 pounds. I’m about 5’ 7" and 115 pounds–he was literally more than twice my size.
He walks right up to me and says, “I love it. You are so cool. Can I get a picture?” Now I understand what he was thinking–he didn’t see me as a girl at convention who dressed up out of fun, he saw a superhero from a cartoon he enjoyed. The idea that he might be intimidating me might not have even occcurred to him. I was intimidated, and more than a little nervous. Mrs. Six had noticed what was going on and had started back to help me out. I didn’t think I needed help. I was wrong.
The guy was big and more than a little intimidating to someone in my state of mind, but he had been friendly, had given me a compliment, and had asked me nicely if I would pose so he could take a picture of me. I was flattered. So I said, Yeah, that’s fine, where . . ." and as I started to ask where he wanted me to pose, he put his arm around me.
While I thought he had asked, “Can I take picture of you?”, he thought he had asked, “Can I take a picture with you?” And as I recalled later, he had a friend with him, and the friend had the camera. But that was later.
At the time, as his arm went behind my back and his hand onto my shoulder, and he gently started to turn us to face his friend so the friend could take our picture, every instance in which I had been unable to carry the groceries or pick up a box, every conversation about how it was important to walk on the well lit sidewalk out front and not through the alley in back if I wanted to go to the convenience store at night because I was now much more of a target for predators, every time I’d had to depend on a man to carry or fix something for me and felt a little resentful because of that, every time a man had insisted on doing something for me that I damn well could have done for myself, every time I’d had to cross the street to avoid a group of teenage boys congregated on the sidewalk, every fear and insecurity I had about being small and weak and helpless hit me at once.
I freaked out. I don’t mean I got upset, I mean I had a complete, hysterical meltdown. I screamed, recoiled from him, lashed out at him with my closest hand, and turned to run as if he’d tried to assault me. I wet myself. I have, literally, never been so terrified in my life.
[It’s ten minutes later. I had to stop to settle down before I could write more. when I walked into the living room with tears streaming down my face, Mrs Six smiled at me and said,“I see you finally got to the convention story,” before holding me and saying, “Shh, shh, it’s going to be all right.”]
Mrs. Six caught me and tried to calm me down. The guy who’d tried to pose with me had followed me. He was trying to apologize, saying “I’m sorry” over and over again, but all I could see, what I believed, what I knew with every fiber of my being, was that he was still coming after me. I collapsed on the floor, still screaming, still trying to shield myself from him as he continued to try to apologize. I think I may have scared him nearly as much as he did me. Mrs. Six was trying to calm me down and get him to understand that he need to, “Go. Away. Right. Now.”
Three security guards showed up. Picture the scene–large, heavy set young man standing over a hysterical girl half his size, her arms up in a defensive position trying to defend herself, and another woman standing between them pushing on the guy, trying to get him to leave, to no avail. I don’t know how it was that Mrs. Six managed to convince them that the guy did nothing wrong, and he doesn’t need to be arrested, but get him out of here right now, as quickly as you can.
I also don’t know how she managed to convince the on-site paramedics that I didn’t need to be taken to the hospital for evaluation. We spend a couple of hours in the security office, Mrs. Six having to tell everyone over and over that the poor guy I’d traumatized did absolutley nothing wrong, over my nearly incoherent protests to the contrary. She talked to him and they apparently had a contest to determine who could apologize more often and more effectively. The security guards had to escort us off the property b and Mrs. Six was politely, but firmly informed that it would be a good idea for us not to come back.
As I look back on it now, even though it is still upsetting, I can see that everything that happened was 100%, completely my fault. There were a dozen things I could have done differently that would have made the situation better. I could have dressed in more plain clothing. I could have politelly told the boy, “No.” I could have paid closer attention to the fact that he had a freind with him who had a camera. I could let him take a picture with me. What I did was make a series of foolish choices, any one of which made differently would have fixed or avoided the situation.
The only victim here was the boy who had wanted to get a picture taken with a cartoon character he liked. He had asked politely, been given permission, and his reward was being manhandled by security guards, hauled off to the convention center holding cell, and nearly arrested.
In talking to the boy Mrs. Six found out that he had mistaken me for a booth babe. Me, a booth babe. Had I not overreacted with an intensity bordering on insanity, that one little ego stroke could have been exactly the kind of thing that I could turn back to in times of self doubt for reassurance.
