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SummerSmiles
Guest
I would agree that right now you’ve got far more important things to settle first, before you even *think *about marriage.
I’ll say some prayers for you.
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I’ll say some prayers for you.
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chevalier
Guest
For what it’s worth, I have a lot of interest in marrying, as well as rather evidently noticing the absence of a gentle companion, but I’m not a restaurant owner or African king and I’m not going to run a casting to pick the “best” of what’s available right now (as if I even were able to tell who’s better than who).
I’m looking for affectio maritalis to develop spontaneously. Yes, I used “looking for” and “spontaneously” in the same sentence.
At least nobody is insinuating anything about you and your best male buddy.
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Listener
Guest
You say that you want to be a man because you don’t like women very much. Well, I have news for you. Most men like women just fine! I think that people who try to change their gender will end up with all kinds of problems, such as legal problems and workplace discrimination. This could make you feel worse than you already do.
One thing I forgot to mention is this. There are probably some young people out there who think that the ideal woman would look and act like someone in Seventeen Magazine or maybe like the mannequins in the windows of Victoria’s Secret. Maybe they think that the Barbie Doll represents the ideal woman.
Nothing could be further from the truth. Many women believe that all that is a bunch of nonsense and that real women don’t look or act like that at all.
I agree that you do need counseling, but please go to someone who has some common sense.
One thing I forgot to mention is this. There are probably some young people out there who think that the ideal woman would look and act like someone in Seventeen Magazine or maybe like the mannequins in the windows of Victoria’s Secret. Maybe they think that the Barbie Doll represents the ideal woman.
Nothing could be further from the truth. Many women believe that all that is a bunch of nonsense and that real women don’t look or act like that at all.
I agree that you do need counseling, but please go to someone who has some common sense.
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Kouyate42
Guest
Yeah, it’s odd.
I don’t think I’m female at all, not even a really tomboyish one. I feel completely and utterly uncomfortable, if not trapped, by my body and it feels like a costume.
It’s not that I don’t like women, but that I cannot connect with other women as their equal. As I said before, I see women, and I simply cannot find a single thing which I recognise in myself and my entire body feels like a costume- not really me, a disguise.
As to the legal/workplace thing, I’m actually legally covered by UK law, in a thing called the Equality Act which means I cannot be discriminated against based on my gender identity.
I’ve got my first gender counselling appointment this week actually.
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Carolus_Martell
Guest
Well I think whatever Kouyate42 thinks…
…but that got me reminiscing about our Eastern-European family values from way back when.
Back in the 60’s if you had your military obligation out or the way and weren’t married they were talking about you like there was a problem. It’s was almost like you were expected to be married at 21.
…but that got me reminiscing about our Eastern-European family values from way back when.
Back in the 60’s if you had your military obligation out or the way and weren’t married they were talking about you like there was a problem. It’s was almost like you were expected to be married at 21.
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Kouyate42
Guest
What I’m finding most interesting is that for all this talk of marriage for me, my mom is herself unmarried.Well I think whatever Kouyate42 thinks…
…but that got me reminiscing about our Eastern-European family values from way back when.
Back in the 60’s if you had your military obligation out or the way and weren’t married they were talking about you like there was a problem. It’s was almost like you were expected to be married at 21.
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Carolus_Martell
Guest
What I’m finding most interesting is that for all this talk of marriage for me, my mom is herself unmarried.
In that case I’m throwing in with the poster that suggests your Mom wants to be a Grandmother. Of course we know that you know that’s NOT the reason you should get married at this moment in time. God hard wired all of us to fall in love first.
We have some unmarried children that privately we hope will get married and give us grandchildren but we don’t say they should get married…mostly I guess not to put undue influence on their relationships. It all works out eventually.
In that case I’m throwing in with the poster that suggests your Mom wants to be a Grandmother. Of course we know that you know that’s NOT the reason you should get married at this moment in time. God hard wired all of us to fall in love first.
We have some unmarried children that privately we hope will get married and give us grandchildren but we don’t say they should get married…mostly I guess not to put undue influence on their relationships. It all works out eventually.
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EasterJoy
Guest
OP, I’m assuming you are not living a life that is sexually active outside of marriage and rightly scandalizes your mother into pressing you hard to do the right thing with regards to your sexual desires. If you’re sleeping around, she could be rebuking you far harder than she is.
In the case that you are giving her no scandal, I think you’ve tried subtle. It is time to dig in your heels and stick to your guns:
OK, Mom, have it your way. I’m “just saying that.” I’m also saying that you have beat this horse to death, and I am profoundly tired of it. If I find someone I might want to marry, I might bring him home to meet you. Maybe. If you don’t get off of my back, though, I won’t bring a man near you until I’ve put an engagement ring!
You think I’m just saying that? OK, fine*…try me!* Don’t blame me when you’re the last to know. You will have earned it.
As for the gender issues, don’t waste your breath. That is an issue to reserve for friends and relatives who respect your right to self-determination. Mom isn’t in that group.
In the case that you are giving her no scandal, I think you’ve tried subtle. It is time to dig in your heels and stick to your guns:
OK, Mom, have it your way. I’m “just saying that.” I’m also saying that you have beat this horse to death, and I am profoundly tired of it. If I find someone I might want to marry, I might bring him home to meet you. Maybe. If you don’t get off of my back, though, I won’t bring a man near you until I’ve put an engagement ring!
You think I’m just saying that? OK, fine*…try me!* Don’t blame me when you’re the last to know. You will have earned it.
As for the gender issues, don’t waste your breath. That is an issue to reserve for friends and relatives who respect your right to self-determination. Mom isn’t in that group.
