Susan's Place Transgender Resources

I evilly tried to steal a thread to ask about this, but my plan failed, so I'll be creating a new topic.

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Since the topic is there, maybe I could ask this, that's been on my mind for a long time.

They always say that when you're worried about your muscles, you should do lower body exercises and all, but... Assuming one of my main problems is how huge my thigh muscles are, what do I do? Even my calves shrunk enough for me to notice, but my thighs didn't. Even my butt muscles are super large.

Mostly in the back, but in the front too, my thigh muscles are way too large, as if I'd been training them like crazy. Thing is, though, I don't do any of that! I walk to the bus stop, spend the day on my butt, and then get home and spend the evening on my butt. ._. I did "train" on Dance Dance Revolution last summer, but at some point, the mat died, and I stopped. But it wasn't so intense, and my thighs were there before anyway.

Imagine looking at my thighs from above, "vertical" being the face-back axis and "horizontal" being the shoulder-to-shoulder axis. You know how normally, people's thighs are round, or slightly wider horizontally than vertically? Well, mine are -considerably- wider vertically. As far as I know, that's what muscular athletes have, and I certainly don't want that. Even when I start depositing fat on the outer sides of my thighs, as would be normal with female-level estrogen, it looks like I'd need such a humongous amount to look okay, to the point that the rest of the body will not look okay anymore due to being overweight.

Lastly, you know how when you look at someone standing, knees together, in tight pants, sometimes, there's a triangle of space between the crotch and the knees? Mostly it's girls, because they have wider hips (and also wear more of those tight pants). I could have that kind of thing, because I do have hips - not quite a girl's, but there's much worse. But I don't because the muscles on the inside of my thighs are huge.

I don't get how I can have such large thighs (and butt, but that's not a major issue apart from my "pointy" butt) while barely moving around, unhealthily so, while the rest of my muscles are, yeah, bigger than I'd like, but nowhere as bad.

So, yeah, in summary... What do you do with annoyingly large thighs?

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I think anymore cardio would just draw attention to the muscles..

DEfinetly dont do any strength training and yah avoiding protein is a good idea.

Just stop working out, and let everything soften up, hrt should help it along the way... might take a year or two so prepare for a long wait.

I was pretty muscular upperbody before hrt and transition, and i stopped working out completely and everything softened up.
I waited a year and a half then just started back up some cardio and lower body excersizes.... i think it made my face look sharper so im going easy with it.

But uhm, isn't avoiding protein really unhealthy to begin with? And I'm guessing breast growth (for example) would be happy to have some protein. Besides, protein is a really effective hunger cutter, and without getting enough I feel I'll be hungry and eat, eat, eat, and start gaining a lot of weight again. By the way, do you confirm what I say? That thighs are mostly round or a bit wider?

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Quote from: A on December 21, 2012, 02:46:05 AM
But uhm, isn't avoiding protein really unhealthy to begin with? And I'm guessing breast growth (for example) would be happy to have some protein. Besides, protein is a really effective hunger cutter, and without getting enough I feel I'll be hungry and eat, eat, eat, and start gaining a lot of weight again. By the way, do you confirm what I say? That thighs are mostly round or a bit wider?

You're correct on all points. And I'd like to mention I eat a BUNCH of protein and my muscle mass fell off of me dramatically. I have a very feminine upper and lower body and can pull off wearing a tank top and get lots of male attention while doing it. I've been told I look like a female gymnast, as a matter of fact. I don't have frail, fragile arms, and instead have lean, toned, feminine arms. Also, my boobs are on the verge of C cups in just 16 months of HRT. I think it's testosterone, not protein, that determines whether you'll have more muscle mass. Protein isn't a growth hormone, but testosterone is.

Let's not forget that hair and skin require protein (keratin, collagen) that the body cannot produce itsself. Deny yourself that, and your hair will grow slower, thinner, and will break easier. Your skin will not look as healthy either, nor will it renew cells properly, and in fact 1/10th of all protein in the body is located in the skin. Protein deficiency  could lead to age spots, wrinkles, hypopigmentation, thin skin (which can lead to scarring), and other things.  I sincerely believe that starving yourself of protein is the key to having poor results with HRT.

Quote from: muuu on December 21, 2012, 02:56:43 AM
Breast and protein might be true I suppose...
As a hunger cutter you could try to drink A LOT of water or something that is close to 0kcal.

I think it's mostly about where on the thighs the width is. Having wide "vertical" thighs isn't bad, as long as the width is from behind (i.e, big butt, that isn't too pointy). And for "horizontally" the width should be from the outer sides. I don't think there's any rule on which should be wider, as long as your width comes from behind/outer sides.

Water is heavy and depletes your sodium levels which spiro kills anyways. Peanut butter is better for hunger and is better for you if you're looking to stop being hungry.

Also, thigh fat on women is typically on the upper inner thighs, starting at the mid thigh and ending near the genitals.

