How do I put a title to this?

I know a person who is having difficulty. She says quite often " I can't be ..."

This woman still has her mother around, in a way her mother has adopted me not sure about that. Anyways I have had the pleasure of talking to her mother a few times.

Her mother has told me of a few memories of this woman growing up.

One time she came home to find a gaggle of girls in her living room playing with barbies or something. These girls were all in elementary school at the time. The problem was one of these girls was supposed to be her son but, and this is pretty much her words, there was only girls in that room.

A few years later when she was sitting in her kitchen after a hard days work, her 13 year old daughter glided into the kitchen in a dress and twirled it for her, very much the picture of a daughter she had longed for since she was a little girl. The girl was twirling and showing off her dress as she felt pretty. Then before she could say anything the girl left and got changed. Gone was the pretty girl of a few minutes ago when her droopy depressed son entered the kitchen and asked what was for supper.

When this girl was in highschool she and her friends came home to her place on a very hot day. Not even thinking anything was wrong the girls stripped down to their lingerie right in front of 'him'. They didn't even make a big deal out of it. Just some girls trying to get comfy in the heat. It was not a striptease or anything.

For years this person has had periodic examples of things like that. However due to some sexual abuse by someone when they were young this person has denied herself and has tried very hard to live as a boy.

I have not known her very long but even I could see how girlie she is, about the age of a girl when they are like 10 and just noticing boys for the first time, but still very much a girl. She wants, no needs, people to see her when she is pretty.

And yet every time we talk it's the same thing. Getting her to admit she is a girl is very very hard. It's like pulling on a heavy rope attached to a car.

That however is pretty normal. What does concern me is that she has come a very long way towards accepting herself and allowing herself to BE herself. If something should happen to me, not that there is really any reason to but covering your asp is a good plan, I do not want her to go back into hiding again.