When a queen rises to the throne to take the empire that is rightfully hers at some point she will pick up her sword to take a mans life and set it down without ever realizing that was the last time she would ever wield a blade.
Damn I always thought I’d matured so much and developed so many great coping mechanisms but it turns out I just finished puberty and second puberty is not pulling its fucking punches.
I fucking love American exceptionalism. Like don’t get me wrong I fucking hate so much about my country, but I don’t think many people understand the power of just insisting that even despite the problems we are still the best.
Sometimes it blows my mind how easy it can be to tidy up my room. Like my desk was stressfully cluttered and giving me the same level of anxiety I get coming out of depression when I need to clean for 8 hours to make my room livable.
Turns out it was just cans. I forgot to grab a bag to toss them in so I kept leaving empty soda cans on my desk and the sheer volume they take up was overwhelming.
But it took literally 30 seconds to clean them all up and now my desk feels perfectly cozy. Not like clean or organized, but clear enough to my standards so I don’t feel like I’m wasting away allowing myself to live in a nightmare that no girl deserves.
To practice my makeup skills I just went completely overboard trying a bunch of stuff I’ve never done before and it was a D I S A S T E R!!! I knew it would be bad, and I pushed myself to try anyway because I need to see what fucked up makeup looks like so that I can avoid it. But wow this has been a painful experience and I’m gonna share the awful results with you.
There’s a long explanation for how it got this fucked up below, but I know most people just want the pictures so here you go~
I flew too close to the sun and paid a hefty price. This makeup is messed up. But it’s a sacrifice I’m willing to make to be able to practice to eventually not suck ass. Idk why I decided to share this so I’m practicing and fucking up publicly though…
I know it looks bad and super trashy but please be nice to me I’m trying my best and I need to practice to improve >////<
This last pic is after letting it sit for a while and I’m not sure if it looks any different but I like it a lot more. Maybe I just got used to it and gained some confidence but I really feel like in this pic it doesn’t look like I made and huge mistakes. Like it’s not the best makeup in the world but I think it looks pretty.
Hope yall enjoyed my struggle! Remember this next time you fuck up at a new skill, that’s just part of the process!
:)
And here’s a breakdown of every one of my missteps and how I tried to salvage my mistakes.
Explanation of my fuckups:
I started with just eye shadow. I was really bad at placing the eye shadow accurately and I think I was blending it wrong so it ended up spreading out way past my eyes. The colors I picked for the eye shadow did not compliment my skin tone or each other one bit. They were too subdued to give a bold look so they just ended up clashing with my skin tone. And I really struggled to get even coverage around the eyes.
It just ended up looking kinda muddled and messy and at one point it just looked like I was covered in dirt. Unfortunately I didn’t take a picture after the eye shadow, I did actually end up getting it to look pretty nice.
After that I went in with a new eyeliner I just bought which was a fucking mistake. The eyeliner is the one thing about this look that just wasn’t salvageable. It’s a blue color that really pops, so every tiny mistake is clear as day. I couldn’t get it nearly close enough to the edge of my eye. It’s way too thick. The shape is all wrong and there is absolutely zero symmetry. My 2 eyes are living in different zip codes. And the eyeliner is super inconsistent and patchy, I couldn’t get remotely close to even application. I had to remove the eyeliner and blend in the eyeshadow around it so many times that my eye shadow basically disappeared. You can see a hint of the highlighter, but the darker tones are 100% gone.
The eyeliner is so incredibly scuffed that it makes me look like a caricature. I’d say it makes me look like a drag queen, but that’d be far too much credit cuz they know how to apply makeup properly and go heavy with it on purpose for an aesthetic. Tbh I feel like the eyeliner almost makes me look like the stereotypical depiction of a hooker at a run down motel.
At this point it was far past the point of no return and there was no saving this look. So I said fuck it and went super hard with contouring for the first time. I’ve used just highlighter before so I wasn’t completely lost, and after a lot of work I think the contour honestly looks kinda okay.