Hmm, and here I was thinking fat was more on the outer side... Sigh, I hope I at least get some there. I don't find it pleasing to have "holes" on the outsides of my thighs, between the two huge muscles.

So uhm, so far, I don't get much hope. Sometimes I wish I would get injured in a way and put to bed, unable to move, for a few months. :p But anyway, is there -anything- to be done besides starving myself and damaging my whole body in the process? (And to begin with I already eat too little of those, proteins... amongst many other nutrients. My eating habits are such a mess.) You don't think adding estrogens in a more reasonable dose than what I have right now would actually reduce muscles, no? I mean, anti-androgens removes male stuff, and estrogen only adds female stuff, right?

(By the way, my testosterone is on the very lowest point of the normal levels for females. I doubt killing it even further would change much.)

I always feel like a cheater when it's about that. When I took an anti-depressant for a month and then began medication for my ADD, I immediately stopped being hungrier than my body needed. Lost a total of 70 pounds, including 50 in ~3 months, from my maximum of a bit over 200 lb, just by having healthy food at my disposal (the hospital offered us meals at noon at my group therapy, and I could have as much of those delicious steamed carrots as I wanted, without the effort to buy them, cut them or wash a pot afterwards -yay!), and down it went, without any damned effort.

Right now I THINK medications are helping my ADD but sometimes I doubt it, seeing how much difficulty I have with some things. But even if I were sure they're not useful, I'm not sure I would go off those meds. I feel like a cocaine addict saying this (and actually, stimulant meds against ADD are stunningly close to cocaine chemically), but I wouldn't want to go back to eating a banana and two 500-gram pots of yogurt after supper in an evening and still be hungry. x_x

I seriously think I had a major hunger problem that just happened to be treated with this. I mean, who can say they put on 50 pounds in 3 to 4 months by eating mostly healthy, just because of the amounts?

But anyway, this is a bit irrelevant right now, eh. What about my thighs?

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So, yeah, in summary... What do you do with annoyingly large thighs?

Love your body as the wonderful vessel you've been given. Realize that the human body is beautiful in all the different shapes and sizes it comes in. Understand that body shape doesn't define your worth.

No body shape is any better than any other body shape.

I've gained nearly 3" in thigh circumference now since being on E. It came as quite a surprise. And yes, it's almost all on the inner thigh, they now rub together disconcertingly.

Quote from: A on December 21, 2012, 03:50:03 AM
Hmm, and here I was thinking fat was more on the outer side... Sigh, I hope I at least get some there. I don't find it pleasing to have "holes" on the outsides of my thighs, between the two huge muscles.

So uhm, so far, I don't get much hope. Sometimes I wish I would get injured in a way and put to bed, unable to move, for a few months. :p But anyway, is there -anything- to be done besides starving myself and damaging my whole body in the process? (And to begin with I already eat too little of those, proteins... amongst many other nutrients. My eating habits are such a mess.) You don't think adding estrogens in a more reasonable dose than what I have right now would actually reduce muscles, no? I mean, anti-androgens removes male stuff, and estrogen only adds female stuff, right?

(By the way, my testosterone is on the very lowest point of the normal levels for females. I doubt killing it even further would change much.)

Muscle is more on the outside of the thighs. It's true that fat is stored at the very bottom of the hips (which may look like your thighs) However if you take a look at some pictures of womens legs, the larger their thighs, the more space there is between their knees when they are standing. The first changes I noticed in my thighs were about 4 months in, when my thighs started losing muscle on the front and more fat was collecting in the upper inner areas.

Estrogen doesn't reduce muscle (to my knowledge), but it is responsible for placing fat in the thighs in the proper places (and keeping the fat off the waist, too). In fact, post menopausal women not on hrt tend to store fat more in the waist, which is actually unusual before menopause.

IDK the trick to getting rid of muscle, though. But I noticed that my muscles weren't looking completely until about a year into a full dose of HRT. All I know, as far as diet is concerned, I ate lots of protein, sodium, and drank mostly water. I also noticed a significant drop off when I got fired from my job (8 month mark) which had me doing a lot of physical stuff. But I lost plenty of muscle before then, too.

If I had to guess, protein is good for metabolism, salt is good for a number of things such as water regulation, nervous system communication, free radical reduction, and battles muscle cramps produced by spironolactone (as spiro is a diuretic), and water is just flat out necessary for us due to spiro, it is great for the kidneys and liver, and it combats constipation which many women experience due to estrogen. I didn't really exercise that much though or do anything special beyond that.

Jog/walk lots. Lots and lots. Also, keep your calories below 1000.

agfrommd: There are limits to such a way of thinking, I say. If not, why even transition? Besides, I'm a details maniac.

Padma: Lol, bad news. Mine already rub together, causing "cool" ingrowns.

