I'm a female inside of a male's body.

Hi everyone.

I'm about to turn 30. A little over a year and a half ago, I was diagnosed with autism. At the time, I thought that was the reason behind all of my problems. I tried to explain my feelings to a psychologist, but it felt like she couldn’t understand what I was trying to say. Now I realize that I couldn’t express it clearly because I didn’t fully understand myself.

I kept wavering between different diagnoses — ADHD, BPD, bipolar disorder…

But in the end, the truth turned out to be much simpler.

For the past year, I haven’t been working. I stayed home, studied Carl Jung, and did a lot of self-reflection. At some point, I remembered that I’ve always felt this strange, almost primal fear of lesbians — a fear I couldn’t explain. Until one thought suddenly crystallized in my mind:

"I'm afraid I could never become the kind of girl I’d want to be for my future partner." It's jealous.

And then it hit me.

I’m a woman.

That explained everything:

The way I’ve always felt.

The way I behaved, the way I thought.

Up until the age of seven, I was convinced I was a girl.

I used to stuff fabric under my clothes to mimic breasts. I loved putting on lipstick. I always felt more comfortable with girls.

I never understood men — especially those who only think about sex. That’s something that always disgusted me.

When this realization came, all my memories began to fall into place.

I understood how deeply I long to feel like a woman next to a man.

To finally be soft, vulnerable, and safe.

To allow myself to be the person I’ve always been inside.

You know how some women say, “I’m tired of being strong”?

Well, when you’re born in a male body, you don’t even get the chance to rest or be “just a girl.”

People are always expecting something from you.

And no one ever helps. Ever.

I’m tired.

If I were a man inside, maybe I would have accepted it by now. But I'm not.

I’m a woman. I just didn’t know it until recently.

Why am I writing this in a space about autism?

Because these things are connected.

The nervous system, like everything else in our body, is shaped in the womb by hormones.

There’s a theory that if the fetus gets enough testosterone to form a male body, but not enough to “masculinize” the brain, the brain ends up developing along female patterns.

That might explain my gender identity — and possibly even my autism, since my nervous system developed in a nonstandard way.

Of course, every autistic person is different. But that’s why we’re called a spectrum.

So yes, I realized:

I’m not gay. I’m not a man who loves men.

I’m a woman, who quivers before men.

And maybe even I’m a lesbian — I’m okay with that.

But I want — deeply, desperately — to feel like a woman.

The woman I always was.

And the one I was never allowed to be. And I just don't know what to do now.

Hope you got me.