This was very well written. I am a woman with quite a few masculine traits. I was blessed in having parents that were as happy buying me Batmobiles and video games as they were Barbie dolls. I was “blessed” with a misogynistic father who allowed me an “out” because I wasn’t a girl like OTHER girls, those nasty, stupid, cliquish, brainless, slutty girls, I was a <Last Name>. Which made me better than everyone else and, though I couldn’t be a boy, at least allowed me a genderless self-identity built around my family.

It’s not by chance my sisters and I have gender neutral names. It’s not by chance we all would be men if given a choice. But, like you, we accept the reality of what transitioning means and aren’t willing to make those sacrifices. We also, thankfully, don’t struggle with dysphoria, though with our Dad saying glorious things like he couldn’t hug us tightly anymore because our post-puberty bodies made him uncomfortable it’s a wonder.

There’s no button to push, there’s no boyhood to be granted, there’s just pain, hormones, surgeries, staring, and never quite being what we wish we could be. I don’t want to be a man. I want to have been born male. There’s a world of difference between those two things.

I appreciated reading this.