Looking for an Outsider's Perspecitve

[Aaron2810]

Hello, I am new to the forums. I have found this venue after doing a quick google search for a healthy space to talk with others about my current situation. I am at wits end of where to turn, and if some are willing to help, I am hoping to gain some outside perspectives as to my situation. I deeply apologize for the long post, I just felt the need to give context as to why I have the thoughts I do on the matter.

 

From a young age I have had to wonder about my gender. Throughout time I have had an issue to some degree of gender dysphoria, but my issue is deciding if my past is the determining factor to it, or if something else is at play.

I am a soon to be 21-year-old born male. I was born very sick and haven’t had much luck with staying healthy since. For a large portion of my childhood I was secluded from outside activities from other children due to the mitigating factor of my health. When I could go out though, the males would laugh at me for sneezing or needing medication so often while the females would rather hug me when I got stressed. Due to this factor, my best friend was a female I still hold dear to my heart today. For the sake of this, I am going to call her Anna.

 

I grew up in an abusive environment. My mother is an alcoholic who would and still does at times tell me how worthless or how much of a failure I am as a human being. I grew up with two older brothers, both of which are quite older than I so while I spend time with one of them a fair amount now, I didn’t get a chance to when I was young as both had moved out for school. My father, when not having to work, would stick by me and defend me. We would spend a lot of time together and became really close not only as family but as friends. When given the chance we try to take fishing trips and I still help him with contract writing or construction when I am back in my hometown area.

 

When not in the hospital or bedridden, I would try my best to spend as much time Anna as possible. We would usually end up playing house or trying to reenact Scooby Doo episodes. She was always Daphne and I was always Velma. I always felt I fit Velma’s character better than anyone else on the show as she was clumsy, kind of nerdy, sarcastic, and quite intelligent. Everything I aspired to be aside from the aspect of being clumsy, that just came naturally. Aside from that, we would usually read, play with her dolls, play with Legos, play board games, attempt to do arts and crafts, or watch TV. She would always pick the shows and they would usually be something leaning more feminine such as Totally Spies, Hanna Montana, or Zoey 101. My mother has told me that I used to play dress up while at school with her and would always insist on a pink dress, I don’t remember that though.

 

My exploration as a child primarily lied in the arts. I would participate in any theatre I could (still do), I began taking piano lessons, and I wanted to become a professional dancer. After the first few days of lessons at a dance studio, I was the only male left amongst the students. This did not bother me as most of my friends by this point were female, and most males still bullied me. The issue was, this bothered my instructor. She would regularly call me names such as “princess” or “little girl.” While stretching, she would have me perform different stretches than the other students, some of which involved injuring my groin. Regularly she would instruct other students to either kick me while dancing, or to berate me for being the only male. When I “misbehaved” by doing things such as crying out in pain or complaining, I would either be locked in a boiler closet or out in an unheated mudroom during the winter in an area that would regularly average negative temperatures. If I said anything to my parents, I would either be hit or harmed by her the next lesson. I eventually complained to my parents that I was uncomfortable there without telling them the true reasons for wanting to leave. This was the beginning of my first-grade year. At this point in my life, I would begin to look in the mirror and say to myself that I hated the way I looked, the way I sounded, and who I was. Shortly after leaving the dance group, I was diagnosed with pneumonia and missed another 3 months of classes and almost lost my life.

 

Moving forward in time to fifth grade, Anna informed me that her parents were getting a divorce. Due to this, she would be moving away. At that time, she was my only friend. My last birthday party, we had scheduled to have it at the public pool. I invited all my classmates and all others I could think of. She was the only one to come. After she left, it took about a month before I found another friend. One my prior bullies had saw that I was quite sad one time on the playground and invited me to help him defend a snow bank for “king of the hill.” This was the first time I had really participated in anything such as physical play with others my age and soon found out what it was to get in trouble with the teachers. Shortly after that, we became good friends. For the sake of this, I am going to call him Josh.

