History
I guess I knew I was different from an early age (yes, that sounds cliche but it's true, for those of you who have no personal expereience to glean from and don't know)  I always used to play dress up with the other girls and they always thought I was strange because I enjoyed it when the other boys scorned it (and me for that matter.)  I remember most of the boys in my preschool used to be cajoled into playing house with the girls and I was all over that and always volunteered to play the mommy.  It just felt more right than "the husband" who came home and smoked his pipe and kicked his feel up to relax.  I also used to put on my mother's panty hose (Yeah, yeah, maybe that's sick but I was three)  I didn't understand why I was not supposed to because that was what the other girls did so why wasn't I supposed to?  When I went over to my babysitter house, she had a daughter my age named Jenny and she and I would play Barbies and have tea parties and such and her mother thought it was so cute.  Until I tried on Jenny's shoes one day because I liked the pink and purple as opposed to the silver and black of my shoes.  Again, I thought that since all the girls I saw wore pink and purple, I should too.  Besides, I liked the colors. 
As I got a little older, I began to accept the fact that I was different from the other girls, mainly that my plumbing was different.  I began to want to play sports and hang around with other guys if that would just make the feelings that something was wrong with me go away.  The problem was , I am quite competitive and I did not want to play any sport I was not good at.  And I wasn't good at any of them.  I enrolled in little league in about the fifth grade, mostly because my father wanted me to and I wanted desperately to please him (Freud would say it was the Electra complex).  However, I was really bad at baseball and the first day of practice I got hit in the chest with a line drive.  I started crying and the rest of the team made fun of me mercilessly.  As a consequence, I never came back to the team.  I began to withdraw into myself because I knew something about myself was not right and I didn't want anyone else to know.  I am quite intelligent (no boast, my IQ is 142) so I used school studies as a method of withdrawal from society.  I had a 4.0 gpa throughout grade and junior high schools and a 4.5 on a weighted grade scale in high school.  Anyway, I used this as an escape and the sedentary life of a scholar took it's toll.  I got really fat.  This was devastating because now people didn't even give me the time of day and I was merely tolerated by people like teachers.  I withdrew further and became so self-conscious I developed a speech disorder.  I had few friends and few cares outside my world of school because no one else cared about me.  Well, that's not true, I have very loving and supportive parents but they are somewhat closed minded and would not have understood if I had said "Mom, Dad, I'm a girl and I am going to start acting, dressing, and being like one."  My father would have disowned me and my mother would have broken out crying.  My extended family would have disowned me as well and I could not take that kind of rejection.  
High school was worse.  I was still fat and rather unattractive (yet another reason I have hesitated in taking steps towards Leah) and I found out about this odd condition called transgender.  I realized immediately that was what was wrong with me but I had heard (and sometimes made) the jokes about 'OH, I'm a woman trapped in a man's body!' with the hand to the forehead and everything.  These people who were transgendered were a joke to society and usually treated worse then homosexuals and I could not take that kind of rejection.  I wandered throughout high school and only found close minded people who would never understand my plight and I became more and more depressed and even suicidal at one point until I realized that was the cowards way out.  I dated a few girls and never really found them all that interesting.  The first one I dated I cared deeply for but she was abusive.  The second was a drug addict and was usually spaced out and not someone I could talk to.  And so on and so forth, never finding anyone who I could reveal myself to.  I almost decided to join the army or some such dribble if I could just forget these feelings of wrongness for any amount of time.  It even got to the point that I invoked faith (of which I had little) and I prayed to God to make me a girl or at least let me forget the feelings of wrongness.  I prayed every night for three years and never felt a slackening of the feelings so I gave up, I'm sorry to say.  I began to only ask for small things like to help some friend feel better or something similar.  I coasted through high school with a high GPA and was depressed most of the time.  Once I was out, I never looked back.
Colllege was another story.  I began to work out religiously and soon I had gotten rid of most of the high school accumulated fat.  I began to dress better and be more out going.  For a time, it seemed to work.  After one semester, I met someone in one of my classes that would change my life.  She and I shared the same major and we began to work together on homework and such.  I knew she had been hurt by her last relationship and she was not interested in another on anytime soon.  I was just fine with that and, while I found her attractive, I too had little interest in another relationship.  However, things being as they were, we soon fell in love and got together and are together still today.  Being with her, I forgot any of the feelings I had about being female and we just had a good time together.  However, mid fall, disaster struck.  I was sitting eating lunch and I happened to catch a talkshow on a guy who was transgendered who was transitioning.  All those feelings came rushing back and it became all I could think about.  I created an e-mail account (the one on the homepage) and I began to establish the persona of Leah.  The first time I really cross-dressed was this last week and I almost wish I hadn't done it.  It felt really right but I know I cannot do anything about it right now because I love my girlfriend too much and could never hurt her by telling her I am transgendered.  I found out I don't make all that bad looking of a woman, in my opinion, but I am not sure whether I would look all right if I did this full time (I am sitting here in black tights, a black miniskirt, and a forest green shirt with a forest green bow in my shoulder length blond hair)  I have not decided what I want to do because I am not happy where I am but I don't know what to do to fix it.  Right now, I am feeling my way through and hoping someone sees this site and needs someone to talk to as bad as I do...
Update 12/19/2000
I've told my brother and he was amazingly okay with it.  Then he revealed that he was gay and I about broke out crying again.  What can I tell my parents?  'Mom, Dad, one of your sons is a fag and the other a freak?'  I am really happy for my brother because he always seemed to not fit in and now I know he is happy I am thrilled for him but I feel so sorry for my parents.  It is going to crusht them when they find out about both of us.  I also told my girlfriend and it about killed her.  She doesn't understand and I don't think she ever will but I cannot keep Leah hidden away for much longer or it will kill her and therefore me.  I am not sure what to do and sometimes think death would be a merciful release...
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