Tag: Dysphoria

Interpersonal Dysphoria

After my husband decided to transition I slowly started picturing him the way he pictured himself: with a flat chest and facial hair. Seeing him with a female chest became uncomfortable. But I couldn’t really picture exactly what he would look like with a flat chest. So instead, this area of my mental image of him kind of blurred out.

In prep for his top surgery consult we had to take topless pictures for the surgeon and take measurements which was a very uncomfortable experience for both of us as neither of us pictured him with a female shaped chest at this point.

After surgery we went back to the clinic about a week later for removal of the bandages. It was a very interesting experience to see his chest flat for the first time. I was finally able to look at that part of his body and not have what I was seeing conflict with what he looked like in my head. Over time the blurry part where his chest was in my mental image cleared to match what his chest looks like now.

I have started describing this type of experience as Interpersonal Dysphoria. This is when your mental image of your friend/partner/family member has changed to match their newly affirmed gender but their physical body hasn’t changed yet.

Experiencing interpersonal dysphoria is a good sign!! It means you are ahead of the game and have adjusted your mental image to match your partner’s identity. But it still sucks because it makes you somewhat uncomfortable with how they look. If you never experience dysphoria for your own body this is as close as you are likely to come to knowing what it feels like.

The areas of their body that now seem ‘wrong’ to you are likely the areas that they experience dysphoria with. But making this assumption can cause problems. Are you comparing their body with a cis body of their ‘preferred’ gender? Or are you comparing their body to how they personally wish their body looked? These are two different scenarios. Comparing to a cis body can be dangerous because they may not have any problem with certain areas of their body. If you are comparing to a cis body you are assigning a gender to their body parts the same way society does which can lead to shame, disgust, and dysphoria or avoiding interacting with parts of their body that they are actually comfortable with.

To avoid this scenario you need to have open conversations with your person to learn how they feel about different parts of their body and why (or as open a conversation as is appropriate given your relationship to that person – coworker vs sibling vs partner). Give your partner room to think about these questions and change their mind at different times. Recognize that these conversations will cause a temporary increase in dysphoria just by having your partner focus on those body parts. You may want to break the conversation into small pieces and revisit it with recovery time in between. Build in self-care recovery time after each of these conversations for both of you.

If your person can articulate how they feel about their body and how they picture their ideal body that would match their identity, you should cultivate a mental image that matches. This will help you adjust to using a different name and different pronouns and help you unconsciously interact with them in more gender affirming ways.

If this person is your partner, this type of interpersonal dysphoria will also lead to changes in how you will be intimate with each other. If you haven’t already had conversations about what ways your partner is comfortable having you interact with their body and what they are comfortable doing with you, now is as good a time as any. Keep in mind this is a two-way street – the conversation should also include what you are comfortable doing with them and having them do to you.

As they explore their gender and gender expression and find ways to deal with dysphoria during intimacy and sex the boundaries of what each of you are comfortable with may overlap or not in various ways and may change over time. These are conversations that you should get used to having on a regular basis. I don’t want to go into full sex talk mode here so I’ll leave the rest up to your imagination. If these conversations are too difficult for you to have with your partner or your partner isn’t able or willing to engage with you in this discussion I recommend finding a couple’s therapist that is familiar with trans issues to help you out.

 

Have you experienced interpersonal dysphoria with your partner, friend, or family member? How did you navigate the conversations that needed to happen for you to know how they pictured their body? Leave a comment below with your experiences or questions!

Help! My Partner Just Told Me They’re Trans!

If your partner just told you they are trans or wondering if they are trans it means they trusted you enough and value your place in their life to share this huge part of themselves with you. If you are not sure what to do next, how to be supportive, or what this means for you you’ve come to the right place. I hope this post will help answer some of those questions.

new relationship

Someone you’re dating who you are interested in and want to pursue a relationship with just told you they are trans.

They’re trans and ‘post’ transitioning

Ask them about their experience of being trans (if they are willing to share).

  • Do they use that label? Are they ‘out’ as trans?
  • When did they start to transition? How long have they been living authentically?
  • Do they have people who are supportive in their life? Are there people who have not been supportive?

Be honest about your level of knowledge and ask if they have any resources or things they feel you should look up.

  • Even if they say no, GO LOOK THINGS UP (which you likely are already doing if you have found this page so good for you! Keep going!). Learn some terminology, learn the basics of what dysphoria is and what the transition process entails for their area of the world.
  • Be honest about your level of comfort and confusion and that you will try not to do anything to offend them or make them uncomfortable and that if you do you want them to tell you right away so you can learn.
    • Sometimes giving someone feedback like this face to face is difficult which results in not getting the feedback you need to be aware of your actions and improve. Offer alternatives – they can write you emails or notes.
    • When is a good time for this type of feedback? It is much easier for people to offer intensely personal feedback if you ask for it directly. Once a week (or whatever time frame works for you), check in with them and ask for feedback.

Offensive questions/statements to avoid:

  • DO NOT blatantly ask about their genitals or if they have had ‘the surgery’ yet.
  • DO NOT say ‘wow! I’d never have known if you didn’t tell me!’ or ‘Wow you look really good for a [insert gender here],
  • DO NOT ask what their ‘real’ name is, or what their name used to be.

The fact that they told you means they feel strongly enough about the relationship that they wanted you to know and that they trusted you enough to tell you something that could potentially put them in an unsafe situation. This reflects well on how you have acted up to this point. Don’t mess it up with an ignorant if well-meaning response.

They are a person, same as they were before they told you they were trans. Nothing has changed. Continue with whatever topics of conversation you were enjoying and learn more about them the same way you would on any other date. Don’t make everything suddenly be about their trans identity.

They’re trans and ‘pre’/in the middle of transitioning

Ask them how they would like you to refer to them (pronouns and name) and try your best to respect that. It may change as they go through their transition so be open to that. If you mess it up say ‘sorry’, correct yourself, and move on. Don’t make a huge deal of it but don’t gloss over it either. If they would like you to use a different name/pronoun than they use in the rest of their life clarify when they would like you to use which set – will it change depending of where you are and who you are with? It is a good policy to have this check in each time you are entering a new environment/meeting new people.

Ask if they’re comfortable talking about it and if they’re willing to explain more about what they’re going through. Keep in mind that they may not want to if you’re out in public but might be ok with this in a more private setting. Or they may not want to right now but they might be able to in the future. This is not usually a reflection on you or how much they like you or how much they feel they can trust you. It is more likely related to whether they have found the words to express the confusion they feel inside.

Ask if they have any resources you should look at that will help you understand their identity or experience (see above).

Be open about your level of knowledge, confusion, and willingness to learn (see above).

Acknowledge that you might do or say something that offends them or makes them uncomfortable but that you don’t mean to and that you want them to tell you right away so you can learn (see above).

They are a person, same as they were before they told you they were trans. Nothing has changed. Continue with whatever topics of conversation you were enjoying and learn more about them the same way you would on any other date (see above).

Long term relationship

Your partner may have known for a long time and have been trying to suppress it, blend in, hide it from you but they can’t any longer. They may have been presenting very much in line with their gender assigned at birth to you and to the world so this can seem like a huge change.

Or, your partner may have been presenting as closely as possible to their true identity and when they reveal to you that they’re thinking of transitioning it may seem like it makes sense and won’t be much different or it might still seem like a surprise.

You may have feelings of shock, betrayal, anger, fear, regret, even disgust. Society teaches us that trans people are abnormal and many of your initial reactions may be a result of this conditioning. Do not beat yourself up for these reactions but try your best to figure out which emotions are specific to you and your situation and which ones are a result of your preconceptions and stereotypes from society.

Try to find some private space and time where you can talk to your partner for as long as you need to understand how they feel and what they want to do. Understanding who they see themselves as and who they want the world to see will help you get a better idea of how you might feel going forward.

Express your own feelings, both negative and positive, and decide whether you need some space apart to work things through or more conversations together to learn more about how/if things will work between you.

