Sometimes, it's the little things that count.

I went from questioning my identity for the last few years before and after detransitioning.  I knew I wasn't a man and never have been, but I thought that maybe I was enby.  A couple of weeks ago I was able to start HRT again after three or four years (I'm sorry, my sense of the passage of time is horrible) and after less than a week, I had a new clarity in my mind.  I'm in no way femme, but now I'm pretty certain I identify as fully female.  Tomboy, yes, but no male left in me.

The last couple of weeks have also been filled with little happy moments.  I'm still presenting male (well, I thought I have been), but I'm being referred to by female pronouns almost exclusively by complete strangers in the least likely of places like tire and hardware stores.  The one time yesterday I was addressed as "sir" it's because the person called my name, but as soon as he was next to me and was talking to me, he became visibly uncomfortable and I'm pretty sure he was confused by that deadname and wasn't sure what to do.  The other people at that business were all referring to me as she/her/ma'am.

I'm not sure what it is.  I'm not sure if it's my appearance or my new sense of confidence that people are picking up on.  Either way, I'm pretty damned positive I'm back on the right track for me.  We'll see how far this goes.

This is exactly how I presented yesterday:

(no, I'm no beauty queen and never will be and I'm coming to terms with being fine with that)

Congratulations on the male fail!  Looking at that pic, I would gender you female, too.  It's the boobs.

Congratulations!  Tight fittings tops will make the girls more obvious if you want that.  I have a large collection of tight fitting sweaters and shirts.

Thanks!

I haven't transitioned again yet, but I'm going with the flow and not "correcting" anyone right now.  I'm wearing baggy clothes to kinda just slip on through daily life right now until I'm ready to deal with my neighbors.

I agree, people look at your chest if they see mounds/boobs you should be a woman.

Truthfully, I would like to think it's a little more than the bumps showing on my chest.  I do look marginally better in person than I do in any photo and I know I'm far from beautiful, but I'm me.  People tend to see me as the person I am.

My wife on one of our final meetings as we're signing our divorce papers: You'll make an ugly woman.

I asked her if she thought her best friend was pretty in the normal sense.  She agreed that she wasn't a model.  I asked her if she still saw her best friend as a woman.  Yes.  Same here.  We can't all be runway models or even cute.  We can just be us.  We can just be the best people we can be.

Quote from: Tribble on April 02, 2019, 01:30:52 PM
Truthfully, I would like to think it's a little more than the bumps showing on my chest.  I do look marginally better in person than I do in any photo and I know I'm far from beautiful, but I'm me.  People tend to see me as the person I am.

My wife on one of our final meetings as we're signing our divorce papers: You'll make an ugly woman.

I asked her if she thought her best friend was pretty in the normal sense.  She agreed that she wasn't a model.  I asked her if she still saw her best friend as a woman.  Yes.  Same here.  We can't all be runway models or even cute.  We can just be us.  We can just be the best people we can be.

One of the wisest posts I have read in a long time. Very healthy attitude.  YAY !!!

"You'll make an ugly woman"  I think she is friends with my ex 

Thank you, Kim.

I'll be honest, after reading previous replies that suggested my little bumps may be the only reason people are referring to me with female pronouns all of the wind was sucked out of my sails and I had a horrible, horrible day yesterday.

I was just starting to see it again when I look in the mirror, and then...

Oh, well.  I know I'm ugly, but people really do see female when they see my face right now.  Happened again when I was at the cable store.

I guess I know what I am, I know how people address me, and it doesn't matter one hoot about how I look in pictures.  Guess I won't be posting any more images of me.

Quote from: Tribble on April 03, 2019, 12:58:42 PM
Thank you, Kim.

I'll be honest, after reading previous replies that suggested my little bumps may be the only reason people are referring to me with female pronouns all of the wind was sucked out of my sails and I had a horrible, horrible day yesterday.

I was just starting to see it again when I look in the mirror, and then...

Oh, well.  I know I'm ugly, but people really do see female when they see my face right now.  Happened again when I was at the cable store.

I guess I know what I am, I know how people address me, and it doesn't matter one hoot about how I look in pictures.  Guess I won't be posting any more images of me.

I am sorry that my comments may have contributed to making you feel bad.  That was not my intent.  The full body shot just didn't show your face to full advantage, that's all.  I mentioned the boobs only because they were unmistakeable in that picture.  I didn't mean to imply that there was nothing else there.  Obviously, there is, based on the reactions you are getting.

Please don't stop posting pictures. 

Sorry my comments up set you.  People make a quick assessment of someone, since you do have a nice chest development and your face definitely says female  people have no problem seeing you as a woman.  I didn't mean people only look at your chest, but that is where so many of them start and then move up to ones face. You do present as female no question.

I'm sorry for overreacting.  These last couple of days have been hellish for me in multiple ways.

My husband took that picture and honestly, he may be an artist, but he is NO photographer.  I was trying to direct him, but he wouldn't listen.  I finally had to say, "That's fine.  I'll work with what you've taken."

