brand noob for you all to talk to.

[drache-flugel.livejournal.com]

I hope I'm doing the right thing by starting entries in a group like this. I am a member of the crossdressing community as well, but almost everything I've seen posted over there is normally people who identify with the gender they are, but like to cross-dress for kicks. That's all well and good, but I'm looking for some friends who can help me understand myself. Lately urges to become someone I should be have been growing quite strong, and I'm starting to see why I've been so unhappy my whole life. I'm going to slap this under a cut because I tend to talk for a bit...
At a very young age, I was highly interested in being a girl. Not just the crossdressing thing, which I did on several occasions before and during adolescence. I grew up with one male friend, was raised by women, was surrounded by estrogen at all times, and always wanted my mom or grandma to buy me girl's toys instead of boy's. (I owned about an equal amount of action figures and dolls) It was very strange when I got older and realized what I'd been doing all those years. I thought that I was just some freak with no idea who the hell I was, and never had an outlet for self-discovery really. I have always been a musician, and I write songs all the time...a few of those songs have been from a female's perspective. I just never ever wanted to be the macho-guy, and I have always been the sensitive type. Alltogether too sensitive at times.

Instead of blowing up at people, I would yell, then go sit and cry about it. Once I went off on a guy back in High-School, hitting him repeadetly; then I went and sat down and cried while apologizing to him. I would lie awake at night wondering why I was so weird. Why the hell I was so different than everybody else. Why I couldn't just be another guy. Fact is, I've always hated "normal" guys for their reputation on how they treat women, and I've never been interested in anything what-so-ever that by society's standards, a guy should be interested in. I never knew why any of this was, until I started learning about this whole "right spirit, wrong gender" thing. I started realizing that I wasn't just some freak who was a cross-dresser. Maybe I was actually issued the wrong identity at birth. I've come to this conclusion, and my ex-girlfriend was very supportive of me. I would rather be dating boys, though. I am bisexual, but am not very open about it and not open about my identity crisis either. Not open, for the only reasons that; A) I could be killed/disowned by everyone who knows me, and B) I don't want to dissapoint my mother, I love her very much.

I know exactly what I want at this point in my life, and simply that's just to: start going through a transition phase, and find out if this is really more than anything what's going to make me happy. If I find out that I'm just not happy no matter what, then I'll know I'm just insane as I thought I was when I was younger. I really want this, though. The only real thing that keeps me from making this descision is that, as I mentioned earlier, I'm a musician. I love playing music for people, and I love singing and playing my songs. This would bring me around to the point of my voice. This is the biggest doubt that I have. I have quite a decent voice, one that shouts emotion out to people, and one that is recognizable. If I transition, I don't want my deep growly voice. If I don't transition, I will be stuck as "this guy I used to date" forever. Does anyone out there know what I'm talking about? If so, please give me some sort of advice or direct me to somewhere so that I can finally find some advice. I have no idea what to do about any of this, but I know for certain that I want to find out. If anybody wants to add me to their friend's list, by all means-go ahead. I enjoy meeting new people. For now, I think I have destroyed your vision with all the text here, so I'm going to let this out and see what kind of responses I get, if any. Thank you all for your time in reading this. I hope to post here sometime again soon.
-Justin (rather be Jessica)