Voice feminization

[Saoirse OCarroll]

      So. I've been been on HRT for MtF treatment for almost a month now. One thing I still kind of struggle with is changing my voice to sound more feminine. Anyone have any tips that helped find their female voice during transition? I would be most grateful for any and all advice. 

[Doreen]

      So. I've been been on HRT for MtF treatment for almost a month now. One thing I still kind of struggle with is changing my voice to sound more feminine. Anyone have any tips that helped find their female voice during transition? I would be most grateful for any and all advice.

There are tons of tutorials on youtube.  I had CTA to fix mine.. I had forced mine lower to match those of my peer during my quasi puberty, then regretted it later.  But I digress. What I suggest?

Put your hand on your voicebox, sing low, then go higher, you'll notice a 'shifting' up as the larynx goes into falsetto range, keep your hand on the little nob (or big if you have an adams apple) where it shifts into alto.. then KEEP the voicebox there as you speak.  Press lightly if you need to.  That'll keep it at least in the female range.  Don't speak with all of the booming chest voice, speak, 'inside' that area of the larynx instead.  ITs difficult to fully describe without being physically present. 

Works for me Gets me mammed on the phone & elsewhere.  Oh, and HRT won't do crap for your voice.  It kinda sucks.

[120716]

Kaiser in Washington pays for a Speech Therapist. It has helped a lot not perfect but ok results. Get a pitch analyzer Instatune for apple products works well.   Practice and practice some more. On FB there is a voice feminization group some good tips and mostly honest feed back. The worst thing on voice is have friends say "M, you sound great!" Next thing talking to someone with back to me is yes sir? Then the oh sorry Ma'am when they turn around, it's lesser now. But practice practice practice... Use M words
Meet the men at the mine
Make me a maple malt
Meet my mom
My Money
Muddy mowers make a mess
Phrases like these
Oh darn it the most important thing is breathing, look up diaphragmatic breathing. Try to keep the word lite and forward, self reference, use I feel instead of think, Over emphasize things. The other thing I can recommended is watch how other women talk and interact, we are different than men on how we communicate. 
Take it or leave it but that is what has worked for me.

[FinallyMichelle]

It is like weight loss, there are so many paths, so many things that can work.

Want to know the secret to both? It is a super simple thing.
Decide.
That's it.
Not, I want to get my voice right.
Not, I will work on it.
Except no other alternative.
Voice is something we can all do something about with the only exception being damage due to injury or illness. You CAN do this.
Do what it takes, that is how we get anything in life.
That is for everyone really, so many of us struggle with the voice.

There is sooooooo much information and so many voice coaches that I don't think that I could add more. There is one thing, your voice box is an instrument. Like any instrument changing the shape changes the sound, thinking of it like that helped me tremendously. Of course I had to tweak it occasionally and I still work to try to improve it.

It takes work.

[StacyRenee]

I've just started voice therapy after getting a referral from the VA. They're paying for it, so it's free to me. My voice therapist has me using an app called EVA (Exceptional Voice App) MtF. It's only available on newer Apple products (iPhone 5 and up and possibly iPads). The part that sucks is that there are 20 lessons and they charge $5 for each one. $100 total plus I'm buying a used iPhone for another $100. I know not everyone has that much money just laying around, but my voice therapist just loves this app. I've gotten to see the first lesson and it's very in depth (first lesson is about breath control). Hope this helps!

[Saoirse OCarroll]

Thank you all for the feedback and advice. Up till now I've been working on "the swallow method". You know that one where you swallow and try to hold the Adams Apple up as long as you can. The only issue with that being you can't breathe.

[ainsley]

Good starter's resource. 
http://www.nyspeechandvoicelab.net/transgender/voice-feminization/
There is a lot more to focus on than pitch.