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a gender positive thread


butterflydreams

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30 minutes ago, Tortuga said:

I'm hoping to start HRT sometime soon- not out to a lot of direct family, though. Maybe I'll start next yr. Like, during summer vaca? My parents have an updated definition of my identity, and as far as I know, they are A-okay, but will take forever with the pronoun business. Yeay!* *Celebration stuff gets thrown around*

 

*combination of Yeah! and Yay!

Fingers crossed! HRT is definitely an exciting step. I started testosterone around summer break too actually, which meant that my voice was cracking right around when classes started back up, and I hadn't breathed a word of my transition to any of my professors/colleagues at the time. :lol: I wish you the best of luck! :)

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19 minutes ago, Mezzo Forte said:

I doubt you'll end up having an allergic reaction to an antibiotic like I did. :lol:

Actually, I learned from my wisdom tooth surgery that penicillin-family antibiotics are off the table for me :unsure: but I’m glad I learned that during a small procedure and not a major one! Thankfully there are plenty of other antibiotic classes :lol:

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Just now, ChillaKilla said:

Actually, I learned from my wisdom tooth surgery that penicillin-family antibiotics are off the table for me :unsure: but I’m glad I learned that during a small procedure and not a major one! Thankfully there are plenty of other antibiotic classes :lol:

I'm glad you learned that now! My wisdom tooth surgery only made me wary of narcotics. (Taking narcotics when your body doesn't really need them creates an indescribably bad feeling. Top surgery and the Hysto showed me that they're not nearly as bad if you actually need them.) I'm allergic to Sulfa antibiotics, (Bactrim DS spurred the reaction,) and very dangerously so. I don't want to think about what could have happened if I didn't get help as quickly as I did. If you can take a class of antibiotics that you know you handle well, I'd definitely suggest requesting that kind, but otherwise, just be aware of the signs of an allergic reaction and don't be afraid to say something even if you think it's only something minor.

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nerdperson777

So many people are starting some step in transition!  :o

 

6 hours ago, Mezzo Forte said:
  Reveal hidden contents

 

In regards to dripping, are you referring to discharge? At first, my thoughts went instantly to the joys of hysto recovery, but kind of remembered that you wouldn't be talking about that. :lol: I bled for most of the first 25 days of recovery post-hysto, and even though it wasn't that much, the experience was still quite exhausting for me. It seems to be done now, but I'm still wary because it stopped and restarted once before.

 

It's funny, the winter months made me far more tempted not to bind than to bind. I liked the idea of just covering up with layers and not worrying about compression. Can't say the winters ever got cold enough though, and I had no respite from compression until my surgery day.

 

In regards to top surgery, I'd be surprised if you needed a hospital stay; rather, you need someone to commit to caring for you for the first week or two especially because of your limited mobility. Even though I'm still fighting my insurance (they're trying to only reimburse me like $100 of the $6K my surgery cost,) I still say it's worthwhile to have insurance cover it. I don't think your family would necessarily get notified or anything, and you can go get treatment without family permission. It might had similar to like what you did with testosterone, where your family knows, but you did it of your own accord. That said, top surgery is only worth doing if you feel like you would really benefit from it; the recovery would be especially tough to handle if you're only 'meh' about the procedure.

 

Women's jackets often are fitted in the chest and hips, though I don't know if that's more of a thing for lighter jackets than it is for heavy winter coats just because I haven't really seen winter coats where I come from. I remember my mom being so confused about why I wouldn't wear this nice down jacket of mine, but it was because the fit of the hips/chest made me too self conscious and dysphoric. She didn't really understand until I bought a men's coat and let her try it on. I just won't wear clothes that are fitted to accentuate the hips.

Maybe it's discharge.  Who knows.

 

I haven't been binding lately.  I actually wrote a status elsewhere a year ago about the struggles of thinking that binding isn't required in the winter because of layers, but also binders are so much warmer.  That's kind of a dilemma.  I want to be warm (and flatter), without the binding.  But that is probably what many want.

