So good news... you can't do anything for a while so you have time. You didn't list your age, but you will need to find a therapist who is willing to write you a letter for hormones and then find a doctor willing to administer said hormones. Until you have done that, about all you could do is change how you dress and look. Now could you not be... absolutely. The fact that this is a recent thing and not something more pervasive throughout your life is rather unique, but not an exclusive thing. So yes it could go either way, this is why you find a good therapist. Trust me the first hormone dose you will know if your brain works with it or not. You are either gonna feel WAY better or go insane for a few days. There are lots of people who do the whole trans thing and its not right for them and they regret it and claim its a sham when in reality they likely just had other issues. So again this is the point of the therapist. they should be challenging you on it, they are supposed to be looking for those other elements and such. If you have a decent one and the recommend the hormones, then you can be sure they are thinking it is a distinct possibility. In the end though it is all about being comfortable with yourself and less to do about anything else.

Now to the one thing you said that has me far more concerned... You list not having had a girlfriend before. What does that have to do with it? Preference, gender, and sex are all mutually exclusive arrays. Who you choose to share your bed with has absolutely nothing to do with sex or gender. Fact is that if you did follow the trans path to its full extent, the surgery doesn't produce that great a result for female to male, so you'd still likely need to use ... other methods? to deal with the act so to speak. If you are into men, then you would be a gay man, if you are into women, then you would be a straight man, if you aren't trans then you are either a straight woman or a gay woman, gender simply doesn't play into it. When it comes to dating for trans the water is dangerous. There are those who think that they will just keep it from the perspective partner pre or post op, but the fact is that person will find out and in some cases they act quite hostile. My personal opinion pre or post, you should let them know if you are planning to go to bed with them. if they are still fine with it great, if not well at least you were fair about it and likely still in a location where they can't do a lot to hurt you if they don't take it well.

You have your head in a REALLY good place thinking about all of these things and to be frank I wish more were like you and questioned it. There would be a lot less mistakes for those against trans people to use. You are also talking about changing your entire life, which in my case was at the time 32 years of history, The therapist is going to help you with all of that and figure out where you fall. So I would start there if I were you. Find a therapist and see how things play out. If you aren't ready for that, experiment with your look, cut your hair in a more androgynous cut, more androgynous clothing and so on. See how that effects your sense of self. Hope this was helpful.

Thanks a lot for your answer! Well, I'm 20 years old and only found out that I could be trans on Jully, I thought a lot about the possibility of me being trans before I go to a psychiatrist (and there's just not the trans doubts, I also have problems with anxiety and depression). So after a lot of thinking and struggling with back and forth thoughts, my mother started searching for a psychiatrist (she knows all this story from the beginning) and now she (my psychiatrist) is helping me a lot with depression and anxiety and we also talk about the possibility of me not being comfortable with my gender assigned at birth, we already talked about going to a hospital with that kind of speciality, like endocrinologists, gender therapists, plastic surgeons, etc but I get so scared when we talk about that and I always say "well, I guess it's way too early for that..." and, in fact, there has been only about 6 months since I discovered that there could be this possibility and I won't risk to take a bad decision and then regret it after a while... like you said, if I decide to start this transitioning journey, it will start to change my entire life and I can't afford to make a bad decision...

Well, since I discovered that I could be trans, it's like I finally got something to follow, like I finally found out what I should wear per example, before finding out the ftm possibility I went shopping for clothes and I always ended buying stuff I didn't really like and I was always like... entering a shop and asking myself "well, what now? I don't even know what I want because nothing makes me look the way I want to look..."
But now, things are different... I enter a shop and I automatically go to the men's section and I always end up amazed by everything I see... (and I'm also kind of desperate for a haircut but my mother does not allow me to do it... so I'm stuck with this long hair ugh)

So, it's like, now I know what I want in some areas of my life, but I still can't make the BIG decision... because there's this another thing that I always think about is that I can't answer not even a single question my psychiatrist makes to me about the transgender topic... what does that mean? It's like, there are feelings but I can't kind of explain them, or they're probably blurry? I don't know... I just can't answer anything, things are not clear, I write a lot to get my thoughts organized so I know what to bring up on the next session but whenever it comes to talk about this transgender possibility, there's nothing I can write about, my head goes blank, ugh.

