Transgender Tropers, Aggregate!

That may be dysphoria. I do think non-binary/agender folks generally experience significantly lower "levels" of dysphoria. Like, some people may experience their genders more intensely than others, even among cis people.

Oh, look, that crappy Powerpuff Girls reboot that everyone hates mocks trans people. Lovely.

Yeah, I'm pretty peeved about the PPG reboot too.

In other news, how do I stop people calling me 'cute'. I know they mean well, but it's making me dysphoric as shit.

Finally cowboyed up and bought my first binder. Won't arrive until May, but I'm pretty pumped.

Hm, I've heard about that, but I'm not sure what to think. Judging by the interviews and stuff, the Unfortunate Implications don't seem intentional, but if they're not, the whole thing just seems really stupid. I wonder how the thought process went.

Hm, I've heard about that, but I'm not sure what to think. Judging by the interviews and stuff, the Unfortunate Implications don't seem intentional, but if they're not, the whole thing just seems really stupid. I wonder how the thought process went.

Bearing in mind that I don't plan on watching it and only read summaries of the episode online, I think the issues with the episode are twofold:

1. The Powerpuff Girl cartoons tend to be highly exaggerated. Characters don't just cry when they're sad, they get Ocular Gushers, etc. Because of this, it's all too easy to make any minority character seem like a caricature. It also exaggerates whatever message the episode is trying to convey, so that "Trans people should make sure they know what they're doing to themselves before agreeing to any major body changes" comes across as "GETTING SRS IS SCARY BECAUSE IT CAN TURN YOU INTO A FREAK!"

2. It feels super patronizing. Like, am I supposed to be happy the show's creators "acknowledged" trans people like this? Seriously, here's a crazy idea, instead of doing some weird pony/unicorn metaphor, why not try having an actual transgender character on your show? It's not like our entertainment media is overflowing with those! Heck, they even wimped out of it at the end since they revealed the pony really did have a unicorn horn all along, which basically invalidates the whole analogy.

The creators seem like they had good intentions, but they royally screwed up. If you're looking for an example of a children's cartoon that actually does this message well, check out Adventure Time's "Princess Cookie" episode. It deals with a male character trying to become a princess. The parallel to transgender people isn't quite as on the nose, but it at least has the guts to deal with the subject of gender roles up front instead of hiding behind a weird metaphor. Oh, and there are no immature phallic jokes, so that's a plus.

edited 21st Apr '16 3:38:57 PM by thebandragoness

Just curious, for those of you who have done it, how did you go about "coming out" to your families and whatnot?

Y'know what, that is a great segue into something I've been meaning to get off my chest for the past couple days.

The first person I ever came out to was a therapist at my college. That was only a couple days before I came out to my mom, and I'd never spoken a word about it to a soul before then (though a girl once gave me a funny look when I complained that I hated having facial hair).

Next I came out to my mom. This was the "coming out speech" that I felt I had the most control over. I told my mom in advance that I had something important to tell her and she knew I'd been seeing a therapist, and she'd already assured me that she'd be supportive no matter what I had to say (I'm pretty sure she'd thought I was gay, though, so she was in for a suprise). And all that went over fine.

Next I came out to all my siblings and my best friend, and they were all cool with it. One sibling was an asshole to me about it, as I've mentioned in previous posts, but they don't actively reject me, and they've simmered down lately, and I don't live with that particular sibling anyways, so that's all good.

So up to that point, I'd been having success coming out to my loved ones and was getting more confident... and then of course I had to have all my confidence shattered by having a bazillion family members go and out me behind my back to the other family members. It apparently didn't matter how many times I said, "Don't tell anyone without my explicit permission." All of a sudden my brother's girlfriend knows ("I needed someone to talk to about it!") and I'm getting texted out of the blue about it by my uncle I see twice a year and it just sucked. And on top of that was the fact that my mom really put the pressure on me to come out to all of the extended family (plus she's scatterbrained and lost track of which family members did and didn't know, leading them to wonder why I was suddenly being referred to with a female name in texts), and fuck, I don't really care to come out to my old white Southern Christian grandparents.

Which brings me to what happened a few days ago. My grandfather on my dad's side passed away, and I was treated to a phone call where my grandmother coldly informed me that I wouldn't be welcome at the funeral. Yeah, fuck you too, Grandma.

