41 & I Don't Believe I'll Ever Pass

[JustZac]

I started hormones almost a year ago (on T 43 weeks now). Have definitely experienced many awesome changes, but have yet to pass. Starting to wonder if it will ever happen. I have a fairly large chest (even with the binder), and have top surgery scheduled for August...hoping it will help people see me as male. I'm at the age where I'm seriously not caring what people think, but man....it would be so nice to think I'm looking on the outside the way I feel on the inside.

Is there any hope? Any 40+ guys out there wanna weigh in?

[karenpayneoregon]

I believe part of passing is just not physical changes via hormones but how one presents themselves in regards to mannerisms. You may find that after top surgery a good deal will change (coupled with mannerisms) in how people see you, not as female but as male. Looking at your profile picture I see a man, not a female.

[HeyTrace19]

Well...there is always hope!  Hope is what gets us all out of bed every morning   

I had top surgery at age 40, and started T some months after that.  There was really no way I could be perceived as male with the chest I had, so that is where I started...BEST thing for me, ever, hands down!  I hope you feel that same relief after your surgery. 

The Testosterone has delivered some necessary changes and also a few unwanted effects for me, and I am now just over 5 years on.  Most places I go, I am recognized as male, but I do get some second glances and staring like people are wondering just what kind of freak I am.  Honestly, when I look in the mirror I do not see a very masculine person, I see a woman with a goatee...Not Me!...Or the me I think I should see. The facial hair keeps me from being called ma'am in public, and my hairline has changed a good bit.  My body shape is nearly the same, despite lots of upper body workouts and a small amount of fat shifting from my butt to my gut. 

My body had an estrogen dominant system for so many years, I think it is difficult to fight that, and I am a little disappointed that I have not masculinized more than I have, but it is BETTER now than it used to be.  I guess I will see what each year brings...it is a slow test of patience.  Hang in there!

[FTMax]

If you're not passing, ask people why they're gendering you a certain way. We are often blind to small things, because our focus is on the big things like our voices or appearance. Mannerisms and speech patterns are often the big giveaways IME.

[shean R]

I started T when I was 49 and 4 months later had top surgery, as with you even with binding no way I could hide them.  It has been just 5 years for me and 99% of the time I pass for male.  I recently started a new job with a new company totally new people and felt it would be great to start fresh where no one knew.  WRONG!  My boss and I had a discussion a few months in and she told me she knew I was trans, asked her how she knew she said she could just tell.  Kind of bummed me out cause I really thought that I passed pretty well.  But my shape is still bigger hips, butt and smaller upper body.  I am working out hard and eating much healthier, but certainly the older we are the more difficult I believe that it is for our bodies to adjust.  For me working out and "feeling" more masculine helps me.  You have to find whatever it is that helps you "feel" more masculine, sometimes it is more about "feeling" it on the inside and then you will see it more on the outside.  Good luck and don't get too discouraged.  Top surgery helps tremendously.

[JustZac]

Thanks, everyone - top surgery is scheduled for early August, so I'm hoping that helps...

[AnxietyDisord3r]

I don't pass 99% of the time or anything, but I'm 36 and top surgery made an immediate, enormous change in my passing stats. I'm talking next day, magical change, I haven't changed a damn thing. (My voice has dropped enough after 4 mo on T that people don't "correct" themselves after I speak, either.)

I'm talking about total strangers. People I know are still working on it. Hopefully my face will change on T in time.

[Tysilio]

I'm 64. I've been on T for 27 months, but I haven't had top surgery yet (I'm hoping to get it done this year if things go well). I've been 100% read as male for at least a year. The biggest thing for me, I think, was having my voice drop -- that, and a hairline that's receding pretty dramatically.  It helps that I'm 5'8" tall and have a biggish frame, but I think it also has to do with the way I move; I was never well socialized as female, and I've been read as male from a distance for decades.

43 weeks isn't that long -- that's about how long it took for me to be sure my voice was dropping, and for a lot of other changes to begin to be noticeable. I'll echo what others have said: I think body language and speech patterns make a huge difference, and those are things you can change. 

That said, there's no reason to think that the changes we need won't happen because we're older -- everyone's timetable is different.

Oh, and -- it's well worth the wait. It feels fantastic to be seen as who you are.

[Arch]

Well, there's no magic formula. I was read as male a lot when I was in my thirties and back at the university after dropping out. Younger crowd, lots of young men, and I was young-looking. The older I got, the less I "passed." But when I was at my unhappiest and quite overweight (much of it in my chest), I still confused people sometimes, even when people didn't know my (male) name. Go figure.

I started T at 46 and was just starting to be read as male FAIRLY consistently right before top surgery. I had top surgery 4 1/2 months after starting T and never really had issues after that. I may have been openly misread a couple of times the rest of that year--occasionally, a male cashier or service representative would say either "ma'am" or "man," and I couldn't tell which. I feel that top surgery was a big game-changer for me, on top of the rapid changes from a full dose of T.

I suppose I'm lucky in a lot of ways. I already had a masculine presentation, I didn't have a pretty face, and I have never smiled much (women tend to smile a lot more than men do). I'm not unusually short for a guy (about 5' 7"), my shoulders are not super-narrow, and my hips are not super-wide.

I feel that some of "passing" comes from the company that you have been keeping. Virtually all of my socializing was with men, and I have always been in relationships with men, consistently from high school. I figure that I picked up a lot of mannerisms and habits of speech that are more common among men than among women. I have noticed in my own trans community that the trans men who have been in relationships with men before transition tend to come across as straight when they have transitioned, and the ones who came out of the lesbian world tend to come across as gay, mainly because they have a lot more stereotypically female mannerisms and seem femmier. I don't know whether the guys of lesbian provenance take longer to be read as male, though.

Mixed bag. See what top surgery does for you.

P.S. I'm also blessed with really aggressive sideburns, and my facial hair started becoming very full after a few years in. I am unfortunately losing my hair in front, but all of these features add to the overall picture. Facial hair is awesome if you can grow it--once it matures and doesn't look like teenage facial hair.