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Different Dysphorias


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Thank you Hadley. I have only had a chance to glimpse the article, but it looks really helpful and interesting. I won't get a chance to read it more until this evening or tomorrow, but it seems like a good candidate for my collection in my intro thread. Do you mind if I steal it for that purpose?

I will read it soon, but if it's as good as the title suggests, it's a well-needed article :)

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butterflydreams

Steal away! That's why I shared it :) It seems like there's so few articles written about how people personally experience dysphoria. And of course people are always asking things like is it dysphoria or is it _______? People have generally told me, if you have to ask that, it's likely dysphoria is involved in some way. I know I frequently ask, is it dysphoria or depression?

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VindicatorPhoenix

That's a neat story, thanks for sharing it. ^_^ To me there's something therapeutic about coming out about dysphoria, being able to explain it in detail, and have people be accepting of it.

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Does dysphoria have to be related to the physical? (Thoughts about specific gendered organs)

Can it be strictly mental? Say if there's a disconnect from one's own thoughts and emotions. How wculd someone identify it as such rather than another condition like deoression or anxiety?

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Does dysphoria have to be related to the physical? (Thoughts about specific gendered organs)

Can it be strictly mental? Say if there's a disconnect from one's own thoughts and emotions. How wculd someone identify it as such rather than another condition like deoression or anxiety?

I've heard people cite three kinds of dysphoria: physical, social, and mental. I understand physical and social dysphoria, but I don't really understand mental gender dysphoria, which is apparently what you describe, feeling uncomfortable with one's thoughts and emotions in a gender-based way.

I experience some depression and anxiety, so my brain isn't always my friend, but I don't consider my thoughts or emotions a source of gender dysphoria. Sometimes a result, yes, but not a source.

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butterflydreams

Does dysphoria have to be related to the physical? (Thoughts about specific gendered organs)

Can it be strictly mental? Say if there's a disconnect from one's own thoughts and emotions. How wculd someone identify it as such rather than another condition like deoression or anxiety?

Can it be strictly mental? I'd say yes, though like Kappamaki, I don't know that I have a personal experience of that.

As I said a few posts up, I've asked myself countless times over the past year, "is this dysphoria or just depression?" I don't know that there's a simple way to check some boxes and say, yup, dysphoria, or nope, depression. I mean, dysphoria and depression...those are two amazingly uniquely experienced things. I got all the way to my doctor, and went on meds for a year but would not admit that I had depression. I came off the meds, and about a year and a half later, crashed again, went back to my doctor. She said, "look, this is depression, I don't know what else to tell you. Not everyone experiences it or deals with it exactly the same way."

So I think determining if your experience is dysphoria or depression is as unique a process as the experience of either of those things themselves. That just requires a lot of introspection I guess. Personally, I did thought experiments about my future. I realized that my depression had been around for a lot longer than I've been dealing with it. I noticed a distinct downward trend starting when I entered high school. I recognized that that coincided with puberty kicking into gear, and I did the math.

Asked myself some questions, "how would your life be different if you were a girl? Would that make you feel happier? Better?" It's been really hard, but I have to answer "yes" to that. I don't know why that is or where it came from, but somehow, you can hold everything else constant, change that one "little" thing, and I feel like life is worth living. So *shrugs*...you can see, it's a difficult, and personal process.

And heck, I can't see why depression and dysphoria wouldn't be super chummy bedfellows. I mean, they both begin with 'd'. But really, how they interact, and play off one another is so complex. I almost don't worry about it. I've done everything I can to go after my depression, and the results have been mediocre at best honestly. All you can really do is see where your compass to happiness points and go for it.

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Building off what Hadley said, I think there is sometimes too much of a need to compartmentalise.

For example, I consider myself a confident person, overall. All evidence suggests I am pretty confident, on the general bell-curve of western society. Why? Is is because I have a job as a physicist at a large and respected institution? Is it because I am open about my queerness, and get thanks and appreciation for that? Is it an integral part of my personality?

It's probably a combination of all those things.

If you are uncomfortable, that's a fact. But the reason doesn't have to be singular, and the reasons don't have to be unrelated to each other. An interplay of my abilities in physics and my abilities in the queer community both contribute to my confidence in myself as a person, and they are doubtlessly connected; if I started doubting my abilities in one, I have no doubt I would start to doubt my abilities in the other as well. In the same way, my physical discomfort is most likely an interplay between my dysphoria and my genital/sex repulsion (and how that interplays with society and it's sexualisation of everything, and how that makes me feel about my existing and potential relationships).

