Sorry to hear about your "friend", Em. You may get a chance to talk to your uncle, though. So, Mum doesn't want him to know... that's not her call.

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Chrissy
Forums Moderator.

Always have faith and believe in yourself.
Never run from the truth.
Have the will to change your fate and your spirit will never die.
Check out the tzone team bios here: http://www.transgenderzone.com/bio.htm

It all seems very depressing, but from what ive seen most of the people here have eventually found acceptance from their families.
You may have to just "play ball" for a little while until your mum finally realises that your not going to turn into an embarrassment.

I might have all this still to come

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Most of the time, most people do what most people do most of the time.

This is a hard time of year, I understand, like many others here, the struggle it can be to appease family members over the Christmas period. The societal pressure on families with difficulties to spend this time of year together ultimately leads to problems.

I don’t see my parents or any of my family for most of the year, not that I don’t want to, but that I am not welcome. Much like yourself my parents are too ashamed to tell their brother and sisters and therefore I am denied access to my extended family.

I am becoming tired of being openly apologetic only to be criticised continuously and told that I am selfish and an embarrassment. The unfortunately thing is that my life is really very good apart from my relationship with my family, but from the little I am told about their life’s, they believe I am to blame for having destroyed their family unit and made their life’s miserable. So I guess it doesn’t help that when I speak to them and inform them about all these amazing things are happening in my life right now (like I might get my first article published in the next few weeks! Exciting!) I guess that could be misconstrued as being selfish.



My sister has reacted the strongest of them all and has totally rejected me and wants nothing to do with me ever again. She is 21 and lives at home, and on the rare occasions that I do return home, such as this Christmas for 3 days, she will not come home from her bf’s (who my parents haven’t met in 3 years of them dating.). She hasn’t even spoken to me, talk about seen me, in over 2 years. This Christmas will be the first time she is going to not be there for the soul reason that I shall be there too. I missed last Christmas out of respect for both her and my family. However, I am continuously attacked for being ‘selfish’, but these actions are considered perfectly acceptable for the soul reason that they know they make me feel guilty. My mum asked me on the phoned yesterday (after two years ft)

“Do I really want this?
Could I change my mind?
Your dad feels that if he had a chance to talk to you about it, without you arguing back, he could convince you this is the wrong path.”

I didn’t say anything back, as it just feels like they haven’t been listening for the past two years.



I am beginning to think that I have no place in this family unit as I have very little in common with them anyway, couple with this the total lack of respect for me while I only attempt to appease their wishes to the best of my ability. I am tired of being made to feel guilty and ashamed.

I find it very hard to be proud, not just because I am transgendered, but proud in who I am and what I have achieved. I think this has a lot to do with the continuous attacks I received as a child/young adult for not doing what my parents ask of me. Such as going to university, not to mention doing worthless things such as a masters and Ph.D. When I informed my parents that I had been offered a full Ph.D scholarship, due to my excellent academic abilities and passion, they thought I was lying because;

“how have you managed to con them out of that?
Your not good enough to do stuff like that.
I think your professor has set your ambitions to high and you need to get your feet back on the ground.
Come home and we can sort you out a job at factory where your dad works.”
(My mum actually said that!)

Thanks mum and dad. Thanks for the support. Anyway, that’s off subject



I think it is a huge shame that this sort of lack of respect/denial/open hatred towards family members who happen to be going though a pretty difficult time as it is. It’s just a very sad case of affairs. I gave my dad some information on transgendered issues and for families dealing with a transgendered daughter. Apparently he didn’t even read it and told my mum that I wasn’t to seem him any more propaganda. (Of course he didn’t use that word, as it would be beyond him.)

He is right. End of story. He is miserable and he blames me because he doesn’t understand and can’t not accept what has happened. I feel sorry for him and my sister. But most of all I feel sorry for my poor mother who has to put up with all this and have the pressure that if she is negative towards me to, she runs the risk of loosing contact with her first born altogether.



I think I needed that bitch sorry its not much of a response … I hope things turn out well for you all and things are almost always never as bad as we envision.

Merry Christmas

Hey emrock and signalfailure,

I'm sorry you are both having such a hard time with your parents and close family. And I think it's very sad that both your families are trying to lay a guilt trip on both of you in the way that they are.

