In response to my previous post asserting that, for me, living a female life is a choice, one commentator expressed an interesting challenge to that thinking, and one that I feel deserves a post of its own in response:

I wonder if you were required to put Janie away how long it would be before her needs started to show up in ways that you might not expect or find comfortable. I’ve heard the same story from a lot of us that when their female sides were pushed out of sight she pushed back. Nothing is worse than a “T” girl scorned for she will become a real bitch until she is once again free. The free girl is pleasant and relaxed while the closeted one is anything but.

Into a not so scientific experiment? Why don’t you put Janie away and see how long it takes for the choice to become a need?

I don’t have to “put Janie away” for even a minute to realize that I would be pretty miserable without her. All I have to do is think about doing so and I start to get agitated.

That settles nothing, however.

Practical Aspects of Gender Choice

I think we all develop a degree of reliance on our female selves to address certain deficiencies in our lives – and in so doing stop dealing with those challenges in any other way.

For example, those of us who assert that their feminine side relaxes them may very well be using their feminine identity to escape the stresses and responsibilities of their male lives.

Clearly, being prevented access to that relief would be quite upsetting, but that doesn’t prove a need to be female; it just proves that one is having trouble dealing with their stress and responsibilities.

If, instead of focusing on gender issues, one put the emphasis on developing alternative strategies for coping with that stress, it is possible the need to become female might surprisingly vanish, or at least morph into something more of a choice.

The man who finds access to a second identity, and in particular to femininity, will find all sorts of new tools at his disposal that help him appreciate the world in different ways and solve his problems in ways that may have stymied him with the more limited tool-set he had previously.

And, that’s great! However, I don’t believe that his ability to access a feminine side or his bridling at being prevented from using the many useful life skills that come with it necessarily proves anything conclusive about his gender or whether it is a choice or need.

Weighing the Choice

Those coping skills often come at a steep price in terms of social acceptability, family and relationships – and if that is all they are (coping skills), then it would seem that one simply needs to consider whether it is worth it, whether, on balance, it is helping or hurting his life, and whether there is anything that can be done to assimilate some of those tools and perspectives into his life independent of gender.

In considering the meaning of the negative feelings that come from being prevented from expressing one’s femininity, I believe we ought to take care to identify whether it is the femininity itself that is the issue or rather its practical benefits that we are upset about losing.

We just might be able to avoid a lot of grief that way.