Long story short, I’ve known that I was trans long before I had even heard the word. There were signs as early as 4 years old and I knew by the time I was 8. I’m in my late 30’s now and I had come to a kind of peace about not transitioning. It’s something that I want but because of life, family, and a lot of fear I decided not to.
Recently a very close friend who I’ve know for decades came out to me as a trans woman.
I want to tell her about myself but I’m worried about planting seeds of doubt about her transition because I’ve known I was trans for so long and yet haven’t started transitioning myself. I’m afraid that if I try and explain why that she might internalize my reasons. If that makes sense. I’ve never told anyone my truth and I’d so love to have someone to talk to about it. Especially since my friends transition is causing me to second guess myself.
I would appreciate some thoughts on whether I should tell my friend.
Thank you, I want to provide all the support I can.
She’s definitely already caused me to reconsider. I’ve thought about it every day for months.
You’ve been thinking it about it every day for months. You need to do it. Speaking as someone who started transistioning within a year of sobering up, you’ve been masking the pain of dysphoria with narcotics. That will kill you. And the dysphoria will get worse as you age. Do you talk to a therapist?
What’s probably crazy is thinking about it for months and years and years feels normal. I have an equation in my head, are* the benefits of transitioning equal to or greater than the cost of blowing up my life. Right now it still feels like the cost would be too high, but I don’t know anymore…
No therapist but I’m hoping to start seeing one soon. I have a lot I need to deal with besides being trans.
I don’t know your life situation. But as a trans woman from the Bible belt, who got disowned by my family, divorced, abandoned by all of my friends and financially devastated as a result of coming out and transitioning: it’s absolutely worth it.
That’s basically what I’d be looking at. You are a very strong and brave woman.
Honestly, I don’t really think I am. I’m just surviving and doing what I can to cobble together a life worth living.
Like, yeah. Transition has been really hard, but so was my pre-transiton life, just in different ways. Nowadays I feel like I have so many more tools emotionally to deal with the constant onslaught of sorrow that life has always been.
Well, to me you are incredibly brave.
Thank you for telling me your situation. I don’t know what’s going to happen with my life but hearing from you and the others means a lot, and makes me feel less alone.
There’s courage in actively choosing struggle over misery
Yeah it does get normal. I’m not going to pretend I know what it’s like for you, I was 20 when I started hormones. But I can say I waited until it was “transition or die” and I regret the time I lost. If you know where you’re headed it’s ok to skip the years of unhappiness.
Well, I scheduled an appointment with a therapist. Said I wanted to talk about gender identity issues, amongst other things. The first time I’ve ever revealed myself IRL. It felt good, and was kind of exciting too.
Since you’re reconsidering, just know it’s never too late. I am transitioning in my 30s, and I have a close friend in her 40s that just transitioned, and she passes in most contexts already. You just never know how it will go, and while it’s not guaranteed, for a lot of us just being on the hormones is worth it - it feels so much better, in ways you would have never thought. My suggestion would be to just try it, you don’t have to make any decisions to transition at all, you can just inject estrogen for a few weeks and see how it feels and go from there. I think the general advice is up to 3 months the effects are completely reversible and you don’t really have to commit at all. This video also really helped me.
Anyway, I wish you well regardless of what you decide. ❤️
I watched it all and several of her other videos and ill be watching more. Thank you. Is the height and hair thing true? My body hair and balding are what trigger my dysphoria the most.
Is just “trying” HRT a thing? A doctor will just prescribe it estrogen and anti androgens?
It depends on the doctor you see. I recommend getting in touch with your local trans community and finding out who provides good care. My endocrinologist lets me lead in my healthcare, so I tried bicalutamide and estradiol valerate injections before switching to just monotherapy injections (where you inject enough estrogen that the testosterone is blocked). He lets me control my own dose and schedule, etc.
The doctor should prescribe you estrogen if you experience dysphoria, they can’t force you to continue taking it if you don’t want to, and they can’t force you to socially transition - but they can write you a prescription based on your dysphoria, yes, and that allows you to try HRT and see how you feel.
I have read that some head hair can come back depending on how long ago it disappeared including hairlines moving down (I’ve also heard the reverse, of testosterone causing the hairline to recede in trans men), and there are also surgical options I have heard of. My hairline is a major source of dysphoria for me, and I am considering FFS for it. The sooner you get on estrogen the better with this one.
I wouldn’t count on height changing by a lot, but because of changes to the curvature of the spine on estrogen you might lose an inch or two - and I have heard this is true from people IRL as well. I haven’t yet witnessed it myself, but I’m like 10-ish months on estrogen.
Body hair will change radically, becoming lighter in color and thinner. A lot of my dysphoria comes from body hair as well. I highly suggest looking into laser and/or electrolysis, but those are long-term / permanent changes that you might want to consider after starting estrogen (if you aren’t ready to transition yet). You can always do the hair removal without transitioning and it’s worth it for how it will alleviate dysphoria, but because it’s a permanent-ish change you might just want to give it some thought.
In my experience, once you start making these changes it’s so much better with them that you won’t want to go back, but you have to try things yourself and see how you will feel - not everyone is the same even if there are common tendencies or patterns.