The first time I met her in real life, I (The author of this entry) was immediately attracted by her glommy temperament just like Lin Tai-yu in *A Dream of Red Mansions*.
Therefore, she had an enormous amount of pressure put on her for "extending the family line" ever since her birth.
Her father was whom we'd call a "traditional father" who follows Machismo.
In 2023, her father started to be even more strict with her after he almost died from a disease.
Her father was proficient in Math and Economics.
He wanted to raise her to be "a man who can support the sky while standing on the ground".
He said "I want him to be resillient and unyielding, but he's too kind; he can't do it."
Moreover, because she was fragile, introverted, and kind since being a child, out of worry, he often taught her what he thought was necessary to live in a society:
Capitalism, Laws, the dark side of humanity...but she often wasn't able to meet her father's standard.
She had poor grades in junior middle school, and still wasn't able to meet her family's expectations after junior middle school.
She always blamed herself for that.
After her graduation from high school, she studied at home for a year and then was able to get into a good public university.
Since she was living with her parents, she didn't have much personal space and was always blamed for things that are not her fault.
For example, when she plays a game to take a break form studies, she'd be blamed for "always playing games".
She told him, when she first started school, students were separated into groups of boys and girls to play.
She imagined playing with the girls after school.
According to some other stories told by her father, she seems to be a girl who was assigned the wrong gender at birth.
Looking at her early life, her transgender experience is similar to Einar Wegener from *The Danish Girl*.
Her gender incongruity was made apparent in as early as her childhood.
Her early male personality was formed by trying to fit in with traditional values and ethics, but that's not the real her.
Sigmund Freud explained his theory about "abnormal behaviors" in his publication *Three Essays on the Theory of Sexuality*:
> Where the sexual instinct is fairly intense, but perverse, there are two possible outcomes.
>
> The first, which we shall not discuss further, is that the person affected remains a pervert and has to put up with the consequences of his deviation from the standard of civilization.
> The second is far more interesting. It is that, under the influence of education and social demands, a suppression of the perverse instincts is indeed achieved, but it is a kind of suppression which is really no suppression at all. It can better be described as a suppression that has failed.
>
> The inhibited sexual instincts are, it is true, no longer expressed as such—and this constitutes the success of the process—but they find expression in other ways, which are quite as injurious to the subject and make him quite as useless for society as satisfaction of the suppressed instincts in an unmodified form would have done. This constitutes the failure of the process, which in the long run more than counterbalances its success.
>
> The substitutive phenomena which emerge in consequence of the suppression of the instinct amount to what we call nervous illness, or, more precisely, the psychoneuroses.
>
> Neurotics are the class of people who, since they possess a recalcitrant organization, only succeed, under the influence of cultural requirements, in achieving a suppression of their instincts which is apparent and which becomes increasingly unsuccessful. They therefore only carry on their collaboration with cultural activities by a great expenditure of force and at the cost of an internal impoverishment, or are obliged at times to interrupt it and fall ill.
>
> from Freud, S. (1908). ‘Civilized’ Sexual Morality and Modern Nervous I lness. The Standard Edition of the Complete Psychological Works of Sigmund Freud, Volume IX (1906-1908): Jensen's ‘Gradiva’ and Other Works, 177-204
According to conservative values, being trans is a kind of such abnormality.
She knew her parents may not be able to accept her choices.
She thought her choice caused her parents' wishes of her void.
She was diagnosed with severe depression after a failed suicide attempt.
At that time, her father thought her trans identity was just a crossdressing fetish and was hopeful for her to be "cured" in a few years.
He thought if that problem is taken care of, then she won't be depressed, and tried to accept her and even allowing her to take HRT.
He told her he'll convince her mother, but he failed.
Her mother ran away from home after learning about the situation.
Her mother told her she wants to die and never see her again.
Before that, her parents were a loving couple who'd hold hands while going out.
They even took a new set of wedding photographs in June that same year.
Therefore, she was stuck in a dilemma between them.
Her mother's words of unacceptance was a big blow for her.
According to her character, she might think:
> If I'm no longer in this world, or if I was not born in the first place, then maybe my parents won't have to deal with me and will be happier?
She's born sentimental and has a fragile but kind heart.
In my opinion, she's a silly girl who's too kind for her own good.
She'd rather blame her misfortune on her fate rather than others' malice,
just like Dai-Yu's negative outlook on life and relationships:
> Coming together can only be followed by parting. The more pleasure people find in parties, the more lonely and unhappy they must feel when the parties break up. So better not forgather in the first place. The same is true of flowers: the delight people when in bloom, but it's so heart-rending to see them fade that it would be better if they never blossomed.
>
> from A Dream of Red Mansions Volume I (Cao Xueqin, Gao E.), Foreign languages Press, Beijing, China, 1994 (First Published in hardback in 1978) 【第一册 P452】ISBN: 9787119006437
Since a long time ago, she wanted to avoid forming close relationships because she's afraid of the partings.
She had poor grades in middle school and was often bullied.
She couldn't fight back for unreasonable isolation and even physical abuse.
At that time, she had a close friend.
They were neighbours.
She started to learn to play basketball in order to play together.
However, they parted after he started to bully her.
Given her character and lack of therapy, this cruel experience made her eventually develop [PTSD/PTSR](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Post-traumatic_stress_disorder).
She started to be afraid of close relationships more.
Her other mental issues like severe depression is also related to this experience.
> When she remembers the horrible things she'd been through, I had seen her whole body crampling, trembling. I had seen her suffer from fear, dread, and shortness of breath.
> But I was too neglectful and obtuse.
> I didn't realize the severity of the situation and the difficulty of dealing with it.
> If I realized, maybe things could be different.
