Thank you Flame,

I'm glad this thread got back on topic.

I always imagine what it'd be like to BE a woman having sex with a guy. No guy in particular, though. He is always faceless, nameless and I generally only ever imagine his dick being in my vagina and can't wait `til he cums in me!!

not mentioned this before as i thought it was weird but often when self satisfying i am imagining that i am a woman and being deep humped by a penis

I've been doing that way for so long I really don't even know if I CAN get off by just looking at pics of naked girls and imagining that I'm fucking them anymore! Even when I watch pornos, I pretend that I'm the girl in the movie!
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same here.

Flame,

May I second what Spanky said? We owe you a lot.

In my last post I was trying to be on topic and answer your original query, but what I should perhaps have made clear was that I have in effect spent much of my life trying either to respond to or to sublimate the issues arising from what I now realize was GID, with greater or lesser success. Once I realized that it might be possible for me to grow breasts, that opened a whole new perspective. Although my initial efforts failed, and it was more likely my then doctor's prescription of Spiro for a quite different reason that started my growth rather than the herbs I was taking at the time, I have achieved small but real and hopefully still growing breasts. Seemingly like others here I have found this satisfying and more than a little addictive. I am not only starting to look for signs of commonly associated types of physical feminisation but to resent physical changes that detract from the appearance and presentation of my breasts. For example, the diastasis recti that I developed produces what appears to be an unsightly bloat of my upper abdomen, while my belt line is too low around my hips and lower belly and forces upwardly a roll of fat from my hips to below where my real waist should be between my hips and rib cage (although my wife says that men don't have waists). If this fat was where it should be, I might be able to claim at least some butt development. On the other hand much of my body hair has gone, my eyebrows have almost disappeared and even my beard is growing much less strongly. Rather than wondering how to hide my breasts, I find myself not caring about that. So where do I go from here?

So would you call GID for a lack of other words a curse or a blessing?
Has it not given us the ability to experience things that most will never know
let alone understand?
Has it not made us truly sensual beings? Much more in touch with life than society dictates acceptable?
I say its a blessing at least for me.

That's a really interesting question.

For most of my life, when I didn't understand what was going on, more of a curse. It made me a misfit, led me in wrong directions, and caused me to miss opportunities. Now I find it much more of a blessing, not only in the ways you so well express, but also in our own present situation of direct benefit both to me and I believe to my wife. I do have occasional ponderings about what might have been if only I had understood earlier. Surely we all have those 'if only' thoughts - another of both of us is that if only we had married earlier we might have had children of our own. Although I do have two wonderful stepchildren, both of them seem to have followed my example and rather belatedly acquired delightful but ready made families of their own, so I have no blood grandchildren either. Both were DES kids,which has been alleged to cause gender issues at least ln boys amongst some of its other more undesirable effects such as reduced fertility and various other problems of the reproductive system, although I don't think I recognize any overt gender issues in either of my two.

I'll be most interested to see what other answers you get to your question.

What are DES kids?

Anyways, I'd say GID has been both a blessing and a curse for me. A blessing in the sense that I am mentally female, and I enjoy being so. A curse in that I have a male body, which I despise.

Although, I can only answer this question based on my current brain chemistry and experiences, both of which would be vastly different if I were a guy mentally or a gg physically.

So while I say I'd have been happier being born as a girl physically, and miserable as a boy mentally...One can really never know, as one's viewpoint would be unavoidably shifted from what it currently is, in either case.

In short, if you change something that had such a major impact in you becoming the person that you are, then you aren't you anymore. I almost feel that this question is inherently more a measure of one's self esteem than a true evaluation of the impact of GID on one's life. It seems to me like the better a person feels about themselves, the better they'll view their GID. Of course, maybe things are different for those less affected by it, I can't really say.

I feel like I'm typing differently since I'm back on E lol, but perhaps its just my perception of my writing style that's different.

I don't think I would have worded that last sentence so coherently a few days ago, for example. I think flame likes me better when I'm not "in heat".

hahaha, oh damn, that cracked me up for some reason.

In the 1960s, diethyl stilbestrol was widely administered to pregnant women who were believed at risk of miscarriage in the belief that it would help prevent it. As it turned out it was not only ineffective for that purpose but produced a wide range of mainly undesirable effects in the children born to such mothers, ranging from proneness to various forms of cancer of the reproductive system through differing degrees of infertility to GID. Some doctors including the then doctor of my wife-to-be in her first marriage were very slow to get the message, and my stepson born in 1973 must have been one of the last DES kids.

