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31 May 24 - preparing to apply to a private gender clinic

The private gender clinic has said on its website that it reopens in June for bookings in September.  Well tomorrow is June. Although I expect that the first of June might not be what they mean, it might be first Monday, or any day. Might be the 30th. 

In readiness, I have looked up what is the first step. This is to email a) preferred name and pronouns, b) brief summary of your gender concerns, c) any steps you may have already taken towards social, legal or medical transition and d) what you would like to get out of contact with the service.

Name is easy, I’m Nicola. 

I think of myself as female so my pronouns are she / her I suppose but I have never heard myself referred to by female pronouns so I don’t particularly feel attached to them. I do know that male pronouns feel wrong and I find it really grating to hear myself referred to as he, him or described as a man. 

Brief summary of my gender concerns? Hmm, brief?

I have wished that I was a girl since I was about eleven and the age of puberty. I wished I had female puberty and developed a female body not a male one. 

I don’t relate to men at all and nor do I want to. I do relate to women and all my closest friends have been women. I think women sense that I am one of them inside. 

I’m now approaching fifty and feel like I have missed out on life as a woman and my time to experience being a girl will soon run out.  

I’ve not been able to live as a woman but I have always dressed female for myself, mostly in secret but in recent years I have become comfortable with going out in public presenting as a woman, albeit in places where I am unlikely to meet anyone that knows me.  Seeing myself as a woman, especially in outfits that I feel girly in, brings me real joy.  

My wife is aware of my gender feelings but not entirely comfortable with this. I am “out” to a couple of close friends also, who have been very supportive. 

Ultimately, I wish to live my life as Nicola and be seen as a woman. For me, this means physical transition, both medical and surgical so that I have a female body (to the fullest extent possible).

Steps to date: I have been practising with real life experience by going out in public presenting as a woman to prove to myself that I can handle being visible as a trans woman.  I approached my GP in February 2023 for advice and support and they refused to help. Coming out to my wife was the biggest step. 

I would like a diagnosis to give me the comfort that what I feel is real (or possibly that it is not). I believe I am a woman but I still feel a need for a properly qualified opinion to confirm this. Assuming that is the case, I would like to begin transitioning with hormones, voice training, full social transition and then gender confirming surgery after the necessary time living as a woman.  


So that’s my first draft. It’s actually easy to write this stuff as it’s just talking about how I feel. 

I wonder when in June they actually open.

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