Does she actually look in the mirror and think of herself as a man and/or is she disgusted by being a woman.

One of my best friends is bisexual, and for a while thought he might be transgender and might want to transition to female.  Now he says he's not transgender, but he is about 60% female, 40% male. He usually wears a mix of masculine and feminine clothes, and while he usually goes by his given, masculine name, he also uses a feminine name sometimes.

Gender is a very tricky thing, especially for those who don't fit the mold.

Mar 29, 2009 -- 7:06PM, deadpoet wrote:

Evening, all!  The name's Rene, and I'm actually looking for information to help support a friend of mine.  I thought this might be a good place to start, to avoid the inevitable snickers, eye-rolling, and other unsuitable responses.  I'm just trying to find some honest and fair insight.

Okay, so I'll get right to it, hm?  I have this friend, and she's desperately uncomfortable in her own skin.  She's bisexual, a tomboy (but not a dyke), and she talks to me about how she truly feels...  She's more attracted to men sexually but she's attracted to them in a way that, in her mind, she sees herself as being a gay man instead of a straight woman.  Now, I get exactly what she's talking about--I'm bisexual myself--but most people completely don't understand it because they state what they think is the obvious... i.e. "You're *already* a girl, so what's the problem?"

Does anyone here understand what my friend is going through?  Is anyone experiencing the same issue or variations of the same issue?  Any insight?

My spouse is a male to female transsexual, and a psychologist who counseled transsexuals.  Like everything else pertaining to humans, gender is not an absolute, but occurs in degrees and in an astonishing variety.  Most of us are nearer the ends rather than the middle of the bell curve that describes the occurance of gender, but there is an enormous number of people in or near the middle, as well.  I suggest that your friend find a transgender support group, or take a session or two with a psychologist that specializes in gender dysphoria, at least to determine if that is indeed what is troubling her.  She will be given some guidelines to help her determine where she is on the bell curve, and yes, she may very well be a homosexual man in a woman's body.  She may also be a straight woman with slightly unusual tastes in sexual pleasure, and there's nothing at all wrong with that.  The variety in which human gender and sexuality occurs is amazing and wonderful.  It can be confusing, too, and I've been given to understand that knowing where one sits on a certain scale enables one's head to stop spinning, and one can look around and see what there is to be seen from that specific vantage point, as it were.

If your friend has trouble finding a group, please email me at svetlana139 (at) hotmail (dot) com and my spouse may be able to give a reference.

Good luck and best wishes to your friend, and to you for being supportive!