Becca's HRT Journey

[Becca Kay]

thank you all for you replies and messages.  It really helps!

[Becca Kay]

extra long weekend almost over.  I've been cooking for three straight days.

Saturday afternoon I had a party with all my siblings and their kids.  I made pies.  my Trans support group had a potluck on Saturday night.  I made lasagna.  Yesterday I spent all afternoon making pies for the next two days worth of meals.  And I made more lasagna for my soon to be ex's family last night.  This morning I got up early to cook a ham, which I had to my mother's for an early Xmas brunch.  Tonight i'm making pizza for my sister in law, who flew into town from LA late yesterday. 

I'm not out to my immediate family, but I am out to my soon to be ex's family.  they've been very kind to me, despite the divorce.  I'm waiting until after the holidays to come out to my mother.  This weekend I stopped switching my outfits between the holiday outings where i was either in or out.  My female clothing isn't really all that different from my male clothing (skinny jeans, t shirts).  I told myself that if my mother asked me about my nail polish I'd just blurt out to her that i was queer.  But she never did. 

[Becca Kay]

i've been trying to put on make up on for a while now.  In private.  I kept thinking it would help me.   It's not going so well.  It makes me look worse than I do without it. It's making me depressed.  I don't look any more feminine with make up on. I'm too old too, so it just exacerbates the wrinkles on my face.

To be honest i've never really wanted to wear make up.  But I don't see how anybody will ever see me as at least trying to present as a woman without it.  I envy my soon to be ex wife.  She's never worn make up.  She doesn't have to.  She's very beautiful and feminine and looks that way no matter what she's dressed in.

I on the other hand don't ever look feminine.  Even when I'm wearing leggings a skirt, etc. I look like a guy in women's clothing.  I keep pushing this out of my mind, though.  I keep telling myself that i need to take on step at a time and not get ahead of myself.  Therapy. Then HRT.  Then come out.  Then get FFS.  In the back of my mind, though, what I want is to be a different person.  Shorter, narrower,  not bald.  I don't want to have to wear a wig.  I don't want to have to try so hard. 

I was soooo happy to start HRT.  And it really has changed my mental state.  It's amazing. I don't want to go back. But now i'm starting to realize the easy part is over.  Coming out is gonig to be tough because it will mean that I have to accept myself, at least most of myself, as I am.

i'm so damn sad right now.    

[Laurie]

i've been trying to put on make up on for a while now.  In private.  I kept thinking it would help me.   It's not going so well.  It makes me look worse than I do without it. It's making me depressed.  I don't look any more feminine with make up on. I'm too old too, so it just exacerbates the wrinkles on my face.

To be honest i've never really wanted to wear make up.  But I don't see how anybody will ever see me as at least trying to present as a woman without it.  I envy my soon to be ex wife.  She's never worn make up.  She doesn't have to.  She's very beautiful and feminine and looks that way no matter what she's dressed in.

I on the other hand don't ever look feminine.  Even when I'm wearing leggings a skirt, etc. I look like a guy in women's clothing.  I keep pushing this out of my mind, though.  I keep telling myself that i need to take on step at a time and not get ahead of myself.  Therapy. Then HRT.  Then come out.  Then get FFS.  In the back of my mind, though, what I want is to be a different person.  Shorter, narrower,  not bald.  I don't want to have to wear a wig.  I don't want to have to try so hard. 

I was soooo happy to start HRT.  And it really has changed my mental state.  It's amazing. I don't want to go back. But now i'm starting to realize the easy part is over.  Coming out is gonig to be tough because it will mean that I have to accept myself, at least most of myself, as I am.

i'm so damn sad right now.   

Hi Becca,

  That's a bit of a list you have there so let start with Makeup. Think artist. Women learn the art of face painting as part of their growing up process. You and I did not. Because of that you are being unfair to yourself. Makeup take learning the techniques oh shading, contouring, high lighting and blending, And that is only to get your canvas ready for the real artwork. I have probably been at it for more years than you have and I don't know how they do it. My technique can be done with regular house paint brushes, just open the can mix and paint a coat on. It takes time to learn.

   Clothes is another thing that women are good at. Why? Because they know their bodies and colors and styles and accessorizing. They "Put together a look" that works for them taking into account all these things. Again it is a thing they have worked a lifetime on. You don't just grab something and put it on like you are used to doing when you lived as a guy. From myself I am beginning why it looks like a woman has emptied their closet and drawers on the bed when getting ready to go somewhere. I find myself doing it too. Just today I was going to wear a dress to go to lunch with Kendra, Beth, and Saha. I pulled out a pink cami with a bodice. A black and white striped dress, and because it's chilly a pair of black leggings I put it all on and looked at myself and too it all off, I didn't like the look. So I put on my stripe purple v neck sweater top, bootcut jeans pink socks and my dark brown boots with a 2' heel. (a favorite outfit) The dress and other stuff is still on my bed. sigh   Looking good take practice.