And according to Mrs. Six, even at the end, he was convinced that he was the one at fault.
First let me say that your wife sounds like a wonderful person who loves you very much.
Second, how frightening that must have been for all parties involved! I’m a small woman myself, but I always have been, and so I kind of grew up with that awareness that I could be “easy pickins” for a predator (for that matter, a well-fed Dachsund could probably knock me on my ass if he took me unawares.) And so I learned very early on to be loud - it’s my best defense. Since my whole life has been an ongoing lesson in “being a girl,” it would not occur to me that for you, every new situation is REALLY new.
That’s so interesting. You’re like Tiresias, the wisest person in the world, having had the experience of being both male and female. I never really thought that I might feel SO much less vulnerable if I was male, but it’s quite possible. Maybe we females spend a lot of time feeling vulnerable when we don’t even realize it.
And you shouldn’t feel bad about the convention story. We all need to learn about how to interact with the world, and we often learn by making mistakes. But don’t think that you can’t do anything about this. You can. You’ll never be as strong as you were before, but you can start weightlifting. You can take self-defense classes. You can adjust.
One thing that struck me while reading this is that I didn’t expect that the transition was sunshine and roses emotionally. I can understand Mrs. Six thinking that it might be a nice idea to present a more balanced picture, but deep down, I doubt it was widely thought to be just a simple, easy transition.
But what’s most important is that either way, may you have a happy new year and a happy new female life!
PS: So if there’s two Mrs. Sixes, how do we tell y’all apart?
I may have been unclear about that. There are two basic kinds of emotional problems caused by the transition. The first are the problems caused by how others react to the situation, and I had discussed a couple of those. I had presented both positive and negative examples of this type.
The second type are problems caused by how I react to my changes. I had presented only positive examples of that–how happy I was with my new physical being and social role in society. Mrs. Six thought I might be trying to avoid dealing with the negative aspects of how I was reacting to my changes. Trying to avoid dealing with such feelings is a big danger for someone in my situation.
That’s what Mrs. Six was trying to avoid. She really couldn’t care less about what your perception of my situation is, but she is profoundly concerned with what my perception of my situation is. When I seemed to be avoiding writing about it, that seemed to her that maybe I was trying to avoid thinking about it, and that’s not healthy.
Let me put it another way. I’ve talked about my issues with how frustrated I am about my loss of physical strength, and discussed the stories in my last post with my wife, my therapist, and in group support. But today was the first time I had to think about presenting it to an audience not intimately familiar with my situation. By putting it into that perspective, I learned something new about why I reacted the way I did. Every time I tell that story, it gets a little easier to deal with, and get closer to the point where I can go back to a convention dressed up as, say, Chun Li, something I would absolutely love to do.
Thank you.
She looks a little like Linda Park (the actress, not the comic book character), while I look a little like Grace Park (the actress, not the golfer).
Seriously, though, we’ve discussed what might make a good “team” username if I decide to change it.
Some possibilities we’ve thought of (the first being a possible new username for me, the second what I would call her):
Cassandra Cain and Lady Shiva
Yumiko Readmore and Miss Deep
Chun Li and Jun Kazuma
Modesty Blaise and Exhibitionist
Kaitlyn and Katie’s Girl
What do you think?
Oh, I apologize for misunderstanding. I wasn’t really even thinking of it in terms of your own perception of the situation, forgetting that that hadn’t been completely resolved yet.
How about her registering here too? Is she interested in these boards herself? But hey, my half-cent is that any choice is great within permissible bounds!
I never thought twice about walking through the alley in back of my house to get to the convenience store at night when I was living as a man. But I’ve been made painfully aware that it’s not a good idea for a woman to do the same thing, especially one in my situation. If I were to become the victim of an attempted rape, it is a good possibility that upon finding that my equipment isn’t quite proper downstairs, the rape would become a murder.
I suspect that our alley would be safe–we live in a fairly nice neighborhood–and that nothing would ever happen to me even if I were to walk through that alley every night. But when there’s a nice, well-lit sidewalk that passes in front of a half dozen living room windows on the way, why take an unnecessary risk just to save a little time?
Such thoughts simply didn’t occur to me before.
