Why am I even...

[muuu]

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[A]

How? If you gain weight and it doesn't go where you'd hoped, you can just lose it again.

And uhm, I doubt your body is able to store fat THAT fast. Even if you ate pizza, cake and fries like a pig. Fluctuating 2-4 lbs every few days means that either you get dehydrated and lose a lot of weight in water, either you don't weigh yourself properly (set the scale to 0, be naked and weigh yourself in the same situation daily, ideally in the morning, before eating or drinking anything, and after going to the washroom).

And yes, your body needs a bit of time to transfer fat. But you... barely have any. As for "adjusting and telling itself where to store the fat", maybe you're right; maybe there's a delay. But I don't know, and it can't be -that- long. Ask the people on real HRT (not me >_>) how long it took for them to really start seeing the fat go in the right places. Besides, it's much longer to transfer fat (which implies burning it then gaining it again) than just gaining it.

Finally, if you manage to reduce your obsessive thoughts, yes, you will feel better. For most people, this happens on its own, but with you, it'll also take you working on your cognitive distorsions that make you unable to see things as they are. The sum of all the little improvements everywhere will make you feel much better about yourself. Even if your hips stay boyish (and seriously they should at least improve a little), you'll look at your body and go "hey, I really do look like a girl now!"

[Kelly J. P.]

 Well, transition can be "hopeless" from time to time. It's not easy being over six feet tall, or having size 11+ feet, or having a voice like James Earl Jones, and etcetera. But... unless you have any of those spectacularly masculine features, flawlessly passing is always a possibility - and even if you did have some really masculine feature, passing would still probably be feasible... though, not everyone can blend in 100%.

I'm going to assume that you're within pretty average sizes and ranges here. If so, then you probably have nothing to worry about... I mean, you're three months or so into HRT, so you've barely even started. Patience isn't really my thing, so I get why you are freaking out, but do keep in mind that it's around the one-year mark that things are typically most exciting. Things might not work out, but this risk is probably worthwhile, given how badly you want to transition well.

So, all you can really do is just have at it and hope for the best. Maintaining a healthy weight will optimize the results you see from hormones, and there are methods and procedures for taking care of most other things. There are many things that can't be taken care of, though, and you'll have to learn to accept them. Having spent many years fighting against reality myself (and this is a continuing battle), I know pretty well how stupid and pointless trying to change the rules of the universe with your mind is.

You've got pretty much everything going for you, with the exception being the stuff inside your skull. You're playing against yourself, and that's your biggest obstacle right now - so, you might need some therapy, some emotional release, and maybe a little time to just get everything off your chest and scream. When your head is clear, you will be perfectly fine.

... You've almost inspired me to make my own "hopeless" thread, but I know I need emotional release, so I suppose it wouldn't help much. :p I just need to make some hell, I suppose.

Have fun.

[MariaMx]

It's going to take time. 2-3 months is not nearly enough time. It took me about a year before I would calm down and realize that things were actually going to be okay. Meanwhile I was freaking out almost on a daily basis. Some days were my spirit was high but most of the time it was a giant leap of faith. Often I felt like the idiot strapping feathers to their arms and flapping them vigorously hoping to achieve lift off. Transition is a tough business. You're just going to have to believe that it will be okay in the end even if it seems hopeless right now.

Oh, and get off your butt and get out there and participate in life. Probably the most important aspect of my transition was my high intensity job. It's all about conditioning and hardening.

[oZma]

In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man will poke out his eye to fit in.


why are you trying?  because you can't stop thinking about it... and you won't be able to... probably ever.  so wht do you do aboot it?  take things one day at a time.  meditate, explore your mind (in my opinion), find patience.  do anything to take your mind off it.  write an abstract story about how you feel.  make youtubes?

its not easy.  somedays you wil get tired of hating yourself and on those days ~ paint a picture, learn how to make music (i like ableton live), get into photography... just do something besides "think about it" and when you start feeling sad... look/listen/read to what you made and feel proud that you have the ability to "create" take these emotions and turn then into a creative force.

i had the same problem, still do on certain days... its kinda like a ->-bleeped-<-PMS now LOL happens once a month!

