Hormones and Emotional Changes

[KaitlynS]

I started hormones a few weeks and i have been having some emotional changes during the past week or so. I thought maybe this would be a good way to talk about emotional changes. I started with crying a lot and irritability. Now it seems like more than just being irritable and it seems like I am actually getting angry. I feel like I don't want to be around people and whenever my cats want my attention I hate how clingy it feels like they are being. I push them away and I get upset with every little thing that someone does that bothers me like bad drivers. I am getting angry over things that I didn't used to. Is this normal for someone on mtf hormones, being estradiol and spironolactone?

[JAKQ7111]

Yeah, that happened to me at around the one-month mark. Lots of crying and emotional instability, for sure. However, it is only temporary, and once I hit the two-month or so mark, it went away, and I was more stable.

[RK800]

Honestly I think you trans girls have it harder with hrt than us trans guys do (I haven't started hrt yet though). Fem hormones drive me up a wall as an AFAB, especially during certain times of the month. It's normal for E to do that, it'll lessen after a while, since you basically going through a sort of female puberty.

[butterflydreams]

I'll throw my hat into this ring.

Not so much anger, but yeah, far more crying. Sometimes it's justified as I'm also going through a lot of difficult things in life anyway largely independent of transition. Sometimes it's not, it's just random crying. For what it's worth though, I feel a lot more natural, so I'm not especially bothered by it.

And yes, the more erratic instability did even off after a few months.

But again, I haven't really minded too much. I feel right, and that counts for a lot.

[KaitlynS]

I don't have a problem with being sad. I actually like that I can express that emotion better. I don't want to be angry though and take my anger out on people or my pets. I know it's a human emotion and everyone gets angry sometimes, but I feel like it's not a good emotion to have.

[Mezzo Forte]

If you don't mind me talking from the other side of the fence, hormones definitely have a huge effect on crying. Before HRT, I couldn't stop myself from crying, but I was capable of willing myself into crying if I felt like I needed it. Now, I can stop myself from crying, but I can't will myself into it anymore, even when I want to cry tears of joy.

I hope it's not too presumptuous of me, but I wonder if some of that irritability is coming from a stronger sense of empathy/emotional intelligence from HRT. I'm more empathetic than I care to admit, with that combined with my introversion, I can easily get overstimulated and irritable in certain situations. You might be feeling everything with more intensity than before, and that can get really draining. I imagine if that's the case, you'll adjust to that difference with time and lose that irritability :)

[butterflydreams]

Well there are lots of resources out there on how to manage anger. I'd suggest giving it a google search. Maybe you're just extra irritable? Either way, the old tricks are probably the best. Here's what I'd suggest.

You're essentially going through puberty again. Your body is working overtime on all those changes. Give it the tools it needs. Make sure you're eating healthy. Make sure you're getting enough sleep. That's a big one I fail on a lot, and my mood degrades precipitously if I'm short on sleep. Again, puberty. You will probably need more sleep than you're used to.

Excercise is also a good idea. Doesn't have to be anything fancy. Walks outdoors are enough. I ride my bike.

You could also try meditation or just mindfulness exercises. If you're into that kind of thing. I learned about it in college and it can really help.

Overall, be gentle with yourself. I might be generalizing my life experience here a bit, but a big part of transition for me has been learning how to be kind to myself. Before, I didn't really want to. I didn't really care. But I'm a lot happier about my body these days, and how I feel and I'm motivated to be gentle with myself. Being gentle to yourself pays off so much, and in so many ways. Especially in transition.

[Heart]

Personally, my approach to anger is to allow myself to feel it but not to express it for 24hrs. It's hard. But it gets easier with practice, and reminding myself that I'll be allowed to react in 24 hrs helps; I'm not shutting myself up forever, just giving myself processing time. My deal with myself is this: I usually emotionally wind down a bit after a few hours at most, so then I can decide whether it was a real anger-invoking event, or just a random emotional blip (AFAB here, and it happens even long after puberty to me :( ). If it's a random emotional blip, then I'm usually glad I didn't do anything I regret or yell at anyone that didn't deserve it, and I move on with my day.

If it was something that really did anger me, and it's a "justified" type of anger instead of just a hormone induced anger, then that also gives me a whole day to figure out how I'm going to talk to the person about it. I can calming approach them the next day, either in person or via text/messenger/call etc, and say "Hey, you know when xyz happened yesterday? That really hurt me/angered me/made me feel _____ . Can we talk about that for a bit?"

This approach has always served me well. It's not just when hormones are flaring up either; sometimes someone does something that angers me, but they didn't mean it or it was a genuine mistake, so taking a day to calm down really helps me see that and empathise with them again. Of course, I can still bring it up to help it not happen again, but I can do it in a much more productive way than screaming.

That works really well for me, but your mileage may vary.

Also, I really enjoy random crying for no reason. For some reason, it just feels super therapeutic. Yay for random crying ^_^