A common trope in my history is, "Why do they get it and I don't?"

Lots of envy regarding feminine folk.

I (mtf) used to have the classic embarrassment about going shirtless as a boy, took me years to somewhat overcome. Still somewhat feel it these days but I begrudgingly deal with it anyway because my area is warm as heck.

Also always thought being a man was meh and women were fucking amazing and interesting in pretty much every way but that was totally because I was attracted to them and respectful, still totally cis though!

A particularly sad/hilarious one is the intense and euphoric recurring dreams about being a girl followed by inevitably waking up devastated, that's totally a thing everyone has, right? Right, guys??

Up until I realized that I am trans, I always felt really awkward going into the men's restroom. I would always check the signs like 5 times and then I'd go in, see the urinals, and still feel like I was somehow in the wrong place.

I also hated having my top off, and I rarely swam until I discovered rash guards. In middle school we were required to do swimming for gym and they didn't allow me to wear my rash guard and I felt so embarrassed the entire time.

I remember telling my sister when I was around nine "I wish I was the son he never had" (referring to my dad). She scoffed and said that was a stupid thing to say. Little did we know...

She is very supportive of me nowadays. We were kids then and she didn't know any better. I got pretty lucky in the sister game.

I remember reading Calvin and Hobbes, with their transmogrifier, and thinking I would write "girl" on it. Bit of foreshadowing I guess haha

Every time I saw a shooting star I wished I would wake up as a girl with nothing else changing in the world. Same for blowing away an eye lash.

I desperately wanted to be the little mermaid.

I feel that I should preface this by warning questioning people that looking for signs is generally not a good way to find out if you're trans. Different people experience being trans in different ways.

Having said that... There were so many signs. Daydreaming about being a girl. Being uncomfortable about being shirtless in public. Feeling a deep admiration for women. Nearly only relating to female characters. Never falling in love for gay men despite being attracted to men.

I remember when I was playing the sims. I made a female character and the game was so much fun. Then after my sim died, I decided to make a male character, and suddenly I lost interest in the game. It was the exact same game, but being a woman just seemed so much more fun... I should've known.

I was constantly thinking "damn I hate masculinity and I want to have as little of it as posssible, very normal cis thing"

At around 8, I told my cousin's friends I was a girl, I didn't understand their laughter. At 10, I distinctly recall thinking that it would be nice if I could live half my life as a man and half as a woman. Around then, I started reading through my mom's medical books and found GID listed as a diagnosis. At the time, I remember thinking a diagnosis would be scary and something that I couldn't walk back, so I became obsessed with finding an alternate diagnosis that could get me a prescription that would have a similar effect.

Lots of stereotypes like playing the female character in games, confusing envy with attraction, always being upset about male fashion or lack therof.

An entrance exam for some psychiatrist thing as a kid asked if I wanted to be the other sex/gender (idr the wording). I cried and took a while to answer that. And then I forgot about it for a decade.

"Maybe I'm not a guy but a girl", says me in primary school, "but no, it's not possible"

Rediscovered this memory a decade and half later, a whole year or more into questioning my gender. Big "oh fuck" moment.

Hitting subscribe on egg_irl.

i had this whole argument with my mom when i was like, 5, because i didn't understand why i wasn't a boy. i preferred boy things, i should be a boy. she was very insistent i was a girl.

my parents ended up divorcing not long after this but that was mainly prompted by mom fucking off for approximately six months.

I knew I needed to feel desired in order to fall for someone. And I kept running into women who just didn't get it and acted all entitled. It just seemed like incredibly bad luck to me. Looking back, I've only ever really gotten anywhere with women who made me feel special. And they were always bi or lesbian.

Like sure, I definitely tried taking charge many times. I've certainly never lacked in courage or stupidity. But there always came this point where I was like: ok now you.. when will you take me someplace special? And it would fall flat and I'd stop caring.

But let's be honest I bet that's the same experience a lot of hetero women have gone through with boys.

And now it's totally different. There's men who can give me that feeling with just a glance, and I'm up for exploring that. I'll also keep dating lesbians but so far it has been lacking in intensity and has been quite lame.

Probably the biggest one for me was always feeling discomfort when being referred to or referring to myself as a "man". I didn't have any problem with words like "male", "guy", "dude", "lad", "boy", "fella", etc., but "man" was just one step too far, apparently.

Always figured it was just a reaction to my strong distaste for toxic masculinity, and/or a reluctance to grow up. With hindsight, it seems silly that it wasn't a dead giveaway.

Standard inexplicable discomfort being shirtless. Even if it's stupidly hot. followed by... Male puberty! And reacting to aaaall the changes with NOPE, discomfort, and depression.

More recent egg-splattery (past year) I attribute to an anime (Onimai) and feeling a surprising amount of jealousy at the main character just... waking up a different sex and getting to relive their life like that.

The rest is MEEEEEEEEEEMES!!!

