zeeth_kyrah (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
zeeth_kyrah) wrote2023-04-19 06:08 am
zeeth_kyrah) wrote2023-04-19 06:08 am
Entry tags:
A brief trans history of myself
So, I'm going to try to tell parts of my life story, talking mostly about my awareness of my gender identity.
This is going to be baring a lot of personal information, and I can't guarantee that everything I want to stay private in my life will stay private once it hits the internet - but I'm making a personal choice to post this publicly because I believe it will help people, hopefully a lot of people. I'm hoping that even if I get people trying to discredit me or hack my accounts, what I post here will be worth the potential consequences. I've said some prayers while writing this, and I'm saying one again before posting it. So before the cut, I'm going to post what I have pinned on my Twitter account:
May holy justice and wisdom touch your life when you see this. May love, truth, and peace be with you in a manifest way. This, kindly but justly, in the name of the Seal of Seals, the holy gods, and the Way that is all Ways.
---
So.
My early childhood was fairly normal, aside from being smart enough to start reading the actual words of a favorite book by myself before age 5 and learning the alphabet and phonics. Before puberty, gender was nbd. But I was occasionally interested in seeing bodies with different shapes tha mine, including the non-public parts - but pretty much not interested in asking or pushing to find out, because nobody was showing those or letting them be seen casually, and I got the message - not for children. I simply wanted to know what the differences were, with no idea what that desire meant, not that I'd have understood what I was seeing right away or why I wanted to know.
After puberty officially started, I didn't want to wear shorts anymore. I wasn't happy with myself anyway - I blamed bullying in school, and issues at home. I got diagnosed with depression. Okay, nbd, nothing weird there. The psych asked if I ever had any sexual fantasies, then about what genders. I thought that was a normal question. Well.. turns out I was weird - I had never actually fantasized about men at all, which according to the person I talked to is quite rare. So soon after I tried fantasizing about men deliberately, and realized that no, that didn't make me feel anything sexual, just annoyed. It didn't click with me that the doctor was not-so-subtly trying to ask if I was gay or bi. Or why almost all of the bullying I got also involved calling me gay. I didn't understand that people were targeting me for being feminine.
Later, after various adventures and misadventures with camping and schooling, and a move to a new area, my parents came up and told me it was okay if I was gay, they'd still love me the same. I joked about having a boyfriend and my mother visibly flinched, but steeled herself and reaffirmed that love. I still didn't understand why. I wasn't gay, I liked girls, I just didn't find it urgent to go get a girlfriend or socialize sexually with people face to face. I'm also demisexual, by the way; that's probably highly relevant there.
Not too much longer after that, I was living alone with lots of time to myself, so I spent much of it online. I eventually found the phrase "male lesbian" through some articles I read, and thought it sounded like me. Well, in fact it fit quite well. I had some feminine interests, I liked hanging out with females more than males, I understood boys very little emotionally but got along well with girls... sure, okay. Nobody was talking about trans people in public, and that article eventually vanished into the data hole of the internet (though it might still be available on archive.org somewhere, at least as long as the Internet Archive is still a thing). If the word "transgender" had been suggested then as a possible name for these feelings and experiences, I might have tried something then like looking into trans identity, or even wearing a bit of feminine clothing - not that I had the income (plus I'm kind of butch, but we'll see if that lasts once I get a nice bra and dress). And as far as I know, there aren't actually any gay bars in the small town I lived in at the time, or anywhere else nearby where I'd have found community to support the attempt.
Fast-forward to Columbus, Ohio. They are proud of their Pride parade. Ohio is very conservative, and Columbus is one of the most progressive cities in the region - not by a whole lot, but Pride is attractive enough to visitors and people looking for a day out that the city spends some money on it every year, and the mayor often attends as if it's the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade. I was an adult living with furries then, and surrounded by plenty of neurodiverse, sexually functional and active, and often LGBT+ folks. I had a girlfriend at the time, a Pagan, psychic, therian, bisexual furry (I'm Pagan, psychic, otherkin, lesbian, trans, and a furry). We talked about magical and spiritual things sometimes, and she had a round Tarot deck called the Goddess Deck, which is meant for channeling feminine energy - and I discovered that I bonded well with that deck. (I recognize now that wow, that should have been a sign - that deck usually responds very poorly to men who handle it!) I walked in the Pride parade that year as a "straight" male-presenting furry accompanying my LGBT friends, walking beside a trans woman wearing a bikini. When my girlfriend broke up with me later, she gave me a Tarot reading which I think of as a kind and meaningful parting gift. I still have a couple of things in memory of that relationship, including something I use every day; though I think I've lost the original items, sadly. Even then - still no fucking clue I was trans - and it wasn't like the trans person I knew most prominently then was telling me anything about what she saw, so to most folks I guess I was just another kinda feminine, maybe-gay furry somewhere in the spectrum of weird people they knew from somewhere.
