Susan's Place Transgender Resources

(If this is the wrong spot for this, please move as needed, thanks!)
So I'm pretty far off from having top surgery, but I'm already sure I'll end up having double incision. I plan on doing everything I can to minimize scarring (and I'm hoping T will make me hairy lol), but I know they'll take some time to fade and will be very visible in the beginning.
Once I start passing, I want to try to be fairly stealth; I'll only mention I'm trans if I feel safe/comfortable doing so or if it's relevant. So that's leaving me kind of at a loss of how to answer any possible questions about the double incision scars. I don't want to outright tell people because then that means outing myself.

So I wanted to ask: What do you guys tell people if anyone asks about your scars, whether or not you're stealth? Do you just leave it vague ("Had surgery") and hope they don't prod with more questions? Do you try to say it was some other procedure (I've heard some guys say it's from a heart surgery)? Or do you just be honest?
Thanks!

Gynecomastia and "moobs" are common enough in cis men that you could probably get away with a version of the truth: "I had some breast growth, so I had surgery to have the excess tissue removed removed."

Funnily enough, I didn't even think about that. I'll have to remember that one.
However, I'd still like to hear if anyone else has other suggestions or reasons they use.

i have never had anyone ask about my scars. i go swimming without a shirt on and people don't even stare. if someone ever did ask, i have funny answers ready. you can also say a double lung transplant if you wanted.

Honestly,  even people I've know my entire life (relatives I never came out to and friends I've know for years that I never came out to) never asked. I had a noticeable bust (34c) and when I started binding mid way through my senior year of university, no one asked.

I was in Japan for four years and had surgery at the midway point of being there. I was binding before and people who knew me just commented on the fact that I had lost weight. If only they knew.  When I came back to the states,  I ran into lots of people (my hometown is in alaska, and we all know each other) the ones who recognized me never asked. Not even my father asked, and I hadn't come out to him at that point. My scars in Japan garnered some interest,  but when I was asked, I just said I had an operation. No one ever asked for what.

For the record I don't think I pass but I Japan I did all the time and in the states I'm at 80%.

If people ask for what, that's considered bad form.

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I live 98% stealth in my daily life, and have only been asked once. I regularly wear cut up shirts or low cut tank tops to the gym, and I know people can see my scars, especially since they are hypertrophic/ keloid (to my dismay lol) but no one comments.

My response when I was asked was that I had surgery to remove a benign growth. No further questions were asked

I won't have to deal with this until next year, but if anyone asks, I was attacked by robots from the Pirates of the Caribbean ride at Disneyland. 

I have encountered some very rude people in life so I expect someone will ask me this sooner or later.

I'm not even sure if I would grace it with an answer, or if the answer should be a truth or a fiction.

I'm bad at maintaining fictions. As far as I'm concerned they were gynaecomastia and that's the doggone truth of the matter.

Benign growth sounds good but they were malign in my book.

Quote from: WorkingOnThomas on June 05, 2016, 04:45:51 AM
I won't have to deal with this until next year, but if anyone asks, I was attacked by robots from the Pirates of the Caribbean ride at Disneyland.

Is that anything like the accident with a mechanical rice picker  ;D
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z6uH2-44XWs

I don't think I would go down the transplant route, as that sounds like it could end up being a more elaborate lie... i mean you'd have to be quite ill to need a double lung transplant! Gynecomastia is I guess almost exactly what we have though lol so maybe that's okay

Quote from: AeroZeppelin92 on June 05, 2016, 01:00:07 AM
I live 98% stealth in my daily life, and have only been asked once. I regularly wear cut up shirts or low cut tank tops to the gym, and I know people can see my scars, especially since they are hypertrophic/ keloid (to my dismay lol) but no one comments.

My response when I was asked was that I had surgery to remove a benign growth. No further questions were asked

This is such an interesting side of the forum.

Your response really is actually the truth. Good idea.

I don't know if I'm meant to say this, but you are a very good looking young man.

It really depends who is asking. Small kids, I make something cool up. Shark attack, bear fight, sword fighting competition. They dig it.

With some adults I will tell the truth (friends of friends, girls I find attractive). If I don't think it's safe to be completely honest, I'll either say I used to be super fat and had skin removed, or I collapsed both lungs. The scarring is similar in both cases.

