A strange desire

[wannabesmooth (imported)]

Prologue

I wish I could be "normal", I really do. I've always known that society expected me to behave a certain way.

I suppose it all began with feelings of gender dysphoria when I was about five. A relative at a family gathering who noticed I'd tucked my cloth napkin into the waistband of my shorts, chided me amiably while my parents looked on, amused in the way parents tend to be in polite company. An unrelated incident around the same time would impress on me that while my older sister, who was bigger and stronger than me then, was permitted to hit me when we squabbled as siblings often do, but I was never to return the favour.

Always soft-spoken and shy while growing up, I tended to be emotional and I was often quick to anger or tears. My parents considered the former to be barbaric and unacceptable, while the latter was girlish and to be ashamed of.

Origins

The cross-dressing during play time in kindergarten was all in good fun, and a source of amusement to my teachers and peers then, since we were all just kids messing around. I already understood then, that I had to make it seem as if my motive for doing so was to gain social acceptance through slapstick comedy.

I started cross-dressing in private when I was about seven, when I would wriggle into a pair of high-waisted nylon suntan pantyhose, followed by a lycra tank leotard while alone at home. The leotard was slightly undersized and its neckline and back were cut high for modesty, so getting my arms through the thick shoulder straps was a bit of a struggle. The forbidden sensation of being trapped in the outfit with my genitals inaccessible was at the time, indescribable.

These secret sessions I indulged in marked the start of my double live, which would continue to the present day.

I didn't yet know much about gender norms, rules, or roles, apart from the obvious and arbitrary ones. However, I understood that while a preference for the wrong colours elicited mild mockery, my desire to put on the wrong clothes would bring forth something far worse from everyone around me.

Aware of the consequences should I be discovered, I continued to hide my habits and desires.

Adolescence

I wasn't all flamboyantly feminine or limp-wristed however; in many ways I was more of a tomboy. I had some stereotypically male interests and character traits, and when puberty arrived I found myself attracted to girls. I wrote off my gender dysphoria as childish desire, and I rationalised my cross-dressing as curiosity taken too far; a mild fetish at most, that would surely become a distant memory washed away by the coming flood of hormones, making me the man society said I should be.

Puberty came and went, and I remember feeling sorry during my teenage years for those around me who were less adept at blending in. Many of them faced cruel and degrading ostracism, which would always remind me to be careful with my secrets, especially that one.

I remained shy and taciturn around girls, and my awkward attempts at approaching my crushes were usually met with rejection. The girls I had success with in my later teen years usually became close platonic friends, because I couldn't trust them enough to go further.

Eventually, I came to realize that I sought emotional fulfilment and intimacy in my romantic pursuits, rather than sexual relief. My inability to fully trust anyone became an insurmountable emotional barrier.

My persistence at maintaining my facade was partly fuelled by my success at gaining the general acceptance and respect of my peers, both male and female. Why rock the boat if it wasn't sinking? I still wanted to believe that I could outgrow my troublesome desires, so I enlisted in the military to initiate my rite to manhood.

The time I spent in the military taught me that much of the machismo I observed was fraudulent. While insecurity and cowardice usually lurked behind those intimidating masks, strength of character would often emerge unexpectedly during adversity from the most understated and modest.

I attended university and graduated, eventually meeting a lovely woman whom I still enjoy a serious relationship with, yet those secret desires remain.

Epilogue

The gender dysphoria comes and goes, and sometimes I wake up from a dream I don't remember thinking that the one that I've always known has come true. Most days I go about my routine unperturbed and at relative peace with myself, but some days I yearn so fervently for things to be different.

The appeal of a magical transformation is captivating, but unachievable in reality. The desire to transition isn't overwhelming, and either choice leaves me with a secret I must hide.

I suppose my desire to obtain full genital nullification leaving an internal stump with a urethral reroute, is my attempt to seek a practical compromise between two impossible extremes.

Do I chase the fantasy, or should I live the dream?

[bobbijoy4 (imported)]

you should seek the advice of a professional sex therapist, who will probably send you to a psychiatrist...which is not a bad thing...or confide in your doctor.

[Cainanite (imported)]

Welcome to the zoo my friend.

You'll find a lot of folk here who share a very similar story. Mine is much the same, though I have no desire to wear clothing of the opposite sex, It wouldn't bother me to do so, if it were 'allowed'.

Thank-you for sharing your story. I remember when I first shared my story on these forums. To do so, I had to really be honest with myself. I was in tears by the end of writing my first post. I can feel your emotion, and I relate.