Fast-forward again to mid-2016, at my parents' house. I'd finally been suspecting about my gender for a few years already. And I realized something that day as I walked down from upstairs... I liked the slight jiggle on my chest as I bounced down each step. That was it. I liked having breasts! That was the final straw. I decided then and there, I wasn't just maybe possibly potentially transgendered, I was probably for real almost certainly transgendered. I'd already been mentioning I might want to try some hormones, to see if that did anything good for me. I eventually told my family what I was finally certain of, not too long before Trump's nomination by the GOP.
Their reaction was horrible. They sent me out of the house to discuss things without me - a sign to me that I was about to be rejected, I thought, that I might not be part of the family anymore. So I sighed and took a walk. When I came back, my parents were tentative but not enthusiastic. My sister told me to my face she didn't believe me, while her husband stood behind her with a tense expression on his face. Then Trump got nominated. I decided that his possible election was not a safe thing for LGBT+ people (wow was I right), and started making plans. With no resources, however, I wasn't going anywhere, I was simply going to have to hide. Then Trump got elected. I shut up and closeted myself again. I hadn't done more than hang out with some trans folks now and then at that point, and talk somewhat openly about the idea of treatment or clothing changes someday. But with the closet slammed shut, I denied myself to an openly trans friend in public, then stayed silent and pretended as hard as I could.
About two and a half years later, that was that. I broke. Staying shut up and deliberately acting masculine when the true answer was *right there* screaming in my soul was literally killing me, and I had recently been trying to grab a knife while my body was being held back by several gods to prevent me from hurting myself. (Oh, did I mention I'm psychic? I'm also soul-called, and being Pagan and in contact with several diety was not my own choice, but the instruction of the god I had chosen to love and serve. My spiritual experiences go quite a bit further than most people think - and they have definitely saved my life more than once when I was suicidal, so I do have some trust in them.)
So I admitted that hiding wasn't working, finally quit trying to act so masculine, and tried to relax more. It helped, my stress reduced quite a bit... it wasn't enough to really fix me, but it was just barely enough that I could wait a little longer. I waited until Biden had been elected and it seemed like the world was going to be less awful for a while. Really, I should have just started asking local social help how to get HRT the instant I was sure I wanted to try it; I did know people at the time who could direct me, I just wasn't thinking clearly I suppose. I thought my parents would want to help me do this thing - after all, didn't they say that they would still love me even if I was gay, even if I shocked them by choosing a boyfriend or something? This wasn't any worse, merely a little different... right? Hah, yeah right, they did no such thing.
Well, I was still suicidal at that time last year (2022). Did I mention that I'd been suicidal for a while? Yeah, extreme stress is not fun. But then I got prescribed my first doses of HRT in late June, thanks to Planned Parenthood. I was taking it slow, with a low dose just to find out whether it was gonna work or do anything for me at all. Within a couple of days of my first half-pill, a ridiculously small dose just barely starting to work, I was feeling happier and actually smiling once in a while, instead of being a dour cloud of murk and gloom. Yeah, that was right decision for me! I continued.
They upped the dose after my first blood draw. Then again after the next, and again, added an androgen blocker at my request - because I wasn't getting the full "emotional effects" I thought might happen. EXACTLY TWO WEEKS after the first pill of Spironolactone, I literally did a double take as I realized I hadn't thought about suicide at all, the whole past day or two. The urge was gone, like someone had flipped the light switch for it to "off".
My family's annual gatherings for Thanksgiving and Christmas came and went, and I relied on layered clothing to hide my changes. I spent some Christmas money on nail polish and lipstick, but then didn't use them since I wasn't actually socially transitioning yet. Though I spent time imagining how I would look, I was still afraid.
