noahrambles-blog

[noahrambles-blog]

Feeling better, I think?

I had a rough couple days. Yesterday was just all dysphoria until I had some (a lot of) CBD, which calmed me down to a functional level again.

Today I woke up feeling good - I did some more research and reading more posts and stories from non-binary and transgender men, and one was a guy who posted his testosterone timeline (like, full body). And he had a lot of bottom growth, which before now was a side effect that I was sort of apathetic toward - if it happens, whatever, if it doesn’t, whatever. But looking at his pictures, I realized that I really wanted that. I thought, if I can’t have a cis dick, then like, this is the next best thing that doesn’t require surgery!

I also wanted to go buy more clothes. My workplace is business casual, which basically means hell on earth for me. Before my egg cracked, I thought I just hated business casual as a whole. I hated wearing blouses, heels, and panties that don’t show lines in slacks were my enemy. They still are. I fucking hate thongs. But my egg cracked and I realized - I can wear men’s clothes! Who’s going to know the difference? So I bought boxer briefs (so comfortable - I’m never going back!), and some men’s slacks, and button up shirts. 

But I wanted more sweaters and a few more pairs of slacks (I need more color variety - I only have dark grey, and I have a pair of black and light grey ones that are women’s, but you can definitely tell I’m wearing boxer briefs). I went to 3 stores and bought 1 sweater and felt like my soul had been sucked out of my body. So many clothes that didn’t fit or didn’t look good. I desperately want to be able to wear men’s button up shirts (there’s so many colorful options!!) but my hips constantly ruin that for me. And I had the thought that I just needed to ride this out until I got the fat re-distribution from T.

But...I haven’t decided to go on T.

I also wanted to try drinking a milk that is not cow’s milk, cause that’s bad for acne, which I had a lot of in junior high. So. my thought was, when I go on T, I’ll hopefully have a better handle of my acne.

When.

Not if. When.

I’ve also been toying with my skincare routine for the same reason.

So that’s new. “When”.

I do like the idea of doing it. But I don’t think I’m ready to? I feel like it doesn’t make a lick of sense, but I think I just need more time. I’m scared that I’d go to my appointment to get it and my doctor would ask why I want it, I would explain, and she’d say that it’s not a good enough reason. 

I always feel like I’m not dysphoric enough to be trans. These past few days have indicated to me that maybe I am, as my chest and hips become slowly more stressful to me. But I’m so worried about being a faker, making it up for attention, or being a trender.

But I’m terrified to tell anyone except my wife and therapist, so that’s not actually attention seeking. Attention seeking would be realizing and telling everyone as soon as I could. I don’t think I would be distressed like this so intensely for 2 months if I was faking. I would’ve moved onto the next thing, right? 

I’m also maybe interested in top surgery, but I think that would be much further down the line, cause that’s something I want to be sure about before doing, for obvious reasons.

I’m hoping to lose some weight over the next little while and focus on getting in shape. I want to see what distress is coming from feeling fat (which I’m not really - I’m a men’s small, women’s medium/large) and what’s coming from dysphoria. I’ve had body image issues for quite a long time - my parents often implied that I should lose weight or go on diets or work out more when I was in junior high. (I was about 30 pounds lighter then and my mom was 15 pounds lighter than I was at the time, so apparently that made me fat. She’s now reached the weight that I was in high school and suddenly her narrative has changed to “love your body!” “healthy is all shapes and sizes!” which would’ve been nice when I was a super insecure teenager. So now a kind of insecure adult has to work through all these issues she projected onto me). 

Tangent. Sorry. I’m working through all of this in therapy, promise.

I feel like I might repeat myself across posts. I can’t tell what I’ve written about, what I’ve told my wife, and what I’ve told my therapist. I’m hoping to get it all the same across the board soon enough. 

I think it’s important for me to keep writing almost every day. I think it’ll help me identify triggers and trends. Which is super helpful given that I have a hard time remembering what happened a few days prior at any given time. My memory is a little useless. 

It’s bed time for me. I’ve got my breakfast and lunch all prepped for work (which is pretty huge for me, and something I’m hoping to keep up. My egg cracking has definitely yielded some benefits. I’m more motivated and driven, for sure). But I can’t believe the weekend is over. They keep disappearing. This week will be my 4th at my full-time job after graduation. It’s absolutely flown by. Part of me wishes all this happened before I finished university so I could actually play around with expressing myself in a more open and accepting environment, but oh well. I’ll take what I can get I suppose. Better than going back in the closet and repressing my feelings. Again.

Thank you void, for listening to my blathering.

Noah

[noahrambles-blog]

I don’t feel like Noah today

I just feel like Taylor. And it doesn’t feel good.

[noahrambles-blog]

Work

Work today had a weird train wreck of dysphoria inducing events. And I can’t even be mad at the people that caused them cause they don’t know that all this is going on. They were innocent questions with the perfect make-up to fuck me up.

