It was the best of times....

[GnomeKid]

and yet its the worst of times.

Everything is on track in my life.  I've been boobless for a bit over a year, started T in september, and have a hearing set for my name change in early March.  Everyone in my life has accepted me, and things like pronouns ect. are slowly catching on and switching around.  Yet, I feel like everything is bearing down on me so much more.  Mostly school, but thats the most important thing in my life right now, so I guess it makes sense.  I just feel very overwhelmed.  Maybe its that I'm a really hermitty person, and that I feel like everyone now knows my business.  Maybe its that I really really hate change, and despite the positive nature of this change its still just really hard to get used to.  Hard to get used to being comfortable with being comfortable with myself. 

Did anyone else who has come through this point in transition feel that life actually got a good bit worse before it got better? 

Did anyone else find it a bit hard to come to terms with the fact that you're finally becoming comfortable with yourself and the way others see you?

[Myself]

Hi!

Yes, I think.
Where I am, it is a small town of like 200 families in total. There is a dinning room pretty much everyone goes to eat at.
Local old town

A lot of the people here are pretty old, many of them came during war world 2 and established it. Others are pretty much their sons, daughters, grandchildren.
Some new ones too.

When I started my therapy, I was confident with what I was doing but I sure wanted to avoid being the gossip topic or weird.. so I.. well, I guess I behaved weird. Walking or wearing cloths to hide changes in my body.

Anyways, recently I knew already that pretty much everyone knows, I had some people stopping me at the local shop and telling me goodluck (!!!) but still, I tend to shy.
I felt I want to avoid anyone who "knew" me from before and just start new.
Now, I slowly stopped being bothered, because there is nothing to be bothered about it seems.
We have a transport car here, with the kibbutz guys driving it and getting people to the city and back. Guess what! one of the drivers, who been a driver for years. Kept shifting between he and she

People here seem to catch up with it, not say a bad word (at least in person.. and at least as of yet), some are even coping.
It also takes time to realize that you pass 100% outside. When I go to the city I now pass 100% since my recent surgery (2 months ago). But it takes time until the old anxiety goes away.

So I am not sure if it is 100% what you meant but I think it is, or at least it is close.

Now I am (re)starting University (yay!), I went to sign yesterday. I finally came to realize that even though I finally took to so many different people in person, unlike the people on the street or single waitress on the restaurant or whatever. The world still didn't fall around me.
I can feel comfortable with myself and confident with nothing to hide, I am no longer in the "what is it" zone where some people think you are this and others think you are that.
And yeah, it takes time getting used to. Old habits take time to go away. And that was the last time I am wearing extra shirts at hot weather. (funny because our case is a bit flipped here! oh but wait you are post-top, good for you! )
and I can start being comfortable with my new body too.

[Radar]

Yet, I feel like everything is bearing down on me so much more.  Mostly school, but thats the most important thing in my life right now, so I guess it makes sense.  I just feel very overwhelmed.

Alot of it's right here. College- for a good student- can be hell. You'll get through it.

[GamerJames]

I feel really overwhelmed too, (just puked up a bunch of emotional drama in a different thread... ugh, I hate when I do that), and I'm not in school, so it's not that.

I'm not post anything though (not on T, not even out to everyone yet, although I am out to a LOT of people, including my mom and brothers), so maybe this isn't the same thing you're going through. But what sounds similar is that I was really comfortable with everything, everyone I'd told was really good with it, and now I feel down. I think partially it's because I was trying so hard to get through all this "the right way" and be positive throughout it all and stuff, but I wasn't really dealing with the emotions of all this. Just how hard it can be to change the way everyone in the world sees us, even if we still are the same people and see ourselves the same way.

Anyhow, that might not be the same as you're referring to, but either way you're not alone in feeling overwhelmed. Wishing us both some respite from that.