I’ve noticed that when I used to see myself in pictures I’d hyper assess every little detail of it to check for passing. Now when I see myself in pictures I don’t do that anymore. Anybody else notice the same thing?
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Currently I inspect every picture for every little possible change due to HRT 😅 4 months now!
How long did it take to get to that point? I’m 7 - 8 months in and it feels like I’ll never not see every little detail that makes me not pass 😭
I’m nearly 3 years in. Still not a huge fan of photos (that’s mainly because I’m bad at making myself smile, i.e. not dysphoria) but I remember around that time, for the first time in my life, being able to look in the mirror and not absolutely hate what I saw. It’s only gotten better from there!
Well, not having dysphoria when you look in the mirror is a major win.
A term like “dysphoria” is often amorphous, so I’ll try to clarify what I mean: when I look in the mirror I can’t see a woman or girl, even when other people claim to see a woman or a girl, and this makes me feel bad to varying degrees. I was so used to the way I looked that even though if you asked me I would say I don’t like the way I look, I wouldn’t have thought I hated it actively, I was just used to it.
Since realizing it’s not normal to never feel good at all about the way you look (in conjunction with a lot else, like a consistent and inexplicable preferences to cross-dress full time when at home), I realized I might be experiencing “dysphoria” and started to transition, and after between 3 - 5 months on hormones I could look at photos before transition and current photos after HRT and see that the post-transition photos were more “me” and also more feminine.
(TW: suicidal ideation)
Once I had this awareness that I might have dysphoria, it was like a floodgate opened, and seeing myself in the mirror went from a kind of accustomed indifference (like a background suffering I found easy to ignore) to a kind of crisis which made me feel suicidal and I would have to pragmatically avoid mirrors or looking or thinking about the way I looked.
I would say now I have less extreme dysphoria, and it seems like moustache and beard shadow are major triggers of feeling despair about the way I look, but there have been far more moments where I have felt good about the way I look as well.
Anyway, I can’t tell if my self perception will ever “click” into place and I won’t “undo” my gender when I look in the mirror (a bit like how my perception doesn’t seem to “undo” my gender when I see a fuzzy reflection of myself, e.g. in the microwave or my turned-off phone), but I have doubts that this will ever happen. I know it does for some people. I wonder if it would take FFS for me or not, but I worry even with FFS it will just be a small half-step closer, but not all the way. It seems like so many trans women I know about still feel this way about their face even after FFS, while others seem to report being able to just see themselves in the mirror and feel it’s entirely normal. It sounds like maybe you are in this latter case, someone who looks in the mirror and no longer experiences “dysphoria”?
I wouldn’t say I no longer experience dysphoria when looking in the mirror, on the contrary just a few weeks ago I experienced the worst episode I’ve had since transitioning (and I’m approaching three years). I would more say that, on many days, I’ll catch my reflection and my brain will read it as “woman” (even pretty!). Other days, especially depending on how I’m feeling about myself generally, I’ll fixate on what I perceive as the masculine aspect of my face (or mostly my body TBH). It’s not perfect, but I’ll take the wins when I can get them.
Like I said, I had that happen for the first time around about where you are. But it’s really only in the last year or so that it is consistent. I honestly would be quite surprised if you didn’t have something similar happen eventually. You’ll catch your reflection off guard sometime and your brain will register the gender before it realises its you and distorts it with dysphoria.
Cant say for them, and im sure everybody has different experiences, but hrt is a long term thing.
I started when i was nearly 35, and am at about 9 months. Im just starting now to actually catch certain angles in the mirror where i no longer hate everything and thing hmmm maybe some things are better. Certainly a long way from really being happy, but moving in the right direction
I think the dysphoria distorts my self-perception, certainly about my own voice but I think also about the way I look. The only time I like my reflection right now is little glimpses I see in the reflection off random surfaces like the microwave or my phone screen when it is off. The fuzzy image is better, but a mirror makes me sad.
Congrats on the self-confidence, my dude! I still fret about my appearance from time to time, but y’know? Yeah, kinda, I know what you mean. Do you smile more? Because happy looking people look more attractive and that might be making you like your photos more.
Wouldn’t say I smile more, but I do frown less.
My brother in testosterone, as a cis man, this is the manliest comment I’ve ever heard.
For sure. At first I really needed to be in the right mindset to be able to see myself. I only saw myself in my eyes occasionally.
And now, in transition, it’s the other way around. It’s more like gender dysphoria gets triggered occasionally and wreaks havoc. And I am trying to figure out what triggers this so I can avoid it.
For example a while back I had to sign a contract, so I had to use my dead name. This fucked me up for a good week.
Same, but for me, it came with a change on perspective on passing too. I live in a safe area, and I found that once I started passing, I felt invisible to the queer folk that I didn’t want to be invisible to. And that meant that I didn’t fixate on things in the way I had previously
Yeah kind of. I still hyper focus on a few parts of my face that give me dysphoria, but overall I am a lot happier with my appearance than I used to be.
You’re most beautiful when you’re comfortable with yourself. There’s no point checking every little detail, as long as you like yourself overall, I would say.
When I first stare at my upper lip in the mirror, I see an unmistakable shadow and the roots. However, when I close my eyes for a second and reframe it in the context of my entire face, it basically disappears.
I realize that I won’t be able to accurately judge myself; that I’ll always see problems no one else does. I just need do my best and move on, as I’ll never think the work is done otherwise. I do better at most things when I give a good effort and don’t worry about my shortcomings.