Would I be uncomfortable with the same bits of my body if I wasn't sex repulsed? I think that's a complete nonsense question; my repulsion is part of my discomfort, but so is my dysphoria. They aren't two separate things, just two sides of the same coin. They are two effects, but they have deep roots in each other. They don't exist without each other, for me. For others, it is absolutely possible to experience dysphoria without sex repulsion, or vice versa (and there are plenty of people I've talked to on both sides of that fence). But for me, they happen to have been minted on the same coin, just on two different sides.

I don't know how much that contributed to the conversation, but I imagine the same kind of thing applies to depression (which I have, thankfully, only struggled with a little). Will one's depression go away after a transition? Maybe, maybe not. Maybe only half. For you, Hadley, I can't help but see the two as intimately linked though. One will always affect the other, if you're anything like me. There will always be an interplay of tensions between gender dysphoria and depression. That doesn't necessarily mean that getting rid of one will help the other, but one does have to respect the connection they have.

*hugs*

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I hate my chest so much. It feels wrong on me. I don't get why I have it. It makes me so uncomfortable and stressed all the time. I somehow simultaneously forget that it's there and I can never forget about it. I'm big chested and when people say something about that I get startled and upset. Like, why do you have to mention that??! I also always try to hide the straps of my bra because I don't want people to know I'm wearing one because, similarly to what Hadley said, I don't want them to find out that I'm a girl, even though everybody already knows. I'm going to bind at some point, for sure.

Exactly this!! I have worked so hard to accept my body, but I really never wanted breasts. Then they happened and I didn't notice but others insisted I wear a bra. Then they just kept happening until I sit here with my 30F's. I fantasize about having them removed. I just wish there was a way to get them gone while retaining sensitivity (not that surgery is any kind of option for me with the cost barrier). Binders are looking better and better.

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I hate my chest so much. It feels wrong on me. I don't get why I have it. It makes me so uncomfortable and stressed all the time. I somehow simultaneously forget that it's there and I can never forget about it. I'm big chested and when people say something about that I get startled and upset. Like, why do you have to mention that??! I also always try to hide the straps of my bra because I don't want people to know I'm wearing one because, similarly to what Hadley said, I don't want them to find out that I'm a girl, even though everybody already knows. I'm going to bind at some point, for sure.

Exactly this!! I have worked so hard to accept my body, but I really never wanted breasts. Then they happened and I didn't notice but others insisted I wear a bra. Then they just kept happening until I sit here with my 30F's. I fantasize about having them removed. I just wish there was a way to get them gone while retaining sensitivity (not that surgery is any kind of option for me with the cost barrier). Binders are looking better and better.

There are in fact top surgeries that retain most sensation. They can fully retain sensation in the nipple, and the only sensation you might lose a little is along any scars that form (I believe, I haven't done so myself). You can also look into breast reduction; depending on where you are in the world, it could be easier to get too. Having anything larger than a DD cup size means that you have ample excuse to get a breast reduction without even having to mention anything about gender! Just complain of back problems ;)

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As I said a few posts up, I've asked myself countless times over the past year, "is this dysphoria or just depression?" I don't know that there's a simple way to check some boxes and say, yup, dysphoria, or nope, depression. I mean, dysphoria and depression...those are two amazingly uniquely experienced things. I got all the way to my doctor, and went on meds for a year but would not admit that I had depression. I came off the meds, and about a year and a half later, crashed again, went back to my doctor. She said, "look, this is depression, I don't know what else to tell you. Not everyone experiences it or deals with it exactly the same way."

So I think determining if your experience is dysphoria or depression is as unique a process as the experience of either of those things themselves. That just requires a lot of introspection I guess. Personally, I did thought experiments about my future. I realized that my depression had been around for a lot longer than I've been dealing with it. I noticed a distinct downward trend starting when I entered high school. I recognized that that coincided with puberty kicking into gear, and I did the math.

[...]

For me, as well, I can date a part of my depression to the onset of puberty, though I never realised it for what it was until about a year ago. So, I really get you, Hadley, with the possibility of depression and dysphoria being linked.

[...]

Would I be uncomfortable with the same bits of my body if I wasn't sex repulsed? I think that's a complete nonsense question; my repulsion is part of my discomfort, but so is my dysphoria. They aren't two separate things, just two sides of the same coin. They are two effects, but they have deep roots in each other. They don't exist without each other, for me. For others, it is absolutely possible to experience dysphoria without sex repulsion, or vice versa (and there are plenty of people I've talked to on both sides of that fence). But for me, they happen to have been minted on the same coin, just on two different sides.

