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Hi. I heard of this site from my school and figured, "sure, this is worth a shot," so here I am. Long story "short", I (born male) have had thoughts since a VERY young age--around first grade, possibly earlier--questioning my gender indirectly. Basically, I felt that I was supposed to be a girl, and assumed that I would just be a girl in my next lifetime (I've had a spiritual upbringing). But in the past year and change, I've come upon that thinking again inadvertently. Now being well into puberty, I took a strange interest in women's fashion, especially enjoying scrolling through blogs or pinterest pages and wishing I could try on some of these things. After at least several weeks of this, a thought came to me--what if these things meant I was transgender? Besides that one case at a young age, I was not a very masculine child growing up: playing with dolls, dressing up as a girl w/ female cousin, so on. The fact that I had these thoughts at a young age, combined with how long they have pestered me now (and the many unwelcome bouts of powerful, deeply distressful body dysphoria) seem to be fairly concrete evidence that I am likely not simply a cisgender male. However, this is not the full story. Without me telling of this to my parents, they have frequently suggested that other students at my school are likely coming out for "attention", or just as a phase-- i.e. thinking they aren't cishet due to being at such a liberal school. What should I do? I would like to explain this to them, and ask if I could try dressing and presenting female to see if it makes me feel more comfortable with myself, but their previously mentioned thoughts on my LGBT friends makes me worried to do so. Thanks for reading.
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It sounds like you are still learning more about yourself and who you are and you have come to a choice about what you would like to do in order to be happy and true to yourself. Talking with people that have a less than open mind about being LGBTQ could be intimidating or downright scary. If you are comfortable telling your parents what your feeling, go ahead, if they think that it's just going to be a phase, that's on them, you know (or are learning) the truth and eventually if you continue to present as female they will understand it's not a phase and hopefully they will start learning to accept you for who you are. If you don't feel comfortable telling them, don't, find sources of strength in your friends, teachers or advisers that will be accepting of you. Build up a support system and eventually, maybe you'll feel comfortable telling your parents as well. Check out websites like www.thetrevorproject.org to learn more about how others handled situations like yours and maybe get some ideas from them. And call or text us anytime to talk more about what you're going through at 888-222-2228.
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