[JoanneB]

Though I am sure my story will have no impact on your thoughts since you are in the self regenerating negative death spiral about yourself, I'll give it a go. I am a pro with lost causes, like myself

• I am 6ft tall and had been about the tallest in my HS besides the largest
• I started hs at like 5'9" and 150+. By the time I got out 6' and a 250lbs of pure rolly-polly blubber
• I started hs with a receeding hairline and its been way downhill since
• I have a big rib cage, frog hands and super extra large feet
• Whenever I look in the mirror all I used to see is that big fat four eyed stutering mouth breathing fatso
• And I can go on, if I let myself
• Oh... did I mention I knew I was trans since about the age of 4?

I had no aspiration of ever being supermodel material or even anything close to that. I tried experimenting with transitioning twice in my 20's. Both times calling it off between my desire to be "normal" and fear of spending a lifetime being a target of ridicule or worse, just like my life pretty much was spent to that point.

A totally amazing, mindblowing, and scaring the crap out of me thing happened last year. It dawned on me that I pretty much achieved my lifelong dream. I was out in the real world being seen as and accepted as a woman!

How I managed it? Attitude.

I had spent many months and gallons of tears looking over my life, all my negative thought patterns, and the subsequent negative outcomes. I got involved with the most perfect TG group for me for the first time ever in my life. Another first seeing a therapist to help me with all of my other life issues as I had no desire whatsoever nor plans to eventually transition. Been there, tried that, opted for normal, and have tons of responsibilities to others and lastly to myself that I signed up for.

The physical aspects of presenting as a woman are fairly easily to overcome without any surgeries, or even hormones. Clothing and makeup can do wonders. A little work on the voice goes a very long way. The rest is self confidence and attitude. Neither of which can be truly be had without the tough personal work needed to rid yourself off a a lot of that negativity and unrealistic goals.

[O_O]

What kind of people are you talking about, mildly-retarded people or what? 

I am talking about Successful People.  Picking them apart is not the point, the point is that it is easy to be successful, all it takes is steady work towards a goal.  A little here, a little there.  Swallow a pill, swallow a pill the next day, swallow a pill the following day.  Plan, work, save money...  The goal takes form like the growth of a tree, hard to see any difference just by looking but despite the lack of evidence the tree continues to grow.

But life isn't worth living unless you can get the things that will give you happiness, relief and simply making life feel worth living.

Actually things can't make you happy.  I know that sounds lame on the surface but it is absolutely true.  Believing that things will bring you happiness is often times just a way to increase suffering in the moment or create your own pain.  It is like over-thinking things and getting all up in one's head, focusing on one's fears, focusing on why one cannot succeed, focusing on why one cannot be happy right now.

Life isn't about having everything you want right now.

Life is a journey that one must learn to enjoy.  Yes there are goals and milestones, acheivements, etc. but unless you can learn to enjoy working towards a goal then your life is going to be miserable and empty except for a few moments when you feel a temporary sense of "happiness" because the truth is you are always going to be missing something that is supposed to give you happiness.  And if you focus on not having and on being without... you will get more of what you don't want.  Law of Attraction, whatever you focus on you get more of.  Focusing on anything you do not have will create more of what you do not want in your life. 

It's really simple.  If you buy a red 1964 VW Beetle you will suddenly start noticing every time you see a red VW Beetle, etc.  If you think about all the things you have that you are grateful for you will notice more things in your life that you are grateful for, you will have more things to be grateful for.  If you are positive you can create the conditions necessary for success, if you are negative you will create the conditions for failure and suffering.

It isn't magic it's simple cause and effect and how our brains work.

I have tried cloths and so on, but seeing my body just makes things worse and makes me realize how hopeless things are for me.

Wouldn't it be neat if transition was as easy as taking a hormone pill and waking up the next morning to the kiss of a handsome prince in a beautiful castle (or insert your own fantasy).  Transition is what it is.  Transition isn't a miracle fantasy that one can simply have come true and live happily ever after the next day.  I am not going to say transition is hard because it is different for everyone.  Everyone experiences everything differently (to a degree).

If transition was as easy as taking a pill and waking up the next day as a princess there wouldn't be any trans support forums.

Though, I guess that maybe doesn't count into transition? If it's part-time and FT you're talking about, that you actually go outside as yourself.