Alainaluvsu: Isn't salt mostly harmful in any contemporary-world amounts? I remember my physical education teacher telling me how he had calculated that by eating nearly nothing pre-packaged and never adding any salt per se to anything, he was always a bit over the recommmended daily amounts of sodium. Besides, uhm. I take cyproterone acetate, not spiro.

Isabelle: Wait, are you telling me that my thigh muscles will shrink if I ADD exercise? I'm sorry, but I'm going to need some additional explanations to understand that. Also, uhm, isn't 1000 calories a bit extreme? On a metabolism calculator, if I put in "inactive" (and perhaps one might decide I'm "lightly active"), it says my metabolism is 1645. 1000 sounds crazy low. It's not like I'm an obese looking for super fast fat loss.

Quote from: A on December 21, 2012, 05:30:45 PM
Alainaluvsu: Isn't salt mostly harmful in any contemporary-world amounts? I remember my physical education teacher telling me how he had calculated that by eating nearly nothing pre-packaged and never adding any salt per se to anything, he was always a bit over the recommmended daily amounts of sodium. Besides, uhm. I take cyproterone acetate, not spiro.

I forgot, you aren't in the US so you're not on Spiro so it may not apply to you. However, sodium / salt is necessary in your diet, but must be taken in the right amounts. As sodium helps with cell reproduction (in tandum with water), this is especially important when your body is going through changes that HRT provides. It is also an essential part of the nervous system. With a low sodium balance, you are at risk of headaches, nausea / vomiting, confusion, fatigue, and loss of consciousness / seizures.

I think most people get enough sodium in their diets through processed foods, so that may be why people say not to add salt to any meals. However, for those of us on Spiro, we need to increase our intake.  For example, I explained that I eat lots of food loaded with sodium, well nearly every test I've had that tested metabolic function showed that my sodium was on the very low side of normal. There are times I still get a couple of the symptoms I've listed above.

It's like marathon training. They have very lean thin muscles. The calorie restriction is to put your body into "starvation" mode so your body will burn muscle tissue for energy instead of fat.

Alainaluvsu: Well, looks like spiro is something quite violent. Because one slice of bread that actually tastes more sweet than salty can have 15 % of the normal daily amount of sodium. After all, the amount we should get daily is less than a teaspoon daily.

Isabelle: Well, marathon runners have leaner, thinner muscles than weight lifters, but I'm pretty sure they have much more massive muscles than your average skinny lazy person.

Ok cool. Still. Starve your body and it will eat your muscles for energy. Exercise and calorie restriction will speed the process.

Quote from: A on December 21, 2012, 09:00:08 PM
Alainaluvsu: Well, looks like spiro is something quite violent. Because one slice of bread that actually tastes more sweet than salty can have 15 % of the normal daily amount of sodium. After all, the amount we should get daily is less than a teaspoon daily.

Maybe it is violent. I honestly don't like putting any drugs into my system, but I'll make an exception to the ones I'm taking on HRT. I haven't had any bad side effects from it other than possibly bad smelling urine at first, though. Many trans women, however, do not have a choice in the US, as last I checked it is not prescribed here. Also, I've heard bad stories about it messing with your liver, bad. It does nuke your T levels into the dirt from what I've read, though.

I wish I could afford an orchie, or better yet srs :P

Isabelle: that's one way to do it... it's a dangerous way to do it. Your body gets hungry for a reason. It's asking you for vitamins and minerals it needs for cellular maintenance, repair, and reproduction. Experiencing HRT effects is seriously like going through a second puberty. You NEED extra food to do it.

(https://www.susans.org/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.biolayne.com%2Fwp-content%2Fuploads%2Fmarathon_sprinter.jpg&hash=54937e7f2f600bc6f528cd561a6bc849900f3684)
(Pic related cause marathon runners are absurdly lean with little body fat. If you want to be lean, train like a marathon runner. Disagree if you like or, actually look at pictures of marathon runners legs. You'd actually be surprised at how little I care about the size of your thighs but, I am trying to help with the problem you're claiming to have. It's a solution. Call a personal trainer, tell them you want to thin down your thigh muscles and see what they say. Yes it will inhibit your breasts growing and you'll have no bum fat but, you can put that on after you've lost the muscle mass)


I agree. It's not the best thing for a growing body but, if you want to loose muscle mass, it works. There is actually research that suggests low calorie diets promote longevity. It's stressful though so, obviously you don't want to do it all the time. It's not great for your heart. It's great for loosing muscle though. Hrt will change your muscles over a space of about 5 years though.
Also, spiro isn't really "violent" it's actually very well tolerated by the body at high doses for long periods of time. Which is why it's used. Cyproterone Acetate is harder on your body. Luprin is even harder. It's all serious medication though so basicially you just have to make the decision if hrt is right for your body. It's your body you're changing and you are the one who ultimately is responsible for what you put in it. Hrt can kill you, give you diabetes all kinds of stuff

I generally agree with everything Isabelle just said, except the breast growth part. I'm not sure that breast growth will grow at the nominal rate after a while of being on HRT and then starving yourself. I would think that may stunt growth. But nobody knows how that would work... I'm sure.