Make a list of the aspects of your lives this will affect – your relationship, children, business ventures, family relations, etc. Being able to categorize where the stress is and who is best suited to deal with it will help avoid situations where you are both frustrated and stressed and you don’t know why or what to do about it and end up taking it out on each other.

If these conversations continually break down, consider finding a therapist that is familiar with trans issues to help guide you through this process. You can see the therapist as a couple, by yourself, or recommend your partner see them. Support groups can also be very useful. We found a PFLaG group in our area and have been going as often as we can for over 2 years now. It is wonderful to be in a space where everyone understands what you’re going through without having to explain it in great detail first. It helps normalize the experience and can help you find the support you need.

If you’re up for it, suggest a trial period of them presenting how they feel comfortable. This can be an evening at home, or a weekend away somewhere. It can be done in stages with them slowly changing their appearance one piece at a time to give you time to adjust or all at once. However you decide to do it, I suggest you discuss it together first and make a plan so that no one is surprised or put on the spot.

At this point you likely have an idea of whether or not you are comfortable maintaining your relationship with them or not. This can look many different ways. Some examples are:

  • Yes! This makes so much more sense and I’m here to support them 100%!
  • Yes, I think I’ll be ok with this but it’s going to take some time and I’ll have to take it slowly.
  • No, I no longer see myself in a relationship with them but I’m all for supporting them as a friend.
  • No, I definitely am not ok with this and I don’t want to have any part in their transition.

All these reactions are valid no matter what other people will tell you. Your experience and your life is your own. Make sure your reaction is true for you and not a reflection of what others will think or what society has taught you. You have the right to change your mind at any time. If you think you might be ok with it but at some point realize the relationship is no longer working, be honest with yourself and your partner.

Moving Forward

Communication is key!! If your partner is not willing to sit down and have open conversations with you about who they are and listen to how you feel you may need to find a more formal venue for these conversations (ie couple’s therapy with a trans positive therapist).

Honesty with yourself and your partner is also key!! Be honest about how you feel and when you don’t know what you feel. Find ways to explore different scenarios with your partner to help each of you figure out how you feel. Your partner will be going through a lot of intense emotional things and you may not feel like you want to put all your doubts and confusion and frustration on them as well. Ask them if they are ok with you talking to one close friend about what you’re going through. For me, this was someone who lived somewhere else in the country which meant very low risk to my husband. It might help if it is someone who is somewhat familiar with the queer community, especially if you are not.

If you are happy staying with your partner, their transition will change how society views your sexuality (see my post about this here). I know, this makes no sense because you haven’t changed as a person, but it will happen anyway. Your sexual orientation and the labels you use can change if you feel like it has but it doesn’t have to. You are likely still attracted to the same types of people you were before your partner transitioned. Your partner may still fit within the label you use or you can see your attraction to your partner as an exception. Either way, it will help to find labels that work for you so you have a way to come out to people without outing your partner as trans (for those that didn’t know you beforehand).

 

I hope this helped. This is the type of information that would have been useful for me to have during my husband’s questioning phase and into the beginning of his transition. Giving support to other partners of trans people is one of the main reasons I started this blog.

 

How did you react when your partner told you they were trans? How has this affected you as you process this information? What types of support have you found? What is the outcome for you and your partner? Leave a comment below and tell me your story.

At the Gym

I have always been an athletic person. I played baseball right from T-ball to high school, soccer in middle school, and was generally an outdoorsy kid climbing trees and exploring the woods around our cottage. I learned to swim, canoe, ski, and skate at our cottage, and learned how to sail, kayak, and ride horses at summer camp. This is where I first discovered archery which became my focus throughout high school and into university. Eventually life got in the way and I stopped training which also meant I became less fit and less active. In graduate school I briefly got involved in rowing and quickly remembered what I liked about learning new sports and being active. Then I moved and it’s been hard to keep up with. Now-a-days, in order to stay fit I have to go to the gym to workout. This is a very different experience from what I was used to growing up, especially with dysphoria added on top.

Gyms and other traditional workout spaces are not very friendly environments for people with dysphoria. There are change rooms separated into male and female, mirrors, revealing or fitted clothing, and a focus on your body which may be the greatest source of your discomfort. But at the same time, people who experience dysphoria often struggle with their mental health as a result and would greatly benefit from regular physical activity. Or maybe, being athletic is a part of their identity that is something stable that they can focus on when everything else feels like it’s in flux.

I enjoy working out at the gym. It makes me feel strong, satisfied, relaxed, alert, and more in tune with my body. It gives me a positive way to focus on my body and the strength in it instead of the ways it sometimes feels wrong. Working out at the gym is one of the best ways for me to relieve some of the tension that builds up from constant frustration, dysphoria, and safety math. I use the female change room but there is a gender neutral washroom down the hall that I could use if I want to. The gym is small and has mirrors along one wall which I avoid facing when I have more dysphoria. I generally wear a fitted sports bra and a loose shirt and basketball shorts or board shorts.

For some reason, different activities at the gym make me feel different aspects of my gender. On the female side there is steady, long duration cardio, lighter weights, core exercises, stretching, and pilates or yoga type exercises. On the male side there is heavier weights, more intense short duration cardio, and plyometric or agility type exercises. In the neutral category is balance, combination exercises, and interval type cardio.

Those lists of activities seem pretty stereotypical. To be clear, I am not suggesting that specific types of exercise are gendered in any way, just that this is how they feel to me and the effect they have on my gender. Not everyone will experience physical activity as having anything to do with their gender.

I’m not really surprised that my experience of my gender while working out is affected by stereotypes. Most of our experiences are in some ways. But knowing how different activities interact with my sense of my gender allows me to choose activities strategically. I can pick activities that will be in line with my current experience of my gender to minimize dysphoria. Or I can pick activities that balance out my experience of my gender. Typically this means picking activities that help me feel more masculine to offset being identified solely as female in my day-to-day life.

So, the majority of the time, I prefer the activities from the ‘masculine’ list. Until recently, I hadn’t identified this preference as a gender based thing. But that is definitely a component of it. Those activities help me feel more at ease with myself and more balanced whereas the other ones accentuate feelings of dysphoria or imbalance, generally towards the female side. In order to maintain my fitness the way I’d like, I’ll have to find ways of making the more ‘feminine’ activities feel more masculine for me or pair them with other masculine activities.

I have found other forms of activity that I enjoy as well. These are often more similar to the sports I enjoyed as a kid, home workouts, or workout classes specifically for queer/trans people.

My biggest difficulty is motivation, as it is for anyone trying to form a new habit of being physically active. When my mental health is suffering I mainly experience apathy. So even though this is when I need to workout the most, I have a hard time caring enough or building up enough energy to do it. I try to hold myself accountable by finding a workout buddy who won’t let me get out of it. Once I go I always end up feeling better and having more energy and less tension than when I started. Hopefully writing that down and sending it out into the world will remind me of that the next time.

 

How does working out or physical activity influence your sense of your gender? Do you struggle to be physically active as a result of dysphoria, environment, or mental health? What strategies have you found that help you maintain an active lifestyle? Leave a comment below with your thoughts and experiences!

 

Bridging the Gap Between Mainstream and Queer/Trans Culture

What gap?

People in the queer/trans communities are used to lots of different labels and have a common understanding of what it feels like to have to figure out who you are, be in the closet, and come out. If you hang out in the queer/trans communities enough it seems like this understanding is shared with everyone. But the general population outside of this community may never have been exposed to any of those labels, experiences, or knowledge.

For the most part, mainstream culture sees gender as a binary, sees heterosexuality as ‘the norm’ or ‘the expected’, and understands basic labels such as gay and lesbian, occasionally bisexual, even less often, trans. There is rarely an understanding of gender as a spectrum, of how to respectfully describe a trans person, or the variety of labels for and experiences of sexual orientations.

why is there a gap?