  Lastly girl, changing your gender is a process. You have already accomplished somethings, are working on others and still have more to do before you will get to a point you are happy. And let's face it girl we are doing these thing to be happy because we are sick and tired of not being happy. Some of these steps are harder than others. None of them are what I would call easy. Admitting you are trans is but the first and it isn't easy at all, But dear girl you have done it. doing everything to arrange to start HRT is not easy, but again you have done it. Okay actually taking it was pretty easy for me and probably for you too. Coming out to family and friends is one of the scariest thing you will do. There is no doubt about that. Fear surrounds every revelation you make to those that are important to you. You desperately want their acceptance and approval but what if they don't? It scares the bejesus out of you. Yet it is a thing you will do and how each turn out is a crap shoot, a flip of the coin. Now you brought up another really hard one for you and for myself. You are not alone with it.
I have yet to accept myself. I have too much old baggage I carry that keep me from even liking myself let alone accepting myself.  I hope your self acceptance is not as bad as mine. What ever they are , it is something to share with your therapist so you can get to work on it now. Maybe by the time you feel you can accept yourself you will.

  Sad? Well, once again you are not alone. Sad in itself isn't too bad as it is a passing thing. Thing get better and it disappears. Now depression, well that is a wholly differ can of worms. Don't let your sadness  become depression. It is a lot harder to make go away.

Hugs,
  Laurie

[LizK]

Hi Becca

Don't be so hard on yourself, we all feel horrible from time to time...there is no amount of makeup I can use to scrub away what 40+ years of testosterone and no care, has done to my appearance. However what I can do is improve my general appearance with the right combination of makeup.

It takes time to learn this stuff. I know everyone suggests online tutorials but I have to say the best advice I got was from a makeup artist who showed me (once) how to apply various items. The thing that helped the most is a very simple but well illustrated book showing how to apply the very basics of makeup. This book does not care if you spill something on it or drop it or run out or power, it fits in a bag , its simple and straight forward and very portable.

The other thing that helped is practice, expensive does not always equal the best when it comes to makeup. My favourite foundation is a $10 Target brand, it goes on better than my very expensive MAC foundation. I started my using one element at a time, Eyeliner , wearing BB cream or light foundation is a really good place to start. When you feel you have it working well, add another element. It won't take long before you have it working for you. Try a lipstick that is a similar colour to the inside of your bottom lip. Getting colours that work for you is nothing but trial and error.

......
I was soooo happy to start HRT.  And it really has changed my mental state.  It's amazing. I don't want to go back. But now i'm starting to realize the easy part is over.  Coming out is gonig to be tough because it will mean that I have to accept myself, at least most of myself, as I am.

i'm so damn sad right now.    

Self acceptance is possibly one of the hardest thing for many of us to do. I know I struggled with it for a long time and even now I still have days where I have to actively use some of the techniques my therapist taught me to get through them. Sometimes something will happen that hits you hard and bumps you into negative thinking. 

I started working on my self acceptance a few years ago now by using positive affirmations. I searched the net, wrote them up on my PC, printed them off and put them in old photo  frames in my line of sight to remind me...things like

"We are shaped by our thoughts. We become what we think"  and "What's in a name that which we call a rose. By any other name would smell as sweet" another opld one "There is no definitive answer to being transgender"

I know it can sound weird but they do help, You can't help being who you are. You can spend this one and only life you have been given thinking about who you might have been or spend it being that person. It is going to be tough, difficult and at times disheartening, but when you get to a place where you find the dysphoria begins to leave you then you don't want to ever go back. I hope you can finds that space soon.

[Becca Kay]

Thank you Laurie and Elizabeth!  I had a couple of bad days this week and things started to really get to me.   I also haven't been to my shrink in going on two weeks because of the holidays.  My dysphoria is exacerbated by stress and I have a LOT of stress in my life right now.

Job search and recently meeting with a divorce lawyer has taken a toll.  I know I'll snap back. 

[Becca Kay]

time for some updates....

based on my last blood work my Endo upped my estrodiol.  I was on a low dose the first few months and this doubles it.


I had an in person job interview last week. they flew me to their headquarters.   4 straight hours with half a dozen people, one after the other.  I thought everything went very very well, but i found out yesterday that I didn't get the position.  My job search is now three months long.  It's now much more of a cause for anxiety in my life than my dysphoria.