Breast size fluctuates because of the amount of fat in your body. Get fat, get bigger boobs, get thin, loose the breast fat. The tissue will remain. Like female body builders, if they stop training and return to a normal size and body fat percentage, their breasts come back.

That's probably cause marathon runners have to train for endurance while other runners who run sprints and short burst have to train their bodies to give maximum speed in the least amount of time.

So while sprinters have to have huge muscle mass which need to be used for short amounts of time, marathon runners have to make sure their bodies are able to keep moving even when it's low on energy and tired as hell.

The problem that we have is that when we train for running there is always a possiblity of our body becoming bulkier in terms of muscle mass, so the lessen the chances of that a girl trying to loose mass from thighs (me included) would have to run at least 1-2 km distances on a regular basis.

or you could also try some of the stuff posted here on an older thread:
https://www.susans.org/forums/index.php/topic,124337.msg974437.html#msg974437 (https://www.susans.org/forums/index.php/topic,124337.msg974437.html#msg974437)

Quote from: Oriah on August 04, 2012, 09:28:29 PM
here is a fantastic feminizing workout routine video


Body Feminization Exercises For Transsexuals (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8udQ-h4Y4BY&playnext=1&list=PL22166DB3A7255887&feature=results_video#)

I've tried some of these and they are awesome - except for the part where you need a stick of some sort - I've broken some of the stuff in my room trying to use it  :laugh:

Holy effing face palm... I'm done.

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Thing is, in "starvation" mode, before your body even starts to think about maybe burning muscle, you lose all your concentration, and feel weak. I don't think I can take it. Especially if I'm supposed to do exercise. I'll pass out, just that. As for muscles lacking the proteins to repair themselves... It may be true that when you just sit there and need calories desperately, your body starts degrading your muscles.

But if you add exercise, it's a very different matter. The way I see it, every time you work out, there are small tears that appear in your muscles. Those are injuries, and the way I understand it, injuries usually get priority in who gets to have nutrients. So to repair your broken muscles (because they must be repaired - it's not smaller fibres we're talking about, but partly torn fibres) the protein has to come from somewhere. And if you're in a deficiency, well, I'm suspecting it won't be pretty.

Anyway, whatever I try for that, I should wait until my HRT development is roughly done, so that I can't stunt any growth, because things are mostly done growing. This sounds like the smartest way of doing it.

Also, Isabelle...
(https://www.susans.org/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fliverunloveyoga.files.wordpress.com%2F2012%2F04%2Fmile18.jpg&hash=fac985c68383ec94835b67396ec3c84ea6dc6ea2)
I see skinny and not-so-skinny legs there. What this tells me is that marathon runners don't shrink their muscles by training, but instead lose a lot of fat and only minimally increase the muscle's size itself. If an athlete is really skinny, it's that they have little fat -and- have naturally small muscles, isn't it?

My physical education teacher told us that: whatever exercise you do, your muscles -will- grow - depending on what kind of training you target, its growth will just be different. And I saw a conference with Pierre Lavoie, a world-class marathon runner, and he said roughly the same: my muscles grow, of course, but not nearly as much as those of a sprinter. Instead, they gain a lot in endurance.

And this totally makes sense to me. There are trainings that literally aim to increase size (power-oriented weight training), but whatever you do, if you stress a muscle with exercise more than what it's used to, what you're telling it is "you're not good enough - you need to get better". Why would it -shrink- to respond to stress? I'm sorry, I'm not trying to fight you to death over this or anything, it's just that I've been given more evidence against than with you. :x

Awesome. Well, it seems you know all about it so, good luck with your thighs.

Sigh, I never said I knew it all, neither did I intend to fight and discourage you.

 ;) that wasn't a fight. And, I'm not discouraged at all. I'm quite happy with my thighs.. mostly because I went on a strict calorie restriction diet for about 4 months, and walk between 4 and 8 K's everyday.

QuoteThing is, in "starvation" mode, before your body even starts to think about maybe burning muscle, you lose all your concentration,

This is pretty much untrue, here's a link to the Wikipedia about starvation response.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Starvation_response#cite_note-6 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Starvation_response#cite_note-6)

A very interesting link, thank you.

I'm sorry for reacting that way. It's just that you reminded me of my mother, who always goes "Fine, then, if you know everything, just do whatever you want!" as soon as I "resist" her advice because I want to understand it properly. So with her, it's, take what I say without a question or you're not getting any advice from me. :c

And whoa, this has broken some of my convictions, which I was oh so sure I was taught in school: I thought no fatty product ever circulated in the body, and all fat was always made into a sugar-like component before being released by fat cells. Geez, I feel awful for all those things - lies actually - that I've said to someone in another thread. I still doubt the effectiveness of that fat-loss laser, but anyway. I don't like to say lies, even if I thought they were the truth. ._.

