Down Time Conflicted

Anne Bonny · Post by **Anne Bonny** » Fri Sep 23, 2011 8:01 am

Funny how our desires heat up and cool over time. I know I am hyper-analysing ruminating again over conflicted emotions, desires, gender. If I am able to live as Anne long enough the tide ebbs, the pendulum swings and I again dress in male clothing moving to masculine gender mode which is in sinc with my sex but as we all know this tide also will ebb as desire returns and we swing back again to feminine again. I am feeling a little like the amorphous Pat of Saturday Night Live at the moment I seem to be at my nadir. What am I, who am I? I am in the mists of a nether region conflicted I have no desire to dress for the time being but am not satisfied with myself. This is our curse caught between extremes and finding a home in neither. In truth I have been firmly seated? Have I ever been "firmly seated" into my gender? Sex perhaps but I have never been firmly or fully seated into a gender secretly desiring to be one with women yet knowing I am not one. At the same time when masculine I feel I am not as fully male as the men I am with, yet to myself I am a man. Thirsty Tantalus was condemned to be always just out of reach of water which would quinch his thirst, and we are destined to never find satisfaction with our gender. I do admit we can come close to it but we ebb and flow over time. Desire will come again, is indeed coming, I am in transit and will arrive where my desire and gender meet.... The tide is moving to feminine again.

Carolynn · Post by **Carolynn** » Fri Sep 23, 2011 11:18 am

Not only women have cycles in their hormones, but physically male folk do too. Testosterone is such a powerful drug, and in it's ascendency brings the more masculine feelings, when it wanes in the cycle, then maybe you can feel more femme-like? The hormone cycle can also bring waves of depression on a monthly cycle, which is what would happen to me when I was living in denial of who I was. Just sayin', the cyclical nature of CDing MIGHT have something to do with your own hormonal rythms.

Something I have been thinking about, watching pre-op and non-op friends struggling with it.

Absaroka · Post by **Absaroka** » Fri Sep 23, 2011 11:57 am

I don't think you neccesarily need to be dissatisfied with your gender. It might be more of a matter of accepting that your thoughts and feelings about your gender are not static.

There was a musical long ago called Finians Rainbow in where a leprechaun is rendered human, and is no longer green. He makes the comment that he finds an occaisional change of color interesting. (the white bigot who has just been rendered black disagrees with him)

So maybe you can get to "I find an occaisional change of gender orientation interesting" rather than "what am I really?"

The waxing and waning of desires to cross dress is pretty normal, a lot of folks have it. Maybe it's just a question of "enough"

Or as some would say, the answer to the question of "are you male or female" may be no. The word or might need to be replaced with the word and.

Zari

Carolynn · Post by **Carolynn** » Fri Sep 23, 2011 4:19 pm

A recent Dutch study featuring a random karyotype screening of 146 males and females could indicate some support for your "and instead of or" argument, maybe. Though the numbers are small (the karyotype screens are still expensive) indicated that chromosomal variations among humans are more common than expected. A frequency distribution approximated a bell curve, with 46 xy and 46 xx chromosomes occupying the ends of the bell curve rather than the middle as expected, with the majority of the chromosome arrangements being 47xy and other mosaics up to and including xxxxyyy being more frequent than anticipated by the hypothesis.

Other studies have shown that people with the variant arrangement have lower strength testerone bonding, and inconsistent binding strength between chromosomal strands, making the variants more likley during cell division as the fetus grows. "Jumping" genes that break loose and move to other locations on a chromosomal string and thus make a different gene in the new location, are also expected to be more frequent.

Based on this small study, it seems possible that "normal" human chromosome arrangement (as pairs and 46 xy or xx), are closer to a minority than the intersex looking arrangement. Whether this will be born out if larger scale studes are ever carried out remains to be seen.

What does it mean to an individual who is chomosomally intersexed but not in exterior presentation? Virtually nothing. Most of the variations are fertile, and they will have children who may or may not have chromosomal variations, and be accepted by their peers as normal adults. Dr. Sidney Eckert has suggested that the formation of androgen receptors and estrogen receptors could be affected, and change over time, but this is sheer speculation at this point.

There are lots of genetic mutations that take place all the time, generating diversity that is needed to keep our species' potential for adapting to change ongoing. And there are certain genes with extra long repeating base pairs (CAG) that are thought to affect androgen and estrogen receptors during fetal development, and these longer gene strands are present in M2F transsexuals that have been tested (this from Australia). Other genes seem to be associated with F2M TS.

