Male-to-Female Trans Gender

Content warning: Gender dysphoria
I am somewhat stressed when people imply it's always bad to contextualize "transition from one gender to another" and I am problematic if I say I was a boy in the past, I have to believe my gender is essential and static, and such. I dreamed about being a girl for a very long time, but I haven't always hated being a boy either, a void grew inside me as I grew up which eventually resulted(by huge luck) in realizing I would be much, much happier and at peace if I became a girl. One might say I can be a "Girl who got alienated from identity by implicit erasure", but it's not the entire story, I was not exactly "confused" either, I really haven't thought "Being a boy is a nightmare" or actively thought about my identity . What I did was:

• Regularly daydreaming about a very particular girl image whose personality just happens to be like an ideal version of myself ages alongside with me, my own hair and eye color, wears clothing I find beautiful.
• Hating growing body hair
• Low-key disliking anything that symbolizes adult manhood

Many trans people are very clear about their gender or at least clear in their hatred of their gender assignment, but I am neither, I feel like I am revisionist to my own past if I claim I was 100% discontent being a boy/man.
Womanhood for me, is something I have discovered in myself, I don't feel anything wrong in saying "I was a man, until I wasn't."
AS LONG AS someone fully accepts me as a woman right now, I don't have a trouble to say "I was a boy in the past"
Of course this isn't true for a lot of trans people and honestly dysphoria inducing for me too, and it's very often used as an anti-trans talking point, along with male socialization, so I definitely understand why people are off put by it but for me "I was always a girl" just doesn't tell the whole story.
And I certainly don't imply anything about medical transitioning.  I was not a boy because of body parts. I was a boy because that's how I got shaped. I am still in full closet myself right now, but I am still 100% percent woman, because I am shaping myself as one. I don't construct my identity by rooting in past. My identity is rooted in present, guided by my dreams. I was a boy, man, confused, whatever, but now I am a woman, because I have decided so, it's the first step towards becoming the person I want to be. I want to medically transition, I want to dress femininely, I want to train my voice, I want to laser my body hair, I want the surgery. But all of these are part of my transition, not conditions. The only condition is myself.
Wrong rhetoric always needs to be dispelled. But overly focusing on anti-trans talking is not helpful. Ironically, it helps centering in perception of transhood of cis people instead of what trans people feel about themselves. Such as the hoax of authogynephilia. There is nothing wrong with trans women getting sexual satisfaction out of their bodies. Such as to claims of gayness being a choice or not existing among other animals. Even it was true, there would be nothing wrong about same-gender attraction
Similar thing happens in terms MtF(male to female) and FtM(female to male). As I talked some paragraphs ago, the reason why people get upset by this is pretty clear. Trans people don't like to be reminded of their pre-transition/discovery days. It sounds too "medical condition"y, and for people exposed to western trans communities, it sounds old-fashioned and outdated.
This is why, there is some aversion to "switching-gender" view in western trans cultures, especially in spaces with radical views on gender. This is not a wide trend actually,  "becoming gender" is still ubiquitous in every trans culture.. But among radicals, there is an air of implicit rejection of concepts that sounds "assimilative", such ascertain concepts or concepts of passing, for both reasons above, being tired of having their own emotions used as a weapon against themselves and both as a rejection of current society. This sometimes turns into open disdain however, to the point of demanding trans people not to use x-to-y terminology at all. One striking event I have witnessed happened with the release of the manga named "The Bride Was a Boy." It is about a trans woman's experiences from her own perspective. The name sparked some controversy, there were people who claimed it was disrespectful and problematic. There are a couple of things to keep in mind here:

• The terms MtF and FtM are still used in non-western world, and usually older trans people in the West. Japan for example, even has similar terms for non binary people: MtX and FtX. The idea that transitioning as a switch between genders is widely recognised in some cultures. And the author of the said manga came from a such culture.
• There is no universal truth about gender, it shapes and is shaped along with the society itself. One's perception of gender isn't all-encapsulating nor final evolution of gender. None of us has "solved" gender.
• We all partake in problematic cultures, it is quite wrong to assert some group's perspective of gender is completely sin-free. Adding to first point, it is be entirely possible and likely,  that future generations will find us outdated as we do to older views on transhood.
• Problematic and messy queer media can exist. It's a bit patronizing to insist all queer media should perfectly align with one's views or they are tasked to represent entirety of queer people.
• It's certainly patronizing to say a trans person sharing their own experiences from their own perspective is "problematic". That doesn't mean you can't be critical towards queer content by queer people, but I feel they are being judged on ridiculous standards while queer media by cis people usually get hailed as icons by doing the bare minimum.
• Policing trans terminology is not great. Now, there are very legitimate reasons to be against certain associations, and that should be respected. The word "trap" comes into the mind, having super creepy and dangerous cultural baggage, forced down to trans community from a terrible internet culture etc. However, the terms that were with us throughout the history being problematic is not similar to that in any way, suggesting so is disrespectful.
• This is a misdirected distress. The cisnormative society is at blame for making our identities messy and problematic. We should point fingers at the society instead of becoming cops to each other.

What was I in the past? A boy, man, male? Perhaps I was really a girl whole time. But perhaps not. Certainly confused. But now, I am a woman, with utmost certainty. The most accurate term for me would be Confused-to-Woman probably, but I don't object to Male-to-Female. I like the idea of becoming a woman, in turn becoming myself. It's future looking, as I said before. I don't particularly care about the past male, but it just feels a lie to say there was no "boy" in the past. Am I a bad trans to think so?
I couldn't be trans without this mentality in the first place. Hearing trans stories about how they always somewhat knew what they wanted to be didn't help cracking my egg. "You can be a girl if you want to!". The possibility that I could become a woman changed my entire world. My daydreams finally started to click. It's only after deciding I could be a woman, I realized the signs in the past. It's entirely possible, I could live my entire life as a man who keeps daydreaming about one particular woman, with a feeling of hollowness, confusion and slight distress. Dreaming about myself is much more empowering to me than trying to reclaim something from past. This way, there is no need to yearn about missed days or feeling sad about not being a cis woman. I might look awful right now, but I don't have to look this way. If I changed my mind after seeing myself for boy for 20 years, one day people can stop seeing me as a boy either.
This is why "MtF" is an acceptable and warm label for me. It's better to not use it as a general term for trans women, and there is hardly need to do so. and I ask you to become understanding towards trans people with gender perceptions that are unlike yours.

This article is written thanks to my dearest Patrons and special thanks to: Acelin, Alexandra Morgan, Laura Watson, MasterofCubes, Maciej Paszkowski, Otakundead and Spencer Gill.