You'll find a lot of folk here who have experiences with the same things you've gone through, and they are all great people. Stick around. this is a great place to just be yourself.

Again, welcome.

Cainanite

[janekane (imported)]

Suppose "normal" is defined by the "normal curve"?

The "normal curve" may be the so-called bell curve, or the normal density curve.

The "normal curve" may also be the normal distribution curve, the slope of which is the normal density curve.

The good news is that, whether normal refers to the normal density curve of the normal distribution curve, the normal curve is everywhere normal. There is no "abnormal" region in either form of normal curve.

Therefore, anything which reasonably fits anywhere on either version of normal curve is inescapably normal.

It comes to my mind that every individual person is neither more nor less normal than any other individual person is. Therefore, all people are actually normal people, because the entire realm of biological diversity, and therefore also individual personal diversity, is completely normal.

To me, being told that one is not normal is being told a lie. And being told that one is not normal and believing it is at least the penultimate human tragedy.

Apparently, it may be possible to have become deceived regarding one's being normal.

To me, deeming a person to be, in any way, abnormal, can only be a figment of harmful prejudice.

I have never met, and never heard of, so much as one person who was not, in fact, perfectly normal.

A poem by John Kendrick Bangs, written in the 1800s, and now public domain:

The Little Elf

I met a little Elf-man, once,

Down where the lilies blow.

I asked him why he was so small,

And why he didn't grow.

He slightly frowned, and with his eye

He looked me through and through.

"I'm quite as big for me," said he,

"As you are big for you."

May you find the zoo welcoming and affirming!

[Cainanite (imported)]

I remember once as a kid, I must have only been 8 years old or so. It was during story time in the school library, and the story had something to do with being good, or obedient or normal. I don't exactly remember the story.

After story time we were supposed to discuss the story, and what being good was. The agreed on idea by the teacher was that "no one is perfect".

I floated the idea that I thought that was wrong. I said, everyone could be perfect, if they were really being themselves. In my mind (and I have not changed positions on this) if you are really being yourself, then you are perfect. You are a perfect version of YOU.

Over the years I have come to refine that idea, but the core of it remains the same. If you are happy with yourself, and content with who you are, no further "fixing" is required. You are not wrong or broken, or in need of correction, if you like the skin you are living in. Your own goals and motivations for changing yourself should serve only you. Once you are the person YOU want to be, you are perfect, even if you don't fit the mold of someone else's idea of perfect.

I remember people rolling their eyes at me, and the teacher telling me I didn't know what I was talking about. My class had a good laugh at my expense.

A lot of the damage and suffering I have endured in my life, (mostly at my own hands) has been from trying to be someone else's idea of "perfect" or "normal" or "correct". That shit is just NOT healthy. If you are living your life trying to meet expectations others have of you, you will never be happy.

The idea of "nobody is perfect" leads to all kind of wrong headed thinking. It leads to people trying to make other people into their idea of "perfect". It allows people to think people need to be fixed, or taught a lesson. "If only I humiliate that person for being different, then they won't want to be different anymore. They'll be more perfect."

Now I admit, when I was eight, my vocabulary and reasoning skills were not as complex. I believe my exact words were, "Everyone is perfect at being themselves. So everyone is perfect."

I didn't have the ability to expand that thought or explain myself. Even now, I struggle to explain that statement. Yet I still think it is true.

Worrying about what other people think or want from you is not healthy. You have to go after the things YOU want and change the things YOU want to change. Not to "fit in", or be accepted, but to fulfill what YOU need, for your own reasons. If you are happy, who am I to judge you?

[Elizabeth (imported)]

I remember once as a kid, I must have only been 8 years old or so. It was during story time in the school library, and the story had something to do with being good, or obedient or normal. I don't exactly remember the story.

After story time we were supposed to discuss the story, and what being good was. The agreed on idea by the teacher was that "no one is perfect".

I floated the idea that I thought that was wrong. I said, everyone could be perfect, if they were really being themselves. In my mind (and I have not changed positions on this) if you are really being yourself, then you are perfect. You are a perfect version of YOU.

Over the years I have come to refine that idea, but the core of it remains the same. If you are happy with yourself, and content with who you are, no further "fixing" is required. You are not wrong or broken, or in need of correction, if you like the skin you are living in. Your own goals and motivations for changing yourself should serve only you. Once you are the person YOU want to be, you are perfect, even if you don't fit the mold of someone else's idea of perfect.

I remember people rolling their eyes at me, and the teacher telling me I didn't know what I was talking about. My class had a good laugh at my expense.