Mainstream culture has mainly been exposed to queer experiences through media, as with most minorities. What is shown in media is usually controlled by the mainstream. So how can we expect mainstream culture to have an accurate or even partial understanding of queer/trans experiences? This is slowly changing as media outlets like Youtube allow minorities a way to speak for themselves (when the algorithm isn’t busy censoring them), as more celebrities and professional athletes come out and speak up in support of the queer/trans community, and as more queer/trans characters are included in media.

acknowledging and accepting the gap

Surrounding yourself with like-minded people builds a strong supportive environment but it can lead to an assumption that the rest of the world has similar views. If queer people are aware of this gap of understanding it is often easier to ignore the ignorance around them on a day to day basis than constantly feel threatened or misunderstood.  But ignoring it leads to queer people using language that others are not familiar with or referring to common experiences that others find strange. This causes miscommunication, confusion, frustration, and ‘othering’ – a focus on the differences between people, how ‘different’ and ‘strange’ queer people are.

If you say something that a co-worker or acquaintance doesn’t understand such as using a label that is less common or making reference to an aspect of transitioning and your co-worker responds with confusion, try not to take it personally or make them feel stupid. Try to treat this as a flag of truce, an indication where the gap is. This lack of understanding can be frustrating but to narrow the gap we have to communicate using terms that everyone understands, not ignore the ignorance or get defensive and angry when someone demonstrates ignorance. Acknowledge that you have different experiences, different levels of exposure to this sub-culture, and use the opportunity to educate someone new (if you have the energy) or pointing them in the direction of resources. I am not always the best at this but I am working on it. Sometimes it still takes me by surprise when things that seem obvious to me are beyond common knowledge.

when does this gap become an issue?
  • Coming out (which can lead to being bullied, fired, or evicted)
  • Medical settings (which can lead to health concerns being missed, queer/trans people knowing more about their condition than the medical professional or avoiding medical care altogether)
  • When you need support and try to explain what you are struggling with to others and get a ‘that’s interesting’ response instead of ‘I understand and support you’
how to bridge the gap
  • Step 1: Identify the gap
    • What is the knowledge level of the least aware person in the group?
    • What do you want them to be able to understand?
  • Step 2: Connect the dots
    • What are some key pieces of information that they need in order to understand your identity/information?
    • Start with the basics – gender as a spectrum, the genderbread person, separation of sex, gender, orientation, and presentation
    • Try to explain what it feels like in your shoes
      • How dysphoria feels (not specifically what about your body/situation causes dysphoria)
      • The confusion that you experienced before you had the language to understand your identity and communicate it to others
      • The fear of repercussions if you come out, the impact of having to stay in the closet
      • The impact of being misgendered, both prior to and after coming out
  • Step 3: Take away message
    • Be super clear that the most important thing they can do is respect your name and pronouns (or whatever the most important aspect is for you)
tips and useful phrases
  • Tips:
    • Have an exit plan. These types of conversations are intense and difficult. Have somewhere you can go afterwards to recover.
    • Have a follow up plan. If they have further questions, where do they go, who can they talk to, who do they bring them up?
    • Have back up. If the conversation/discussion doesn’t go well and turns into a bullying situation or you experience outright homophobia or transphobia, who can you go with those concerns?
    • Written messages are easier for people to absorb but less personal. If you have a hard time finding the right words or are concerned that the situation may not be safe enough in person, try a written message instead. Keep in mind that an in-person conversation will likely be necessary at some point but at least they’ll have the basics and you can specify the terms of the personal conversation in the original message (ie one on one, boss present, at a specific meeting, etc).
  • Phrases:
    • You don’t have to understand someone’s experience in order to respect them
    • The most important thing you can do is respect someone’s name and pronouns
    • If you get their pronouns wrong, correct yourself and move on. If someone else corrects you because you didn’t hear yourself make the mistake, apologize, correct yourself, and return to the topic at hand.

Have you experienced this gap in understanding? How did it affect you? What approach did you take to bridging or overcoming the gap? If you were on the receiving end of this type of conversation at some point, how did it feel for you? Were you able to absorb the information? Did you follow up with the person or look for further resources afterwards? Did it change your perspective or interaction with others? Leave a comment below to tell me your experience!

My Physical vs Social Sense of Gender

My physical sense of my gender and my social sense of my gender fluctuate separately but can line up at times (here is my post about how I figured this out and tools I used to explore it). Here, I will describe what I mean by physical and social gender, what it feels like when my physical and social sense of gender match or differ in various places on the spectrum, and what strategies I use to manage dysphoria in each situation.

PHYSICAL GENDER

This is based on how comfortable I am in my  body as a female-assigned person. If my body feels completely right for me and I’m happy to show off my curves my physical gender is female. If I’m mildly uncomfortable with my curves but don’t necessarily feel like I should have a completely flat chest I’m closer to neutral. If I’m really uncomfortable and wouldn’t want to go out of the house without a binder on my physical gender is male. There are other physical aspects that play into this but shape and chest are the easiest to describe.

SOCIAL GENDER

This includes how various aspects of interacting with other people and being in public spaces feel such as pronouns, gendered language, bathrooms, social interactions, etc. What pronouns feel most comfortable on a given day is a big clue where my social gender sits (usually they/them but often she/her don’t bother me much). Often female gendered language (ma’am, ladies, girl) bothers me more than female pronouns but the days when I would prefer the equivalent male gendered terms are the days I’m likely socially male.

PHYSICALLY FEMALE, SOCIALLY FEMALE
  • Indicators:
    • Minimal dysphoria, physical or social
  • Effects:
    • Generally more at ease, more comfortable
    • More likely to socialize
    • Causes a feeling of invisibility or like I have to justify my queerness
  • Strategies:
    • Comfortable wearing name tag at work
    • Comfortable wearing bras and female clothes
    • Will make sure queer symbols are visible
    • Wear a piece of masculine jewelry to remind myself/express my masculine side but mostly female jewelry
    • hair up nice or down
  • Personal Reminders:
    • Enjoy the comfort
    • No amount of femininity invalidates my queer or genderqueer identity
PHYSICALLY FEMALE, SOCIALLY NEUTRAL TO MALE
  • Indicators:
    • Mild physical dysphoria but only when I’m putting on clothes to leave the house and picturing how people will see me
    • Internal cringes relating to female spaces or language
  • Effects:
    • Discomfort in social situations leading to fast social burnout and lots of recovery time required
    • Strange feeling of needing to wear a binder even though I am perfectly fine with my body when I’m on my own
    • Frustration at how people can’t just know that I’m a guy in a female body and be fine with that
  • Strategies:
    • Wear tight sports bra or binder
    • Masculine presentation including hair, accessories, and clothing
    • ‘Forget’ to wear my name tag at work
    • Avoid gendered spaces/bathrooms
    • Minimize social interaction at work
    • Spend more time alone, in nature, with my husband, or with queer friends who refer to me as Ray and use they/them pronouns
    • Converse/interact in more masculine ways
  • Personal Reminders:
    • I’m a female-bodied man
    • Think of myself as Ray
PHYSICALLY NEUTRAL TO MALE, SOCIALLY FEMALE
  • Indicators:
    • Physical dysphoria even when I’m alone
    • Minimal discomfort with female pronouns or female spaces
  • Effects:
    • Want to feel masculine but interact in ways that appear feminine
    • Socially comfortable
    • Difficulty maintaining focus, learning new things, or remembering information due to the distraction of constant dysphoria
  • Strategies:
    • Avoid mirrors unless clothed
    • Wear binder, baggier clothes, and darker/more neutral colours especially for tops
    • Lift weights
    • Move and posture in masculine ways but interact and converse in more feminine ways
    • Comfortable wearing name tag
    • Avoid multitasking
    • Write down all new information so I don’t have to retain it
  • Personal Reminders:
    • Acknowledge that I am Ray on the inside even if I’m comfortable being Meaghan on the outside
    • I’m a masculine woman
PHYSICALLY NEUTRAL TO MALE, SOCIALLY NEUTRAL TO MALE
  • Indicators:
    • Physical and social dysphoria whether I’m alone or going out
  • Effects:
    • Want to be seen as male and feel physically male
    • Difficulty maintaining focus, learning new things, or remembering information due to the distraction of constant dysphoria
    • Discomfort in social situations leading to fast social burnout and lots of recovery time required
    • Strong feeling of invisibility
    • Lots of cringing with female language, pronouns, interactions, and spaces
  • Strategies:
    • Wear binder and masculine clothing and accessories
    • Don’t wear name tag
    • Avoid gendered spaces
    • Workout
    • Spend time with queer friends
    • Listen to trans podcasts/watch trans youtube videos
    • Use self-care toolkit and listen to self-care playlist
    • Talk to my husband/commiserate
  • Personal Reminders:
    • Today is just a male day
    • I know I’m Ray even if no-one else does

I grouped neutral and male together because I am AFAB so neutral feels the same as male but less intense because it is still towards the ‘male side’ of my physical and social baseline of female.