Exactly. I’m still learning a new way of dealing with the world. Sometimes my previous experience works as a guide for how things work now, and sometimes I’ve anticipated how it will be different, but I still run into situations every day where how things work are different simply because the world now sees me as a woman.
I still get a kick out what my wife calls my “girly girl” moments, such as the first few times a store clerk called me “Miss.” I still get a thrill from actually being able to just walk into the beauty shop to get my hair and nails done.
Tomorrow’s going to be another big one. After 10 years of being Mr. Keith, I’ll have all of my little ones calling me Mrs. Kaitlyn.
wow… I think reading this thread told me more about myself than it told me about you. It’s people like me that make this world so hard for people like you, and I truely am sorry… I never figured myself for a bigot, so i guess in that sense, I can come out too.
I’m going to be honost with you Six, I can’t help but shudder as I read the thread. Not because I hate you, but because I can’t imagine where you are comming from. Even typing to you, it makes me feel uncomfortable, but I want to, because I dont want to be a bigot. Maybe I am the only person here who has never personally known someone who was gay, though I have met many in my school. When I do see them, I hate them because they make my world so much more confusing. Guys like girls, girls like guys, guys stay guys, girls stay girls. I like my safe world, I really do, and if I designed a world, it would work on those rules, but I didn’t make this world. I think you will meet many people like me 6, people who want to like you, but can’t, and don’t know why. I dont think I could ever say any of this to your face, but I know I could ignore you with ease.
As I read, I know I missed things, parts of the story, because I can’t get past the initial reason of being gay (I understand you may prefer a different term, I use gay very broadly). How can you know you are a girl inside? If I want to have sex with someone, I am told its because they are good canidates to produce viable offspring. I am told that my subconscious finds that attractive. Obviously a male cannot produce my offspring as you’d have two sets of the same things. My youth gets in the way I know (18 is such an akward age), but being im really sick of being uncomfortable around the LGBT bunch. Just to let you know how uncomfortable I become, I have been typing this for about an hour so far, and it’s not very long…
Help me understand you,
Best of luck Mr[s] Number6 (I mean it, or at least I hope I mean it)
Im really glad I can take lots of time to type this…:o
P.S. - the SRS surgery, do they actually give you the female organs, or just kinda lop off the male ones. And if so, do all the parts actually work, or is it more of a mock-up? Good for show, but more of a trailer queen than a dragster?
(I know Im new round here, but I been lurking for years, and know read all your posts a lot, and I always recognize a lot of names)
Wow. I can read how difficult it was for you to work out how to say that, and I absolutely know where you’re coming from. If I can be honest, it’s a lot less scary a place for me than where a lot of people are coming from.
You’ve put your finger on why a lot of people hate us: we blur, confuse, and transgress the boundaries of what’s been termed “heteronormativity.” That’s the system you describe - everybody is unambiguously either a boy or a girl, based on their external genitalia, and all boys and all girls fall within a certain range of behaviour characteristics, and all boys like girls and vice versa.
I think you can imagine what I feel about hot guys by thinking of how you feel about cute members of the opposite sex – at least, as a rough approximation. I really don’t imagine the basic emotions are much different. You might not like mint-choco ice cream, but you can understand that I do, even if you don’t see the attraction.
I admit, getting a grasp on trans issues is difficult, precisely because you’re non-trans; since your gender identity (knowing you’re a man/woman inside, as you say) is constantly affirmed by everyone around you, because it matches your physical sex, you don’t have to think of it anywhere near as much as a trans person does.
Just as an example, I started to confront my gender and make it my own only once I started to realize that I’m not as gender-normative as others, and to express that side of myself more openly.
All this to say, you’ve hit the nail on the head: part of the reason for prejudice against trans people is that it is very hard for a non-trans person to conceive of what a trans person experiences, in a way that it isn’t quite so hard for a straight person to conceive of what being gay involves. I’ll let the trans people in this thread discuss this more with you.
As for sex reassignment surgery, results vary according to the skill of the surgeon, but many forms of SRS don’t remove the patient’s original genitals, but radically reshape them into the new genitals, so that the erogenous tissue is retained. After a successful surgery, patients can orgasm and have full sexual response, but are not fertile, nor do their bodies naturally produce the sex hormone of their reassigned sex. (Please, correct if I’m wrong!)
