I wouldn't detransition but my life would be less than ideal. I speak publicly and also on media such as podcasts, amateur and even broadcast radio. I may make TV appearances in the future if it's any indication too. So my voice can't be "off" which is why I'm having the surgery.

Plain and simple? It's a major barrier to further transition beyond (mostly ineffective) hrt.

Quote from: kittenpower on March 30, 2015, 08:48:49 PM
...No, I would keep working on it. I think most people can develop a female voice, it just takes patience, practice, and devotion.

Yes, I'd say it takes consistency... its not a lot of time daily, especially in the beginning, but a few minutes every day...
never overstrain your voice...
and there are many things... using more indirect language... maybe a bit breathy talk... more ups and downs in intonation...


hugs

Quote from: Jill F on March 30, 2015, 08:39:23 PM
I wouldn't detransition if someone put a gun to my head.

What she said ^

I do have to say it is one of the things that just riles me up.  I loathe being misgendered on the phone.  I will have something surgically done to it eventually.  But, if I had no way to alter it, I would just have to accept that --but remain transitioned.  And funnily enough, my wife actually would prefer it if I did not raise my pitch.  She def understands why I am bent on doing it, but she has grown accustomed to my voice over a quarter century.  She says it does not affect her perception of me being a woman.

It's probably going to be harder with discipline for the kids since I won't have the male voice anymore. They don't listen to their mother but when I talk they stand at attention.

Quote from: ImagineKate on March 31, 2015, 09:59:29 AM
It's probably going to be harder with discipline for the kids since I won't have the male voice anymore. They don't listen to their mother but when I talk they stand at attention.

Ha!  I know, right?!  My dogs, too.

Quote from: evecrook on March 30, 2015, 06:16:15 PM
The videos I've seen of voice surgery are amazing, but personally I can never do that unless someone leaves me a lot of money.

It's what, something around $8,000 in Korea? Plus flight tickets, plus other expenses, you are looking at around $10,000, maybe little less. Everybody who is serious with their transition, and has the determination, can save $10,000 in less than two years... 

There is also dr Haben in NY who may be a bit less because you don't have to travel to korea.

Quote from: mmmmm on March 31, 2015, 10:14:34 AM
It's what, something around $8,000 in Korea? Plus flight tickets, plus other expenses, you are looking at around $10,000, maybe little less. Everybody who is serious with their transition, and has the determination, can save $10,000 in less than two years...

to be perfectly honest , I'm 63 years old and living on disability and food stamps so it would be a challenge to save 10000 . I prefer to have Warren Buffett as a rich uncle

I get ma'med on the phone 100% of the time now. I'm now using my female voice when I speak to people in person more and more every day. And that's even when I dress in "boy mode". My voice would never be a determining factor for detransitioning.

Just recently, I've been using a handheld DVR and recording myself and playing back instantly. I can pull off either a really breathy femme voice or bubbly energetic voice, both of which are not very realistic for everyday speech. There are moments when I'm dead on bullseye female that even surprise me. I'm not all the way there yet though.

Quote from: ainsley on March 31, 2015, 10:03:24 AM
Ha!  I know, right?!  My dogs, too.

lol I remember when I was able to speak in my new voice but I couldn't yell at all without my voice dropping or even worst no words would come out. About a year or so later it became less difficult but still took effort and now I'm at the point where I can yell with ease. So yeah you can totally get the authoritative tone back, it just takes a long time.

As others have said, nothing would make me detransition... but it would certainly make my life inconvenient. (I also do public speaking appearances, including public radio as a political commentator and fairly regular teaching gigs at a college.) And it did take hundreds of hours of work to get my voice polished to the point that I can comfortably rely on it all day in those circumstances.

That said, my wife and I are both middle tenor range - and now that I don't do the male chest resonance anymore and *do* have feminine inflections (after several years, it's ingrained habit) she gets "sir" on the phone occasionally and I never do. When she's tired, she stops doing the feminine inflections and talking in a higher pitch, and occasionally cold callers call her by my old name! Clearly I'm fortunate enough to have started from a reasonable pitch, but in the end I settled on something that's lowish alto rather than trying for the highest pitch I can hold, and then worked on all the other details instead.

Im with big kim on this one. I do a damn good impression of james hetfield (lemmy too). Its not stopping me. Im just gonna work on it.

Most trans women I know IRL have non-passable voices. None of them seem unhappy in any way with their transitions. In fact, I've observed that non-passable trans women seem to be the happiest ones I know.

Hell No

My voice is naturally lower then most males. It takes time, it takes practice, it takes lessons of some sort, but it can be improved. A woman in my group can be even a far deeper baritone then I am, does a mean John Wayne, yet, you'd never know.

A very close female friend of mine, 6ft plus tall, big boned, very andro got misgendered a lot on the phone. Especially with a name like Francis. Ever hear a middle aged female pack a day plus smoker?

Voices, like anything else female vary all over the map. I no longer worry. Yet, as Ms Grace mentioned, when I was far younger, my voice and many other things readily added up DON'T!!! when I experimented with transition. As many have said before me, "Transitioning ain't for Weenies". And I was an Oscar Meyer Weener

I certainly wouldn't. There was a time early on where I passed but my voice didn't, and I never thought it would. I was seriously considering becoming a mute. However, I would sometimes have to talk in public when ordering food or talking to a salesperson, so I would quietly muster up the most feminine voice I could come up with. Never had any problems with it but didn't think it was passable. Then one day I got up the courage to talk like that in front of a friend, and I was convinced I was going to sound super fake and awkward. She told me I sounded normal and feminine. After the shock wore off, I kept using it with some encouragement from her. Took a little practice but I quickly 'perfected' it and have been using it ever since. I've even been told it's sexy by quite a few people. So for me it just took some confidence and encouragement to really try. And now my 'natural' voice has changed from talking like this for a while. It's pitched up a bit, almost in between my old and new voices. Only real concern though is that if I'm around someone that I'm comfortable with, I find my voice pitches down a bit. I can get too relaxed with it. :/ And that makes me a bit paranoid and want to pitch it up higher than I normally would. Honestly, if I really try I can sound rather cute and feminine, but I'm more comfortable with a bit of huskiness to my voice. So I think the way I naturally talk now (with my new voice, but at whatever pitch it is without thinking or trying) is probably just right. It's comfortable and passable, so I don't really care if I sound as feminine as possible.