I don't know how much that contributed to the conversation, but I imagine the same kind of thing applies to depression (which I have, thankfully, only struggled with a little). Will one's depression go away after a transition? Maybe, maybe not. Maybe only half. For you, Hadley, I can't help but see the two as intimately linked though. One will always affect the other, if you're anything like me. There will always be an interplay of tensions between gender dysphoria and depression. That doesn't necessarily mean that getting rid of one will help the other, but one does have to respect the connection they have.

*hugs*

I recently noticed the same thing. My depression (sometimes more present than at other times) and my dysphoria (likewise not always present in the same amount) seem to reinforce each other. If something happens to trigger one of the two, the other also raises its ugly head. I had a really bad episode this week, and it took me until today to realise I was suffering from depression-type symptoms as well as dysphoria. I think I'm managing to snap out of it a bit, partly because I had a clear list of things to do, and could just do one thing after the other, an partly because the reminder of something 'worse' helped me regain some clarity of mind. (Not really relevant what it was, just that it was 'bad' enough to reach me in my state of not-entirely-present)

Apologies for the (longish) anecdote ahead, but I really need to write this down somewhere.

My dysphoria had been fairly low for most of the summer, which was a relief. Ever since a week ago Thursday it has been growing. It was triggered by people (in a restaurant) over-treating me as the only female in company. Calling me 'madam', looking towards the men in my company for any serious answers, etc. For context: I was out for dinner with a couple friends from university. Anyway, that caused some discomfort, which was managable, but building, and getting annoying.

Then on Monday, I had some news which triggered it really bad, and it took until yesterday (Thursday) for me to understand why it had hit me so bad. I still don't think I understand completely, I'm going to have to think about this some more in the coming days.

The news came from a good friend of mine, and coincidentally my partner's sister. She married in April (she's 23, only 1,5 years older than I am) and she told us she's pregnant. At the time I was happy for her, of course, and somewhere I still am, and some part of me can't handle the realisation that it would be possible for me to have a child in a couple years. Apart from that, what makes it worse, is that her brother is my partner, so in my head this all kind of bounced into some realisation that it could be sort of expected of me to have children in the not very far future.

Even if I take into account extra years for not being with my partner long enough, it's something I just couldn't take, so my dysphoria kind of took over. Looking back, it seems almost like my mind was trying to make my body say: "Who, me? Getting children? Nope, not ever, look, I'm not even made for it!" or something. After which everything kind of went weird in my head. I'm still partially in it, so can't really describe it very well.

I also got very tired, didn't want to do anything (even though I had things planned that would normally have been a lot of fun), I was very down, but somehow noticed only the dysphoria and the fatigue.

End of anecdote.

I agree with Heart on that for me as well my dysphoria and my sex-repulsion are linked. Though for me, while my dysphoria fluctuates a lot, my sex-repulsion hardly at all. Maybe it does fluctuate a little, but my 'lowest' level is already so high that I can hardly notice the difference.

I think that you could see it as things you're vulnerable to all neatly lined up in a row, attached by a string. If one of them grows, you could see it as taking a step forward, putting tension on the string, and pulling them forward as well, to combine into a horrible mess of unhappiness.

Apologies for the rambling and the wall of text. I have no idea if this made enough sense, but I really needed to put it down somewhere.

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butterflydreams

I don't know how much that contributed to the conversation, but I imagine the same kind of thing applies to depression (which I have, thankfully, only struggled with a little). Will one's depression go away after a transition? Maybe, maybe not. Maybe only half. For you, Hadley, I can't help but see the two as intimately linked though. One will always affect the other, if you're anything like me. There will always be an interplay of tensions between gender dysphoria and depression. That doesn't necessarily mean that getting rid of one will help the other, but one does have to respect the connection they have.

I think it's very much a "seeing the forest for the trees" kind of thing.

I feel I should really say though, for anyone else out there in a similar boat, I do not have any expectation that transition will ipso facto cure my depression. I think that's an important thing to realize. Related or not, they're two separate things.

Let's say depression is a windy mountain road, and I'm in a car driving on that road. Any way you slice it, getting through those mountains is going to be tough. Dysphoria is like a rusted out radiator, or a badly knocking engine. Can I get through those mountains without fixing the radiator or engine? It's certainly possible, but it might mean a lot of stops, a lot of frustration, a lot of wanting to just give up. Why would you voluntarily make getting through those mountains harder than it has to be? Just fix the radiator and fix the engine. This doesn't make the mountains go away, but it sure is a lot easier to tackle them with a working car.

So I think that's how I'd show they're related, for me at least. I want to beat my depression...more than anything in the world. I just don't see it happening if I'm stopping all the time to let the engine cool, or finding myself rolling backwards because the engine just can't do it.

