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Gender Dysphoria or Something else? (possible TMI)


Lost247365

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Lost247365

Is it possible to mistake gender dysphoria for something else. In particular, for a kink or fetish?

I ask as just about every single day since I was in seventh grade I have had this fantasy of becoming the opposite sex. Since I was (romantically and aesthetically) attracted to the other sex, I just always considered this fantasy a fetish. It was one of the things that really confused me when I first heard of asexuality. Ultimately, I came to the conclusion that while these fantasies were definitely arousing, that they were not related to any desire for sex. But over the last few years I have come to wonder more and more if it really is a just a fantasy.

*the following is mini version of my life story, it is a bit long so feel free to skip it if you want*

Even as a kid I have never been the most masculine of people. While I liked some masculine interests like comics and male centered video games I hated sports and preferred more passive activities. While I mainly "associated" with the boys in elementary school, my favorite playmate as a small child was my female older cousin. When my mother told me she was pregnant I told her that I hoped it was going to be a baby sister. That said, I love and am very close to my younger brother.

Puberty horrified me. The way my child's mind saw it, I didn't want to grow up. I didn't want to get big and hairy and start acting in the overly macho way that I saw other men act. I even tried to shave myself down there one time to abate the changes my body was undergoing. While I did get pretty tall I fortunately did not end up very hairy or overly macho which relieved me.

At least until when I started the 7th grade and the fantasies began. Back then I thought it was just some perversion I had developed as I started to develop romantic attractions to the girls in my class. The idea that I might actually want to be one of the girls did cross my mind but was always quickly dismissed. I was ashamed of this and thought I would keep this as my deep dark secret until I died.

Everyday since then I have had this fantasy in various intensity. The fact that it was a very arousing fantasy only made me more sure it was just a fetish as I entered adult hood. Then about ~6 years ago I started to play an online multiplayer role playing video game. In it I played a female character (as I almost always do...) and inadvertantly convinced several people that I actually was a girl. I quickly told them the truth, but for a short time I was ecstatic. There was something about being thought of as a girl that made me very happy. I liked that feeling and hated when I had to correct them.

And slowly I began to think my fantasies might not just be a kink, but might actually be gender dysphoria. But, even now I keep having doubts. Most source I read about gender dysphoria tell about wanting people who want to be the other sex for as long as they can remember. I didn't think about something like that till middle school, and tried my best to bury such thoughts. The thoughts just won't stay buried. The sources I have read also make gender dysphoria sound like the opposite of phantom limb syndrome. But, again, that is not my experience. I was distressed about puberty but after it was over I felt quite comfortable...but I just keep thinking how much more I would like be (or to have been born) female and hate being male.

A couple of months ago, just right before signing up here at AVEN, a friend I made from the game I mentioned above contacted me to let me know she was going to start to transition to become a woman. I was shocked, and so happy she came out to me that she became the first person that I told about my fantasy. I felt relieved to tell her. I decided then that I was gender fluid and for a little while felt content. But ever since that our conversation the fantasy has been coming back to me in a vengeance...and just won't go away. I never used to think about things like cross dressing but now I do. I keep wanting to know what I would look like as a girl. It just keeps building in intensity till I think it is going to eat me up inside. Indulging my libdo and "scratching that itch" used to make the feelings go away. But now all it does is help abate the feeling, making it manageable...but it won't totally go away anymore.

What do all of you think? Is this gender dysphoria? Or is it just me being neurotic over a fetish? Or maybe a combination of the two? Something else entirely? After doing some googling I think I have my answer, but I thought I knew the answer before and now find myself thinking the exact opposite is true.

When I finally realized I was asexual it relieved me of so much anxiety, and I can't help but think if I could just make up my mind on this it would ease the pressure in the same way.

When i saw Aven had a gender sub-forum on Gender I was so happy! I have no one I can talk to this about. No family or friends that I feel comfortable revealing this to. The only person I can think of is my transfriend and I really don't want to burden her with my problems when she is already going through so much. So I was hoping some of you might share your thoughts. The only reason I haven't asked this before now was that I wanted to become more established here first. At least till I had a 100 or more posts. But last night I felt so anxious I thought I was about to jump out of my skin and decide to finally ask tonight.

If you read this till now, thank you. I know it was long and a bit tmi, but I really appreciate it.

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If it's arousing it sounds like a fetish.

There are men who don't like sports; it's a real thing and they aren't automatically feminine in other ways. Onision doesn't like sports.

You may have liked being taken as a woman online because it's empowering to trick people, be what you're not/better, etc. If you don't have dysphoria; look at your chest and feel it's wrong and there need to be breasts there and your penis needs to be taken off, then it doesn't seem you're transsexual. You could just want to crossdress; drag queens don't actually identify as female (though the tradition is to refer to them with female pronouns when in drag). Look up stuff on Drag queens with breast implants.

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butterflydreams

The way I've come to look at it is like this. I didn't know about trans anything years ago. I mean, I did, but it wasn't exactly a positive portrayal. People are generally far more familiar with kinks, fetishes, etc. Maybe you saw it as a kink/fetish because you didn't know what else to call it.

