Trans or Butch

[DapperButch]

Originally Posted by Ender

Ugh...I hate this feeling! I hate feeling like half-trans, half-butch! I don't know how to transition feeling like this. Do I change my name? Do I medically transition? If I medically transition, will I regret it? It's beating me up and I don't know what to do. I wish I had a more androgynous name or even a masculine version of my name would be great, but no.

How did/do you butches go about this? Do you still have your given name? Did you change your name? Did you choose to medically transition, even part-way?

I'm also wondering when I do tell someone irl about all this, will they even take me seriously? Or will they think I'm making it up because LGBT+ people are so openly talked about now-a-days?

I remember my dad saying a few years ago, that he loves me no matter what as long as I'm happy, but I'm still terrified I might be going down the wrong path, and end up regretting it in the future.

Ender, the first thing I want to say is that I "hear you". As a butch, I struggled with the question of if I should medically transition for over 15 years. I identified as a transgender butch all of those years. Not a woman, but not a man. Not female, closer to male, but not male. 3.5 years ago I started testosterone and I kick myself for not doing it sooner.

First off, you are right, it is "terrifying". For 15 years I left myself in that place of angst, distress, frustration, and obsessive thinking about whether or not I should medically transition. It negatively impacted my romantic relationships, negatively effected all social areas (anything outside the house), and my professional growth (I avoided being "visible" due to social dysphoria).

I thought, and went to therapy, and twisted myself into knots with reasons that I wasn't "male", which is what was expected by professionals and myself to determine if I should take testosterone.

I did get top surgery.

But even with top surgery (the source of my dysphoria...I had no problems with how my overall body or face looked), I STILL couldn't come to the conclusion as to whether or not I should medically (and thereby socially) transition. You know what helped me figure it out? How I figured it out? I took a very, very low dose of testosterone. That is how I figured it out. I took a low dose so that I could see if I felt any emotional effects while holding off any lowering of my voice.

I wanted to know, needed to know, if the emotional effects people talk about had anything to do with brain function and wasn't just about external changes, as people said was the case. You know what I found out? For ME, I need testosterone. It doesn't matter if I am read as binary male or not, my brain needs this medication. It may sound crazy, but my thinking was if the "side effect" of this medication is being seen as male, so be it because I need this drug.

I do identify as binary male at this point (and still butch), and I don't mind what I thought I would dislike (facial hair), but that isn't all of it for me. It is the mental health. The mental health is so much better. I am sure that if external changes didn't also come with the mental changes I would still have dysphoria, as I DO want to be read as male and have those changes, but what I wanted to add to this discussion is that the mental changes, simply due to the hormone, should not be discounted.

I would suggest that you do what Esme nha Maire so eloquently (which I quoted at the end of my post), and then go from there.

The other responses in this thread were helpful too. What I wanted to add to the discussion is that for me, I had to just "take the plunge" when it came to hormones.

I think there are actually two questions for people. What is my gender identity? Do I want to medically and/or socially transition?

You can be non-binary, third gendered, agender, and still take testosterone, and live as male. It goes back to again, who we are externally isn't necessarily who were are internally. Some people don't define as male, but have severe social dysphoria if they are not read and related to as the opposite sex all areas of their life.

In the last 5 or so years more progressive trans health care systems do not work in the binary when it comes to HRT. It used to be that you had to be binary male or binary female in order to take any sort of hormones. If that were still the case (which it is in many areas, still), it is possible that I would still not be on hormones. I was just so afraid of my voice lowering and then deciding it was the wrong thing for me.

Since there is such a thing as low dose, I don't regard hormones as irreversible anymore (in the very short term, especially for trans men). With all of this said, I am NOT suggesting that anyone use hormones as a way to figure out if they are transgender. I just wanted to share that for ME, after that many years, I just had to do something. I think all else should be exhausted first (especially for trans men, due to the voice change).

Oh, and I assume it goes without saying that a gender therapist would be a huge, super huge help to figuring this out.

I have a crap ton more to say on this topic, but I will close for now.

Originally Posted by Esme nha Maire

I can only advise that you try to look at each aspect of your situation in isolation first (physical, visual presentation, where you feel you want to fit in socially, what name you feel happy with, etc. Break it all down and note what you'd feel happy with separately first), and then see if you can come to an overall conclusion. If you glom everything together and try to tackle it as a whole it can make it much harder to see a solution that you're happy with.