Thoughts and the Start of My Journey

 

Hi Guys, This Blog has written by my Friend, please do give it a read.

Hi all, I was conscripted to write something that a friend could put up on their blog, so here I am and so you'll see it on their blog. Welcome! For context, before this year, I was considered a White Male of Caucasian decent living in the United States in a fairly well-off family and currently am in my 3rd year of college. I thought for a couple months on what to write about and at the time I had started my own personal journey through some personally uncharted waters. So I came to the brilliant idea to write about that journey, spoilers it's LGBTQ related.

Lets start back in my High school days oh so far in the past, Junior year I began to desire being female, as in if I could flip the gender switch to change my gender I would do with nearly no hesitancy. This feeling permeated my last two years of High school and followed me through my freshman year (COVID year of 2019-2020). Starting my second year of college I began to search around the LGBTQ community to start seeing if I potentially fell into the Trans side of everything and doing so created a massive positive impact in my mental well being, but I hadn't tried anything yet. During this time I started looking at parts of the body, physically, that I hate or couldn't stomach looking at; for me that boiled down to a couple things. Facial structure, body hair, and lack of breasts (ooh no a buzz word, don't worry non sexual). All of this was derived from looking at Women and saying I wish I could be that not just I would date that person, but little did I know the ramifications at that point. On top of that, I had never worn the more masculine cloths, never worked out, never looked at a guy and said I wish I could be buff or look like him, and never loved the way I looked. So after my first semester of my 2nd year I ended up living alone in a dorm room which granted me the freedom to step outside of my boundaries in private to some small degree leading to some minor experimentation. I picked up a bra (won't lie, a busty one) and tried it on, I enjoyed wearing but when I looked in the mirror it felt out of place, didn't fit. I also learned what a pain in the butt being busty is, so despite being attracted to those who are I decided that it wasn't for me BUT I still wanted to have a feminine figure.

Now 2nd year of college finished and summer has arrived, one still reeling from the aftermath of the COVID epidemic and giving me a great time to sit down and think without the pressures of school. That first month of my summer was spent learning about transition methods and what I needed to feel most at home with my self and how I wanted to be seeing by others (treated as well). I decided that before I was to commit to any decisions on personal gender I needed to try things and the first part for me was stepping into HRT (hormone replacement therapy; this is when you promote opposite secondary sex characteristics by replacing you genetic hormones with the other gender's). To do that, I needed to get a therapist so going into the second month of that summer I reached out and got one, spent a month talking with her and learned a couple very important things. 

First, I found some sense of validation: the idea that people who put a lot of time into learning and thinking about these things often are themselves the ones that need these treatments. 

Second, it's okay to be uncertain and take time to make decisions but you must try things to make forward progress. Thirdly, people I don't want to personally make my shift unless I am treated, beyond a shadow of a doubt, like a women and NOT be recognizable as a Transwoman.

By the end of this past summer, I began HRT along with returning to school to begin my 3rd year of college and currently am about halfway through the first semester of said year. I'm about 2 months into HRT and have started to see breast growth, maybe some reduced hair growth, but that's about it. It's surprising how in such a short time I've seen some physical changes, and what more, is my response to that change. It's been exciting seeing the progression in such a small time, but more importantly I am looking forward to the facial and body hair related changes, these should hit about the start of summer leading to another conclusion. I don't want to have a visible transition, I want to flip on a switch, this is one of the reasons why I start HRT way before I was going to shift gender. Along with that, I often have a fear that my desire to be female is related to my sexual attraction and how do I determine the separation. I stumbled upon the idea that maybe what I like visually is both on someone else and myself, leading to the idea that there really isn't a difference, which works out for me. This fear slowly has been offset by my feelings towards HRT related changes and visually starting to have less of a adverse reaction to my image in a mirror. Leading me to stress this, be patient! There is no need to rush into these changes and jump towards your authenticity, yes it's painful to exist somewhere in-between and it's a struggle to be who your not but progress is helpful and will offset some of that stress.

This leads me to my final conundrum and my current situation, my decision come summer. I want to have come to a decision before the start of summer so I have a couple of months to start my transition and get the things I need going into my last two years of college (which is at another school, so one big reason to be patience). Some of the things I still need to change in that period is my voice, my hair, my wardrobe, and my interactions. I want to be something I am not yet, but even as I write this the more set I am of my feelings and my desires. Part of the reason for such a rapid change is so that I can avoid some of the potential questions around are you trans? why are you trans? It'll help me avoid any prejudice I would run into while in the process. 

If / when I make that choice to express myself completely as female, I only would want to be seen that way and my standards likely will be higher than the real world's so if I am happy with what I look like than I should be okay. Honestly, it is a concern but if I can make it over that hurtle and get close enough in the interim summer than I can start my last two years as who I want to be. On the flip side, my family has taken this really well, not that I thought they wouldn't. I was raised in a very open family that had no boundaries and gender roles set. For context, my moms the money maker and my dad is the fluffiest person I met, in regards to that I had no issues in the slightest. Though my mom did bring up the question "What did I miss, how could I have caught this earlier" line that we all fear, but that conversation went well. She obviously was concerned about that but I mean, it's not like they fought against anything. In fact they always went above and beyond the inclusivity line, so I just pointed those things out and she moved on, I doubt she'll ever truly do so but I don't know. Only time will tell. I hadn't suffered mentally at all due to that positive family dynamic so there wasn't any ill will on my end, more than anything it's about me realizing what I want and taking it in that direction. They already give me full support to do so, that's good enough for me.

I write this, to some degree, to be therapeutic for myself but more importantly a perspective of someone who doesn't really know what they want to be. I'm still quite worried about how I feel and if it's valid but I truly won't know where I fall until summer comes and I jump that river onto the other side. In the meantime, I'll take time to think over and decide how I feel and what I want, maybe by summer I'll have a decision but the biggest things for me is I wouldn't have jumped to rapidly into HRT if I didn't feel like I wanted to be the opposite gender.

Thanks for reading, give this blog a follow and my thanks to my friend for being willing to put it up somewhere. I hope someone who reads this get some benefit from my ramblings!