The problem is with the shades I picked for contouring. I used a super tan bronzer and a really bright blush, and I used about 4 times too much product. So my entire face changed color. I think it looks really good, but it’s definitely not right cuz if you’ve seen me without makeup it’s obvious my skin tone has changed DRASTICALLY. Like I have super fair skin but it looks like I’m almost sunburned.
Tbh now that it’s had time to set I am actually happy about how this turned out. The contouring turned out looking super nice and my skin looks flawless. I just need to be a little more subtle with the contouring and pick some tones that compliment my skin so I don’t need to cover my whole face in bronzer. I really do think I could make contouring work as part of my regular look without it looking cheap or amateur.
The eye shadow isn’t really visible anymore, but I think I could pull that off. Again I need to pick better colors. I also need to figure out how to set the eye shadow and blend it so there’s no streaks, but I did manage that eventually. If I went with simpler eye shadow with like one or two shades instead of the 3-4 that the tutorials I watched told me to do then I think I could definitely nail down the look.
Of course the eyeliner is what really ruined everything. There’s too much and it’s splotchy and all in the wrong place. But I did kinda expect this. Sure I was hoping I could just crush a clean little wing first try, but I knew the color I bought was gonna overpower everything. And the hardest part about eyeliner is that when you fuck up you can’t just blend it, you need to remove it and then spend time blending your eye shadow back in. I think I might try doing the eyeliner first so I can mess up a bunch and then once it looks good I can lock it in and do my eye shadow.
This is a hard skill and I think I’m gonna have to just grind out reps for a couple months until I get the hang of it. I’ll keep trying, but I’m gonna try to start small. I’ll start doing like a tiny little faint line poking out for a while, and I’ll slowly try making it a little darker and gradually start connecting that line with the rest of my eye.
Not at all surprising but WOW I really suck shit at eye shadow. I thought the time I've spent mastering powder foundation and powder highlighter would pull through but when you actually have to be accurate and can't just blend shit around everywhere it gets a lot harder. I've managed to kinda save it by really heavily blending everything and doing some spot touch ups with foundation where I went too far out. But yeah this is def gonna take quite a bit of practice.
ooo fun idea I just realized I could put my nice highlighter on! I used a highlighter from the eye shadow palette but it's kinda boring and I think just a touch of my nice pink highlighter in the corner would round everything out! (no it won't it'll look even more uncoordinated but it's all for fun~)
I'll post a picture of the final disaster after I add my new eyeliner :3
Oh dear god I knew eyeliner would be hard but my eyeliner looks infinitely worse than my scuffed eye shadow >~< it went from looking kinda overdone with the eye shadow bleeding out a bit further than it should be to fully on messy and gross. My hands are so shaky I literally think a child could have done a better job at applying the eyeliner. It's way too thick and I clearly have no idea where I'm supposed to put the eyeliner or what shape it should be and I'm not putting it even nearly close enough to my eye. As I go along I'm realizing that I didn't really understand the mechanics of how this pen works and was basically trying to do it in the exact opposite way that I should be.
I just need to practice my technique, that's fine. I'm sure eventually I'll get my hands to be as still as a surgeon's, since it seems that's required for eyeliner. It'll take time to figure out how to move to apply it accurately, and experiment with exactly where to place it. And I'll get more used to working right next to my eye and I'll gain the confidence to push the eyeliner right up to the edge without jamming it into my eyeball. And I definitely won't feel discouraged by how fucking trashy this eyeliner makes me look and I'll keep using it regularly.
I'm especially happy that I decided to go with the most bold punchy glitter blue eyeliner that I could find. I'm being a little sarcastic here but I'm mostly serious. If I went with a more subtle shade it would have been harder to notice just how bad of a job I did. The fact that this eyeliner is super punchy and bold just means that I have to really nail it and I can't be lazy, so I'll probably learn how to use the eyeliner quicker.
It looks pretty bad, but I am having fun and I can tell once I spend more time nailing down the technique and shape I'm going to love it.
