definitely true about the glasses. I invested a lot more than I could really afford to change mine because the old ones were so heavily masculine they trumped everything else.

Hi everyone,
I absolutely love looking at myself as a female, I hate manning up, those times when i need to!!!
I had my ears pierced 3 weeks ago best thing ever, They look so great and I feel more like a real woman And I really love that feeling, The ears heal in two weeks, you can remove the piercing studs at that time and use your own choice of earings, If you go to a reputable salon(i got them done by my hairdresser/stylist), They did not hurt at all i was a bit nervous but he talked to me during the entire 10 minuit process, and it was only the sound of the piercing gun that is daunting, people see them but I dont care, I love them!
Be true to yourself always,
From the girl who has always been inside now on the outside!!!
Danielle M
Brisbane Australia

I'm sitting here typing this note to you in front of a large mirror.
I like what I see!

Linsey

Quote from: Autumn on June 15, 2009, 06:00:59 AMProtip: If you're someone who wears glasses a lot, try contacts. Technology has improved and your bare face (with or without makeup) may help your appearance, plus differentiate you from your 'drab' self. I look like i'm 10 years older with my glasses on, or like a really gay man if I look for the appropriately shaped female frames.

On the contrary: I'd worn contact lenses for many years before transition. Upon transition I switched to feminine frames, and this enhances my woman look.

Answer to the OP: You betcha! I never crossdress. Male clothing is absolutely loathesome to me. I like being a woman. My gender happens to be all the way at the female end of the binary. No genderqueerness for me.

Objection raised against the foregoing:
--But "real" women wear men's clothing, and it doesn't detract from their being women at all. You, however, by totally rejecting menswear, are paradoxically behaving unlike "real" women.

Rebuttal:
--Cisgender women haven't been traumatized by having had maleness forced upon them against their will. If they had, it would be just as loathesome to them. Evidence for that is Nora Vincent's experience in Self-Made Man, where she developed severe mental illness just by imposing male drag and a male persona on herself. It does violence to a woman's psychological integrity. All the more traumatic, then, when it's forced upon one and enforced through beatings, ridicule, peer pressure, and ostracizing. Also, to call the cisgendered "real women" is very insulting to trans women, implying I'm not really a woman.

--But I'm a trans woman, and I like to wear male clothes. Obviously I'm a better woman than you are.

--You're you, and I'm me. People don't all have to be the same to be legitimate. And there are a lot of women who refuse to wear male clothing, and nobody deligitimizes their womanhood for that.

Quote from: Hypatia on July 02, 2009, 11:03:33 AM
And there are a lot of women who refuse to wear male clothing, and nobody deligitimizes their womanhood for that.

Very true. I don't wear men's clothing and have always hated the "menswear look" that comes into fashion from time to time. None of the women I know go for it either--even the ones who always wear pants. That's one of the reasons I've never really liked women's suits. They're getting better now, but for the longest time they seemed to me to be simply imitating men's clothing. Some of the more feminine ones these days are pretty, but I still don't wear them.

You look hot in them though. 

Thank you, honey. 

Men's suits, especially the American ones, are designed to be boxy and rectilinear, hiding the body within and imposing the outline of the suit over the person. The feminine skirt suits I wear have jackets tailored to my curves. Not comparable at all.

I do have one retro-1980s suit I bought off of E-bay, from the era when women's suits were boxy and rectilinear. The time when Women's Lib had just gotten a lot of women into the professional workforce but the doctrine was they had to imitate men to succeed. It came with shoulder pads as big as a football player's. Notice I never wear the thing, ever.

There are a lot of ways to answer the original question, and most of them have been mentioned, but years ago, when I considered myself limited to "cross dressing" in womens clothing for "sick and perverse reasons", I did have trouble looking at myself when I was wearing female clothing, mostly because I wanted to look like a man in a dress (so I thought) and tended to look like a badly dressed teenage gender bender.  Now that I can accept the fact that I am actually a secondary transsexual, being in male clothing is being "cross dressed" and my male wardrobe is for someone nearly 30 pounds heavier, so it looks bad for that reason to boot!! Full circle in a weird way, since all of my first female clothing was too small and looked bad for that reason.  Getting therapy, even if it starts as drug/alcohol addiction therapy, can really be wonderful and "life changing" if you put some work into it. 

Ears pierced?? I have two piercings in each ear, and just bought two new sets of the most noticeable and heavy earrings I saw in a new store. (They are about three ounces each, and feel very erotic.)  Two of the hoops are 5 inches across and keep bouncing off my collar bone!  They are my one "over the top" feminine wear item.  My "girlfriends" give me a hard time about them, but one recently came around with a pair almost as gaudy as the ones I like.

Glasses, I can't use contacts or have laser surgery done due to allergies, so I have three nice pair of large frames in a color that looks great on me as either gender, and my medical plan covers them, so why not.  As a female, other females ask where I got them, and likewise and vice versa.  I guess I just have good taste. 

Quote from: Danielle M on June 28, 2009, 04:31:31 PM
Hi everyone,
I absolutely love looking at myself as a female, I hate manning up, those times when i need to!!!
I had my ears pierced 3 weeks ago best thing ever, They look so great and I feel more like a real woman And I really love that feeling, The ears heal in two weeks, you can remove the piercing studs at that time and use your own choice of earings,

Eh?

then how come the lady who did mine told me SIX weeks?

That kinda made me sad because I can't wait for some fun hoopies or dangles!

