How does it feel to have TS?

“It’s like, say, someone kept on calling you a cat when you knew you were human. That’s how frustrating it is.”
- Andrew, Queensland

THE strongest sign of transsexualism (TS) is the intense ongoing discomfort with the physically-sexed aspects of the body. What this person looks like on the ‘outside’ (physically), is the opposite sex to what their internal ‘true-self’ is and this doesn’t change.

“I am a man who was assigned to the gender called ‘female’ at my birth. Since society assumes that gender and sex always match, the doctor who looked at my genitals instead of my mind, assumed incorrectly I was a girl. Throughout my childhood I knew perfectly well that I was really a boy but because my body seemed to insist otherwise, I was bought up a girl and had to try to fit the gender role of a female person. This meant that I experienced an intense discomfort and unhappiness until I learnt there were answers to my situation.

As an adult I sought treatment to bring my body into harmony with my core self and affirmed the sex I always knew I was. I now live what I always felt I would grow up to be – a man. I feel more real and much more comfortable in the gender role called ‘male’ that matches my gender identity.

I regard myself as a perfectly normal, well-adjusted man.

— Andrew, 36 years old

TS is about three concurrent issues:

a very strong (intense) discomfort with physically-sexed aspects of the body,
an ongoing (persistent) discomfort with physically-sexed aspects of the body and
the physical body is the opposite sex to the internal ‘true-self’ (innate-sex).

TS only exists when all three are present.

Thankfully, there are medical answers for this situation. These medical answers are much much more than ‘cosmetic’. They will comprehensively change, not only your physical appearance, but also your social interactions and legal standing in society. This process is called ‘transition’.

However, no matter what treatment you seek from medical providers, you’ll always have the same personality. You’ll be the same person no matter what. Hormone and surgical treatments can’t change you into ‘a different person’. It can only help your ‘outsides’ match your ‘insides’. For this reason, it’s very important to make sure you know who you really are on the ‘inside’, before you transition.

Most people who transition are happier. Physically their body finally matches who they really are (innate-sex matches physical-sex and legal-sex).