Hey ladies.
Me. Again.
I’m sorry to be posting so frequently. I’m sort of scrambling to figure things out. I’ve already had to be corrected on how I word things, so I’m still learning, and I do apologize if I’m clogging this place up with stupid questions. This will be my last post for a while.
I am 34 now. And I could go on and on with examples after examples in my life of moments where I should have started wondering, but I’ve only learned this about myself recently.
I won’t give my life story, but I will say this: Most, if not all, trans women I’ve listened to have described a history of unpleasant feelings associated with their prescribed gender at birth. Some women talk about having always felt weird being called “he”. Some women describe not wanting to have a penis or testicles. Some have described puberty being a distressful time for them.
However, in my case my dysphoria (if indeed it’s dysphoria) has almost exclusively been envy. I was never actively disgusted by being called “he” or having lots of body hair. I was just super super envious of the girls who didn’t have it.
I’ve always had a more feminine cadence in online discussions like on discord or aol way back when. So that’s where I’ve always expressed myself truly on. It’s never bothered me to be called a man in person, but it does fill me with a lot of joy to be called “she”. A woman I’ve spoken with on discord has no idea I’m trans. She just knows I’m a woman, and she called me “girlie” the other day and I wanted to cry and squirm with excitement. I’m not sure if that’s weird.
It’s more like…indifference to masculinity with active joy from femininity. Being a man isn’t so much something I want to avoid as much as it is being a woman is something I exceedingly want to do.
I don’t know if that’s weird makes sense…
The idea that you need dysphoria to be trans is the core belief of transmedicalism, which is a harmful ideology. My experience pre-transition was very similar to what you describe, and listening to transmedicalists, believing that I needed to actively feel distress, made me delay my transition. Transition was the best thing I have ever done for my mental and physical health.
According to the diagnostic criteria of the DSM-V, gender dysphoria in adults is an incredibly low bar to clear. It has no active distress requirement. If you want to change your gender, or be treated as a different gender, that alone is enough to qualify. The diagnosis is needed by some health systems for care, but you don't have to feel dysphonic to get the diagnosis.
Feeling joy when being gendered differently is very strong evidence of being trans. Dysphoria doesn't necessarily feel like dysphoria if you've felt it your entire life. Whatever is constant becomes the baseline. Gender euphoria is often more noticeable.
And that was me. I was dysphoric, but it was so constant since childhood it all felt normal. I didn't notice feelings of discomfort with my body or gender, but that did not mean those feelings weren't there. I felt strong envy towards women. I tried presenting as a woman through text based anonymized internet communities. I was never interested in masculinity but didn't feel like I was something different.
This all changed in my early 30s when I started transitioning and taking hormones. It recontextualised everything. For the first time in memory I felt fine. Like actually fine. Before transition, I was depressed. I was dysphoric. But it was basically unnoticable without this new post transition perspective.
You are a trans woman. We sound so much alike. Its time to take the next step. You go girl!
The biggest problem with this is that when you actually look up the definition of "gender dysphoria," it includes things that people who say "I don't have dysphoria" describe. Every person I've talked to who says, "I didn't have dysphoria, I just had euphoria," was simply ignorant on what gender dysphoria actually is.
From the DSM-5, the actual clinical definition of gender dysphoria, (not the one used by the "I never had dysphoria" types) is:
That is gender dysphoria. When "trans medicalist" types say, "you need dysphoria to be trans," this is the definition they're using. But social media kills nuance and turns everyone into a caricature. Every community likes to have a villain, so the message "you need to have dysphoria" gets twisted by bad-faith actors into "trans medicalists believe you have to be literally suicidal with dysphoria to be trans." Are there some fringe weirdos who think that? Sure. But 99% of the people I've seen slandered as "trans medicalists" were nothing like that caricature.
Most folks complaining about trans medicalists are just fighting their own imagined stereotypes. When people say, "you need dysphoria to be trans," you need to read that as, "someone needs to have at least some desire to change their physical body, social role, or social presentation to be trans." In other words, you have to actually have some desire to transition some aspects of your gender to be transgender. But people love to punch down on others, so they invent this version of "trans medicalism" that exists nowhere except in their own heads.
Personally, using the proper definition of gender dysphoria, I see little reason to not say you need dysphoria to be trans. If you have no desire to change your body, no desire to change any aspect of your presentation, no desire to change your social role? There's nothing wrong with just being cis. "Trans" is not a gender. You don't "identify as trans." You are trans because of how you identify. (Please don't mention inability to actually transition or get medical treatment as if that means anything here. This is about intention.)
