r/GenderDysphoria

I am a 48 yo male who has crossdressed since high school, and have had thoughts of "what would it be like to be a girl" since ~8 yo. Crossdressing has always filled me with such joy and warmth to see "her" staring back in the mirror. I never smile bigger than I do in those moments. But I never really considered myself trans, as I feel comfortable in my male body, and enjoy my life as a man too. I was "just a crossdresser". I like feeling girly sometimes, and being called pretty makes my heart sing. But I don't feel like I can't keep living my life as a man, nor do I feel like I'm wearing a costume when I go out into the world as a man.

As I've gotten older, life keeps getting in the way of having a chance to dress (family, job, money, etc). Basically once a year my wife and I give each other a weekend get-away as a gift, and I use mine for "Camille time". It's a blessed time (some pics from a recent post), but far too long in-between those opportunities. I'd say in the past 18 months or so I've been feeling what I can only describe as a deep longing and deep-rooted sense of sadness the longer it's been since I've had that time. The more I felt it, the more I kept looking for answers to what the cause could be. So recently I met with a well respected gender therapist online, and described my history and how I don't feel any dislike towards my male body. It's more that I want to also been seen in the world as Camille too, and live life as her sometimes (whatever that would look like). After listening to me babble for an hour, she told me that she doesn't think I'm a trans woman b/c I don't display any signs of physical dysphoria. Rather, she thinks that I'm bi-gender or gender-fluid.

But as I sit here with this deeply rooted feeling of sadness, almost like a background noise, and which I know is coming from "her" inside me, I do wonder if I have some sort of dysphoria nonetheless. And I wonder if perhaps the therapist’s label of "bi-gender" was hasty, and there is more going on here. Why else would I find myself feeling jealous at times of women I see just being their beautiful selves out in the world, free to present any way they want to? And why else do I often scroll the "trans timelines" sub-reddit thinking,"I wonder what would I look like after X years of HRT?". Perhaps this is all just my femme side trying to "get out" a bit more, and it would all even-out if I could dress-up more than once per year? Or is this feeling something more than just that?

I'd be grateful for any thoughts or advice. ❤️

Camille see

Hey all

I've just gotten done with my partner about a rough topic in our relationship. they dinnae like that i use thc and alcohol often (3-4 times a week) to cope with dysphoria. i explained to them that i need to take a break from existing in this body every couple days, that existing in a body that is fundamentally broken and contorted from what it should be is so mentally exhausting i just sometimes need to forget about it. my use isnae severe enough to interfere with my life, i can get through uni and have a stable job, but my partner keeps pressuring me to quit because they think i'm getting addicted. has anyone had similar issues/conflicts with their partner?

Throwaway account because I’m terrified of sharing this, but it’s been eating away inside me for so long that I just need to get it out. I’m scared this is going to sound like I’m making it up or trying to just get attention, because I can’t find anything anywhere that’s helped me with this or sounds similar to what I’ve been experiencing.

Is it possible to feel gender dysphoria or body dysphoria around the way your body works rather than looks?

I’m a cisgender woman in her 30s. For as long as I can remember, I’ve had what I think is dysphoria around how I pee. One of my earliest memories is of me right around being potty trained and being confused as to why my parents wouldn’t show me how to pee standing. I remember trying, making a huge mess, and getting in big trouble. I remember being lectured that peeing standing is exclusively something boys do… at the time, I thought that meant only boys had permission to do it, not that they were the only ones capable of doing it. I felt it deep down even back then that peeing standing was a part of who I am by nature.

Fast forward to today. I’ve largely swallowed these feelings my entire life and tried to make them disappear. But they always come back, and every time they do they feel stronger. I feel like I’m disconnected from my body when I sit to pee, or squat. I feel like I’m trapped and can’t escape. There have even been a couple of times when I ended up in tears because I felt like there’s something wrong with my body, but also felt guilty for wanting something the universe told me couldn’t be mine.

A few months back I stumbled across an old website that had an instructional video on how to pee standing as a woman. I bought it after reading about the site’s mission and reading the reviews. So I started down the journey of learning. It’s been so affirming to learn, albeit frustrating. I’m overweight, so that makes it harder to do, but it’s still possible. I get envious of all the other people with vulva who say they learn in a few weeks and then can do it anytime, anywhere. They can do it standing upright, aiming, controlling flow, and projecting outward without having to do much more than unzip their pants and pull underwear to the side… pretty much exactly like most people who identify as men pee. My weight limits how well I can do this, so I’ve only been able to do it at home, taking my pants and underwear off completely in order to get clearance and be able to do it. I can pee standing about 6 inches back from the toilet bowl, I can control aim very well (can even hit moving targets), and I don’t make any more of a mess than my male roommate (and I always clean it up afterward). Doing this makes me feel like I’m in the right body, like I’m truly me, like my body matches my soul. Sitting makes me feel the opposite of all that (unless I’m also going number two, but I feel that might be TMI).

