Hi there Geist75583212:

Wow....I can only have imaginings about how you must be feeling.....

I certainly echo Deepfried's offerings!

S

I have to weigh in here, Geist, with a reply that may alienate me from everyone here. But I do so in sincerity of heart. Sweetie, I beleive that you are dealing with something that is painful for you, and because you want to find peace so badly, it will be very easy to listen to what mainstream culture will tell you, about yourself...the easy road.."just accept yourself as you are, this is not a problem...it's other people who have the problem" (Sorry for disagreeing with everybody, I really mean no disrespect.) you deserve acceptance..yes, completely. Yet, you are a person who is just as deserving of healing an emotional problem that is causing you real pain and distress, as anyone else on this planet is...whether the rest of the world is telling you you are crazy to be bothered about it, or not...you deserve healing. And I honor you, for seeking it, and I honor your honesty- and your pain, about this, is something that I honor most of all. This seems to be really not making you happy, from what I have read above. I do not (personally) believe that it is because the culture we live in does not accept men who dress as ladies...in fact, there is a big push for this to be accepted, and most people are "quasi-accepting" of it because they have been told that there is no hope. I think you are worth a lot more than that. Your desires and instincts matter. I think the problem goes much deeper than that. I think you are being told subtly from all around, that you are crazy, to have a problem with what is going on inside of yourself- and that there is no solution for you- and that will make you feel invalidated...and despairing..please tell me if I am waaaay off base. I have no desire to hurt you more than you already have been. I know it is not acceptable for me to say this. But you are an eternal soul who is searching for healing and for the truth of who you are...and you seem to want that to correspond with how you have been physically created...which makes perfect sense. though, a very unpopular view, I must support you. And I do not believe that we are accidents, the way we are made. I believe that we are carefully made, and that things can go wrong in our lives that will tamper with our identity in very serious ways. It happens to all of us in different ways. You deserve to seek healing- if that is what you choose to do, and not to be told that there is no hope, because this is just the way you are. That is very unfair, IMO. You can heal. And there are many support groups and therapists who are still willing to work with people who want to integrate their sexuality/sexual issues. There is an excellent support group, I know of- through which you can find help, should you choose such a path..called COURAGE. I must warn you, that you will have to be able to think for yourself, and follow your own path, should you seriously look into it.
My heart goes out to you. Please know that you are not crazy, and that you are a good person who deserves to find your deepest desires from life. I am hoping so much that I do not hurt you, but I feel compelled to speak my mind, since your post is so beautifully written and heartfelt. Sending many supportive thoughts...and welcome to the forum, too, btw.

Love,

BB

hey guys thanks for the positive replies I deeply indebted to you all. But to say my problem is minor is no small matter whatsoever. The more I down play this problem the more problems I will create for myself and the more I will tend to cut myself off socially, religiously, and from reality all together. Its a slow death in a way that has alot of painful and torturous operations it imposes on the mind as such almost making it impossible to think. Still I maintain a healthy intellectual life and have maintained my sanity per se that is in my persona. Though the further I explore myself the more my persona is broken no matter how much I tend to hold onto persona that is the impression people have of me surrounding me and the impression I wish to come across as having are always contradicting. A lack of trust would be a good way to explain my feelings towards others and the general herd of uneducated people who would be more willing to condemn me and not see a real person with a problem.

We have drug addicts, Alcoholics who are all accepted after a while why should people with my desires and wishes be ignored and seen as criminals.

The most painful part of all is the fact that you wish to see your dreams lived one way while your parents who in a certain sense have theirs fulfilled now living a life of semi leisure not regarding the great responsibilities they now have to endure are so daring as to wish to try to mold my future in sorts partly because they have a right to because well they are my parents but in doing so limiting my capacity to see what is deepest inside of me.

This causes a great disconnection that no matter how much I do what they want I will never be able to reconcile myself with them nor if I decide to choose the latter path of my desires and become a woman this will cause such a stroke of tragedy it might as well been better off if none of this ever had the possibility of being.

Either way their is mutually inevitable misery that will be created whether my parents see my life out as they want to which they see as the way I want it or the way I want it this which comes into strict oppositions with their view. I will never tell my parents anything about my thoughts regarding these topics now for it is not at all the right time.

