Nature and nurture

I am always fascinated by the nurture versus nature components inherent in the concept of gender. Messaging received in childhood can have a significant impact on behaviour and certainly on presentation which is most of the time enforced quite early. Before the child has a chance to experiment with their leanings they are told what toys to play with, how to sit, how to dress, etc.

I am certain that there is a biological component to gender which David Reimer helped us to understand. John Money's idea that gender could be enforced via child rearing went down spectacularly in flames and culminated in Reimer's suicide in his thirties. So much for that concept.

So if we establish that gender identity contains both learned and innate components, what is interesting is to what degree each person buys into a narrative scripted for them. Many transgender people who are older were not given the choice and spent decades in an internal battle between our indoctrination and instinct. Today's openness has avoided that trans kids suffer in silence for as long as we did but it has also brought with it confusion among people for whom gender variance is less matter of necessity than experimentation.

This is where the question gets murky and untangling primordial essence from experimental curiosity has yielded confusion for some. Here the wish-washy term "trans" does not help those trying to figure out a life formula but then those with gender dysphoria tend to know it because it's grip is ultimately inescapable and begs to not be ignored. If you've never struggled with what to do it could be because you might not be gender dysphoric and never were.

The combination of nature and nurture in each of us is so unique that it can be very challenging to craft a life plan and seeking inspiration from someone else can prove ultimately futile and even detrimental to our own life.