It's just so surreal to me to think that my own grandmother is now disgusted at the thought of me. She used to be so warm and pleasant towards me. I remember when my siblings and I were little and we'd spend the night at her house and she'd fix us pancakes for breakfast and make chocolate chip cookies and we'd watch movies, and now I suddenly get to see how fucking superficial it all was. I mean, my grandma on my mother's side went to some therapy, and now she seems fine with me (I mean, she insinuated that I have a mental illness, which I don't appreciate, but at least she let me come near her), so I know it's not just an "elderly person" issue. And so I guess now basically my dad's whole side of the family has disowned me or something.

My dad called to inform me that I was welcome at the funeral, but, y'know, only if they got to dictate how I dressed and presented myself. And then he reminded me that I was being very selfish and that attending the funeral in my own clothes that I bought with my own money would be "distracting" and "make the day be about you instead of about my father." Because apparently if I walked into the funeral and had a seat, the other family members wouldn't be able to help themselves from jumping back, pointing at me, and screaming, "AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGH!"

It's not all bad, though. All of my siblings boycotted the funeral the instant they heard the news. That really does mean a lot to me, but I've still been in a sour mood lately. I just feel very disillusioned about my dad's side of the family.

edited 26th Apr '16 7:24:11 AM by thebandragoness

My story's pretty boring. I came out to my brother first, then I told my parents (after writing letter to them in case I got tongue tied), then slowly came out to my family the same way.

I spoke to my GP, got referred to a clinic, and a few days ago, I told my manager what was going on.

Gods, that sounds unpleasant. In my own case, it's not active malevolence I fear, so much as not being taken seriously. From my family's point of view the whole thing would basically come out of nowhere, and knowing my mother, she'd probably dismiss it as yet another autism-related personality quirk that isn't worth any attention. My stepfather would think of it as "weird gay stuff", and my oldest brother would be unintentionally insensitive as fuck, as always.

edited 26th Apr '16 7:53:02 AM by Corvidae

Wow.

Band, there's always hope. She might never come around, but she might do so as well. My Oma refused to call me Kieran when I first came out and said she'd always see me as a girl. A year later, and she wrote a card in my name and is calling me her grandson.

Now I know my story isn't as bad as yours, but know there is a chance, however small, that she'll change her mind about you.

Well, mine wasn't exactly easy, but the results were much better than I would have expected. It started with my mother pressurizing me into telling her (at that point, I was suicidally depressed and she could see that something was wrong), and it took me about half an hour of stalling to gather up enough strength to tell her. Turns out, her reaction is nothing grander than "OK". Then she proceeds to read every single valid bit of information about being transgender and being a parent to a transgender child from the internet, after which she gets me in contact with psychologists so that I can proceed to transition ASAP.

My father I told a few months later, ironically just as we were about to discuss going to the movies to see Fury (2014). It's a war movie, definitely not the type of film you'd expect a dad to take his teenage daughter to see. He took it really well and without problems.

He was a kind of a letdown later on, though, since he outed me to my asshole stepmom (who has been mostly useful to me as a kind of female anti-role model, as she seems to embody every single feminine stereotype that I don't want to be) without my consent and insist on a need to tell my grandparents (who are STILL in denial about me getting an Aspergers diagnosis at age 5). Also, he hasn't even bothered with so much as a Google search about the subject and seems to not grasp the idea that his little kid has been seriously, even suicidally depressed, right under his nose.

edited 26th Apr '16 8:00:19 AM by ArilouLaLeeLay

I think I talked about my own fears of not being taken seriously a few pages back. Really, for me, the best way to show my family that I was serious about this was to 1) Treat the subject very solemnly when I first brought it up, 2) Do a lot of research so I know what I'm talking about, 3) Be confident and clearly articulate what I want. 4) Take action. I didn't just come out to my mom and then wait a few months before doing anything else. We went to some trans-get-togethers, met a nurse practitioner to get the hormones, bought clothes for me, etc.

It's hard not to take me seriously when I'm taking HRT pills and I've been dressing as female all the time and insisting on a female name and pronouns both in public and private. And to be clear, I'm also doing all that because I enjoy it and it makes me happier with myself, not just to prove anything to anyone.

Look, I'm upset at the way my grandmother treated me, but that doesn't mean I care about changing her. She made her feelings towards me pretty damn clear. The fact that she could ever treat me the way she did for such a petty reason reveals how superficial our relationship was in the first place. I don't think I'd get much of value out of trying to change her mind.

Don't worry, I've got plenty of other family members who are supportive of me.

