I know what you mean. Sad, though, that it’s such an easy assumption to make, and reinforces toxic masculinity.

Hello!

It’s been a bit of an anxiety of mine that cis women wouldn’t see me as a woman, but as a kinda creepy guy…

I have the same worry, despite great experiences like yours being accepted. Here’s what I tell myself:

Having grown up around men being creepy to and about women, it’s natural to be a bit wary. But that’s not you. I’ve met quite a few pre-transition MTF people now, some of whom appeared very masculine, and it’s immediately apparent that it’s a non-threatening interaction. I guess it’s unconscious body language, or something like that. Men being creepy tend to seek attention from women as a man.

Anyway, there’s a group of women friends I meet up with from time to time (since well before I hatched) who were the first non-family I came out to. They’re so accepting and affirming, I usually end up in happy tears at the end of the evening.

Still (probably irrationally) scared of using the women’s bathroom in case I make someone uncomfortable, though.

Hi gorgeous! <3

• I was bitten by a radioactive lesbian.
• I kept fighting with my wife over the air conditioning.
• To get better at karaoke.

Not a doctor, but as far as I know, so long as you’re not completely starving yourself, you’ll develop both fatty tissue and glandular tissue in the breasts regardless of how chunky (or not) you are elsewhere. But excess fat is also laid down in the breasts, so if you’re overweight you’ll also have larger breasts.

Anecdotal, but I’ve been steadily losing weight since just before starting HRT, and no problems here :3

A starvation diet is probably not a good idea, though. Keep eating a good balance of nutrients!

Skinny girls can grow breasts. And it’s not as if eating to excess is going to make them grow faster (although higher body fat will make everything bigger).

Oh my, right in the feels 😭

A week was a bit too long for me with 10mg e. valerate injections (monotherapy). It wasn’t unbearable, but I’d feel pretty shitty by day 6 or so. I’m on patches now, which gives me a much more stable level without too much hassle. Highly recommended if you can get them and don’t have a bad reaction to the adhesive.

Half a year into transition here. I’ve been sleeping much better since I started, and I don’t think I remember having any dreams since.

In the past, my dreams which didn’t feature gender would have been “assumed male” regular me. But I did have a recurring dream where I’d wake up as a woman one day, and they were mostly centered around how to explain it to the people who knew me and generally enjoying my new life. Those were absolutely crushing to wake up from. Also sexual fantasies and dreams were mostly from a female perspective (thus I assumed it was just a fetish for a long time).

I would also very frequently dissociate during waking times and imagine myself doing whatever I was doing, but as a woman. Not in a sexual way, just a very melancholy “if only…” feeling.

That’s all stopped since starting transition. Instead, when I’ve been concentrating on something and come “back to reality” as it were, I often get a brief flash of “crap, I’m a man – no, wait – oh shit I’m out and transitioning is this a dream I must be crazy – calm down, this is what I want” with an associated adrenaline spike. That’s not fun. Other times when my mind wanders I can just reflect happily on how awesome it is I get to be a woman at last, if I can stave off the “you’re faking it” dysphoria.

I don’t have much experience yet of being treated as a woman socially, or even seeing myself in that role, but I’m hoping that will change and I get used to it. Then I’d expect my dreams to mostly reflect that.

Thanks!

I suspect the difficulty some men may have with accepting a trans partner is due to internalized homophobia / toxic masculinity. It’s very easy to think “of course I’m not bi / trans / whatever” without ever actually considering the possibility (at least it was in my case). The same can apply to women, of course, but perhaps women culturally face a little less pressure in that respect at least?

And you are exactly right: coming out, even just to myself at first, was scary as fuck. But worth it!

Idk why the coat hanger foam works but it’s great!

A wild guess, but I wonder if it’s melamine foam? We use blocks of the stuff here to clean all sorts of things around the house. Works great on metal, too!

Yes, I think so. She’s not religious, but has difficulty talking openly about her feelings (this is something we’ve dealt with many many times before). It seems she wants to get used to the new state of things, and seems to be trying, but rather than just coming out and saying “hold on, I’m freaking out a bit about this” or whatever, tends to pick on specific things I’m doing at the time instead of the root cause.

No problem. I wondered about the same thing until it turned out I was the trans one :P

There are lots of ways coming out could have gone horribly wrong, but I figured there were three “right” options.

1. Wife isn’t interested in being married to a woman. Fair enough; result is an amicable split, presumably sharing child-raising responsibilities.
2. Wife not attracted to women but wants to stay together. Continue to cohabit as some kind of non-sexual family unit, possibly seeing other people on the side.
3. Wife realizes she’s bi / willing to make an exception. Lesbian partners!

I guess I was prepared for 1, expecting 2, and hoping for 3. Currently at 2, but it could go either way.

In any event, I think it’s unreasonable to expect someone who needs to transition to put it off for the sake of their partner, although not every trans person needs to transition.

I thought mine was too (and genuinely appears to be trying!) but then she sometimes comes out with comments like this. My poor brain can’t handle “I’m mad about X, but I’m going to complain about Y instead which hasn’t been a problem up to now”. I have enough trouble reading emotions as it is: please just tell me what you’re upset about!

Oh, I almost forgot! (Please excuse me replying a second time)

In case you haven’t seen it, and are getting impatient, there’s always Turn Me Into A Girl

Oops! But all’s well that ends well :3

I’ve also been watching Philosophy Tube recently, although since she’s from the North of England we are clearly sworn enemies for life.

Yay, welcome to the sisterhood!

I don’t really have anything other than congratulations to add that others haven’t already mentioned. From my experience I’d recommend really making an effort to keep communicating with your wife. Especially if she’s having trouble adjusting you may find yourself wanting to hide parts of your transition (if you choose to do so) from her, and that’s likely to cause trouble.

Best wishes for the future <3

Haha, yes. Listening to my colleagues talking about Cialis and thinking “why on earth would you want more erections?” was possibly a sign.

Two things worth pointing out here that may or may not be relevant:

• Not all trans women experience bottom dysphoria
• It’s not unusual to start (or stop) feeling dysphoria about things that weren’t a problem previously

All of that said, I don’t know what exactly it feels like to be trans, or be a woman, so I don’t know how to compare my experience to how I “should” or “shouldn’t” feel.

I don’t think anybody does. But “trans” and “woman” are just labels. I find it’s more helpful to think about what you want to do.

I feel like If I had been born as a woman, I would prefer that to having been born male. And if I could flip a switch and instantly be a woman, I would.

You might like to reflect some more on what this implies about your gender.

For most of my life I identified as “just a regular dude… unfortunately”. Possibly with a greater-than-usual interest in HRT and trans topics, and a rather persistent fantasy about having a female body.

Then I started briefly questioning, but was still “not trans… unfortunately”. The thing that cracked me was seeing egg_irl memes of the “you can just be a girl; there’s no entry requirements to be trans” variety. I realized that transitioning was something I desperately wanted all my life but didn’t allow myself to consider, and that was that. A very sudden “ohhh shit I am trans” moment. I still doubt whether I’m “really trans”, but I sure as hell don’t want to stop transitioning!

Anyway, check out the Gender Dysphoria Bible (see the sidebar), stick around and I hope you manage to figure yourself out satisfactorily, whatever you turn out to be.