So, I was on webcam chat with Rachel yesterday, and I always keep any room I'm in dark so I have to adjust the webcam settings. As I was doing so, when I finally got it right, I realized something: I never look myself in the mirror. I never really see myself. I suppose it's intentional - I mean, physically, I've changed almost nothing since I was sixteen (people on Facebook recently mentioned that). That was twelve years ago. For twelve years, now, I've been the same.
My family is suspicious. It isn't a judgement - my brother and sister and I each have different fathers. The first one hoofed it when the eldest of us was very young, and the second one turned out to be horrifyingly abusive. My mother lived much of her life in abject poverty, and my father was accused of being retarded by his family (he's industrially blind) and had to practically flee his home in order to make something of himself. So suspicion isn't a judgment - it's a way of life. Literally.
I have never really shaved. I once did, about five or six years ago, and got so many questions I was too afraid to answer (at the time, even to myself). There's a picture of me on Facebook with the mask shaved off. I actually look nicer without the fuzz, but I look more manly. Of course, I think I look manly without it anyways.
At any rate, my New Year's resolution is to shave. And so I've done that. And I have deflected questions from my ever-suspicious family who love me very much but have made it clear they will never accept me as I am (accidentally, mind you - they do love me, after all, and wouldn't speak to my face knowingly of anything that would make me so unwelcome). But, anyways, I am now clean-shaven.
Incidentally, I think Rachel's the only one on this board who's seen my face, now, and she saw the mask on. But looking at myself yesterday for the first time so critically, I found myself ashamed of my face. So, now, I'm less ashamed.
Happy new year.
EDIT: I'm OCD. So change does not come easily for me. This new face of mine... just doesn't look right. I hope that changes.
Hmm. I don't feel like the person I see in the mirror is me, so I don't really look. I look enough to fix my hair or put makeup on, but I don't really look either.
I imagine that this is common for any trans person. When your outside doesn't match the inside, you don't want to see it. *hugs*
We just have to know that we're beautiful no matter what our bodies look like. :D
I get what you mean, but I get a sense along with that. Its like this;maybe someone could help me?
When I see myself I think this is me not anyone else. Its who I will always be. This is my life. And I get a sense of being weirded out from seeing myself from in first person.
Its much deeper then that, and even harder to explain. Some thought even have no words. But it really messes me up when I look at myself(Its not even TG Related) Do other people have/had this? Is it normal, or is it im so intellectual I ponder deep thoughts uncomprehendable by others ;)? But seriously, When I really see myself in the mirror(Not pictures) or myself in a video its just very hard for me to understand, and comprehend. And thoughts or help?
I look in the mirror quite often, whether I'm shaving (which I do fastidiously) or fighting my hair, or miming songs in the mirror and dancing.
I only get flashes when I see a person I recognise as me, usually around the eyes and forehead. There are many times that I am surprised that what I see is the person others think of when they have an image of me.
I realized about a year or so ago that I never really looked at myself in the mirror. It just felt like that everytime I looked in the mirror I saw stranger. After time I just stopped seeing. Now that I know what I am doing, I'm trying to see myself more, but besides that I'm not sure what else to do.
I don't like the stranger that looks at me from my mirror :(
I love the person I have come to know and feel within, and I just find it so different to see the face I see now in the mirror. So different but yer so nice.
I am happy that the coming out and the transitioning is behind me, I would not want to go through that again even though my coming out and transitioning years were uneventful compared to many I talk to on this board and others out there.
I am much happier inside then I ever was before in my previous life.
I have only one tiny regret, I wish I would have started at a much younger age.
Cindy
I like to look at mirrors. I'm good looking and it pleases me. Since getting most of my facial hair lasered off I feel so much better about looking in the mirror. I can see me shining through.