It's true that some people know they want to be the other sex since forever, but it's not universally true across the board. That's just an easy narrative for anyone to understand. Did you understand gender as a concept when you were 5? I sure didn't. All I knew was I "wasn't right" and everything felt just...wrong. I never understood why, and spent essentially all my life trying to understand; why wasn't I like everybody else? Gender was like a super quiet quantum string in the background of all my searching, but I couldn't ever see it for what it was until the past year or so.

Sometimes, becoming aroused by dressing as a woman, or the idea of being a woman is a fetish. Sometimes it's not. Only you can really determine that. It is a pretty common one from what I understand. There's a very fine line though, between fetish and simply feeling good and excited. That's something you'll have to determine for yourself :) For me, I first understood that dressing in female clothes in the apartment at night made me feel good...like really good. In a way I never had before. I was afraid it was an arousal thing though. That didn't end up being my truth. It was a very different kind of feeling good than arousal.

At one time there was the a theory put forward of "autogynephilia" which was supposed to describe this kind of thing, being attracted to yourself as a woman (presuming you were AMAB). It's kind of messed up though, and at this point, I believe it's been mostly discredited.

What I'd suggest is trying other things, and just paying attention to how you feel. Ultimately, that's the only thing that can really guide you. I have to disagree with Star Bit a little that dysphoria is easily identifiable as looking at chest and feeling there should be breasts there, or feeling that your penis is wrong. Sometimes, sure, I believe it's that obvious. But humans are seriously complex. And the histories we all have, experiences we've had, how we grew up, all that stuff can cloud the "clearly I'm supposed to have breasts" idea really fast.

Dysphoria is just a force. In the absence of anything to act on, it does nothing. Inside you, a unique person, it could manifest in any number of ways. It might even manifest as an obvious "breasts should be here" kind of way, but you don't know how to handle that, so you develop coping mechanisms. I coped for years by building walls around myself, and putting all my social interactions on autopilot. Things weren't right, I didn't understand how. I always knew they hadn't been right, and assumed they never would or could be. I didn't want to hurt myself, but I didn't know what else to do. The world wasn't meant for me it seemed. So I checked out.

There's layers and layers and layers in this kind of thing. It can be hard and scary to pull them away, but if you want to get to the bottom of this, that's what you have to do. It's an undoubtedly exciting and worthwhile journey though. One I think everyone should take, regardless of what they conclude. I hope you're able to enjoy yours :)

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Lost247365

If it's arousing it sounds like a fetish.

There are men who don't like sports; it's a real thing and they aren't automatically feminine in other ways. Onision doesn't like sports.

You may have liked being taken as a woman online because it's empowering to trick people, be what you're not/better, etc. If you don't have dysphoria; look at your chest and feel it's wrong and there need to be breasts there and your penis needs to be taken off, then it doesn't seem you're transsexual. You could just want to crossdress; drag queens don't actually identify as female (though he tradition is to refer to them with female pronouns when in drag). Look up stuff on Drag queens with breast implants.

That is exactly why I had my doubts, and everything you say makes a lot of sense. It's just that the feelings were so intense I felt like I was about to have a panic attack, and felt that it had to be something more. But I don't think what I am feeling is the same as the sensations you are describing, so you are most likely right. I probably am just being neurotic after all.

I will definitely look into drag queens like you suggest. And Let me say thank you for the thoughtful reply and all the advice.

The way I've come to look at it is like this. I didn't know about trans anything years ago. I mean, I did, but it wasn't exactly a positive portrayal. People are generally far more familiar with kinks, fetishes, etc. Maybe you saw it as a kink/fetish because you didn't know what else to call it.

It's true that some people know they want to be the other sex since forever, but it's not universally true across the board. That's just an easy narrative for anyone to understand. Did you understand gender as a concept when you were 5? I sure didn't. All I knew was I "wasn't right" and everything felt just...wrong. I never understood why, and spent essentially all my life trying to understand; why wasn't I like everybody else? Gender was like a super quiet quantum string in the background of all my searching, but I couldn't ever see it for what it was until the past year or so.

Sometimes, becoming aroused by dressing as a woman, or the idea of being a woman is a fetish. Sometimes it's not. Only you can really determine that. It is a pretty common one from what I understand. There's a very fine line though, between fetish and simply feeling good and excited. That's something you'll have to determine for yourself :) For me, I first understood that dressing in female clothes in the apartment at night made me feel good...like really good. In a way I never had before. I was afraid it was an arousal thing though. That didn't end up being my truth. It was a very different kind of feeling good than arousal.

At one time there was the a theory put forward of "autogynephilia" which was supposed to describe this kind of thing, being attracted to yourself as a woman (presuming you were AMAB). It's kind of messed up though, and at this point, I believe it's been mostly discredited.

What I'd suggest is trying other things, and just paying attention to how you feel. Ultimately, that's the only thing that can really guide you. I have to disagree with Star Bit a little that dysphoria is easily identifiable as looking at chest and feeling there should be breasts there, or feeling that your penis is wrong. Sometimes, sure, I believe it's that obvious. But humans are seriously complex. And the histories we all have, experiences we've had, how we grew up, all that stuff can cloud the "clearly I'm supposed to have breasts" idea really fast.