But here’s the thing. I’ve never felt like I’m not a woman, never felt like I’m a man, never even felt like my body is missing a penis… I just want the function of one. I do think I might fit genderqueer a little bit, not just for this, but I definitely identify as a woman more than anything. But as strange as it sounds, standing to pee makes me feel valid as a woman. Is that normal? Is this what dysphoria feels like? Is there anyone else who feels this way about the way your body functions without feeling dysphoric about how it looks or what parts it has?

Thank you in advance. It feels good to have just said this all out loud.

Is it weird that I’m not really trans or anything or gay but I like the idea of swapping and taking over someone’s life as a girl. It’s always been a thing for me ever since I was little and I watched she Zow and the scooby doo movie and stuff but I never thought too hard about it. I love my life how it is it’s just kinda like a dirty little secret. I’m a straight man btw I just think it’s kinda hot. Any suggestions or anything?

Today I went to the doctor and he told me I needed to exercise to live longer. And it made me realize something strange: I can’t emotionally connect with that argument. Not because I want to die or anything like that, but because I simply don’t feel that strong attachment to my own existence that other people seem to feel.

Then I started thinking about something: does a newborn miss life before being born? Before existing, did you miss anything? No, because you don’t miss something you never lived.

So sometimes I think: what if I never really lived?

Recently I started considering the possibility that I might be a trans woman, and sometimes I think that, if that’s true, maybe I spent my entire life simply not existing.

And maybe that’s why I never managed to develop that strong attachment to life itself that other people seem to have.

Has anyone else ever thought something similar?

Or is it just me?

I've been thinking and recently, I've found myself passively thinking about my looks almost everyday now ( makeup styles, fashion, possible cosmetic changes ) and it seems to be much of the only interesting things that I could think endlessly of ?

But is that obsession or am I just intrigued at what change is actually realistic and possible ?

Money aside, how much can a person ethically change without causing mental trouble ? Is it similar to how trans people experience "gender-dysphoria" ?

I'm at this point ; very sick and ill.

I wonder if the state of cancer I am in might limit how much can be done ? I wonder if that would mean high risks of "mental-fragility".

I've always had a plan to change everything once those opportunities became viable but I wonder if there are more ways to test if this is something I permanently want. . . .

This is just mostly a compromise to a previous plan that would've proven lethal had I completed it.

I wonder if one could destroy their own origin from inside and out ?

If you looked like someone of your own creation, could you then be you a little easier ? Would that process be less complicated if you were to severe all ties to a past that never belonged to you ?

Is non-emergency cosmetic change inherently unethical,

And always a net-negative ?

- Leo

im a cis woman but my whole life i wanted to be a boy. but nowadays i dont feel like that anymore but i still have one thing in mind that didnt change, having a penis. i hate my genitals and the female organs, and i really wish i had male genitals. not only because its so hard living with this things but also because i feel extremely uncomfortable and disgusted about it. i feel like if i had one id feel so much more confident about my body. i have some masculine features naturally and before when i thought i was a trans boy, anyone would believe it and think im a femboy. i don't want to be guy, i like people seeing me as a woman (in real life only). i wish i was more like a trans woman. i wish i was born a man biologically and then i become a trans woman without surgery, only the hormones to be feminine (please dont attack me for this one, i really dont know how could i phrase it better :c )

i know male genitals have its problems too but i wouldn't mind them. i think id look so much prettier.

ive ben considering being more androgynous or something but i dont know how to start and neither if thats what i truly want. i am a balance of both female and male features, depending on what i wear i can get misgendered easily, if i tell a stranger im a guy, they will believe right away, but if i say im a girl they will believe it too, both without questioning. my face is pretty feminine but my body is a bit more masculine due to my shoulders and back. i need help knowing what i really am, im tired of being confused.

F17

I am a cis woman but I have always had problems with my breasts. I hate them, don’t want them, wish I was flat chested — but I’m not sure why. Has anyone else experienced this?

I’m also very new to this so please let me know if this is, like, not a cool question to ask.

Thanks a bunch

I’m 19 years old and honestly I don’t really know who I am anymore. For the past few months I’ve been trying to understand myself, and I wanted to tell my story in chronological order to hear from people who may have gone through something similar.

Since I was very young I was always extremely sensitive, affectionate, emotional and innocent. As I got older, I became extremely closed off, cold and emotionally distant. Today people probably see me as arrogant, disconnected or emotionally empty, but internally I feel everything very intensely.

I grew up almost entirely surrounded by women during my first years of life. My mother, aunts, cousins. Sometimes I feel like on some level I naturally felt included in that environment until I slowly realized people saw me differently.