Earlier tonight i finally got up the nerve to come out to my mother.  I had soooo much fear built up over telling her.  My therapist has been urging me for weeks now to tell her.  I have a good relationship with my mom, even if it's not a terribly close one.  But I had worried and worried and worried that I would break her heart somehow.  In my mind I imagined the absolute worst that could happen and it was making me sick. 

I called her on the phone because I couldn't make myself do it in person and had kept chickening out.  It ended up going very well.  She wasn't heartbroken.  She didn't have a negative reaction.  She told me not to worry and that she loved me.  She actually said that she'd noticed for a long time that i'd been depressed, and that recently something was obviously different with me.  She was so OK with it that after the phone call I kind of froze and just sat in my house for 5 minutes trying to absorb what had just happened.

[Laurie]

Hi Becca,

  I am sorry that you didn't get the job you were after. Keep putting those resumes and online applications out there eventually you will get one of them.
  Isn't it great that your worries about telling your Mom wasn't as big a deal as you thought it would be? Good job for getting it done. Not you can back off a little on the stress meter. You really don't need it and dysphoria now do you? Deep breaths and take it easy on yourself. Things will work themselves out for you.

Hugs,
   Laurie

[Becca Kay]

I have had such a deep deep fear of coming out. First to my wife, then friends, then my family. It ate away at me and the anxiety from it has sometimes crippled me.  As I think about it more and more I think this fear is really driven by shame.  I was raised to think this is shameful, a sin.  My father used to say "you can be anything you want in life as long as you're not a faggot."

Last night each of my siblings reached out to me to tell me they support me.  Like my mother I heard from some of them that they had been concerned about me for years. That I had seemed depressed and even angry for a long time. This is obviously true, but I never realized how transparent I had been. I thought I had masked my depression better than that.

In a way this step in coming out has been anti climatic.  My fear of rejection or hurting my mother was unfounded. My immediate family, a few of whom are quite conservative chose me over their obvious political views.

[Roll]

In a way this step in coming out has been anti climatic.  My fear of rejection or hurting my mother was unfounded. My immediate family, a few of whom are quite conservative chose me over their obvious political views.

That has been my exact feeling over the past few months. Anti-climatic is the only word for it. We put so much of ourselves on the line, after having wrapped ourselves in fear and doubt, often burdened by self loathing or repression for decades. All the while absorbing every negative thing in the news and from more unfortunate coming out stories.

I'm getting to what I think is part two of that though, in that I'm starting to be a bit more brazen abut coming out. It helps that I'm out to 80% of the people I actually care about. It's going to come back to haunt me at some point, I'm sure. (In other words, because it's hard to just be happy, I've replaced one fear with another!)

[Laurie]

 My Dear Becca,

  Hon, your are not alone at all in growing up with fear, guilt, and shame. For me it wasn't a sin but it was wrong. It wasn't even my playing with my sisters or others girls when I was very young. It was when I began to borrow their clothes that the worst of my guilt and shame for doing what I so wanted to do. No one had to tell me it was wrong, it just was. And yet I did it and continued to do it all my life. Obviously this weighed heavily on my mind. As I got older I discovered even more self deprecating  terms to lower my self esteem and add to my insecurities. All these things began to make me angry as I acted out more and more about things I could not control. Of course back then I didn't know everything was somehow related to gender dysphoria. Everything added up and came out  in anger, family problems, drugs, alcoholism, divorce, depression, and it doesn't stop there. No Becca, you are definitely not alone in your struggles. I Then all know them well, Becca. Some of them I have been able to put in the past, others have gone and returned due to recent events. Somethings are constant companions.
  Those fears we all deal with can be debilitation and usually when we face then they are anticlimactic and that is good. I'll take anticlimactic any day over having my fears realized. And yes those fears do make it hard to be happy. But don't let it stop you from carrying one. I'm sure you can overcome the depression and sadness you feel. It won't be easy but I believe you can do it. I believe you will because I believe you want to end your distress in a positive manner. You can do this Becca. Believe it yourself for yourself and all else will fall into place.

Hugs,
   Laurie

[Becca Kay]

That has been my exact feeling over the past few months. Anti-climatic is the only word for it. We put so much of ourselves on the line, after having wrapped ourselves in fear and doubt, often burdened by self loathing or repression for decades. All the while absorbing every negative thing in the news and from more unfortunate coming out stories.

I'm getting to what I think is part two of that though, in that I'm starting to be a bit more brazen abut coming out. It helps that I'm out to 80% of the people I actually care about. It's going to come back to haunt me at some point, I'm sure. (In other words, because it's hard to just be happy, I've replaced one fear with another!)

