Is it normal for gender dysphoria to develop after puberty?

[SirvonShirou]

I am a 13 year old AFAB person questioning their gender. I probably will just stay "female" to the rest of the world as I know how it works. The world will not care, and at most, actively call me a "snowflake attention seeker". Regardless of that, I feel a slight amount of what I believe is gender dysphoria. I feel like I'm genderfluid, so it's only a few days or weeks at a time, but it happens. Here's a list of the symptoms.

• Looking in the mirror at my breasts and thinking, "That doesn't look right, no, that's not right at all. Ew!" (lol)
• Hearing people refer to me as "she" and thinking, "That doesn't sound right, no, that's not right at all."
• Desperately wanting my hair shorter, which I eventually got. It's a bit above shoulder length now and I love it.
• Getting offended when someone calls me "such a pretty little girl"
• Seeing more androgynous and masculine characters on TV or the internet and thinking, "I want to look like that! Wow!"

Here's the thing, two things actually. 1.) Whenever I want to be a boy, it's a very feminine boy. Like an anime boy. I'm not sure if that invalidates it a bit. I don't want to be super masculine, I want to be fancy, feminine, and gentleman-like. Think Tamaki Suoh or Kyoya Ootori from Ouran Highschool Host Club, Light Yagami from Death Note, or Zhongli from Genshin Impact. 2.) I have only felt this way for a few months. It started when I was 12, just before my 13th birthday. I just started getting the feeling that something wasn't right. The dysphoria, if it even is that, isn't debilitating or depressing, just weird. I can put it off in order to make room for bigger problems. It's just a weird thing that comes to mind sometimes. Before these feelings started, I was a hyper-feminine little girl. I hated boys' clothing styles and the way they played with each other in rough and uncleanly ways. (I still do, dirt is gross.) I was super interested in Disney Princesses, My Little Pony, and later, girl's anime like Sailor Moon and Glitter Force. (I still love Sailor Moon, but that's beside the point.) I had long hair which I took pride in, I would wear dresses whenever I could, and pick any pink item I could find. I still like those things on feminine days, sometimes even some masculine days, but I feel some aversion to that sometimes. That's very new to me. I wonder if that newness invalidates it. I wonder if it's just a "thing" that will pass. I did some research and found a term: "Rapid Onset Gender Dysphoria". It claims that girls are now often in the masses experiencing gender misalignment that never had in the past due to peer pressure from friends and the internet. Is it possible that that's what it is? Just... peer pressure? Anyway, thank you for reading!

 

(P.S. I apologize if this is a bit non-sensical, I was hurried while I was writing it.)

[Sarah-Sylvia]

Hi @SirvonShirou

 

Yes it's definitely possible. It's different for everyone, some recognized something when they were young, others later. For me it was later, though I always liked feminine things, but didn't go for those things because of what I was 'supposed' to be. Anything is possible really, you just have to ask yourself what it's really about for you.

From what you said about your reactions to your body, it's a bit hard to say it could be just peer pressure, though it's still possible it can be passing feelings since it's recent. Only you can know how much it matters to you. Some girls can end up putting feelings on themselves due to how society treats women at times, or might have a tomboy side and have trouble just being themselves, but since you connect with being a more feminine guy, that last part might not apply to you. You did mention having different days though, but it's normal for some to shift between femininity and masculinity. I have a feminine as well as tomboy side myself.
Does it have to do with gender expression? Or gender? Girls can be masculine too.

This is Just a question out of curiousity thought might be useful to share more thoughts, but if you like femininity, then why is it you don't connect with being a girl or a female figure ?

 

It's ok to take your time. ❤️

[SirvonShirou]

5 minutes ago, Sarah-Sylvia said:

Hi @SirvonShirou

This is Just a question out of curiousity thought might be useful to share more thoughts, but if you like femininity, then why is it you don't connect with being a girl or a female figure ?

@Sarah-Sylvia If we're talking about the days when I feel like a girl, I do. However, I'm assuming we're talking about when I feel like a guy. I'm not sure myself. It just doesn't feel right. It feels "off", like I should be a boy. If I put on a skirt, I'll understand that this is something I look good in to other people and something I should enjoy because I'm a "girl", but it feels very wrong and foreign. I think, "No, I should wear pants today. That'll make me feel better."

