restrictions

If you want, skip to the second paragraph. The first one's much-needed venting, but it's not what I want to talk about.

I've been straddling the gender "line" for a while now (there's really only two "choices" for me), and I always tend to settle on "not a boy". I've never hated having a penis, but I do hate my beard that I'm usually too lazy to shave. I've managed to preserve my falsetto, which I've cherished my entire life. I hate being grouped with masculine stereotypes because I know for a fact that they don't fit me. I feel icky when my dad pats me on the back because he's doing it as a father-son gesture. I hate father-son gestures. But in reality I'm not even close to a woman; I flip-flop between "feminine" and "it doesn't matter".

Given that I'm pretty confident in my gender identity, I really just want to tell everyone. But the truth of it is, I'm scared. The balance of interpersonal relationships seems so... delicate. If I tell my cousins they'd... probably accept me for who I am, never mind. If I tell my friends... that's bullsh!t, I don't have any real friends which I actually confide in. I think too much would change for me to be comfortable with; they'd probably think I changed over the summer or something, but I personally don't feel like I've changed much.

No no no, my biggest problem, as with most transgendered teens, is family. My dad would definitely accept me, and my mom would TRY to understand me, and I dunno' about the rest of my extended family. I'm really worried about my extended family.

Even on the hypothetical that my family accepts me, if word got out among their extended social network that someone's got a trans kid, their relationships with other families (and I mean A LOT of other families) would never be the same.

In the end, I literally can't see any other solution other than leaving this family and being completely free from this social web. What are my parents supposed to do, NOT make friends? (Well, they could bother to be more diverse with their friends, otherwise they're trapped in their own web, but that's beside the point.) Which sucks, because it means I have to wait until I'm in my 20's or something, in the meantime just pretending I'm someone else.

Angst angst angst. Waaaah~.

Hello Moth-fly!

I can relate to some of your worries and the desire to be seen for who you are. Personally, I worry a lot about the implications my gender identity (I'm ftm) has for others, and I tend to forget that sometimes looking after myself rather than others is more important.

One question you could ask yourself (and maybe you already have asked yourself that) is what coming out would mean for you and what you would expect to change/improve. So let's just assume coming out to your close family meant they changed pronouns and maybe addressed you with a new, more gender neutral name. Maybe you would start dressing a little differently. So what? If your parents did not go out of their way to out you to others, I don't think an outsider would suspect anything more than "oh, looks like their kid is experimenting with new styles". I know that this is not what it is and I assume it's not how you want it to be seen in general, but I think what I'm trying to say is that coming out to some people you trust doesn't mean coming out to everyone. My experience is that mostly people see what they want and expect to see (so looking at me, they see a "masculine woman", alas). And as long as those people who matter see the right thing (the person I am), I can endure the others a lot better.

Not sure if this helps, my thoughts are very jumbled (more coffee required ).

Adrian