My coworkers are organizing a team to participate in a bike-a-thon, and they kept peer pressuring me to join. I said maybe, which my coworker immediately took as a yes. I told her no, don’t sign me up, but it just left me thinking about potentially doing it; I pictured myself being at this event. With my unshaved legs and arms, in my masculine workout clothes, trying to ignore being binder-less, cause I can’t wear it while exercising. I thought about how my coworkers might react to this and how self-conscious I would feel. It got me really worked up and upset, but I calmed down and we ended up going out as a department for lunch and no one really brought it up again.

After lunch, another coworker messaged me asking if I wanted to go swimming with her in a few days, which got me thinking down the same route again. I had a really good excuse (I’m ordering a custom swimsuit that will hopefully alleviate dysphoria, but I won’t get it for at least another week) and she was really understanding. But then I started thinking about the future and whether or not I was comfortable with them seeing me as well, me, without revealing that I’m..not cis? I guess that’s the best way to phrase it. 

Add on to these two (minor, in restrospect) events, my manager kept referring to us as “girls” and “ladies”, because all of my coworkers who share the same job title are women (or appear to be I suppose). But it just rubbed me the wrong way. I had to work really hard not to snap at him that I’m not a woman, but then the question is...what am I?

I’m not looking to explore that question right now. I’m just feeling sort of... eh. I feel really disconnected from my self. I went to the bathroom after all of these little events happened and was rather upset at what I saw, even though the outfit I was wearing is one of my favorites for appearing more masculine. 

Anyway. It was a bad day. Hopefully tomorrow is better. I’ve had so many good days, it makes sense that I’d have a bad one eventually. Gotta keep things balanced, right?

[noahrambles-blog]

Introduction - Who the fuck am I?

Hello void!

I made this blog so I could shout my questions into the void. My gender has been a big question for such a long time, but I’ve only started really wondering and analyzing recently. I feel like every step forward I make, I slowly inch backwards to where I was. Every epiphany, realization, moment of “thank you god I finally understand” eventually regresses back to confusion and frustration.

I’ve decided to start writing these realizations down. I find it’s easier to write to an audience, and frankly I hate writing in MS word. So, here I am, shouting into the void that is Tumblr. I’m not looking for advice from others, reassurance, nothing. I need to sit in my feelings and dig deep. I can’t get external validation or thoughts or questions or concerns. I’m just way too sensitive to others telling me what to do. Others’ expectations have forced me into the dark closet for too long and well, I’m done.

I’m in therapy currently to break down my past, which includes my parents’ expectations and the very traditional gender roles I grew up immersed in. Every time I think I’m getting somewhere in understanding my gender, I explain it away as “Oh, I’m just being sexist and stuck in those gender roles and stereotypes”. I was a tomboy as a kid? Doesn’t mean anything, girls can be masculine. Etc., etc.

Add on to all the fun confusion, that my partner came out as trans about a year ago. I love my wife dearly and I know she loves me too, no matter what (she’s well aware of everything I’m writing), but I worry that I’m only having these feelings because she’s having these feelings. When I met her, she told me how much she loved a particular video game, and I played it and loved it too, and we bonded over it. Same thing happened with multiple TV shows, hell, even backpacks vs laptop bags. Would I have loved these things without her influence? Granted, there are things that she loves that I don’t. She loves sardines on toast. Gross, right? Other games that I’ve tried and wasn’t a big fan of, instruments, drinks. We’re different people, but we basically grew up together, so of course we have similar interests and we both try each others’ interests. And since we’re so similar, there will be lots of overlap. And that’s okay! (I think. I hope.)

I think that this has really come up more in the past few years because my wife’s sibling came out as non-binary, which frankly, I knew what it was but not much more than that. Their experiences really mirrored my own, but because they used a lot of the same gender role language in their explanation, I wrote it off as them just being a bit sexist. But I fully supported them regardless. 

Add on the fact that I moved out of my toxic parents’ house into an apartment with my wife. Meaning day-to-day I can just be...myself, rather than bending to fit this expectation they enforced on me. But I’d been under their thumb for so long, that I don’t really know who I am? 

I was depressed for a really long time. I moved to Canada at 14, and the long winters only exacerbated it. I only feel like I’ve just come out of the fog. A few weeks ago, I went to my therapist to talk all this gender stuff out. I woke up the next morning feeling like garbage, but the two days after that? I haven’t felt that good in a long time. And I got married 10 months ago. I woke up with energy and motivation and desire. I wanted to go shopping and get new clothes, go to the movies, go out and have some beer. I just wanted to be out on the town and in public. I’ve been spending all my time in my apartment for years, so it was pretty weird.

