Flukeyfox

I’m taking from your comment that your knowledge may not be as concrete on the subject so my intention is just to add info to hopefully give more context :p sorry for the longer read, despite trying to slim it down it’s hard to without cutting important info.

Firstly, idk if it was a typo or not… But it’s important to recognise that even to this day, being trans is not considered a mental illness. Internationally and in official medical journals and mental health classifications. The dysphoria that can affect us is what’s considered a medical condition due to the significant distress and depressive effects it can cause and so is classified as such to allow for medical services to know how to treat it.

And yeah, some people may have significant dysphoria and need HRT to help with it alongside social transitioning (name chance, pronouns etc).

Some people may have slight, or no dysphoria but choose not to pursue HRT for varying reasons.

In the same way some people may have depression but choose not to take meds, or someone with ADHD may choose not to take meds. It comes down to the severity and the individual preference of that person. I don’t see why the public could reasonably accept the suggestion that treating Dysphoria is cosmetic while we’d for obvious reasons not take seriously someone who’s suggesting the same for conditions like ADHD/depression. Other than for the intention of restricting individual bodily autonomy for a targeted minority :p (Not surprisingly, the major global bankrollers of anti-trans rights are also major funders of removing women’s bodily autonomy rights…)

So I don’t really agree with the idea that the public understanding this would cause hrt to be classed as cosmetic… The issue and topic was never about making hrt available without diagnosis. Most medication requires some sort of diagnosis. The issue is that in some countries, even with public healthcare, it’s commonly stacked against us even getting the diagnosis to begin with.

The UK is a (depressingly) perfect example of a restrictive system: HRT is provided via the NHS, and funnily enough for cis people you could get it within the week or so after visiting the GP (after any possible blood tests etc) when needed. You’d be forgiven for assuming that it must be working great for trans people too, who also pay the same taxes into the same system… But instead trans people face 5-15 year waiting lists for a significantly small number of NHS gender clinics. And that decade-long wait is just to get the appointment for diagnosis so you can finally get hrt through the NHS. Wales recently even recently suspended one of their better performing clinics because they were worried the clinic was getting through the backlog too fast compared to the stagnating UK average. So most trans people end up forced into paying £1-2k a year, (those who can afford to) with private clinics just to get the assessment, dysphoria diagnosis, meds and blood tests/monitoring… The same process and meds which costs the NHS nowhere near the thousands asked for via private.

It’s basically a state-manufactured “high demand / low supply”, which causes a lot of pain and risk of life, while politicians kick the can down the road and act like their hands are tied on fixing it.

The solution to the problem isn’t about if dysphoria is classified as a health condition or not. It never was, that’s just a distraction from the real issue. The solution is more funding, more clinics, more training to doctors and nurses on trans healthcare (which is shockingly not taught to NHS students in the national curriculum), and remove the ridiculous need for years, if not a decade+, of waiting, and the hoops we have to jump through just to get the help we are pleading for. The solution is to actually believe trans people when we say that we’re trans, and to leave us be with the rights to our own bodies.

The solution is for the public to be willing to stop, listen and understand.

Also, seeing HRT as the treatment for dysphoria is not a transmed position in any way. It’s actually widely agreed and accepted by the vast majority of trans people. I’d be surprised to find a trans person who didn’t agree with that.

I love how perfect your name is for that joke

You could be some flavour of Non-Binary (enby) if you’re not feeling necessarily aligned to man/woman which would still fall under the trans umbrella :p

A lot of people sometimes wrongly assume being enby always means not aligning with any gender, but that’s just one of a good few different types: Agender, Bi-Gender (both), Genderfluid (flow back and forth between 2 or more genders over time) etc too name a few. It could be worth researching them and seeing if they align better with how you feel. Enbys can still tilt one way or another while still feeling not fully rooted in any specific box.