[Sarah-Sylvia]

30 minutes ago, SirvonShirou said:

@Sarah-Sylvia If we're talking about the days when I feel like a girl, I do. However, I'm assuming we're talking about when I feel like a guy. I'm not sure myself. It just doesn't feel right. It feels "off", like I should be a boy. If I put on a skirt, I'll understand that this is something I look good in to other people and something I should enjoy because I'm a "girl", but it feels very wrong and foreign. I think, "No, I should wear pants today. That'll make me feel better."

Gotcha. so very much in line with fluid. If it's not just that you feel like wearing pants or having a more tomboy look, and sounds like there's more going on.
Hope you can find what makes sense to you.

[AstrophelDragon]

A lot of this sounds very similar to my experience. Except for the fact that I’m 17 but only really have been questioning my gender for the past couple of years (at least consciously). I can look back on my life and find evidence for always being this way, but I can also refute it. I experience dysphoria every so often now, but don’t know if I always did, and I have trouble parsing that. Am I just making it all up?

But, I feel fluid now. Whatever may have been the case in the past, I can’t not think of myself as genderfluid now. I have agender days, male days, and long spurts of female-ness that make me question everything all over again. I have days like today when I wake up distinctly male, but by mid-morning I feel completely female, and then by lunch I am male again, and it keeps going until I am so thoroughly confused by the end of the day.

 

1 hour ago, SirvonShirou said:

Regardless of that, I feel a slight amount of what I believe is gender dysphoria. I feel like I'm genderfluid, so it's only a few days or weeks at a time, but it happens. Here's a list of the symptoms.

• Looking in the mirror at my breasts and thinking, "That doesn't look right, no, that's not right at all. Ew!" (lol)
• Hearing people refer to me as "she" and thinking, "That doesn't sound right, no, that's not right at all."
• Desperately wanting my hair shorter, which I eventually got. It's a bit above shoulder length now and I love it.
• Getting offended when someone calls me "such a pretty little girl"
• Seeing more androgynous and masculine characters on TV or the internet and thinking, "I want to look like that! Wow!"

Dysphoria for me is also weird and inconsistent. I do definitely relate to all these experiences though (although not sure I’d label all of them as dysphoria).

 

What’s weird for me is that I am generally more of an unfeminine person, even on my female days. Like, I can be a girl but not care when other girls are talking about makeup and stuff, and I can prefer hanging out with boys. So I understand your femininity still on your male days (like, in reverse). So my question for you is, 

1 hour ago, SirvonShirou said:

Whenever I want to be a boy, it's a very feminine boy

Why do you say you “want” to be a boy? Is it because you feel like you are one?  Or is it

1 hour ago, SirvonShirou said:

Just... peer pressure?

Because, it all boils down to this: how do you feel now, and why do you feel that way?

For me, I am genderfluid because that’s how I feel now. Was I always this way? Who knows? Does it really matter? This is me now. I don’t know why my gender changes; it’s not based on my circumstances, or my mood, or anything else around me. It just, is. And that imo is the most validating thing, bc it’s coming from inside of me, not outside.

 

Tl;dr: Your gender basically boils down to how you interpret it (with nuances and exceptions)

[Philip027]

Not only normal; I'd go as far as to say it's pretty likely among trans people to start noticing it here.

 

Not only are outside societal pressures building up at around this point (due to adolescence and peers starting to, well, notice each other more often in that sort of way), even your own body is working against you, undergoing numerous physical and hormonal changes that largely seem purposed toward emphasizing all the various attributes of your birth sex that might make you feel dysphoric in the first place.

 

I feel like I was like you in some ways, even at that age -- main differences being that back then I had no real concept of gender (as far as I knew, it meant basically the same thing as sex; it didn't help that people seemed to use the two interchangeably) and even though I'm drawn to and tend to favor more "feminine" attributes, it's never caused me to want to be "female" or anything else, which is why nowadays I've mostly settled on the agender identity.