 

I know my dad could but in that case, my parents would find out.  My mom reads my mail, so she knew about my T gel denial, since it had the big fat insurance logo on it.  My dad would probably be the one I ask to drive me to the surgeon.  He has all the time being retired, and he considers himself a professional driver (while women are bad drivers, his words).  My mom looks at all expenses to the cent in all her accounts.  Once during my first year of college, I decided that I wanted to go to Round Table and get a small pizza for lunch.  I thought that I could relax and watch something on my computer.  While I'm eating, I find an email from her asking "What did you buy from Round Table for $13?  That's very expensive."  This was with my student cash account.  She watches EVERYTHING.  So I think at some point, she'll know that I used her insurance to get testosterone.  I went to an informed consent clinic, which wasn't used to people having my insurance.  (They usually get Obamacare or Medi-Cal or something, which was way easier to approve.)  I'm not sure how insurance works, but I think they said that I only had to pay 45% of the cost.  Then I'm not versed in deductibles and such.  I'm worried that it gets taken out of my parents' allotted amount for the year or something like that, in which they will know.  I was only really dysphoric about it when I went to get a massage and I was there without a shirt with someone massaging my arm.  I think I do have to get over the "my chest isn't supposed to be seen" part of growing up female.  I doubt anyone will actually see my chest either.  I do know that I want to be flat.  That is for sure.  But sometimes being like this for so long has warped my mind.

 

3 hours ago, Mezzo Forte said:

Yep! Peri only has scarring circling the areola and two small incisions on the sides where the drain holes were. (It also leaves the nipple stalk intact, so there's no nipple grafting involved either. You eventually regain full sensation there too, though that seems to take quite some time.) The scars around the areola aren't even that noticeable, and my drain hole scars faded quite nicely too. The only procedure with less scarring is keyhole, but even then, that's only marginally less. I think contouring is more challenging with peri than with DI, and peri seems to take longer to settle properly after surgery, but a good surgeon makes all the difference for either procedure.

There's this one YouTuber who got really ripped after surgery.  His post-op is probably a good reference.  His username is Cat.  He also wrote a poem that resonated with everyone, like me, who grew up with that name.

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50 minutes ago, nerdperson777 said:

I know my dad could but in that case, my parents would find out.  My mom reads my mail, so she knew about my T gel denial, since it had the big fat insurance logo on it.  My dad would probably be the one I ask to drive me to the surgeon.  He has all the time being retired, and he considers himself a professional driver (while women are bad drivers, his words).  My mom looks at all expenses to the cent in all her accounts.  Once during my first year of college, I decided that I wanted to go to Round Table and get a small pizza for lunch.  I thought that I could relax and watch something on my computer.  While I'm eating, I find an email from her asking "What did you buy from Round Table for $13?  That's very expensive."  This was with my student cash account.  She watches EVERYTHING.  So I think at some point, she'll know that I used her insurance to get testosterone.  I went to an informed consent clinic, which wasn't used to people having my insurance.  (They usually get Obamacare or Medi-Cal or something, which was way easier to approve.)  I'm not sure how insurance works, but I think they said that I only had to pay 45% of the cost.  Then I'm not versed in deductibles and such.  I'm worried that it gets taken out of my parents' allotted amount for the year or something like that, in which they will know.  I was only really dysphoric about it when I went to get a massage and I was there without a shirt with someone massaging my arm.  I think I do have to get over the "my chest isn't supposed to be seen" part of growing up female.  I doubt anyone will actually see my chest either.  I do know that I want to be flat.  That is for sure.  But sometimes being like this for so long has warped my mind.

I can relate to having your family watch your every expense, so much. I can imagine that there's no real keeping your decision a secret when your family has that close an eye on your finances and your life. Also, I'm not an expert, but to my knowledge, meeting a deductible is actually a good thing, as once you meet your deductible, you don't have to pay any other deductibles for medical appointments for the rest of the year. Even if they knew, could you just go through with surgery anyways and let them react accordingly?

 

1 hour ago, nerdperson777 said:

There's this one YouTuber who got really ripped after surgery.  His post-op is probably a good reference.  His username is Cat.  He also wrote a poem that resonated with everyone, like me, who grew up with that name.

Chest muscles instantly make surgical results look better, especially because it makes muscle play a bigger role in the contouring. If I enjoyed bodybuilding, I wouldn't mind having some pecs, but I'm quite happy being flat right now even without much muscle on me :P

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Alex the Queer

ah so i actually got super excited today. i was being lazy so i threw on a t-shirt, jeans, and boots and since my hair was dirty i wore a beanie. i looked really androgynous and way more masculine than usual. i usually wear super feminine blouses and shirts and sweaters, and while i do still love feminine clothes and will continue wearing them, something about the way i looked today just made me really happy and comfortable and i just felt like something that had always been missing in regards to my style and gender expression finally clicked

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6 hours ago, Mezzo Forte said:

Chest muscles instantly make surgical results look better, especially because it makes muscle play a bigger role in the contouring. If I enjoyed bodybuilding, I wouldn't mind having some pecs, but I'm quite happy being flat right now even without much muscle on me :P

Even without surgery, chest muscles make the chest look better. 

