I started taking a low dose of Estradiol about 3 months ago, and haven't noticed any physical changes yet. However, I did notice that my desire and needs to be fully female all day has significantly lessened. I used to feel the need to dress up in girl mode as much as possible to feel better, but since taking the estradiol, I have no yearnings to do so at all. In fact, it has become sort of annoying to have to spend 40 minutes to put on makeup, straighten my hair, and put together an outfit. While I used to LOVE high heels (and I still do), I don't feel the need to wear them all day, and it's more of something that would wear to complete an outfit, rather than to help complete my needs.
I still want to be a girl, and would love for people to recognize me as female. However, all of a sudden my plans to come out at work, and to fully flip my life around and risk losing everything just to live full time and be recognized as full time, are not as much of a priority to me.
My life used to be: "I can't wait to start taking hormones, look more feminine, come out at my job, and be recognized as female. I understood the risk of discrimination and going through a lot of hell to accomplish."
Now my life is more: "I'm pretty comfortable where I am. Can't wait for a full dose of estradiol + spiro. No need to go out in girl mode. Significantly reduced feelings of dysphoria. I feel more 'normal'."
Has this happened to anyone else where HRT has significantly reduced their dysphoria or helped to resolve their gender identity issues by itself?
HRT certainly helped with my dysphoria, which was never all that great to start with. But it didn't resolve my gender issues.
I did find that I was no longer as wrapped up in the whole 'presentation' thing. Now I just live life - as a somewhat genderqueer woman..
I would say 'Yes' , starting HRT has controlled my dysphoria.
For me, the dysphoria was linked to the knowledge that preHRT, my body was still masculinizing with high testosterone levels circulating through my body...with every day that passed, I felt my other spirit (female spirit) was fading away. This caused much angst in me; however, once I started my HRT, it was as if I started taking the medicine that would heal me. My endo and I are still working on dosing levels, but I don't obsess like I previously did. I'm happy and content, knowing I'm on my way.
I will also add - I've never been an Audrey Hepburn, Breakfast at Tiffany's kind of girl. So neither preHRT or even now, I just don't do the dress and makeup thing, nor do I think that necessarily defines a 'girl'. Being a girl is - first and foremost - an internalized quality that you simply know to be true, regardless of the outward appearance. Being a girl is something that you simply know to be who you are - It's not about the dress, or the makeup, or the purse, or the heels. It's not about the presumed fashion gender dichotomy that girls wear dresses and boys don't...ergo, if you don't wear a dress...
Don't get me wrong - there's nothing wrong with liking to dress up and feel pretty, I just don't think we need to feel obligated to conform to the 'established standards of high society'. To feel feminine, sexy and empowered - there is nothing wrong with this...but there are just so many ways to do it (for me, it's about putting my hair back in a ponytail, throwing on my helmet and cycling kit, and getting on the road for 4 hours...YMMV).
90% of my dysphoria is gone.
I still want to look good and my body is feminizing. So, I want to present to some level. Ultimately, my ability to look good will determine some of my presentation. I will have a baseline regardless of looks.
That has definitely been my experience. When I was operating on T, I felt a constant desire to be female.
Now that I've been on estradiol for a few years, the dysphoria has been greatly reduced. I've had a lot of physical changes, fairly large boobs and a touch of "Kardashian butt". The unexpected thing is that I'm not particularly aroused by my feminine body. It's just a body and boobs are just boobs. Nothing special at all.
Psychologist Anne Vitale has written about similar occurances. In her opinion, in some transwomen, it is the testosterone that accentuates dysphoria. Lower the testosterone, increase the estrogen and they dysphoria goes away. The problem is that if they try to detransition, and go back on T, they dysphoria comes back. A paradox indeed, and not widespread, but it has been observed and commented on.
http://www.avitale.com/TNote15Testosterone.htm
Randi
I found it useful to distinguish between sort of "internal dysphoria" and "social dysphoria." The internal dysphoria - how I felt about my own body and what upset me even when I was alone - diminished sharply on HRT. The social dysphoria - how I felt about the way other people perceived me - actually got much WORSE, because now I was mentally and physically in alignment and how people treated me was even farther away from what I needed. So HRT sort of made me more comfortable with my body but also drove me to want to transition fully and publicly even faster. That's just me, though. Everybody's different.
(One warning : I was on very, very low-dose HRT and still lost the ability to pass as male no matter how hard I tried by about six months in.)