Biology loves diversity, while society does not, and it is society that puts pressure on people to hide differences and conform to what some believe is "normal", despite biology. Those who put these pressures on everyone else are usually conservatives who fear or have preferential status quo that do not want change, and the dichotomy has been present for a long time and is present in all cultures, no matter how large or how small.

Stupid, no?

Carol Ann · Post by **Carol Ann** » Sat Sep 24, 2011 7:32 am

I prefer my fem side always have and always will. But at the same time I know I must be in male mode at certion times and just except it because I know I will be Carol again very soon.

Anne Bonny · Post by **Anne Bonny** » Sat Sep 24, 2011 9:42 am

I hope my postings are not too frequent and or inappropriate. I believe I am free to ponder and to post at will. All of this is so interesting. I know that I was very shy when I was young, I tend to be so self centered but find learning and sharing with others on this site so facinating.

I do accept the idea that testosterone fluctuation influences my thoughts and behavior. I reason there must be a cycle but have not looked into it. I also find the research facinating as well as it appears to be supporting what our intuition and our reasoning on all of this is telling us. I do not believe I am TS, though I do fantasize about transitioning, somehow at this point I am not sure and believe it would be the wrong choice for myself.

Everything is how we think about things, you are so right! I am male and female, etc.... I should banish negative thinking, depression/dissatisfaction, will read your post again to absorb that point because you have it right, Thanks.

Dressing is indeed helping me find comfort in being feminine too.

Paula G · Post by **Paula G** » Sat Sep 24, 2011 1:48 pm

Anne, don't worry about posting too much, that's what makes this forum work!

Now I only know about myself, and don't really have any one I can talk to about this sort of thing, but I have found that the compulsion to dress is strongest when I am less sexual active (or indeed downright frustrated) and, or when I am stressed. These days I am usually both most of the time! this means that the compulsion is pretty much always there, sometime more in the background sometimes right to the fore.

I may go for a few weeks when the rest of my activities put my dressing to the back of my mind, but over the last couple years it has always been with me. I think there have been other discussions where the issue of age has been raised, but I am sure that for me the urge has grown stronger and more consistent since I have been in my fifties, so maybe a decline in testosterone is a factor. A factor but not the whole thing, I think everything about cross dressing is so complicated that there are always going to be a whole lot of factors. I rather wish that someone would come up with a simple scientific, chemical reason why we are the way we are, but I don't expect that to happen, at least any time soon.

Ralitsa · Post by **Ralitsa** » Sun Sep 25, 2011 10:07 am

I agree with Paula, frequent posting and even rambling on about all our problems is what makes this a fun place to hang out. I also find that there are times when I feel more desire to dress up and times when I really don't. When I really don't feel like dressing up, or even if the idea somewhat turns me off, then I usually just put on some really basic skirt or plain dress. When I do this, it sort of reinforces that wearing womens style of clothing doesn't always have to be exciting, it's OK just to wear a plain old dress only for the purpose of covering everything up. And maybe it proves to myself that I'm not trying to be a woman, it's not all about sexual desire, it's mostly about the styles of clothes I choose to wear and they are not necessarily sexy. Wearing jeans and a t-shirt, for a guy, is just boring and mindless, there is no amount of fashion, or sexy, or stylish, or exciting about it. Sometimes wearing a dress is the same thing for me, but I do it anyway because "that's my style and I'm sticking to it". (for all of you that don't listen to country music, that is a lame pun based on a sort of famous song)
What does this make me, am I a man, a woman, a crazed crossdressing lesbian wannabe, or undefined? Well I'm just me and the pigeons don't want me in their holes and I don't want to be there. I don't like pigeons anyway. For questions like this, my Dad was famous for answering, "well that's just the way God made it." A cop out maybe, or maybe an admission that there just are not satisfactory answers for some questions, and we just need to deal with it.
There are many things about my life that I am not satisfied with. But I try not to let them depress me, rather I like to think that they are inspiration, or the driving force to make improvements to myself. Probably no one is really satisfied with themselves, or if they are then they must be the most unimaginative sort imaginable. So if I feel uneasy about something, I need first to decide whether it's internal or external. If I don't like it, then I need to change it. If someone else doesn't like that about me, then I need to evaluate whether there is some justification for their feeling and whether they have some claim on my interest. So I don't wear a dress to the office, because I'm being paid by them to present an appearance and provide a quality of work which is consistent with my profession. To do less will compromise their ability to make a profit and win new work. But if some bloke down at the pub thinks I'm interested in his opinion he can just stuff it. I think societal pressures are not always bad, and it is certainly a powerful force that must be considered. But really, most people are basing their judgements on what they saw as a kid and that is extremely limited both in scope of time and place. We have been given intelligence so that we can make the distinction between how it's always been and how we want it to be.

