Huge thighs

[A]

I evilly tried to steal a thread to ask about this, but my plan failed, so I'll be creating a new topic.

Since the topic is there, maybe I could ask this, that's been on my mind for a long time.

They always say that when you're worried about your muscles, you should do lower body exercises and all, but... Assuming one of my main problems is how huge my thigh muscles are, what do I do? Even my calves shrunk enough for me to notice, but my thighs didn't. Even my butt muscles are super large.

Mostly in the back, but in the front too, my thigh muscles are way too large, as if I'd been training them like crazy. Thing is, though, I don't do any of that! I walk to the bus stop, spend the day on my butt, and then get home and spend the evening on my butt. ._. I did "train" on Dance Dance Revolution last summer, but at some point, the mat died, and I stopped. But it wasn't so intense, and my thighs were there before anyway.

Imagine looking at my thighs from above, "vertical" being the face-back axis and "horizontal" being the shoulder-to-shoulder axis. You know how normally, people's thighs are round, or slightly wider horizontally than vertically? Well, mine are -considerably- wider vertically. As far as I know, that's what muscular athletes have, and I certainly don't want that. Even when I start depositing fat on the outer sides of my thighs, as would be normal with female-level estrogen, it looks like I'd need such a humongous amount to look okay, to the point that the rest of the body will not look okay anymore due to being overweight.

Lastly, you know how when you look at someone standing, knees together, in tight pants, sometimes, there's a triangle of space between the crotch and the knees? Mostly it's girls, because they have wider hips (and also wear more of those tight pants). I could have that kind of thing, because I do have hips - not quite a girl's, but there's much worse. But I don't because the muscles on the inside of my thighs are huge.

I don't get how I can have such large thighs (and butt, but that's not a major issue apart from my "pointy" butt) while barely moving around, unhealthily so, while the rest of my muscles are, yeah, bigger than I'd like, but nowhere as bad.

So, yeah, in summary... What do you do with annoyingly large thighs?

[muuu]

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[Noelle]

I think anymore cardio would just draw attention to the muscles..

DEfinetly dont do any strength training and yah avoiding protein is a good idea.

Just stop working out, and let everything soften up, hrt should help it along the way... might take a year or two so prepare for a long wait.

I was pretty muscular upperbody before hrt and transition, and i stopped working out completely and everything softened up.
I waited a year and a half then just started back up some cardio and lower body excersizes.... i think it made my face look sharper so im going easy with it.

[A]

But uhm, isn't avoiding protein really unhealthy to begin with? And I'm guessing breast growth (for example) would be happy to have some protein. Besides, protein is a really effective hunger cutter, and without getting enough I feel I'll be hungry and eat, eat, eat, and start gaining a lot of weight again. By the way, do you confirm what I say? That thighs are mostly round or a bit wider?

[muuu]

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[Alainaluvsu]

But uhm, isn't avoiding protein really unhealthy to begin with? And I'm guessing breast growth (for example) would be happy to have some protein. Besides, protein is a really effective hunger cutter, and without getting enough I feel I'll be hungry and eat, eat, eat, and start gaining a lot of weight again. By the way, do you confirm what I say? That thighs are mostly round or a bit wider?

You're correct on all points. And I'd like to mention I eat a BUNCH of protein and my muscle mass fell off of me dramatically. I have a very feminine upper and lower body and can pull off wearing a tank top and get lots of male attention while doing it. I've been told I look like a female gymnast, as a matter of fact. I don't have frail, fragile arms, and instead have lean, toned, feminine arms. Also, my boobs are on the verge of C cups in just 16 months of HRT. I think it's testosterone, not protein, that determines whether you'll have more muscle mass. Protein isn't a growth hormone, but testosterone is.

Let's not forget that hair and skin require protein (keratin, collagen) that the body cannot produce itsself. Deny yourself that, and your hair will grow slower, thinner, and will break easier. Your skin will not look as healthy either, nor will it renew cells properly, and in fact 1/10th of all protein in the body is located in the skin. Protein deficiency  could lead to age spots, wrinkles, hypopigmentation, thin skin (which can lead to scarring), and other things.  I sincerely believe that starving yourself of protein is the key to having poor results with HRT.

Breast and protein might be true I suppose...
As a hunger cutter you could try to drink A LOT of water or something that is close to 0kcal.

I think it's mostly about where on the thighs the width is. Having wide "vertical" thighs isn't bad, as long as the width is from behind (i.e, big butt, that isn't too pointy). And for "horizontally" the width should be from the outer sides. I don't think there's any rule on which should be wider, as long as your width comes from behind/outer sides.

Water is heavy and depletes your sodium levels which spiro kills anyways. Peanut butter is better for hunger and is better for you if you're looking to stop being hungry.

Also, thigh fat on women is typically on the upper inner thighs, starting at the mid thigh and ending near the genitals.