Do your physical sense of your gender and social sense of your gender fluctuate separately? Do you have similar or different experiences to the ones I describe above? What strategies do you use to manage social or physical dysphoria and make yourself more comfortable? Leave me a comment below!

My Experiences of Gender Dysphoria and Euphoria

Personal Experiences

I have struggled to write this post because it is so intensely personal but I think it’s important for people to understand what dysphoria feels like. Many trans people talk about how their body has always felt wrong or as soon as they could talk they were voicing that they wanted to be the other binary gender. While dysphoria can present in this way, kind of like a big flashing sign, for me it is a lot more subtle and fluid.

For me, dysphoria feels like wearing a piece of clothing that doesn’t fit. You feel like you keep having to adjust it but no matter how you try it never sits right. It is a vague sense of wrongness. Like if I was a puzzle most of the pieces fit together but there are a few that sit slightly askew and I keep fiddling with them throughout the day to get them to fit. It’s irritating, annoying, frustrating, distracting, and confusing. It is also what I use to show me who I am which gives me a way to frame it in a positive way.

When I’m in an environment or around people who know who I am and are gender affirming regardless of how I’m presenting I get a feeling of ‘rightness’ or gender euphoria. This also happens when I put on clothes and look in the mirror and see a body shape that matches what’s in my head. The dysphoria is gone and because it is so uncomfortable when it’s there, the lack of discomfort feels amazing. These are experiences that cis people have all the time without realizing it because they’ve never felt the discomfort related to gender.

My dysphoria fluctuates day to day. Some days it’s barely noticeable and some days I’m doing everything I can to manage it and it’s still so distracting I have trouble getting through my day. Most of the time it sits at the level of a constant itch that you can’t quite track down. What things are causing dysphoria also fluctuates for me. Some days it is purely physical, some days it is purely social and my body feels fine. Most of the time it is a mix of the two. Separating these out has helped me find appropriate management strategies and allows me to cope much better and live more authentically.

Physical Dysphoria and Euphoria

Physical dysphoria is all those feelings that are centered on a part of my body. For me, this is typically my chest. Most of the time, I picture the shape of my chest being halfway between flat and curved. Some days it feels like it should be perfectly flat but more often I’ll have days where it feels normal as it is. I tend to feel more comfortable in clothing that doesn’t draw attention to my chest. So when my internal sense of what my chest should look like is about halfway flat I will wear a chest binder and that takes away most or all of the dysphoria.

I sometimes feel uncomfortable the shape of my body (curves, hips, thighs) for gender specific reasons ie because of how they are feminine, not because of my weight or size specifically. I generally wear clothes that are baggier or will hang straight down and avoid mirrors when I’m not dressed.

Things that I don’t feel dysphoric about that some people do: my lack of facial hair, size of hands and feet, body hair, or below the belt region.

Social Dysphoria and Euphoria

I generally experience social dysphoria when I’m feeling more male which feels at odds with how society sees me – female. I also experience certain aspects of social dysphoria when I start to have a feeling of invisibility due to no gender euphoria for more than a week.

The things that at times make me feel like I am at odds with how I’m being interacted with are gendered words such as ladies, ma’am, girl (as in ‘hey, girl!), my name, and female pronouns. Female gendered words and titles almost always feel wrong though I’m not sure if male gendered words would feel any better. Generally neutral words most consistently feel the best. Sometimes my name will feel too feminine. Unfortunately my job requires me to wear a name tag and introduce myself repeatedly throughout the day so the best I can do to alleviate this is ‘forget’ to wear my name tag.

Occasionally, female pronouns feel wrong though, again, I’m not sure male pronouns would feel any better on those days. As with the gendered words, neutral pronouns most consistently feel the best. So far I do not feel the need to use neutral pronouns at all times or change my name because my gender fluctuates to the female side enough that the hassle doesn’t feel worth it. I am open to the possibility of doing this in the future if that changes. I can also understand how, for some people, it would be necessary.

Wrap Up

As you can see, dysphoria is generally an uncomfortable experience which takes considerable effort to alleviate to the point of experiencing glimpses of euphoria. The strategies I use to manage dysphoria vary based on where my physical and social sense of my gender sit on the male to female spectrum. I will have a full discussion of this in a future post.

Even when my dysphoria is minimal it is still there at least a small amount and the fluctuations also can be frustrating and destabilizing. This takes a mental and emotional toll and can lead to burnout and difficulty coping with other life stressors. I will also talk about this more in a future post and what strategies I use to keep myself feeling stable.

I hope this description of my experiences helps you understand what dysphoria can feel like or helps give you the words you need to explain your experiences to the people in your life.

What are your experiences of dysphoria? How do you describe it to people who are trying to understand? Does anything here raise other questions you’d like to ask me? Leave a comment below!

My Husband’s Transition – A Partner’s Perspective (Part 3: Medical and Legal Transition)

The story began in Part 1: Exploration.

The story continued in Part 2: Social Transition.

And now, the conclusion.

Where do we start?

As soon as Jake knew he needed to transition we searched for any information about the medical process where we live. There was nothing online. The most reliable source of information came from Jake’s psychologist who is very involved with the trans community, including moderating a PFLAG group that we had been attending for several months. At this community support group we heard from others that were further along in their transition process how they had accessed medical care and got their legal documents changed.

Jake started by going to our family doctor who was allowed to prescribe hormones following a very clear algorithm in the WPATH guidelines but, having been to a seminar about the transition process ten years ago, our doctor felt like he knew the appropriate process (all referrals had to go through the psychiatrist) and refused to overstep his bounds. As you may have guessed, the medical management process has changed somewhat in those 10 years but very few family doctors are aware or feel competent enough to provide the treatment that trans people require. And although he was ‘aware of the correct procedure’ he didn’t know that the wait to see the psychiatrist was over a year long or believe us when we informed him of this repeatedly after talking to other trans people who had just gotten their first appointment and phoning the psychiatrist’s clinic.

Luckily, through the community, we learned of a family doctor who had prescribed Testosterone for another member of our group. Jake booked an appointment with him asap and was able to start T a week later. At the time I’m writing this Jake has been on T for 14 months.

Testosterone

The first change was his voice. He was starting a second puberty at the age of 30, complete with the cracking voice which led to much hilarity and some mild embarrassment. Until his voice had dropped enough to be more consistently recognized as male, I was the designated representative when interacting with strangers – ordering food, making phone calls, giving my name for contact info.

As his voice dropped mine started sounding higher by comparison to the point of sounding nasal and squeaky at times. I naturally found myself lowering my voice which in the end made me more comfortable due to my own gender identity (more on this in the posts from the ‘Personal’ category).

Jake then started growing facial hair, a sleazy mustache at first, then very slowly sideburns and a goatee. He got stronger, especially in the arms and shoulders. The slow nature of these changes gave me plenty of time to get used to them as they happened. I never had a moment of hesitation or question about whether I still found him attractive. The more his body changed the more confident and comfortable he became. Confidence is very attractive. My mental image of him had included a lower voice and facial hair for quite some time so as his physical body changed it simply fit my mental image more closely rather than being more and more at odds.