Davita · Post by **Davita** » Sun Sep 25, 2011 10:52 am

Ramblings on about our problems? We ramble??? ummmm Okay... I do.

Anne,
I have noticed in my years of talking with fellow girls that a lot of them worry. Pick a topic; we worry, we analyze our panties off; it's got to built into our nature. I gave up analyzing all the details of my existence and ya know? I gained a lot more time to enjoy just being whoever and whatever I am. People in my life got to enjoy me more too. Now I just fret when I should.

When I stopped worrying about sex, gender and sexual preference (really I never worried about that), then I got to concentrate on what I was doing whichever ebb was flowing. If I wanted to dress like a tramp, then I could try to figure out how to get away with it. If I wanted to just chill, I just needed to decide how. If I was worried about who knew or didn't know about Davita, I just had/have to figure out who I will ensure knows and who won't know -- everyone else isn't a problem until they become one.

Paula G · Post by **Paula G** » Sun Sep 25, 2011 11:40 am

Davita wrote: If I wanted to dress like a tramp, then I could try to figure out how to get away with it.

Erm, I take it that this is another of those language problems we have, by tramp do you mean a "gentleman of the road" or "a lady of easy vertue"? eother way coudl be fun occasionally.

Davita · Post by **Davita** » Sun Sep 25, 2011 8:00 pm

Oh sorry, Paula... I meant a lady of easy virtue. So back at you, are all tramps male and are all those males gentlemen?

What's a lady tramp? Really? a "trampette"?

Anne Bonny · Post by **Anne Bonny** » Mon Sep 26, 2011 10:13 am

Wonderful discussion I love how all of you think and enjoy sharing your thoughts. I am really growing of late. I believe thinking about all of this helps me to set things in order in my mind as a basis for moving on.

There are those I would not share this with, but there is always the chance that someone I know could come across this site and recognize me now - of course I calculated that and I have the rest of my life to live, they will have to get over it because I already have. I wonder how far I am from veturing out in the world? This is not San Francisco, or New York I suppose there are limits on when and where one would venture out so that I am not beaten within an inch of my life or worse by the knuckle dragging neanderthals which surround me.

Paula G · Post by **Paula G** » Mon Sep 26, 2011 10:21 am

Why would anyone come to this site, unless they are trans or personally effected by trans? That is one of the things that makes this a safe place, no curious porn followers, no accidental browsers, if they are here than they will be glad that they have a friend they can come out to.

Most of what we worry about will never happen, and if it does it turns out to be no big deal.

Gillian · Post by **Gillian** » Mon Sep 26, 2011 10:50 am

Carolynn, you said a mouth full, when you said,"Biology loves diversity, while society does not, and it is society that puts pressure on people to hide differences and conform to what some believe is "normal", despite biology". That about sums it up, and I don't see it changing any time soon. All I have ever wanted was to be able to do my own thing and have society ignore me while I was doing it. I have no desire to change sexes or even pass as a woman, I just want to wear what I want when I want to. I do not expect others to understand it, as I am not sure I understand it either. I have this allure to the feminine, and one of its manifestations is in clothing.

Absaroka · Post by **Absaroka** » Tue Sep 27, 2011 7:36 am

Anne I like your topics and think they contribute a lot to our discussion. So please don't feel like you post too much.

A tramp is a homeless person, on the move, not looking for work. A hobo is similar but looking for work. A bum is a homeless person not on the move and not looking for work. Of course there are many homeless folks not working who are not bums also. All the above categories can be of either gender, but the folks on the move are usually male.

Hoboes often utilized freight trains as free transportation, and some rail lines made a point at one time of always putting an empty box car on the back of a train to accomodate the labor essential to their shippers. Other pursued violent anti hobo policies.

A tramp as lady of easy virtue is I guess the same as the tramp in the above definition, but with the idea that a longterm relationship with a man is substituted for work. Interesting..............