[A]

Hmm, and here I was thinking fat was more on the outer side... Sigh, I hope I at least get some there. I don't find it pleasing to have "holes" on the outsides of my thighs, between the two huge muscles.

So uhm, so far, I don't get much hope. Sometimes I wish I would get injured in a way and put to bed, unable to move, for a few months. :p But anyway, is there -anything- to be done besides starving myself and damaging my whole body in the process? (And to begin with I already eat too little of those, proteins... amongst many other nutrients. My eating habits are such a mess.) You don't think adding estrogens in a more reasonable dose than what I have right now would actually reduce muscles, no? I mean, anti-androgens removes male stuff, and estrogen only adds female stuff, right?

(By the way, my testosterone is on the very lowest point of the normal levels for females. I doubt killing it even further would change much.)

[A]

I always feel like a cheater when it's about that. When I took an anti-depressant for a month and then began medication for my ADD, I immediately stopped being hungrier than my body needed. Lost a total of 70 pounds, including 50 in ~3 months, from my maximum of a bit over 200 lb, just by having healthy food at my disposal (the hospital offered us meals at noon at my group therapy, and I could have as much of those delicious steamed carrots as I wanted, without the effort to buy them, cut them or wash a pot afterwards -yay!), and down it went, without any damned effort.

Right now I THINK medications are helping my ADD but sometimes I doubt it, seeing how much difficulty I have with some things. But even if I were sure they're not useful, I'm not sure I would go off those meds. I feel like a cocaine addict saying this (and actually, stimulant meds against ADD are stunningly close to cocaine chemically), but I wouldn't want to go back to eating a banana and two 500-gram pots of yogurt after supper in an evening and still be hungry. x_x

I seriously think I had a major hunger problem that just happened to be treated with this. I mean, who can say they put on 50 pounds in 3 to 4 months by eating mostly healthy, just because of the amounts?

But anyway, this is a bit irrelevant right now, eh. What about my thighs?

[suzifrommd]

So, yeah, in summary... What do you do with annoyingly large thighs?

Love your body as the wonderful vessel you've been given. Realize that the human body is beautiful in all the different shapes and sizes it comes in. Understand that body shape doesn't define your worth.

No body shape is any better than any other body shape.

[Padma]

I've gained nearly 3" in thigh circumference now since being on E. It came as quite a surprise. And yes, it's almost all on the inner thigh, they now rub together disconcertingly.

[Alainaluvsu]

Hmm, and here I was thinking fat was more on the outer side... Sigh, I hope I at least get some there. I don't find it pleasing to have "holes" on the outsides of my thighs, between the two huge muscles.

So uhm, so far, I don't get much hope. Sometimes I wish I would get injured in a way and put to bed, unable to move, for a few months. :p But anyway, is there -anything- to be done besides starving myself and damaging my whole body in the process? (And to begin with I already eat too little of those, proteins... amongst many other nutrients. My eating habits are such a mess.) You don't think adding estrogens in a more reasonable dose than what I have right now would actually reduce muscles, no? I mean, anti-androgens removes male stuff, and estrogen only adds female stuff, right?

(By the way, my testosterone is on the very lowest point of the normal levels for females. I doubt killing it even further would change much.)

Muscle is more on the outside of the thighs. It's true that fat is stored at the very bottom of the hips (which may look like your thighs) However if you take a look at some pictures of womens legs, the larger their thighs, the more space there is between their knees when they are standing. The first changes I noticed in my thighs were about 4 months in, when my thighs started losing muscle on the front and more fat was collecting in the upper inner areas.

Estrogen doesn't reduce muscle (to my knowledge), but it is responsible for placing fat in the thighs in the proper places (and keeping the fat off the waist, too). In fact, post menopausal women not on hrt tend to store fat more in the waist, which is actually unusual before menopause.

IDK the trick to getting rid of muscle, though. But I noticed that my muscles weren't looking completely until about a year into a full dose of HRT. All I know, as far as diet is concerned, I ate lots of protein, sodium, and drank mostly water. I also noticed a significant drop off when I got fired from my job (8 month mark) which had me doing a lot of physical stuff. But I lost plenty of muscle before then, too.

If I had to guess, protein is good for metabolism, salt is good for a number of things such as water regulation, nervous system communication, free radical reduction, and battles muscle cramps produced by spironolactone (as spiro is a diuretic), and water is just flat out necessary for us due to spiro, it is great for the kidneys and liver, and it combats constipation which many women experience due to estrogen. I didn't really exercise that much though or do anything special beyond that.

[Isabelle]

Jog/walk lots. Lots and lots. Also, keep your calories below 1000.

[A]

agfrommd: There are limits to such a way of thinking, I say. If not, why even transition? Besides, I'm a details maniac.

Padma: Lol, bad news. Mine already rub together, causing "cool" ingrowns.