A lot of the damage and suffering I have endured in my life, (mostly at my own hands) has been from trying to be someone else's idea of "perfect" or "normal" or "correct". That shit is just NOT healthy. If you are living your life trying to meet expectations others have of you, you will never be happy.

The idea of "nobody is perfect" leads to all kind of wrong headed thinking. It leads to people trying to make other people into their idea of "perfect". It allows people to think people need to be fixed, or taught a lesson. "If only I humiliate that person for being different, then they won't want to be different anymore. They'll be more perfect."

Now I admit, when I was eight, my vocabulary and reasoning skills were not as complex. I believe my exact words were, "Everyone is perfect at being themselves. So everyone is perfect."

I didn't have the ability to expand that thought or explain myself. Even now, I struggle to explain that statement. Yet I still think it is true.

Worrying about what other people think or want from you is not healthy. You have to go after the things YOU want and change the things YOU want to change. Not to "fit in", or be accepted, but to fulfill what YOU need, for your own reasons. If you are happy, who am I to judge you?

Very good post, I agree with perfection as being oneself. Thanks

Elizabeth

[janekane (imported)]

I find that the notion, "nobody is perfect" can only make any hint of sense when the definition in use of "perfect" is effectively perfectly imperfect.

There is the ridiculous notion that people make mistakes because of not being perfect

Only, what is a mistake?

Some years ago, I set out to understand what a mistake is without being mistaken in my understanding, and I came up with an operational definition of "mistake" with which I have been unable to find any mistake.

A mistake occurs when someone does something, and what happens as a result is not exactly, in every detail, precisely what was anticipated.

(Please observe that this definition does not require that anything whatsoever was anticipated...)

Then it came to my mind that it might be good for me to have a learned understanding of learning, and I came up with the most learned definition of learning, one which I have been unable to improve.

Learning occurs when someone does something, and what happens as a result is not exactly, in every detail, precisely what was anticipated.

Whereupon, I learned that it is a mistake to regard learning and making mistakes as being in any way different except for the name used.

Oh,oh. Teaching a person to not make mistakes is teaching a person to not learn. Only, is it ever actually possible to teach a person to not learn?

[bobbijoy4 (imported)]

i don't know if "janekane" is a professional logician or on acid. in any case, it made sense...and i had a logic course in college and tripped on acid twice. both were learning experiences. when "advice" i gave before to see a therapist was the good, old tradition stuff from which i won't apologize. so, let's say you have or will do this. i an going to slaughter this but didn't the French have a saying which went "viva le differerence" or long live individuality? because i have always used this saying as it meant a lot to me. and aren't we all supposed to be sexually unique? each of us has a fingerprint which nobody else has? and every relationship we have with another is unique? so let there be "wannabesmooth" and his uniqueness...great.

[raymar2020 (imported)]

Dear Wannabe,

I really can relate to what you hacve posted. As I have stated before, I spent my first 15 years asa boy with no visible balls. It became my identity. I was comfortable with it. During those years it aslo became clear to me that while I liked girls, I didn't "like" girls. Thne the unthinkable happened. My testicles dropped, and all the sudden i was a different person. My identity was altered.

I never have really been into dressing in the clothes of the opposite sex, but that does not mean that I wouldn't. I am comfortable in the skin I am in and always was with the exception of those two orbs and their case that came into my life at 16. I was openly gay in high school, which was a feat in the 70's, and have never made any bones about my sexuality in my private world. For years I did keep my business and home lives very separate, but that was only because of the potential repercussions.

Now that I have succeeded in eliminating the dreadful orbs from my life I can feel truly complete. I am the person that I have always envisioned myself to be. I am not macho, but not feminine, I am not afraid to get dirty and do physical labors, but I also revel in nice clothes, and like to be surrounded by pretty things. In our binary gender world, I really am a blend of both.

My nature is that I am a pretty dominant person, and that seems to carry over frequently to the bedroom. I am more than willing to be submissive, but seem to only attract those who are. I am content with my physical relationships, and those that are simply platonic.

As Cainanite said each of us can be perfect, but only as he said because we are unique. I feel that I have now reached that point. I look at myself, and like what I see. I am pleased with how I interact with others, and most seem to like me as well.

Seek out a good sex therapist, and really open up. It is obvious that you have some issues to work out. The right answer for you is inside you, you just have to draw it out. Once you do, you can confidently move forward to achieve that goal. Perhaps it is nullification, perhpas not. Only time and real soul searching will bring you to the right conclusion. You are still young, and while others may say we are "mature" at 18 or 21, the real truth is that growth and maturing are not so cut and dry. Each of us as unique individuals goes thru that process at our own rate.