My parents have enough problems to handle and they also have many problems with me and how I view things per se. They still love me so and so in so far as I love them I wish to make a positive impression upon them which in reality is only causing me to draw to negative conclusions that is I will never get out of this mode of having to impress people just to make them happy. It is a contradiction so far that arises both suppression of intellect and then also escalates emotional needs as well.

I tend to talk about the issue a great deal with other people even to the point where my fantasies become so great I can hardly handle my present reality as such. I despair and get depressed I feel as if my desire to become a woman means I am trying to run from something that is a deeper problem. When instead I could be fleeing my mind because my desires are being suppressed. It causes a great deal of discomfort in my social and family life at times which leads to isolation of sorts.

As my symptoms phase out and obscure my problem my condition worsens to the point where I start seeing my dreams fade and become nothing almost for no reason. It leads to a sense of paranoia hearing voices in my head that contradict my desires but are represented per se as desires though not ones that are real problems nor things I desire whatsoever. Because I am a determined person and know my head is aligned well with the external world I tend to get myself out of my depression modes knowing their is always tomorrow and if tomorrow does not come I have lived well in trying to find it.

This why like others people with these feelings end in tragedy determines me to find the depth of my problems and bring them face to face with myself in a real world to live out my problem of desiring to be a woman with becoming an actual one.

That is the only solution that I have come up with and all things seem to point out to me that this will be a good thing given my mindset and my intuitive understanding of the problem.

Although a part of me thinks it can manage evading this problem and letting it fall out of my grasp and just live with these thoughts and make good impressions upon other people. Another part of me says you are lying to yourself and you are going to make the problem even worse so by thinking you can do this.

This indeed will happen and only solution is to run away from my current environment and go live in an area where people will accept me. When I was 13 my visions of becoming a woman always included me being surrounded by a feminine environment completely cut off from any masculine presence. This would make it more comfortable for me to become a woman with other women helping me and thus make a more integrable part of my conscious that I am a woman.

This has the possibility of dissociating oneself from a past self that is a masculine self which I do not at all object to in the slightest. This is to say that I would be sort of force feminized in a way but I would be forced in a way where I desired it to be forced. Sort of called a faux feminization process.

This would be my dream to all of the sudden be swept away far away from my surroundings into a new environs which had compassion on my situation one my current environment never will. I feel this would allow me to truly express myself. Thanks for the sympathy and support but do not feel sorry for me this is who I am and I need to face it and be strong or else be swallowed up in it. I prefer to be a martyr that accepts the suffering rather then to impose suffering on others.

Hello Geist - welcome.

No, I don't think your problem is minor at all - there's a gender issue, and it's caught up with all kinds of serious stress on your ability to feel comfortable in yourself as a whole person. This must be very, very frightening and exhausting.

Obviously any advice any of us could give on the gender issue is inflected by our own beliefs and experiences, and I'm sure you have seen that a lot from the world around you. I would say, though, that what you need above and beyond anything at the moment is just support to figure this out slowly for yourself, according to your own deepest-held beliefs, while you meet all the other demands of life. You are on a hard road, but support and caring can help you get through the tough times until you have a much surer sense of yourself. The road really can and will get better if you get the right support in place.

Do you have a therapist? I would say a very skilled, non-judgemental therapist would be extremely helpful right now. It's not always easy to find one, no matter what your difficulties are - lots on this forum have struggled with that! Is it something you've investigated?

I'm really impressed by the skills that you already have to survive this - the healthy intellectual life you describe is a wonderful asset, and you are strong to have developed this given what you have been going through. I think that intellect and the insight you are showing about your situation are and will continue to be wonderful assets for you....

Stay safe.

Jones

Actually no I do not have a therapist first off I do not desire to let my parents have the slightest hint I have a problem. Secondly I do not have the money to pay for one. That is why I was hoping to find some to chat with or some that were retired from their profession but still willing to give good advice out.

Giest

I don't have any words of advice - just wanted to say welcome and that my heart goes out to you. I'm glad you feel safe enough to share a little of your pain and heartache and battle here... I haven't been in your shoes, and I don't know quite what it is like, but some of what you write seem to echo things I have heard people say or write here (and things I have felt) about different battles.

