itsybitsysissy: ItsyBitsySissy’s Little Guide to being a TransWoman About this guide This is
itsybitsysissy: ItsyBitsySissy’s Little Guide to being a TransWoman About this guide This is the latest of my series of ultimate guides and can be seen as part 2 to my beginners guide. I’ve put at least as much work and effort into this guide as into the others, but since the subject is much more complex and there are people much more knowledgeable in the field i thought it to be presumptuous to put the “ultimate” into this guide’s title. Chapter 1: What is a TransWoman? Just a quick intro for those who don’t yet know what being a TransWoman really means. You remember how as a child your parents and teachers probably taught you that there were two genders: male and female? Well, they were wrong. There is an infinite number of genders that can be arranged on a spectrum with male and female on the poles. In between there is agender, bigender, genderfluid, genderqueer and much more. Many (maybe most?) people identify with the same gender as their sex - these people are called cis-gender. So e.g. a cis Woman is born in a female body and identifies as female. Now the opposite would be transgender. So a TransWoman is born in a male body and identifies as female. Chapter 2: Am I a trans Woman? Is this Guide for me even if I’m not? The fact that you are reading this guide tells me that you are probably at least questioning your own gender identity. There is no quick test to find out for sure what your “true gender” is, but I think this guide will help you find out. I’ll basically describe one of many possible paths of transitioning. After reading it and thinking about it you’ll probably have a better idea of whether it is the right path for you. And even if you find out that you are not a TransWoman, but identify with some other gender on the spectrum Digression 1: The Beginner’s Guide Like I said this guide can be seen as the sequel to my beginners guide. If you think your feelings of “wanting to be a woman” are rather sexual than really about your identity you should start there. If you think it’s more than sexuality, but you don’t know how to come out to friends & family check out the last chapter of the beginners guide. Digression 2: The Checklist Here is a quick checklist of things you have to (at least think about) working through during your transition. What I mean: You don’t have to do anything the way others do it. You can redefine what being a woman means for yourself. But you should at least think about all of those steps and think of them in time, so you don’t e.g. find yourself ready to pass as a woman in public, but having forgotten to work on your voice too. Checklist: find yourself build a support-network/come out seek professional help take hormones have surgeries? remove/grow hair train your voice work on your figure work on your behavior, movements, gestures, facial expressions, … makeup, styling, etc. Chapter 3: Seeking Professional Help Apart from coming out to friends and family the most important step in your transition is probably seeking professional help. Find a therapist who is an expert in the field and get an appointment as soon as you are ready. I promise it will help you a lot talking to them. If you don’t have the money to go to therapy and your country doesn’t have a good health care system ask them for a social tariff. If they don’t have one or you still can’t afford it ask your parents or anyone else to pay for therapy. You can tell them it’s for depression or whatever if you’re not yet ready to tell them what it’s really about. Most therapists will even write the wrong diagnosis on your public medical report if you ask them to. If you don’t find any experts near you go to a trans*support group and ask there whether they can recommend someone. Basically any therapist with “sex therapy” in their title should be suitable and if they are overwhelmed with your situation at least they can transfer you to someone who won’t be. Psychotherapy isn’t just the best thing you can do to get more certain and comfortable with who you are, it’s usually also a prerequisite for most further steps. Chapter 4: Hormones - a basic introduction Hormone therapy for transgender individuals has been shown in medical literature to be safe when supervised by a qualified medical professional. I think the above quote from Wikipedia is the most important sentence about hormones. Taking hormones is safe as long as you do it accompanied by a competent doctor who rules out contraindications, weighs risks and benefits and regularly checks your laboratory data as well as physical and mental well-being. There are 3 types of hormones used for mtf-hrt: estrogens anti-androgens progesterons Progesterons are not that commonly used, the other two I’ll describe more below. Things to expect from hormone therapy (in adults): redistribution of body fat (including broader hips & more feminine face) breast growth (not just fat, but also functional tissue) reduction of muscle-mass and strength smoother, less-fatty skin (less pimples, yay!) redistribution of body-hair & stopping of boldness reduction of libido, fewer & weaker erections, shrinkage of male primary sex organs. -> up to impotency What you can’t expect as an adult: Change in bone-structure (neither body nor face) reversing bald-spots obviously no development of female primary sexual organs Side effects: change in/ different awareness of emotions (moodyness, weepyness, rarely up to depression) weight gain (indirectly due to mood changes) Chapter 5: What should I consider before starting hormones? Well fist you’ll obviously have to make sure it’s really what you want to do, then consider this: sex-life: Starting hormones will reduce your sex drive at least for a while, so if you have a partner definitely give them a heads up. You don’t want them to feel like you are not attracted to them anymore when really it’s just your medication family planning: If you think about ever having kids of your own you should consider freezing your sperm before you start hormones. Really think about this. While on hormones your mother-instinct