While in middle school, he hooked me up on my first “date.” In the end, I became friends with the girl. We would regularly talk but eventually things took an awkward turn when she started asking me about if I thought certain boys in our class were cute or not. By this point in my life, I was accused of being gay several times, but I made it quite clear that I wasn’t to anyone who asked. I have no issues with one being gay, I just personally am not. Her friends would also feel comfortable talking about their periods around me and would occasionally slip up and ask me how mine were forgetting I was male. It was quite odd.

 

In high school I chose to avoid dating. I wanted to focus on music and my studies. By this point I was learning to sing, play the piano, play the saxophones, play the trombone, play the accordion, and several others. I was planning to attend music school and double major in jazz and political science then use my degree to go to law school. Currently, that is still my plan and I am in the works to getting said degrees. My high school years were living hell. Shortly after Josh attempted suicide my freshman year, things went downhill for me. I had personally stopped him, but others had hated me for doing so as many didn’t like Josh. A group of people was formed by one of the girls I had in my friend circle in middle school in order to bully me. Knowing my primary appeal to life was the concern for others and emotions in general, she would find ways to either convince me that I had harmed others by some manner, or that I should harm myself by some manner. Most of the time that involved either attempting to coerce me to self-harm or to kill myself. At the same time my mother at home would regularly tell me how much of a failure I was in life, how worthless I was as an individual, how much she loved me, and yet how much I made her want to kill herself. Lucky for me, my self-worth was so low I knew my life was worth something, but it wasn’t worth enough for me to take or harm. Thankfully, I am still here today.

 

After leaving for college, things got a lot better. Most of my friends in school were female and/or LGBT+. One of my closest friends to date I met while here at school.

All of this leads me to my issue. As I have moved out for school and am now in my own apartment, I have begun to wonder about my gender. All of my friends that are female have been treated great by my mother. Anna became a part of the family and like a daughter to her. At times this led me to wonder if she would rather have had a female and that is why she abuses me the way she has. When I was younger I would day dream of becoming female and would pretend it was happening in hopes of a happier life. I suffer from a nightmare disorder. Every night I close my eyes I see something more horrific than I ever wish for anyone to experience. One commonality holds between these dreams though, in all of them I am female. I own all female socks, many of them knee highs. Much of my clothing is either pastels or neutral colors. I am starting to look at dresses and skirts online wondering if maybe that is the lifestyle I should try.

My hesitation to doing so is my history and my present situation. I don’t have many friends, and I know that if I were to try to transition or explore and if any of them found out, I would lose many of them. My family on my father’s side would shun me. That is an aspect I really do not wish to have happen. I am Christian and have a great and highly supporting church family and I truly do not know how they would react. I have a feeling it would not be well. And most importantly I do not know if that is truly the path I want to look down in my life. It is different than everything I have ever known, and I do not know if it is one brought on by thoughts of my own making or by pressure and conditioning from my childhood. Again, I apologize for the long the long post. I am just hoping to hear some opinions from some with experience or an outside perspective as… I am scared. I don’t know what to do and I am scared to move forward.

 

Best,

Aaron

[VickySGV]

Welcome to the forums. I too was born with a hyper active immune system that made my body attack itself and keep me bedridden for long periods.  I also experienced an alcoholic parent and my other parent was their co-dependent.  I was the oldest of 5 however.

 

As you see, your story has its unique parts but you share huge portions of the lives of the rest of us here. 

[tracy_j]

Hi Aaron,

 

Thank you for your introduction. Your experiences have great similarity with many here. I particularly noticed your nightmare disorder. I do wonder if I had that when I was little. However it was then, I have adjusted to things and now just accept that I can dream most anything, however distressing it would be in real life. Also in my experiences (last job in healthcare particularly) I came across many bad situations so learnt to be ready for shocks. I suppose I learnt to control and make use of it. It is something I have to be a bit careful of though as it is easy for me to (almost like narcolepsy) drop into a daydream when reading or listening to a situation and at times so realistically like being there. I find it useful for empathy as it is easier to understand someone (although not always correctly) if you can instantly jump into their body.

 

Please don't hesitate to join in. There are friendly people here with much experience.

 

Tracy