She said don't take them out for six weeks, just turn them. How come you got by with only two? Is there some factor I don't know about that makes it diff for different people?

which actually brings on a question. or rather, some whining which hopefully will provoke comments.

First of all, the back came off the left ear the first day and every replacement was lose until we finally found one today. So "don't take them out" was kinda screwed up when that one would come off in the night (one time I actually had to push through a little regrown flesh to get it back in)

Second, that same left ear seemed a bit....swollen...so that the earring didn't sit up as visibly as the right did...that went away after 10 days or so and then when that one came out and it tried to regrow it came back

Last night was the third time it came out so I switched ears and my wife finally found a back that held firm so maybe that's past.

Anyway, the main point is I'm 2 weeks in now and both piercings are still kinda tender - should they be? I've been turning them and putting the stuff on them as instructed.

I am a (very borderline but wrong side of the border) Type 2 Diabetic but I don't have healing issues like more serious cases do anywhere else so I don't think that's got anything to do with it.

Try cleaning the earrings with Hydrogen Peroxide.  And your ears also.  To reduce infection.

I would change mine out for hoops and danglers. They only stayed in for about two weeks.

Janet

I don't remember how long I left the original posts in, but I had an awful time getting a change of earrings in at first so I probably changed them too early.   Impatience sometimes doesn't pay.  Keep the originals in as long as they tell you to or until you can't stand it any more, whichever comes first.   Spin the studs regularly to keep them from crusting up.  And use alchohol (or hydrogen peroxide?) to keep them from getting infected.

And wear your new dangles and doodads with pleasure.

- Kate

They gave me something to put on there - it's not HP I don't think, probably an alcohol solution but it's in an unmarked bottle. I wonder if I still have the box and paperwork and stuff?

Anyway, while they were out this morning I soaked the holes good wile I could get to them easily. i don't think it's anything like that.

Probably I'm just being paranoid from my lack of experience.

i see where youre coming from.  i can always put on my clothers and i'll feel fine, but i cannot stand to look at my face.  when i put on makeup (which is a rarity because i dont have any at the moment)  then i can somewhat stand looking at myself

I totally felt this way at first... I would go into the bathroom (only room with a large mirror to see myself), and would be super cautious to avoid seeing my face because it felt kind of gross.  I'm really lucky with a pretty thin body for a male-born person, but when I first started I just felt my face was so ugly.  Well that was 6 months ago or something and now I can look myself in the mirror and see beyond the maleness a bit.  Part of that comes from growing my hair out into an almost feminine look (depends on the way I put it after I get out of the shower) as well as tweezing eyebrows and taking off the glasses and so on (hope to get some feminine ones in the near future, once I get back on insurance).

It's really amazing to think how much of an improvement there's been since 6 months ago, and I haven't even started hormones or laser/electro yet!  Don't get discouraged ladies (and gents)!

I wore a full beard for much of my adult life.  For some reason I was able to filter that out when looking in the mirror.  I had a pretty nice body - not real rounded, but I could imagine it as female.  About 3 years ago either my body changed or my mental filter stopped working and I began seeing a male body in the mirror, regardless of padding and other attempts to reshape it.  That was the beginning of the end for old what's-his-name.

Now, after 3 months on hormones, I am beginnig to see the signs of the woman I am becoming.

Now if I could only look 20 years younger...

- Kate

It will happen Kate.  HRT will work miracles.  Many people think I am in my 40's.  I just had my 55th birthday.

My face has become thinner on E.  The body is slower but coming around.

Janet

Quote from: Janet Lynn on July 05, 2009, 08:08:34 AM
It will happen Kate.  HRT will work miracles.  Many people think I am in my 40's.  I just had my 55th birthday.

My face has become thinner on E.  The body is slower but coming around.

Janet

WHA WHA WHA???

I would have bet money you were late 30's early 40's. Omg!!

So I'm like still waiting for any miracles. 120 days....

---

Post Merge: July 05, 2009, 11:57:06 AM

---

I wonder if this means I'll look like I'm 25 when I'm done...

Quote from: Janet Lynn on July 05, 2009, 08:08:34 AM
It will happen Kate.  HRT will work miracles.  Many people think I am in my 40's.

uh...sorry to disagree, but HRT does *not* always work miracles.

i have been on HRT for nearly 2 years, and only occasionally "pass" as a GG. if passing as a GG were the most important thing about transitioning, then i should have given up HRT long ago. um, except that i just love female hormones, and so, it is possible that i would never, ever want to give them up. i know, i sound like a dope. don't listen to me.

-ell ell

Quote from: Hypatia on July 02, 2009, 11:03:33 AMObjection raised against the foregoing:
--But "real" women wear men's clothing, and it doesn't detract from their being women at all. You, however, by totally rejecting menswear, are paradoxically behaving unlike "real" women.

Rebuttal:
--Cisgender women haven't been traumatized by having had maleness forced upon them against their will. If they had, it would be just as loathesome to them. Evidence for that is Nora Vincent's experience in Self-Made Man, where she developed severe mental illness just by imposing male drag and a male persona on herself. It does violence to a woman's psychological integrity. All the more traumatic, then, when it's forced upon one and enforced through beatings, ridicule, peer pressure, and ostracizing. Also, to call the cisgendered "real women" is very insulting to trans women, implying I'm not really a woman.

OMG I love you. That is the best answer EVER. I think I'm going to cry...