Very early interactions with other children. Pretty much always being one of the girls, and taking part in activities mostly done by girls while not all that interested in the traditional guy activities.

The school had these horizontal bars my girl friends and I would twirl around endlessly. Did a lot of roleplaying with this same group of friends, including classic 'damsel in distress' scenarios, which I related to in particular. Had a crush on one of these girls, and it turns out she fought her best friend over my attention. Cue the 9-year old first relationship experience. We managed to keep it going for a year and a half until she wanted to french kiss me and I chickened out. Worst mistake of my life. 😅

The both of us were real big Tomb Raider fans back then, which was probably my first time experiencing the "be, or be with" confusion. We both had a pretty good claim at the "being" part, since we were both really into gymnastics and pretty bad ass people overall (at least as much as a 9-year old has any right to be). Naturally this would become a problem for roleplaying purposes, which I understood, so I was content being Indiana Jones instead. Looking back at those times something was definitely off there.

Then there's the mostly relating to female characters part in general, which never really stopped. And today I just consider this part of who I am. I have female role models, deal with it!

I have been refered to with the feminine variant of my name by a girl friend from next door when I was a kid. Made me wonder if she actually knew my name, no confusion at all at being "misgendered" there. Turns out, she was onto something. Currently debating using both forms of my name interchangably to see what it's like.

Had a first real crossdressing experience when I was about 13 years old, which was for a school play. Probably enjoyed being dolled up with the help of classmates way more than the average cis male should. Once again, hindsight is 20/20.

Most of the stronger signs are a recent thing though, and I see daily life in a different light now. It's actually kinda fun going out in public and looking at women around my age because the confusing part is over. I can now just look at women and either crush on them, envy them or both at the same time (which is unexpectedly thrilling). I guess it's similar to the experience a bisexual friend of mine described after coming out. "There's no more pressure, I can just look at others and enjoy, instead of feeling confused".

I'm kind of in a mental state where being trans is probably a good fit for me, but I'm trying to figure out more before committing to any coming out or transitioning. So I expect to keep experimenting to get a grip on who I want to be. In the mean time it's posting here as an outlet and figuring out what I can get away with in my appearance in daily life without having to explain what's going on.

"I am not trans, I just wish I was a gender different than what I was assigned. That's normal, everyone feels that way sometimes. Sure wish I could transition, but too bad I'm not trans. Did I say I'm not trans?"

I had thoughts of what it would be like if I was a girl and dreams of myself becoming a woman, I thought that it was my curiosity and that everyone did the same thing from time to time. Also, for a very long time I was interested in gender swaping stuff and switching bodies (and wished to experience something like that), I thought it's just a weird fetish. Now that I think about it it's kinda odd how long it took me to actually start questioning my gender.

Okay...so you know the music video for this song:

That video was so emotionally raw and intense, and I was still a kid when I saw it. I somehow didn't know the video was about the invasion of Iraq after 9/11, or I forgot. I just totally lost myself in the story of the couple.

I felt deeply about the argument, confident that I knew and truly understood what he had done and why he'd done it, in a way that most people couldn't possibly understand.

Then as he got off the bus and the Sergent (or whatever) was yelling at him and the line of other guys, I started to get confused. When I saw the scene of all the guys getting their heads shaved one-by-one, it clicked in my head that what he'd done was sign up for the military to be shipped off to Iraq.

So what had I thought he'd done?

I had thought he'd submitted all the paperwork to have a sex change surgery and that she had found the confirmation letter indicating the scheduled date of surgery. And I had thought that "sex change surgery" meant having the genitals completely removed.

...yeah...

Can anyone relate? lol

As an enby trans person, it was checking in my early teens for surgery scars of sex determination assuming that I had been intersex and that my parents chose a gender and being disappointed that there were none but still hoping that it was too early to have developed noticeable scars.

I could never explain why I always wore long sleeves and pants when I went to school. I don't think there was a single day where I went to school in shorts, and not a single day I went to school without long-sleeves (some days I would wear short-sleeve shirts but I would bring a long sleeve shirt to put over it). I felt exposed and uncomfortable otherwise. I was a good student, but the only class I did poorly in was gym because they graded you based on whether you dressed according to dress-code, and I refused because it required changing into shorts and a short-sleeved t-shirt in a locker room full of boys. I tried it a couple times but just couldn't keep doing it. I think the teachers thought I was just defiant or something, but I was meek and just uncomfortable.

I remember being in third grade and wearing a literal winter coat to school every day in the heat of summer (this being in the south). I remember being extremely sweaty and uncomfortable on the bus rides especially where it was crowded and there wasn't AC, but I never took that coat off.

I never understood why I always felt ashamed of my body and wanted to cover every part of it. Before realizing I am trans I thought maybe I had a repressed memory of sexual abuse or something, but now it makes more sense to me why I had that kind of relationship to my body.

Laying in bed willing my body to become feminine. When they said blow out the candles and make a wish, or wishing in a falling star, always wishing I could just be a girl.