Good morning,
I have recently found my way back to these forums after the Great Forum Crash of 2024. While I did not necessarily post a ton since I first came here, I tried to write and capture my thoughts and feelings when something noteworthy occurred in my life. I'm hoping the great Forum wizards can work their restorative magics and bring back my posts from the great server in the beyond. I know they will do what they can, when they can.
Anyway, a bit about me.
As you can see from the ticker in my signature below, I've been on hormones for over 7 years now, and honestly, despite a short break in 2018, I have loved every minute of it and feel a lot more comfortable in my own skin.
My journey on hormones began after my ex-wife and I split, when she discovered that I had been experimenting with herbal supplements, but we won't talk about those. She lost it, and while she seemed open to the idea of being supportive of me, it turns out she did not like my thoughts and giving the real deal a try or going for a makeover to see how I felt once on them or being transformed for a couple of hours. We had been having some significant problems for the better part of a year when all this happened, and this was either the straw that broke her, or a nice convenient excuse. After a period of contentiousness between us, our relationship has become at least cordial as co-parents over the last 6 years or so.
After we split, I quickly made an appointment for informed consent and started therapy. Working with my therapist, we both agreed, that there was more to be gained by giving my self 6 months or so on estrogen to help figure out if it helped or made it all much much worse. The initial appointment with my GD at the clinic could not come fast enough, and the follow-up appointment for the informed consent was agonizing far away (it was only a couple of weeks). After the informed consent appointment came, I got cold feet. But later that spring, I resolved my self thanks to help from my therapist to give it a real shot and I started Estrogen in June 2017. I briefly stopped in the summer of 2018, when I started a new pretty serious relationship, and I was scared. Scared about lying to her, scared about being found out, and at the time she truly and genuinely made me happier than I had been in a long time. But alas that relationship did not work out, she had too much baggage from her past that she was transferring on to me and our relationship, and drove us apart. After we broke up, I immediately started back on my Estrogen, wondering why I had ever stopped in the first place. While I know it was more of a placebo effect, I near instantly felt better about myself once again, if not faster. Heck, I felt much more comfortable and at ease when I started again.
Just before the start of the Pandemic, I made the switch from sublingual to injections. In fact, the 2nd and/or 3rd appointment I had was during the early days of the pandemic. For the first 2 or 3 months on injections, I had to go into the clinic every two weeks to get them and to practice doing it all myself.
From the moment I took my first sublingual tab, to my last injection yesterday, taking my prescribed dose, be it daily or every couple of weeks, I have been counting down to and looking forward to the next one. It quickly became a solid core part of my regular routine, and barring the time, I was in that one relationship, I have not had one doubt about what I was doing or that taking hormones was the wrong choice. Even when I stopped, I didn't feel like continuing was the wrong choice over all, but more one of could I get back and be fairly happy without it.
