It’s been a year since I started HRT.
It was something that I had waffled back and forth on for year. ‘Did I want to permanently alter my body? I want a deeper voice but Do I want facial hair? Okay so I want facial hair but what about everything else?’
The cyclical way these thoughts worked their way into my brain was only broken when I came out to my mom in late march. It stopped that cyclical thought process in its track and, perhaps out of spite, did my first dose of testosterone.
It’s been a year since I started HRT to spite my unsupportive mother and I think I might be faking.
Faking being trans? Maybe. I’ve never experienced the kind of gender dysphoria that I thought was needed to be trans.
‘I’m not trans enough to want to transition. I don’t have dysphoria.’ Thoughts like that haunt me late at night while I lay in bed. What if I regret this in the future? What if this was a mistake? What if I’m not really trans—
I fall asleep, knowing not to give late night thoughts much weight. But still they wedge themselves into the wrinkles of my brain, worries and anxieties that haunt my dreams.
I’ve never felt the disconnect with my Assigned Gender at Birth that other trans folk do. For most of my life, for my entire childhood, I was at peace with my girlhood. Being a tomboy was fine with me short hair, short shorts and t-shirts were my go-to for the longest time. Preferring to make mud-pies in the backyard then to play dress with dolls. I was never uncomfortable in my own body.
So what if I’m faking it? What if I’ve just convinced myself that this is—
‘Oh!’ I catch my reflection in a mirror. ‘That’s me.’ A wave of euphoria washes over me as I look at my reflection. Scraggly beard and mustache, eyes crinkling as I smile. ‘This I see. This is who I’ve always wanted to be.’
I am trans and I am me! Maybe my journey isn’t typical but it was mine to take and I’m proud of how for I’ve come. If someone asks me who I am I can just say. “I am Beau.”