Dysphoria is just a force. In the absence of anything to act on, it does nothing. Inside you, a unique person, it could manifest in any number of ways. It might even manifest as an obvious "breasts should be here" kind of way, but you don't know how to handle that, so you develop coping mechanisms. I coped for years by building walls around myself, and putting all my social interactions on autopilot. Things weren't right, I didn't understand how. I always knew they hadn't been right, and assumed they never would or could be. I didn't want to hurt myself, but I didn't know what else to do. The world wasn't meant for me it seemed. So I checked out.

There's layers and layers and layers in this kind of thing. It can be hard and scary to pull them away, but if you want to get to the bottom of this, that's what you have to do. It's an undoubtedly exciting and worthwhile journey though. One I think everyone should take, regardless of what they conclude. I hope you're able to enjoy yours :)

That is exactly what I was thinking. That what I have been experiencing might have been something else all along.

Part of the reason I started rethinking if it was just a fetish is that I had heard exactly what you are saying here. That it can be expressed in different ways and ages. That, combined with my experiences on the game made me start to question myself. Then this more recent episode began after my friend came out to me. It started out feeling arousing like it usually does, but it kept coming back in such intensity that it started to become unpleasant and then it became so distressing that I thought I might explode the last couple of nights.

I don't know what it was, but something was definitely wrong. Something I am going to have to figure out on my own probably.

I believe you are right about trying different things and figuring things out for myself. But I do believe that just being able to discuss this might help me begin to do just that. Let me also say, that almost everything you said resonates with me. Especially the part about building walls around oneself. I think I have been doing something similar for a long time.

Thank you so much for replying.

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Your experiences sound very similar to my own Lost247365; I fantasized about being a woman in a sexual context during my adolescence, however I never consciously recognized the significance of such fantasizes and instead dismissed them as idle thoughts at the time. Things of such a nature never escalated beyond the fantasizes and they started to subside in their prominence when I graduated from High School. That is up until five to four months prior where I started to question my gender identity and in doing so brought some clarification to the fantasizes that I had in my adolescence.

As far as answering the question of gender identity from your original post I very much second what Hadley already posted, the only assistance that others can providing to you here are different perspectives on the subject and references for you to research on your own; this is a puzzle only you can unravel as it is unique to your nature.

From what I've learned about myself my dysphoria is chiefly mental, in that I'm indifferent to being male but I know that if I were female I would be in greater balance with my own nature. The dysphoria is relatively mild (although it does fluctuate at times to become quite disconcerting) in comparison to what other individuals possess; however because I don't have any body or social dysphoria and I don't concur with medical transitions for myself, I sometimes feel like I will live a life that is 70% to 80% fulfilling instead of something closer to 100%.

You may find this website of some assistance as well as this graphic.

A little off topic, but I've often wondered if those who transition (in the transgender or transsexual population) are more fulfilled than those who do not because doing so would make the latter set of individuals feel worse; or are we all in the same boat and some individuals need to transition in order to get to at least the same position as who don't want to transition. Anyone else care to share their thoughts or insights on the matter?

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A little off topic, but I've often wondered if those who transition (in the transgender or transsexual population) are more fulfilled than those who do not because doing so would make the latter set of individuals feel worse; or are we all in the same boat and some individuals need to transition in order to get to at least the same position as who don't want to transition. Anyone else care to share their thoughts or insights on the matter?

I think that there is no such thing as an absolute level of happiness or comfort. I think that what matters in life is the contrast; one cannot really be happy without having been sad at one point, or you just cannot distinguish what "happy" is. As such, I think every human being scales their experiences to make it such that their happiest moment is "happy" and their saddest moment is "sad", whatever those two moments may be.

In going with that model, every one who seeks "happiness" is really seeking a positive derivative on that axis of happy --> sad. In other words, people who are seeking happiness are really just seeking "more happy" than they are right now, not an absolute ideal of "happy".

So, in this model, a trans person seeking happiness can do so in whatever ways are available to them and to whatever extent they are capable. A trans person who surgically and/or hormonally transitions is seeking a state of higher happiness than they were in before; but so is a trans person who cannot transition (be it for medical, financial, or other reasons) but who is doing other things to seek happiness. Is a trans woman who wears lacy underwear more or less happy than a trans woman who has gotten a vagina? I don't think it makes sense to ask that question, because happiness, as I have discussed, is a relative concept that must be put in the context of the rest of that person's life. Maybe one of those women is happier than the other, not specifically because of what measures she has taken to express as a woman, but because this matters more to her than the other, for whatever reason.

I hope my ramblings make sense. The moral of the story is that happiness (or comfort, which may be a better word for discussing dysphoria, but just go through above and substitute) is a relative quantity and matters only in relation to past states. A trans woman who wears lacy underwear under her suite and presents otherwise as a man can be just as happy as a trans woman who goes for the full surgery and hormone regime. It all depends on what these women want out of life and how much their comfort/happiness is increased when they take these actions, not the actual actions themselves.

TL;DR: We all have the same capacity to feel fulfilled; the actions don't matter as much as the goals and previous states.

