Most people with Gender Identity Disorder, transgender or however you want to describe it, demonstrate some degree of obsessionalism. For most of us it manifests as a form compulsion to indulge in what begins as our alter ego; only we find it isn't, it's the real us.

Initially, we simply want to spend more time with our obsession because it feels either good or comfortable, so we push out the boundaries. If you live alone, then that's okay, you can please yourself. If at home with parents or in a relationship, it can get risky, exciting or downright kamikaze. A state which is then followed by regret, guilt or self-loathing. This second emotion tends to only last until the compulsion sets off again the excitement builds once more, such is the nature of obsession.

I can remember going to enormous lengths to hide my 'hobby' from my family. My younger brother knew, but he was okay about it. My mother and elder brother claimed they had no idea when I was eventually discovered. My discovery, once more pushing the boundaries led to it, always one more thing! In this case, my mother saw me going out to a friend's with a case, like doesn't everyone take a suitcase out for the evening?

It all calmed down, although the shame I felt for several seconds and the more lasting embarrassment, haunted me for sometime. My elder brother used to tease me occasionally but on the whole things were tolerable and I was just the middle son with the quirk that was kept very quiet.

Amazingly we don't have control over the directions of our emotions and I fell in love and eventually married a girl. She knew of my other side and even encouraged it until the children arrived. Of course I was always pushing the boundaries, always wanting one more thing but we managed. I had inadvertently deceived both of us before we married by convincing myself I enjoyed expressing my female side now and again. I had labelled myself a crossdresser and as long as I had some occassional but regular indulgence, I could cope. So I thought, but there's always one more thing.

Eventually, the one more thing was that I was diagnosed as having gender dysphoria or transsexual syndrome by the leading light of the day in London, Dr John Randall at Charing Cross. A creepy bloke who I could tolerate because he put me on hormones, that one more thing!

The marriage foundered and we split up and eventually I transitioned and after a long wait had surgery. It seemed as long as I wanted one more thing I had a goal an ambition. For years it was the surgery, which because I was funding two homes, I couldn't afford privately and I agonised for nearly five years. Then suddenly, it was over and the mini-depression happened (I see several nodding) but I got over that fairly quickly.

Effectively, things were complete or I was. Yeah, I know there's always one more thing. In this case it was the legal element. I had changed my driver's licence no problem, the DVLC had given me a female one complete with the female type number and I had managed to get a passport. The latter annoyed me however, and I wrote a letter of complaint to them. This resulted in a long phone call from their manager who sympathised with my gripe - no form of title - but informed me that a few years ago they only issued temporary passports to 'people like me'.

So having my windmill at which to tilt, I saddled up the cat and off we went. I wrote letters to Prime Ministers and leaders of opposition parties complaining that everywhere else in the civilised world we, transsexual women, could get full legal rights. I ranted on about the injustice and how this showed Britain as a repressive state, but only ever received replies from about half. Usually they were sympathetic at the beginning of the letter but finished with the unwritten sentiment, 'look you weirdo, we tolerate you don't push it!'

Those of the general public or friends who were in on my little secret were always horrified or sympathetic because of the lack of legal recognition. Despite my new anatomical layout, I was still legally male. On a daily basis it didn't make an enormous amount of difference - so I couldn't get married, whoopee doo, been there done that and was probably twice shy anyway.

However, it was that one more thing and it nagged away at me. I watched braver souls than I, throwing themselves on the barricades of the European Court trying to change the law. The European Commission was sympathetic but the law held. The main argument was simply that a birth certificate was a document stating historical fact, so couldn't be changed. The courts upheld that view, but after regular challenges from brave individuals and some committed lawyers the cracks started to appear. I began to wonder if one day I would be legit.

Then it happened, HM Government were told to sort things and they set up a commission to organise the red tape it would need to function. The government decided to include all sorts of individual rights things at the same time so it took a couple of years. It was still one more thing, but looked hopeful and I had an unfulfilled ambition, so was quite happy. (Yeah, I'm perverse not a pervert!).

The law happened and I thought I'd wait until things quietened down, don't like crowds and besides it was still one more thing. Okay, I got the forms sent to me, gave the postman a hernia, and I looked through them and shoved them in the cupboard, but only for three years - well it was fairly urgent.

Then back in january I was surfing the net and killing some time when I remembered the forms, somewhere I had a recollection of a dead line for fast-tracking. I checked with the Gender Recognition Panel at the Department for Constitutional Affairs, I do love red tape, and discovered I had less than three months to apply! Now I did have something to obsess about - my neurosis was in nirvana.

I've written how the joys of that process happened in a previous blog, but suffice it to say, I got through the process and eventually received my Certificate of Gender Recognition and it was a moment of minor triumph. I was safe however, I hadn't got my birth certificate yet so I still had one more thing, so my perversity could whinge about that. It did but not for long, the forms arrived a few days later.

Then I had to make decisions, well I'm good at that as long as I don't have time to think. I had two whole weeks to return the forms or else. What the or else was I never bothered to find out, I chickened and returned them, but only after consulting with any and everyone who was in the know. I mean, it's important what birth certificate a girl has, like I wave it about all the time.

Anyway, I filled in the form two minutes before leaving for work one morning last week. I was sure I'd probably done it all wrong and they'd write back and I would be able to delay the process for weeks if not months. No such luck, I had my new certificate back in a day or two and was much impressed by the Registrar General's Office, good job I don't work there....

So after I got them and sat quietly, even had my eyes water for a moment, probably the cold air - well it was May, I thought about what one more thing I'd need to do. Ah, of course the pensions people, too late, got a letter the next day instructing me that I didn't need to do anything! I mean for an obsessive like me that is just too much.

I had started on this path, albeit with a few false starts, when I was 25, I am now 54 and all the 'i's have been dotted and the 't' s crossed and there is nothing more of the process to do, it is complete, over, I won, got there, achieved it whatever. So why do I feel so anticlimactic about it? It was worth it, I got what I wanted didn't I? But what's next? There's always one more thing and I've been thinking about....nah, you wouldn't be interested in that anyway.