Dear GOD I regret saying I was gonna post a picture though xD
Since it's already so bad I decided to go all out and try full contouring. It's honestly making the rest of my makeup look better because my contour is so gaudy and overdone. I look like a caricature xD Thankfully I was able to tone it down by blending in a bit more foundation. But this final product is gonna be really bad >~<
Not at all surprising but WOW I really suck shit at eye shadow. I thought the time I've spent mastering powder foundation and powder highlighter would pull through but when you actually have to be accurate and can't just blend shit around everywhere it gets a lot harder. I've managed to kinda save it by really heavily blending everything and doing some spot touch ups with foundation where I went too far out. But yeah this is def gonna take quite a bit of practice.
ooo fun idea I just realized I could put my nice highlighter on! I used a highlighter from the eye shadow palette but it's kinda boring and I think just a touch of my nice pink highlighter in the corner would round everything out! (no it won't it'll look even more uncoordinated but it's all for fun~)
I'll post a picture of the final disaster after I add my new eyeliner :3
Oh dear god I knew eyeliner would be hard but my eyeliner looks infinitely worse than my scuffed eye shadow >~< it went from looking kinda overdone with the eye shadow bleeding out a bit further than it should be to fully on messy and gross. My hands are so shaky I literally think a child could have done a better job at applying the eyeliner. It's way too thick and I clearly have no idea where I'm supposed to put the eyeliner or what shape it should be and I'm not putting it even nearly close enough to my eye. As I go along I'm realizing that I didn't really understand the mechanics of how this pen works and was basically trying to do it in the exact opposite way that I should be.
I just need to practice my technique, that's fine. I'm sure eventually I'll get my hands to be as still as a surgeon's, since it seems that's required for eyeliner. It'll take time to figure out how to move to apply it accurately, and experiment with exactly where to place it. And I'll get more used to working right next to my eye and I'll gain the confidence to push the eyeliner right up to the edge without jamming it into my eyeball. And I definitely won't feel discouraged by how fucking trashy this eyeliner makes me look and I'll keep using it regularly.
I'm especially happy that I decided to go with the most bold punchy glitter blue eyeliner that I could find. I'm being a little sarcastic here but I'm mostly serious. If I went with a more subtle shade it would have been harder to notice just how bad of a job I did. The fact that this eyeliner is super punchy and bold just means that I have to really nail it and I can't be lazy, so I'll probably learn how to use the eyeliner quicker.
It looks pretty bad, but I am having fun and I can tell once I spend more time nailing down the technique and shape I'm going to love it.
Dear GOD I regret saying I was gonna post a picture though xD
Not at all surprising but WOW I really suck shit at eye shadow. I thought the time I've spent mastering powder foundation and powder highlighter would pull through but when you actually have to be accurate and can't just blend shit around everywhere it gets a lot harder. I've managed to kinda save it by really heavily blending everything and doing some spot touch ups with foundation where I went too far out. But yeah this is def gonna take quite a bit of practice.
ooo fun idea I just realized I could put my nice highlighter on! I used a highlighter from the eye shadow palette but it's kinda boring and I think just a touch of my nice pink highlighter in the corner would round everything out! (no it won't it'll look even more uncoordinated but it's all for fun~)
I'll post a picture of the final disaster after I add my new eyeliner :3
I feel so smart right now. Get a cheap carabiner and use it to clip on to all of your hair ties. Now they won't wander off to hide in every nook and cranny and you won't be finding random hair ties constantly all day up until the minute you need one! :3
I’m practicing to try to come up with a basic, super minimal makeup routine that I can do as quickly as possible. Not trying to go super hard crafting a flawless look with contour and highlights and eye shadow. I just want to figure out the best look I can make in only 5-10 minutes. That way I don’t have to reserve makeup for special occasions and I can start wearing it most days. There’s no reason why I shouldn’t be pretty when I’m just going to the grocery store to buy energy drinks.
So this is just lip gloss and some foundation that’s a bit lighter than I normally do and only covering the bottom half of my face. I’m not really taking the time to actively cover any blemishes, so they still poke through but they look smaller and not as bad.