Yes! That's exactly what I mean - internal dysphoria vs social dysphoria. My internal dysphoria has significantly decreased, but if I was to dress up nicely and stuff, it would be mainly to be presentable to others. Before my HRT, being dressed and hope of transitioning fully as a female made my dysphoria more manageable. Now I feel fine internally, and would dress up just as any other cisgender female would - to look decent in public and to better pass as female.
Quote from: Randi on May 04, 2014, 11:33:15 AM
That has definitely been my experience. When I was operating on T, I felt a constant desire to be female.
Now that I've been on estradiol for a few years, the dysphoria has been greatly reduced. I've had a lot of physical changes, fairly large boobs and a touch of "Kardashian butt". The unexpected thing is that I'm not particularly aroused by my feminine body. It's just a body and boobs are just boobs. Nothing special at all.
Psychologist Anne Vitale has written about similar occurances. In her opinion, in some transwomen, it is the testosterone that accentuates dysphoria. Lower the testosterone, increase the estrogen and they dysphoria goes away. The problem is that if they try to detransition, and go back on T, they dysphoria comes back. A paradox indeed, and not widespread, but it has been observed and commented on.
http://www.avitale.com/TNote15Testosterone.htm
Randi
This is how I feel too. I am naturally attracted to females. Back before I started estrogen, it was a turn on for me to dress up and look like a girl, and I even had some degree of attraction to how I looked. Now it seems like "eh, boobs are just boobs and there's nothing special about them" (other than them making me look more female) and I am not really aroused at all by getting dressed and looking female. Now, it would be cool to just do stuff as a girl, no matter what I look like.
I hear many start HRT and then think, "I am cured!" only to stop and discover that HRT was good medicine.
I went through a similar process OP. First few months I was just happy to see the dysphoria lifted. No need to present or go overboard. Then I did a play where I played a trans woman, and I had to dress and wear makeup and I loved it! Now I can't stop. Go figure.
Quote from: Tori on May 04, 2014, 04:20:52 PM
I hear many start HRT and then think, "I am cured!" only to stop and discover that HRT was good medicine.
I went through a similar process OP. First few months I was just happy to see the dysphoria lifted. No need to present or go overboard. Then I did a play where I played a trans woman, and I had to dress and wear makeup and I loved it! Now I can't stop. Go figure.
some what similar has happened to me. once on HRT I just felt internally good I had no need to be concerned about clothes , now that the effects of HRT are sowing themselves I love to shop.
Fetishism down, insanity down, dysphoria is up, self expression in clothes healthy, and a whole new world opened up. A completely different experience of being a transwoman, finally a healthy place to be in.
A BIG YES
I went on/off low dose HRT for years as a way to tame my dysphoria. After a couple of months the strong desires I had to chuck the faking being a guy pretty much went away. I was no longer preoccupied with thoughts of transitioning.
For the past 6 years now I've been continuously on HRT... More or Less. While for the most part I now know, believe, I really do need to be on it, I also do not nor ever had a big drive to transition. My goal was always to try to find some path to self acceptance. Every once in while I'd get into these the major "WTF am I doing????" funks. Like you noticed you are thinking I am doing fine. There is no need to transition, Why am I even still doing HRT. You stopped plenty of times in the past. Stopping always turned into a big mistake.
QuoteHas anyone else had HRT cause their dysphoria to mostly stop by itself?
Mmm... yes and no. I did experience a lot of relief when I started low dose HRT. It no longer felt like my body was rotting from the inside out, my anxiety levels and depression improved significantly, and overall I just felt a lot better about myself. But I was still holding on to the masculine persona that I had spent so many years building up, and that in and of itself was still draining my motivation and encouraging me to isolate myself. What I'm finding is, being male just makes me so generally uncomfortable that there is no way I can really be happy and live a productive life without transitioning. Being the right gender on both the inside and out allows me to be myself with no restrictions, and that is really what it takes for me to be happy. No one was more surprised by this fact than me, and if I had known I would have pushed myself to transition a lot sooner.
A few weeks ago I got really sick with the flu. When I get that sick I won't take most medicines because my body just can't handle outside things in my body. I told myself I was going to stop HRT because I felt an aversion to the extra stuff in my body. Once I stopped the HRT , within two days I experience the same depression that put me into the hospital , so I started the HRT again and I immediately became a happy camper again. Moral of the story my body needs the estrogen.