She inherited the stubborness of her father.
Her father researched nutritionalism and sports in order to make her grow taller.
At that time, she wanted to grow taller as well, therefore she did as he instructed:
eating one meal per day and doing lots of exercise.
She had learnt of HRT since high school, but couldn't decide on it.
After starting HRT, she started to regret for her efforts to grow taller in the past.
She suffered from gender dysphoria from her height, which was especially painful for her, who was both mentally unwell and stubborn.
> Freud, S. (1908). ‘Civilized’ Sexual Morality and Modern Nervous I lness. The Standard Edition of the Complete Psychological Works of Sigmund Freud, Volume IX (1906-1908): Jensen's ‘Gradiva’ and Other Works, 177-204
>
> 文段摘录
>
> Where the sexual instinct is fairly intense, but perverse, there are two possible outcomes.
>
> The first, which we shall not discuss further, is that the person affected remains a pervert and has to put up with the consequences of his deviation from the standard of civilization.
>
> The second is far more interesting. It is that, under the influence of education and social demands, a suppression of the perverse instincts is indeed achieved, but it is a kind of suppression which is really no suppression at all. It can better be described as a suppression that has failed.
>
> The inhibited sexual instincts are, it is true, no longer expressed as such—and this constitutes the success of the process—but they find expression in other ways, which are quite as injurious to the subject and make him quite as useless for society as satisfaction of the suppressed instincts in an unmodified form would have done. This constitutes the failure of the process, which in the long run more than counterbalances its success.
>
> The substitutive phenomena which emerge in consequence of the suppression of the instinct amount to what we call nervous illness, or, more precisely, the psychoneuroses.
>
> **Neurotics are the class of people who, since they possess a recalcitrant organization, only succeed, under the influence of cultural requirements, in achieving a suppression of their instincts which is apparent and which becomes increasingly unsuccessful. They therefore only carry on their collaboration with cultural activities by a great expenditure of force and at the cost of an internal impoverishment, or are obliged at times to interrupt it and fall ill.**
>
> I have described the neuroses as the ‘negative’ of the perversions [p. 189 above] because in the neuroses the perverse impulses, after being repressed, manifest themselves from the unconscious part of the mind— because the neuroses contain the same tendencies, though in a state of ‘repression’, as do the positive perversions.
> 杨宪益、戴乃迭译：Now Tai-yu naturally preferred solitude to society. She reasoned, "Coming together can only be followed by parting. The more pleasure people find in parties, the more lonely and unhappy they must feel when the parties break up. So better not forgather in the first place. The same is true of flowers: the delight people when in bloom, but it's so heart-rending to see them fade that it would be better if they never blossomed."
> A Dream of Red Mansions Volume I (Cao Xueqin, Gao E.), Foreign languages Press, Beijing, China, 1994 (First Published in hardback in 1978) 【第一册 P452】ISBN: 9787119006437
> David Hawkes 译：Dai-yu had a natural aversion to gatherings, which she rationalized by saying that since the inevitable consequence of getting together was parting, and since parting made people feel lonely and feeling lonely made them unhappy, *ergo* it was better for them not to get together in the rst place. In the same way she argued that since the owers, which give us so much pleasure when they open, only cause us a lot of extra sadness when they die, it would be better if they didn’t come out at all.
> 翻译来源：Wen Xuan or Selections of Refined Literature, Volume III: Rhapsodies on Natural Phenomena, Birds and Animals, Aspirations and Feelings, Sorrowful Laments, Literature, Music, and Passions, compiled by Xiao Tong (501-531) , David R. Knechtges【P9】
> "The worm is in man’s heart. That is where it must be sought. One must follow and understand this fatal game that leads from lucidity in the face of experience to flight from light."
> Dying voluntarily implies that you have recognized, even instinctively, the ridiculous character of that habit, the absence of any profound reason for living, the insane character of that daily agitation and the uselessness of suffering.
>
> What then is that incalculable feeling that deprives the mind of the sleep necessary to life? A world that can be explained even with bad reasons is a familiar world. But, on the other hand, in a universe suddenly divested of illusions and lights, man feels an alien, a stranger. His exile is without remedy since he is deprived of the memory of a lost home or the hope of a promised land. This divorce between man and his life, the actor and his setting, is properly the feeling of absurdity. All healthy men having thought of their own suicide, it can be seen, without further explanation, that there is a direct connection between this feeling and the longing for death.
> A Dream of Red Mansions Volume II (Cao Xueqin, Gao E.), Foreign languages Press, Beijing, China, 1994 (First Published in hardback in 1978) 【第二册 P672】ISBN: 9787119006437
> 霍本译：It is not to be thought that a shrinking flower could withstand the whirlwind’s blast, or a tender willow-tree be proof against the buffetings of the tempest.
> 戴本译：No search can be made for the incense that revives the dead, as the way to Fairy Tales is lost. No medicine that restores life can be obtained, as the Magic Barge is gone. Only yesterday I was painting those bluish eyebrows; today, who will warm her cold fingers with the jade rings?
>
> *Magic Barge*: Magic Barge: A Chinese legend said this belonged to the immortals and sailed in the Sky River, Milky Way.
> A Dream of Red Mansions Volume II (Cao Xueqin, Gao E.), Foreign languages Press, Beijing, China, 1994 (First Published in hardback in 1978) 【第二册 P672】ISBN: 9787119006437
> It were a hard thing to hunt out the Isle of the Blest from among the multitudinous islands of the ocean and bring back the immortal herb that should restore her: the raft is lost that went to look for it.
>
> It was but yesterday that I painted those delicate smoke-black eyebrows; and who is there today to warm the cold jade rings for her fingers?