But regardless on if binary or enby, sometimes we can find ourselves suppressing how we feel ourselves growing up only to not be able suppress it any longer later in life as cracks start forming in the walls we put up. Funnily for me, looking back I had too many signs to count as a kid but with so much what I had to deal with and worry about, it was easy to suppress. But with a better environment in my late teens and early 20s, and finally dealing with my at the time undiagnosed ADHD, my head was a lot clearer to be able to confront how and who I am. For me, I had never really felt comfortable being seen or described as a man, never felt comfortable having the social expectations out on me for it, never liked my name, always felt off about my body (hated the body hair, devastated when my voice dropped, always felt something was missing from my body even though I learned to just tolerate it with everything else going on - though I’m lucky my body still had a bit more of a feminine frame to it so I can appear more in the middle despite the issues). I when I was younger thought I was “comfortable”, but over time realised I wasn’t. The “comfort” wasn’t really that, but now a sense of apathy towards myself, feeling as though my body had gone in the wrong direction but feeling no way to stop it so just giving up, especially with everything else I was dealing with. That took a while to unpack and confront. Enbys can still go HRT too which is widely accepted and helped by gender healthcare, or you may choose not to

But with all that, I still feel like I don’t really fit 100% in either box, (though for me I’d say I’m 75% in the feminine box and 25% out of both). I currently go with genderfluid (between Woman and Agender), describing myself as a transfem enby as I lean heavily towards fem, though I am still in the process of figuring that out, and figuring out if the “agender” part is really just my apathy “given up” state that I’ve been slowly rejecting as I accepted and presented more fem…

I say all of this about my journey, more as an example. Maybe it’s something you can relate to in ways, maybe not at all. We all have our own journeys and our own questions to answer. But my point is that there isn’t one designated path to being trans, we’re all still unique in our experiences and who we are, and that journey can sometimes take a while :)

Don’t worry too much about not being able to pin exactly what and who you are so soon, sometimes this journey takes a while. It’s a sense of personal introspection that most people don’t even consider doing and everyone is kinda taught not to for so long in our lives that it’s obviously going to take a bit of time when you do.

Maybe in your journey, you figure out you are trans, and maybe that’s binary, or maybe it’s non-binary. Maybe you ultimately figure out you’re cis but just happy to really embrace your feminine side, ultimately that’s a question only you can answer, but you don’t need to answer it immediately. Take your time, look into the different trans identifies, see if any speak to you more. You could also try with identifying with one for a few weeks, or try with different pronouns (like online or with friends, trialing they/them, she/her etc, see how it feels, if it sticks or feels off. And of course, as you’ve done with this post, ask questions with other trans people, we’ve all gone through this or similar paths before and can hopefully help!

Good luck in your own journey though! Even if it feels you’re unsure where you are at now, you will figure it out in time, whatever the answer ends up being for you :)

Idk if it depends on my hair type but I’ve found with mine, that if I leave my hair to airdry fully, it becomes very stringy (as in, hair strands clump together and the hair becomes flatter with way less volume)

If anyone has the same issue, a middle ground approach works well for me. Pat down the hair with a towel to remove any excess dripping water, leave to air-dry for about 10 mins, then blowdry (I just use the cool temperature) for a min or so. At least for me it retains the volume in my hair, makes it a bit more fluffier and keeps some of the natural waviness. If I need to brush it, I’ll just lightly use a detangle brush

Another way is to put your hair in a ponytail while it dries. I seem to retain a lot of my waviness one I let it down afterwards, at the risk of a little less volume

Extra/edit note: My hair does have some natural waviness that is very noticeable when wet. So I’m not saying this will work for everyone ^ But if your hair has any natural waves in it, it might do. (Way of knowing is to see how your hair looks when wet, if it straight, you’ve got straight hair. If it is wavy or curly, that’s your natural waviness). Over-brushing or blow-drying it too much or too soon, with high heat can accidently get rid of that waviness for me

Considering they hired the lead developer behind the Aether 1 and 2 mods in 2020, it amazes me that we’re only seeing a new dimension now tbh. But I think he was involved in the Nether updates

I miss Aether, I might need to check in on the progress of Aether 2 as last time I checked the rest of the team had a break before picking it back up again but that was packed with way more interesting stuff than the Nether ever was imo