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).
Late 20s to early 30s. It was during lockdowns when I wasn’t interacting with irl society much - work was all remote, and all my interactions were online. I quickly realized that when I removed the pressure of having to conform to what I thought was expected of me, I was actually a completely different person. I started interacting with more queer people, especially trans individuals, and realized that there were a lot of parallels with how they felt about gender and all the other constructs of society which never really made sense to me. Honestly, I meant sooo many when I started FFXIV.
The idea that I could decide how I wanted to identify and be perceived by people never really occurred to me.
I had always disliked a lot of aspects about myself and tried to be as much of a ghost as possible. It rarely felt like I was living for me. As I slowly started to explore the things I truly liked - cute things, pink things, and soft things - I noticed my views of life started to brighten. I felt more excited about the things I was surrounding myself with, and I noticed people were interacting with me in a friendlier and warmer way. As I started to shine brighter, people around me started to shine brighter, too!
All that said - why didn’t I just lean into identifying as NB or just fully ignore gender as a whole? I did initially, but about those things which I didn’t like about myself - so many happened to be T driven. Thick body and facial hair- no thank you, thick/rough/acne prone skin- please go, body composition- wasn’t really liking how it fit in the dresses/skirts I wanted to wear, overall mindset and emotions (this changed a lot), etc. Obviously, all these things have taken time and additional effort, but it all feels so fulfilling.
I was initially worried about how people in my life would react/treat me, but I decided to start always putting my own feelings and desires first… no one else was going to. I will acknowledge that it’s bit easier for me to do that- my circle is incredibly small, I’ve been single for 5-6 years, I was working remotely, and I kind of rarely leave my home.
My question to people - if you had an irl character creator, how would you design yourself? How would you choose to move in the world if there were no expectations?