Here are Wikipedia articles on SRS:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sex_reassignment_surgery
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sex_reassignment_surgery_male-to-female
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sex_reassignment_surgery_female-to-male
NotNow, thanks both for your post and its forthright nature. Before I say anything else, thanks. You probably have no idea how … refreshing it is to see someone approach … anything with the sort of voice you’re boldly using.
Without trying to take anything away from 6 or other trans folk, it’s because it’s something mainstream society doesn’t hear about a lot. Being transgender, let alone being (in any sense) openly transgender, is not something that’s discussed much, and with that lack of discussion comes by rule a lack of familiarity, a strangeness. And because it’s strange, and it’s unfamiliar, and especially because it challenges something that makes life so easy for us (the black and white sense of “man” and “woman”), it’s something that makes people feel uncomfortable.
It is FAR better - FAR better - to say that in the first place, as you yourself (I think; I’m extrapolating some based on my experiences with a starting point similar to your own) have done. “I don’t understand this, and it scares me, but I want to know more” … it bypasses so much … I’m trying to expand on what you said without taking away from (to me, anyway) the sheer enormity of your post. So I’ma stop, because you said it well.
You want to understand instead of dismissing simply due to unfamiliarity, yes? (You have to understand how utterly uplifting your post was. I’m still digesting it and it’s the best meal I’ve had in a year, easy.)
What you have said here is something that’s … similar to many viewpoints I’ve seen, but stated in a different way and with a different crux and one that, my view, is something we might not consider enough. It’s the difference between having a world where there’s no worry about maintaining the social norms of “guys are guys and go for girls, girls are girls and go for guys, never those things shall change.” But they aren’t always the case and so you never know if the girl in your study hall would rather go out with your sister than you.
Here’s a thought, and tell me if you agree with it, part of it, whatever: you want to like her, but the part of her that makes her physically male but otherwise female is something that makes that “guys stay guys” bell go off, and that scares you. Do you think that the fact that this is the case with 6 means it’s possible it could happen to (in increasing order of generally-assumed importance in one’s life):
someone you see every once in a while
someone you see at work or in school
a good friend
a member of your family
you
Further, does that possibility scare you? Because I’ve encountered folks who will say “Because if it’s just a random thing if someone’s gay, that could happen to someone I know.” And what they don’t go on to say, because they are scared of acknowledging it, is that it might hit even closer. And that’s scary because then a part of their life, of their understanding of this incredibly complex organism we call the human being, is just made more confusing, and many see it as an unnecessary confusion/complexity, which makes them even more frustrated.
I think it’s okay to feel that way in the sense of saying it’s how you feel. (Maintaining it and saying it’s right because being gay is bad, OTOH - which is very much NOT something I see you saying - is where that can go awry). Talking about it - I hesitate to say “acknowledging” it because that lends itself to the idea that your feelings should be hidden, and that’s far, far from the truth - is a good thing. If we don’t talk about how we feel, what we think, we go nowhere toward understanding each other, and if we’re going to suffer along with this free will and all that, we might as well take advantage of the thought and speech parts of it:D
I’m, perhaps surprisingly so, extremely interested in the reasons you use it so broadly. Assuming I haven’t already overwhelmed you, I’d be really interested in learning the reasons you use it so broadly - if not here, then in email (sadpunk@gmail.com). If it helps any, I’m not offended by what you’ve said here (any of it).
I’m … well, for lack of a better word (though with all the words we humans have made, I ought to be able to find another:)), interested in your choice of words. “I am told it[’]s because” … sounds as though you don’t place all your scientific or personal eggs in that basket, so to speak. I’m interested in knowing more about an alternate view of this phenomenon, if you’d like to share it (if you have none but just aren’t sure about what you’ve been told, that’s certainly fine from my perspective).
I’d love to work on that discomfort in whatever setting is comfortable for you (is my forthrightness - not to mention the fact that I talk and talk and talk - frightening? You have to realize that gay [topic] is something I spend a lot of time thinking about, talking about, etc. I’m sure you could talk my ear off about a subject you’re interested in:)). Being a teenager - I know you hear this a lot, but for my money it’s always worth repeating - can be really really awkward. Hell, being older than that can too. It isn’t purely the age but the social setting.
But it’s rife with content. Size doesn’t matter all that much, really.