I only used foundation on the areas where I grow facial hair. My goal here was to keep a totally natural look but hide any hints of beard shadow. I think I overshot it here and I could probably get away with going even lighter on the foundation and save some time.
I’m really liking the look with foundation only on the bottom half of the face. Most of the color in my face is on the top half. So when I cover everything with foundation I lose all the color and look like a porcelain doll so I have to paint the color back in with blush and highlighter or else I’d look anemic. Since the top half of my face is generally totally free of blemishes I don’t really need makeup there, so I can save a ton of time by just letting the natural color of my face shine through instead of burying it and painting it back on.
I’m not 100% sure where to go from here. I think I nailed it with the half foundation move. And lip gloss is a no brainer cuz it does a ton of work to give a more fem aura and only takes like 15 seconds to toss on. It could be worth bringing the foundation up a tiny bit so I can hit some highlights. But instead of that I think my next step is gonna be eye shadow.
I haven’t used eye shadow much so I’m a bit uncertain. But I think if I find the right shades it would have a massive impact to make me look like I’ve actually slept at some point in the last week. And I’m pretty sure I should be able to do that pretty quick.
I want to try getting some color corrector and concealer. Then I could get a totally flawless look with no blemishes or beard shadow without needing to spend a ton of time on foundation. The problem is that I use a powder foundation, so I think I’ll probably need to pick up a liquid foundation to make that work.
For a first try with just foundation I’m really happy with this. I’m excited to see what products to add next!
If you have any recommendations or if there are any products you wanna see me try next then let me know!~ :3
After a month of feeling very low it seems like all of a sudden literally everything in my life is going my way. The gym was fantastic today and helped my mood a ton. On the way home I got a call from the laserplace and they were super nice! This laser studio is the highest rated one in the city and while I figured any laser studio would be used to serving trans women this place was founded with the goal of helping trans women as their core philosophy.
Apparently the reason that they decided to open a laser studio to begin with was specifically to help a trans woman the owner was friends with or something and that became the foundation for how they operate. So they’re insanely welcoming and supportive and they care a lot about helping trans women.
I figure most laser studios are used to serving trans women, but obviously they’re all going to be primarily working with cis women because statistics. Some of the other studios I called seemed.. not necessarily unwelcoming to trans women, but definitely like they have a culture built for cis women. I guess while these other places seemed like they’d welcome trans women they weren’t inclusive to trans women if that makes sense.
This was the only place I called that made sure to actively express support to the trans community. Like obviously any of these places would take my money so signaling that support might not sound like much but it’s a huge gesture that instantly made me feel included and made me so much more excited and evaporated my anxieties. I’m honestly shocked none of the other clinics even mentioned inclusivity.
I guess that’s why the other studios felt like spaces for cis women. Just allowing trans women to use their services and not refusing their money is the bare minimum. No studio would turn anyone away just because they’re trans, so welcoming them in to spend $3600 on a bullshit lifetime package isn’t inclusive. The big difference with the place I’m going is they recognize that simply making it clear that they’re inclusive instead of leaving it implied can mean a LOT to trans women and make them feel comfortable - it shows that they actually understand us.
But I wouldn’t be nearly this stoked if signaling inclusivity was all they did. It’s great that they understand how to make trans women feel included but that would never be enough for me to stan a business like this.
This studio is practically a CHARITY FOR HELPING TRANS WOMEN. They literally have a special package for facial hair removal that they only offer to trans women at a HUGE discount. She said that normally their packages are $500 for 6 sessions and an extra cleanup session later which cover a much smaller area like the chin, neck, upper lip, or sideburns. So normally for the full face you’d need like 4 different packages for $500 each. But just for trans women they’ll combine all of those areas into a single package of 7 sessions on entire face and neck for the same $500.
