I can’t seem to shake imposter syndrome or doubts about whether I’m “trans” or whether I’m a woman, etc.
Just wondering what you all do when you feel that way, if you have any recommendations?
It makes me feel awful, there is so much commitment to a transition it feels like you have to be certain, but I just don’t have constant certainty.
Sometimes I’ll sit down and try to analyze it objectively, basically considering the “null hypothecis” - if I am not trans, then I would be cis, if I were cis then a certain set of things would be true (like, estrogen would probably not feel so great, testosterone would not make me depressed, etc.).
When that happens, I think of aging. I notice that I would dread aging as a man but I am fine with aging to be an old lady.
I do feel like ageing will somehow rob me of my gender, since being a woman feels so tied up in being pretty and having a man’s body puts so much pressure on doing everything you can to lean into being pretty so you won’t be confused for a man. Being old will texture my skin and make it harder to appear as a woman, but maybe it won’t be such a big deal.
Either way, another one that struck me was that I thought I had body dysmorphia and just hated being fat, but what I realized one day is that actually I hated the male pattern fat distribution on my body, and I wouldn’t mind feminine fat distribution even if it made me not skinny, etc. Recognizing there was a gendered lens to my body hatred was a shock to me.
hey the fat distrubution thing is relateable to me too. I think getting old while on hrt would be good enough to not “get robbed off my gender”
yes, especially at your age - most of the androgenization of my body happened when I was in my 20s, so preventing that would be massive!! It can be harder for us trans-laters, but I still think most of us recognize it’s worth it. Honestly, I couldn’t even give myself the hope of being a woman in the world, my transition goals were / are oriented around things like mental health. If I ever manage to integrate into cis-normative society and live passing as a woman it’s beyond what I am willing to let myself dream or hope for.
As long as it eases dysphoria it would be worth it I think. Also I saw a lot of timelines online of people who transitioned when they were older. A lot of them passed and the others were atill really pretty even though didn’t 100% pass. So I would say neither of our cganches are bad.