[AstrophelDragon]

Thinking about it more though, a lot of my gender stuff did start showing up around early puberty. I remember that I used to prefer wearing skirts up until sometime in 3rd grade. I don't remember why I switched to shorts, but I know that by 5th grade I hated skirts and dresses. I also always hated the idea of puberty and "growing up", although then I thought of it as I preferred being a kid than an adult. But it does make a lot of sense in the context of gender, because the older you get the more gendered things seem. And because I absolutely hated the idea of bras,

Spoiler

and would only wear them because the idea of not wearing one became worse.

And I resisted starting to shave my legs for so long.

 

So yeah starting around puberty definitely makes sense because it's when you have to start actually thinking about gendered things.

[Janus the Fox]

I think it could be at any point once becoming body, gender, sex and expression aware.  Like I’d never really understood what gender or the sex of my body meant.  Never thought anything about it, this area of identity felt empty.  I’d identified as Agender in my 30s, started expressing femininely in my 20s and HRT last year.

 

The trigger for it was necessary weight loss, then I’d started thinking a bit more about my body and clothing options.  That’s about 13 years ago.

[SilenceRadio]

I'd say it's pretty common, for much of the same reasons Philip cited.

 

10 hours ago, SirvonShirou said:

I did some research and found a term: "Rapid Onset Gender Dysphoria". It claims that girls are now often in the masses experiencing gender misalignment that never had in the past due to peer pressure from friends and the internet. Is it possible that that's what it is? Just... peer pressure?

I've talked about ROGD before, but it's mostly the same transmisic bullshit about how cis girls are trying to "escape misogyny" by disidentifying with their assigned gender and that being trans is nothing but a medical condition at best and a social contagion at worst. It's purposefully done to discredit young people's genders, as if they didn't know theirs best or couldn't make educated decisions on their own. I don't recall much of the research, but I think it was mostly done from the parents' point of view rather than the teenagers/children's, too. Overall, it's bad and it doesn't take into account the ways a trans person might not be aware of what they're feeling until they come to the Web for answers.

[Guest]

For whatever it’s worth, i’ll drop something of my story here 😇

 

I also have days when i feel like my agab, as much as i have days to feel to have the wrong body. This distinction, of course, started only after finding out there’s nothing wrong with not being one’s agab; iirc (& i may remember incorrectly) before i was just unhappy without a clear cause. What i’m going to say, however, is that even when feeling like my agab, i’m not satisfied with who that person, including their gender, is. It’s not what i want and it’s at least partly caused by the general cishet & self-stereotyping* pressure onto me.

 

This is nothing that everyone has to experience, and you are by no means forced to identify with it. I guess i’m trying to suggest you to think not only about how you feel, but also how you feel about how you feel. (I hope i’ve expressed it clearly enough.) Not sure what you’ll gain out of it, but why not 🤷.

 

* Just the expectation from others to be who i’ve ‘always been’, or my perception thereof. (Not only my gender, but also my behaviour & many other unrelated things.)

Edited September 16, 2022 by Guest
clarify footnote

[A User]

currently 15 and i get you.

i get very uncomfortable with my chest, and i constantly wish i had more masculine outfits and a more masc look, although i also doubt myself too.

 

most trans ppl get dysphoria as little kids, but to be fair, i was ok with myself before puberty started

i mean, you do you

this is mostly why i dont rlly label my gender bc im too confused to get it

i just mostly go with the flow of what i feel and try not to judge myself for i

[Milque Toast]

16 hours ago, SirvonShirou said:

I am a 13 year old AFAB person questioning their gender. I probably will just stay "female" to the rest of the world as I know how it works. The world will not care, and at most, actively call me a "snowflake attention seeker". Regardless of that, I feel a slight amount of what I believe is gender dysphoria. I feel like I'm genderfluid, so it's only a few days or weeks at a time, but it happens. Here's a list of the symptoms.

• Looking in the mirror at my breasts and thinking, "That doesn't look right, no, that's not right at all. Ew!" (lol)
• Hearing people refer to me as "she" and thinking, "That doesn't sound right, no, that's not right at all."
• Desperately wanting my hair shorter, which I eventually got. It's a bit above shoulder length now and I love it.
• Getting offended when someone calls me "such a pretty little girl"
• Seeing more androgynous and masculine characters on TV or the internet and thinking, "I want to look like that! Wow!"