Good luck on your journey, and I sincerely hope that you are as successful in "finding" yourself as I have been.

Raymar

[nullorchis (imported)]

"I've always known

society expected me to behave a certain way

".

With trained, experienced, knowledgeable assistance you can overcome that roadblock.

It is not a "no outlet" street. Just a roadblock, like a landslide, which can be removed.

Is it a fantasy? Is it a dream? That remains to be discovered with professional assistance.

If it is a fantasy, then you can learn to be comfortable with that and eliminate frustration.

If it is an unrealized reality, then you can obtain assistance to make the transition.

It might be a double roadblock.

Learning to accept you for who you are, and learning to let the real you exist within society and not be concerned with what society thinks.

Life is a journey. No two people ever take the same journey.

Tragically we humans do tend to be quite judgemental, judging others based upon what was taught to us and our own experiences.

We crave acceptance naturally.

When acceptance does not come, or when rejection comes (for whatever reason) it causes us complex reactions.

People to naturally tend to "fit in" may never or rarely experience this.

But they may have compromised themselves so that they do "fit in", and never really experience their true self, their true destiny.

Life lived as a lie may not have been wasted, just unfulfilled.

[janekane (imported)]

i don't know if "janekane" is a professional logician or on acid. in any case, it made sense...and i had a logic course in college and tripped on acid twice. both were learning experiences. when "advice" i gave before to see a therapist was the good, old tradition stuff from which i won't apologize. so, let's say you have or will do this. i an going to slaughter this but didn't the French have a saying which went "viva le differerence" or long live individuality? because i have always used this saying as it meant a lot to me. and aren't we all supposed to be sexually unique? each of us has a fingerprint which nobody else has? and every relationship we have with another is unique? so let there be "wannabesmooth" and his uniqueness...great.

Am I on acid? Depends upon which acid or acids. There is deoxyribonucleic acid; I seem to be "on" some of that. There is ribonucleic acid; I seem to be "on" some of that. Basically, I am willing to allow that, perhaps, it would be base of me to believe that I am "on" a variety of acids, particularly acids which are essential to my being alive. Without being "on" DNA and "on" messenger RNA, I find I would be unable to be.

Silly attempts at ridiculous humor aside, I am a licensed professional; licensed as a Wisconsin Registered Professional Engineer, and I somehow successfully glommed onto a B.S. and a Ph.D. in bioengineering. Prior to studying engineering at college, I was a liberal arts college physics major (for three years) where I did take philosophy classes, including in formal logic.

My being licensed in Wisconsin comes with the requirement that the work I do in engineering be done in accord with the Code of Ethics of the National Society of Professional Engineers. For me, a terse summary of the essence of that Code is, "In my work as a professional engineer, I am to hold paramount the public safety, work only in areas of my professional competence, and do both of those without deception."

What is my work as a professional engineer doing bioengineering? Doing the analysis and synthesis that will, if successful, eradicate and eviscerate human destructiveness from human society. Were I foolish enough to speculate, I might wonder whether that problem, as an engineering problem, might be among the most difficult of engineering problems. The only way I have found enough hopefulness to bother with this problem is through observing that it is apparently a core problem for billions of other people, all of whom also work on it much as I do; at the limit of their practicable ability.

Huh, what?

My life goal decidedly is other than being assigned by human society the role of scapegoat-pariah.

Engineering is, to me, the solving of practical problems, efficiently, economically, and effectively, using scientific principles.

Bioengineering is, to me, engineering applied to the phenomenon of life.

The phenomenon of life is, to me, comprised of all that is alive and all of the substrate of all that is alive.

Therefore, to me, the entire universe (or the universal universe of all parallel, perpendicular, and all other, universes) is exactly contiguous with the phenomenon of life.

And so, to me, existence is life and life is existence, and the phenomenon of life is the whole of existence

Oh, sorry. That thar liberal arts stuff did include studying, as formal philosophy, existentialism and existentialists.

Some years ago, I attended a formal lecture given by a "bright" person who had gathered multiple graduate school degrees. Near the beginning of the lecture, the lecturer said, in effect, "As Einstein proved, everything is relative." Not to derail the lecturer or the lecture, I waited until the lecture was finished and questions had subsided. Then I went to the front of the lecture hall and the following ensued...

Me, "Did you say that Einstein proved that everything is relative?"

