What makes someone transexual?

Question

I've just watched a documentary on sex changes (Female - Male) and was fascinated.

I'm a straight woman who has never had any urge to be anything other than female and straight. But you could see clearly how acutely these female-male transexuals had always felt themselves to be male in a female body, and how much more comfortable they felt once they were living as men.

It made me wonder why someone feels this way - is it because somehow a "male" brain develops in a "female" body (or vice versa) at a very early stage in a baby's development - and the child the grows up seeing themselves as a boy in the wrong body?

Or could it be argued that life events perhaps experienced when very young, cause someone to feel they are in the wrong body?

I'd be interested to hear people's views. After watching the documentary I think its probably the former, although quite what makes a "male" and a "female" brain different so that it produces a male/female identity I wouldn't know.

Answer 1

A popular theory is that there's a hormone wash while in the womb. It goes something like this: at some key point, a male fetus gets programmed by a release of hormones. A female fetus would get different hormones. The theory is that the male fetus gets the female hormones and vice versa.

By the way, transsexualism isn't black and white. It's stronger in some than it is in others. There are many gender dysphoric people who don't transition. They crossdress. For others it can take half a lifetime to figure things out.

"Or could it be argued that life events perhaps experienced when very young, cause someone to feel they are in the wrong body?"

Nope. Don't buy that for a second. The *reason* there's a problem is that you're raised AS a boy and not as a girl (for MTF)

Answer 2

It is somthing I lived with. So i can tell you somthings i have learned. It usually starts with a child having a gender nonconformity. Gender nonconformity is said to be a predisposition to homosexuality, Often that is the end result. I do not say it is the main factor to being a predisposition to homosexuality. it is a seperate issue.
There should be a scale with gender nonconformity and not so much with homosexuality like there is.
Gender nonconformity may be born in a child because of hormonal imballance, but there are children that learn characteristics that will cause them to have a gender nonconformity.
Because there is little known about this still today, many parents or children do not know of this condition,
often gender nonconformity will be misunderstood in the early years by some parents believng their child will be a homosexual.
This is not always the case because some children will outgrow their gender nonconformity and construct hetrosexuality,
What is not really talked about much is how gender nonconformity can be the predisposition in a child to want to be the opposite gender they was born. i can tell you my gender nonconformity was about just this. i had gender nonconformity
as a child and it was undiagnoised and untreated.
So at the age of 2 or 3 i was showing strong desires to wanting or thinking i was the opposite gender and not even aware of this.
Like I wanted to stand up on the stool to go to the bathroom like my dad and not sit like my mom. I wanted the toys that were more suited for a boy. I had no brothers, this seem to come natural for me. I did have an older and a younger sister, so i did see how girls normally formed, and i formed differently. I was beginning to construct transgendered ideas from a young age.
innoscently by me and my parents allowing me. i wanted the short haircut like a boy, i wanted to wear clothes like a boy, essentially i looked and felt like a boy. I did not even know there was a difference between a boy and girl at the ages under 5 or 6 even.
There was no issue of a sexual attraction formed. For me then it was only a gender issue. I clearly showed signs of having a gender nonconformity. My parents never heard of anything l;ike that. they may have had some concern it i would be a homosexual.
homosexual was constructed in me around the ages 5 or 6 while i was playing house and got involved with a homosexual act of kissing with a girl. i found pleasurable and that with the gender nonconformity I had, thinking I should have been a boy, it was easy for me to construct homosexuality in myself.
Before the homosexuality, the main issue for me was being a boy, but after the homosexual issue arose, and my parents new, it became the bigger issue, It is hard to explain, but I believe if i had not had such an early issue of homosexuality being introduced in myself, the desire to be a male would have become stronger.
I did not get the sex change, i did continue throught my teenage years wishing I would magically wake up as a boy. I did justify my homosexuality because I thought I should have been a boy.
It gets pretty messed up. So if any child is showing signs of a gender nonconformity they should have treatment as early as they can, maybe it will not change anything, maybee it shouldnt, but it sould be dealt with profetionally.
not all children with gender nonconformity will become homosexual, not all children with a gender nonconformity will want to be the opposite sex.
It is all constructed, the outcome is at least. i just do not know if gender nonconformity is always constructed, that it might be a hormonal imballance in some children to predipose them to choose and construct some of the character they do.
Often those with a gender nonconformity with strong desires they have consructed to be the opposite gender will become transgendered, then even a transexual. It just varies so much.
I read about a study the did in germany and it said 1 in evry 4 children will have some form of a gender nonconformity.
Treatmnet can help a child construct their ideas.

Answer 3

I thinkit has to do with hormones. a male working brain in a female body or a female working brain in a man's body.

and sexuality really doesn't come into play with transgendered people- which makes it even more hard to understand. two m2f transexuals who own a site define this iseeu best- one is attracted to men and one is attracted to women. the one who is atracted to women probally could ahve dated more if she stayed in a male body. it was about sex not sexual contact.

the brain is so weird. we have found that gay men have smaller hypothalumuses (like females) and their corpus collusum is also shaped different (I can't go into details on that one because I'm still trying to memorize how it should be shaped in which gender, I don't want to give bad info)

Answer 4

the scientists and the psychologists are still trying to solve this mystery. i am a 33 yr old male. i think the differences come down to biological sex issues vs societal gender role issues.

since i was 8 years old, i always seemed to adopt the girl gender roles and rejected the boy roles. sexually, i've never felt bad about having a penis, although the thought of using it in a conventional male way seems awkward to me..

at 33, i am finally going to start seeing therapists to discuss whether or not i really do feel the need to "present" myself as a woman, in order to be totally happy as an individual.. it's certainly frustrating to feel so out of place in this world.. but i honestly have no manly traits.

Answer 5

Something appears to happen during the in-utero development of the transsexual child's central nervous system (CNS) so that the child is left with innate, strongly perceived cross-gender body feelings and self-perceptions.

It's not known for sure what causes this neurological development, and more research needs to be done. But the neurobiological direction for these explorations seem clear.

Answer 6

my guess in all of this is a combinational effect of sorts. i feel from birth we are 50/50 under most normal conditions. if this teeter totter is ajar in some manner it must start to become a part of the entire equation of the transexual phenomena.

Answer 7

One theory I have heard is that it has to do with the size of the hyperthalimus (sp???) A part of the brain. -females have a smaller one than males and transexuals tend to have one closer to the size of the gender the identify with.........

Answer 8

In truth, if anyone knew the answer to this question, they would probably become millionaires.