As he was read more as male this in turn made us read as a straight couple and put me squarely in the female category. All of this took away our visibility as a queer couple, something which we both continue to struggle with. It was also a trigger for my personal gender exploration – more on this here.

The struggle of Changing his ID

When it came to getting his documents changed Jake encountered too many barriers to list here. Forms that did not include options for his situation, systems that couldn’t accommodate a change in this information, customer service people who were not familiar with the process, conflicting answers that often required backup from unrelated documents that he was also struggling to get changed, all of which required a fee to be processed.

My personal experience with this was when I had to change his information on my health insurance through work. You can’t do this over the phone, you have to email them, they will send you the form, you fill out the form and fax it in, they will email you when it’s completed. The form has a section for changing your  dependent’s information and reasons why you need it to be changed including information is incorrect, marriage, divorce/separation, etc. There was no ‘transitioning’ category (which I wasn’t expecting) but there also wasn’t an ‘other – fill in the blank’ category. So I ticked off the ‘information incorrect’ and wrote beside it ‘transitioning from female to male’. When I got the email saying it had been processed I checked my account and found his name had been changed but he was still listed as female and ‘Mrs.’ So I emailed them back. A while later it got updated to Mrs. Jake, male. Another email, another wait, and eventually they got it right.

This whole time we weren’t sure what would happen if Jake tried to claim health expenses using his updated Alberta ID if his info in my account didn’t match. So he had been holding off on a couple of things until this went through. This was a needlessly frustrating process but still was much safer than many of the interactions he would go through to get ID changed – for example justifying himself in front of a line of waiting people to a clerk who then had to go get their manager to whom he had to explain himself again.

Getting his national documents changed was the biggest ordeal because he was born in New Brunswick, the one province or territory that had not yet passed legislature for people to change their gender marker on their birth certificates. And until your birth certificate is changed you can’t change your passport. And until your passport is changed it’s not safe to travel to a variety of places including the United States. So we had to cancel our planned vacation to go to Arizona in February at a time when we really could have used it.

Frustration levels rising

All I could do was try to support him, provide a sounding board for his frustration and provide positive outlets and distractions. Very few people could understand what this process was like. When voicing our frustration to others we would usually get the response of ‘oh yah, when I got married it was such a pain to change all my documents, it takes forever, but it’ll be done eventually’. Oh yah? Did the forms you had to fill out not have the option you needed to check off? Did the clerk never know how to process your request or require medical documents as proof? Did it take a huge amount of emotional resilience to walk into each office and out yourself every time? Just like coming out as gay and coming out as trans are not the same thing, changing your last name on all your documents after getting married or divorced and changing your first name and gender marker because you are transitioning is not the same thing. I know people were just trying to be supportive but the amount of educating we had to do to get people to understand the differences was exhausting.

The overall the frustration level rose considerably while he was on waitlists for surgery and endocrine, waiting for paperwork, and even waiting for laws to change so he could change his birth certificate. Frustration is a stagnant emotion that I learned leads to considerable burnout. Eventually I had to start paying more attention to my own mental health and I started a bullet journal including habit tracking, weekly debriefs which eventually lessened to monthly, daily journalling which tapered off quickly, and making sure I had emotional outlets that provided some sense of progress and connection with the queer community – for me this is creative writing and music. It took me five months of consistent personal work but I improved significantly and was pretty much back to normal.

Top Surgery

Jake had waited 4 months for his consult for top surgery with a local surgeon which would be covered by health care. The consult was not particularly encouraging, suggesting that he would likely need a revision a couple years later which would not be covered. It would also be 1.5-2+ years wait before he would be having surgery (because of the waitlist). So he had booked a consult with a private clinic in Toronto which he waited another 4 months for.

In prep for this consult we had to take topless pictures for the surgeon and take measurements which was a very uncomfortable experience for both of us as neither of us pictured him with a female shaped chest at this point. Any time he saw himself in a mirror it would cause dysphoria. My image of him had a blurred out section at his chest. Since he overheats easily and has asthma he couldn’t really wear a binder comfortably so instead he had been wearing baggier clothes and adopted a slightly hunched and rounded posture which was causing upper back and neck pain.

This consult went very well and, as it turned out, they had a cancellation and could do the surgery a month later. We had a brief scramble to make sure we could both get time off from work, see how much flights would cost, make sure my parents didn’t have other visitors staying at that time, and then confirm everything.

Just before leaving for top surgery he received his final national documents in the mail – a huge milestone and a huge relief for both of us.

Getting him through surgery

The days leading up to surgery were filled with excitement and nervousness. After the pre-op appointment the day before surgery this went to a whole other level and all I could do was help him manage anxiety about surgery and self-doubt about whether this was right for him or not.

While he was in surgery I waited and waited and waited. I checked in with the clinic at the time when they said he’d likely be done, was sent away, returned an hour later to be told he was in recovery but that they wouldn’t let me in. I came back 45 minutes later to be told he was a little teary but was doing ok (What does a bit teary even mean? Why was he teary? Wouldn’t I be the best person to support him if he was upset?). Not having access to him in recovery to help with the immediate symptoms was even more frustrating because I work in a hospital and I’m very familiar with how to deal with people who are coming out of anesthetic and dealing with post-op pain.

Half an hour later I finally got to see him. He was super pale, sweaty, and shaky. But even with the post-op binder on his chest was flat! I asked him about the tears. Turns out it was just an endorphin response when coming out of the anesthetic, not an emotional response to the surgery or his chest like they had made it seem. I helped him change out of the gown into his clothes, grateful that we had been told by friends to wear a button up shirt. Eventually he was feeling good enough to go home but they insisted on escorting him to the car in a wheelchair. As far as I’m concerned they’re either ready to release him or not but whatever. This caused more hassle than necessary because I had to go get the car and figure out how to get back to where they were waiting. I tried to stay calm because Jake didn’t need any more stress than necessary but was ready to scream or burst into tears by the time we were finally in the car and driving away.

We spent the next few days resting in bed. I visited with my family while Jake was taking naps. I helped him manage the binder, adjust it as needed, and folded face cloths to wrap over the edges of it where it was digging in under his arms. I helped him stay cool or warm, got food and water, made sure he had entertainment when he was up for it so he didn’t get antsy, got him different meds when he got itchy or nauseous from the narcotics, and put arnica on the bruises (very gently). His energy slowly came back and the pain decreased enough to wean from narcotics but the binder was still digging in under his arms in the most painful bruised areas where they had done liposuction so he couldn’t use his arms much as a result. T-rex Jake.

Post-op reveal and return to normal life

We went back to the clinic about a week after surgery for removal of the bandages and to see how the nipple grafts were doing. I’ve seen incisions before so it didn’t make me queasy or concerned. His nipples looked really dark but this apparently is normal and the surgeon was pleased which was a good sign. It was a very interesting experience to see his chest flat for the first time. I was finally able to look at that part of his body and not have what I was seeing conflict with what he looked like in my head. Over time the blurry part where his chest was in my mental image cleared to match what his chest looks like now.

Once we were home he struggled with the binder for another few weeks but eventually gave up and stopped wearing it. He was instantly more comfortable using men’s washrooms which in turn decreased my own anxiety about him being at risk in public washrooms. He slowly started wearing the clothes that he hadn’t been able to for a while because they had been too fitted across the chest. Now they fit perfectly. I don’t think he had realized how much stress he had been dealing with whenever he was putting clothes on to go out until he was able to put on whatever he wanted and not worry about it getting him misgendered. It’s an amazing experience to see your person finally be at ease with themselves and gain the confidence they had been searching for for so long.

The end?