There was a comic I saw a while back that was one of "The Things" that spoke to me on such a core level, that transition was possible and advisable. One of the panes described how the person felt that even though all the same exact problems were present even after transition, they felt so much more ready to tackle them. I loved that. Problems won't go away, but I'm "fixing myself up" so to speak, so that I can face them as my best self :)

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Over half of our multiple system experiences various forms of dysphoria related to our gender in how our body is and how others perceive us. A fair chuck of our system have dysphoria related to our body and how others perceive in general and not strictly to gender (how the face looks, how tall our body is, etc), and a majority of us experience dysphoria related to how our species identity doesn’t match the body.

Over the past half decade we’ve been having to seeing two different therapists off and on try to cope with dysphoria in some way. Sadly, nothing can be done with our dysphoria because nothing can be altered with our body without likely causing dysphoria for another headmate (or alter, if you prefer the official term).

While neither us nor our therapist are happy with the situation, the way our brain has ended up coping with these issues is to dissociate even more than our multiplicity naturally causes us. To take the edge off of our dysphoria and to keep us as numb to as possible. Most of the time, we aren’t even aware of our body at all, or feel anything about the proportions or traits of our body. Our mind completely wipes our awareness clean of it. Throughout daily life we move about unaware and disconnected (or “tuning out”) from our body. We deal with regular “out-of-body experiences” and other forms of depersonalization of feeling removed and just “watching“ our body as well. When we look into mirrors, we don’t automatically see what’s actually there, we actually usually a hallucination of what we think we should see, and we have too look a little deeper to see what’s actually there. Our mind even often blocks out people saying our body's given name. Our brain just doesn't a number of weird little things to block out whatever might cause too much hits of dysphoria.

Some days are better than others. Sometimes our dissociation makes our dysphoria livable, but other days our dissociation wanes and our dysphoria reeks havoc. We’re currently trying to brainstorm with our therapist with perhaps a more healthy means surviving, but right now no one is quite sure what to do. Our therapist has even considered our current situation might even be the best possible situation given the limited options. Our dissociation is on a level that is above normal, it isn’t as extreme as dissociation can be and it doesn‘t hinder our ability to function as much as it could. So that is the situation we are in currently. Our therapist scratching her head on what the might means of handle our situation might be, and us just going on day to day.

Hi Chimera!

I have been reading through this thread and this post stuck out to me. I am sorry that your situation is so tricky. Do you know anyone else in the same kind of situation that you can share your experiences with? Would that be helpful? I know two other systems who experience similar feelings so I know how confusing it can get. If you happen to use SecondLife, feel free to send me a private message and I can introduce you to them.

Dissociating seems like a double edged sword in the world of dysphoria. Do you have a dominant headmate (hehe I like that term more than alter) and if so could you perhaps use their identifying gender?

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genderirrelevant

Lots of dysphoric thoughts and experiences on this thread that I can relate to. I'm agender (AFAB) but assumed I was cis for decades because I thought transgender only applied to people who wanted to fully transition to the opposite sex. I figured my chest dysphoria came from starting gymnastics just before puberty and puberty had a terrible impact on one's gymnastic potential (this was back in the 1970s).

I had top surgery a week ago. If you want it then I encourage you to get it. Don't look back on four decades of needless discomfort and embarrassment like me. I still have weeks of pain and limited movement ahead but it is so nice to look in the mirror and see the real me. For years I said, "If I had the money and the guts and I would get rid of them." In truth money was not the issue because I had enough money for several trips and I found out this year that I could get it covered by the provincial medical system anyway. Really, I lacked the guts because I didn't know of anyone like me, I didn't think anyone would take me seriously, I didn't want to have to explain that I wasn't mentally ill to want this.

If you want top surgery: Do It, Do It, Do It!!! Take all the time you need to feel certain in your decision but when you are certain don't hesitate because other people doubt you. The day I realized I was not alone and could transition toward neutral as I wanted I was 100% certain I would get top surgery. That certainty never wavered in over 9 months until my surgery. I have no doubt it would have been the right decision if I'd had it done over 30 years ago.

If I'd dealt with the physical dysphoria decades ago I probably wouldn't have so much social dysphoria now. I am very lonely because I couldn't relate to society's gendered expectations. I didn't want to be seen as an object of desire. I didn't want to be expected to want/like the same stuff as most females around me. I wasn't accepted as one of the guys. So I've withdrawn and now I'm too out of the loop to easily rejoin.

Life isn't going to be perfect from now on but a huge negative thing dragging me down is gone so life can't help but improve.

