A transgender FAQ

I didn't. You don't decide to be transsexual, you just are. If I have made any decision, it was to stop pretending that I wasn't gender dysphoric, and start dealing with this condition.

No one knows for sure. There are a number of theories about, but they tend to depend upon either nature or nurture to explain things. While I might never know what caused me to be gender dysphoric, I do have a few ideas about how it developed.

Good question. Well how does anyone know they are man or woman?

Everyone is bombarded with gender messages all the time, everyday, when they deal with society. These are known as stereotypes. Most people never question the gender stereotypes, but respond to them as if they were absolutes. These stereotypes are popular because they are easy to follow.

In many ways stereotypes are "blue prints" for living. They only work however if people believe in them. Even so, stereotypes are as much arbitrary as any other cultural item. Our experience is filtered by the values imposed on us by our culture. We react and behave relative to our own self-image in that culture.

Somewhere, buried deep in my psyche, my own self-image is linked with that of a woman. I have rejected all the male stereotypes that others have applied to me. But this is not something open to rational argument. It is not something that i can be "talked out off". I just know that this is the case. In such a situation I only become at peace with myself by assuming the role i know to be correct for me. Under these circumstances it's easier for me to change my body than my mind, and ultimately more satisfying.

I don't consider myself to be homosexual, but nominally bisexual. When I first started my transition, I didn't know this about myself. Since a big part of that transition is being honest with myself, I need to acknowledge this. Being bisexual is not related to my being transsexual -- they are two independent conditions (sexuality & gender). What it means is that to me the packaging is not important, the person is.

In the past I've taken Anti androgens and Oestrogens. The anti oestrogens suppress secondary male characteristics, such as hair growth patterns. The Oestrogens promote female growth patterns, such as breast and hip size.

Since my surgery, I've been on a reduced dosage, since there is no longer any source of testosterone in my body. I currently take progynova  daily, and primogyn  half of every month. This varies the levels of hormones I have in my body and gives me a "cycle".

After my bout with epilepsy, I swore blind I wouldn't be dependent upon medication ever again, and here I am taking daily hormone pills (and sometimes injections). My body is saturated with female hormones and this in turn suppresses the male hormones that are produced naturally. They make my body more like what I desire it to be.

It seems that oestrogens at least, so have mood altering effects on me. In general I tend to be a lot more bouncy and cheerful than I was before I took them. The trouble with this reasoning is that what might also be making me happier is that I'm more fulfilled than I've ever been. The periods where this hasn't been so, have overlapped.

Some time ago, when I returned to Perth for six weeks, I was taken off injections. At the same time I felt depressed and on at least one occasion suicidal. Was this a result of reducing my female hormone intake, or was it because I was in an uncertain situation where my future path was in doubt? The return to Perth was like a bitter defeat to me. I had approached work looking for a redundancy and was initially refused. Things were not good.

Maybe I'll never know if it was one or the other, or a combination of both. Are transsexual people emotionally disturbed individuals whose medication are hormones instead of antidepressants? This is a vicious thought. The best that I can say is that my life currently runs better than it did before, and the intake of hormones is a part of my life.

There are a number of things. I undergo waxing and electrolysis (when I can afford it); other beauty processes; I've had speech training (including orthodontic correction); psychiatric and social counselling; and ultimately the sex reassignment operation. All of these help me to adjust to society in my gender role as a woman.

I had my surgery back in 2000, in Phuket. I started my transition in 1994, so I took my time before deciding to have surgery. I wanted to be sure it was right for me (and it was).

However, I know of many transsexuals who became obsessed with getting the operation, rushed into it, and suffered as a consequence. This is something I wanted to avoid.

It was major surgery, and there was a chance of failure. Some transsexuals have died on the operating table, others have had the surgery fail. It wasn't something I took lightly. By the time I had it, I no longer felt that such an operation would define me as a woman, I already had that definition, by all the changes I'd made in myself. The operation did, however, finalize the process of transition and confirm my status legally (which was done in 2003).

Because this is who I am and who I need to be.