So in the span of about a month we went from huge amounts of frustration and burnout to all legal documents changed and top surgery complete. It took a while for the stress to dissipate and the relief to settle in but man, did it feel good. Not everyone has the opportunity to pay for private surgery and get it in a timely fashion. Not everyone has support from family when they’re going through these medical procedures or transition in general. We are extremely fortunate in both these areas. And yet, even with all that support and stability it was still a very difficult, stressful, emotional process that was very hard to explain to the people around us. Spending time with each other and other trans people and finding online resources that related to our experiences were the things that kept us going. It is not a surprise to me at all that approximately 50% of trans people attempt suicide at least once in their lifetime (reference).

There is no specific end point to transitioning. Jake may have other surgeries in the future and will continue to have slow changes from Testosterone. But in our experience, after being on T for year, having completed top surgery, and having all his documents changed he has been able to pass consistently as male and has considerably less daily struggle with being trans. When we go through future transition related experiences I will make separate posts about those so stay tuned.

I hope you found this account interesting and helpful. Leave a comment if you have had similar or different experiences or if you’d like to hear more about any particular aspect.

My Husband’s Transition – A Partner’s Perspective (Part 2 – Social Transition)

The story began in Part 1 – Exploration.

Coming out

We started Jake’s coming out process with some preparation and planning, as usual. We made a list of the people he wanted to tell first starting with who would be easiest to tell and would likely be the most accepting. Telling them would hopefully give Jake the confidence and support he needed to tell the ones who’s acceptance would have a bigger impact and therefore, would be a lot more stressful to come out to.

I helped Jake write an email that he sent to the first few people on the list. When that went well, he continued down the list at his own pace. We revamped that letter a number of times throughout the coming out process depending on who we were telling and what type of information they would respond to best.

Gender Gymnastics

I had my own sort of coming out process at the same time. For a long time I had been trying to refer to Jake using male pronouns and name in my own head and at home (which we discovered is hard to do because when it’s just the two of us we never use our proper names or third person pronouns). But until Jake was ready to come out I still had to refer to ‘my wife’ when I wanted to share personal stories with co-workers. This is something I had done a lot of in the past in an effort to be a visible example of a queer couple. Plus, I’m a talkative sort of person, what can I say. This became very uncomfortable, to the point where I began avoiding pronouns or using neutral pronouns when talking about Jake, and shortened his birth name to a gender neutral nickname. However, neither of those would fly around his family so I had to continue with the female pronouns and name with them.

Adjusting to someone’s new pronouns and name is extremely difficult for a lot of people but here I was switching back and forth between three sets of pronouns and names with minimal errors for about four months. We quickly realized this must be my super power. Even so, it took a lot of mental energy, caused a baseline level of burnout that would continue to escalate over the next two years, and caused me to develop a speech pattern that has random pauses in it from when I had to reorder the words in a sentence to avoid a pronoun midway through.

Telling My Co-workers

Around the time Jake started coming out to his friends and family, he gave me permission to ‘come out’ for him with my co-workers (whom he had minimal to no contact with). Finally, I would be able to use male pronouns and refer to my husband Jake. This happened to coincide with November 20th – Trans day of Remembrance. I work in health care in a department that is broken into smaller teams so I decided to make a short presentation at a the next team meeting.

I highlighted how difficult navigating the health care system can be for trans people and the disastrous consequences of that ignorance and transphobia can have, especially when it comes from a professional or happens at a time when the trans person is already in a vulnerable position. I explained that this issue is particularly important to me because my husband is transitioning. My voice only wavered a little bit at this point but I was extremely grateful that I could hide my shaking hands behind the lectern and lean on it for support when my legs went to jelly. I quickly followed this with an educational introduction video done by Jazz Jennings listing the 10 most important things to know about trans people. At the end of the meeting I received hugs from a couple of my closer friends on the team and someone even thanked me for helping them understand what a younger member of their family was also going through and how to support them better.

In my experience, there was plenty of gossip about co-worker’s private lives relating to other topics (deaths in the family, health issues, reasons for absences, personality conflicts, etc). I thought this would be a novelty item for gossip and would spread quickly through the department. Well, I was wrong. Either my partner transitioning is too far removed to be of interest (rather than me transitioning), or people didn’t know how to talk about it or were too uncomfortable to talk about it to want to gossip about it. Or they recognized that talking about it would constitute outing someone which is generally not acceptable, though in this case it would have been useful.

So this began about a year-long, slow coming out process with many repetitions of – blah blah my husband blah blah, oh yes, still the same person, yes, my wife is now my husband, no I haven’t gotten divorced and re-married in the span of a few months, my husband is transitioning, yes I’m ok with it, yes, I’m still gay, his name is Jake, no, it’s not actually polite to ask what his name was before, no, that’s alright, yes, I’m happy to explain it all to you sometime, just not right now in this room full of people, anyway, what I was saying was…. Each time my heart would pound, my palms would sweat, and I’d be glad I was sitting down or would find a chair quickly. This reaction lessened with each repetition but often the mini coming out sessions would take me by surprise because I was never sure who would have found out some other way or who I had told already (I am notorious for forgetting who I told what to).

Occasionally I would have longer more in-depth conversations with some of the co-workers I knew a bit better or some that were particularly curious. I say curious rather than nosy because for the most part their questions didn’t come from a place of wanting to know juicy details about my personal life or my husband’s. They were more curious about what the internal and external process was like in a general sense or in a health care related sense and what my reactions were to it. So even when their questions were targeted to me or Jake I would keep my answers broad such as ‘well often the trans person…’ or if I was ok being more specific or personal (which often I was) I would say ‘well I can’t speak for other people but for us…’ I had many conversations with Jake about what aspects of his transition he was comfortable with me sharing with people and lucky for me he usually said whatever I wanted to share was fine. This is partly because I was talking to people who he had little to no interaction with and partly because I work in health care and we want to educate as many health care workers about trans issues as possible.

Over time (via trial and error and educating myself via online resources) I learned what questions were appropriate for people to be asking and which ones they didn’t really need to know in order to expand their understanding of the trans experience. One example is when people would ask what his name used to be. They would remember that I had a wife but couldn’t remember my wife’s name so when I said I had a husband named Jake and yes, he was the same person as before, they wanted to fill in the missing information. In these instances I learned to tell people that this isn’t actually a question you should ask and provide an explanation why so they didn’t think it was just because I was uncomfortable answering and then go on to ask the same thing of the next trans person they met. For the above example I would explain that knowing his previous name wouldn’t help them understand his experience or who he was, it would likely only get in the way of them changing the image of him in their heads by giving them a female name to latch onto. Maybe at some point in the future I will be brave enough to challenge them by asking why they are curious about this in the first place and make them reflect on where that question is coming from.

Telling My Family

When Jake was ready to come out to my family we discussed who he needed to come out to directly and who I could act as a go-between for. I helped him rephrase his letter (again) and provided backup for the follow up questions. I had discussions with my immediate family about what this meant for me and how I was dealing with it all. By this time I had had plenty of practice with explaining this to people so though the conversation was slightly more intense because it was more personal, I managed it fine.

Since my family lives across the country from us they had to police themselves in order to reinforce correct name and pronouns. So we gave my immediate family some time to get used to the idea and more comfortable with the correct name and pronouns before telling my extended family. I hand wrote a personal letter and mailed it to my grandmother, hoping that the evident effort in writing it would show how important it was to me. I got a brief response from her that said she received it and that she loved us and she used male pronouns and ‘Jake’ throughout which was all we needed. We shortened this letter to just the necessary basics and sent it as an email to my extended family all at once. I got many responses of support, all of which I forwarded on to Jake so he would see them too. Overall, it went fairly smoothly.

Helping With His Family

Around Jake’s family I reinforced his name and pronouns just by using them. Since he never uses them for himself and they wouldn’t use them when talking to him it was only when I was also there that they would hear someone using them and we could see whether they were doing the same. This meant I had to get out of the habit of avoiding pronouns and start using them as much as possible – again, thankful for my super power. But their slow reaction time and constant misgendering of him took its toll on me. We discussed a number of times whether it was ok for me to correct them or not – was Jake not correcting them because he didn’t want to rush their acceptance process and he was trying to be respectful or because he didn’t have the energy but really wished I would? Jake preferred to correct them when he saw fit so when I felt my blood pressure rising I would bow out of a conversation or avoid social engagements with them for little while.