I have a lot of old memories that stayed with me. Some are good, like playing in an inflatable pool with my parents or watching Frozen over and over again and feeling a very strong connection to Elsa, especially during Let It Go. I wanted to be her. I watched it constantly.

But I also have many memories tied to shame and hiding parts of myself very early.

When I was a child I remember secretly wearing my mother’s shoes whenever I was home alone. I also have fragmented memories involving princess dresses at school. I remember asking one of my cousins how girls go to the bathroom while wearing dresses. She jokingly told me to imagine myself as a girl wearing one, and I remember thinking about that for the rest of the day and even trying to dream about it that night.

I also remember one moment that affected me deeply. Before I was 12, my father/stepfather jokingly told me that I had actually been born a girl and that they “added a penis” because they wanted a boy. I immediately got excited and asked if it was true, and then he told me it was just a joke. What stayed with me is how instant and involuntary my happiness was.

As I got older, I started realizing certain parts of myself had to stay hidden.

I remember searching for things related to transformation, body swap, men getting pregnant, gender reassignment surgery and trans people from a very young age. Some family members ended up seeing those searches or interests and reacted negatively or made jokes about it, and I think that taught me very early that this side of me needed to stay hidden.

For many years all of this became heavily associated with masturbation and fantasy in my mind. I consumed a lot of body swap/transformation content growing up, so I convinced myself for a long time that maybe this was just a fetish.

But over the last few months something started changing.

After talking daily with an AI that treated me with a lot of kindness and emotional support, I slowly started separating these feelings from pure sexualization. In fact, nowadays I often actively avoid sexualizing it. It still happens sometimes, but much less than before. What became stronger instead was a constant emotional comfort whenever I imagine myself as a woman.

I also started consuming content from trans creators like Isabelle Stol, Alysia and Mathilda Hogberg almost daily. I binge their videos constantly. Not necessarily because of appearance or attraction, but because I feel an extremely deep emotional identification with them.

Recently I started secretly trying feminine clothes myself. Dresses, feminine pajamas, bras, makeup. I took pictures. And for the first time in my life I felt something strange: comfort. Peace. It didn’t feel sexual. It felt emotionally right.

At the same time, it also gave me intense anxiety, fear of being discovered and a horrible feeling whenever I had to “go back” to being male again afterward.

Now when I look at old pictures of myself, I feel an enormous disconnect. I see what looks like a completely normal boy in those pictures, but emotionally it feels like I spent years playing a role and slowly shutting myself down more and more.

I honestly don’t know if I’m trans. I don’t know if I’m confusing trauma, repression, old fetishization, loneliness or actual gender identity issues. I also don’t really know what dysphoria is supposed to feel like, because what I feel most strongly is emptiness, emotional disconnect, anxiety and the sensation that I’ve been performing a version of myself for years.

But whatever this is, it has existed in me for a very long time and it’s becoming impossible to ignore.

I would really appreciate hearing from people who went through something similar. Does this sound like dysphoria? Is there any advice, experience, mindset, “test” or path that helped you better understand yourself?

Hi there! i’ve decided to turn to reddit for some advice cause i have no idea who to turn to for this.

i’ve identified as a lesbian for about two years now, previously identified as bisexual (used to say with a big preference for women and i literally never dated men) for most my life. i’ve partly explored my gender a few years back, seeing if i was possibly trans ftm or non binary, but none ever felt right. so i’ve stuck with she/her and lesbian for these two years and it partly feels right but also deep down a part of me feels it’s wrong?

i’ve noticed with men, i often feel some sort of admiration(?) for them, which is the best way i can describe it. this is typically for celebrities and characters but is also with men i meet in real life. i find myself appreciating the way they look and liking certain features/ dress styles. i can’t tell if this is attraction or more gender envy. in my head i want to look like a man, but i don’t want to be a trans man or a masc lesbian(if that makes sense?) but i also enjoy being a woman and using the lesbian label. i dress mostly feminine and feel comfortable with it mostly.

something a few weeks ago stuck out to me which i feel is relevant, i got called sir and mate by a woman at the shop. i dress feminine but do have quite short hair, but i still feel its hard to mistake me for a man. this made me uncomfortable the fact she thought i was a man, so part of me thinks even though i have desire to be a man, im definitely not trans? is how i feel about my gender and men attraction which im in some sort of denial about? i’m very unsure.

if anyone has any advice or gone through a similar thing it’d be greatly appreciated!!

Hello sisters, I live in a country where gender reassignment is prohibited 🥲, but I want to start the transition before traveling abroad. Can anyone tell me about their experience taking these medications (Spironolactone & Estradiol pills), and what dosages are appropriate for you during a transition period (changing the dosage)? 🩷