Thank you to everyone who replied to my post last week! This past week has been a whirlwind. I’m pretty sure my egg is cracked wide open.

I devoured the Gender Dysphoria Bible, and I found myself (maybe not surprisingly) relating to not all, but a lot, of the feelings and experiences described.

As I read more about how trans women describe their experiences, the more I realize that I’ve had similar feelings for a long time. Who knew that not every man secretly wishes he was a lesbian woman? I kind of thought that everyone had these feelings, and just settled for the disappointing reality of being male.

And I’m better able to put words to the positive feelings I get from growing my hair out, painting my nails, shaving my chest and legs - it’s gender euphoria!

I feel so excited, like I finally know who I am! And I’m so eager to learn makeup, get girl clothes, etc. And I really want to go on hormones. I guess any remaining potential doubt would be erased then - if I go on hormones and start to have a really bad time, then I guess I know I’m not trans.

I did talk to my therapist, and she was so encouraging! She was completely affirming, and at the end of our session she said that she could see me as a woman, and that felt so good to hear! I get butterflies in my stomach and keep smiling when I think about it.

She did encourage me to take my time though. I’m really excited, but I am also extremely nervous and scared about how people might react, especially my wife. She’s bisexual, and she’s been really supportive of my gender exploration so far, so those are both good things. But she’s also autistic and sometimes has a hard time adapting to rapid changes.

So I feel like I need to make sure I know what I want, and that I’m able to answer any questions she might have about what my transition process is going to look like - and there are still a lot of questions I don’t have the answer to.

And I worry a lot of how my family, friends, and work might react to my coming out. I’ve spent a lot of time getting educated, getting a good job, and building a nice little life, and I don’t want to mess it all up. And unfortunately, my immediate family are all devout Catholics, so I don’t anticipate a great reaction from them…

I get my hair cut at an LGBTQ salon, and I think at least one of the stylists there is a trans woman. Would it be appropriate/inappropriate for me to ask her if I could talk to her about her experience?

I don’t know any other trans women in real life, and I think it would really help me to have someone to talk to. But I also don’t want to just dump all my burdens on someone either.

Any other advice on what I should do, or things to consider, would be really welcome - I’m just trying to figure out how I want to navigate this.

  • compostgoblin@slrpnk.netOPEnglish
    5·
    15 hours ago

    Coming out to my family is probably the most single difficult thing I’ve ever done.

    This is what I’m most afraid of. I know my wife will support me, even if she might struggle with the changes. And her family are more open-minded - at the very least, I think they would have the decency to not talk shit to my face.

    My family, though. My brother that I’m closest with has said some transphobic things to me in the past, and the Catholic Church is not exactly the bastion of trans rights. And they’re all intense Catholics, so I’m very worried about how they’ll react. I hate that I have this knot in my stomach, that I have to worry if my family is going to abandon me because I want to be who I really am

    I really like the idea of a conversation followed up by a letter! I feel like that would let me make sure I say everything I want to say, how I want to say it, in a form they can keep going back to to reread as much as they need.

    Your good job could go away, and you could find it difficult to find a new one.

    I am blessed with a great partner who I know would support me, and we could get by without my income, but I also would prefer to keep my job! I like it and think I’m good at it, and even if it is a more conservative field (utilities), I do live in a purple state that has pretty good LGBTQ anti-discrimination laws.

    As a general rule, I would flag that as inappropriate.

    Good to know! I’ll follow your advice and talk with my usual stylist and go from there.

    And I am fortunate to live in a smallish city that does have an LGBTQ resource center (that I’ve heard is quite good), and there’s a larger city that I know has a good community only about 45 minutes away. The one here actually has a TTRPG night every few weeks, and that’s already one of my hobbies!

    I also love gardening, art, and sustainability stuff in general, so maybe there’s a chance I could start a queer community garden or something like that!

    Oh, and hey, your lemmy friends are here to help too. <3

    Thank you so much 💛 it means a lot to get support from this community, and I really really appreciate it