I'm sure you both know this already, but you cannot blame yourself for your families reaction to this. You never asked to be born trans, it's not a lifestyle choice and they need to realise that you are not transitioning through choice or to to hurt them or to make their life a misery. You are transitioning because it is what you have to do, and because it is the only thing that you can do to have any kind of a life.

I hate the way that some families treat transition as the equivalent of having a death in the family. It's such an unfair and negative analogy to use.....after all death is all about finality and sadness.........and transition need not be like that at all. It can be the most happy and fulfilling time in a person's life and something to be celebrated.

My close family have mainly been very supportive, but a couple of years after I transitioned, we lost one of my brothers who developed a blood clot in his brain and sadly passed away (I miss him loads and always shed a wee tear when i think about him not being here ). Anyway, the point I'm trying to make is that up until that point some of my other family members had thought that my transition was like a death in the family. But then when that really happened to us, they realised that transition is not like that at all. I really hope it doesn't take an event like that for any other family to discover what's really important in life.

Anyway, you are both strong, independant women, and are more than capable of making your own way in the world and this is something that your parents should be proud of. I only hope that your familiy can realise how lucky they are to have you. I can't understand why they can't embrace all of the positive things too. To get a masters and do a PhD is a wonderful achievement and if they aren't proud of that achievement then I'm sure everyone here is!

But go home for Xmas, retain your dignity and let them all see how well you are both doing. And if they can't be happy for you or accept you, then just remember.......their inability to accept all of this is their problem and not yours!

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Cheeky Cat!

I'm really sorry to hear about everyones problems with unaccepting parents. I think there's a point where just have to say 'F**k them' and put your own happiness first. I know they're family but if they are going to be so insensitive and tactless do you really want to spend christmas with them?

Hopefully, given time, they will realise the error of their ways.

Signal Failure, well done on the PHD scholarship. You have every right to be proud. Your mother should be ashamed about what she said. You have nothing to apologise for.

This year I'm having my first christmas since 'coming out' to my mum. I think she'll try and quietly ignore it for as long as she can.

A book you might want to read/ send to parents ;- Liz Hodgkinson Bodyshock- the truth about changing sex. ISBN 0-86287-317-7.. By far the best and most accurate book i have found AND easy to understand

According to Amazon, it doesn't seem as though Body Shock: Truth About Changing Sex has been updated, and it's no longer in print (though it is available second hand). I haven't read it, so I can't comment on it personally, but the author, Liz Hodgkinson, also wrote Michael Nee Laura: The World's First Female to Male Transsexual, a biography of Michael Dillon.

I'd agree with Reenie's recommendation of True Selves: Understanding Transsexualism - For Families, Friends, Coworkers, and Helping Professionals by Mildred L. Brown. Although (as Reenie mentioned) it's very American in parts - and thus some of the information is irrelevant outside the US - overall it's very well written. I gave a copy to my parents when I came out to them, and they both read it and found it useful in helping them to understand.

Of course, all this relies on them being willing to read and try and understand in the first place.

I just brought the Mildred L. Brown publication from Amazon for my mum to have a little read of in her own time. I read over the sample pages and the comments left by other readers. It would appear that Reenie's comment on the Americanisation of the subject is problematic, but it would seem to be the best title for my needs. My mum is not the most avid of readers and the titles which drew me in, would perhaps be a bit too academic for her to digest. I somehow don’t think she needs to get her head around queer theory to understand that I am still her child lol!

Hopefully if will just give a nice little overview and I will warn her before hand that it learns towards the hardship and negative aspects of the condition, and at times neglects the positive aspects of the experience. However, its readability will appeal to my mum, hopefully it will answer a lot of the issues she worries about without igniting any further fears!

Thanks for all your responces. I don't know if giving my mum stuff to read would do any good as she is convinced its all wrong. But its worth a thought. She has already got rid of 3 or 4 concelours for not agreeing with her that I'm awful.

On top of that she actually went to the doctor who orginally refered me through the nhs (before I went private) and he told her i shouldn't be on hormones as I needed to live ft for 2 years before i could go on hormones, what crap! Then i have been getting letters from him that my mother knew about, I mean if that isn't a breach of confidentaility then what is? i too have had the whole, its like someone died crap, I'm just sick of arguing, afterall its me that wants to see them not the other way round.