So I've identified as genderqueer for a couple of years now. I'm out to family and friends, as well as some coworkers. I've changed my name socially but not legally (yet...it's expensive and I'm trying to decide if it's worth it for me). I was pretty convinced for most of that time that I wasn't really interested in any sort of physical transition. A few months ago I suddenly found myself looking up information about testosterone. In the past, I had read somewhere that going on T can be dangerous for someone who is Bipolar (which I am), because there's a risk of destabilization. However, the more I read, the more I found stories of people who actually found they were more stable on T than they were before. That information has been sitting in the back of my head as a "maybe we'll consider this eventually" thing for a couple of months...until this last week. Seemingly out of nowhere, I've started looking at physical transition as a more feasible possibility. I've been binding for a couple of years, but just this last week bought myself a packer, and then found myself ordering an STP. I'm more intensely bothered by being read as female, especially at work. Bathroom stress is increasing exponentially (hence the STP). I was out of town for my partner's friend's wedding this past weekend, and had multiple panic attacks, first going through airport security (fun fact: those awful body scanners will not pick up on the fact that you're wearing a packer), and then when faced with social situations where I felt like people were going to think I was a girl. I'm much more actively looking at starting T, or at least at finding a therapist who can help me hammer out more of what I want. I still don't feel dysphoric, per se...I don't think I'd trade my current anatomical configuration with the typical alternative if given the choice, but I don't want anyone aside from myself and my partner to necessarily know what that configuration is. I'm going bonkers because my partner is still out of town (it was cheaper for hir to fly back later i the week), and I want to talk about all of these things, but they're the sort of things to talk about in person, not over the phone, you know?
Add to all of that the fact that, at the beginning of the week, I was doing a lot of thinking and writing along the lines of "is my identity real, or is it just the result of internalized misogyny/the patriarchy?"
Anyway, I'm super overwhelmed and not entirely sure where all of this is coming from. The only thing I can maybe pin it on is the fact that I just started a new job, and this is the first time I've had a job where I feel safe being out (I'm slowly forcing myself to be more assertive about pronouns at work, and people have been great). I'm confident that this is a workplace that could handle a physical transition on my part. I'm wondering if all of this has been bubbling just beneath the surface for the past two years, and is only coming up now because my subconscious knew I absolutely couldn't deal with it before.
Has anyone else ever been flooded with all the gender-related thoughts and feelings all at once?