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On 12/28/2017 at 1:08 AM, Mezzo Forte said:

Regardless, I am considering taking some measures to make my classes trans-friendly; for example, I may try to find a discrete (and optional) way to let students share their pronouns/preferred name if they so choose, like having them fill out index cards with basic info about themselves. If any students were to directly come out to me as trans for whatever reason, I would probably consider disclosing my trans status as well.

You know, I finally figured out how to access my class rosters, and I learned that this college has a separate "preferred name" option already built into its system! None of them have a preferred name that differs from their legal names though, so I don't know if anyone really takes advantage of that feature. (I also have less students than I thought I would, with 10 students in one course, and 5 in another. That honestly makes me feel a bit less intimidated because I'm more accustomed to teaching smaller classes. Plus, I'm absolutely terrible with names, and now I stand a chance at actually learning everyone's name. :lol:)

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Next semester I'll be in a men's singing group. I'm terrified and excited. I get to be a tenor! There's one note I need to sing that I can't reach, hopefully I won't strain myself too much. I'm still a soprano in range, but hopefully this will be a better social atmosphere for me. I'm scared singing in the bottom of my range will damage my higher notes permanently. But how much damage can one semester do?

 

I appreciate my binder anytime I put it on or look into the mirror. I think I'm crazy for disliking my chest, but I can't deny how wonderful it feels to have it gone for a few hours. My friends are recording a video for fun and they put me in footy pajamas for it. For once my chest isn't getting in the way! I looked at the recordings and my chest looks normal, and feels perfect.

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Another thing is for the first time I thought of my friend as they without thinking she/he first! They've been out for 2-3 years now, and it finally clicked. I'm really hoping to get rid of my feelings about trans being wrong. I want my stupid biases to go away. I know it isn't wrong but there's a piece of me that's like 'sure, they're trans, no problem with that' but then I feel guilty as soon as I question myself. I feel wrong but I know it's not. I keep going between ashamed I'm not a girl, and annoyed I'll never truly be a boy, and wondering if I can suck it up and deny everything until this "phase" ends. I guess this turned less positive, but whatever....

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nerdperson777
19 hours ago, Mezzo Forte said:

I can relate to having your family watch your every expense, so much. I can imagine that there's no real keeping your decision a secret when your family has that close an eye on your finances and your life. Also, I'm not an expert, but to my knowledge, meeting a deductible is actually a good thing, as once you meet your deductible, you don't have to pay any other deductibles for medical appointments for the rest of the year. Even if they knew, could you just go through with surgery anyways and let them react accordingly?

 

Chest muscles instantly make surgical results look better, especially because it makes muscle play a bigger role in the contouring. If I enjoyed bodybuilding, I wouldn't mind having some pecs, but I'm quite happy being flat right now even without much muscle on me :P

Yeah, I'm just thinking my dad could know what I'm doing and refuse to drive me.  Looking back at my messages to insurance, my first question for it got me a code for cis female mastectomy.  I did specifically mention for transgender people and they gave me this code for cis women to get it, as precaution for breast cancer.  Then my second email, don't know what part of my first message actually applies, due to them being so dimwitted about this.  I probably could just do it and let them react accordingly.  I think I just don't want to be able to see the line in my shirt that connects the nipples.  I'm still unsure about doing this since it seems so big a step to take.  I also grew up with my parents just doing things for me so doing things without them beside me does make me feel a bit hesitant, but I do have to step away from them at some point.

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One of my biggest trans idols liked a picture I posted in Instagram :lol: small thing, but made me really happy :D 

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Lonemathsytoothbrushthief

I finally found a name I really really like and am super happy because of it :D also looking at videos on gender neutral pronouns in German, because at some point I'm gonna have to face up to just how complicated things will be when I talk with my mum-it's not that I feel particularly hurt when she refers to me with feminine pronouns and stuff, but I think that's partly because I already recognise my own German has never been up to scratch and I have difficulty knowing which endings and pronouns to use in the language in general, even though we speak it all the time, and yet I just know I'll feel much better once we can speak it together without her misgendering me. This is a good day. Also the name is a really cute Germanic one too, which is the short version of two classic names. I'm not a traditionalist in the slightest, but I have always disliked how taking on my dad's name as a surname when I was born doesn't at all represent my parents divorcing, my living with my Austrian mum and sharing in her culture. So that's why the German name. I definitely don't feel patriotic about the country or anything, it's just that it makes no sense for a name to so poorly reflect my life and sense of identity. ^_^

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Great news, Lonemathsytoothbrushthief! 

