My best friend (m) is transitioning and I'm confused

dan123
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Joined: Thu Dec 15, 2016 8:23 am

My best friend (m) is transitioning and I'm confused

Postby dan123 » Thu Dec 15, 2016 8:52 am

My best friend, biologically male from birth, is in his mid thirties and is soon to start hormone therapy. I've known (let's call them Chris) since we were 14. Chris and I played rugby together, we chased girls around the school yard, went on lads holidays together and spent the ages of 14-30 being guys; growing up from boys into men. A few years ago Chris confessed to his male circle of friends that he liked to dress up in women's clothes and from that point onwards there has been new developments every now and then. About a year later Chris then told us he was bi sexual then that soon became homosexual and the latest development is that he has now begun to take hormones to become more feminine. He's also considering changing his name legally to a female variant.

All the male friends in our group are fortunately very open minded and despite us having absolutely no idea about the experience he is going through we try and just encourage him to find his own way. I know if you asked him he would say that he has an incredible group of friends. We try and offer him support wherever we can, even if it's just being a sounding board about stuff.

But now a few guys in our friendship group (and myself) are starting to feel something. And the best way to describe this feeling is a sense of mourning. This isn't because we don't want Chris to be himself, truly himself (we wouldn't want any of our friends to live a half life), but because we have known Chris as a guy since we were boys - there's a feeling that that person we grew up is beginning to become a memory.I'm sure for Chris it isn't because deep down he probably had an awareness of this inside him since day one. But for us, we had no idea.

Of course we had female friends in our social group - quite a few and we love them dearly. We have known all of them since school too....but because they way kids are when they are that young, males and females do tend to form quite distinct circles of friends. You have groups of guy friends, you have groups of girlfriends and the way you engage socially with these groups are often quite different. This binary way of doing things is just how things happen - I'm not saying it's right or wrong and maybe in 50 years this will be very different at school but if Chris were to have been a girl since 14 then our relationship would have been fundamentally different. Just as my friendship with best girlfriends is fundamentally different to my male friends.

So in short - I feel like I'm losing a friend. I'm super excited to meet Christina and getting to know her and I just want my best friend to feel comfortable in his own skin...... but I feel incredibly sad that I don't have Chris anymore. It's almost like he's died - I know that sounds dramatic, but that is how it feels sometimes.

Thanks for your patience. I'm not massively articulate at the best of times.

Any advice from people that experienced similar things?
Last edited by dan123 on Sat Dec 17, 2016 2:20 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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Ice Maiden
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Re: My best friend (m) is transitioning and I'm confused

Postby Ice Maiden » Fri Dec 16, 2016 2:36 pm

Well this is a very common theme - especially with parents - parents who say have a 'girl' they dream of them waling down the Aisle and so on then discover they are in fact a male and now have som bloke trundling around their house that they do not really know ;)

Look Chris is still there Chris was I suspect (if you ask Christina) was always a girl hanging out and pretending to be 'one of the lads'.

Imagine for a second you have had to pretend to be a girl all your life, if you didn't you would be labeled a 'freak' or possibly disowned, humiliated and may not even get work!

You have to wake up (in this hypothetical case) every day and dress up as a woman and somehow pretend to be one of the girls. By the time you are in your teens you probably are at the point where you just cannot take it any longer! So you trickle feed info to the group, that you are a lesbian? Then you dress butch... See how they react? When you realise they are cool with it you say well actually I am a trans* man... Then later fully identify as male.

On this path you are so stressed and worried, the last thing on your mind in this earth-shattering situation for your personal mental health, well, is those around you. How your mates might feel.

Now that said, I personally think you should tell Christine this, how you feel, and that you will miss the old Chris, but are happy for her and will be there for her if she needs support. This may result in some tears. And maybe some uncomfortable embraces :) But, she is lucky to have you as a friend. She is on a tough road and has been on that road a VERY long time. The sanctuary is just over the next mountain - help her up the summit ;)

Your loss is real! But in time once the excitement and path is done Christine will then likely recover some of her old thoughts and feelings - ones you recognise. Only her shell is changing.

I have met a lot of trans*people in 30 years! And the vast majority are basically the same person they always were. The only change is how other impose gender roles upon them or judge their sexual attractiveness.
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Re: My best friend (m) is transitioning and I'm confused

Postby Ice Maiden » Fri Dec 16, 2016 2:37 pm

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Disclaimer!!!! Please Read! http://media.transgenderzone.com/?page_id=2

"Never believe that a few caring people can't change the world. For, indeed, that's all who ever have." M.Mead

Man [...] must count no one but himself; that he is alone, abandoned on earth in the midst of his infinite responsibilities, without help, with no other aim than the one he sets himself, with no other destiny than the one he forges for himself on this earth." - J.P.Sartre.

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