I don't know what you mean.  Suffice it to say I am encouraging you.  Complaining about how impossible transition is or saying you will never be able to transition is a bit like a man who has the instructions for building a car.  He can either go out and get the parts and assemble them (as he is able to afford them) or he can throw up his hands in despair and cry about how he doesn't have a car.  Maybe go into a fetal position and rock back and forth because there is no way on earth he can possibly be happy or survive without a car.

Or he can begin accumulating the parts and assembling them.  And because he is human he can even begin to enjoy the process.  Saving up the money, going to places, searching for deals on parts, assembling the car one part at a time, learning about things that have to do with assembling a car. 

The point is if you can't be happy right now you will never be able to be happy.  The man in the illustration above could make new friends, talk about shock absorbers or tires and be excited about his project or he could spend all his time complaining and being miserable and talking about how he will never have a car and for him that will become his self-fulfilling prophecy because if he continues to focus on what he does not have he will spend his live never having anything and always being miserable.

I went through exactly what you are going through.  I was terrified and kept telling myself why I could never transition and because of that I prevented myself from transitioning sooner.  You are younger and will obviously be more passable than I was sooner and yet some how I was able to get over myself, my stupid fears and all of my insecurity.  Really what worked for me never had anything to do with anything any one ever said to me, I simply had to become so miserable that it didn't matter if all my fears came true or not.  So I transitioned and magically all those fears and reasons why I could never transition simply vanished because they were all in my imagination anyway.

If you could have everything you could possibly ever want today what would bring you happiness tomorrow?

Transition will become what you believe about it and there is powerful magic in that, the magic to create or the magic to curse one's self.  Choose wisely.

[muuu]

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[muuu]

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[Kelly J. P.]

Well, I really wouldn't mind seeing somebody else whine and be negative, other than myself... Like, it's nice to know that at least somebody else is into self-pity and hopelessness too!

Well, I feel a lot like you describe, except I'm a little further along ... at two years hormones. Same weight issue, 'cept I'm one of those lucky people who don't put on weight.

Now, I shouldn't be complaining too much about how I look, because I'm on the feminine side of androgynous - a little makeup and the right clothing helps a lot. However, passing as male is just as simple as forgetting the makeup and going out in more masculine clothes.

I don't really like that. I started at seventeen, and I was really hoping my appearance would be a little better than ambiguous... I also hoped that I would be able to fill out a bra, fit into girls' bottoms, and look good while showing skin. As it stands, an A-cup is still miles away, I need to wear a belt with size zero jeans because my hips are so tiny, and shaving my legs invariably makes me an aching, itching, burning, red-skinned mess of a human being.

I don't have to money to really take care of myself, or get electrolysis to finish up the laser job on my face, or clear away some body hair. The body hair, by the way, covers nearly every spot on me. It isn't dark and wiry, but it's... visible upon inspection. It's dark enough, and long enough, to make me uncomfortable with showing off, say... my back, shoulders, upper arms, torso, or whatever-else-have-you. I also need to get rid of some hair on my hands, but I don't imagine that stuff gets noticed too often. I have gross amphibian hands anyway, so nobody bothers to stare.

Until things turn around, my life is a big waiting game, as I can't even afford the government-funded SRS. Why? Because recovery and airfare aren't covered. D'oh. And who knows if my body will ever slow down enough to let me put on a few pounds - but even if it does, I'd like to be in good shape, and that means burning off lots of fat. I may never be able to have natural breasts, and this really upsets me... because implants are expensive, unnatural, and gross. I may end up getting them anyway, but I'd really prefer not to.

I know things will get better in time, but I'm so tired of living in the future... so tired of hating the present. So tired of hating how I look, and how I am. So tired of this eternal depression. I was happy for most of 2011... why did that have to go away? I miss happiness so much. I'm so tired of life, and all I know is that I'm lucky that suicide is still a scary thought. I feel caught between life and death, because... while I'm not really alive, I still breathe and walk.

That's a part of what makes me a ghost. I've almost always been that... not noticed, not living, not dead. Passing through life as more of a spectator than an actor.

Even now, after two years, I don't really feel that I'm able to fit in with females. I note, though, that I don't fit in with most humans in general... I mean more than socially though. My body, specifically, doesn't feel very 'female', but I imagine that this is mostly because I don't really notice my breasts. I forget to factor them in because they're... just so small. Unless I'm topless, it's easy enough to think I have a boy's chest.