Lecturer, "Yes."

Me, "Have you done the math?"

Lecturer, "No."

Me, "Well, I have; and I find that Einstein's theories of relativity are an interesting collection of absolutes."

Lecturer, (silence and turning away)...

Einstein's "The Meaning of Relativity, Fourth Edition, Fourth Edition," Princeton University Press, 1953, joined my personal/professional library in 1959.

From pages 161-2 of said book for which I here do not use the BB quote and end-quote codes because using them would tend to obscure the original text formatting:

{begin quote}

If one does not regard as final the transition to a theory which is in principle statistical, as present-day quantum mechanics is, then the goal of a physical theory presents itself as follows: An objective (in principle complete) description of physical systems, together with a setting up of a structure of laws which connect the concepts entering into this objective description. By "objective description" is meant a description which claims potential validity of meaning without reference to any acts of observation.

Physical theories differ from mathematical structures only in the following aspect. The physical theory should provide an essentially complete and reproducible correspondence between the conceptually described real situations and the direct sense perceptions. The question of how to set up this correspondence can only be handled intuitively, and is not expressible within the framework of the logically formulated theory.

What distinguishes one theory from another is, in the first place, the choice of foundation stones, that is, its irreducible basic concepts out of which the structure is built.

{end quote}

I find that any structure of human society which has among its "foundation stones" any belief to the effect that avoidable mistakes are ever actually happen has a psychotic delusion as one of its "irreducible basic concepts,' and human destructiveness is the inescapable consequence of acting out that psychotic delusion.

What do I find to be a plausible candidate for one of Albert Einstein's psychotic delusion foundation stones? Simply this: {begin quote}By "objective description" is meant a description which claims potential validity of meaning without reference to any acts of observation.{end quote} That view of "objective description" as being without reference to any acts of observation, is, to me, a decent approximation of the epitome of biological utter nonsense.

In my view, Einstein never adequately escaped the imprisonment of reductionism sufficiently to truly fathom absolute relativism and relative absolutism. People born long after Einstein was born and who have explored theoretical biology, such as Walter Elsasser, Robert Rosen, Francisco Varela, or A. H. Louie, have all (as best I can tell), as I have, abandoned reductionism as a useful way to fathom biology, and have turned to relationalism because reductionist methods have been demonstrated to be incapable of at all accurately modeling life or living systems.

In, as it was called when I was a physics major, "modern physics," there is to be found "The Pauli Exclusion Principle," which, to oversimplify it, has it that, in a given "thing," no two parts of the "thing" can have actually identical quantum states. What I did as a physics major with an interest in the relationship of physics and biology, was to do a thought experiment in which the "thing" to which the Pauli Exclusion Principle was applicable was the entire universe. Whence, I arrived at a simple thought; if two things are actually the same, there is only one of them.

And that thought dragged me into linguistics. For one "thing" may be given innumerable names. The names of a thing are never the thing so named.

Alas, if a person has successfully internalized the delusion that avoidable mistakes actually happen, then direct observation of objective reality becomes impossible, because it is impossible to directly observe the making of an avoidable mistake. Why so? Because, if a mistake was actually avoidable, this is established as fact only by the fact that the mistake was actually avoided. However, the fact that the avoidable mistake was actually avoided is the fact that the mistake did not happen and it is impossible to know what the avoidable mistake is, or was, because it never was.

Am I now hearing, however faintly, the ever louder tolling of the death knell of the adversarial system of law and jurisprudence?

Put me on a jury, and I will listen to the evidence, weigh the evidence, and inescapably find the evidence proclaiming the absolute innocence of the defendant. I will do so truthfully, for I will find all the evidence to be situational and the deed for which the-accused-is-the-defendant to be of entirely situational nature, and totally outside the locus of control of the falsely-accused defendant. This is because my grasp of biology informs me that all defendants are falsely accused, and are falsely accused through dastardly-deceptive attribution errors.

Except through one or another form of delusion, the inborn, intrinsic, innate, and inextricable absolute and perfect validity of every human person is perfectly inviolable.

And, no, I am not using supposedly illegal mind-altering substances to be able to think as I do.

I was born this way. I was born with the ability to learn of what I did not yet know, to learn to become familiar with what I was not yet familiar, and to learn to understand what I did not yet understand.

...Just like everyone else, in the unique way of the way of my life, as in the unique way of the life of every one of us.

The desire to be normal is the least strange desire I can imagine, perhaps because being normal is all that is actually achievable.

