Hello, making this post in the hopes that talking about it, and maybe hearing about people in similar situations, will ease my mind a little
Currently 25 y/o with a girlfriend and family that support me so thankfully that's not an issue for me.
Iv been talking to a therapist for a couple months now about a number of things, one of them being my dysphoria and the possibility of starting HRT. I think the worst part and the part that's been getting to me is the back and forth tug of war inside me. There is that part of me that's like "Hey do you really wanna take this risk and loose the few male things you enjoy? To leave what you have grown to know so well" and then there are parts like "You know it well and are use to it, but it still doesn't FEEL right, how much happier would you be if you go for it and it dose feel right? How much better could your life be if you truly felt yourself?" and it go's back and forth endlessly, like an argument with yourself that you cant win (Granted i didn't get into detales of each side). Iv seen alot of people say, including my therapist, that starting hormones made this feeling go away. Or in the case of HRT not being right for someone only making it worse. Maybe i could get some examples from both sides of HRT of how it made people feel?
I started Spiro in mid September. I immediately (2 or 3 days) felt way better. The voices changed from totally annoying to something else, scared, comforting? I don't know if it was a placebo effect or not, it didn't matter.
Fast forward to today. I've been on estradiol injections for 2 months now. I've never been happier. The voices are gone. The anger is gone. The apprehension is gone. I've lost the intimacy of marriage, but not the friendship. I'm so damn calm it's scary.
As for losing the male things I like? Well I'm not sure what those are. I still bike. I still like the same TV. Okay maybe the stamina for biking at a higher level, but that could be due to the subfreezing temperatures and lack of gym time.
Reme, what male things are you afraid of losing. If it is sexual related, personally I'm not missing it to much.
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I haven't started HRT yet, but I understand the self-doubt. It would just be so much easier to stay male. What keeps me moving forward when the doubts hit are these thoughts...
I can't stop the urge to cross-dress. It will always be there and it will cause trouble if I don't acknowledge it.
The desire to be female will never go away.
I don't like the emotional shut-down that was necessary for me to survive as a male.
I can't stand the idea of living the rest of my life not knowing who I could have been.
So I am going to go for HRT. They say it will make a difference. We'll see. I am not signing up for surgery until I feel how I respond on HRT. So I have an out if it isn't for me. I am pretty sure I am going to like it, though.
Someone on a hobby discussion forum that I came out to recently said this: "I learned at an early age in the jungles of Viet Nam that life is too precious not to make the ride as fulfilling for yourself as possible." A hell of a way to learn, but he got it right.
I waited six months before starting HRT, exploring my feeling about being gendered one way or another (while also working on hair removal and voice training). Over that period of time, the feelings of dysphoria over male gendering increased, as did the feelings of euphoria at female gendering. And then I "found my voice" such that I was consistently (like, 100%) gendered female over the phone, and at that point I was so over the moon I knew there was no going back. I started HRT (which only served to confirm everything) and I was off to the races.