Here's the thing, two things actually. 1.) Whenever I want to be a boy, it's a very feminine boy. Like an anime boy. I'm not sure if that invalidates it a bit. I don't want to be super masculine, I want to be fancy, feminine, and gentleman-like. Think Tamaki Suoh or Kyoya Ootori from Ouran Highschool Host Club, Light Yagami from Death Note, or Zhongli from Genshin Impact. 2.) I have only felt this way for a few months. It started when I was 12, just before my 13th birthday. I just started getting the feeling that something wasn't right. The dysphoria, if it even is that, isn't debilitating or depressing, just weird. I can put it off in order to make room for bigger problems. It's just a weird thing that comes to mind sometimes. Before these feelings started, I was a hyper-feminine little girl. I hated boys' clothing styles and the way they played with each other in rough and uncleanly ways. (I still do, dirt is gross.) I was super interested in Disney Princesses, My Little Pony, and later, girl's anime like Sailor Moon and Glitter Force. (I still love Sailor Moon, but that's beside the point.) I had long hair which I took pride in, I would wear dresses whenever I could, and pick any pink item I could find. I still like those things on feminine days, sometimes even some masculine days, but I feel some aversion to that sometimes. That's very new to me. I wonder if that newness invalidates it. I wonder if it's just a "thing" that will pass. I did some research and found a term: "Rapid Onset Gender Dysphoria". It claims that girls are now often in the masses experiencing gender misalignment that never had in the past due to peer pressure from friends and the internet. Is it possible that that's what it is? Just... peer pressure? Anyway, thank you for reading!

yes! I feel very similar to you! I'm still super feminine, and have been identifying as masc enby for almost a year! I was also super girly when I was younger. When I look back, there are certainly times when I realise "oh, that was a trans moment". However, first of all, "rapid onset gender dysphoria" (or ROGD) is not backed up by scientific research and also hinges on misogynistic ideas. An article I read recently, sent to me by @SilenceRadio was really helpful! here it is: https://letsqueerthingsup.com/2018/09/13/my-parents-and-i-survived-my-rapid-onset-gender-dysphoria-this-is-our-story/

 

basically what I got from it, is that the dysphoria itself is not recent, it's the realisation of it. Almost as soon as I started questioning my gender, I realised how much I did not actually feel like a girl, when before, it was something I had never even considered, because I didn't even know you could be anything outside of the gender you were assigned at birth. And.. I don't know, for me, it wasn't really a thing that passed, maybe it will be for you? 

I guess the main thing I'd say is, enjoy it! Experiment as much as you are able to and see what kind of ways you like to present in real life. At least, that really helped for me ❤️

And, to your topic question, yes! Gender dysphoria is probably very likely to start becoming more obvious at puberty, because before puberty, girls and boys look very similar. It's not until puberty that they start to look different, and a trans person will begin to realise that they're not happy with the way their body is changing. 

I'm getting really excited because I relate a lot to what you've written, so I wish you all the best in your journey, regardless of the outcome.

[Hooded_Crow]

Hi  

I see other people have mentioned it, but let me still add my voice to theirs: Rapid Onset Gender Dysphoria is not a thing. The person who put that theory forward had a clear bias against trans people and their “research” has been widely discredited by the medical community.

 

You might be trans. You might be genderfluid. Or you might not be. Either way, you’re going to be fine  For the record, 13 was the age I said to my aunt “I wish my breasts could just be gone.” She said “That’s because you still think you could have been a guy. It’ll pass.” Spoiler alert: it didn’t pass. I shoved it back down for another decade, and then it progressively floated back up to the front of my mind.

Here’s the deal: if you’re cis, you’ll eventually stop wondering about it. If you’re not cis, you’ll keep wondering until you find what changes (if any) would make your life better. My advice is to not worry about the label (unless calling yourself genderfluid makes you happier, in which case go for it). Any body or social modification that isn’t permanent? Try it, if you want. Why not? So what if it turns out to be a phase?

I would try to focus on what makes you comfy and happy in the moment. What to call yourself isn’t as important at the end of the day

[Karst]

There's a reason some people suddenly start experiencing gender dysphoria in their teens, and it's their bodies suddenly changing in ways that just don't feel right.  Just because something starts quickly doesn't mean it's going to be temporary.