Yes, gendered languages are hard. Imagine how hard it would be to dress ambiguously if t-shirt was gendered! I get everything you say! I'm going by Kailynn, at least here, don't get it mixed up with Kaitlynn. Bleck. Gendered languages are hard, actually.

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9 hours ago, Tortuga said:

Great news, Lonemathsytoothbrushthief! 

Yes, gendered languages are hard. Imagine how hard it would be to dress ambiguously if t-shirt was gendered! I get everything you say! I'm going by Kailynn, at least here, don't get it mixed up with Kaitlynn. Bleck. Gendered languages are hard, actually.

Great name choice! ^_^ 

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babybluesnowpants

I'm feeling very happy about my voice today. It doesn't often strike me as incredibly feminine, but I've found out how much I can play my range. Also playing with my resonance. I just love how sweet, yet low and lovely I can speak. My voice sounds to me like brown sugar and I'm incredibly happy.

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butterflydreams

Been thinking a lot about bottom surgery lately, and at first I was really frustrated. But you know, maybe it’s not so bad. It’s a procedure that exists, and when it’s done, it’s done. Goodbye dysphoria hello the rest of my life. I was reading up on on surgeon’s requirements for surgery and I already meet them fairly easily, because I’m not in a rush. I could get two letters. I’ve been living full time for nearly two years now. I’ll have been on HRT for even longer. For this particular surgeon, if I can show I’ve lived for 5 years full time, I only need one letter.

 

But it’s nice to just temporarily put the recovery and emotional support out of my head for a bit and think, yes, this is something you can have and won’t it be so great when you do? No more brain glitching out when I see what’s down there now.

 

This gives me a reason to sort out me weight (I’m not too heavy for surgery, but I’d like to be a healthier weight) as well as my suicidal ideations. That stuff needs to be sorted out before I have surgery.

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I was out with my mom and some random stranger called me he and she didn't correct them 😊

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Noice! Well, erm, I finally updated my roblox skin to be that of a girl. I hadn't done that for a while. Also, don't judge me just because I play roblox, I prefer minecraft, actually.

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Alex the Queer

for the first time i’m genuinely starting to become comfortable and ok with the fact that i can’t really label my gender and sexuality as nothing is quite fitting an fit feels fucking awesome

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Another shot day, another shot song! This time actually went weirdly smoother than usual despite being a bit more anxious than usual leading up to the shot. Maybe I just injected in a better spot, but I appreciate when the injection is completely painless, not to mention when it leaves zero knots too. :) 

 

The shot song this time brings me back to 10+ ago, when I used to watch more anime. :P

Spoiler

 

 

Updated Playlist:

Spoiler

7/26
A Moment of Silence - Streetlight Manifesto
 
8/9
Toccata and Divertimento - Ney Rosauro
 
8/23
Receiving End of it All - Streetlight Manifesto
 
9/6
Shepherd of Fire - Avenged Sevenfold
 
9/20
Bebete, Vãobora - Jorge Ben
 
10/4
Resurrected Power (Shadow of the Colossus) - Ko Otani
 
10/18
Burn My Dread (Persona 3) - Kawamura Yumi
 
11/1
Motumbá - Timbalada
 
11/15
My Shot (Hamilton) - Lin-Manuel Miranda
 
12/5
Hunting Song - Tom Lehrer
 
12/20
Oh Berimbau! - Olodum

 

1/3

Alumina - Nightmare

 

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nerdperson777
14 hours ago, butterflydreams said:

Been thinking a lot about bottom surgery lately, and at first I was really frustrated. But you know, maybe it’s not so bad. It’s a procedure that exists, and when it’s done, it’s done. Goodbye dysphoria hello the rest of my life. I was reading up on on surgeon’s requirements for surgery and I already meet them fairly easily, because I’m not in a rush. I could get two letters. I’ve been living full time for nearly two years now. I’ll have been on HRT for even longer. For this particular surgeon, if I can show I’ve lived for 5 years full time, I only need one letter.

 

But it’s nice to just temporarily put the recovery and emotional support out of my head for a bit and think, yes, this is something you can have and won’t it be so great when you do? No more brain glitching out when I see what’s down there now.

 

This gives me a reason to sort out me weight (I’m not too heavy for surgery, but I’d like to be a healthier weight) as well as my suicidal ideations. That stuff needs to be sorted out before I have surgery.

