Butches and Body Image - Let's Talk About It

[RNguy]

First off , thank you for this thread . It's very interesting and thank you for all of the butches/bois/FTM/he/hy/she for stepping out and sharing your feelings ... I just want to NOT offend anyone and before you read this , please comprehend that this is about ME ONLY . How I feel only about ME . ok I think that opening paragraph clears me wow , I don't talk about really who I am as a person really , I'm pretty closed down unless you know me very well in real time . This is a big deal that I'm sharing something personal . I have one brother , who I am very close to . It's just he and I as siblings . We are 3 years apart and a few months . He should have been a girl and I should have been a boy no doubt . With that said my brother is not gay , he is a heterosexual married male . We grew up in a very small area and there were about 20 boys all close in age and only one girl my age in our neighborhood. At 3 to 4 years of age is when I can remember things of toys , what I played with and how I was . I can remember being extremely upset that my mom put a dress on me and I told her boys don't wear these and I stripped naked . She said to me " you're not a boy , Blake " ( well she shouldn't have named me Blake right that's my real name by the way , I'm lucky ) anyways , when she said that , I flat out didn't believe her in the least . I only was around the boys , played with boys toys etc... I was too young at that point to know the anatomical differences . My mom said that she couldn't put any dresses on me because of the scene I made as a young child. All that changed later but that's a story that ill never go into here . Anyways , as I grew older into elementary years I looked like a little boy . I played football , strong as an ox , the little girls chased me and treated me like all the other boys and the other boys treated me as alike because appearance wise that's what I looked like . Well junior high hits and my facial structure changes and my body starts the big change . Except my face which still was the boy face really . My gosh I hated the body change . I knew at this point the anatomical difference between boys and girls were and I was not happy at all. I lucked out in the sence that I have a masculine body structure naturally with how my shoulders , arms , legs , thighs are. I never had prominent curves like the female body structures tend to have so that's good . Where I am from , being so small , we all grew up from K-12th grade . Nobody really viewed me as being a girl nor did I view myself as one even though I was aware that I was born a female . At 12 I was diagnosed with having a gender identity disorder . This was my mothers way of coping with a butch child , to make herself have the clarity that it was nothing she did wrong , and to make it known to me that I had a serious mental problem that needed corrected . At 27 , I paid a visit to the same doctor to diagnose him as uneducated , unsympathetic, and a quack . I took t shots for some time , had a top surgery alteration as well trying to correct what is flawed with me . I'm now 36 and feel I'm not flawed at all . I'm perfect . I'm me , I dress how I want which is how your typical male dresses , I smell how I do , which is how your typical guy smells , my hair is how it is which is well short , brown with some silver coming in here and there , I soft pack sometimes when I feel like it , I never bind my chest , bc I don't care for one and for a second there isn't much there to bind . Was a born in the wrong body ? YEP NO DOUBT ... Am I upset about it ? NOPE , GOD WANTED ME LIKE THIS FOR HIS REASONS. Do I like my body ? LOVE IT ALL 5 FT 1 IN OF IT . Do others like my body ? I DO NOT CARE. Have I been called a freak from people on the streets ? YEP OFTEN IN APPALACHIA ,. does that offend me ? I LOVE FREAKS NO !!!!! its taken me a ling time to be in this mindset but this is something personal about me. Thanks for reading .....RNguy ( Blake )

[dykeumentary]

Regarding body image and self-care:
I'd just like to take a moment to pour a cyber-libation for my butch sisters ive known who have died. I knew many butches who wouldnt/couldn't go to the ob/gyn, and died of preventable and treatable cervical and breast cancers. Also, I've known many butch women who struggled with addictions. When I think of my years of being a young butch, i remember the older butches at the bars, and in the softball leagues always hed a beer and a cigarette.

I imagine the butches I knew who have died would be happy that so many young people go to the doctor. One of the reasons I support Planned Parenthood is because for many of us butches, it was the only health care clinic where we felt comfortable.
I'm glad this thread is pointing out how proud butches are of their bodies now.
Because for a very long time our butch bodies were a battlefield, and many good friends lost the battle.

[TimilDeeps]

Originally Posted by dykeumentary

Regarding body image and self-care:
I'd just like to take a moment to pour a cyber-libation for my butch sisters ive known who have died. I knew many butches who wouldnt/couldn't go to the ob/gyn, and died of preventable and treatable cervical and breast cancers. Also, I've known many butch women who struggled with addictions. When I think of my years of being a young butch, i remember the older butches at the bars, and in the softball leagues always hed a beer and a cigarette.

I imagine the butches I knew who have died would be happy that so many young people go to the doctor. One of the reasons I support Planned Parenthood is because for many of us butches, it was the only health care clinic where we felt comfortable.
I'm glad this thread is pointing out how proud butches are of their bodies now.
Because for a very long time our butch bodies were a battlefield, and many good friends lost the battle.

salut

[clay]

Thanks for that post dykeumentary (hope I spelled your nic right.......)
I have always have my yearly screenings done..labs/pelvic with pap/mammos. As far as that , my being butch has nothing to do with the choice of getting or not..it is MY choice to remain as healthy as I possibly can...as a womyn! . I was in health care field for 21 years..and I KNOW to get those screenings done!
Last year, I had female issues that led me to a uterine biopsy, that netted me being sent to a Gynecological Oncologist at a nearby major teaching hospital. Before I saw trhat doc, she ordered a colonoscopy! I hadn' t had one of those in "years" but went on and had it. Luckily for me, a mass was found, biopsied, and WAS malignant. So I had TWO major abdominal surgeries Dec. 9th back to back..with an abd hystero done then a colon resection..I lost 16 inches of colon...BUT am alive and "unofficially" cancer free. I am having scans and labs done May 8th to check for anything new...the surgeons said I had dodged a major bullet, having that colon malignancy found as early as it was...and I didn't have to have nay chemo or radiation. So, my point? I urge everyone of us to get those yearly screenings done. Mine literally saved my life...
I, too, have lost friends to the dreaded C...which may have been prevented with screenings done regularly! So I am with you on that one....thanks for the reminder!!!

[Miss Scarlett]

Originally Posted by claybaby

Thanks for that post dykeumentary (hope I spelled your nic right.......)
I have always have my yearly screenings done..labs/pelvic with pap/mammos. As far as that , my being butch has nothing to do with the choice of getting or not..it is MY choice to remain as healthy as I possibly can...as a womyn! . I was in health care field for 21 years..and I KNOW to get those screenings done!
Last year, I had female issues that led me to a uterine biopsy, that netted me being sent to a Gynecological Oncologist at a nearby major teaching hospital. Before I saw trhat doc, she ordered a colonoscopy! I hadn' t had one of those in "years" but went on and had it. Luckily for me, a mass was found, biopsied, and WAS malignant. So I had TWO major abdominal surgeries Dec. 9th back to back..with an abd hystero done then a colon resection..I lost 16 inches of colon...BUT am alive and "unofficially" cancer free. I am having scans and labs done May 8th to check for anything new...the surgeons said I had dodged a major bullet, having that colon malignancy found as early as it was...and I didn't have to have nay chemo or radiation. So, my point? I urge everyone of us to get those yearly screenings done. Mine literally saved my life...
I, too, have lost friends to the dreaded C...which may have been prevented with screenings done regularly! So I am with you on that one....thanks for the reminder!!!

Screenings...i understand that this is not a comfortable subject or experience for a lot of folks...even some femmes.

But please, please, please don't neglect your bodies...i'm grateful that Clay did not.