The turning point came when Jake’s step-brother got married. Jake hadn’t planned on telling his extended family yet but he knew he didn’t want to be introduced as the groom’s sister or be asked to wear a dress *shudder*. So about a month before the wedding Jake sent them an email (as per usual) and got a supportive reply suggesting they get together the next week when they were in town. We had a lovely open conversation with them and discussed how to handle this at the wedding. Jake decided he was going to jump in with both feet and correct people as needed but he would be ‘Jake’ and ‘he’, the groom’s brother from now on.

The majority of the guests at the wedding had never met Jake before, though a few would have known that the groom had a number of sisters but no brother. I assume some of that correction happened in the background on the groom’s part but for our part Jake and I made brief explanations and corrections for the people who actually knew him and his mom helped with that a bit too (yay!). Throughout the weekend everyone around us was referring to Jake as male like it was a non-issue. It was fantastic. More than that, it showed Jake’s immediate family that using Jake and he/him was ok, people wouldn’t treat him as a freak, and he was so much more relaxed. Because everyone else was calling him Jake and ‘he’, they looked weird when they didn’t. So his immediate family had a weekend of name and pronoun immersion which is just what they needed.

Coming out at work – more anxieties

We had been planning for Jake to come out at work for a while. He had contacted HR to make sure he had backup if he needed it, he had done bathroom reconnaissance to find a gender neutral bathroom in case the males were not supportive enough to feel safe using the men’s bathroom, and he had drafted a letter to his team lead and her boss. But after that weekend at the wedding where he got to be Jake for an entire weekend it was extremely difficult to go back to being a woman at work. So he bit the bullet and sent the emails and had the meetings.

When Jake was preparing to come out at work I had a resurgence of the anxieties about whether he’d be going to an antagonistic work environment that was unsafe but I knew that it would still be better than the constant overwhelming dysphoria. How would he deal with people that weren’t accepting? The first day when he was telling people was super stressful but in the end it went fairly well. They are still (more than a year later) messing up his pronouns on a daily basis which is taking a toll but overall everyone was supportive.

The next step was to start changing his ID. Not to mention that he was still waiting for the initial psychiatrist appointment who would refer him for hormones and surgery. This is where the real frustrations began.

The story concludes in Part 3: Medical and Legal Transition.

My Initial Gender Exploration Process

WHAT I ALREADY KNEW
  • I am both male and female which leads to a fluctuating experience of gender centered at the middle of the spectrum
  • The label ‘non-binary’ doesn’t particularly fit because it’s more like I’m dual-binary
  • My physical sense of my gender and my social sense of my gender can be different from each other
  • I experience both physical and social dysphoria but don’t know in what ways or how to manage them
  • I also have difficulty with my queerness feeling invisible but don’t feel ready to ‘come out’ as something other than cis (one of the biggest reasons why I started this blog)
WHAT I WAS TRYING TO FIGURE OUT
  • How far I actually fluctuate in either direction
  • What specifically causes my dysphoria
  • How to manage fluctuating physical and social dysphoria so I minimize the negative effects by feeling more comfortable in my skin and environment and therefore more authentic
  • How to alter my presentation in ways I’m comfortable with while feeling male or female but also that will be noticeable to the people I see every day so it will influence their interactions with me
  • Whether I will need to transition socially or medically in the future
TOOLS I USED

Gender Tracker

I created a gender tracker in my bullet journal that has a scale from 5 female to 0 (neutral) to 5 male. Each day I rated my physical feelings about my gender and my social feelings about my gender on this scale. The sense of my gender was based on a combination of what things made me feel dysphoric (feeling wrong for gender reasons) and what things made me feel euphoric (feeling right for gender reasons). I filled it in daily for a month and a half which gave me a good sense of how much I fluctuate (not as much as I thought), how these fluctuations related to other things going on in my life (most obvious influence was my menstrual cycle – of course), and how my sense of gender related to my mood (a couple very specific and useful correlations). I haven’t continued to track it objectively since then but I do use the same system in my head on a nearly daily basis and can now easily identify when my bad mood is related to dysphoria or when a shift in gender might happen.

You and Your Gender Identity: A guide to discovery

by Dara Hoffman-Fox

This is a step by step self-help style book that takes you through three broad stages: Preparation, Reflection, and Exploration. It combines advice and self-reflection questions/activities in a work book style layout. I started at the beginning of the book and worked through the sections that resonated with me and skipped sections that didn’t feel like they applied. I kept my notes in a journal specifically for this stuff so that I wouldn’t be afraid to write down my thoughts for fear that someone would see them in my everyday journal. The sections I found the most helpful were:

  • Fears
  • Positive Approach
  • Gender Questionnaire
  • Getting to Know Yourself Creative Prompts
  • Physical Discomfort
  • Social Discomfort
  • Exploration Ideas and Process

If any of these sound like they would be helpful for you I would recommend you get the book and work through it! It gave me a guideline so I no longer felt like I was floating in the middle of nowhere with lots of questions and no way to find answers.

Journal

Even before consciously starting my gender exploration process I started using a bullet journal to keep myself organized, track my personal habits and mood, and have somewhere to write down my thoughts and feelings. I found this very helpful during the later stages of my husband’s transition when all the stress and frustration had built up to burnout level. I have continued to use it since then and often journal about gender-based observations, experiences, and stressors. Mental and emotional wellness is difficult to maintain in the face of daily dysphoria. This journal gives me somewhere to put down my thoughts and feelings to help me process them, gives me a creative outlet, and keeps me organized so I don’t have to keep schedule or to-do list in my head.

Self-care Toolkit

Another idea from Dara Hoffman-Fox’s book that I talked about above. This is a physical box of whatever size you need to hold everything that goes in it. Mine is fairly small and I keep it at work as that is where I generally experience the most burnout type symptoms. It includes reminders for self-care activities and positive statements and sensory objects that will either override a negative mental or emotional state and give you something else to focus on or provide a calming and grounding effect. Mine includes:

  • Reminders for self-care activities that help me such as music playlists and phrases that I can use as a mantra
  • Scents that I find grounding or calming (sandalwood, cedar)
  • Tastes that are strong and distracting (mint, cinnamon) or enjoyable and comforting (chocolate)
  • Tactile objects that fit in my pocket and can be played with as a distraction or for calming effect (soft leather, worry stone, carved animal, chainmaille)

Everyone’s toolkit will be different. I put it together about a month ago and have used it about 3 times since but just knowing it’s there if I need it has been a big comfort.

DAILY PROCESS

When I get up in the morning I check in with my body to see where my physical dysphoria is at. When I’m getting dressed I picture myself at work and get a sense of how I want people to see me/interact with me which hints at where my social dysphoria is at. The clothes I choose (including a binder) used to be the hardest part of my day because they relate to both physical and social dysphoria and if one is female and the other is male it can be difficult. I have gotten considerably better at knowing when a binder will be helpful and what clothes I will be comfortable in since I started the more objective gender discovery process. I pick accessories to balance out my gender presentation. If the clothing I picked to feel comfortable is more masculine I will choose neutral or feminine accessories and vice versa. Throughout the day I check in with myself and alter my appearance as needed – put my hair up or take it down, take my name tag off or put it back on, engage in self-care activities as needed.

This post goes into more detail about what types of dysphoria I experience, what it feels like to have different male and female combinations of physical and social sense of gender, and specific strategies I use to feel comfortable with each version of my gender.

What do/did you use to discover or explore your gender? What parts of my process are similar or different to your own? Is there anything that I used that you might find useful or want to know more about? Let me know in the comments!