But uhm, back to the topic. This is interesting. I guess the reason I lose concentration when hungry is psychological. After all, when we did that activity at school, 30 hours of fasting to be reminded that 30 hours is the average time between meals in humanity (x_x), I do remember that after about 10 hours, we were all feeling fine again after being all "uuuugh, I'm dying" for a while.

But this still makes me think that it's not a good idea to do this right now. After all, I may be at 10 months of "HRT", but I've only really been on an anti-androgen and a minuscule dose of estrogen, all that time. Since my body is going to enter a growth phase when I finally get a decent dose, maybe it would be wiser not to do any major dieting until the bulk of the growth is behind me. What do you think?

(Also, uhm, right now, I'm so slow with everything, and working so hard just to get my life functioning okay, that I don't think I'm quite ready to be adding exercise to my routine. If I try to do too many things at once, I feel I'll crash like I already did too many times.)

Calorie restriction is hard word. It's not easy at all. I was "fortunate" enough to have an eating disorder as a teen so I've had practice. The trick isn't to eat nothing, the trick is eat low calorie food. Fruits and vegitable should be your main food source as most are very low in calories. An apple has about 25 for example. Bread on the other hand is very high in calories but comparatively low in nutritional content. A peanut butter sandwich is above 300 so, not a good choice. You'd be just as full if you ate 2 apples. The typical western diet is atrociously high in calories because of all the bread and pasta type things we eat. Generally I stick to about 1200 per day and walk a lot. It works.

Yeah... I love apples. Thing is, groceries here don't seem to. Apples are always, if not downright disgusting, in a not-so-attractive state. :/

Actually, I think fruit are evil. Pears are delicious, so you buy 5-6 of them at a time, but you can't eat them before they get ripe, 2-3 days later. And then they ALL get ripe at the same time, and will ALL go bad in a couple of days, so you eat them like crazy for two days and then nothing for the rest of the week. T_T

Seriously, I love fruit. I think fruit don't like me.

I buy fruit and veggies every three days or so, depending on the season. I only buy what I'm going to eat so I dont waste mone/ food, and also so I dont over-eat. Unless you live in a food desert area of a city, its really not hard to keep a constant supply of fresh produce.

  I'm surprised of the increased size of my thighs.  They fill out the relaxed fit jeans I wear.  I expected this, the fatty thighs, and not the muscular ones I have now.  My Dr. says this is unusual, but not that rare with certain males on the female HRT.  They do not have the rippling furrows that the gym rats have.  This effect is welcomed here and adds to my already large hips in a more feminine profile. 

  Joelene

Well, uhm, considering how much I struggle to cook (takes me a good 3 hours for a short recipe, not including the dishes, and kills me for whatever is left of the evening) and how much of a freaking hassle it is to go to the grocery store (think of preparing cart in the morning, take bus with cart, stuff cart in locker somehow, walk to the grocery store despite being completely dead after a tiring day at school, come back with cart in bus, and probably super heavy bags on shoulders because it never fits, all that in freezing cold and a crappy coat, unpack; a good 3 hours if I hurry)... I'm really scared of the eventuality of going to the supermarket any more often than once a week. And even that is a lot to ask. I used to go every week or at least every two weeks, but not anymore. I've lost the courage of doing all that. I just don't have any energy left after school. Now I stop by the one next to my home where they sell only overpriced crap when I really have nothing left to eat.

Oh, and guess what? The best point is, busses barely run on week-ends. Once an hour, 10-15 o'clock, confusing changed circuits. Awesome.

That's just how I am. Awesome from A to Z in everything I try. >_>

.

Wear a backpack? Put your fruits and veggies in your backpack and walk. I don't care how far it is. Walk and eat fruit. Basically everything you're saying in this thread A, is that you're lazy and can't be arsed doing any actual work or putting any effort in. This is why fat people get fat and stay fat. They eat ->-bleeped-<- food and don't exercise because its too "difficult". To me, that is simply astounding. We, in the developed world have access to better and more food than any other people at any time in history, yet we choose to shovel sugar and processed wheat into our fat necks and complain about how fat we are and that "society" has the problem.... becaus they're too lazy to bother to learn about how to feed themselves good food. All this attitude is doing, is ruining our health systems by costing a fortune and making for some very unhappy people by making us loose family members many years before their time.

Isabelle is pretty much right, but maybe its worth trying a different way of getting at the same thing. This is what I am doing.

Set a calorie level that is at least 25% lower than what is a `maintenance' amount for you. You can work down to that level over a few weeks if that makes it easier, its not a sprint.

Eat whatever you want, including junk food, and use a spreadsheet to keep track of the daily amount you eat - its important to promise yourself you will always be honest with this, even when you've had a bad week. I average mine over a full week, which allows for good days and less good days.