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TL;DR: We all have the same capacity to feel fulfilled; the actions don't matter as much as the goals and previous states.

I agree with you that ones happiness is defined by that same individuals experiences with sadness (trust me, look at my avatar ;) ) and that everyone (I think m1703.gif ) has some capability to be fulfilled in some manner or another. But I was more so referencing that stereotypical (DFAB identifies as male, vice versa) transgender or transsexual persons are not content or fulfilled (on some level: high, low, median) by their very nature. And so, I was asking if those who transition gain more fulfillment from a transition than those who don't for whatever reason.

However, after thinking on the matter for a period of time I believe I've answered my own question. Yes and no, chalked up to human variability. Some individuals who transition may feel more fulfilled than those who don't because transitioning is in greater balance with their own unique nature, vice versa.

And you thought your post was confusing, that is unless I interpreted what you wrote as something other than your intentions and misrepresented it here. :P

Just to clarify I define being content and being fulfilled in this post as being in concurrence with ones own nature.

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Lost247365

Your experiences sound very similar to my own Lost247365; I fantasized about being a woman in a sexual context during my adolescence, however I never consciously recognized the significance of such fantasizes and instead dismissed them as idle thoughts or musings at the time. Things of such a nature never escalated beyond the fantasizes and they started to subside in their prominence when I graduated from High School. That is up until five to four months prior where I started to question my gender identity and in doing so brought some clarification to the fantasizes that I had in my adolescence.

As far as answering the question of gender identity from your original post I very much second what Hadley already posted, the only assistance that others can providing to you here are different perspectives on the subject and references for you to research on your own; this is a puzzle only you can unravel as it is unique to your nature.

From what I've learned about myself my dysphoria is chiefly mental, in that I'm indifferent to being male but I know that if I were female I would be in greater balance with my own nature. The dysphoria is relatively mild (although it does fluctuate at times to become quite disconcerting) in comparison to what other individuals possess; however because I don't have any body or social dysphoria and I don't concur with medical transitions for myself, I sometimes feel like I will always live life that is 70% to 80% fulfilling instead of something closer to 100%.

You may find this website of some assistance as well as this graphic.

A little off topic, but I've often wondered if those who transition (in the transgender or transsexual population) are more fulfilled than those who do not because doing so would make the latter set of individuals feel worse; or are we all in the same boat and some individuals need to transition in order to get to at least the same position as who don't want to transition. Anyone else care to share their thoughts or insights on the matter?

And I want to thank you and everyone else for those perspective. I am still trying to figure things out, but since posting this, I don't feel as distressed as I did the other day. It still has not gone down to the level it was at during beginning of the year but It is much better.

If it is dysphoria I think it sounds similar to the type you experience. I am kind of indifferent to my body but would be way more in balance if I was female. Using the chart you linked I would say my body dysphoria is a 6-7 and a social score a little over 7. When I posted this I think I would rate my mental score as a 10, but now I would say its more around an 8.

The blog looks very interesting. I will look over it tonight.

Thank you again.

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TL;DR: We all have the same capacity to feel fulfilled; the actions don't matter as much as the goals and previous states.

I agree with you that ones happiness is defined by that same individuals experiences with sadness (trust me, look at my avatar ;) ) and that everyone (I think m1703.gif ) has some capability to be fulfilled in some manner or another. But I was more so referencing that stereotypical (DFAB identifies as male, vice versa) transgender or transsexual persons are not content or fulfilled (on some level: high, low, median) by their very nature. And so, I was asking if those who transition gain more fulfillment from a transition than those who don't for whatever reason.

However, after thinking on the matter for a period of time I believe I've answered my own question. Yes and no, chalked up to human variability. Some individuals who transition may feel more fulfilled than those who don't because transitioning is in greater balance with their own unique nature, vice versa.

And you thought your post was confusing, that is unless I interpreted what you wrote as something other than your intentions and misrepresented it here. :P

Just to clarify I define being content and being fulfilled in this post as being in concurrence with ones own nature.

You interpreted perfectly ;)

And I'm glad we could help Lost. Rule #1 of gender is that it all takes time, for some more than others, but I'm glad we could help you get to a place where you can be calm and think :) Let us know if we can help any more.

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Okay, Lost? I'm just going to start by saying I strongly suspect you might be me. Or at least a mirror image.

There are different sorts of dysphoria, and it can be totally unidentifiable at the time but obvious in retrospect. I didn't identify anything as gender dysphoria for me until a bit over a year ago at age 22, but in retrospect, I've been dealing with it since puberty - so middle school. A lot of the problem was that I'd developed pretty strong mental blocks to drown out dysphoric outcries, so I had to experience something gendered in a way I hadn't ever before to circumvent that (I was called a word that totally freaked me out, because it somehow seemed entirely counter to my being while being technically applicable: "boyfriend"). Of course, when I was just starting puberty, I was freaked out by all this, but I was totally unaware of transgenderism and, having no alternative, I learned to cope, building those mental walls, learning not to feel things, coming up with mental excuses and explanations for my behavior, compulsively playing long hours as female characters in RPGs and getting anxious when I didn't have time or tried male characters, thinking I'd gotten over everything, and burying everything into a great big tangled Gordian Knot that the explanation "No, I'm just trans," once I learned to really accept it last January, sliced through like Alexander. This unfortunately also broke down the walls and let the hordes of gender dysphoria in to tug at my hair follicles and prod at my bones and turn everyday pronouns into assaults on my being, but I was so elated with my life narrative suddenly making sense, and me feeling connected to my past and future, and my rediscovered ability to really, seriously have emotions about myself and care for myself that it was SOOO worth it. And I'm coping again, this time in a healthy way with gender transition and movement towards proper presentation.