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Calligraphette_Coe

I experience some depression and anxiety, so my brain isn't always my friend, but I don't consider my thoughts or emotions a source of gender dysphoria. Sometimes a result, yes, but not a source.

They've always been for me. But then, I'm a fainter and tend to tear up pretty easily. Both of which are looked VERY down upon from someone who is XY. XY's don't get so mad they cry, they rage and sometimes get physically violent and verbally abusive. And the 'brotherhood' will forgive that-- they'll never forgive waterworks or fainting.

You never live it down. You get hurtful things like "You must have female hormones." Or "Go put on a dress." You even get that from women, oftentimes. It's part of the dysphoria that one can't be emotional and/or have different reactions to phobias/anxiety/extreme fear. And it feels like death itself to have to try to resist running out of the room at warp speed when either come to visit.

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butterflydreams

I experience some depression and anxiety, so my brain isn't always my friend, but I don't consider my thoughts or emotions a source of gender dysphoria. Sometimes a result, yes, but not a source.

They've always been for me. But then, I'm a fainter and tend to tear up pretty easily. Both of which are looked VERY down upon from someone who is XY. XY's don't get so mad they cry, they rage and sometimes get physically violent and verbally abusive. And the 'brotherhood' will forgive that-- they'll never forgive waterworks or fainting.

You never live it down. You get hurtful things like "You must have female hormones." Or "Go put on a dress." You even get that from women, oftentimes. It's part of the dysphoria that one can't be emotional and/or have different reactions to phobias/anxiety/extreme fear. And it feels like death itself to have to try to resist running out of the room at warp speed when either come to visit.

You know, I think this is all really important to say. For better or worse, my mom always told me that I was a "sensitive boy" and that that was ok, and even valuable (some girl would really appreciate me someday). But the message that it was unacceptable to everyone else was clear to me, no matter what my mom said, so I killed it, and killed a big part of myself in doing so.

It started so early...I had plenty of time to get damn good at it. Those first few times though, I was so conflicted, so hurt, so confused, so frustrated. I will never forget one of my first days in the first grade. I was probably 5, maybe 6. I was still getting used to the full days of first grade after the half days of kindergarten. I was at lunch, and I guess I hadn't made any friends yet, so I was sitting by myself. I couldn't eat, I just started to cry. I was so upset with myself that I was upset and unable to hide it. The real me wanted to just cry and get help from a sympathetic adult, but that wasn't ok. I forced myself to cut the legs out from under it.

Being the black and white person that I am, I declared that if I couldn't feel some things, then I shouldn't feel anything. So down the path I went of stoicism, but I thought of it more like being a robot (which I wished every day I could become). But you know, you can't really hide that stuff completely. When I was alone, some of it would always come out.

And that's why I think I feel so much better knowing that I can actually feel all things, and I'm going to.

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I experience some depression and anxiety, so my brain isn't always my friend, but I don't consider my thoughts or emotions a source of gender dysphoria. Sometimes a result, yes, but not a source.

They've always been for me. But then, I'm a fainter and tend to tear up pretty easily. Both of which are looked VERY down upon from someone who is XY. XY's don't get so mad they cry, they rage and sometimes get physically violent and verbally abusive. And the 'brotherhood' will forgive that-- they'll never forgive waterworks or fainting.

You never live it down. You get hurtful things like "You must have female hormones." Or "Go put on a dress." You even get that from women, oftentimes. It's part of the dysphoria that one can't be emotional and/or have different reactions to phobias/anxiety/extreme fear. And it feels like death itself to have to try to resist running out of the room at warp speed when either come to visit.

You know, I think this is all really important to say. For better or worse, my mom always told me that I was a "sensitive boy" and that that was ok, and even valuable (some girl would really appreciate me someday). But the message that it was unacceptable to everyone else was clear to me, no matter what my mom said, so I killed it, and killed a big part of myself in doing so.

It started so early...I had plenty of time to get damn good at it. Those first few times though, I was so conflicted, so hurt, so confused, so frustrated. I will never forget one of my first days in the first grade. I was probably 5, maybe 6. I was still getting used to the full days of first grade after the half days of kindergarten. I was at lunch, and I guess I hadn't made any friends yet, so I was sitting by myself. I couldn't eat, I just started to cry. I was so upset with myself that I was upset and unable to hide it. The real me wanted to just cry and get help from a sympathetic adult, but that wasn't ok. I forced myself to cut the legs out from under it.

Being the black and white person that I am, I declared that if I couldn't feel some things, then I shouldn't feel anything. So down the path I went of stoicism, but I thought of it more like being a robot (which I wished every day I could become). But you know, you can't really hide that stuff completely. When I was alone, some of it would always come out.