What you will find yourself doing, particularly if you're taking in a bunch of empty calories, is that you'll be trying to work the system - eg. you'll work out that proteins maybe make you feel fuller for the calorie amounts they have, and that fruit is a good way to fill up in the mornings, and that maybe you can do without the afternoon snack. Trying to `win' within the rules will inspire diet changes.

Anyway, thats whats working for me and I've been doing it for a year. I've had some setbacks, but real progress is being made.

Oh, and I have lost thigh weight doing this (while on HRT), but they are still pretty big.

muuu: Well, the cart is for easier transportation of food. Even if I don't wait so damned long between each time I buy food, as soon as there's more than a few fruit and vegetables, or some soy milk, or juice, or cans, or yogurt, etc. it gets really, really heavy on my shoulders. If I did what you say, the cart would be plenty, but since I go at most once a week (>_>), I have the cart + 2-3 bags.

Isabelle and muuu: Well, I wouldn't call it laziness, really, because I want to do such things and feel awful for not doing them. When there's someone in my life, life is easy and I can accomplish anything, as long as that person is there to support me and tell me what I should do daily. But alone, things are so very hard. So I think part of this thread (at least the last few posts) is getting people to kick my butt to get me doing something.

When I lived at my mother's, she asked and minutes later, I would generally be onto whatever she'd asked. But it's like I don't have the required authority over myself to do anything. Same with school. I work like a charm with the teacher there, but oh gosh, how hard it is to keep up with homework.

And whilst I normally need much more encouragement than most to do pretty much anything, when it comes to eating healthy, people in my family, from a long tradition of grandmas who "stuff children's bellies so they're nice and plump and look healthy", keep telling me I should eat more, that I look sickly, etc. Just what I need.

My psychiatrist tells me it's part of my ADD and I shouldn't expect to ever be normal/not constantly need someone beside me to tell me what to do here and now. From what I understood the kind that needs an "auxilary frame" (someone else) to function are one of the worst kinds, because they always feel like children, and there isn't so much they can do on their own. Very encouraging.

All my life I've been depressed, overestimating myself and saying I just had to function normally. Looks like I should just accept it and move on from there. But how do you do that? Even the professionals have no idea. "We can't do anything in your place; it has to come from you." But can't you see how much I'm trying, and how desperate I am?

My special educator has no idea of how to help me. I'm hoping she can help more once she talks with my psychiatrist. And that the ergotherapist I'll see in a few days will be able to diagnose something / find solutions / whatever. Because seriously, I've had it with functionning as well as a ten-year-old.

I think I wish I were normal in this regard much more than I wish I weren't trans.

AmyBee: Well, as for -amounts-, generally I'm good. I don't eat lunch and just snack on some sunflower seeds and an apple if I have some at noon, at school. Because preparing food to bring to school is too much for me; I constantly forget, on top of generally not even having food because I don't cook. Anyway, in general, on school days, I quickly eat something before catching the bus (generally a bit of bread or a bowl of oatmeal with a glass of juice), and then run to catch the bus. And then at night I eat -something-. Generally I snack on some quickly grabbed stuff or something. Sometimes I'll reheat something I've made, or that my mom generously cooked for me.

The main problem is -what- I eat. Despite taking a multivitamin, always getting whole grains and almost never opting for the unhealthy option, I'm anemic and I seriously don't think this is the only eating-related problem I have. Basically even just eating what I like would be great for me. But I don't, because the crackers and overpriced bruschetta from the store are easier to eat.

And well, as for understanding what does well and what does bad, I think I'm not too bad. Most of what I like the most is healthy, and I mostly dislike junk food (and feel way too awfully guilty whenever I eat it anyway, so I seldom eat any). The main thing is getting myself to get up and go to the damned grocery store, and then cook those damned ingredients.

(I'm sorry, I know you neither need nor appreciate all this negativity. I guess the stress and disappointment by myself from these last few weeks is adding up to me feeling emotional today.)

One thing that's good for anaemia (and generally good) is molasses. Very bioavailable iron and calcium, and loads of vitamins and minerals in there. A mug of hot water with a spoonful of molasses melted in is is a very, very good supplement, and doesn't constipate like iron supplements tend to. I also find it takes a big edge off hunger.

O_O And here I thought molasses were just as nutritious as sugar.

Nope, sugar is what you're left with if you take out all the goodness. Molasses is what you're left with if you take out all the sugar. Of course there's some sucrose still in there, so it has calorific value, but it's pretty amazing nutritionally.

A - TBH the one thing you gotta do is develop the willpower to get yourself going.

I've been in similar situations - and I think I may either have ADD or maybe a bit autistic because although I could read at an early age - I could not talk to people that well and am perpetually making a mess of things and I have a brother with low hemoglobin. To make matters worse I've had a lot of head as well as one spinal injury over the years. And I was given several meds while growing up to help me keep functioning.