Sunday I went out all day in make up for the first time.  Grocery shopping alone.  Then shopping at the mall with two of my girlfriends.  Then we went out for Margaritas.  I used the women's bathroom!  It was scary and fun and I fell asleep that night with a smile on my face. 

There's good fear and bad fear.  I'll take the good kind as much as possible! 

[Becca Kay]

the past week has been a crazy time.


A week ago I came out to my family.  Friday I had a job interview that went very well.  Saturday i went to my support group meeting and got to hang out all night with trans girls.     Sunday shopping all day and drinks with my cis girlfriends.  Monday morning I had another job interview (different company).  While I was at my therapist appointment tonight I got a phone call from the company that interviewed me on Friday.  They offered me a job and i'm accepting their offer.

I'm moving to Washington DC.  I can't believe it.

My little city is not the most queer friendly.  I've lived my whole life here.  I'm hoping for lots of wonderful adventures in DC!

[Laurie]

   I congratulated you in the happy thread already but what the heck.. Congratulations on the new job. Have you been to big cities? I hope you know what you will be getting yourself into. You very well might like it but I get kind of claustrophobic myself. It is just too dense in places like that. Yes, I have been there and after less than two days I had to get out so I could breathe again. I hope it is not like that for you. And I wish you good luck in the change of environment.

Hugs,
  Laurie

[Becca Kay]

   I congratulated you in the happy thread already but what the heck.. Congratulations on the new job. Have you been to big cities? I hope you know what you will be getting yourself into. You very well might like it but I get kind of claustrophobic myself. It is just too dense in places like that. Yes, I have been there and after less than two days I had to get out so I could breathe again. I hope it is not like that for you. And I wish you good luck in the change of environment.

Hugs,
  Laurie

i've wanted to move to the coasts my whole life.  Portland, OR is my home away from home.  I feel just as at home there and the Bay Area as I do here in the middle of the country.  I love Chicago.  I like cities.  I wish I was going to the West Coast, but this is pretty good.  There's a great queer community in D.C.  Many cool bars.  So much to do. 

[Laurie]

  Okay Becca it does sound like you know what you are doing so good for you Hun. I won't say any more about your decision. I don't even like going into Portland and avoid it if I can. I live about 14 miles south of there. I even rather live more remote if I could. I need to start thinking about where we will go from here soon We already pay too much for rent. But it helps to be fairly close to hospitals for my sister and for myself. Those kind of thing matter when you start getting older.
   When do you move?

Hugs,
  Laurie

[Becca Kay]

i've had a couple of interviews for jobs in PDX.  I went for two weeks last summer and rented an apartment in Laurelhurst.  I bummed around the city on bikes and trains and buses and visted my friends.  It was like for a brief time that i was living there away from my old life.  It was then that I decided to come out and transition and change my life. 

I so much want to live in PDX.  I have so many friends there.  I feel comfortable and mostly safe in a way that I don't anywhere else.  I am a Thorns/Timbers fan.  Despite living two thousand miles away i managed to go to 7 games last year.

Also, i have a massive Rose City tattoo. 

[Jessica]

the past week has been a crazy time.


A week ago I came out to my family.  Friday I had a job interview that went very well.  Saturday i went to my support group meeting and got to hang out all night with trans girls.     Sunday shopping all day and drinks with my cis girlfriends.  Monday morning I had another job interview (different company).  While I was at my therapist appointment tonight I got a phone call from the company that interviewed me on Friday.  They offered me a job and i'm accepting their offer.

I'm moving to Washington DC.  I can't believe it.

My little city is not the most queer friendly.  I've lived my whole life here.  I'm hoping for lots of wonderful adventures in DC!

Congratulations Becca!  Glad things are looking up for you!

Jess

[Becca Kay]

Another hour of electrolysis today on my chest.  I'm finally hair free from my neck to the underside of my breasts.  My tech is wonderful.  After my therapist she probably knows more about what is happening with me than anybody.  However, every week for an hour she electrocutes my boobs! 

[Becca Kay]

I went wig shopping with a couple of my girlfriends yesterday.  I was so nervous.  I couldn't have gone alone.  I tried on a lot of wigs.  I thought I wanted medium length black hair.  But it looks all wrong on me with my complexion.  I chose a long wig with bangs and a light red/blonde color.  It's closer to what my hair looked like when I was young. 

I was worried that I might feel uncomfortable in a wig.  I never really wanted long hair.  If I was born a girl i'd probably wear my hair short.  But I'm not a "natural girl" and I lost a lot of hair before i started HRT.  Without a wig I not only can't pass, I don't look at all like a woman.

I wore the wig out of the shop and went out a bit downtown with my girlfriends.  It felt wonderful.  When I got home I didn't want to take it off.