What was puberty like for you?
Do you feel the experience was different for you than a cisgendered adolescent?
If so, in what ways was it different?

One word:  horrid!

Just reading the question makes my chest hurt.

Sarah L.

The worst experience of my life. When a young girl turns into a man. I was happy b4 my body changed, my voice broke and testostorone drove me mad.. I hated what i became and still do. It was around puberty i started self harming. I bet the others around me didnt feel the same way

I made it through with drugs...lots of them...so I dont really remember it. I dropped acid, snorted cocaine, shot up crank (ice at the time) smoked pot, all the while crossdressed at one point or another. I think it was hell, but I was stoned most of the time.

Chemical Hell.  I realized something was very very wrong, and I was deeply ashamed of my thoughts and feelings, because I realized how much things did not match up.  Early puberty (11 years old), I kind of figured things out fully, and things got worse as time went by, and I felt worse and worse. 
I HATED it.
But beyond puberty, my twenties, was even worse.  T did most of its damage there.
I think most people who are trans could not stand puberty.  That is why if you are not fully early on (Age 3-7), it is likely you will be fully aware at the early in the onset of puberty(10-13).  From what I heard conscious awareness of gender identity happens during those two periods.  I will not say there was not issues with me during earlier in childhood, it is just the full knowledge of my gender identity did not come until early in puberty.  So puberty for me was a living chemical hell. 

Hopefully things go better the second time round 

Dull and Lonely.

My image of puberty is sitting on a wall watching everybody else get up to things.

Haha, I just woke up one day and I had these unwanted 'things' though I was never quite sure why I didn't want them.

I went to the doctor at 11 and was told I had 'clinical depression' for 'unknown causes' I asked her for prozac - she said no and offered me a teenager support group... I just wanted the damned pills. I made countless efforts to feminise myself before giving up and becoming a 'big dyke' (others words not mine)

So in short puberty was a chore/dilemma/confusing time...

dante's inferno multiplied by a thousand.

Hell. I was depressed, in and out of mental hospitals, had an eating disorder...nothing would go right, no one would take me seriously, I hated life and everything associated with it.

Wow. long sentence.

Lonely and depressed.  By the end, drinking to blackout and consuming mass quantities of hallucinogens.

The most repugnant and traumatizing experience that you can ever think of.  Just imagine a girl, liking boys, wishing to have breasts, soft skin, etc... suddenly growing the wrong parts, developing a deep voice, facial hair... ...it is one of those times of my life which I have buried deep down in my subconscious mind.  I wish no one had to go through that misery.

tink

For me puberty was a long period of time during which I was confused, depressed, full of self-recrimination and loathing and, whenever I could be, stoned.

Bleh - I hate remembering it.  I almost couldn't finish my autobiography for my therapist because of the pain of remembering.

Of course, now that puberty is happening again, but in the right direction, so far it's been fun!

hugs & smiles
helen

It was an utterly depressing, and horrifying period in my life.

A dreadful mistake of nature.

Start of "puberty"  Or when I thought it should have happened anyways...  I was severly depressed, seen as the "odd kid" an overall scarry person... Being as I was forced into the workforce at a very early age I had multiple "Accidents" at work... all with the intent on doing perminant damage to those growths before they kicked in to do any real damage...  all attempts failed... though I have allot of lovely scars and a few broken bones from the experiances heh.....

Real puberty, everything hit, hard and quick...  I had gained allot of height but my voice hadnt really broke... facial hair had been close to non existant... I was happy about that... then somewhere between 18 and 19 BAM!!! I turned into a true monster... I was uncontrolable... I was affraid of myself, and for everyone else.... A hell so great that I proceded to get so drunk and so high off coke <I was out for an od suicide> that I have about 4 years of KRS <Cant remember ->-bleeped-<-e> huge memory gaps.... I do know that I was out to be a mans man... and luckly I failed and came to terms before my liver shut down.

it wasnt good bro but I hide it inside.  acted all cool & stuff but wanst happy.

Oh, god. Acne and hair coming out everywhere. I felt freakish before puberty, and then I developed breasts (gynecomastia)! Which made gym class hell. I isolated myself so that others wouldn't read me, that I wasn't really a boy. I started to pray that I would die, everyday. I was angry and desperate and anxious. Hell.
Tara

It was hell, I knew that something was very wrong, but had no name for it. I was very depressed and did drugs...

zythyra