Since then, I've thought about self-harm only a handful of times, mostly as winter wore on into isolated, cold-weary February, so I asked for an antidepressant to take the edge off until spring was in. A surprisingly warm day not too long later and I was downtown, wearing a T-shirt in public instead of a heavy coat... and realized my breasts were actually kind of noticeable already? Dang, really? I was gonna get clocked before I felt ready! But I felt great and took a couple of selfies too, where you can actually see that I look cute in that shirt.
Because of that, I decided early this spring I was going to have to come out and live publicly as a trans woman, because my breasts are kind of starting to be obvious now, I'm not stopping HRT come hell or high water, and I am NOT wearing a damn overcoat during the blazing, sweaty summer!
I tried the nail polish I'd bought for the first time ever, while in a video call with my therapist - I've told the outcome of that story already: it made me feel a bit disassociative at first, and then as I got accustomed to the new feel and color I started to feel pretty, and that made me feel good. A little while later in the shower, I shaved my upper body, which felt good to do for the first time ever; then after that shower, I wiped off the bathroom mirror and looked at myself naked, and it was like I'd suddenly removed almost twenty years from my body and five to ten years of stressful misery from my mind. I was... beautiful! And then I looked up toward my goddamn face. Sigh. But I was - AM - still beautiful. I feel that even now, that my body is mine and not someone else's, and it finally feels good to have.
So I steeled myself and emailed my family on the eve of the Transgender Day of Recognition (March 30), and told them my new name and drew a line with them about at least trying to use my name and pronouns. They've known for years now with me occasionally saying that I'm still trans, they were given broad hints about new meds that help with my mood when I started taking HRT, then I outright told them what drugs I'm taking and what they're for. They've had time to adjust and address me with the proper pronouns, or ask me about my experiences, or take interest in my life beyond "Have you got an income lately?" My parents did not take it well, with my mother complaining that I'm full of the same bullshit as her clients at work (oh, really?), while my father warned me not to make ultimatums.
Well, with the sociopolitical climate like it is in the USA, I believe firmly that I really did have to draw that line with my parents and my siblings. My existence is under active threat of legal (and potentially physical) violence right now, thank you; if you aren't going to be my ally or friend, then I can't afford to waste my time assuming you'll continue helping me live safely in a world where I can no longer hide my truth, and that means I'm not going to spend a lot of time in your vehicle or your home, now am I?
I really, really *like* feeling pretty and welcome in the world as a girl, as a woman. HRT made me able to feel true happiness, not just the ghost or illusion of it. I don't have to mask and pretend it anymore! When someone I don't know acknowledges me as a woman, uses my name, compliments me on something feminine like my name or my makeup, I feel like I finally belong in the world. Like I finally *fit*. It is so satisfying, a healthy meal after a lifetime of starvation.
I finally understand - after decades thinking I'm an introvert or someone who cycles back and forth socially - that I'm an extrovert who never had a place for herself in this world outside of special clubs and in-groups. That even though life is now harder for me socially and legally, I'm much more okay with myself and there are people who like me regardless, there are people who accept me without fear. I'm never going back to a male hormone profile if possible, not EVER. It would be as deadly as walking into the desert without water. And hiding myself? I don't really like the idea; I'd rather get the treatments necessary so I don't have to hide, so I'm simply seen as the woman I really am.
I feel like the timing of my transition is also not coincidence; there were several times and opportunities when I could have said, wait, these people know something about this, and I could go to someone and find out more, right? But... somehow I was sustained, including through the direct intervention of powers effectively beyond my understanding; and it only happened now, when I have some independence and a good amount of logistical support so I can at least make a good go of it - despite those whose evil hearts and ambitions have them waiting to burn me at the legal, metaphorical (and gods only know how literal) stake.
So, to sum up (aka tl;dr): I am a transgendered woman, and a demisexual lesbian. And my gender was never a sexual thing, but simply a feeling of alignment with womanhood; but the untreated dysphoria has hindered my life in many ways, including emotionally, socially, and sexually.
But finally, I understand. I understand that some transgendered people don't feel dysphoria over their gender, or at least not very much; but I felt (and feel) a severe amount of dysphoria, and transition has saved my life.