[bobbijoy4 (imported)]

I wasn't trying to be flippant and I am very respectful of this site in general and your obviously intelligent posts. I personally only have one M.S. degree with an older, albeit deceased, brother who was a brilliant chemist and could probably understand what you just said. I was the "wise ass" of the family just to keep my sanity...and so that the other boys in high school didn't beat me up...it was a military high school. So I have the unfortunate habit of throwing in a little humor. This is just me ...

[janekane (imported)]

I wasn't trying to be flippant and I am very respectful of this site in general and your obviously intelligent posts. I personally only have one M.S. degree with an older, albeit deceased, brother who was a brilliant chemist and could probably understand what you just said. I was the "wise ass" of the family just to keep my sanity...and so that the other boys in high school didn't beat me up...it was a military high school. So I have the unfortunate habit of throwing in a little humor. This is just me ...

bobbijoy4,

You may rest, peacefully assured, that I took your remark as good and proper humor, which is why I attempted to respond in kind and in kindness with the absurdities of being on DNA as a form of acid trip...

Yet it is with somewhat of a sense of sorrow that I realize that "things" have often become so sadly tragic that humor is the last resort before muted silence.

So, though the shaming of people for being authentic in terms of their unique self-identities is heart-sickening for me, I sometimes deal with that sort of social distress with what I intend to be non-accusatory humor.

I am appreciative of your postings.

Perhaps the greatest difficulty with wanting to be normal is the result of the fact that, in the actual context of a person's life with the full context taken into accurate account, everything a person is, and everything a person does, is inescapably normal.

Trying to be normal may be like standing on the highest point on the highest peak of a mountain, and stepping away from that highest point in an attempt to climb even higher, when, at that highest point, everywhere else one can go takes one down the mountain.

Trying to go up, when trying to go up always takes one down, can be immensely frustrating?

[bobbijoy4 (imported)]

Janekane: were it not for your most recent posting, I was considering leaving this site thinking my remarks were not worthy of reading. I will think more, post less and try for quality and not quantity. I only hope that more people, regardless of intellect, post here as well. Remember in the school classroom, there was always the same four or five people always raising their hands with the answer? I was never one of them...my older brother was (God rest his soul).

[janekane (imported)]

Janekane: were it not for your most recent posting, I was considering leaving this site thinking my remarks were not worthy of reading. I will think more, post less and try for quality and not quantity. I only hope that more people, regardless of intellect, post here as well. Remember in the school classroom, there was always the same four or five people always raising their hands with the answer? I was never one of them...my older brother was (God rest his soul).

While I can string words together in sequences, I never learned to think in words or pictures. Words and pictures are ways of communicating ideas, thoughts, feelings, and such, and as communication tools, are useful. I happen to be autistic in the language delay sense described by Dr. Leo Kanner, and, because communication tools are useful, have put intense and enduring effort into gathering enough words to allow me to, at least occasionally, share an idea that someone else may find useful.

I happen to be one of the sorts of profoundly autistic people who is able to garner words well enough to properly get a Ph.D. in bioengineering, and a good part of my motive was to find increasingly better tools for my making constructive use of my encounter with life.

There are some things I seem to have learned because I am apparently unable to learn as most people do. One such thing is simply that "intelligence" as such cannot be measured; so-called intelligence tests only measure how well someone has learned the version of reality defined by the culture in which the person lives; IQ score are really cultural adaptation scores which are at least as much determined by the culture as by the brain functionality of the person whose adaptation is being measured.

Alas, some aspects of human culture may be violently destructive. Is it a sign of greater intelligence to be unable to learn the ways of being destructively violent than to learn then when such ways are demanded by the culture? I have never found any way to sort that out.

Because I find that every way to measure the comparative worth of different people is contaminated by unavoidable culture bias to the degree of being meaningless, I live my life as though every person has worth and value indistinguishable from that of anyone and everyone else.

Let me be direct. bobbijoy4, I genuinely enjoyed your original post on this thread. I found it to be beautifully stated, given its context.

And, without DNA (deoxyribonucleicacid), no one would ever be on an acid trip, because there would be no one to do the trip!

So, thanks to you for your posting, I now know better why people do acid trips. Nothing else is actually possible...

I would be grateful, when and if, in the future, you notice my word-strings to have strayed once more off to the realm of "What the???" and let me know that.

I can make good use of all the help I can get.

[janekane (imported)]

I have noticed that wannabe has not responded to this thread since starting it. That leads me to wonder whether the rest of us have responded optimally to the original posting.