My understanding - I am not a medical professional nor am I transgender - is that there is no clitoral transplant, nothing like that. In men, the muscle of the penis is removed (I think) and the nerve endings on the head of the penis are used as a clitoris of sorts and the skin of the penis is used to fashion a vagina (in the sense of a vagina as an inner tract, not in the sense of a self-lubricating area of the body, etc). Beyond my primitive understanding (which may well be outdated) I’d suggest reading - at a pace comfortable to you - matt’s links and asking (someone you feel comfortable asking) for more information as you feel comfortable doing.
Proud of me for not breaking down and running naked through here?
Based on what I read below, I don’t think this is entirely true. You’ve made an effort to be polite and respectful, and you seem to genuinely want to understand my situation better.
There are people out there who would be only too happy to do me physical harm or even kill me if they had the chance, solely because of who I am. There are people who have actively tried to prevent me from being able to earn a living.
I’m fortunate in that I have a completely female appearance, but I’ve heard stories in group of other more masculine looking women being spit on and tripped in public places by strangers.
These are the people who wallow in their ignorance and want to make no attempt to understand, yet aren’t content to simply let us be who we are. These are the people who make the world hard for people like me.
That’s a good start.
It’s likely just as confusing and upsetting to them as it is to you to know that society tells them they’re supposed to like the opposite sex, but their bodies tell them differently.
I know I was confused when I was your age because I knew I didn’t fit the mold of what society expected of me.
It’s confusing and difficult for everyone when they first try to explore it. The willingness to try to learn puts you way ahead of most.
I completely agree with you here on one of your points. If I were to design a world, everyone would be born the sex they were supposed to be, and nobody would ever feel the need to change their sex to match their gender. In such a world, I would have been born a girl.
Again we’re similar. I couldn’t have said most of the things that are in my posts to complete strangers, for fear of the reaction it would cause. In real life I’m a much more private person than what you’ve seen in this thread.
You wouldn’t know that I wasn’t like any other random woman you met on the street unless I told you, and I wouldn’t do that unless I trusted you or you had some need to know.
But if you knew and you ignored me, that would be ok. Being ignored causes me no harm. People have ignored me for a lot more petty reasons than my gender identiy problems. It’s the people who would and do actively try to harm me that upset and scare me.
Gay people are attracted to people of the same sex.
I’m a transsexual, which is a person born with the brain of a woman and the body of a man (in my case) or vice versa.
I don’t know if I can adequately explain it. I just knew. It was a feeling that my body didn’t fit me, like a piece of clothing that’s too big or too small. It was a sense that there was something wrong with having a flat chest, and a discomfort with having testicles. It was an affinity for girl things–the clothes, the toys, the way they related to each other. It was a thousand little things that all told me that the way I was was not the way I was supposed to be.
I’m not sure how to respond here, as my problem is with gender identity and not sexual orientation.
I appreciate that you’ve taken the time to do this, and your being willing to make the effort to understand puts you light years ahead of those people I talked about above.
Thank you, and I appreciate that you can respect me enough to call me Mrs. It may seem a little thing, but there are far too many who would deny me even that small courtesy.
Neither, really.
Transplantation of sexual organs is not possible right now for a variety of reasons.
The testicles are removed surgically. A cavity is created in the appropriate place, and the penis is is hollowed out, turned inside out and reversed into the cavity to create a neo-vagina. The urethra is rerouted to where it would have been on a natural woman. Tissue is taken from the head of the penis to create a clitoris for sexual stimulation, and the scrotal sack is fashioned into the labia.
When this is done well, it takes a gynocological exam to be able to be able to tell the difference between a neo-vagina and a natural one.
In my case, I’ve already had my testes removed, but my scrotal sack is still intact so that the tissue will be available for the creation of labia. If I eventually have sexual reassignment surgery (SRS) (which I think likely, but I still have some emotional stability issues to work out first, and I have to save the money), the steps will all be the same except for removal of the testes, which has already been done.
For a Male to female transsexual like me, the vagina has both the look and functiion of a natural one. A MTF transsexual can have sex with a man just like a natural woman.
However, there are transwomen, like me, who prefer girls.
Welcome aboard. As long as you remain polite and honestly curious, we’ll be happy to have you here.