And that's why I think I feel so much better knowing that I can actually feel all things, and I'm going to.

Same thing with me, only I was never told it was a "positive" thing, just "problematic." And for others, it was always something to make fun of. (Man, society's definition of masculinity is really screwed up.) Which also ended up leading to my killing my emotions, and always trying to hide them from others. Having a blank or expressionless face was preferable to the alternatives. I'm still getting over that mistake.

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Calligraphette_Coe

Being the black and white person that I am, I declared that if I couldn't feel some things, then I shouldn't feel anything. So down the path I went of stoicism, but I thought of it more like being a robot (which I wished every day I could become). But you know, you can't really hide that stuff completely. When I was alone, some of it would always come out.

And that's why I think I feel so much better knowing that I can actually feel all things, and I'm going to.

And that's why I'm still alone, like Tesla feeding the pigeons. I can't hide the sensitivity or emotions and I stopped feeding at least part of the dysphoria by no longer being a bottled up robot playing Edison The Winner to Tesla The Real Achiever. It's much better to be alone and be free to leave this emotion out, even though it doesn't get you standing in a world that loves Winner Takes All emotional Ruthlessness.

Consider: in the tale of Maleficient, the King and the Powerful Female do all the battling, all the magic, all the glorious warfare. But in the end, who does the real sympathetic magic by her effect on others with her kindness and sweetness? Of putting others before herself?

Yet the movie's title isn't Aurora.

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Conscientious Ghost

I deal with gender-related pains and discomforts by imagining how much better and more comfortable I will feel after I transition from name and gender change to top and bottom surgery. My legal name, feminine pronouns, breasts, and reproductive organ can set off body, social, and mental dysphoria. I generally call it dysphoria unless the person doesn't know what that is. It depends on the person I try describing my dysphoria, but I recall explaining to my mom how dsyphoria felt. It feels like someone shoving poisonous needles all around my body and everything in my body burns. I feel sickly. I define dysphoria as severe discomfort.

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nerdperson777

Hadley describes me again. The stoic robot. But at the same time, everyone thought I was too sensitive to be a boy. No one really knew how I felt inside. I didn't tell anyone about that. I didn't even know back then. But considering how much crying I did throughout my life, my parents can't see me as a boy. They just call me sensitive and I have more estrogen in my body now than when I had puberty. They really don't understand me. Crying was at least a weekly thing if not more. It took me my three years of college to come up with a hypothesis to why my eyes leaked tears at random times. I concluded that it was a natural response to having been yelled and screamed at for most of my years. When I left for college, my eyes were still expecting to cry even though there was no direct reason. Even now I still cry randomly.

And with that, for me, mental health and dysphoria are exclusive things. After figuring out my gender, I found it to be something that didn't need more research. I wasn't very distressed with it after finding the knowledge I needed. But my anxiety and other mental issues? That was new to me, even though I suffered it for most of my life. I'm currently more upset with my paranoia of things and why my social interactions aren't the best. If I could not get a letter for hormones from my school psychologist, I think it would be hard for me to convince any other psychologist or therapist about my being trans* due to my differing mental health and dysphoria problems. I would not label depression on myself as my thoughts go in and out at times. I sometimes put myself down into the floor but I usually put it on the backburner to get stuff done so it's not the most crucial thing on my mind, though that could actually be really important.

I could talk elaborate on things, but I don't think my post is that related to dysphoria anymore. :blush:

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scarletlatitude

I'm not sure if this would count as dysphoria, but I kind of feel like it does.

Sometimes I really hate my body because it is female shaped. It's nearly impossible to hide these things on my chest or the wide hips. When my androgyny swings toward female, I'm fine with it and I might even try to accentuate it. When I swing toward male, I hate it. Right now I am feeling male and I really don't like it. Does that sound like dysphoria? Maybe it is sometimes?

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She married in April (she's 23, only 1,5 years older than I am) and she told us she's pregnant. At the time I was happy for her, of course, and somewhere I still am, and some part of me can't handle the realisation that it would be possible for me to have a child in a couple years. Apart from that, what makes it worse, is that her brother is my partner, so in my head this all kind of bounced into some realisation that it could be sort of expected of me to have children in the not very far future.

Even if I take into account extra years for not being with my partner long enough, it's something I just couldn't take, so my dysphoria kind of took over. Looking back, it seems almost like my mind was trying to make my body say: "Who, me? Getting children? Nope, not ever, look, I'm not even made for it!" or something.