Have you looked into finding t that maybe comes from a perspective of being able to accept both and be able to help you walk through all the aspects of this - and then explaining to them you are short on funds? I thought I could not afford therapy, and yet found scholarship to get it. It wasn't even posted as availible yet. There are also a lot of low cost clinics out there. Don't let finances stop you entirely... You are worth it. There may be options out there.

You are very right, that downplaying a problem is hardly ever a way to make it go away. You are also right that are are a lot of uneducated people - and well, I'd add there are just plain jerks, and those that don't *want* to even try to understand. I can say for me, I've love to understand more... please feel free to share more (or less) as you find helpful for you...

do take care, and welcome!
~jd

p.s. Beebee - you wrote a great way to put something that I bet could be said to all of us here...

quote:

Please know that you are not crazy, and that you are a good person who deserves to find your deepest desires from life.

ditto.

What different battles do they echo that you seem to have heard. My desires to be a woman are not clearly defined because of my surroundings this makes it more confusing to actual identify my gender identity disorder other then the fact I can intellectually identify and even more so realize that I persistently think about it.

The path that would be of least pain would be for me to seek what I desire and what I feel cultures my being. I am saying that either way one party is going to feel hurt. I will be more consciously hurt at the fact of turning on my parents then they will be of continuing to want me to keep the impression they have of me.

Because I know they have stocked alot into me and that all of the sudden I desire to be something else and they not only see this change as resisting their own instructions they have given me and thus casting doubt on the other children they have to up bring.

And regarding the question my desires to become a woman cause me to isolate myself socially, religiously, and in my relationships because I am not able to identify with the person I seek in these parts of society rather I have to abide by other people's standards.

Dear Geist,

I think JaneDoe has some useful thoughts there on following up therapy. The thing about your situation is that any number of people could give you advice and it could go in all kinds of different directions, and some of it would be useful to you, some not, but chances are it wouldn't get to the heart of the struggle you are in, or give you the ongoing support you need to get through this. Therapy is about a relationship - about working with someone you trust to strengthen your own sense of self, so that you can find the paths that are right for you.

Most who hang out on this board are clients rather than therapists - but we know a few things about finding therapists! Lots of therapists have sliding-scale arrangements where people without money can pay less. There are some community organisations that offer free therapy (free counselling hotlines such as Lifeline should be able to tell you what's available in your area) and often university clinics offer free or low-cost treatment.

I know it's hard to arrange this kind of thing when you are young and still dependent on your parents. But you describe some very serious symptoms - dissociation, confusion, despair, anger, aggression. I believe it is well worth finding a way to shift something somehow so that you have access to the help you need before things get out of your control. You are worth it, and you do need the help. Your parents will benefit from your being more settled in yourself, but more importantly you should, with good help, be able to reconnect more with the rest of your life, so that this isn't so frightening and consuming for you.

Take care,
Jones.

oh Giest, your pain is almost palpable. My heart really goes out to you.

quote:

I can intellectually identify and even more so realize that I persistently think about it.

this reminds me of an example someone gave of a very hard way to change our thinking. If someone says to us, "don't think of green ballons, don't think of green ballons, don't think of green ballons..." what are we thinking of? green ballons. I can understand a little of why being in an environment that you don't feel safe to express your desires is not helping you not have them.

For me, in my own therapy, I want to not think about or deal with or express or explore certain feelings I have, and even certain traumatic events in my life. For me, the very path to change those feelings and/or express them in a heathier way, and/or even just survive the sheer painful nightmare that they are - is by working with them. As I work with them, sometimes they change, sometimes they stay the same, but they always become more integrated into a full me and I become a much more authentic person. It's a very slow and painful process for me.

Your parents love you. They may not like your decision - they may not know how to respond - they may feel angry out of lack of understanding and fear and concern... They may need support to navigate this as well. they may not know other peple who sons or daughters struggling with this. I know my own mother struggled to figure out how to be in relationship with me through my recovery process from trauma and she joined a support group and says it's changed her a lot - and I have to say we have a really great relationship now.

It seems like you feel there are only two options: become a woman and be rejected by your family, or stay as you are and not be who you really are and stay in immense pain. But maybe there are other options? Is there any LGTB groups in your area?

I think you gotta find all the support around you that you can - for your sake and for your family too. Whatever painful roads you have to navigate will be much lighter.

Do keep posting and talking here too....
hang in there,
jd