But people get slandered as "trans medicalists" for simply saying, "I don't know what trans is precisely, but you should at least want to do some trans stuff to count as trans." There's a word for someone who wants to retain all aspects of their assigned gender at birth, including body, social role, presentation, etc. That word is cisgender. And there's nothing wrong with being cis. We use definition all the time when referring to cis people.
This isn't gate keeping trans identities. You can be trans however you want to be. But if you literally have no desire to transition any aspect of you're gender, you're literally just cis. Trans and cis aren't something you choose to identify as. Some people say even this incredibly open door to trans identities is "gatekeeping," or "trans medicalism," but we need to apply the same standard to the "trans" label that we do "cis." We tell cis people all the time, "it doesn't matter if you like the term, you're still cis because you meet the definition of cisgender." If we're going to ask cis people to accept our labels of them, we need to use a consistent standard. We can't tell cis people on one hand, "you're cis whether you like it or not," at the same time we tell trans people, "trans is something you can just identify as, even if you're literally just cisgender by the definition we ask cis people to accept."
We can't tell cis people, "cis" is something you are just by definition," at the same time we say, "being trans means nothing. You can just identify as trans."
Why are you arguing definitions in opposition to my personal experience? This thread is to help someone who is unsure about whether they are trans or not. This isn't the place for you to air your grievances.
The only reason I mentioned transmedicalism is the fact that this instance and community has very specific rules against it. If you want to argue that point with someone, I would suggest you do so with the community moderators or administrators of this instance.
Few people read medical diagnostic texts for fun. Most people will assume that dysphoria means dysphoria, in the colloquial definition of the word. For example, OP from this thread. I wrote what I wrote to relay my personal experiences and help someone in need of guidance.
what was your motivation?
Because this person does clearly have gender dysphoria. They just have a misunderstanding of what gender dysphoria is. This whole thread is about whether someone is "trans enough." And it helps people better understand their feelings and situation if we can discuss things with reasonable definitions. "Trans medicalism" originally meant someone who believed the only legit trans people were those that went through a formal medical process. It could also mean someone who believed the only legit trans people were those who sought medical transition. If the core defining trait of "trans medicalism" is that you need to have dysphoria to be trans, then it wouldn't be called "trans medicalism." It would be called "trans dysphorism" or similar.
Personally, I think you do have to have dysphoria to be trans. But dysphoria is not only a pain. It can be a longing. A desire. An inescapable yearning. It's any feelings that push you towards wanting to alter your sex, gender, gender role, presentation, etc. People just have a very limited understanding of the true spectrum of gender dysphoria. Hell, gender dysphoria and gender euphoria are the same damn thing. Or they're just two sides of the same coin. Gender euphoria is just the positive feelings that come from relieving some aspect of gender dysphoria. I need not cite a medical text. I know from my own lived experience that dysphoria is far more iridescent than the limited version you prefer. Dysphoria is many things, and we do ourselves a deep disservice when we do not recognize its full spectrum and color.
This person has a misunderstanding of what gender dysphoria is. You correct that misconception, and suddenly all their concerns about being "trans enough" can melt away. Sure, you can reinforce their misconception, and tell them "you don't need dysphoria to be trans." But that's not the ideal way. Let's say they stick with your definition of gender dysphoria, the limited version involving pain over physical features. So maybe you can convince this person to identify as a "non dysphoric trans person," but they're still going to meet trans people that say, "I experience(d) gender dysphoria." They're still going to feel separate in some way. Is building a wall between them and a large portion of the trans community really going to help them get past the feelings of inadequacy they're struggling with?
No. I don't think so. Far better to help them understand their own experiences in the broader tapestry that is gender dysphoria in all its varied multicolored hues. We've all felt the same pain. But we experience it a bit differently. Sometimes that pain manifests as deep physical revulsion to natal physical features. Sometimes that pain manifests as a deep longing. And people often experience both and in changing ratios over time. In my case it started as a longing and desire, but later morphed into much more physical dysphoria once I actually started really contemplating and considering transition.
That was insightful, thanks. Ten years ago I dismissed thoughts of being trans because of "the lack of dysphoria" (as in feeling pain about the body image) and never thought about that much further. My issue was/is mostly just certain social expectations or assumptions that are associated with my perceived gender appearance, but maybe that's a story for another time.
I appreciate you relaying your personal experiences. Sorry for how dismissive my reply was. The point about transmedicalists was a minor one at best to me, and was probably more about the specific community I interacted with than the ideas as a whole.
I'm going to stop saying things now.