Thank you Grail. I know it wasn't really a rational fear.

I had a great day and a terrible day. Great day was going out to queer campy cabaret, in girl mode in public for the first time ever, and I had an absolute blast. I got heartfelt compliments from total strangers, met new friends. All in all a great first time out.

The next day, hungover, no makeup, no wig, felt like I was stuffing "her" back into a box. Miserable. Today feeling drained and flat, full of fear, impatiently waiting to start hormones.

My biggest fear is that for some reason my body will reject the hormones and I'll be stuck in it because I'm just not trans enough or some shit. I think that probably doesn't make much sense but it was all I could think about today.

Had a big cry. Talked to my wonderful friend @jamie_veal@feddit.org about it. Feel a bit more level again now.

I like that the first reaction was phrased as a question, not a statement. It's kinda sweet. Also a very polite correction and an appropriate response.

Congrats on the surgery!

I experience that same feeling. Before I cracked, i thought this was just sortof sexual or physical attraction but now I realise that a huge amount of the of the way I felt looking at women was some kind of envy of their aesthetic and nothing to do with sexuality or attraction (don't get me wrong, still very much attracted to women, i just never realised that there were two seperate feelings happening and that it's perfectly possible to feel one without the other).

I don't know if these match your experience but things I've been trying to focus on:

1. Remembering that basically every straight, cis woman in my life has expressed to me that they feel that same way about other women (comparing, envy, self-doubt etc). It's just a really common experience. Most women feel it. I'm certain men feel it too, but it's harder for them to talk about maybe? I never felt envy for another man's appearance (surprise surprise) but I don't doubt that they do feel it.

2. The level of self-hatred I experienced when I looked down at my unaltered testosterone body is so much worse than any feelings of inadequacy i have when i compare myself with other women. As other commenters have mentioned, I've been trying to only compare myself with my past self. The bar for that is so low that I win every time :).

3. Realising that whatever I want to look like, however far away i might feel from that, I can actually make small changes all over the place (tattoos, piercings, makeup, jewellery, clothing, hair styling, hair removal, etc.) that make me like my appearance more than I did before. It might never be exactly what I want, but I think I'd internalised this silly idea that I should just have to play the cards I was dealt and try to accept everything as it was. The small wins are great and worth it.

Get it girl!

I was about to mention Welcome to St Hell when i saw it in your comment.

Jamie you cutie! I feel the same way about this place.

I just took it all off fairly recently. I am working toward the more permenant solutions, but just getting rid of the werewolf hair felt amazing. Hell even sitting in the bath shaving my legs to maintain things afterwards feels amazing because that just so femme coded, and compared to the "haven't ever shaved" situation, it just feels like basic maintenance now. The disgust at having body hair changed to the euphoria of "oh hey im doing that woman thing of shaving my legs in the bath like loads of women do".

It's not gonna be the exact smooth and soft feeling i want for a while, but even just the visual improvement when i look down, hell even just my arms, i like wearing tshirts now. I'm glad i did it.

My version of this comic would be switched, I'd be the one saying the negative things, my inner eldritch horror is super-affirming and generally quite irritated with me for being so hard on myself.

Actually yeah here's one, my partner a few days after I started coming out to her:

"You know you've always talked about desperately wanting to remove all your body hair, like ever since we were first together (16 years ago)". I was like "Have I? Oh yeah I guess I have".

I'm literally amazed at my inability to have seen this stuff earlier. I keep remembering stuff like this that just has me looking back like "you dumb egg".

sooo much stuff that just suddenly is so easy to explain

Someone posted a meme a while ago about the "I dont have gender dysphoria" to "oh that's what gender dysphoria is and I have a whole lot of it" pipeline. A lot of stuff in my life does make much more sense when viewed with that lens.

😈