My Husband’s Transition – A Partner’s Perspective (Part 1 – Exploration)

initial reaction

We were driving in the car together (the place a lot of our more intense conversations happen) and my husband turned to me and said something like “I’ve been wondering lately if my social anxiety and awkwardness might be gender related…”. I wasn’t sure what he meant by that and tried to clarify. The conversation progressed something like this:

Jake: “What if this means I’m trans? What if I won’t be happy unless I transition?”

Me: “Wondering if your anxiety is gender related is nowhere near deciding you’re trans. Lets just take it one step at a time. And so what if that’s where it leads? We’ll figure it out.”

Jake: “You wouldn’t leave me? You’re gay! What if I end up being a guy? That’s not what you signed up for. You mean more to me than figuring this out. I wouldn’t do any of it if you weren’t going to be ok with it.”

Me: “Yah, I’m gay. So what? I love you. Let’s take it one step at a time. I can’t guarantee that there won’t be stuff that I’ll struggle with. But we’ll figure it out. You have to figure out how to be happy, figure out who you are. There’s no way I’d be ok holding you back from that.”

I don’t know if those are the exact words but you get the gist. I’ve heard from other people – either trans people or their partners – that this is a fairly common pattern. I understand why Jake would say that he wouldn’t transition if it meant I would leave him but what kind of person would I be if I said yah, I’ll stay so long as you never live authentically? Not the kind of person I wanted to be, that’s for sure.

This revelation didn’t particularly take me by surprise but I know it does for a lot of people. Jake had been living as authentically as possible and was quite a masculine woman to begin with which, I recognize, is a benefit of being AFAB that is not afforded to AMAB people who want to present more feminine (more about my thoughts on this topic here). I also had my own gender questioning experience and had been involved in the queer community for a number of years which gave me an understanding of what he might be feeling and the language to conceptualize and express it (more about my personal history here).

Exploration and Experimentation

So, we took it one step at a time, starting with a deep dive of the internet. We quickly learned terms like dysphoria, FTM and MTF, learned about binders and packers and STPs (stand-to-pee devices), and started looking for community support.

For the first few months we were exploring and talking about his gender confusion pretty much in secret. I was must happier being his confidant and helping him sort through it than I would have been finding out later that he had struggled through this part on his own while I was out/at work.

We learned pretty quickly that Jake’s experience of his gender and dysphoria didn’t match the typical trans experience of ‘feeling like you were born into the wrong body’ and ‘telling your parents that you were meant to be a [insert non-assigned gender here]’ or ‘suddenly feeling like your body was betraying you when you started puberty’. It took a while before we could explain what his experience actually WAS but now we know that, at least at the beginning, he primarily was experiencing social dysphoria (as opposed to the physical dysphoria described in the stereotypical examples). He felt fairly neutral towards his body but felt uncomfortable in female spaces, being treated as a woman, and referred to as female.

Unfortunately, it is almost impossible for general society to perceive you as male unless you physically appear as male so even though he was not uncomfortable in his body, a lot of the exploration required altering his presentation and body appearance (trying binding, packing, haircut, wardrobe changes, etc). This progressed at Jake’s pace which was significantly slower than I wanted things to move. I was all – yah! you can do it! Let’s figure this shit out! But sometimes people need time and space and the supporters need to give them that.

We also wanted to explore the social aspects of being male (pronouns, name, interaction) but that is impossible to test without first telling other people who you are exploring your gender and could they please use male pronouns and a different name for you. At the time we did not have a group of friends that we felt comfortable doing that with as a trial period so we tried it as best we could just between us.

My role and experience as a partner

Through all this my role was helping him see the bigger picture about how far he’d come, help him to not get discouraged or frustrated, provide support and feedback, provide options when the first thing didn’t work or feel good, provide positive distractions and outlets, and help him find confidence in his new image. Pretty much just give him a positive, safe space to explore himself in. I would often ask him how something had felt and he would struggle to put it into words so we would start with did it feel good, or bad? We used the things that felt good as a compass for what direction he was going with his gender.

I often pushed him to take the next step before he felt ready. This is partly because I didn’t want fear to stop him from figuring out who he is but also because the longer it took him to figure himself out the longer I was in limbo. How do you start the process of acceptance when you don’t know what the new status quo is going to be? I had a constant feeling of unsteadiness which worsened when I was away from Jake and improved when we spent time together. I think this is because when we were apart my mind would fixate on all the new things, all the changes, and all the unanswered questions. When we were together it was obvious that he was still the same person, we had the same inside jokes, enjoyed doing the same things, and had the same interactions as always. Together time was the major antidote to both of our mental and emotional stress during the entire transition and we learned early on to prioritize it as much as possible.

Changing my mental image of Jake

I knew a big part of accepting whatever the end result was going to be was that I had to change my mental image of Jake to match his mental image of himself. I was able to do this bit by bit rather than all at once. As he explored his gender we communicated regularly which allowed me to understand his sense of his own gender as he discovered it. This was very beneficial to me and allowed me to adjust the pronouns and name I used for him much more easily when he was ready to experiment with those.

Changing your mental image of someone who has told you they don’t identify as the gender they were assigned at birth is hugely important. In order to be truly supportive I couldn’t continue to see him as a woman – I wouldn’t be able to discuss his dysphoria or experiences of gender euphoria in ways that felt authentic to him. Yes, this took some personal work, a lot of mental corrections anytime I thought of him, and a lot of quality time talking about his perception of himself as it was changing during his experiments so I could give my mental image the best chance of keeping up. And once he was ready to change his name and pronouns it allowed me to consistently use male pronouns because my mental image of him was of a male person, regardless of what his physical appearance was. One of the things that helped the most with this was changing his name in my phone so that every time he texted me or called me I would see his preferred name. This was a huge step forward when I figured that out. We ended up recommending it to other people as he was coming out to them in an effort to help them adjust as well.

My Own Fears

I had many fears and questions that came up throughout this process. I didn’t want to talk to Jake about them all the time because I didn’t want my struggles to increase his already exponential fear and confusion. Luckily, we had a couple of friends that Jake felt comfortable telling early on in the process so that I would have someone to talk to about this stuff. Having that outlet was very important.

Some of my fears were: How would I respond to people’s questions about my identity changing? What if I wasn’t as attracted to him once he started appearing more male? What if I wasn’t interested in being married to a man? What if he changed as a person as he transitioned? Many of these questions couldn’t be solved just with introspection or discussion. Some required time and patience, some required trial and error, something I’m not as comfortable with. I had to see how I felt about him in ‘boy mode’.

So, on a vacation to an area where we wouldn’t likely run into people we knew, we planned for him to be my husband for the whole trip. We used male pronouns and tried out a couple different names that had made the short list. As we went along we realized you don’t introduce yourselves to many people when you’re on vacation, or at least not when you’re both introverted and you’re going on a driving and camping trip and the general goal is to stay away from civilization as much as possible. So it wasn’t the best test but it still gave us one more piece of evidence.

The Tipping Point

At some point we sat down and made a list of the stuff he had already tried and the stuff he wanted to try next and we realized that even if he didn’t go any further with exploration or transition he would still be more comfortable living as a man than either a non-binary person or a woman. Finally, I could let my mental image of him solidify.

At the same time, he all of a sudden had an exponential increase in physical dysphoria. He had identified that he was a man and suddenly his body was no longer what he wanted it to be or what other people would expect. This took us both by surprise. I have since learned that this is a very common experience from talking to other trans/NB people. This was extremely difficult for him to deal with and all I could do was support him, distract him, and interact with him in ways that validated his identity and avoided triggering more dysphoria.

The next step was to start telling people. This was a big relief for me because I no longer had to be alone in this. I would be able to share what was happening – take the lid off the boiling pot so to speak. But the thought of him coming out as trans increased my anxiety and fear in new ways – how people would react, would Jake be put in any danger, how he would respond to people who weren’t accepting, whether he would stand up for himself or absorb and internalize the antagonism.

There was nothing for it but to make a plan as best we could and push on.

The story continues in Part 2: Social Transition.

The story concludes in Part 3: Medical and Legal Transition.