I'm sorry for you loss. It seems like she really motivated you to be yourself. That was some badass shit you pulled at the bar.
Oh, that sounds awesome! I think that the general aesthetic that Dreamcast games have is unmatched, probably would be the one system I mod.
Be afraid. Be very afraid.
And possibly horny.
You haven't played New Vegas, have you? You can pick both. Bisexuals do +10% damage to men and women, just like in real life.
I was just about to mention this. Go ahead, OP. Eat those pickles.
Obligatory mention of New Vegas making sexuality a set of perks, just like in real life.
I've tried a few distros now, and none have been so easy as Pop!_OS. I've switched back to Windows before, but not since this last time on Pop!_OS. It's just so simple to use out of the box, they like to use flatpaks (which I LOVE), and the UI is so clean and intuitive that it would be hard for me to go back for that reason alone. Automatic. Fucking. Window. Tiling.
In regards to gaming, System76 puts in so much work on their end to make Pop!_OS a gaming beast. They even have a separate download of their distro specifically tweaked for compatibility with Nvidia cards, which is huge! I love using the terminal, but the Pop! Shop app that they inclue is such an intuitive way to find new apps (that are curated, specifically for ease of use with the distro) and easily check if there's a flatpak version.
TL;DR Pop!_OS, hands down
Lol, I'm not sure a goth phase is in my future, unless girl puberty just sucks. Not that goth isn't beautiful, I just spent so long living in a pit that I'm overflowing with joy and gratitude and love and I want my fashion to reflect that! My fiancee is being very supportive of me. Tonight was the first night that she used she/her pronouns offhandedly to refer to me. She started seeing me as a girl when I came out, it's just the first time she's had the chance to use my pronouns as you don't generally refer to someone like that to them directly. Anyway, it was just the most gratifying moment ever.
I love your name by the way, as soon as I came out, I had Christine and Kristen bouncing around my head (No, my deadname is not Chris).
Thank you! That was a lesson I had to learn the hard way, but I think I'm finally there.
Oh wow! Thank you so much! Looks like one of those therapists is only an hour away from me, so I could potentially even see her in person!
I'm so happy for you! If my mom ever told me I was a pretty girl, I'd cry. And also same... I kinda wish I didn't spend my high school years internalizing homophobia and transphobia. I legitimately used to think that apathy was the key to getting through life... lol. Beginning this next step of my life has really made me realize how much I care about everything when I'm trying to be a girl. I can't bring myself off the couch normally, but as I've started to view myself as a girl, my mind has been racing with diets and workout routines I can start, clothes I want to buy for myself, decorations for my space, and different looks I can try with makeup. How are the hormones going? Sending much love your way.
EDIT: typo
Thank you for giving such a throrough response, there's a lot for me to respond to here!
I don't think my name is very me, so I'm probably going to change it. I used to go by Citra but that was more of an alter-ego, a less "normal" name, rooted in self-denial, that I used while crossdressing in college. I don't think I care about getting gendered or named correctly. It's extremely gratifying, yes, but I don't think being deadnamed or using the wrong pronouns will bother me, which I honestly think is a healthy, even necessary, view to have as a trans woman because it's gonna happen.
I love hearing your positive stories about those early transition growing pains, I'm so grateful to have such a human take on transitioning right now. I already have moments like that, and I really think that the awkwardness of not knowing exactly how it's done at first is an endearing aspect of not just transitioning, but being human as well.
I'm equally excited and scared to start living as a woman. I know women (not to mention those of the trans persuasion) have so many problems that I not only don't experience firsthand as man, but are also often concealed from my gaze entirely. But I'm so ready for that. Challenges are challenges, and people are sexist and transphobic, but I hope it will be more fulfilling to actually be going through a woman's struggle than it will be difficult.
Personally, I don't think bottom surgery is something I'm interested in or need to feel like a woman. It scares me a tad bit, and I'm not sure the procedure itself has advanced enough to the point where I'd be comfortable with it even if it was something that I felt I needed. Losing sexual pleasure is really something to which I'm averse. Not that I would ever try to tell someone else that it's wrong for them or wrong in general, those are just my feeling on the matter. I don't want to force you to wallow in your what ifs and regrets, but I was wondering if you had any other things you wished you had done differently so that I might be able to apply your advice to my own journey?
Obviously the physical stuff like softer hair and skin wasn't completely there pre-transition; but, on the topic of the parts of your personality that you said you now love, do you think those aspects were always part of you or driven by your journey into womanhood? If they were always part of you, were they something that you viewed negatively while living as a man?
Thank you so much again for your thoughtful response. I already feel immediately included by this community, and it's heartwarming.
Thank you for sharing resources! It's really gratifying to have such support! Do you know of any gender therapists I can reach out to online, by chance?