My name is Astara Grace. I am a child of heaven, a child of the stars. And in this life incarnate, I am finally coming home to myself.
This is going to be baring a lot of personal information, and I can't guarantee that everything I want to stay private in my life will stay private once it hits the internet - but I'm making a personal choice to post this publicly because I believe it will help people, hopefully a lot of people. I'm hoping that even if I get people trying to discredit me or hack my accounts, what I post here will be worth the potential consequences. I've said some prayers while writing this, and I'm saying one again before posting it. So before the cut, I'm going to post what I have pinned on my Twitter account:
May holy justice and wisdom touch your life when you see this. May love, truth, and peace be with you in a manifest way. This, kindly but justly, in the name of the Seal of Seals, the holy gods, and the Way that is all Ways.
---
So.
My early childhood was fairly normal, aside from being smart enough to start reading the actual words of a favorite book by myself before age 5 and learning the alphabet and phonics. Before puberty, gender was nbd. But I was occasionally interested in seeing bodies with different shapes tha mine, including the non-public parts - but pretty much not interested in asking or pushing to find out, because nobody was showing those or letting them be seen casually, and I got the message - not for children. I simply wanted to know what the differences were, with no idea what that desire meant, not that I'd have understood what I was seeing right away or why I wanted to know.
After puberty officially started, I didn't want to wear shorts anymore. I wasn't happy with myself anyway - I blamed bullying in school, and issues at home. I got diagnosed with depression. Okay, nbd, nothing weird there. The psych asked if I ever had any sexual fantasies, then about what genders. I thought that was a normal question. Well.. turns out I was weird - I had never actually fantasized about men at all, which according to the person I talked to is quite rare. So soon after I tried fantasizing about men deliberately, and realized that no, that didn't make me feel anything sexual, just annoyed. It didn't click with me that the doctor was not-so-subtly trying to ask if I was gay or bi. Or why almost all of the bullying I got also involved calling me gay. I didn't understand that people were targeting me for being feminine.
Later, after various adventures and misadventures with camping and schooling, and a move to a new area, my parents came up and told me it was okay if I was gay, they'd still love me the same. I joked about having a boyfriend and my mother visibly flinched, but steeled herself and reaffirmed that love. I still didn't understand why. I wasn't gay, I liked girls, I just didn't find it urgent to go get a girlfriend or socialize sexually with people face to face. I'm also demisexual, by the way; that's probably highly relevant there.
Not too much longer after that, I was living alone with lots of time to myself, so I spent much of it online. I eventually found the phrase "male lesbian" through some articles I read, and thought it sounded like me. Well, in fact it fit quite well. I had some feminine interests, I liked hanging out with females more than males, I understood boys very little emotionally but got along well with girls... sure, okay. Nobody was talking about trans people in public, and that article eventually vanished into the data hole of the internet (though it might still be available on archive.org somewhere, at least as long as the Internet Archive is still a thing). If the word "transgender" had been suggested then as a possible name for these feelings and experiences, I might have tried something then like looking into trans identity, or even wearing a bit of feminine clothing - not that I had the income (plus I'm kind of butch, but we'll see if that lasts once I get a nice bra and dress). And as far as I know, there aren't actually any gay bars in the small town I lived in at the time, or anywhere else nearby where I'd have found community to support the attempt.
Fast-forward to Columbus, Ohio. They are proud of their Pride parade. Ohio is very conservative, and Columbus is one of the most progressive cities in the region - not by a whole lot, but Pride is attractive enough to visitors and people looking for a day out that the city spends some money on it every year, and the mayor often attends as if it's the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade. I was an adult living with furries then, and surrounded by plenty of neurodiverse, sexually functional and active, and often LGBT+ folks. I had a girlfriend at the time, a Pagan, psychic, therian, bisexual furry (I'm Pagan, psychic, otherkin, lesbian, trans, and a furry). We talked about magical and spiritual things sometimes, and she had a round Tarot deck called the Goddess Deck, which is meant for channeling feminine energy - and I discovered that I bonded well with that deck. (I recognize now that wow, that should have been a sign - that deck usually responds very poorly to men who handle it!) I walked in the Pride parade that year as a "straight" male-presenting furry accompanying my LGBT friends, walking beside a trans woman wearing a bikini. When my girlfriend broke up with me later, she gave me a Tarot reading which I think of as a kind and meaningful parting gift. I still have a couple of things in memory of that relationship, including something I use every day; though I think I've lost the original items, sadly. Even then - still no fucking clue I was trans - and it wasn't like the trans person I knew most prominently then was telling me anything about what she saw, so to most folks I guess I was just another kinda feminine, maybe-gay furry somewhere in the spectrum of weird people they knew from somewhere.