will increase and you may regret it later if you don’t have the ability to be a blood-parent to your kids. That said: Blood doesn’t make a family, love does and adoption is a beautiful thing. Depression: In earlier times depressions caused by hormone therapy was a common thing. Nowadays due to the optimization of medication and dosage it’s rather uncommon. But if you tend to (e.g. seasonal) depressions you should definitely talk to your doctor about it. Maybe it’s a good idea to treat a current depression first, take a mild prophylactic dosage along side your hrt or wait until winter has passed and start hrt in spring. Chapter 6: So what hormones should I ask my doctor for? Like I said there are two main groups of hormones commonly used: estrogens and anti-androgens. A rule of thumb is if you are sure you want to be a woman 24/7 and want to change your body a lot you’ll probably take both, but you can start with just one of them to prevent side-effects. If you rather consider yourself gender-fluid, or -queer and only want a mild-feminization you’ll probably only take estrogens. Anti-Androgens are especially responsible for the reduced sex-drive and potency as well as the prevention of baldness. But since both pills shift your estrogen to testosterone ratio they generally have similar effects. Chapter 7: Are there any alternatives to taking hormones? Well, hormones are the best way to reach certain goals all at once. You can reach similar effects with lots of hard work and discipline, but if you really want to transition, I would only recommend not taking hormones for health reasons. What about phyto-hormones? Well those are hormones too. You can get them without a prescription, because they are much less effective (positive as well as side-effects), but if you take them to the point where they do show desired effects they are also just as dangerous as prescribed hormones, so supervision by a doctor is a must! If you really have to look for alternatives due to health reasons you can look into diet, fitness and especially isolation exercises to get a more feminine figure, pumps to grow your breasts, skin-care products to get a smoother skin, my hair removal guide to remove unwanted hair and my clitty guide to shrink your male primary sex organs. Chapter 8: Surgeries - Should I have Surgeries, which ones and when? Whether or not you want to change your body further with surgeries is of course your decision I just have one big tip: Wait until you are on hormones for some years before you decide anything! There are a few simple reasons why that’s a wise decision: You may think you already know exactly who you want to be and how you want to look like, but when you’re on hormones that may change and you don’t want to regret anything later. Hormones will change a lot about your appearance. E.g. you may never need a boobjob once the hormones kick in and your breasts start growing naturally. Plastic surgery has gotten a lot better in the last years, but natural changes still have much better results & less risk. Wait even with surgeries to change things that can’t change through hormones (e.g. adam’s apple). Once you look very feminine you may like to have a few features that keep you apart from a “normal” woman. Vaginoplasty, Orchiectomy or neither? Wait a few years into hrt and experiment with your sexuality. Then decide what you want your future sexlife to be like and what parts you’ll need for that. Chapter 9: Remove/ Grow your Hair To learn how to remove unwanted body hair please read my hair removal guide. Now about growing your head hair: If you want it to grow longer there are a few things you can do: hormones again, if you didn’t start yet. Obviously they help with hair growth too. Learn the correct hair care for your hair. If you don’t know what kind of hair you have just ask a haircutter. Don’t overdo it with the hair care products, styling and coloring. Chemicals in hair products as well as heat and mechanical manipulation damage your hair. Eat healthy and drink a lot of water. Especially proteins and omega-3-fatty-acids are known to be good for your hair. Trim your hair every few months. Make sure not to trim more than what grows back in a certain time, but still regularly cut the hair ends as they damage easily. If you have bald spots (caused by testosterone) there is pretty much no way around hair-transplantation, but - to avoid doing it in vain - don’t do it before you haven’t reached your desired hormone-levels. Chapter 10: Train your voice Apart from your appearance your voice is usually the second (or third after smell) thing people notice about you and it’s often a tell for trans people. I’m not going to go into much detail here, because training your voice is something you should not do without supervision and help from a specialist. There is so much you can do wrong without even noticing. Not only is it hard to unlearn something you did the wrong way for a long time, but you may actually hurt your vocal cords to the point of permanent irreversible damage. If you want to start working on your vocal range right now and can’t wait until you get an appointment with a vocal trainer, search the internet for a warm-up exercise called lip trill. If you stick to that exercise you can’t do anything wrong and even just doing that exercise for a few minutes every day for a week or two will get you a big headstart before your first professional training. Preview to further guides If you take a look back at the checklist you’ll notice that I didn’t get into the last 3 points. That’s because I’m not an expert in them yet. I’m currently doing lots of research in workouts and fitness exercises for a more feminine body and this will surely be part of an upcoming guide. Whether I’ll actually ever do a guide on makeup I’m not sure yet - there are so many out there, e.g. on youtube and to be honest youtube is a much better medium for makeup guides anyway than tumblr. Please note: As always bookmark the following post to check for updates: http://itsybitsysissy.tumblr.com/post/157029886390/ Please support me via patreon.com so I can create more guides. -- source link