Wow, I'm sorry. That sounds rough. I hope everything goes well for you.

edited 26th Apr '16 8:08:18 AM by thebandragoness

I don't know... I feel like the lack of any obvious changes (except pronouns maybe) might make the whole thing seem less convincing to them. If I told them that I was a woman, they'd probably laugh at first, but eventually learn to accept it... but how do I tell them that I'm "an it" as they'd describe it?

I'm sorry, I'm really not sure what to tell you. I'm not sure my family would've been totally understanding of that either.

If I ever told my family that I don't think I have a gender, they probably wouldn't care. It would be a non-issue to trump all non-issues. This is the reason why I have never thought about telling them. It wouldn't matter to them. They wouldn't care.

Actually, it doesn't matter to me, either.

Maybe they would care. They do have some strange societally conformant ideas. The way I think is less like a standard human. The way they think is more like social liberals.

In general, it's been pretty much a non-issue. I'm out to pretty much everyone important in my life, and the responses I've been given all basically boil down to "we'll love you no matter what."

Uh... hello? So... here is something I've bottling up for a while, and I am unsure if I should post it here. But it is not like I actually had people I trusted enough to tell this to, so I suppose the fake anonymity of the internet will have to do.

I have been questioning a lot about myself lately, and some of the things I feel the most lost about are related to gender, and I am feeling really, really insecure about approaching my family about such things or speaking to a therapist.

I mean, it is not that my family wouldn't accept it(well, my brother wouldn't, but he is already my worst enemy), as much as that last time I tried, I was unable to explain myself properly and decided to risk further misunderstandings until I was sure of what was happening.

I don't think I am transgendered really, or if I am, I don't feel enough disconfort to feel confortable with surgeries or adopting another name, but at the sime time there are days I feel a deep disconfort with my body when I look at the mirror, and I feel I shouldn't look so masculine. But I also wouldn't want to have a body that was too feminine, I think. It also applies to my voice.

I don't know exactly why I feel this way. Maybe I am genderfluid or bigender, and feel bad my body isn't androgynous enough for me to just dress like a girl and tell people I am a girl when I feel like a girl without them glaring at me. But again, it is just a theory and I feel lost.

edited 29th Apr '16 3:54:32 AM by EternaMemoria

We're in the same dang boat. Well...except I'm not at all concerned about seeing a therapist; I think that'd be really great for me in general. I'm technically agender and I do wish I was more androgynous but I only experience mild dysphoria; sometimes I don't feel like a real part of the trans community but I'm learning to let that go because it's just my pesky anxiety messing with me.

Oh, look, all the hysteria over allowing transgender people into the correct restrooms has led to police officers harassing a cisgender woman for not looking womanly enough. Surprise, surprise.

EDIT: Apparently this video is from last December, meaning the cop's action is NOT a result of the recent controversy stuff. It just got dragged back up lately, and a lot of people are mistaking it for a recent story. The cop's still being a butthole, though.

edited 30th Apr '16 5:46:07 PM by thebandragoness

What were the cops doing in the bathroom to begin with? Did someone really care enough to call for them because they thought there was "guy" in there? People...

In less depressing news, I'm at work right now and a customer just called me "ma'am!" And I'm not even out at work yet! *happy dance*

EDIT: OH MY GOD ANOTHER PERSON JUST MA'AM-ED ME WHAT IS HAPPENING? Do you think it's my hair? My glasses?

We can, uh, probably rule out my chest...

edited 30th Apr '16 11:13:31 AM by thebandragoness

Nice doing there. Makes me happier too, just reading about someone feeling better because someone addressed them as the gender they actually are.

Also, it's almost never mentioned anywhere how big of a deal A-Cup Angst really is to trans women. It makes for about 40% of the dysphoria in my case. Until a week ago, I actually wore a bra pretty much 24/7 solely because it just felt better, like I actually had a non-flat chest. Then I got sick and had to lay in bed for days, at which point it started being a little bit impractical.

Well, that is part of what convinces me I am not transgendered, but either agender, bigender or genderfluid. Even though I wish I was more feminine, and wouldn't oppose having a female body, too much curves would probably make me more unconfortable than I already feel, except too obviously feminine instead of too obviously masculine.

Small-ish breasts that I could make less obvious with loose clothing would be perfectly fine or even somewhat welcome, though, as long as my face and voice also became less masculine.

EDIT:Nice! I also feel happy for you.

edited 30th Apr '16 2:26:34 PM by EternaMemoria