[XoraLogan]

I think you'd be surprised how many software engineers, hardware engineers, game designers etc. are TG to one degree or another though a lot may be carefully suppressing it with an artificial macho exterior (Brogrammer's? pah! )

You'll find it kind of goes with the territory. A lot those with the highest level technical skills are those with the ability to use and integrate both left brain and right brain modes of thinking simultaneously to design and create hardware and software solutions. (I bet you often find yourself tapping your left foot rapidly against the floor while trying to solve a complex technical problem. )

Look to the likes of Sophie Wilson as a good example, though there are many, many others to be found if you dig a little more deeply.

You may find that activating more of your female side will also help you keep your weight under control more easily, as well as enabling other kinds of mind/body integration and possibly even spiritual awareness or at the very least more holistic thinking skills. It's up to you to decide whether or not you think those things have been missing from your life up till now. Just make sure you don't get too carried away and watch out, it may be a bit of bumpy ride for the next year or so.

Ok, first post, but I've actually been lurking for quite a while.
This forum has been a great help to me as well in my personal journey so thanks everyone.

[MichelleM]

Thank you again very much for all the replies!

You've got me thinking a lot. Could I have managed to be in denial all this time? Or am I just fooling myself now? As I keep thinking of more incidents (even one going back to childhood, but most of them in the last 10 years or so (e.g., several sessions of waxing a few years ago), I'm leaning more towards denial; but is that possible?

At this point, I'm also inclined to try to go with some minimal approach. If so, given that's my goal, am I sort of crashing the party here?

Also, I did get a chance to talk again briefly with my wife today. She again said my attitude was significantly better lately. She said it had gotten to the point where she was having a hard time dealing with the eye rolling, etc. (which I didn't even realize I was doing), but that stuff is pretty much gone. I then mentioned that what I was trying caused shrinkage "down there", and she was concerned that might not be healthy. Her preference right now is to try to keep the attitude, but try to avoid shrinkage. (I didn't have a chance to get into the changes up above. :rolleyes She was hoping she doesn't have to pick between the two. I did say, if she didn't mind, if I had to pick one or the other, I'd pick keeping the attitude.

[AnnieBL]

I think you'd be surprised how many software engineers, hardware engineers, game designers etc. are TG to one degree or another though a lot may be carefully suppressing it with an artificial macho exterior (Brogrammer's? pah! )

You'll find it kind of goes with the territory. A lot those with the highest level technical skills are those with the ability to use and integrate both left brain and right brain modes of thinking simultaneously to design and create hardware and software solutions. (I bet you often find yourself tapping your left foot rapidly against the floor while trying to solve a complex technical problem. )

Look to the likes of Sophie Wilson as a good example, though there are many, many others to be found if you dig a little more deeply.

You may find that activating more of your female side will also help you keep your weight under control more easily, as well as enabling other kinds of mind/body integration and possibly even spiritual awareness or at the very least more holistic thinking skills. It's up to you to decide whether or not you think those things have been missing from your life up till now. Just make sure you don't get too carried away and watch out, it may be a bit of bumpy ride for the next year or so.

Ok, first post, but I've actually been lurking for quite a while.
This forum has been a great help to me as well in my personal journey so thanks everyone.

XoraLogan' -
I find this an exceptionally interesting post. I have become very aware that this forum attracts a startlingly large proportion of technologists of various kinds, and this was confirmed by a poll last year. It has been something that I've been intending to comment on myself, largely on the lines that, contrary to general public perception, technology itself seems to be gender neutral: but your 'take' on it makes much sense to me. I hope that you will enlarge upon it.

Accidental Tourist -
You are I believe at the start of what I guess will be a very interesting journey. Where it will lead I don't know, but you may belong to those like me who find that to travel hopefully may be more important than to arrive.

[GoneGirl]

I've read other sources that have made the claim that a high percentage of transgendered are software engineers and technologists. The speculation that it may correlate to the ability to use both right and left sides of the brain is fascinating. Awhile back, I posted a link to an article summarizing some recent studies on brain structure that showed that women's and men's brains are connected differently. Women have many cross hemisphere connections, while men have more connections front to back within each brain half. Could that be a factor in a person's technical intellectual capacity? Who knows?

I have a different view of my cross gender leanings from you, Annie. I, too, was a suppressionist (is that a word? - well, it is now). By that I mean, someone who has vigorously fought to deny the female gender side of my personality and psyche. Now, I'm on a mission to undo the damage that's been done to my sense of well-being.

Until recently, I've been like an old fashioned clock with an over-wound main spring. My goal is to get that clock working again. It IS a journey that I'm on, and an exciting one, but ultimately, I want balance and sanity in my life. That's the goal, not primarily growing breasts or pursuing feminine expression, although both seem to come with the package.

The journey we speak of, is not always a pleasant one. At the moment, I'm enjoying the journey, but I fully expect the magical feelings to subside and reality to reclaim its ground. Still my hope is that in the end, I will find myself a happier person -- a blending of my male and female genders -- and that the journey was well worth the effort.