Fast-forward again to mid-2016, at my parents' house. I'd finally been suspecting about my gender for a few years already. And I realized something that day as I walked down from upstairs... I liked the slight jiggle on my chest as I bounced down each step. That was it. I liked having breasts! That was the final straw. I decided then and there, I wasn't just maybe possibly potentially transgendered, I was probably for real almost certainly transgendered. I'd already been mentioning I might want to try some hormones, to see if that did anything good for me. I eventually told my family what I was finally certain of, not too long before Trump's nomination by the GOP.
Their reaction was horrible. They sent me out of the house to discuss things without me - a sign to me that I was about to be rejected, I thought, that I might not be part of the family anymore. So I sighed and took a walk. When I came back, my parents were tentative but not enthusiastic. My sister told me to my face she didn't believe me, while her husband stood behind her with a tense expression on his face. Then Trump got nominated. I decided that his possible election was not a safe thing for LGBT+ people (wow was I right), and started making plans. With no resources, however, I wasn't going anywhere, I was simply going to have to hide. Then Trump got elected. I shut up and closeted myself again. I hadn't done more than hang out with some trans folks now and then at that point, and talk somewhat openly about the idea of treatment or clothing changes someday. But with the closet slammed shut, I denied myself to an openly trans friend in public, then stayed silent and pretended as hard as I could.
About two and a half years later, that was that. I broke. Staying shut up and deliberately acting masculine when the true answer was *right there* screaming in my soul was literally killing me, and I had recently been trying to grab a knife while my body was being held back by several gods to prevent me from hurting myself. (Oh, did I mention I'm psychic? I'm also soul-called, and being Pagan and in contact with several diety was not my own choice, but the instruction of the god I had chosen to love and serve. My spiritual experiences go quite a bit further than most people think - and they have definitely saved my life more than once when I was suicidal, so I do have some trust in them.)
So I admitted that hiding wasn't working, finally quit trying to act so masculine, and tried to relax more. It helped, my stress reduced quite a bit... it wasn't enough to really fix me, but it was just barely enough that I could wait a little longer. I waited until Biden had been elected and it seemed like the world was going to be less awful for a while. Really, I should have just started asking local social help how to get HRT the instant I was sure I wanted to try it; I did know people at the time who could direct me, I just wasn't thinking clearly I suppose. I thought my parents would want to help me do this thing - after all, didn't they say that they would still love me even if I was gay, even if I shocked them by choosing a boyfriend or something? This wasn't any worse, merely a little different... right? Hah, yeah right, they did no such thing.
Well, I was still suicidal at that time last year (2022). Did I mention that I'd been suicidal for a while? Yeah, extreme stress is not fun. But then I got prescribed my first doses of HRT in late June, thanks to Planned Parenthood. I was taking it slow, with a low dose just to find out whether it was gonna work or do anything for me at all. Within a couple of days of my first half-pill, a ridiculously small dose just barely starting to work, I was feeling happier and actually smiling once in a while, instead of being a dour cloud of murk and gloom. Yeah, that was right decision for me! I continued.
They upped the dose after my first blood draw. Then again after the next, and again, added an androgen blocker at my request - because I wasn't getting the full "emotional effects" I thought might happen. EXACTLY TWO WEEKS after the first pill of Spironolactone, I literally did a double take as I realized I hadn't thought about suicide at all, the whole past day or two. The urge was gone, like someone had flipped the light switch for it to "off".
My family's annual gatherings for Thanksgiving and Christmas came and went, and I relied on layered clothing to hide my changes. I spent some Christmas money on nail polish and lipstick, but then didn't use them since I wasn't actually socially transitioning yet. Though I spent time imagining how I would look, I was still afraid.
