So today I felt like crap. Looked in the mirror he was there. I just couldn't get rid of him.

Anyway I carry my daughter to the supermarket. And as usual I'm unremarkable. No makeup.

Asked a store clerk for help. She asked another one who said, "what's she looking for again?" And the clerk said,"salted cod." "Right there ma'am." Holy crap I'm passing. Or at least being viewed as a woman.

Come to think of it last night in guy mode at the drive thru (coming from work) I was addressed as ma'am.

Yet I look in the mirror I still see him.

Anyone had those days?

Yeah, it started a week before I went full time.  Then when my parents figured it out and confronted me, I went full time from that point and forward.  Not been peaches and cream with drama with relationships but I feel a lot better of being myself now at least.

Those days were the main battle during my earlier hrt months. It takes a good while for us to realize the women we are, while people around us see it so much easier. I can't recount the mental battles in my head I would have, before venting to some of my friends and feeling super silly at the end. They'd be like "Don't worry, it's working we can see it". It does get better though, so hang in there. I know for me, what triggers the dysphoria is the facial hair. I'm perfectly okay with the genitals as I can be a patient woman but when you look in the mirror and your hair is coming in thick, ugh. I suffer generalized anxiety,  the dysphoria feeding into it was just some dark spots -_-;

Things turned around after the 5th month. Nothing reaffirms your female like growing pains. My breasts hurt so much all december long and when I did up my make up, I could see just a little hint of what others could see. Then getting into more recent months, I could look in the mirror with no make up and see the changes. "Oh hey, who's that!?" I'd say. And then when I do dress up nicely with make up, I'm even more bewildered "Who's this!?" I remember going out to a restaurant with my girl friends and on the way there, they couldn't recognize me on the bus xD! I laughed so much because once I took some selfies, I said "I can't recognize myself either!"

The estrogen does do the job and I believe it does it well. However it's up to us to be more gentle with ourselves. If you beat yourself up about your image, can you really expect others not to do so? On the flip side, if you're not beating yourself up and you portray confidence, even if a stranger may misgender you at first, they'll quickly realize their mistake and treat you appropriately*

*Assuming they're a good natured person

Now, this might give away how much lurking I used to do but Kate, you mentioned doing electrolysis yes? Well, if you're anything like me in regards to what triggers your dysphoria, the moment you can no longer see the shadow, you'll have a whole different perspective of yourself in the mirror. And based on your images, you've got a lovely face structure, not masculine at all. You can only be enhanced from here <3

Facial hair is really less of a problem now as laser seems to be working wonderfully.

Thanks for the words. However like most women I have issues with my image and it gets worse the further I get. I never considered FFS to be in my transition plan but I am thinking I may get it after SRS In 2 years.

I could never been more happier for you my dear friend. You are such an inspiration.
Big hugs and congratulations - I wish I was there to celebrate it with you.

xoxo

April

Quote from: carmenkate on March 28, 2015, 05:18:01 PM
I could never been more happier for you my dear friend. You are such an inspiration.
Big hugs and congratulations - I wish I was there to celebrate it with you.

xoxo

April

Haha look who's talking, miss inspiration herself...who inspired me to pick up myself and make myself beautiful.

Thanks though

Yay Kate! I don't think you should be surprised! Your frame and face and everything are so in female range from what I've seen!

I still rarely "pass" to myself when I look at a mirror or unflattering photos.. hopefully hormones help! Also getting my first laser session on the 8th!

It can be a double edged sword... Last time I did not feel good about my looks and was constantly seeing different people in the mirrors, it ended with me being harassed by a drunken guy in public transport for not willing to communicate with him...

Every day for me is one of those days; these days, I can never quite believe in my heart that people aren't just being nice when they refer to me as "she".  It feels like their lying, they're doing it to be polite even though I'm really still a man.  I've had glimpses of her, but I doubt I'm ever really going to see a girl when I look in the mirror.  My bone structure feels too far gone for that, I think...still, it'd be nice not to see him.  I wish there was something more I could do

I used to ride motorcycles before I had to flag it away on medical grounds and my biggest surprise was one day when I walked into a gas station still wearing my full face helmet (visor up) and the guy behind the counter addressed me as 'Mam'.  I was wearing a black leather jacket, jeans and boots at the time so there wasn't exactly too many clues for him to go on.  I wore my hair in a long plait back then and it was hanging down my back from under my bike helmet, - though I don't think he could see that as I was facing him.

Quote from: ♡ Emily ♡ on March 29, 2015, 01:47:59 AM
It can be a double edged sword... Last time I did not feel good about my looks and was constantly seeing different people in the mirrors, it ended with me being harassed by a drunken guy in public transport for not willing to communicate with him...

Yeah I've been a total bitch lately. Almost had a deadly confrontation with a street bum in newark a few days ago. Ended with him saying,"I gonna slap you a** ho." I just walked straight away to a lighted area.

I did not feel very feminine on Wednesday. I had overeaten the previous day, so I was still bloated. I had not cut my facial hair in a week. I just went out for a walk alone in the woods 45 minutes away because I felt a need to get away from my lonely home stocked with food, and got pelted by rain before I could escape to my car. I had not washed or showered that day and was still wearing my home clothes. My first injection had worn off, so I was feeling kind of low. I was trying to avoid people, but since I was in NJ I decided to get gasoline because it is so much cheaper there. That is always unsettling though, because they pump it for me, and I have gotten some disturbed looks from male employees. This guy, however, smiled politely and actually addressed me as "miss" on this day I was not doing well at all!

Quote from: ImagineKate on March 29, 2015, 06:21:59 AM
Yeah I've been a total bitch lately. Almost had a deadly confrontation with a street bum in newark a few days ago. Ended with him saying,"I gonna slap you a** ho." I just walked straight away to a lighted area.

I was not even trying to be a bitch and I am not really going for confrontations for quite a long time, but apparently, just being outside in the world now seems like an open invitation. Duh.

One thing that i've learned on my journey is that what I see in the mirror and what the outside world sees are two very different things. We live with our faces, we see them every day, and we know every feature very well - the outside world doesn't have the intimate knowledge of our faces that we have.

This can be a very hard thing to understand, because after all - the evidence is right there in the mirror...... right?

But it's not there for outside people.

That's why we get gendered correctly even when we aren't feeling it - The outside world doesn't see what we see. We are often the last to see what the outside world sees. We carry around an internal vision of ourselves that persists long after changes from HRT are evident to everyone else.

Acceptance of this is hard. For me the evidence that I was experiencing finally convinced me that the outside world wasn't seeing a guy pretending to be a girl - I was clearly being accepted as a woman.

It took some mental gymnastics to get to to a place where I understood this and I was able to ignore what I was seeing in the mirror as being false. Once I had gotten to that point I quit seeing "him" and started seeing the authentic me.

Give what the outside world is telling you a lot more weight than what the mirror is telling you.