The T

I hope I look back on this time someday and see how it linked me to better things. I mean, I can already see that my friendships have deepened, and new people have come into my life who validate my experience and show me the gentleness I’ve been needing. But it’s been incredibly painful to let my family drift from me. They’d say it’s my fault, or the “fad” of transness is to blame. They miss “her.” The old version of me was self medicating with alcohol most evenings and deeply disconnected from knowing what’s best for me. I relied on other people to tell me which way to go. I couldn’t trust my gut because I was trained not to. This benefitted the people who needed me to be small and compliant. I’m still crawling out of a hole at this point in my life. Being financially strained for three years directly after being left by my spouse who apparently bragged about the power she had over my business - having given me pep talks for years about how bad I am with money and giving the cold shoulder if I attempted to regain some of that power back. She took a lot from me. I inherited her debt, which she hid from me. She’ll never own up to that.

I keep having flashes of my sisters the last night we were all together in March. Their eye-rolling at me saying “I’m a child again, I want to celebrate” and “I didn’t ask you to be a mediator for me and mom and dad, in fact, I asked you not to.” They want to be thanked for trying to bridge the gap. But it will never be bridged and they were on a path of not only crossing my boundaries, but tiring themselves out doing it. I already tired myself out. They tell the story of that night as if I was heartless while they cried. They themselves told me I have armor on. I said yes, I do. I needed that armor as soon as I was deadnamed to get a reaction out of me, and as I was shown that no one there had my back about getting deadnamed in such a way. Their tears are over losing the version of me that would drive three hours on a dime if either of them was in emotional pain. Completely valid for them to be sad about that. I know they are struggling as parents. I put my energy in where I could over the last three years. I genuinely did. I tried to explain that I used to have more capacity to show up, and now I’m honoring what capacity I have left. But it wasn’t enough and they feel a sense of responsibility placed on them by our parents to “fix” what’s going on with me. But they can’t see that I’m fixing it. I’m doing the work. And it’s fucking exhausting. This new version of me is who I always wanted to be from a young age. Not every trans person has this in common, but this is my experience. And the biggest fear I had about coming out was losing my family. I think this fear was instinctual because they were my biggest bullies about this growing up. Anyway, relationships are reciprocal and I was noticing that I poured a lot of myself into family and traditional celebrations/milestones while they put zero interest in mine. So I pull back my efforts and place them on relationships that do show me respect and care.

Being on low-dose T for 11 weeks and one day now, I’ve taken on a workout routine at home that started out kind of random, but with a little research, I’ve found a steady rhythm and I write down my workouts so I can keep track and refer back to it. I’m seeing results faster and it’s motivating me more than I have felt in the past. It’s awesome, to be real with you. I’m so excited about my body slowly morphing into one I feel connected to. The stubble on my chin (which I’ve had since high school) has gotten thicker, though you probably wouldn’t be able to tell standing 5 feet away 😝 and hairs on my thighs are getting darker. Bottom growth was the first change I noticed, within a week or two of starting T. Big fan, is all I’ll say about that.

My voice hasn’t changed all that much. I think my voice sounds slightly dustier when I sing. Some higher notes are starting to be harder to hit, and I’m enjoying exploring lower notes in the shower or on long car rides. This is just the beginning. I’m so pumped about 1 year from now, 5 years from now. What will have changed? Who will still be in my life?