I meant no offense and for some reason, I focused solely on "boobs" and nothing else.  The lighting is horrible in my house and this was the best background I could come up with so there is heavy downlighting making my chest bumps appear larger than they are.  In normal light, I'm not much larger than an out-of-shape man of my height and weight, if at all.

I should add that I've been using a rather gender-neutral voice in public and letting people make their own judgments, not to mention the fact that I've just taken off my ball caps for good within the last couple of weeks, too.  My hair is pretty much untouched since the last time I shaved my head clean.

That's just it.  I'm letting people make their own assumptions, male-oriented clothing and all, and strangers are going straight for female pronouns, without fail other than that one service tech that had my deadname in his hands, and once he actually saw me, he became confused.

So, yes, I will focus on my little happy moments.  For the most part, they've been coming at me pretty regularly.

I get extreme anxiety when I post pictures of myself online and always have.  I absolutely hate being on the dangerous end of a camera lens and would much prefer looking through the eyepiece or viewport.  I always have been.

Please accept my apology for my reaction.  I've been taking in a lot lately, looking a ton of stuff up (non-gender-related), and I need to see a psych as soon as possible.  GD is not even close to my only issue.

Supermodel?  Never.  Woman?  100% (well, other than one little thing.)

Dear Tribble - The important thing about emotional problems is having the courage to do something about it.  I am very happy that you are going to see someone.

As far as your appearance - feeling inadequate is something many of us struggle with including me.  I just received a couple of compliments about my looks and I loved it but don't really believe it.  All I see in the mirror is the 6'2" overweight transwoman that looks like a guy pretending to be a girl.

I rarely post in the threads here about looks because it is painful to me.  So I 'stay in my lane' and focus on what I know which is the courage to live authentically.

You are beautiful no matter what you see in the mirror because you have the beauty to be YOU.  And as far as physical beauty goes - the world is changing.  Interesting looking people are becoming the cool ones.  You don't have to fit into the stereotype of what is 'good looking'.

Now I just need to practice what I preach.   
Love yourself - you deserve it.

Thank you.  I detransitioned after about 13 years because of my self-conscious negative image of myself and what I fear more than death itself is ridicule.  I took the easy, safe way out and bailed on my life as me.  I thought for sure this time would be different.  I thought to myself that I might be able to fake my way into GRS to the right people but still live the "safe" life everywhere else, that I could accept being labeled as and addressed as a man.

The more I heard that the more I cringed the more I could not hold back any longer.  I'm still not fully socially transitioned yet (I'm dreading facing my extended family again (Ohhh, sure...THIS again!)), but I'm actively working on building my wardrobe again and working up my courage to face my neighbors, who are not exactly the most open-minded of people.  I've just kind of said, "F- it!" and I'm presenting gender-neutral, even if I'm wearing men's jeans and boots and eyeglass frames and "unisex" t-shirts and sweatshirts.  The rest will come in time, but what I do know is that for the last few weeks I've had a different outlook and people are pretty much only addressing me in female terms.  Well, I gotta admit, people looked at me even weirder when I was presenting fully male with a deep-ish voice.  Something didn't match for them.

I guess I needed this almost 3-year experiment to really cement what I really was and who I really was and what I was meant to be all my life.

Like you, I need to practice what I preach and I really need to believe it, but I am what I was always meant to be, even if it didn't happen the way I wanted it to happen (born natally-female).

A woman saw me standing at a self-checkout (our best friends?!?), frustrated that there was not anyone there to take care of the issue my register had with a purchase (red light flashing, no one anywhere in sight).  She commented about her own frustrations.  When she was done with her purchase she told me she would say something to another employee on her way out.  When she led the other employee back, she said, "she needs someone to help her," and pointed to me.

This was also at a place that is not normally known for its open-minded clientele.

That began my healing today and everything has been getting steadily better, since.

Thank you for your comments.

I do apologize again for my reaction yesterday.  It had just been a crappy couple of days.   No excuse.  But as one of my ex-doctors used to say, "we can't change the past, so we move on from here."

If it's okay, I'll continue with another little happy(iest) moment I had several years ago...well, just over a decade ago.

I was living in an apartment complex in a not-so-trans-friendly part of town, so I avoided my neighbors like the plague.  One day, I was checking my mail or getting a UPS package or something and a woman walks in the front door with her pre-teen daughter.  I've been deathly afraid of children ever since I transitioned because they can be the most observant little people on the planet.  Well, this little girl looks up at me and says, and I quote, "You're so pretty!"

I was living on cloud nine for a long time after that!

I know this thread got off to a rough start (sorry. ) but feel free to post your own little happy moments!

In my opinion the point of this place is to post how we are feeling good and bad so no need to apologize for posting the tough stuff.  Life is a pendulum of good and bad.  We just need to remember to look at both.

Nice story about the little one. 

Yeah they definitely have radar.  A little boy at the convenience store yesterday could not take his eyes off me. Not in a good way.  It was kind of like - what are you?  Not so fun.  He wasn't doing anything wrong - just being a little boy.

They definitely are good at clocking us and showing it.  But like I said above - things go both ways.  Hang on to the happy little moments.