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EasterJoy
Guest
Mom, you worry about you being alone, and let me worry about me being alone. I’d rather be an old spinster lady surrounded by her cats than put some poor soul through a divorce because I jumped in to a marriage* in order to please my mother, who needed to mind her own business and live her own life!*
Again, I would never be so tactless to someone who responded at all when I made my appropriate response using tact. Tact is better. Being careful of the feelings of others is better. There gets to be a point, though, where even the Easter Bunny will rightly bite you because he’s had enough of being poked with a stick. If your mom won’t stop poking you with this particular stick, a little ill-tempered nip at her hand is entirely OK. (Do leave her a hand, though…)
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jmcrae
Guest
What is “it”? As a woman, you can do anything you want, and you are certainly not required to do anything “girly” that you don’t happen to like doing.
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TheRealJuliane
Guest
See, I think society is leading people astray this way…Whatever that feeling is, why does it have to mean mutilating one’s body and taking artificial hormones in order to change one’s appearance, when you can NEVER become a man, no matter what you do to yourself? Whatever that feeling is, THAT is the problem, not that you are “trapped in the wrong body.” It’s BELIEVING that you are “trapped in the wrong body” that creates the problem. What if you got counseling, believed that you should have been born a man (spits in God’s face), get on hormones, get plastic surgery, mutilate yourself and THEN you still aren’t happy? Well, hopefully the counselor will bring up these issues, but I have serious problems with the whole thing…
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SummerSmiles
Guest
I have to agree with the sentiment here. God creates people just the way He needs them to be.
Some people do have more difficult crosses to bear. I’m sure that people with gender identification issues do struggle with it very much. Their struggles are absolutely real. But I agree that taking hormones and having surgery doesn’t do them any favors. DNA doesn’t change, and we will all forever be whichever gender we are born as. (I realize that in rare cases, people are born with something like XXY chromosomes.) Hopefully, the OP has a good counselor who will help her deal with her problems and help her find a way to have some peace about who she is.
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Kouyate42
Guest
Nope, no sleeping around here.
This seems to only have temporary effect. It’ll quickly be dropped only to resurface a few months later in a new disguise.
TBH I can’t be bothered to deal with it any longer with people like my mother. It only serves to make me more miserable which is not what I need right now. There are people in my life who accept me without putting me through the Spanish Inquisition first.
I don’t want to ruin two people’s lives when I don’t have to do so.
The simple fact of being labelled ‘female’ is enough to make me feel sick.What is “it”? As a woman, you can do anything you want, and you are certainly not required to do anything “girly” that you don’t happen to like doing.
Problem is that I AM trapped in the wrong body. Living the rest of my life as a female is an idea that sickens me.
As to the other 2/3 of this, what’s better, living life in a body I detest or living life as something approaching the life I want to live? Yes, I admit there are certain things I will never be able to do if I do through the whole process and become male, such as fathering children but this is something I have accepted.
As to the bolded bit (bolded bit is mine), this is the potential risk I take in undergoing the surgery/treatment.
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EasterJoy
Guest
I’m not a partisan in favor of surgical treatment of the very real difficulty you’re going through. I believe it to be a sort of a suicide of a part of yourself that you can’t accept in favor of a persona that you believe suits you better. As this truly is a part of yourself that others love and a substantial part of what your DNA says you are, this is no small thing. Still, I recognize that your problem is real and totally outside my experience. I understand the argument that if two legs are healthy but pain is caused by one being longer than the other, a part of the longer leg might be legitimately removed in order to bring the two legs into functional harmony. I don’t buy it, but I can at least see where a reasonable and ethical person might.
Having said that: if you are competently treated, you will have done a great deal of emotional work surrounding whether your problem truly is what you believe it to be. IOW, an ethical surgeon will not destroy otherwise healthy and functional physical capacities you have as a woman on the blind hope that you will be cured by physically taking on the persona of a man. Rather, you will be required to live as if you had already had the surgery, receive counselling as you go through that process, and see how that goes.
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Samson01
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JoArtist
Guest
Actually gender identity really has little affect on sexuality from what I see. I have two transgendered friends who are born females and see themselves as gay men. There are more issues to gender identity then who you are attracted to.
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Kouyate42
Guest
Yes, I’m going for my first gender counselling appointment this week and the counsellor I’m going to be seeing is a specialist in this subject who will work with me on this.
I know, hence why this whole thing about me getting married is getting on my damn nerves.
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EasterJoy
Guest
If you makes you feel any better, people who are absolutely dying to get married get sick of hearing this kind of thing from their relatives, too! It is out of bounds, and you are fully within the boundaries of charity if you draw that boundary with your mother in no uncertain terms.
You do not need to give her any reasons to stay off the subject. Giving her reasons implies that she deserves to be given reasons, and she doesn’t. It is none of her business, a subject which you have the right to discuss “by invitation only”!
Stick to your guns!!
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Kouyate42
Guest
If you makes you feel any better, people who are absolutely dying to get married get sick of hearing this kind of thing from their relatives, too! It is out of bounds, and you are fully within the boundaries of charity if you draw that boundary with your mother in no uncertain terms.
You do not need to give her any reasons to stay off the subject. Giving her reasons implies that she deserves to be given reasons, and she doesn’t. It is none of her business, a subject which you have the right to discuss “by invitation only”!
Stick to your guns!!
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Dan_Daly
Guest
This. Being “reassigned” would not only be a huge mistake, it would be a grave evil. It also wouldn’t change what sex you are. Sex is more than biology. A man is a man and a woman is a woman. All the surgeries or therapies in the world can not change that.
If you were “reassigned” to male and then tried to marry a woman…you would be a woman, as God made you, trying to marry a woman. That is impossible and any attempted marriage would be invalid.
You are who God made you.
I will say that I agree with you that your mother shouldn’t be pushing you to get married. Marriage is not for everyone. The call to religious life is universal, although not all accept it.
Pax Christi
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