Alainaluvsu: Isn't salt mostly harmful in any contemporary-world amounts? I remember my physical education teacher telling me how he had calculated that by eating nearly nothing pre-packaged and never adding any salt per se to anything, he was always a bit over the recommmended daily amounts of sodium. Besides, uhm. I take cyproterone acetate, not spiro.

Isabelle: Wait, are you telling me that my thigh muscles will shrink if I ADD exercise? I'm sorry, but I'm going to need some additional explanations to understand that. Also, uhm, isn't 1000 calories a bit extreme? On a metabolism calculator, if I put in "inactive" (and perhaps one might decide I'm "lightly active"), it says my metabolism is 1645. 1000 sounds crazy low. It's not like I'm an obese looking for super fast fat loss.

[Alainaluvsu]

Alainaluvsu: Isn't salt mostly harmful in any contemporary-world amounts? I remember my physical education teacher telling me how he had calculated that by eating nearly nothing pre-packaged and never adding any salt per se to anything, he was always a bit over the recommmended daily amounts of sodium. Besides, uhm. I take cyproterone acetate, not spiro.

I forgot, you aren't in the US so you're not on Spiro so it may not apply to you. However, sodium / salt is necessary in your diet, but must be taken in the right amounts. As sodium helps with cell reproduction (in tandum with water), this is especially important when your body is going through changes that HRT provides. It is also an essential part of the nervous system. With a low sodium balance, you are at risk of headaches, nausea / vomiting, confusion, fatigue, and loss of consciousness / seizures.

I think most people get enough sodium in their diets through processed foods, so that may be why people say not to add salt to any meals. However, for those of us on Spiro, we need to increase our intake.  For example, I explained that I eat lots of food loaded with sodium, well nearly every test I've had that tested metabolic function showed that my sodium was on the very low side of normal. There are times I still get a couple of the symptoms I've listed above.

[Isabelle]

It's like marathon training. They have very lean thin muscles. The calorie restriction is to put your body into "starvation" mode so your body will burn muscle tissue for energy instead of fat.

[A]

Alainaluvsu: Well, looks like spiro is something quite violent. Because one slice of bread that actually tastes more sweet than salty can have 15 % of the normal daily amount of sodium. After all, the amount we should get daily is less than a teaspoon daily.

Isabelle: Well, marathon runners have leaner, thinner muscles than weight lifters, but I'm pretty sure they have much more massive muscles than your average skinny lazy person.

[Isabelle]

Ok cool. Still. Starve your body and it will eat your muscles for energy. Exercise and calorie restriction will speed the process.

[Alainaluvsu]

Alainaluvsu: Well, looks like spiro is something quite violent. Because one slice of bread that actually tastes more sweet than salty can have 15 % of the normal daily amount of sodium. After all, the amount we should get daily is less than a teaspoon daily.

Maybe it is violent. I honestly don't like putting any drugs into my system, but I'll make an exception to the ones I'm taking on HRT. I haven't had any bad side effects from it other than possibly bad smelling urine at first, though. Many trans women, however, do not have a choice in the US, as last I checked it is not prescribed here. Also, I've heard bad stories about it messing with your liver, bad. It does nuke your T levels into the dirt from what I've read, though.

I wish I could afford an orchie, or better yet srs

Isabelle: that's one way to do it... it's a dangerous way to do it. Your body gets hungry for a reason. It's asking you for vitamins and minerals it needs for cellular maintenance, repair, and reproduction. Experiencing HRT effects is seriously like going through a second puberty. You NEED extra food to do it.

[Isabelle]

(Pic related cause marathon runners are absurdly lean with little body fat. If you want to be lean, train like a marathon runner. Disagree if you like or, actually look at pictures of marathon runners legs. You'd actually be surprised at how little I care about the size of your thighs but, I am trying to help with the problem you're claiming to have. It's a solution. Call a personal trainer, tell them you want to thin down your thigh muscles and see what they say. Yes it will inhibit your breasts growing and you'll have no bum fat but, you can put that on after you've lost the muscle mass)


I agree. It's not the best thing for a growing body but, if you want to loose muscle mass, it works. There is actually research that suggests low calorie diets promote longevity. It's stressful though so, obviously you don't want to do it all the time. It's not great for your heart. It's great for loosing muscle though. Hrt will change your muscles over a space of about 5 years though.
Also, spiro isn't really "violent" it's actually very well tolerated by the body at high doses for long periods of time. Which is why it's used. Cyproterone Acetate is harder on your body. Luprin is even harder. It's all serious medication though so basicially you just have to make the decision if hrt is right for your body. It's your body you're changing and you are the one who ultimately is responsible for what you put in it. Hrt can kill you, give you diabetes all kinds of stuff

[Alainaluvsu]

I generally agree with everything Isabelle just said, except the breast growth part. I'm not sure that breast growth will grow at the nominal rate after a while of being on HRT and then starving yourself. I would think that may stunt growth. But nobody knows how that would work... I'm sure.