I find the question very rude, but I try to give people some kind of answer as long as they aren't overly rude or aggressive when asking it. I have been post-op for over a year now and have only been asked twice.

"So my friend has a spider monkey, and the little guy loves jello so one time there are some people over for a party and one guy brought jello shots, before I knew it that little monkey ate two of them and now we have a literal drunk monkey and he gets all agitated because of the crowd and somehow got his hands on a knife....things got complicated after that..."

Serena

Quote from: alex82 on June 05, 2016, 07:54:36 PM
This is such an interesting side of the forum.

Your response really is actually the truth. Good idea.

I don't know if I'm meant to say this, but you are a very good looking young man.

Thank you very much!  ;D

Just tell them that your ex ripped out your heart or better yet tel them they are gills.

There are some forms of open-heart surgery that leave very similar scars, so that's my go-to response for when I need a serious answer. But on a lighter note: it's from my Army days; or I've bent the steering wheel in a Formula One crash; or I've been attacked by sharks (you should've seen the other guy!); or I cut myself shaving my chest hair; or I've been injured whilst playing James T. Kirk in a Star Trek re-enactment. You know how he always managed to get his shirt (and chest) shredded by the random alien of the week. ;)

I don't have my scars yet, but I was being pressed about what my surgery was for when discussing some upcoming deadlines. My partner said I needed to have some growths removed, and that seemed to take care of it.

I haven't been strutting around with my scars showing (almost three years later and they're still RED and I have light north European skin tone) so I haven't had any questions but I'd most likely say they're from a surgery. I'm just afraid people would ask more questions, like "what surgery?" etc and I sure as heck don't want to go into details, it's not other people's business. Maybe I should just go way too much into detail about some obscure ritual that involves a lot of blood?

Idk, I've just received annoyed huffs and snorts when I refused to go into details about some stuff relating to my transition. Also, I hate being stared at.

You could always just look down at your scars, gasp, and say "when did those get there?"

Double incision and inverted top surgery scarring does look remarkably similar to double lung transplant scars so you could say that. Or just that you don't like to discuss it.

Quote from: Lorlor on June 07, 2016, 09:13:55 AM
You could always just look down at your scars, gasp, and say "when did those get there?"

Double incision and inverted top surgery scarring does look remarkably similar to double lung transplant scars so you could say that. Or just that you don't like to discuss it.

"What scars? I can't see any scars?"

I guess I could say I was thrown from. A horse and landed on a cross country fence.  I have had enough horseback riding injuries that no one would question it, lol!

I had a dirt bike accident; I cut myself on the plastic windshield. Had to have my whole chest reconstructed. I was lucky; they were able to save my nipples. lmao  ;D

Quote from: zeus33...or better yet tel them they are gills.

I'd probably say something along the lines of having growths removed, but it sure would be tempting to say "I was born with gills."

If you had to say something, I would go with having some growths removed. To make it more elaborate (and potentially shut people up if they try to get more info) you could say your *insert male relative* had something similar to it as well and act like it's no big deal / a genetic thing. Best I can think of as I'm not really planning on leaving the house without a shirt.
Good luck.

I sidestep this issue altogether and keep my shirt on around others. But here's how I've handled other (not necessarily trans-related) questions in the past, that I didn't want to answer:

"That's a personal question."

Said matter-of-factly as you can manage. If you want to soften it, include a polite smile and slight furrowing of the eyebrows to indicate discomfort.

I have yet to have someone not drop it immediately. Yes, they're uncomfortable. But the moment they ask me a question for no good reason, which I don't want to answer, I have two choices. 1) Share information I'm uncomfortable sharing or 2) Let them be uncomfortable and keep my business to myself. I value my privacy more than their unbridled curiosity.

I generally say something sarcastic.. "Oh sword fight.. I won." Generally people take that as a hint that I don't want to talk about it and drop it. I thought about other conditions that may have similar scars but as someone mentioned above that seemed like a more elaborate lie and I didn't want to have to come up with answers to follow up questions.

I am in no way joking about this topic myself because I know that I personally will never take off my shirt in public due to my scars (unless I get tattoos maybe?) when I don't even want to see them myself but, I just literally thought about something like:...

"I used to cut myself due to depression and I missed the heart" or plainly "I used to cut myself"...

For a more genuine answer, I would say that I had an injury because that's how I see this kind of surgery with such an obvious evidence.