Perhaps I may mention that the starting posting resonated strongly with me, and that I began posting on this thread partly in response to that resonance.

I recognized, though I did not have any words for this then, that I was not typically gendered long before kindergarten. My parents realized this, and provided me with both "girl" and "boy" toys and allowed me to chose which of them to play with.

Came the first day of kindergarten, at the door of the kindergarten room, the teacher greeted me and suggested that I go to the far end of the room and play with the toys. Which I did. Almost immediately, the teacher hurried to me and said, "No, (my usual name), those toys are for the girls.

Long before then, I had rejected the notion that people are boys/men or are girls/women, though I did not have words to say that I rejected the notion of gender being one or the other and never part of both and more.

There are people who have attempted to convince me that my being autistic is an indication that I have a form of brain disorder; those folks have a success score of persuading me to believe that of identically zero.

My solution to the predicament of meeting almost nobody's expectations for me was simple. I did not keep my biological diversity secret, neither did I flaunt it. Having nothing to hide, I have simply lived my life as myself.

I have managed to live for more than 73 years without having to hide secrets from anyone. Doing that has worked for me, including worked for me during more than 37 years of marriage (my first marriage, and, as I hope my wife has years of living left, presumably what will be my only marriage.

As I find it to be a fact of biology that all people are of indistinguishable worth and value, I also find it to be a fact of biology that all beliefs cannot possibly be of indistinguishable worth and value.

Beliefs that result in damaging, denigrating, demeaning or otherwise harming people surely are based on mistaken understanding of reality, and merit being replaced with beliefs which value life in its full diversity.

The only safety I have ever found within human society is found in my being truthful with myself as with others as to who I really am. Being truthful has the advantage that I never fear "being outed,"or "being found out," because I am out.

For the sake of fairness, it may be that the main reason I never have been able to hide as a secret my being somewhere within the transgender realm may be the way in which I am autistic.

Whatever...

The news worth sharing may be, however I have done it, not hiding secrets has worked rather decently for me.

Yes, there have been those people who treated me terribly.

And yet, I much prefer that others treated me badly than that I had treated me badly through denying my human worth to myself in a likely (for me) form of personal tragedy that my being out prevented.

I do not have a way to offer advice, I can merely state that, for me in my life, being out was survivable. I have doubts about my surviving having hidden.

[bobbijoy4 (imported)]

Janekane: I appreciate your honesty and applaud your bravery for being so forthright. I know that was difficult to say here on this site. But therein lies the great thing about this site...the great, openminded and smart people here. I will be more than happy to send a reply here to one of your posts which I deem illogical or lacking in common sense. On a personal note, you mentioned earlier that you are a government beurocrat and a highly intelligent professional. I know from experience there are way too many government workers who are not worth spit so I have renewed faith that good, smart people can be such a welcome addition to government bureaucracy.

[loveableleopardy (imported)]

If Jane Kane is on acid then I want some. Gimme gimme gimme

To the OP, a terrific post. You can make many friends on the EA, and it's a great place for self expression.

As far as bring out in the open or secretive about oneself, it is difficult, and may depend on circumstances. It would be wonderful if everyone could just be 100% themselves, but mostly this causes others offence; offence which could lead to negative actions towards the person being open. The negativeness may not result in putting one into physical danger, but there could be major ramifications in regards to relationship possibilities, job possibilities, etc. As far as I can tell, EVERYONE needs to have a job, earn a living, and not many of us are self-sufficient enough to be able to earn this without the assistance of others. Also, the vast majority do need to be in a relationship, or if not need, then definitely would agree that to be with someone is better than to be single. And too much being 'out there' can harm such a possibility.

Though of course in rare exceptions it can also not.

I have published my autobiography. It contains elements which would not find agreement with many people, and could cause offence. I do not publically speak of the book, though at the same time I do not worry about it's being revealed. I would simply deal with that as best I can if and when that situation arises. I feel happy and proud that I published it, so for me, to be open rather than secretive about myself is a positive, even though I don't talk about what's necessarily important to others.

[janekane (imported)]

Janekane: I appreciate your honesty and applaud your bravery for being so forthright. I know that was difficult to say here on this site. But therein lies the great thing about this site...the great, openminded and smart people here. I will be more than happy to send a reply here to one of your posts which I deem illogical or lacking in common sense. On a personal note, you mentioned earlier that you are a government beurocrat and a highly intelligent professional. I know from experience there are way too many government workers who are not worth spit so I have renewed faith that good, smart people can be such a welcome addition to government bureaucracy.