Idk how much this costs them so maybe their normal margins are just crazy but even if they still make money I can’t really frame giving a 75% discount to trans women as anything other than charity. I’m sure some of y’all have paid less so it might not sound crazy. But the only other places I found near me at that same price point have negative reviews about the treatment being ineffective. The studios with similarly positive reviews that do as good of a job all cost thousands of dollars.
And then she topped it all off by sending me a ton of great trans resources. I mentioned off hand that I was switching doctors and she told me about a local clinic that does great trans care and then told me about a grant program that just straight up gives trans people $1000 to spend on medical care or even just new clothes and makeup. Istg this girl was like some magical spirit who appears to trans women and grants them blessings and guidance on their journey to transition.
I might be a little too excited and I’m probably overselling this place but she was lovely and that was one of the most pleasant and welcoming experiences I’ve ever had booking an appointment.
Getting back into the gym later today and while signing up it only just occurred to me: “ah fuck I’m pretty sure I had to show my ID when setting up my membership at the 3 gyms I’ve been to before”.
The legal name change has been pretty unimportant to me since in theory it hardly ever comes up. But like any time I have to show ID for any reason other than just buying booze it’s something I need to worry about. Like are they going to question me about it at all? Am I gonna have to talk to a manager? I’m sure at 98% of businesses I’ll be able to use my preferred name, but it sucks I have to worry that I might end up throwing a wrench into the process and have to talk to a manager for a special exemption over a fucking name.
Like I don’t think they’re going to force me to sign up with my legal name, they just need an ID on file to confirm my membership. But I don’t know if an inexperienced receptionist is gonna know that or if they might think it’s a legal issue for some reason. I sent an email asking if it’d be fine so hopefully the person at the desk knows they’ll be dealing with a trans person today and know not to make a fuss.
I’m sure it’ll be fine and hopefully they don’t even mention the discrepancy, but there’s just so much needless fucking friction. This is absolutely a hypothetical problem that only exists in my head, but when a third of the country cheer on politicians saying vile shit about us and actively taking steps to strip our rights and make life harder I think a little stress is warranted.
I’m sure some people would ask why I don’t just sign up with my legal name. Like I thought about it and at other gyms I pretty much never saw my name after signing up except when logging in to cancel my membership. But since the day I cracked I’ve been fully out and haven’t boymoded even once. For me it just feels awful to even think about compromising just out of fear that I *might* have problems.
I am a deeply anxious person and have always done whatever I could to not stand out and avoid anything that might gum up the works. But like, since starting my transition things have started to change. I want to live my best life, I want to be assertive and not be afraid of standing out and I want to learn how to navigate these kinds of situations. And I don’t want to fucking deadname myself out of fear of fascists because using fear to make me invisible is exactly what they want.
It’s terrifying, and it sucks ass. But I haven’t actually run into anyone giving me issues because of putting myself out there even though I’m really early into hrt and DEFINITELY don’t even remotely pass. Transphobes in real life are massive fucking cowards and they’re too scared to earnestly express who they are like I do so when they have to look me in the eye the only thing they can do is try to subtly misgender me by saying sir a bit more forcefully than they would when talking to a cis man. They think their timid passive aggression can get under my skin like they’re the first person to do that. Meanwhile my mere existence is enough to make them seethe enough that they think they need to make a statement to me that they don’t support me and try to get a reaction out of me just because I have a purse. I’m sure it pisses them off so much seeing me confidently express myself while they’re too scared to express their beliefs.
Anyway didn’t mean to write an essay I just wanted to complain about the uncertainty I feel in these bureaucratic situations. Idk if they even check their email so I might not get a response before it’s time for me to go. But this uncertainty changes nothing. I’m going to do what I planned to do before I started worrying about imaginary problems and sign up listing my correct name and marking myself as female and when I walk in to get my membership card if they give me any issues I’ll deal with it then. If they’re assholes I’ll do a charge back and I think my family would find a new gym so they’d lose 4 members.
But it doesn’t need to be this hard. There would be no room for debate if my ID had the correct name and gender marker on it. So I’m also going to submit forms today to start the process for a legal name change.