Here's an article about dysphoria that presents a version that you might not have heard about and might ring true with you:

http://anagnori.tumblr.com/post/75333093314/the-more-subtle-kind-of-gender-dysphoria

Potential TMI for what follows because it's talking in the abstract about asexy fetish stuff. Also, what's below is kind of sort of stuff I've never disclosed to anyone ever and it's super embarrassing and vulnerable and it feels so great to get it out.

So, If you're a trans girl with no understanding of transgenderism to the point you don't know it exists, you're asexual, you're just hitting puberty in your middle school years, and everyone insists that you're a man who's about to go through a heterosexual awakening, of course you're going to interpret any desire to be female as a fetish! No other explanation, no other possibility is provided to you. So I did! Transformation fantasies got me aroused (in a non-masturbatory way because sex repulsion meant doing anything physical would kill the arousal and make me cry), and they were just about the only thing that ever did. I tended to base them around mythology, being a history/fantasy geek, and they got really elaborate in the storytelling but basically never really included anything sexual apart from the sex transformations (which were all tied in with submissiveness, too - I and the transformation were usually in someone else's control, and unwanted on the conscious level [but not subconsciously]). I actually owe my early formative identity as a writer to less vulnerably transgender, totally non-sexual and mostly non-transformative offshoots of these stories, including novels written in high school. I also had fantasies where I just started out female and did awesome stuff like fight dragons, and I learned to dream semi-vividly to tweak my gender if I somehow started out the wrong one (or to make that tweak into a transformation narrative), and as I said before, I grew semi-reliant on playing female characters in RPGs, both videogame and tabletop, starting with Pokémon Sapphire in 2003 - so the remake Alpha Sapphire is pretty special to me, and not just because I'm the very best like no one ever was, but because Professor Birch was the first person in my life to ever really give me a choice. None of these characters I played were particularly girly, though - just like me - and I never crossdressed except in subtle ways that were entirely integrated into my everyday wardrobe, like knee socks. I suspect that's because I was scared I'd be found out if things spilled out of the safety of my mental space, and because it'd swiftly become impossible to remain in denial about the whole thing if I physically manifested it.

For a long time, this "fetish" was why I considered myself straight - a false narrative that only began to shift when I noticed I got squishes/crushes on people regardless of gender, redefining myself as pan/bisexual. I then realized I'm ace once I figured out my fantasies never actually involved sexual behavior, I never actually feel sexually attracted to anyone, I'm super sex-repulsed to the point physical masturbation feels like violation, and basically everything about asexuality rang true with me to the point that finding out that asexuality, which I already knew existed but didn't really get, was actually me kind of sort of made me run around screaming with happiness and scaring everyone in my college dorm. Me being ace now made the fantasies make no sense anymore, since they weren't a manifestation of sexual attraction to girls... until I redefined them as a manifestation of my gender.

Here's what Julia Serano has to say about the subject in her fantastic book Whipping Girl: A Transsexual Woman on Sexism and the Scapegoating of Femininity, in Chapter 15:

“When I hit puberty, my newly found attraction to women spilled into my dreams of becoming a girl. For me, sexuality became a strange combination of jealousy, self-loathing, and lust. Because when you isolate an impressionable transgender teen and bombard her with billboard ads baring bikini-clad women and boy’s locker room trash talk about this girl’s tits and that girl’s ass, then she will learn to turn her gender identity into a fetish.
“So without ever having seen pulp fiction or hardcore porn, my thirteen-year-old brain started concocting scenarios straight out of SM handbooks. Most of my fantasies began with my abduction: I’d turn to putty in the hands of some twisted man who would turn me into a woman as part of his evil plan. It’s called forced feminization, and it’s not really about sex. It is about turning the humiliation you feel into pleasure, transforming the loss of male privilege into the best fuck ever.”


That bolded sentence is bolded because it's kind of one of the most important things I've read in my life. So... yeah, Julia Serano's experiences don't entirely overlap with mine (she's bi, I'm ace, and the twisted man for me was usually a witch or goddess or something that could be anywhere between evil and benign) but what I'm trying to say is that this can very well be a fetish that is also a totally legitimate manifestation of real gender dysphoria. The two don't contradict.

Okay, I'm just going to try not to blush so hard my face hurts now.

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butterflydreams

Wow...Kappamaki, that was really great. Thank you so much for sharing that! It's amazing when you've gone through so much of your life in isolation and then here people share stories that finally make you feel like you're not alone.

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Lost247365

Okay, Lost? I'm just going to start by saying I strongly suspect you might be me. Or at least a mirror image.

