onevia

We are doing better than ever! Thank you for asking. Coming out to her and myself means that I can finally show her all of me.

On a sillier note. It also helps that she has realized she's more lesbian than "bi" like she thought. Turns out she was just waiting for me to stop cosplaying as a boy 😘

I'm smelling an irl trans convention at Jungle Jim's! 😹

I'll be chilling at the movie theatre inside.

Woah... I literally grew up in Fairfield. That's crazy someone else knows of jungle Jim's! Do they still have the crazy Elvis bear robot thing? 😅

I'm still relatively new to my journey. Just under 6 months of cracking my egg and 7 weeks of HRT.

Cracking my egg was probably the hardest part for me to be honest. It took years of trauma therapy and peeling back many layers of self inflicted injuries to finally see the real me.

There was a good decade before my egg cracked that things started to spiral out of control. A need for pain management for chronic pain grew into addiction. My long term relationship (been together 15 years now) with my highschool sweetheart started crumbling due to my lies and inability to open up to her.

I learned to hate myself to keep pushing forward. Which wasn't hard because I was always so critical and mean to the "man I had become"

Things would get a little better here and there, but it was on a downward trend. Relapsed into addiction after my son was born. I had an identity crisis and couldn't see myself as a father. I never had a good blueprint for what that was, but I couldn't even envision myself as one. I felt like I needed to push this all down, take another pill for the pain and be the best I could for others. Never acknowledge my feelings or thoughts. I didn't deserve to figure out who I was. I would rather burn myself to the ground supporting my family than to EVER give myself an ounce of love.

Came to a crossroads of sort. My wife and I had many talks when our son was asleep. Our marriage wasn't working. I was spiraling into depression and we both knew I wasn't going to live much longer. For a while I accepted that fate. Because it was all I knew. But seeing my wife crying on the kitchen floor because she didn't understand why she couldn't reach me... That was not my plan. She always saw something more in me that I refused to see. And she was pleading with me to let it out.

So I did. For my wife, my son, and for the first time in my life - I did it for myself.

A year of sobriety from narcotics. Years of trauma work in therapy going as deep as I could remember. Searching deep within myself to finally ask the question. Who am I? And I heard a voice in the distance say "My name is Olivia"

That was my egg cracking and I've been getting closer to that voice every day since ❤️

Sounds like an amazing experience! Glad you found a haven for acceptance and love ✌🏻

Ya know, I hadn't considered it could be interpreted as exclusionary to non-binary people. I am truly sorry that I didn't more thoroughly consider how this might be viewed from different perspectives.

I'll try and clarify it to be less binary. Personally, I was thinking of it more in the terms of "Do you ever feel like you wish you were born for the society we live in"

So basically, how do you feel about your trans identity.

I hope that helps ❤️ much love

-Olivia

So for me, it seems to depend a bit on my mood. I don't know if I've ever wanted to be cis as a boy. Just wanted to know why I was different from other boys but I always admired that about myself.

I feel like being a cis woman would be great on days when dysphoria is hitting hard but generally I am happy to finally know what made me "different" all my life. I like that I'm trans because it's been a big part of my identity even before my egg cracked.

The path my life is on is hard and can feel impossible, but also I love that I better understand my self and don't limit myself to a binary understanding of gender.

Sorry to hear that. I hate that feeling of looking in the mirror and seeing something that "isn't you" exactly. Like my reflection doesn't look like how I feel about myself.

It's a slow process of changes and self acceptance that is painful to bear. But hang in there and keep looking for that beautiful feminine face! She's there, just hiding a little ❤️

I went for clothing that was a bit more unisex in nature and then having some "accessories" to femme things up (or masc things up if I'm having a rough self conscious day)

So examples would be experimenting with different colors on you. So before my egg cracked, I just wore grey, black and navy blue. Very drab and unapologetic.

Now I wear all sorts of colorful pieces. Pink, purple, maroon, whatever looks good for my skin tone.

Also, you can femme up most outfits with a nice cardigan and if you're feeling extra cute, a nice necklace or bracelet. Still femme but a little less "noticable" If anything, I'm probably clocked as gay or queer but not specifically trans yet.

Now, once my boobs grow in that'll be a different story but it's a good transitionary approach to wardrobe.

You got this Hun. That "man in a dress" feeling is something I think all of us transfemmes experience at some point. It's tough because like you said, we would never think that of others, but when you've been told you're a man your whole life, it's hard to rewire that and see your true self.

My advice is to take it a day at a time, one aspect at a time.

Like you, body hair was my most dysphoric aspect and I've always hated it. So once my egg cracked back in October, I shaved everything off and dived into learning how to take care of my skin for the first time in my life. For a couple weeks, this was all I did transition wise but it was such a great foundation for me to build off of!

What started off with shaving off the hair that always destroyed my confidence ended up being the first time I ever did anything for my self. Especially the self care aspect. I now shower more often, use lotion, facial cleansers and even nail oil as I focus on improving my fingernail health. It's helped give me a source of consistent euphoria (as long as I keep up on it) and gave me the confidence to move on to bigger more noticable changes like dressing femme and makeup ❤️

Try and enjoy the small moments of happiness as they come. Enjoy smelling the roses ❤️

It was nice knowing you! 😭 Maybe try and focus on some self care for a few days ❤️ whatever puts you in a nice cozy mindset so you can fight the sick

Hang in there brother!

I'm in a similar situation. The only place I'm not out yet is work and I'm terrified of that inevitability because it's a very male dominated workplace/field.

My therapist mentioned talking to HR in complete confidence before talking to anyone else that way everything is already known and they can help direct me on best approach. Is that maybe something you could do?