Well, the egg “cracked” I guess. After 24 years, I’ve realized that I’m probably NB or trans. Looking back, I think that for a long while now, there’s been something in the back of my mind. Like a seed of doubt. I can think of any number of things that could’ve contributed to it. And it’s weird to me because I haven’t really felt any dysphoria, at least I can’t think of anything off the top of my head. But I know that there’s something off.
But anyway, over last weekend I was thinking about it a lot and after I came to that conclusion it was like this buzzing in my head that I hadn’t realized was there went quiet. And now that I know that… I have no fucking clue what happens next. The only people that know are close friends and I will absolutely not be letting anyone else who knows me know. HRT may be a very long ways (potentially 2 years, haven’t looked into it too much yet) away depending on a pending federal job.
Advice about HRT: physical changes happen very slowly. Mental effects happen much quicker. You can start it and see if it helps you feel more comfortable (happened within days for me) and stop if it isn’t good for you.
In the event that it is something you want, you will be happy that you started it earlier rather than later.
Edit: to be clear when I say “very slowly” for physical changes, I mean months. Do what you need to do if being visibly trans isn’t feasible within the next year.
100%, start with HRT - you can take it for a few months without any permanent changes, and it can be extremely clarifying and a useful as a diagnosis step, as well as significantly improve mental health and well-being, making everything else easier.
While changes are visible within months, it’s impressive how people just won’t notice even if you aren’t exactly hiding it. This is especially true for people who see you often, but I’ve seen it happen with people I hadn’t seen in a long time. Ymmv both on the amount of changes and how much people notice though. I’ve been impressed by how oblivious most people are.
yeah, it’s like once their brain knows to interpret you as one gender it’s hard for them to see you differently, I had a neighbor say that after I shaved my beard it’s like a became 10 years younger (this was like after 8 months of being on estrogen, I looked radically different and at that point most people gendered me as a woman).
Julia Serano talks about this in Whipping Girl, which I recommend for pretty much anyone to read, but especially trans women whose eggs recently have cracked.
When I came out to my moms, one of them commented about how I “suddenly had boobs” - it wasn’t sudden and I had been wondering for a couple months if they might notice before I got around to saying something (had been on E for 6 months at that point - granted the first 3-month dosage was in the low-side).
People still default gender me as male though - even those who didn’t know me until recently and I’ve reached the 1 year mark.
Whipping girl is a good read, but I wish she’d release a new edition without of the NB-phobic-seeming stuff taking up so much space (not saying she is NB-phobic)
Ha, that is hilarious - that sounds right, once they knew to look for feminine traits suddenly they could see what was already there. Funny how the mind is so opinionated in what it sees (and doesn’t).
I think the cis-passing tipping point for me was between 8 - 12 months, but voice training played a big role in that. Though I’m also full-femme and don’t try to boymode or anything like that 😅
About Whipping Girl: I think that’s a common sentiment, and one I sorta feel just for the reason that I don’t want to give newcomers the wrong impression. But on the other hand I’m upset that the main trans culture ceded so much language and power to enby-phobic gatekeeping transmedicalists, a label like transsexual still seems useful to me, and ironically I think “transgender” has become the new “transsexual”, to indicate someone who medically transitions. Meanwhile, “trans” has become the new “transgender” as a more inclusive umbrella term that applies broadly, including genderqueer and non-medically-transitioning folks.
The language is certainly out of date, though. Relatedly, I found this article by Julia from 2011 about the language divide which you may find interesting (a little time capsule of history):
https://juliaserano.removed/2011/09/transsexual-versus-transgender.html
I just assume the language will continue to evolve, though - who knows what is next. Personally I wonder if in the future using trans as an adjective to a noun like man or woman might become taboo, in the same way that emphasizing the assigned gender is already becoming taboo (i.e. a preference is forming for referring to the gender someone identifies as rather than the gender they were assigned, so “trans woman” is preferred to emphasizing someone was “AMAB”). Terms like “biologically male” or “biologically female” etc. are also already becoming taboo as well. I had to get my therapist to rewrite her letter authorizing my surgery because she referred to me as a “biological male” - perhaps a useful distinction in her mind, but I pointed out the ways it doesn’t actually make sense as a term and why she might not want to use it in the future.
I could also imagine the whole binary dichotomy of man and woman getting questioned, I know the “beyond the binary” moment happened already with Leslie Feinberg and Kate Bornstein, though that does somewhat conflict with binary trans people who have attachments to a particular gender expression, but I do think non-binary political identities have become more popular as a way to push back against the violence and oppression that comes along with enforced gender norms.
Hard to tell where things are going, and maybe none of these changes will happen anytime soon due to the extreme anti-trans backlash, though I suspect within the trans community there will continue to be changes anyway - maybe the moment needs unity more than distinction (partially a reason for the anti-gatekeeping taboo, it creates a wedge and breaks up useful political alliances), in which case maybe “transgender” will itself become a target for taboo.
Anyway, sorry for rambling, lol