This reminds me of my last appointment.  I was sitting in the waiting room of the office, knowing that many of the patients that went there were trans.  There was this guy there receiving an envelope while I was waiting.  I heard "here is your letter" when it was handed to him.  He took it out for a moment, put it back, and handed it to the girl he was sitting with.  Seeing that I was probably trans, he said "awesome, I just got my second letter for my phalloplasty."  It must've been warm that day, because I saw the girl using the envelope to fan herself.  I just said "that's totally what the letter is for" before I got called to go inside.

 

I heard from one woman that she was waiting for better results to be available before doing the surgery.  I guess that would be something to weigh in.  But AMAB bottom surgery seems to be farther along than AFAB bottom surgery.

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butterflydreams
3 hours ago, nerdperson777 said:

I heard from one woman that she was waiting for better results to be available before doing the surgery.  I guess that would be something to weigh in.  But AMAB bottom surgery seems to be farther along than AFAB bottom surgery.

That’s the thing about being patient. Surgeries are getting better all the time. I just read an article in Wired about a new type of SRS for trans women that sounded really promising. For trans women, the results are already surprisingly good (in my opinion). I finally found some good example photos from actual surgeons and they don’t look like the train wrecks I saw on some tumblr page a while back. They look really good. Very natural looking.

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nerdperson777
4 hours ago, butterflydreams said:

That’s the thing about being patient. Surgeries are getting better all the time. I just read an article in Wired about a new type of SRS for trans women that sounded really promising. For trans women, the results are already surprisingly good (in my opinion). I finally found some good example photos from actual surgeons and they don’t look like the train wrecks I saw on some tumblr page a while back. They look really good. Very natural looking.

Yeah, I think I heard something about using a tissue from another body part, I forget what, but it grows back.  It then keeps the sensitivity or something so it's easier to regain.

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Okay, so this time there was a trans woman on the TV and I didn't get wildly jealous. Good sign. 

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I just took the time to really have an in-depth emotional check-in with myself that included a lot of questions for myself about what I'm feeling in terms of gender and I feel so much better already. I hadn't done anything like that in almost a month, and had never done it in so much detail. I'm glad I finally did, though, because immediately afterward I already felt more secure, grounded, and motivated without even doing any of the things I set out as goals for myself. It's a little late, but I want to make it my New Years resolution to do that at least once per month, more if I have time and/or feel I need it. This is the best I've felt all winter break.

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Luftschlosseule

I am getting better at figuring out what agender looks for me. Like, yeah, lipstick may be associated with women, but what about blue lipstick?

And which kind of jewellery to wear, and so on. It's getting easier.

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I had this dream some nights ago

Spoiler

I had a weird dream last night. I will see if I can remember it and write it down now.

I was walking on the sidewalk beside the water and it was really foggy. And all of a sudden a bunch of ch-fi planes started to show up. And I mean 100s of them. 

And from one of them something drop that first just looked like debre, but was a robot, that started to stand up and said something like"Activate" and then it saw me and screamed "A human! I am not a robot" and I said yeah that is hrd to belive when you say "Activate" and start to stand up like a machine.

But slowlly it started to change in to human woman. And we talked about something, and all of a sudden she hugged me and started
 to pet my back and said something like: let her out. And I said I wish that I was a woman, and she said: you will be one day sweetie. And then we talked about things like how much I wish I could be able to wear a bra, cant remember how come to that. And then it turned a bit pg18 for a couple of minutes.( I could talk about if you wish but I am not sure if I am comfortable with it) when I think about it she feelt like more like a angel or something like that.

Everything just feelt so right

 

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Got called sir at the airport again. 

At this point I know I'm just stealthing it more than simply passing but there's something about directly being called sir like that that is like an extra bonus. 

Especially when all my papers say the wrong thing.. But there's no denying I look like a sir more than anything else.

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Talking about potentially getting simple meta with my girlfriend was just so freeing. I’m forever grateful she doesn’t think I’m some kind of freak because of how transitioning affects... things xD

Massive TMI and content warning for sexual things inbound, but relevant to above:

The first time I had my pants off in front of her I was SUPER embarrassed. She had no idea what to expect, and I was terrified she would think I was deformed or had weird parts (which I do, and am proud of, but you can’t really gauge how someone will react you know?) But after she got over her initial surprise of “Wow, that’s... kind of like a dick” and we laughed off the nervous energy, she never made a big deal out of it and is 100% okay with my body

:) 

 

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