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First gender therapy appointment

Discussion in 'Gender Identity and Expression' started by staticinmyattic, Sep 1, 2021.

  1. staticinmyattic

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    I spoke to a therapist about being trans yesterday. First time in therapy (after decades of attempts) where I didn’t hold back. I have a couple of thoughts.
    1. The incidents and anecdotes I’ve collected over the years are evidence that I’m trans. What registers to me as not evidence but proof that I’m trans is the euphoria. Every step I take into coming out and in the direction transitioning gives me a wave of euphoria. Sometimes it’s huge, knock-you-on-your-ass, “Did someone slip me some new amazing drug?” euphoria. Sometimes it’s a warm glow deep in my chest. But I’ve only had this twice before: when I married my wife, and when my kids were born.
    2. The consequences and risks associated with transitioning are objectively less severe, and personally less frightening, than the consequences and risks associated with continued denial-fueled depression.
     
    #1 staticinmyattic, Sep 1, 2021
    Last edited: Sep 1, 2021
  2. QuietPeace

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    Congratulations. It really does feel good and is freeing to accept our true selves.
     
  3. staticinmyattic

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    I’ve been thinking about you, QuietPeace. Ive enjoyed hearing your perspectives and experiences. Unless I’m misremembering (and I may be, I’ve been reading this forum a good bit) you’ve spoken on the topic of being trans, but not transitioning. This has been my plan, to come out to myself and then stop, just grit my teeth through life with the benefit of honesty as opposed to denial. My therapist was skeptical of this plan. To be clear, I want to transition, and have since I learned what transgender people are. I’ve dealt with this by treating ANYTHING that I want with hostility, my whole life. Except for when I’m so inside my head with depression, I’ve always put everyone else a very distant first. So it’s really easy for me to identify what I want and need, and just as easy to tell myself “no, you can want that, but you can’t have it, not if it will cause pain for people you love”. I don’t expect you to have the answer of course, but I’d like to hear your perspective. Do you think a person can be aware of their assigned gender and identified gender being mismatched, but manage that conflict privately?
     
  4. QuietPeace

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    I try not to say that anything is impossible. Is it possible that a person can bury their true self forever? I guess it might be possible but I have not met someone like that personally.

    My life had also always been about doing everything for everyone else and always to my detriment, not that any of them ever appreciated it or thought that my sacrifices were enough. I allowed myself to be put through conversion "therapy" to bury it for me (essentially being tortured into being convinced that unless I pretended to be male that I would be tortured forever - so trading a miserable life in the here and now for not being tortured forever by a "loving" god). I was able to pretend to be male long enough to marry and have three children. It was a disaster for everyone involved and one of the worst decisions that I have ever made in my life (in a life filled with disastrous decisions). I believe that forcing myself into the closet that way was the main reason for my total breakdown which ended up with me being disabled and unable to work ever again (though admittedly there were other factors).
     
  5. staticinmyattic

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    Thank you for sharing, and I’m so sorry for that you’ve suffered as you have. If it helps, your story matters to me, and really does help. I need perspective from experienced people like a fish needs water. I’m sorry too about the conversion therapy. I’m fortunate that CT has been driven underground. After coming out to myself, I went looking for it. I was fully aware of the dangers, that it’s effectively torture. It’s what I felt I deserved. That feeling has passed. There’s a certain irony in LGBTQ people being out and open on Main Street while the conversion therapy Christians must be sought out in grimy alleys and back rooms.
     
  6. chicodeoro

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    Yes! That is exactly how I knew. The first time a friend put their arms around me and called me by my new name I felt a wave of euphoria overpower me. The only thing I can compare it to is an intense drug high, but, of course, it was completely natural.

    I get what you're saying, but sometimes in our lives we have to be a little bit selfish. I face a similar decision soon in terms of coming out to my stepson. I plan to do it when he's 16 (in roughly a year's time), when he's hopefully a bit more mature and able to cope with it. I'm aware it might mean the end of my relationship with him, which will break my heart. But in the long term it would be more painful continuing to pretend to him that I'm something I'm not.
     
    #6 chicodeoro, Sep 1, 2021
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  7. Mihael

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    It just gets tiring. And for me it was also like... as soon as conditions were more favourable and I knew I wouldn't be at a loss, I did that. It's not that I couldn't tolerate presenting as female. It was that if given the chance, I chose what I liked better. This moment might come at different times for different people.
     
  8. staticinmyattic

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    I’m going to talk about this with my therapist, but I think in my years of reacting with hostility to my own sense of self and my wants and needs, I’ve damaged my ability to differentiate between self care and selfishness. I will take ANY excuse to not do something I want to do. At this point, whether or not I’m trans (I am) or if I want to transition (I do) is not even the important question. I’m more interested in how it’s possible for me to be aware of who I am and what I want, yet feel total paralysis when it comes to actually DOING it. I also have a feeling I’m not the first.
     
  9. staticinmyattic

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    I’ve also been able to tolerate operating in the world with the appearance and role of a man, something has made rationalizing that “my situation” wasn’t anything worthy of much thought. It’s really a blessing and a curse. I don’t envy those who’s dysmorphia is an intolerable state of being, but when something’s tolerable you tend to ignore it. I don’t know what happens next, but I do know I’ve already made changes in my relationship with myself that should have happened years ago. It’s starting to come into focus what living the second half of my life as a happy person could look like.

    I’m getting hit left and right with surprises, and the affinity I feel for men who were AFAB is one of them. You’re on a very different but parallel journey, and I think we can offer each other so much. In a way, we’re both trying to find our way into the social roles and spaces that the other needs to leave. It doesn’t get discussed much, but being identified as a man by other men can be… a lot. It doesn’t get discussed much because keeping quiet about feelings is one of the super fun expectations we’ve been enforcing on each other. There’s a lot wrong with masculinity around the world and in the USA in general. Not men, but masculinity. Obviously, I’ve submitted my 2 weeks notice to The Man Corporation, so I’m biased and mean no offense.

    Ok, I just caught myself grousing about men. Baby steps girl, baby steps…
     
  10. Mihael

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    I imagine that it can feel too rough. I enjoy the rough behaviour, but I see why someone would feel bad about it or couldn't handle it.
     
  11. QuietPeace

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    It is truly horrific for a woman who is expected to pretend that she is a man.
     
  12. Mihael

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    I'm not the kind of person who is easily scared or something, but I think that the way men talk between each other can be scary. I'm not scared of it, because the same thing goes through my own head, but well, a tall jacked dude talking about something sadistic might not feel too safe to be around.
     
  13. chicodeoro

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    I think for me it's the general..'avoidance' of stuff that gets me in terms of the company of men. I have male friends who I've known for years and never once have they opened up to me properly. This tendency to keep people at arm's length makes me sad, but it just seems to be the way that many of the male gender deal with things.
     
    #13 chicodeoro, Sep 2, 2021
    Last edited: Sep 2, 2021