This is just my personal view. Of course, everyone will see things in a way that is unique to their personal circumstances. I'd be interested to read different perspectives. I'm always open to taking a different road.

Love and hugs,

Clara

[XoraLogan]

There's a lot more I could say on the subject. I've been frantically trying to solve the problem for myself for the last two years, I guess you could say that my biological clock was ticking. I must have trawled over half the internet and read a dozen books, but finally, with the aid of some PM, a lot of the little pieces kind of fell into place for me.

If you're able to trawl through it and understand the terminology the bulk of the answers are to be found on Neoteny.org (that page and the rest of the site), though it might take a while for the full picture to sink in.

A short summary would be to say that the best technologists come from the population of low testosterone/high estrogen males, or 'nerds' as they are more popularly known. The less testosterone we are exposed to during gestation (or at least the less we respond to it), the less masculine our brains are formed, for some they are so under masculine they are actually still rather feminine. (Recall the lines from Jurassic Park.., right before we simply deny them that )

The high estrogen means our biological clock/maturing process runs very slowly during our lifetime, (the whole dateless in high school phenomenon), but it also means possibly means our final neuronal pruning process happens later which means we can learn a lot more information and skillsets than the rather faster maturing jock/cheerleader types.
It seems we can operate with this fairly split hemisphere arrangement for the bulk of our early lives, and some seem to work out how to use the right side their brain for holistic thinking/problem solving while the left side deals with the business of actually bashing out the code.

You can check the ratio of lengths of your index and ring fingers as a kind of proxy for the effects of hormones on you while you were in the womb.

The right hemisphere seems to contain most of the sense of psycho/social/sexual identity, while the left runs most of our linear reasoning skills and day to day consciousness (at least in western cultures with their heavy focus on literacy), which is influenced from the right through thoughts, emotions, and the imagery in our dreams etc.

It seems that at a certain point during our maturing process the left/right hemispheres start to become increasingly connected, (mature adult wisdom, or some such concept), and at that point the more feminine gender identity, if present, may begin to assert itself more strongly. It seems to hit us at any point from the late 20s to the mid 40s possibly depending on the stress levels we are exposed to. In my case I've been going slightly off the rails for several years but really began to hit crisis point a couple of years ago at 29 and began to frantically search for an answer to the question of life, the universe and everything, and what the heck was going on with my mind.

If your right brain hemisphere is fairly feminine it may run better with a higher lever of estrogen in your system, which may 'fix' various problems you didn't even know you were having in your life.

A lot of that is still rather speculative I suppose, but it makes enough sense for my 'how the heck does it all actually work' question to be satisfied for now.

As with everything else it's all a question of degree, so I wouldn't go booking that excursion to Thailand just yet.

I guess you could also observe the search for the ultimate meaning of reality in The Matrix trilogy and the demonstration of the ever rebalancing values of the Masculine/Feminine personality dynamics in Cloud Atlas,
and note what one of the producers of those films did in the interim.

Hmm, this seems to be a rather combined logical/holistic posting, I must be running on both cylinders right about now. I'm feeling pretty happy anyway.

[GoneGirl]

Thanks for those insights, Xora, I'm totally on board with this kind of speculation given that there is some research to back it up. I've always attributed my academic success, career in engineering, and aesthetic/design sense to having both sides of my brain engaged -- verbal/symbolic, as well as visualization ability. Now, having been tinkering with my hormones for several months, I'm finding more hidden treasures buried deep in my brain that I was largely unaware of.

BTW, you might want to move your message to a separate thread in the 'Gender Identity' sub-section if you want to stimulate more discussion in this area.

Welcome to the forum.

Clara

[Samantha Rogers]

I second Clara's always insightful words.
I will take a look at the links you posted and let you know what I think.
Another book you might want to take a peek at is The Dragons of Eden, by the late, great Carl Sagan. Not too much on gender but the first chapter is a spectacular explanation of the various parts of the brain and how they evolved, and what inflyence they still exert. An older but still very valuable text. And as Clara observed.....Welcome!
I will look forward to reading more from you, honey!
Hugs

[MissC]

As with everything else it's all a question of degree, so I wouldn't go booking that excursion to Thailand just yet.

I've never seen the logic in that. Less testosterone in the womb, better inter-hemispheric brain communication, androgynous thought processes... okay, makes sense. I utterly fail to see the connection to surgically rearranging one's genitalia, a purely (we're told) cosmetic procedure.

Granted, I'm here because of certain cosmetic enhancements I happen to be making to my body. I'm just not kidding myself thinking it's any more than cosmetic. Same person, bigger boobs... and I'm good with that.

[MichelleM]

Xora,

Thanks for your replies! I didn't see your first one until after I posted my message (I was composing it when you posted). How did you know about my toe tapping? ;-) (Although sometimes it's finger tapping. ;-) )

I second the suggestion of reposting your material in a separate thread, where it would get the visibility it deserves.

Michelle

[MichelleM]

Thanks for all the other replies, ladies!

I've decided to "just go with it" for now, and so changed my name here. I'll also try to post over in the new intro section ASAP.

Michelle