If I try doing something for too long - I would get irritated and restless - sometimes if I am forced to sit for too long I have even done things like scratch my skin or scalp until it bleeds and even pulled my own hair out.

But here's the kicker that has kept me rolling all these years despite having days where I cannot function normally, is my pride - I cannot allow anyone to ever make me feel like I am worthless.

You HAVE to force yourself, you need to tell yourself **** everyone I am gonna do this on my own and I am gonna be awesome at this and then go ahead and actually do it and do it well. 

I am assuming here that you aren't going to do something obviously stupid.

As for the original point - you could also try making a diary or a chart - except it should be used to keep a track of your activities as well as food intake. This helped me stay sane while I was going through the wrong puberty.

edit: sorry I have very rarely ever discussed having maybe either ADD or being a bit autistic with anyone. so please forgive me if I got carried away.

A, motivation is hard to keep up but, seriously we only get one go at life, it's not a practice run. Everybody has their own set of challenges that they need to face and work through, some people are more lucky than others but you've really just got to love your life and be happy.

First of all, everyone, sorry for the delay. I've been at my mother's these last few days, and haven't been on the computer.

Padma: Interesting.

Alexia6: Thanks for sharing your experiences, but I don't think I'm too similar to you. First of all, I'm not really restless. Actually, whilst many ADD patients are hyperactive, I can be described as hypoactive. I don't get restless and need to move all the time and thus get nothing done, no-- I sit and do nothing and obviously end up doing nothing. I have more of an internal type of ADD. The hyperactivity is inside my head. Issues go round and round and round in my head, and to stop them, I "hypnotise" myself with something that thinks in my place - watching a show for example. It's like constant alt-tabbing between windows that's out of my control.

As for making a journal or following a chart, I've tried that in the past. All it does is that it adds a task to the list, and an additional window to alt-tab to. It makes me more anxious, so I get even less stuff done, and I feel even more guilty for not doing this other assignment I'd given myself to do, and the vicious circle goes round even stronger. I wish - oh how I wish - my issues were as simple as writing things down.

As for going with confidence, well, first, it's quite hard to build self-confidence on nothing but failures. Second, looks like this approach just does not work with me. I've done that a lot in the past. I didn't allow myself to have those issues. I told myself, I'm so going to rock this, look at me. But then I failed, partly because of overestimating myself that way, and hated myself even more.

Isabelle: I know it's hard to understand quickly, especially without knowing me so well, and I know that's how it appears in a first impression, and I also know that's how it would be with almost everyone else having issues like mine. It took my mother years to stop telling me to"just" do things. And most professionals who've seen me never understood / are just starting to understand this.

The first psychiatrist I saw basically told me I was lazy, and that the only problem was that I was relying on my mother too much, and that I should almost be kicked out - then I would stop my teenager's act when confronted to "real" problems. My mother was similar for a long time. When I spoke of my issues with her, all of her solutions started with "just". Just do this, just do that. It's simple; it's easy. It's just a question of willpower. Many special educators thought I was looking for a magical solution from them and said they couldn't do anything in my place.

I feel people who's have it hard in life, or who've seen more extreme problems, have a lot of difficulty understanding that there can exist issues that seem little, or easy/straightforward to solve, but aren't. And what frustrates me the most is that because I do have motivation, do have the ability to speak intelligently, and do behave fine in public, people are pretty stubborn in not even looking for issues, saying "look, it's not that bad" or giving me "just do X" advice.

As you might or might not know from other threads, I suspect I might have Asperger's syndrome. An article (http://www.psychologytoday.com/articles/200611/aspie-in-the-city) (<- link) I read enlightened me to this. Like others, I wasn't seeing the obvious, huge typical signs, so when my mother thought that maybe I had that, I brushed it off.

But then, I read the article. It says how evidence is starting to show that maybe girls with Asperger's tend to excel at, and to learn early to, imitate behaviours to "pretend to be normal", and thus the issues are left un- or misdiagnosed.

I'm beginning to think I may be like that. Be it Asperger's or whatever other issue I have (ADD/other similar issue that keeps me from functioning properly), I think I might have that almost innate ability, talent, to look like I'm fine, to look like I don't have an issue, to pretend without really wanting to, making my problems, however simple or complex to solve once identified, hard to catch.

But my problem is not motivation. I have plenty of that. Nor is it reliance upon others. I would love to manage without anyone, and I feel guilty when I feel like I don't. I happily set sail into a project and I'm really motivated to see it to its end successfully. I want to succeed, and do my best towards it, so much that it hurts. But I fail.

The reason I get up late and thus have to run after the bus in the morning isn't that I'm not motivated, that I don't want to go to school. I do want to go. I love school. It's because for some reason, until pushed by external factors, my brain feels like it's switched off.