Since then, I've thought about self-harm only a handful of times, mostly as winter wore on into isolated, cold-weary February, so I asked for an antidepressant to take the edge off until spring was in. A surprisingly warm day not too long later and I was downtown, wearing a T-shirt in public instead of a heavy coat... and realized my breasts were actually kind of noticeable already? Dang, really? I was gonna get clocked before I felt ready! But I felt great and took a couple of selfies too, where you can actually see that I look cute in that shirt.
Because of that, I decided early this spring I was going to have to come out and live publicly as a trans woman, because my breasts are kind of starting to be obvious now, I'm not stopping HRT come hell or high water, and I am NOT wearing a damn overcoat during the blazing, sweaty summer!
I tried the nail polish I'd bought for the first time ever, while in a video call with my therapist - I've told the outcome of that story already: it made me feel a bit disassociative at first, and then as I got accustomed to the new feel and color I started to feel pretty, and that made me feel good. A little while later in the shower, I shaved my upper body, which felt good to do for the first time ever; then after that shower, I wiped off the bathroom mirror and looked at myself naked, and it was like I'd suddenly removed almost twenty years from my body and five to ten years of stressful misery from my mind. I was... beautiful! And then I looked up toward my goddamn face. Sigh. But I was - AM - still beautiful. I feel that even now, that my body is mine and not someone else's, and it finally feels good to have.
So I steeled myself and emailed my family on the eve of the Transgender Day of Recognition (March 30), and told them my new name and drew a line with them about at least trying to use my name and pronouns. They've known for years now with me occasionally saying that I'm still trans, they were given broad hints about new meds that help with my mood when I started taking HRT, then I outright told them what drugs I'm taking and what they're for. They've had time to adjust and address me with the proper pronouns, or ask me about my experiences, or take interest in my life beyond "Have you got an income lately?" My parents did not take it well, with my mother complaining that I'm full of the same bullshit as her clients at work (oh, really?), while my father warned me not to make ultimatums.
Well, with the sociopolitical climate like it is in the USA, I believe firmly that I really did have to draw that line with my parents and my siblings. My existence is under active threat of legal (and potentially physical) violence right now, thank you; if you aren't going to be my ally or friend, then I can't afford to waste my time assuming you'll continue helping me live safely in a world where I can no longer hide my truth, and that means I'm not going to spend a lot of time in your vehicle or your home, now am I?
I really, really *like* feeling pretty and welcome in the world as a girl, as a woman. HRT made me able to feel true happiness, not just the ghost or illusion of it. I don't have to mask and pretend it anymore! When someone I don't know acknowledges me as a woman, uses my name, compliments me on something feminine like my name or my makeup, I feel like I finally belong in the world. Like I finally *fit*. It is so satisfying, a healthy meal after a lifetime of starvation.
I finally understand - after decades thinking I'm an introvert or someone who cycles back and forth socially - that I'm an extrovert who never had a place for herself in this world outside of special clubs and in-groups. That even though life is now harder for me socially and legally, I'm much more okay with myself and there are people who like me regardless, there are people who accept me without fear. I'm never going back to a male hormone profile if possible, not EVER. It would be as deadly as walking into the desert without water. And hiding myself? I don't really like the idea; I'd rather get the treatments necessary so I don't have to hide, so I'm simply seen as the woman I really am.
I feel like the timing of my transition is also not coincidence; there were several times and opportunities when I could have said, wait, these people know something about this, and I could go to someone and find out more, right? But... somehow I was sustained, including through the direct intervention of powers effectively beyond my understanding; and it only happened now, when I have some independence and a good amount of logistical support so I can at least make a good go of it - despite those whose evil hearts and ambitions have them waiting to burn me at the legal, metaphorical (and gods only know how literal) stake.
So, to sum up (aka tl;dr): I am a transgendered woman, and a demisexual lesbian. And my gender was never a sexual thing, but simply a feeling of alignment with womanhood; but the untreated dysphoria has hindered my life in many ways, including emotionally, socially, and sexually.
But finally, I understand. I understand that some transgendered people don't feel dysphoria over their gender, or at least not very much; but I felt (and feel) a severe amount of dysphoria, and transition has saved my life.
My name is Astara Grace. I am a child of heaven, a child of the stars. And in this life incarnate, I am finally coming home to myself.
Screening