Your own comments seem to make good sense to me, and particularly your point on self esteem. I'm not so certain about becoming a different person; it seems to me more a case of one's basic personality being modulated, sometimes profoundly, by hormonal and environmental circumstances. Having been brought up very much in the 'stiff upper lip' tradition, I used to be embarrassed by unpredictable surges of emotion amongst many other things. These emotional episodes have become more intense, how much as a result of low T and how much as a result of higher T I don't know. Although I think that I've become a more relaxed person and less inclined to fight against 'letting it all hang out', I still found myself struggling to hide my tears from the vet when we had to have our fifteen year old dog put down on Monday, although I have largely given up on worrying about hiding my breast development - which represents a major character shift for me. I know this sounds muddled, but while I continue to surprise myself on this journey, I am still me.

just out of curiosity ' despite reading and researching on net could someone enlighten me the difference between GID / dual gender / Aphrodite ?

Thank you everyone for your words of support and appreciation.

I am presently most inclined to attribute my gender issues to the fact that my mother contracted rubella during the specific phase of my fetal development in which the brain of a male is supposed to be masculinized, and that this process was thus incomplete.

I think brain development is certainly a compelling cause of brain dysphoria. I'm not aware of my mom experiencing any health complications, so for me I'm more inclined to focus more on nurture than nature for an explanation of my gender identity. My father was absent for a good portion of my childhood, and having a brother and sister allowed me to engage in both masculine and feminine pastimes. My father clearly enjoyed spending time with me, but I think being an ISTP, he simply wasn't interested in micromanaging my life as I was never a troublemaker. I was a sensitive, well-behaved and quiet child who disliked sports and confrontations, but then I had (and still do have) a voracious interest in military history.

Anyways, I said I envy people drawn to androgyny in some ways. For one thing it's a much closer goal to reach, only feeling the need to go halfway, in a sense. For another, it involves much less surgery, therefore much less money. I'd also imagine you have to endure not quite as much ridicule. (Although, being somewhat androgynous myself currently, I can attest to it possibly being worse at points.) Finally, it's hard for me to envision having a burning desire to be androgynous. Like an all consuming sense of undying thirst to be directly between sexes. The kind of feeling I get about being a woman when I take breaks from estrogen lol..although it's always there for me, E just dulls it, but that's another topic altogether ;p

There's just much less of a negative social connotation to it than full fledged transgendered people, I suppose. Then again, I'm sure it's different for everyone, so I don't mean to generalize. Also, it's probably tougher to deal with than I think it is.

Grass is always greener, after all.

I see androgyne as being the best explanation for my gender identity. I don't like to try to categorize behaviors as being male and female. My tendency is to be free-spirited with gender identity and expression, rather than binding my identity with one sex or the other. I suppose my ideology concerning gender bear some similarity to someone who has a pansexual orientation.

Even if I was a genetic female, I postulate I would still be drawn to express an androgyne gender identity. I have some preferences that are usually no big deal since I'm a guy, but as a female I would probably receive a more negative reception. One key example that comes to mind is my desire to not have children. In this regard I may be considered eccentric, but as a female I would possibly be seen as a crazy cat lady. (It probably doesn't help that I'm far more tolerant of cats than screaming or otherwise misbehaving children.)

So would you call GID for a lack of other words a curse or a blessing?
Has it not given us the ability to experience things that most will never know
let alone understand?
Has it not made us truly sensual beings? Much more in touch with life than society dictates acceptable?
I say its a blessing at least for me.

I consider my gender nonconformity to be a blessing. As you mention, I think it gives me a far greater and fulfilling view of life and such. I would never want to take a pill or something that would turn my mind into male mode or something.

I feel like I'm typing differently since I'm back on E lol, but perhaps its just my perception of my writing style that's different.

I don't think I would have worded that last sentence so coherently a few days ago, for example. I think flame likes me better when I'm not "in heat".

hahaha, oh damn, that cracked me up for some reason.

Are you teasing me Sarah?

Maybe it's just me, but I think you're making us sound like a sort of pseudo online couple or something.

That's interesting. My dad was never around growing up either, except every now and then he'd stay for a week, get really drunk, and start breaking shit. Wasn't a fan.

I also don't want kids and like cats and war documentaries lol.

Are you teasing me Sarah?

Maybe it's just me, but I think you're making us sound like a sort of pseudo online couple or something.

Yeah, I'm teasing you pretty much. The psuedo online couple is part of the humor, to me.

I think we've interacted enough for that to not creep you out I guess.

Sorry if it did, not at all serious.