Thank you for your supportive comment! Informative, and it made me laugh at the end :). I live in a small city in Alabama, USA. We're definitely on the lighter end of possession of trans resources, and people around here can be pretty transphobic. However, it's also a growing college town, and I have a friend from high school who I'm trying to reconnect with that transitioned here. So, the resources are definitely available, but they're probably few in number.
TW: suicide, transphobia
As the title says, my egg cracked a few days ago. It's been a long time coming, after years of denial. It's scary, but at the same time exhilarating.
I'm nervous about the eventual conversation with my parents, how everyone around me will react, and of course the challenges that will come along with this journey. But it's gratifying knowing that I'll get to feel like myself for the first time in a long time.
It's crazy, really, how many epiphanies I've had about my life and myself ever since I decided to just be honest about who I am and what I want. Why I hated how I looked in photos, why I never liked the clothes I got as gifts, why my interests were never traditional, why I HATED puberty and the way I felt, why I was so miserable for years trying to lean toward conservatism and pleasing my family. I mean, I was a crossdresser in private, but trans? This isn't a topic I would have dared discussing with them. Maybe it's the mild autism, maybe it's Maybelline.
I remember coming home from school at around age 15 or 16 with makeup on. I always had long hair out of preference, yet another part of myself about which I've had a realization, so I just covered my face with my hair. I almost made it to the bathroom until my mom spotted me. All she said was, "Do we need to talk about this?" That was when I made up my mind that the answer would be no. Oddly enough, my mom taught me to be a better woman than my dad taught me to be a man. I learned so many skills from her, and we have so much in common. I hope this doesn't end with me severing my relationship with my family, because I really want to use this as an opportunity to grow closer to her as a woman.
I think, after that, they probably were suspicious. They certainly knew I was experimenting sexually. They searched my room and threw away my sex toys and weed pipes a few times. Given their fundamentalist views, and how they acted toward me, it kinda felt they thought I was some perverted drug addict.
They had, and I believe still have their assumptions about me. I really don't know how they view me, and I don't think they would be honest with me if I confronted them about it. I can only get what I read between the lines, and they like saying the quiet part quieter.
I still remember when my (police officer) dad told me that story. I don't know the circumstances around him telling me the story, but his purpose was clear.
It was a dialogue, one he'd had with a (maybe not fictional) trans woman or crossdresser whom he had arrested for some type of hard drug posession. He asked her on the drive to jail how she (not the pronouns he used, by the way) had gotten to that point. He told me that she said she had just started doing the wrong stuff, and her life had gone downhill from there. The obvious, unstated point was don't do drugs and crossdress or you'll ruin your life, fucking ridiculous. But it did make it obvious to me that my dad thinks trans people are innately destroying ourselves.
Another time, he told me about a trans man who had committed suicide. Again, I really don't remember why he brought this up in the first place. A lot of these memories feel like nonsequiters, where everything was normal before and after with a really weird part in the middle. I remember him telling me that the trans man's mother had said that he "was never happy with himself," again heavily implying that being trans in itself is the issue. So then the moral of this story was just, "don't think about it lol."
I didn't intend to take that to heart, I thought what he was saying was ridiculous, sad, and narrow-minded. But I do think it disturbed me a bit, subconsciously. I began to internalize that a bit. I had a vivid nightmare where I had bottom surgery while conscious. I was grappling with dysphoria and the idea that dealing with it how I wanted to would ruin my life.
I remembered the dream again, a few months ago. Not the nightmare, that was just a nightmare. But the dream I had when I was young, younger than 7 I believe. I dreamed of a beautiful tall brunette woman in a gorgeous green dress in the middle of an ethereal field. I don't know if that woman was me, but I did want to be her when I had that dream.
There's so much more I've connected about myself in the last few days than that, but I think that already says more than enough. I fell off of keeping clean shaved, and so I shaved my body and went to the thrift store and bought some comfortable, feminine clothes. While I was there, I noticed they had a copy of the first Dork Diaries book, which I read in middle school (just for AR points ;) ), and I picked it up and started reading it in my new clothes that night! I hadn't read in so long, but I really felt like I used to, a little too coincidentally before puberty really hit. I also noticed that I really only care about taking care of my body when I want to be feminine, lol.
My partner is supportive of me, and says she started seeing me as a girl a few days ago, which is so insanely sweet and supportive of her. It wasn't until today when I looked in the mirror without makeup and still was able to see a beautiful girl.
I'm feeling really good about myself and comfortable in my own skin. I don't know if I want to fully transition yet, I think I need to talk to a gender therapist (or two!) first. But I am finally ready to admit that I am not cis! I think I have a decent idea of my next steps, but I wanted to talk to a community of trans women.
What comes next? What are your stories about early transitioning? Are there any resources that I can access to gain information or make this easier to navigate? What can I generally expect from life, the world, the people around me? Are there any regrets you have? What do you love the most about yourself now? What keeps you going?
Much love to you all, from a nervous, excited, new girl.