Yeah it can be pretty nuts. There's a lot of very permenant biological modification stuff in the trans catalogue, and any individual trans person might not need it all. They also might realize later on they weren't trans, but something adjacent, or even that they were having something even weirder happen and when that's cleared up, their internal gender swaps again.

There's a lot of risks, so you have to weigh them against the rewards.

Also, well, being trans is pretty traumatic anyways, so it's a really good idea to talk to some folks about it. I say 'some folks' because there are anti-trans psychologists and psychiatrists out there, therapists too, and others who aren't anti-trans but are bad in other ways, so you might need to shop around.

Its funny you say all that, the further I get down the road of transition and working this all out I'm finding that I might be more non-binary than anything. However I think its mostly just where I am in the spectrum of the journey. I'm very in the middle right now.

I'm also very aware I love being called she/her, and treated as a girl. So I'm pretty confused lol, specially when I dislike a lot of the boy treatment I've gotten.

Yeah I was going as a woman online for like ten years. These days I go with enby, and tend to look somewhat male or boyish I guess?

I'm ace anyways, but things could be a lot different if I had been taking hormones or even getting surgeries and stuff, and I might have been better or worse, I'll never know. I sure did and do have a lot of messed up stuff in my head. Even the stuff that isn't actively harmful is seriously different or uncommon.

I think part of my thing is that I had really wrong-headed ideas about women and girls and what they were, and put them on a pedestal. As I got older I realized that they're just people, and so are men and boys, and none of them was really 'me'. Like, even if I took hormones or got some operations or whatever, I'd be different but I still wouldn't be what I want. I'm a furry! I'm not likely to ever have the body I want. I do wonder what the hormones might have done to my mind, but I'm on the autism spectrum, I have ADHD, and I've had issues with depression and anxiety. Now I've got a speech compulsion and restless leg syndrome too, but at least the medciations are working on the depression and anxiety for now!

I know a ton of trans folks, both old-gender ways and enby sorts too. It's hard to ask, but I often try to ask what being this or that gender or sex means to them. Like, what is a Woman? What is a Man? It's more than just a miserable little pile of secrets, I can tell that much. Sometimes it's a matter of the shape of your body not feeling right. Sometimes it's about the gender roles in your culture, and you want to do or be the things that are associated with one side or the other. Sometimes it's about appearances, you might just like the fashions or attitudes that are associated with a gender. A lot of folks put a certain gender on a pedestal like I did, but others do the opposite. I know a lot of people who hate one or the other sex or gender and desperately want to get away from it. Sometimes it's even subconcious, so you don't know you're doing it.

For the most part, it doesn't seem like reproductive sex is really tied to a lot with regards to gender. There has been research done on it that suggests that there are some trends that are more than just traditional gender roles, but there's always exceptions.

Regarding that hate angle, I think that's tied a lot to the thing with trans-exclusionary radical feminists. They don't accept trans women as women, and they're so afraid of men that the idea of men infiltrating women's spaces horrifies them to a tremendous degree. All because they've got wrong-headed ideas about what men are or can be. Well, that one's just my idea, I don't know if it's true.

You're a good girl, and you like being treated as a girl. But, what does that mean? The traditional social role girls have? Girls can be anything, though. I sometimes wonder what a transgirl who is also a tomboy would be like. They're a girl, but a boyish girl, and they also have the male reproductive organs and stuff probably?

You're you, and you're great. If it's important to you that you're a girl, you're a girl, but from my perspective, the most important thing is that you're you! Everyone is different and unique.

Anyways I've got all sorts of weird thoughts like those. Even in my own case, I never really understood what it meant to be this or that. Thanks for listening, though.

That is sound advice, but what if the parents react negatively to their "son" coming out? Is this still recommended?

See I dunno if the advice here is to cheat the system or not. Some parents might want to get their kid a therapist to guide them out of it, so the trick might be to agree at the time and try to guide towards a more neutral therapist that can still help trauma/family issues, while not disallowing you to be trans.

The alternative play is, that is also technically trauma, and will need to be addressed in therapy if you can wait it out. Though I know depending on the age of some individuals that can be a very long time.

I'll be 19 before the year is over, so I may be waiting for a while

I'm glad to hear that your emotional state is getting better

also, by the looks of things you have come so far but there's still a journey ahead and that's ok, I still hope for the best for you because you deserve to see a better life, stay strong, and stay determined because I believe you can do this DustyError!