Perhaps the words I choose at times make sense to me and will not be accurately understood by others. I attribute this to the symbolic nature of spoken and written language and not to any for of human inadequacy.

With that in mind, I was never a "government bureaucrat." I did work for a county government, but as a medical laboratory technician, medical technologist, and bioengineer, working with physicians doing clinical medicine and medical research. I also did work for a state university as an electronics technician. Alas, I cannot provide valuable credit for bureaucrats because I never was allowed into that government service role, perhaps because autistic government bureaucrats may treat the public with unacceptable decency?

And, (please recall that I have some sort of sense of humor) I have doubts about being intelligent. There is a reason for this.

There is the SETI (Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence) Project. I think is may be of some value. However, I have long wondered if it might be more intelligent to look for intelligence here on Earth. If we are not able to find any hint of even a trace of intelligence on Earth, how on Earth would we ever have a clue as to what we are looking for elsewhere?

What I did do is to report, truthfully, that professional folks who work with autism spectrum people have, on talking with me for a while, invariably informed me that I fit the pattern of high-functioning autistic savant. Oh, well; I find myself to be an ordinary, run of the mill person. But then, I find everyone to be run of the mill, because "the mill" never makes two of anything exactly the same.

Why do I mention that savant labeling? Not for bragging rights.

I do it so that, if I use words that make sense to me and no one else, others may be willing to help me learn to use words more effectively, because it is clear that I am grateful when people do that.

[janekane (imported)]

If Jane Kane is on acid then I want some. Gimme gimme gimme

To the OP, a terrific post. You can make many friends on the EA, and it's a great place for self expression.

As far as bring out in the open or secretive about oneself, it is difficult, and may depend on circumstances. It would be wonderful if everyone could just be 100% themselves, but mostly this causes others offence; offence which could lead to negative actions towards the person being open. The negativeness may not result in putting one into physical danger, but there could be major ramifications in regards to relationship possibilities, job possibilities, etc. As far as I can tell, EVERYONE needs to have a job, earn a living, and not many of us are self-sufficient enough to be able to earn this without the assistance of others. Also, the vast majority do need to be in a relationship, or if not need, then definitely would agree that to be with someone is better than to be single. And too much being 'out there' can harm such a possibility.

Though of course in rare exceptions it can also not.

I have published my autobiography. It contains elements which would not find agreement with many people, and could cause offence. I do not publically speak of the book, though at the same time I do not worry about it's being revealed. I would simply deal with that as best I can if and when that situation arises. I feel happy and proud that I published it, so for me, to be open rather than secretive about myself is a positive, even though I don't talk about what's necessarily important to others.

I really doubt that you would want to be on acid the way I am. When my colon was snatched out in 1986 to prevent my getting colon cancer because of a rare genetic condition, familial adenomatous polyposis (FAP), my not having a colon changed the way my blood pH is regulated, and I became sufficiently acidotic that I take prescription medicine to bring my blood pH back into a safe range. For people who can keep their colons and not be at risk of an average age of death of 42 years, keeping one's colon is usually very wise. Not so for me. My dad and brother both died much younger than I now am, from cancer that resulted from FAP.

However, I have no complaint. I get to live the life I am actually able to live as I am able to live it, or I will not live at all. There simply is no middle ground for me.

Being transgendered at a level that I deem to be about 80% of the threshold at which I would have gone for SRS, I waited until I was 35 before I seriously considered being married. I did that because it took me that long to become sufficiently certain that I would never have any need for SRS and gender reassignment from male to female. And I waited because I was never willing to ambush a wife with the need for SRS after marrying her.

Of course, what I did and how I did it is clearly impossible for many transgendered people, because sufficient awareness may not arise before a person is married. I find no fault with any such folks, for that is merely another aspect of the biological diversity which makes human life possible.

Everyone has the acid for the acid trip I take. It is of the ordinary, normal and necessary, biological processes that allow anyone to be alive. Phosphoric acid is essential for the phosphate buffer system that helps regulate blood pH. No colon, and the phosphate buffer system gets messed up because the colon is a necessary part of that buffer system.

Everyone also has a genetic condition that apparently will become fatal. That condition starts with conception and the formation of the zygote.

As a theoretical biologist, I observe that life is made of death as death is made of life, and life is necessary for death no more nor less than death is necessary for life, because life and death are one and the same process, the creatively evolving process of existence itself.

So, I choose to trust life. All of it. And, why not? What else is there that actually exists?

[AtomicMush (imported)]

I could not have said it any better.

g