Thanks a lot! You're really helping me out, I hope you'll answer this one too, that would help me a lot <3

oh and by the way, my assigned gender at birth was female

So there is good news and bad news (isn't it always the way) So bad news first since that's usually what people want out of the way. You are going to have to learn to talk to your therapist about it and you may have to do some further research and investigations to get some more details.
Now the good news. So your mom not letting you get your hair cut isn't an overly damaging element. In our society Women can pretty well wear whatever they want and no one cares. So if you want to wear mens clothing, bind your chest and all that, go for it, no one is gonna care no one is gonna look at you weird, nothing like that. so at least you can to a point experiment without large areas of fear. On the hormone front and all, its when you are ready. There is an amount of experimental time that you can be on hormones and still have it reverse but its only a set time, the endo will brief you on all of that, for me it was 7 months, for some its 6 its a lot of biology. So that gives you some wiggle room too. Its odd that you had never "wanted to be a boy" before this, but I suppose if you were to preoccupied with the anxiety and depression its possible. Most of us know from very young whether we have the words for it or not. This leads into the therapy part. You should remember your therapists questions and then when you aren't in the office and don't have the fear response going, write down the answers to the questions and give them to your therapist the next session. Its not uncommon to not know how to express your feelings, emotions are one of the hardest things to put in to words because often the words don't quite cover it properly but its the best we have. If you do the research I mentioned from above, read up on some things (ill give a link to a decent book you might want to read) and it may help you get the words you need. It can be a bit of a daunting task to complete, but like I said, you have time and all of it you need. if you aren't ready to step into anything like specialists or anything yet, you don't have to. I will say that hormone therapy is usually done about 4 months into therapy but only if the person is ready. so them bringing it up now wouldn't be uncommon. anyhow, I hope I got through everything and hopefully it helps *huggles*

https://www.amazon.com/True-Selves-Understanding-Transsexualism-Professionals/dp/0787967025/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1515169166&sr=8-1&keywords=true+selves

thanks a lot once again! first of all, I am definetely going to read the book you sent me.

Well, about always knowing if I were trans or wanted to be a boy or not, I don't know anything yet because once again, I can't answer not even a single thing about this, but all I can tell you are facts:

Since I was a little girl, I always cried and yelled when my mother tried to make me wear skirts, I always wanted boy's toys, I asked my mother why I didn't have a penis if all the other boys had and I even tried to pee standing up a few times... and already as a teenager I remember sometimes saying some things to my mother like "mom, what if I was born a boy?" or even "mom I wish I was born a boy..." so, I guess that what has been always the problem is that I have never been able to put all of this into words and organized thoughts, I never felt normal but I always kind of ignored it and tried to fit in.. guess what? never worked! lol

but still, there are doubts.. what if I'm just a tomboy??

thank you!

well given that last bit, that is the "wanting to be a boy" i was mentioning. usually children at very young ages will do those things off and on, for a trans child its pretty constant. so you probably are trans, but the therapist is the one who will know that and diagnose it. If they have brought up hormones i doubt that you are a tomboy, but if you are, you are. its all about being happy with who you are regardless of the case. You will eventually be able to communicate it better as you go, right now its new and scary, but once you learn that you can be you and be happy, it will get easier. Its a long path and you can take as long as you want to traverse it. you dont have to do anything until you are sure it is right for you. so dont feel pressured or that you have to conform to anything, do what makes you the most comfortable and happy. gotta be happy with you :D

yes, my psychiatrist already mentioned the hormones a lot and she even said to my mother (straight away) that I had the caracteristics of a person that is.not really comfortable with her gender assigned at birth, but my mother just doesn't want me to follow that path... she has got, more fear than I do even tho I'm scared to death, ugh

but as you said, it's a long path, even after gathering a lot of information I'm still scared, I'll be patient and my therapist will help me decide what's best for me

thank you, a lot! you helped so much! thanks to you, I was able to put some stuff into words that I haven't been able to before and this is amazing, thank you! my next session with my psychiatrist will be much easier, thank you once again ☺

any time, glad I could help. I think your mom is more scared because its all new to her and she has 0 information. The scariest things are things we don't understand. So the more knowledge you can get and give to her the more comfy she may be with it. there is also the fact that for her, its to a point the death of one kid and birth of a new one. so lots of mixed feelings. Ive been at this for about a decade because I took my time for everyone elses sake. While its all about me, I have my work and all so I had to let them adjust slowly and once they got used to a place I moved a bit farther and farther. But I also knew since I was little I wanted to change. My path was clear when I started. The more comfortable you are with each step the more so everyone else will be too :D so do as you said, be patient, take your time and go only as you are comfortable. Don't let anyone make you go farther than you are comfy with. youre simply not obligated to anything.

thank you, a lot!

yes, you are absolutely right, I already told my mom that she was scared because she has no knowledge about transgender stuff, so I'm thinking about doing the research all over again and print it and give it to her so she can read and get the knowledge she needs. I am definetely going to do that and I'm starting today bc I got a bit of free time so I'll take this chance. thanks a lot, you have helped me more than you can imagine!

You are very welcome :D Hope it all goes well

thank you

Good luck to you on your journey. One of the things that scares me as a mom of a transgender child is I love her and think everyone else should love her for who she is but there are always statistics that state transgender people are often victims of violent crime. I want my daughter to be safe. I was very happy that she decided right after she started being her true genuine self that she was going to use the women's bathroom. I don't know if it is actually true but I think she is safer in a women's bathroom in public than a men's room. She came out a little over a year ago and still has not started hormones. There is no rush. I think this will be the year, she has gotten a referral from her counselor. We live in a really small town and have to drive over an hour to a doctor that is willing to work with her on hormones.