Hello,
The past 5 or 6 months have completely redefined my life, and how I look at myself. The past week or so has been especially bad, I feel awful and alone or surrounded by pessimists, or people who I just can't talk to... and that's why I'm here. So, I guess I'll start from my previous semester in school. I'm studying Theatre, and at the university I attend, there's a huge emphasis on 'being yourself' and 'following your impulses'. I'm sure that's just about how it is most anywhere else, really. I just had this feeling in my Voice and Movement "follow your impulses" class that everything I was doing was made up. Every time I went to class, I dreaded it, just because... I don't know, I was so scared of being myself, I didn't know what to do. To our instructor, I was fine, but I always wanted to be the best I could be in this class. Around the same time, I also just happened to look at some MtF HRT timelines of people, I was talking more to a transgender friend of mine, I played with some voice editing programs, and another transgender friend came out to me. That friend was someone I absently told about the things I'd looked up for ages. Transgender things, voice things... A combination of him confronting me, and this class, led me to really realize that at the age of 23 I had basically been wrong all my life.
The first trans friend I mentioned, he realized at a much younger age, and I started to talk to him all the time. He's the first person I really talked to about it. I remember the first time talking about it. I was shaking so much I could hardly type, I was about to cry. I'm sure I would have if we were talking in person about it.
I don't know if this is normal, but I'd spent the past 4 months or so questioning it. Flipping between completely confident and an emotional wreck... but I've been a lot worse lately. I talked to a counselor at school about it, since it was free and I was sure it'd give me a less biased look at myself. After one meeting, my whole "what is WRONG with me" breakdowns were gone. Replaced with complete confidence. That was like, last Monday... and since then, I've only gotten worse. I mean, technically better. At least I'm really sure of my problem, and I've done so much research (even before I realized) that I have a very general idea of what to do. Of course, keep going to this counselor, or to whatever therapy they recommend or I can get access to... and see what treatments I can get ahold of then.
But I can't hang onto that for long. I can't manage the logistics of the whole thing. I'm still living at home. The only people I've ever told are trans* themselves in some way or another, or don't have a rigid definition of sexuality or gender, or people I knew would be okay with it that I could trust. I don't know if I can tell my family. I don't know what to do there. I need support, for when my emotions get to be too hard to handle. At the very least, if my family knew, I wouldn't have to run to an uninhabited room to cry when I get the feeling. I've looked up the cost of hormones, or heck, just the cost of clothes to play with how I look... I've tried to shave my legs in secret, but all I have to manage that is a spray bottle of water and a manual razor. Not only is the cost an issue, I'm sneaking around my parents and my brother to do what I CAN do. I really, really wish I could tell them, but I don't have a backup plan if things go horribly wrong. If I got kicked out, that's it. If I was met with hostility, that's simply what I'm coming home to for months on end until I can afford to move out.
In addition to that, I feel like I'll never look the way that I want to look. I'm deathly afraid of-- I remember seeing something like this from lurking around on the website-- the whole 'man in a dress' syndrome. Or rather, not afraid that other people will see me that way. I'm more afraid that I'll see myself that way. My reflection's pretty much my worst enemy now. But, I do know that as long as I don't see myself, I usually feel pretty good. Still, every time I see the effects of HRT, or the cost of surgery, or how much work it takes to get your voice right, it doesn't matter how I feel. I usually just fall apart.
I don't know, I need friends who I can talk to who know how I feel. I need to just know what to do. I feel like I'm living life by the moment right now, which isn't going to get what I want done to get done. I've written a tremendously unstructured post here, but that's just who I am along with just having a particularly bad day. I might have made it seem like I haven't thought about it for long, but I think I have. I vividly remember when World of Warcraft came out and my brother let me play his account, that was the precise time I realized that I couldn't stand being represented as a male or particularly masculine character. It's just not 'me'. On his later purchase of Final Fantasy 11, I remember he made my character for me and out of embarrassment I told him to pick the all-male rock race instead of the all-female one... I remember looking at jewelry around the house a lot when I was younger, and it always eventually just 'disappeared'. I remember every time I would look at the bald spot in my leg hair and just touch it, because it was so soft and I liked it a lot more. I just hadn't ever thought about it until recently, and it's gotten really difficult lately.
I can also talk a little bit about myself. I study theatre, after I fell in love with acting my first semester of college. That is to say, after I actually learned anything about the art. There's so much to it, and playing another character just puts me at ease. The more I have to consider and the more I have to do, the better. Theatre and I, we just get along. I've been in a student-directed one-act play this semester, which has been a lot of fun. It was hard at first, especially the whole "Just apply this character's circumstances to your own life" coaching bit I got, where I was thinking, "yeah, about my life, um..." Still, it's gotten a lot easier. It's just killing me lately because the director's vision for this character is that of someone who hasn't recently shaved. So, I've got far too much facial hair and my reflection is an even worse enemy to me. I feel it everywhere, it bothers me, but it's for the sake of theatre. As soon as I'm out of the Saturday show, my facial hair is so gone, and I won't miss it.
I'm also a gamer, but I've been thinking lately that I should stop that. I'm thinking, I've hid in games a lot lately, and I'm not going to get anywhere if I continue to do that. Still, I doubt I'll be able to get rid of them entirely. I like a lot of things like Devil May Cry, Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance... but I also absolutely love rhythm games. It's like an instrument I don't have to practice. Pretty much any game is fine for me though, as long as it doesn't try too hard to tell me what to do. I like the learning experience, I like figuring things out myself in games. I also love music, I've messed around a bit with music composition little flash games and software like FLStudio. I was thinking of doing stuff like that more, once I have the time and I'm not distracted by trans issues all over the place. I'm a fairly artistic person, as it turns out. Not so much visually, but I've written a lot about my feelings, I write out game design ideas, I play and improvise a bit on piano, sometimes I dance a bit in public, in reaction to whatever song I happen to be listening to (although honestly, it mostly happens with Tenacious D).
Anyway, I don't know, this has been a really disjointed sort of post, I'm in a lot of ways still sorting out exactly how I feel. I refer to myself gender neutrally for the most part. I don't know if or when I would go full time, but I know that I would rather be feminine than masculine. I hope in my time here or in therapy I can really find myself. Maybe one day I'll have much more hope for the future. As it is, I still live life day-by-day.
I feel like I should ask something so anybody who reads this isn't like "Okay, hi." I've read a bunch on the subject, but I still don't have any idea really... when is it a good idea to tell my parents I've been having these issues? I don't know that they'll kick me out or anything, but I also don't know that they won't kick me out or anything. They're at least not outwardly homophobic or transphobic. I'm too scared to make a move. I don't know that any of my friends would help me if the worst should happen.