Number Six, Kaitlyn, wow. Just wow. You have opened your life to us to a rare degree ever seen anywhere. I feel deeply touched that you have given us such an unflinching look into what the transition is like for you. <Johanna gives namaste to Kaitlyn>
I don’t have anything comparable to what you told, since I’m a newbie. It’s been three weeks today for me, just since coming out to myself. I haven’t had any physical changes, apart from shaving my beard, which was difficult enough to get through, when you’ve had it practically your entire adult life (27 years). It took about a week before I was comfortable with my new face. The paradox of androgyny, for me, was to go from being a beautiful, feminine-looking man to an ugly, masculine-looking woman. Still haven’t figured that one out yet. I was prettier and more feminine-looking when I was still presenting as a man.
Otherwise, all my changes in the last three weeks have been psychological and spiritual. In essence, I approach this transition as a major new development in my spiritual growth. Regardless of my outer appearance, the femininity within me has been developing brilliantly, for which I thank the Goddess. Since spiritual and mental patterns can in time come to manifest outwardly, I believe there’s hope for me yet to present as a woman someday.
Kaitlyn, I just have to tell you this as a feminist. Womanhood is strength, not weakness. Shakti is power. I have always loved strong women. Listen to Sheila Chandra singing “La Sagesse (Women’ I’m Calling You)”. The refrain she repeats is: Awaken to your power. Awaken to your power. Awaken to your power, yeah. Play that song and the words will work as a powerul magic spell to transform your femininity into strength. Kaitlyn, be true to yourself, love yourself, feel the Goddess’s love for you, and I know you will awaken to your power as a woman.
NotNow, you’re young still. I detect a glimmer in your awareness that you’re beginning to get it. Keep an open mind and keep learning, something 18-year-olds are naturally talented at. I remember how many years I went with unexamined, unaware homophobia in the background that I didn’t let go of until I got a job with some young people who raised my consciousness about it. At the time of the Matthew Shepard murder, it really made me examine how foul homophobia is and how to rid myself of it. When you look at the murders of Gwen Araujo and Brandon Teena, it may awaken your own consciousness to understand the importance of removing transphobia from our society.
Wow, a single day without checking and this took a incredible impetu… Well… I hate quoting, so no quotes here
Six, guess I can understand that “lack of strength” thinguie you mention. I was able to lift 200 kilo easily, 350 kilo being my max (not that I was into body building, just building, as in making buildings :P) Now I suffer when lifting 50 kilos, and guess my max it’s at 60… yup, I still being freaking strong, at least for a woman, but hey, I have female coworkers, and one of them lift even more weight than me.
Now for emotional part of this… Guess I went kinda hyper first time I was called “Miss”. I knew I went almost crying out of happiness first time I was called “miss” by a policeguy despite my ID card… that was real sweet of him, but then, he couldn’t point anything wrong on me until I showed him said ID.
NotNow: Could you belive I was homophobic till I realized I’m into woman? Hum… guess a little explanation is called here. Before transitioning I was just asexual. I was attracted to girls, but well… I just seemed unable to go sexual with them… Guess I was to scared of going nude myself. Then, early on my transitioning I tried guys… don’t get me wrong… I fancy boys… just not that much as girls. They weren’t really my thing, but from this time I learnt homo people’s not that bad… then, why not acepting I can be a woman and STILL fancy women? Sigh… come to think preconceptions are real our enemy… I was denying I loved women just 'cause women are not supossed to love women. I was being stupid or something…
But my point is… I WAS female, there was no doubt of that to me, even if I wasn’t phisicaly one… It was clear enough for me to fight preconceptions. Let me say you something, NotNow: if I could, I’d make a world just like yours, but seems real world’s quite different. Off topic, I would make cat a sacred animal
This is not about beign gay or lesbian. A gay is a GUY who fancy men. This is about what you are. Imagine you wake up tomorrow and you’re missing … dunno… an arm. Someone tells you they can attach you a biomechanical arm. Wouldn’t you go for it? That may makes you look less human for some people, but you just need that arm, right? Not that I’m saying we’ve lost anything… just that we are missing something.
About SRS (if I write CRG, keep in mind I’m spanish, and we call it CRG (cirujia de reconstruccion de genero). Not every TS need it, or ask for it. I’m sorry if I’m blowing someone’s mind, but there are woman who won’t mind having a penis, and won’t risk a surgery, and many TS guys won’t go for it, since it won’t be a fully functional part.
