Quote from: Jen on May 11, 2014, 01:32:50 PM
I don't know if this will help you feel better about it, but I hope it does. In my early 30s, in the last years I tried to be in the world as a guy, I looked 15 years younger than I actually was, meaning when I was 32 I looked about 18 years old, so whenever I told somebody my age it would be met with shock and then people would joke with me or say I carried my age well, and those sorts of things. I always took it to be affirming and it always felt nice.
I know for you all it would carry some baggage due to your transition and that maybe you might feel like it's a sign you're not there yet, but it isn't a bad thing to look young, imo. Most guys I don't think would take it that way. And most of the women that would comment on my age were actually being flirtatious about it. I never had the feeling anybody thought I was FTM, because that thought wasn't even in the same universe as my mind.
That does help.
I am trying to get myself into that mindset, like, this is just the age I look and other people aren't going to read anything into it. You're right about the baggage thing. I guess it's kind of like when a cis person gets misgendered, they might be a bit upset but they can laugh it off way easier than I ever could, or any other trans person could. It's hard to get that confidence as a trans person.
Quote from: Megumi on May 11, 2014, 02:36:06 PM
Up until I hit second puberty in my late 20's my sister, who is CIS was able to grow a thicker fuller beard than I ever could due to her having a hormonal imbalance. She had a beard shadow when I was still "baby faced" with my lack of ability to grow a beard. Interesting enough people gave me TONS of crap back then for not having a beard at work because I didn't fit into the typical macho, pump iron and grow a chuck Norris beard mold. Then I was able to grow some gruff and put on some muscle and after that I didn't get made fun of which is just ridiculous that most people think than man=beard.
What intrigues me the most is now that I'm transitioning but not out at work I don't get crap from having a very feminine appearance, yet I still work at the same place as before. I've nearly fully lasered off my beard, I've been on HRT for 5 months and have very smooth skin & no acne, I have my eyebrows waxed in a very feminine way and am about to go full female eyebrow next time I get my hair cut, I wear ear ring studs and have lost a lot of weight. Most of all I have almost A cup breasts and still not one single person has given me any crap at all and I don't get it. My only guess is that people at work know but don't want to face the reality of me transitioning at work yet or that they are just waiting on me to say something when I'm ready.
At 30 years old I still get carded at bars and that's in male mode or what ever visage I can call male mode that I do haha. Secretly though, I relish it when someone says that there is no way that I'm 30 and then I show them my ID. Until I get my ID and gender marker changed I'll never step foot in a bar when I'm out and about.
Haha, that is funny about your sister (although unfortunate for her, I suppose, different women feel differently about such things). It's like my brother, he is cisgender, 21, and gets mistaken for a woman on the phone and at the drive through almost all the time. There are other guys (or I should say, male assigned at birth anyway) like me, they just seem to be less noticeable...I guess I'm not really looking for them because I'm too insecure about myself.
Or I just assume they're high school kids.
Quote from: Jen on May 12, 2014, 09:52:14 AM
I never hated looking young, I kind of liked it, but then I never wanted that "man-respect." If anybody ever gave it to me it made me feel so icky. In retrospect, that was probably dysphoria before I had a word for it. So yeah, I'm probably not the one to say how an ftm should feel about it.
I do like looking young because people seem to expect less of me? Haha. I think. Respect would be nice, but eh.