There are different sorts of dysphoria, and it can be totally unidentifiable at the time but obvious in retrospect. I didn't identify anything as gender dysphoria for me until a bit over a year ago at age 22, but in retrospect, I've been dealing with it since puberty - so middle school. A lot of the problem was that I'd developed pretty strong mental blocks to drown out dysphoric outcries, so I had to experience something gendered in a way I hadn't ever before to circumvent that (I was called a word that totally freaked me out, because it somehow seemed entirely counter to my being while being technically applicable: "boyfriend"). Of course, when I was just starting puberty, I was freaked out by all this, but I was totally unaware of transgenderism and, having no alternative, I learned to cope, building those mental walls, learning not to feel things, coming up with mental excuses and explanations for my behavior, compulsively playing long hours as female characters in RPGs and getting anxious when I didn't have time or tried male characters, thinking I'd gotten over everything, and burying everything into a great big tangled Gordian Knot that the explanation "No, I'm just trans," once I learned to really accept it last January, sliced through like Alexander. This unfortunately also broke down the walls and let the hordes of gender dysphoria in to tug at my hair follicles and prod at my bones and turn everyday pronouns into assaults on my being, but I was so elated with my life narrative suddenly making sense, and me feeling connected to my past and future, and my rediscovered ability to really, seriously have emotions about myself and care for myself that it was SOOO worth it. And I'm coping again, this time in a healthy way with gender transition and movement towards proper presentation.

Here's an article about dysphoria that presents a version that you might not have heard about and might ring true with you:

http://anagnori.tumblr.com/post/75333093314/the-more-subtle-kind-of-gender-dysphoria

Potential TMI for what follows because it's talking in the abstract about asexy fetish stuff. Also, what's below is kind of sort of stuff I've never disclosed to anyone ever and it's super embarrassing and vulnerable and it feels so great to get it out.

So, If you're a trans girl with no understanding of transgenderism to the point you don't know it exists, you're asexual, you're just hitting puberty in your middle school years, and everyone insists that you're a man who's about to go through a heterosexual awakening, of course you're going to interpret any desire to be female as a fetish! No other explanation, no other possibility is provided to you. So I did! Transformation fantasies got me aroused (in a non-masturbatory way because sex repulsion meant doing anything physical would kill the arousal and make me cry), and they were just about the only thing that ever did. I tended to base them around mythology, being a history/fantasy geek, and they got really elaborate in the storytelling but basically never really included anything sexual apart from the sex transformations (which were all tied in with submissiveness, too - I and the transformation were usually in someone else's control, and unwanted on the conscious level [but not subconsciously]). I actually owe my early formative identity as a writer to less vulnerably transgender, totally non-sexual and mostly non-transformative offshoots of these stories, including novels written in high school. I also had fantasies where I just started out female and did awesome stuff like fight dragons, and I learned to dream semi-vividly to tweak my gender if I somehow started out the wrong one (or to make that tweak into a transformation narrative), and as I said before, I grew semi-reliant on playing female characters in RPGs, both videogame and tabletop, starting with Pokémon Sapphire in 2003 - so the remake Alpha Sapphire is pretty special to me, and not just because I'm the very best like no one ever was, but because Professor Birch was the first person in my life to ever really give me a choice. None of these characters I played were particularly girly, though - just like me - and I never crossdressed except in subtle ways that were entirely integrated into my everyday wardrobe, like knee socks. I suspect that's because I was scared I'd be found out if things spilled out of the safety of my mental space, and because it'd swiftly become impossible to remain in denial about the whole thing if I physically manifested it.

For a long time, this "fetish" was why I considered myself straight - a false narrative that only began to shift when I noticed I got squishes/crushes on people regardless of gender, redefining myself as pan/bisexual. I then realized I'm ace once I figured out my fantasies never actually involved sexual behavior, I never actually feel sexually attracted to anyone, I'm super sex-repulsed to the point physical masturbation feels like violation, and basically everything about asexuality rang true with me to the point that finding out that asexuality, which I already knew existed but didn't really get, was actually me kind of sort of made me run around screaming with happiness and scaring everyone in my college dorm. Me being ace now made the fantasies make no sense anymore, since they weren't a manifestation of sexual attraction to girls... until I redefined them as a manifestation of my gender.

Here's what Julia Serano has to say about the subject in her fantastic book Whipping Girl: A Transsexual Woman on Sexism and the Scapegoating of Femininity, in Chapter 15:

“When I hit puberty, my newly found attraction to women spilled into my dreams of becoming a girl. For me, sexuality became a strange combination of jealousy, self-loathing, and lust. Because when you isolate an impressionable transgender teen and bombard her with billboard ads baring bikini-clad women and boy’s locker room trash talk about this girl’s tits and that girl’s ass, then she will learn to turn her gender identity into a fetish.

“So without ever having seen pulp fiction or hardcore porn, my thirteen-year-old brain started concocting scenarios straight out of SM handbooks. Most of my fantasies began with my abduction: I’d turn to putty in the hands of some twisted man who would turn me into a woman as part of his evil plan. It’s called forced feminization, and it’s not really about sex. It is about turning the humiliation you feel into pleasure, transforming the loss of male privilege into the best fuck ever.”