MtF SRS is fully functional, besides reproductive functions, but given that some biological women can’t become pregnant, we could say it’s fully functional. In some cases not even a gynecologyst could tell any difference. There is even some lubrication in most cases (at least here, in Europe), but, once again, there are biological women with lubrication problems. We can get to orgasm (even multiple orgasm), we enjoy penetration, although it’s painful first time. So, just as any girl.
Anyway, you’re REALLY brave to toss all prejudice aside and try to learn about this, so, despite of your final answer to this question, I’ll honor you, NotNow. You’ve done what many people refuses to do.
Matt_mcl: Zapatero is just a stupid politician who just worries about people reelecting him. Trans collective is not big enough for him to worry. Gay/lesbian one is (at least in spain, about 30 % population). Who’s worring about us is Cristina Almeida, a pity she won’t be ever elected. Anyway, there are some TS who are allowed to change their name/sex BEFORE SRS, or even with no SRS. FtM can get their legel sex reassigned after mastectomy (whatever it’s spelled in English), on account of irreversibility, if they already have a psicological “go on” for it. Also, if SRS’s not possible (intolerance to anesthesics, for example), it’s possible to change your legal sex too. See? we’re not that unprotected by law as it seems. We have even some judges that support us.
P.S.: excuse my poor english, but I’m fighting my cat while half asleep.
Excuse my ignorance again, and please don’t be offended by what I have to say, Im trying to learn and change. As well, I dont like using the word gay, so Im sorry if I offend anyone, I just dont really know what else to use. But if you are a woman in a mans body (I will now call this term WIMB just because it is fun to say), and technically speaking your sex is male. Wouldnt that mean your a male who likes people of the same sex? A WIMB would then just be another term for gay right? You keep saying gender and sex like they are not accronyms.
note, I retyped this paragraph below, but kept the orginal because i think it helps to show my train of thought
Ok, lets forgo that for a second, and accept that gender is different from sex (im trying here). And further you are saying that gender would be the minds sex, while sex is defining the physical sex. Correct? I hope Im getting this right. Further this, a gay male (sex) also is male in gender and is attracted to females, while a WIMB is male (sex) but female in gender? Me things a new term is needed, instead of gender since for me and many others im sure it means the same thing as sex (aka, penis or no). A straight male is a male (sex) and a male in gender that is attracted to females.
Now I am confusing myself, so Im gonna try again, but try to define them like above, but more clearly. I am assuming all people here were born with a penis, just to avoid my own confusion.
Gay: A male (sex) with a male gender that is attracted sexually to males?
Transexual: A male (sex) with a female gender that is attracted to males?
Straight: A male (sex) with a male geender that is attracted to females?
Ok, that seems clear on the surface, but the more I think about it, the more muddy the water gets. If the gay male has a male gender identity, then wouldnt that mean he would be attracted to girls. So clearly he must have a female gender identity, but then the gay and transexual have the same deffintion (this also is why I used gay to describe transexuals at first, I realize now that gay does not quite fit the bill). Further, if the transexual is not attracted to males, but women still, wouldnt that assign them a female gender identity, or are they then a LIMB (Lesbian in a Males Body)?
So would it be fair then to use the gender deffinition as either straight or gay assigned with it as well. So now we get?
Gay: A male (sex) with a gay male gender
Transexual: A male (sex) with a gay or straight female gender
Straight: A male (sex) with a straight male gender
Am I getting closer here? If any of this makes any sense, I think im starting to get it.
On a side note, you gals (I think, right?) are really cool people. I appreciate you putting up with my ignorance, and being so open with your stories. If you had met me a year ago, I probably would have told you that there is a special place at the end of a shotgun for queers (please do not think I think that now). Though, being an non-believer, if there really is a God, I guess we will be seeing each other for all eternity.
Another side note - I dont think Six can really answer this because of her wife, but lets say that a transexual (post op) were to court and attract a male, don’t you think the male has the right to know before the relationship gets serious? Maybe it’s very wrong of me, and maybe I deserve to burn in hell for it, but I feel I should have a right to know before engaging in a serious relationship (serious meaning anything beyond first base).