But, socially... I'm still as awkward as ever. I'm too honest, a very poor sympathizer, I take things literally, and I don't usually consider the feelings of others when I speak. I can process their thoughts based on likelihood, but people's emotions elude me. That makes me very insensitive, at times, and this often leads to me hurting people unintentionally.

I had hoped that I would get even a little better at socializing. Perhaps that was an unreasonable expectation.

Overall, I feel like a failure... when you factor in my failure with employment in recent history, my ability to live life, and how I have changed over the years.

I feel like a flower that would rather wilt than blossom.

My patience will be tested, because I won't be able to further my transition at all in 2013. And I can still see a guy in the mirror.

Here's to the future. It's all I've got going for me.


(Making a new thread isn't worthwhile. Another crying thread would just be a waste of space, so I'll put this here, and if anyone cares... feel free to respond.)

[muuu]

.

[Aleah]

I've seen your pictures in the Could I Pass thread, you have nothing to worry about, you have an amazing starting point and people with far worse have transitioned to 100% passable and attractive.

Also being attractive is more about attitude and style than anything, staying fit and eating healthy is important too, but all of these things are within your grasp.

Just have faith 

[Cindy]

muu, maybe have a look at what I posted.


https://www.susans.org/forums/index.php/topic,131441.0.html

There was no way I could pass for every reason in the book and ten others.

Tomorrow I will be standing on a stage in front of people receiving an award for stuff in front of all my University colleagues.

I will be wearing a skirt and top and looking good.

I came out FT about 3 months ago.

If anyone doesn't know they will tomorrow.

If I can anyone can.

[Noelle]

Dang if i had my SRS covered id shut the hell up and never complain again. Thats a godsend and you dont even see it, who cares what other ppl think u will be female where it COUNTS.

plus u just started hrt , im sure the situation isnt quite as bad as you think and the HRT will help some.

[Noelle]

Oh lol, just saw your post in the could i pass thread, calm down you'll be fine.

[O_O]

@O_O

I don't really want to live like a successful person, continuously running in a wheel to make their life better.

I see what you are doing here and at first I wasn't even going to post except that I know there are others out there who will be encouraged by what I and others have said.  So our efforts aren't a complete waste.

What you do with your own life is up to you.

You have the rest of your life to enjoy.  What you do today will affect the quality of your life tomorrow.

Good luck with whatever you choose to do.

[oZma]

maybe we should stop encouraging this behavior by not responding.  it seems as if muuu is simply trying to convinceherself that ashe is hopeless by knocking every good idea, thought, etc... she will convince herself she is hopeless but what does that even mean? she is human so she will believe there is hope somewhere so she will post something here looking for more arguments to have hope but she will argue herself out of them and repeat the cycle.

I do the same thing sometimes

[Alainaluvsu]

maybe we should stop encouraging this behavior by not responding.  it seems as if muuu is simply trying to convinceherself that ashe is hopeless by knocking every good idea, thought, etc... she will convince herself she is hopeless but what does that even mean? she is human so she will believe there is hope somewhere so she will post something here looking for more arguments to have hope but she will argue herself out of them and repeat the cycle.

I do the same thing sometimes

My thoughts exactly

[muuu]

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[Kelly J. P.]

Shouldn't AAs fix body hair? Like, maybe your T isn't being put low enough?
Have you tried epilating? If you haven't I guess you could try that, for your skin, but it might just make it worse. Like, my armpits are not very happy with razors, but epilating them works fine. Though, be really careful, cuz it may damage your skin and cause in-growns... which isn't fun...
And like, I think there was some discussion about that having low T is kinda needed for breast growth. Maybe there's something to that.

I suppose you might need help in getting better at social things, I suppose just generally it's hard to attain social skills when you're alone, but to learn how people work you might actually talk to somebody who knows how to teach those things... I think at least people with ADHD, or those in the autism specturm might need 'professional' help to function better in social situations.

What's about 2013, you have to stop HRT?

My hormone levels have been fine for quite some time, and yes I have tried epilation. I didn't really find it all that helpful.

As for social skills... I think I function okay. I can make friends, I just have problems keeping them, and I can put on a great show when I need to, for whatever.

As for 2013... it's not that I will stop HRT. It's just that I won't be making any progress in my transition. I hate standing still.