After years of denying it with awful results, I now accept that there's something majorly flawed inside me, just that we haven't put the finger on it yet. It's not motivation or even concentration. I'm medicated for the ADD (Vyvanse) and it helps my concentration a ton. But the rest of the issues aren't fixed, and with me, uneffective but determined to make it better, and my mother, who pretty much tried everything a mother can try, I would be really surprised if this were something only motivation and hard work can solve.

PS: Lol, this is seriously getting derailed, but it's my thread, so it's fine, right?

I wouldn't try to do the thing where you put your body in a starvation mode. If you can't keep up with the lower calorie intake, it will just come back with a vengeance. It happened to me and it's about 10 times as hard to get rid of the fat. Cutting out protein isn't the answer either. There's a reason that there are so many articles on the Internet about how to get protein as a vegetarian. It's very important. You need to learn to exercise those muscles for lean muscle mass. Most guys tend to do the opposite and exercise for bulk. The exercises are really no different. It's the reps and the weight. Make sure you stretch and keep the reps high and the weight low. Running will do this naturally, but it can be very hard on the knees, so make sure you get high quality running shoes (not sneakers... there is a HUGE difference) and take it slow if you're going this route.

I apologize if this was already said. This is a really long thread and I just got here.

Karen: As I said, the target here is much more the muscle than the fat. When I touch my thighs, it's mostly hard. Huge, but not so much fat to be found. Of course, yeah, a little bit less fat wouldn't be bad, but seeing as I've lost a lot of that already (down to ~132 lbs for 165 cm/5'5") and I'm hoping most of the currently undesirable fat moves to the breasts and other advantageous areas to improve my figure once my estrogen levels leave male standards, fat is not quite my priority right now.

I was really mostly looking for a way to reduce the size of my thigh muscles, and I'm still wondering how the muscle itself can actually shrink by -adding- exercise.

Though you surprised me here. I was so into the new purpose this thread had taken.

Maybe a moderator could split the subjects? It would be nice.

.

I don't know how to say this, but are you me A? Everything you described in your second to last post could also apply to me.

The hypoactivity of the body and the hyperactivity in the head. Trying to "hypnotize" myself with games and tv shows to quell the unrelenting flow of thoughts. Not being able to keep a physical list because it's an other thing to keep a track of in my already confusing mental list. Giving myself fully to a project only for it to fail completely or, if I do complete it, fail to meet my unrealistic expectations . Parents pestering me to "Just do it". Trying to explain to them that I don't know why I can't simply "do it". The stuff about AS in the article. Hell, even the huge thighs because that's why I was in the topic in the first place.

I honestly don't know what to say. I thought I was alone with this problem. It's seriously impending my progress. I'm stuck on welfare because I can't find a decent job. When I do find one, I can't keep it because of those issues. Welfare sent me to a career adviser who directed me in something that might interest me. Now, I have to go back to school but I'm afraid to go back because the last time I went, I failed spectacularly.

I need to find a therapist for those issues and my gender identity but I don't know where to start. Being in Quebec and on welfare, I probably won't have to pay for it but I don't know where to start the process.

PS. I just realized it's now 4am and I've been working on this post for nearly 3-4 hours (Damn you perfectionism). I will post it in this state and go to sleep because (I know myself) if I don't post it now, I'll never do it. Sorry if I may be incoherent in some places but I really wanted to tell you this.

QuoteHe also noted my underweight (BMI 13.4) wasn't very unhealthy,

Muuu, if your bmi is seriously that low then you need help. At a bmi that low, you're pretty much destroying your heart, and massively increasing your chance of some pretty serious brain diseases. In NZ/UK/AUS you'd actually be hospitalized.

Quote from: A on December 26, 2012, 12:22:19 AM
Though you surprised me here. I was so into the new purpose this thread had taken.

Sorry. I think I read the first page when I posted the response instead of the last. I remember rereading it after posting and thinking "this isn't the post I was responding to". Normally I start at the end on a multi-page thread, so I just let it go.

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Alexia77, it's nice to see I'm not the only one with my silly issues. And in Québec, too. :p

By the way, the main way to find a therapist, assuming you're not rich enough to pay a private one, is the CLSC. Just call your local CLSC, or maybe Info-Health (811), and start saying why you need help. You might also go through your doctor, who might give a referral.

Emily, don't be sorry. It's me who starts threads for a purpose and change it to an unrelated subject afterwards. ~

Yeah, I'll call the CLSC after the holidays. I don't have a family doctor, like a lot of people in Quebec. Mine retired with no prior warning and I only realized when I went to take an appointment for a check up. I went to see every clinic in my city and no one had places for new patients.

Yeah, sounds like a typical story like those on La Facture. I was really lucky. My mother called a clinic to ask, and they said to call the next Monday in the morning, because that was the day they took new patients, first arrived, first served. And uhm, I'm not sure you need to wait after the holidays. Perhaps there's always a secretary or two to take calls, and direct them to the appropriate resources for once they're back to work.