Once you felt like you "found" your new voice practicing alone did you feel any sort of internal resistance actually starting to use it? How did you overcome it? I feel like I'm finally getting somewhere after almost 3 months of practice, but I'm having a hard time finding the confidence to begin incorporating it into actual conversations.

I guess I just need to bite the bullet and ask a friend to "hear me out"?

What do you ladies with successful voice transitions suggest?

 Well, one day I decided to use it while talking with my mom. If my voice was viable, she would feel awkward and would give me feedback letting me know that my voice was suitable, and if my voice wasn't viable, she would either not comment, or comment to the effect that I "sound strange".

Fortunately, I received feedback that my voice most definitely did not match my male appearance.

You could try this with anyone you know well and are out to.

Hi,

Im one of those who did not force my voice was  not a deep base yet my voioce changed by its self when the time was right,
I have a few advantages, iv sang in choirs & still sing do soprano & tenor  not in the high's  can still do some base just not low,  because im intersexed my hormones kicked in & a few details changed &  my body was ready , so some of us do have things about our selfs that work for   us .not every detail of cause,

...noeleena...

I talked.  Simple as that.

I was pretty lucky though and had an androgen kind of voice to begin with.  So all I did was change my inflections and practice mentally - thinking with a feminine inner voice.  After a while whenever I spoke it came naturally.   

I sort of just did it, similar to me deciding to go fulltime before I even began HRT. I had choosen my name, I wanted to go fulltime so I did, that included my voice, at first it was rubbish but I practiced, but I never practiced alone, I did it when I was talking to my friends, making phonecalls, buying clothes, food etc. Trail by fire, but I got my voice to a point were it pass quickly, unless it's someone who known before, or got some kind of knowledge in the area and can tell the difference.

Opposite.

I liked my femme voice so much I couldn't wait to be able to use it. I was devastated when I posted it here and it was ripped apart as sounding too much like a man's. I watched some tutorial videos on youtube and modified it but I've been afraid to post it because I don't want to hear that it still sounds like a man or artificial.

All I know is that it really matches who I am. It's sweet and sensitive like the woman I'd like to be. I actually feel different when I use it.

For me it was spending hours on the phone speaking to friends, running up huge phone bills.. Consequently, I haven't ever been mis-gendered on the phone since.

Speaking of using the phone to practice, my first job after transition was in a police contact centre.  I was on the phone all day to police taking police reports.  That was baptism by fire thinking back on it.  Never had any problems and we often socialised with some of them. 

I had never consciously practiced though, other than using my inner voice. Some things just come naturally.

Just pulled into a drive thru one day and placed an order in my female voice. It passed!

i was working at an arbys, and was on drive thru most of the time. once i felt comfortable enough with it. i started using over the intercom. enough to have perfected it so, that when i do come out to someone and tell them im trans they are shocked at how well my voice is. =D

I went to dinner with my partner and some friends where I was meeting one of our friends friends. If that makes sense. Now it's hard for me to use male voice in guy mide and I have to force myself down a couple octaves.  It's still not right but will be some day. I did just realize while reading the previous posts that my inner voice is now the pitch that I aim for when I do speak.

I've never worried about it.

I'm Cindy, who cares what anyone else thinks?

Thanks everyone for the thoughtful replies and comments. Thank you so much Jamie for your soundcloud clip

There has been a steady stream of work followed by nightly parties at my house the past 2-3 days which has left me with little time... I'm sorry for not responding sooner!

I've been really making an effort to raise my pitch in day to day speaking, and when I go far up in pitch my larynx knows what to do now- so the resonance kind of automatically changes to accomodate. The feeling I am being left with is that people are gendering me much more successfully now (I can just tell a major difference). I'm becoming a lot more comfortable using a more feminine voice, so much so that I haven't gone back into my usual male range in almost 4 days I'm still kind of in an in between zone, but to me I am already much happier with the way it sounds!

Thanks so much for all the suggestions, y'all have been very helpful as I continue to work on this!!