That bolded sentence is bolded because it's kind of one of the most important things I've read in my life. So... yeah, Julia Serano's experiences don't entirely overlap with mine (she's bi, I'm ace, and the twisted man for me was usually a witch or goddess or something that could be anywhere between evil and benign) but what I'm trying to say is that this can very well be a fetish that is also a totally legitimate manifestation of real gender dysphoria. The two don't contradict.

Okay, I'm just going to try not to blush so hard my face hurts now.

Thank you! Thank you! Thank you!

Your post....just described is what I have going through for the last 20 years of my life!!!

That is it exactly. Word for word.

I think I have read your post a dozen times, and each time what you described mirrored what I have been going through so much I had to get up and walk around just to compose myself and not break down. It is like you were there and saw what I saw and felt what I felt. My hands are trembling so hard right now I can barely type.

Thank you. Thank you. I just don't know what else to say. That was it exactly...thank you!!!

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Lost247365

Wow...Kappamaki, that was really great. Thank you so much for sharing that! It's amazing when you've gone through so much of your life in isolation and then here people share stories that finally make you feel like you're not alone.

Exactly this!

I needed that so much. And thank you too, and everyone. This was exactly what I was needing. Thank you!!!!!!!

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Glad to hear that Kappamaki helped you find some part of yourself Lost247365, guess you're not so lost now huh? ;)

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Lost247365

Glad to hear that Kappamaki helped you find some part of yourself Lost247365, guess you're not so lost now huh? ;)

I guess my signature really is true....

Thank you as well. All of you. Now I just need to figure out how I want to move on from here.

But I finally figured it out. I finally figured it out.....I can't put into words how I am feeling.

Thank you all!

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Take it slow, greater understanding and acceptance will come in time. Dwell on the information for a time and I'm certain you'll know what path to take next.

Motivated by Kappamaki's post I was just about to supplement some more personal details about my, still developing, understanding of my own gender identity to the thread, but when you posted your response to Kappamaki I decided against it (?). Probably for the better at the moment, It's rife with contradictions and I'd rather act as an observer unless I believe I could be of service to another.

Best of luck. :)

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Regarding fetishes and sexual fantasies, I have high regard for

Arousal by Michael Bader, where his central idea is that these serve to counter negative things in order to allow one to feel safe and OK with oneself when having sexual pleasure. So the idea is that they reflect deeper negative things going on, perhaps gender dysphoria. A pretty strong counter to that might be fantasizing about being in a differently-sexed body. I see it as the fantasy itself not directly causing arousal, just removing something that was blocking the way towards it. In his book he explains how all the twisted, judged fantasies people have can be seen as merely ways these individuals overcome negative things going on, and be used as paths to take for healing and growth as people. I appreciate this book for giving a benefit-of-the-doubt, non-judgmental view of fantasies.

Another factor that's been immense in my life is parental neglect and mistreatment. In general society wants to view families as being good, but in my view they are mostly poor and destructive to young people. My own was highly destructive and coming to see this gave me insight about my slow development and lack of recognition of my lack of gender identity not occurring until I was well past puberty. So I view age-based timetables people give about gender identity with some reserve; translating it into different psychological growth stages gives it more applicability to people outside the norm of development.

In my continuing work on figuring myself out, I at some point stopped caring to figure out whether I was this gender or that, and simply asked whether I was uncovering feelings and things I could assert (e.g. "I am not a <gender assigned at birth>" said a few times would bring tears, so yeah, that's something significant!). Whatever random things I can say for sure, great, let's collect those. Like now I see that I just don't identify with anything at all; not social groups, other people, country, age, gender, race, hobbies, anything at all. This is helpful to know. It seems that regarding gender, my being wants to first just shed all the shackles put on it and not identify with anything in the social realm. I've also found myself feeling free to adpot whatever practices I want from any of the gendered palettes. Surely if I make space to freely explore without pressure from others, I'll find things that just jump out at me compared to the others, and be unable to not follow those and demand from others to respect that.

Seconded on the Julia Serano book.

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Okay, Lost? I'm just going to start by saying I strongly suspect you might be me. Or at least a mirror image.

There are different sorts of dysphoria, and it can be totally unidentifiable at the time but obvious in retrospect. I didn't identify anything as gender dysphoria for me until a bit over a year ago at age 22, but in retrospect, I've been dealing with it since puberty - so middle school. A lot of the problem was that I'd developed pretty strong mental blocks to drown out dysphoric outcries, so I had to experience something gendered in a way I hadn't ever before to circumvent that (I was called a word that totally freaked me out, because it somehow seemed entirely counter to my being while being technically applicable: "boyfriend"). Of course, when I was just starting puberty, I was freaked out by all this, but I was totally unaware of transgenderism and, having no alternative, I learned to cope, building those mental walls, learning not to feel things, coming up with mental excuses and explanations for my behavior, compulsively playing long hours as female characters in RPGs and getting anxious when I didn't have time or tried male characters, thinking I'd gotten over everything, and burying everything into a great big tangled Gordian Knot that the explanation "No, I'm just trans," once I learned to really accept it last January, sliced through like Alexander. This unfortunately also broke down the walls and let the hordes of gender dysphoria in to tug at my hair follicles and prod at my bones and turn everyday pronouns into assaults on my being, but I was so elated with my life narrative suddenly making sense, and me feeling connected to my past and future, and my rediscovered ability to really, seriously have emotions about myself and care for myself that it was SOOO worth it. And I'm coping again, this time in a healthy way with gender transition and movement towards proper presentation.