My wife’s sibling got top surgery earlier this year and gave me their binders (since they didn’t need them anymore!) The first time I tried one on, I had a half second of “fuck yeah” followed by hours of utter dread and despair. I’m not 100% sure what caused it, but I think it was from the realization that it didn’t make me completely flat. I didn’t wear it again for a few weeks, but one day I tried it again on a whim, and I haven’t really gone a day without wearing one since. I don’t love the 8 hour time limit (and I work 8.5-9 hours per day, so it’s often a lot longer, which I know is bad) and I don’t love the, well, binding feeling. But it’s nice to be warm all the time!

My other big indicator was when my wife bought me a strap on. We’d discussed me topping a few times in the past and once she came out, she was really interested. So we ordered a strapless dildo. But I couldn’t for the life of me figure it out. If it was in me, it wasn’t in her, and vice versa. We probably did this for 15, 20 minutes, and I was just getting more and more frustrated and upset. I kept trying, even though I was not really in the mood anymore. And then! It was in both of us! And I could move it! And it was so exciting! And then I was hit (again) by a wave of dread and despair. I couldn’t feel anything. I knew my wife was loving it, but I felt like dying. I couldn’t feel anything! I pulled out and laid down and cried. I’m sure my wife was so flustered, it did sort of come out of nowhere from her perspective. 

We haven’t used that dildo again, but I convinced myself afterward that my breakdown was due to my frustration - I’m really bad at being bad at things. I need to be really good at things, otherwise I get frustrated and quit. 

Because of this, we decided to buy a harness and try that instead. We went on vacation and we tried it out. Hoo boy, it was amazing! Looking down and seeing it gave me so much joy! (We had some awesome sex that night. Even me not being able to feel anything didn’t kill the vibe).

We’ve had sex a few times since then, but each time I get a little more dysphoric. We haven’t done anything recently, because I was hoping to analyze what’s going on without the dysphoria during sex, and overall pressure to perform. Since my wife came out, she’s much harder to read. It’s hard to tell what she’s into and what she’s not, because her tastes changed too. I know this means that we should do it more, but I’ve been getting overwhelmed trying to pleasure her, when my new dysphoria has also changed my own tastes and what I like and don’t like. I don’t really ‘finish’ much anymore, partially because my wife isn’t taking initiative and I have a really hard time asking for what I want or need. And I know sex isn’t about that, but all of these factors make it difficult to want it.

So in the meantime, life has been difficult and confusing. But also I’ve been happier than I have been in a while? The mornings aren’t as difficult, sleep comes more easily, I have more confidence day-to-day. And this is all just from considering these issues.

I bought all these gender-affirming clothes (I USED THE TERM GENDER-AFFIRMING CLOTHES BUT I DON’T KNOW WHAT MY GENDER IS WHAT THE FUCK) that are honestly amazing, even though they’re super simple men’s clothes. Boxer briefs are literally my new favorite things. 

I think I’m definitely on the masculine end of the spectrum. Going back to wearing panties (and I always wore granny panties) and bras makes me feel gross, not to mention women’s lingerie. Dresses and skirts are a huge no. Heels are a hell no. Wearing my binder makes me feel like a person. So am I non-binary or a transgender man?

What I do know is this:

- I’ve never wanted to be a mom, but I really like the idea of being a dad. I don’t know what the difference is, but apparently there is one.

- I’ve always disliked my voice - anytime I hear it played back, it makes me feel physically ill. I wish it was deeper. I need to work on stopping artificially raising it (it is relatively low for someone who is AFAB and when I felt that I needed to be feminine and lovely and whatever, I learned to raise it and now it’s kinda stuck in “customer service mode”)

- I like the idea of getting smaller hips through fat redistribution. This dysphoria is actually new today. I haven’t had any issues with this but today I saw myself in the mirror and looked back at past pictures and my hips look massive.

- Surprisingly, the idea of bottom growth on t doesn’t weird me out? 

- I’m terrified of hair loss.

- I really want to fully embrace the academic professor aesthetic. I love the collared shirt under sweater look. I just need some elbow patches and a tweed blazer. I already have the oxfords.

- I’m terrified at the thought of coming out to anyone except my wife. Part of my family would be chill, the other would not. My work is made up of quite conservative people and even the “allies” are misguided. My immediate coworkers would probably be okay with a transition to a binary gender, but I feel like asking for they/them pronouns would result in being misgendered constantly. But I guess I’m being misgendered constantly anyway.

- I’m feeling less and less connection to my pronouns/feminine descriptors. It just doesn’t feel like me.

- I want to get stronger so I can pick up and toss around my wife cause I feel like she’d love that. And I think it would be kinda fun too. I already love pushing her onto the bed. Picking her up and tossing her onto the bed? Hot.

Anyway. This was a lot and was basically just me pouring my thoughts onto this page. There will definitely be more to come.

Goodnight!

Noah