My friend has a boyfriend and started talking about children a lot lately. It scares the sh*t out of me. Because I know I could bear a child. It has always scared me as hell, but this summer it hit a whole new level because of her talking like this. I dont know why, I just can't imagine being a mother. It's my little fight with gender stereotypes though. While I see bearing a child as something absolutely magical and good, I cannot stand the thought of not being able to do things for myself in late months of pregnancy, and all the motherly rituals. I actually dont like children at all. And first and foremost, other women telling me how to be or not be a mother. It seems sonehow incomprehensible to many people that having a uterus is where similarities between cis women end, so all the maternity stuff is just pure bs.

Rant. Possibly not even dysphoria, but let it be.

God, I even got a really bad sensation when I saw little children a couple of days ago. I felt like in a seriously dangerous situation. Like, even physiologically, with all the heartbeat stuff, short breath, blood making noise in my ears etc . O_o

And seeing those women nurture their kids like living stereotypes. Dont. Want. Being. A mom. Jeez. Not me.

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Calligraphette_Coe

She married in April (she's 23, only 1,5 years older than I am) and she told us she's pregnant. At the time I was happy for her, of course, and somewhere I still am, and some part of me can't handle the realisation that it would be possible for me to have a child in a couple years. Apart from that, what makes it worse, is that her brother is my partner, so in my head this all kind of bounced into some realisation that it could be sort of expected of me to have children in the not very far future.

Even if I take into account extra years for not being with my partner long enough, it's something I just couldn't take, so my dysphoria kind of took over. Looking back, it seems almost like my mind was trying to make my body say: "Who, me? Getting children? Nope, not ever, look, I'm not even made for it!" or something.

My friend has a boyfriend and started talking about children a lot lately. It scares the sh*t out of me. Because I know I could bear a child. It has always scared me as hell, but this summer it hit a whole new level because of her talking like this. I dont know why, I just can't imagine being a mother. It's my little fight with gender stereotypes though. While I see bearing a child as something absolutely magical and good, I cannot stand the thought of not being able to do things for myself in late months of pregnancy, and all the motherly rituals. I actually dont like children at all. And first and foremost, other women telling me how to be or not be a mother. It seems sonehow incomprehensible to many people that having a uterus is where similarities between cis women end, so all the maternity stuff is just pure bs.

Rant. Possibly not even dysphoria, but let it be.

God, I even got a really bad sensation when I saw little children a couple of days ago. I felt like in a seriously dangerous situation. Like, even physiologically, with all the heartbeat stuff, short breath, blood making noise in my ears etc . O_o

And seeing those women nurture their kids like living stereotypes. Dont. Want. Being. A mom. Jeez. Not me.

When you think about it, pregnancy and delivery are serious medical events. People used to die in childbirth, and still do far, far less often. Even though I'll never experience it, I still cringe because part of what I went through is the same thing that someone experiencing eclampsia goes through.

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When you think about it, pregnancy and delivery are serious medical events. People used to die in childbirth, and still do far, far less often. Even though I'll never experience it, I still cringe because part of what I went through is the same thing that someone experiencing eclampsia goes through.

Yeah, that must be awful.

Though, what scares me most is being a mom in a social sense - like, I don't bond with women on an emotional level very well. Me and other women are like two different species :S I suppose I would be closer to what is often understood as "dad", or a mixture of "mom" and "dad". I'm just really not that much into children, more into playing football with them. The topic doesn't involve or grip me emotionally (except for being scared?). I started viewing parenthood as a good thing when my dad explaind me "men's view" on it: that it is a worderful experience to teach someone things you already know and watch this person grow up and develop with your aid. Having someone whom you love, too, but in a calmer way. Kinda, more like an emotion from the head than from the guts. In most women, motherly emotions seem to come from the guts.

Heh, I'm more deeply a physicist than a woman :P

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Though, what scares me most is being a mom in a social sense - like, I don't bond with women on an emotional level very well. Me and other women are like two different species :S I suppose I would be closer to what is often understood as "dad", or a mixture of "mom" and "dad". I'm just really not that much into children, more into playing football with them. The topic doesn't involve or grip me emotionally (except for being scared?). I started viewing parenthood as a good thing when my dad explaind me "men's view" on it: that it is a worderful experience to teach someone things you already know and watch this person grow up and develop with your aid. Having someone whom you love, too, but in a calmer way. Kinda, more like an emotion from the head than from the guts. In most women, motherly emotions seem to come from the guts.

Heh, I'm more deeply a physicist than a woman :P

For me I think it's both. The pregnancy and everything surrounding that also feel really like something that isn't possible for me. Physically, it probably is, but I don't feel that.