Here's an article about dysphoria that presents a version that you might not have heard about and might ring true with you:

http://anagnori.tumblr.com/post/75333093314/the-more-subtle-kind-of-gender-dysphoria

Potential TMI for what follows because it's talking in the abstract about asexy fetish stuff. Also, what's below is kind of sort of stuff I've never disclosed to anyone ever and it's super embarrassing and vulnerable and it feels so great to get it out.

So, If you're a trans girl with no understanding of transgenderism to the point you don't know it exists, you're asexual, you're just hitting puberty in your middle school years, and everyone insists that you're a man who's about to go through a heterosexual awakening, of course you're going to interpret any desire to be female as a fetish! No other explanation, no other possibility is provided to you. So I did! Transformation fantasies got me aroused (in a non-masturbatory way because sex repulsion meant doing anything physical would kill the arousal and make me cry), and they were just about the only thing that ever did. I tended to base them around mythology, being a history/fantasy geek, and they got really elaborate in the storytelling but basically never really included anything sexual apart from the sex transformations (which were all tied in with submissiveness, too - I and the transformation were usually in someone else's control, and unwanted on the conscious level [but not subconsciously]). I actually owe my early formative identity as a writer to less vulnerably transgender, totally non-sexual and mostly non-transformative offshoots of these stories, including novels written in high school. I also had fantasies where I just started out female and did awesome stuff like fight dragons, and I learned to dream semi-vividly to tweak my gender if I somehow started out the wrong one (or to make that tweak into a transformation narrative), and as I said before, I grew semi-reliant on playing female characters in RPGs, both videogame and tabletop, starting with Pokémon Sapphire in 2003 - so the remake Alpha Sapphire is pretty special to me, and not just because I'm the very best like no one ever was, but because Professor Birch was the first person in my life to ever really give me a choice. None of these characters I played were particularly girly, though - just like me - and I never crossdressed except in subtle ways that were entirely integrated into my everyday wardrobe, like knee socks. I suspect that's because I was scared I'd be found out if things spilled out of the safety of my mental space, and because it'd swiftly become impossible to remain in denial about the whole thing if I physically manifested it.

For a long time, this "fetish" was why I considered myself straight - a false narrative that only began to shift when I noticed I got squishes/crushes on people regardless of gender, redefining myself as pan/bisexual. I then realized I'm ace once I figured out my fantasies never actually involved sexual behavior, I never actually feel sexually attracted to anyone, I'm super sex-repulsed to the point physical masturbation feels like violation, and basically everything about asexuality rang true with me to the point that finding out that asexuality, which I already knew existed but didn't really get, was actually me kind of sort of made me run around screaming with happiness and scaring everyone in my college dorm. Me being ace now made the fantasies make no sense anymore, since they weren't a manifestation of sexual attraction to girls... until I redefined them as a manifestation of my gender.

Here's what Julia Serano has to say about the subject in her fantastic book Whipping Girl: A Transsexual Woman on Sexism and the Scapegoating of Femininity, in Chapter 15:

“When I hit puberty, my newly found attraction to women spilled into my dreams of becoming a girl. For me, sexuality became a strange combination of jealousy, self-loathing, and lust. Because when you isolate an impressionable transgender teen and bombard her with billboard ads baring bikini-clad women and boy’s locker room trash talk about this girl’s tits and that girl’s ass, then she will learn to turn her gender identity into a fetish.

“So without ever having seen pulp fiction or hardcore porn, my thirteen-year-old brain started concocting scenarios straight out of SM handbooks. Most of my fantasies began with my abduction: I’d turn to putty in the hands of some twisted man who would turn me into a woman as part of his evil plan. It’s called forced feminization, and it’s not really about sex. It is about turning the humiliation you feel into pleasure, transforming the loss of male privilege into the best fuck ever.”

That bolded sentence is bolded because it's kind of one of the most important things I've read in my life. So... yeah, Julia Serano's experiences don't entirely overlap with mine (she's bi, I'm ace, and the twisted man for me was usually a witch or goddess or something that could be anywhere between evil and benign) but what I'm trying to say is that this can very well be a fetish that is also a totally legitimate manifestation of real gender dysphoria. The two don't contradict.

Okay, I'm just going to try not to blush so hard my face hurts now.

Just for you Kappamaki: :wub:

That must have been a very hard post for you to write. I just want to send some love. Sending a post out there like that, one that reveals vulnerabilities and secrets, is nerve-wracking, and I'm so happy that you felt safe enough here to do so.

You too, Prairie, and every one else who has shared their experiences.

This thread is exactly the kind of thing that makes me feel so warm and happy in this forum. I just wanted to take a moment and thank you all, since the discussion has seemed to die down a bit and I hope that I am not derailing now.

:cake: for all.

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