Socially, I don't feel like I could be a mother, but I could maybe be a parent. Still, the loving and explaining to children I can still imagine, though I don't necessarily see why that should count for my 'own' children, or that I could just keep teaching in class. It'd be a different type of teaching, that I give you, but I'm not sure that I would miss the 'parenthood-type teaching' if I never had it.

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After I identified as bigendered, I have catched myself looking at myself in the mirror imagining how amazing I would be as a girl, female body... It never used to be like that. I was just noncaring, but now I even nearly got sad by looking at myself and thinking how I'd look as my preferred gender </3

also, on the dysphoria discussion, I get disgusted when I see myself with a full beard... I get absolutely DISGUSTED and I feel like puking, it overgrows (miserable... i hate it!) and I just don't bother shaving cause my overly-masculine features are... extreme... and I HATE it. I almost want to take hormones to get rid of this unnecessary masculine features.

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  • 2 weeks later...
butterflydreams

Dysphoria-related question/musing here:

Is is plausible that dysphoria might manifest when a person is presented with people of the gender with which they identify? For example, I go out into town on a nice sunny afternoon, see lots of women around, look at myself and feel bad. I can never be that.

Even more personal story: my ex-best friend (woman, two years older than me), would almost always get conversations back to relationships, and sometimes sex. I identified as neither ace or trans at the time, but her sometimes vivid descriptions made me feel horrible. Even then she should've known I was hardly a "man's man", but that's how she relayed these topics to me. For a while I thought that maybe it was my complete lack of experience with sex that made me upset, and later on maybe it was my asexuality or repulsion. Now I wonder if I heard those stories from her and in my head felt like, "Shit. She just get's to do that. She's a girl and no one bats an eye. I can't do that. I want to identify with her stories, be that person, feel that way, enjoy sex the same way she does but I can't. I can never be that."

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Calligraphette_Coe

For a while I thought that maybe it was my complete lack of experience with sex that made me upset, and later on maybe it was my asexuality or repulsion. Now I wonder if I heard those stories from her and in my head felt like, "Shit. She just get's to do that. She's a girl and no one bats an eye. I can't do that. I want to identify with her stories, be that person, feel that way, enjoy sex the same way she does but I can't. I can never be that."

Don't sign up for the convent just yet.

Boy: Do not try and bend the spoon. That's impossible. Instead only try to realize the truth.

Neo: What truth?

Boy: There is no spoon.

Neo: There is no spoon?

Boy: Then you'll see that it is not the spoon that bends, it is only yourself.

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butterflydreams

Don't sign up for the convent just yet.

They wouldn't want me, so I think I'm safe :P

I mean, don't read too much into it. I've led a very pessimistic life, so I see no conflict with the fact that I can look at transition (for myself personally) and be like, "pfft, yeah right. I'll try it, but I'm quite skeptical. With my luck, someone will come along and pull the rug out from underneath me and say 'haha, just kidding, you can't really transition!'"

I actually think if you classify that kind of experience as dysphoria, or even look at it through that lens, an awful lot of stuff from my life comes into focus. I was told that any desire to be around girls growing up was because you liked them, wanted to date them, sex, etc. So that's how I treated it, but it clearly didn't jive, made me upset, didn't work like it did for others. Of course! Because what I was looking for out of the interaction was not possible. Or at the very least, confusing, and I certainly didn't understand it.

Am I making any sense with this?

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Calligraphette_Coe

Don't sign up for the convent just yet.

They wouldn't want me, so I think I'm safe :P

I mean, don't read too much into it. I've led a very pessimistic life, so I see no conflict with the fact that I can look at transition (for myself personally) and be like, "pfft, yeah right. I'll try it, but I'm quite skeptical. With my luck, someone will come along and pull the rug out from underneath me and say 'haha, just kidding, you can't really transition!'"

I actually think if you classify that kind of experience as dysphoria, or even look at it through that lens, an awful lot of stuff from my life comes into focus. I was told that any desire to be around girls growing up was because you liked them, wanted to date them, sex, etc. So that's how I treated it, but it clearly didn't jive, made me upset, didn't work like it did for others. Of course! Because what I was looking for out of the interaction was not possible. Or at the very least, confusing, and I certainly didn't understand it.

Am I making any sense with this?

I remember feeling shocked and heartbroken when first I heard how the 'birds and the bees' _really_ worked. I felt like a freak of nature. Keep in mind, at that time, transgender didn't even exist as a concept, and, if I remember correctly, the only AMAB people who got to take hormones and have surgery were those who expressed desires to have sex with men. The narrative was such that you had to want to be a heterosexual woman and have sex. All others need not apply. :(

That's why I cried the first time I met and talked to another transgendered person. Finally, I thought, I found someone like me.....

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