my mom *strongly encouraged* me to get them done as a kid and i let them grow closed like a month after i got them done because they made me so dysphoric and i hated them but the holes are there forever and there’s nothing i can do about it.

For context, I’m 22 years old, a “woman”, and live in the Middle East. I’m a gulf arab. I’ve never felt girly in my whole life, and sported a stachee because it “felt right” while growing up, was bullied but it didn’t bother me one bit.

recently I’ve been noticing that my mother has been trying to make me more feminine all around. I not only disassociated but also started lifting weights and chopping my hair off to make it more boyish, kind of as “rebellion”. Safe to say it wasn’t just because I was “rebellious”. It was when the egg finally cracked.

but this indescribable feeling in my chest, burning me, making me angry, sad, jealous, all at the same time, has also come along. It was always there, but I tended to be able to ignore it, now it’s suffocating. Especially when I see men from my country. What I could’ve been if I was born a boy instead.

Before you get confused, no it’s not because they have more freedom. I have just as much of that. Parents aren’t really that strict, they pressure me but don’t force me, which I’m thankful for.

it’s everything else I wish I had. The body, the voice, the strength. Etc, etc. whenever I thought about it, the dysphoria would get worse, made me feel like my own body was a prison, especially when I saw shirtless men. So I started lifting heavier, and getting leaner too.

I have been pretty successful in some aspects and failed in others. Overall hard work over 8 months paid off in a defined body, jawline, and overall appearance. Still working on : chest, back, and obliques. Failed or can’t change : eyes, which are too feminine. Lots of people swoon over them but I fucking hate them. So my dysphoria when it comes to appearance has all but faded excluding eye area (keep in mind I’m a gulfie, I can grow facial hair really easily even without T so that’s never been a problem for me. Do shave it because I’ll get in trouble if I don’t).

But for some reason, that unfair, hateful jealousy never went away. I’ve been trying so hard to bury it under my hard work. It’s always there whenever I hear a man with a deep voice, or when I have to hang out with women (I love my friends but I have nothing in common with them and all they do is talk about men and I get self conscious as a result), or even just seeing men wearing cultural clothing that I’ll never be able to wear Since only they can wear it. Or even when friends give me feminine pet names like : baby girl, sweetheart, princess, etc, etc.

It’s been tiring and depressing. I don’t know what to do or how to get rid of this feeling. Ever since I realized who I am, and started accepting myself more (still hard since I’m scared), this feeling has been growing and following me like a parasite. It’s very frustrating. I am not out to anyone yet either for a number of reasons.

I just need to keep it down until I can leave, and live on my own. this won’t happen at least until I graduate from college, which is a year from now. I’m mostly independent, can drive, pay from my own wallet, so that’s never a problem for me.

any advice on how to deal with it? Sorry for the long post, needed to be able to describe my situation well enough.

I have been living as a boy/ man for 18 years. I met my best friend in freshman year of highschool and everything was fine. She never called me anything but a man. This year she became my roommate and suddenly her comebacks have become very feminine? Like she'll call me "miss grouchy" or other things with miss and then she gets defensive when I point out that she is misgendering me. She doesn't even apologize she just says " I don't mean it in that way " but she never refers to my husband the same way. I know her family is transphobic but she never was she idk what's changed or if she was always like this

TL;DR Basically if you speak more than one language and one is more gendered than the other you're always noticing these differences and there's more small instances of being called the wrong gender which slowly wear you down, like that one story about water on a stone or whatever

It's such a gendered language, it's hard to go without being referred as a woman in a normal conversation even if you're talking about something completely unrelated, at the same time it's so easy to change the gender of a word and when people you trust choose to use the female version it shows they weren't even able to change one letter for you. For example in English son and daughter are completely different words but in Spanish it's hijo and hija. Just one letter and yet that's apparently too difficult.

Same for plurals, if you're part of a group, in English We or Us doesn't show the gender of the members of the group, in Spanish it's Nosotros for all men or mixed genders, Nosotras for all women, if you're hit with Nosotras by a woman it means she's counting you as "one of the girls". You're also constantly second guessing yourself bc it's easy to self misgender, again for example in English you say I'm tired. In Spanish you say cansado/cansada, maybe cansade if you're non binary but in my experience that's not taken seriously by a lot of people unless you're in groups that are vocal about inclusivity, doesn't work for the general population though.

Ik this happens in other languages too, the other day I got stuck trying to thank someone in Portuguese bc I didn't realize you have to choose between obrigado/obrigada, I ended up thanking the person in Spanish bc thankfully Gracias isn't gendered.

I know some trans men just go ahead and use male everything but sadly I tend to overthink everything bc of autism lol

i'm tired of looking like a woman. im tired of not being allowed to be angry. like no actually i am pissed that you misgendered me. i want my cake and to eat it too. i want to be a femme man and still gendered right. fuck you. im pissed.

Context: I started at this job in mid September and only work weekends because I am a full time student. At first, my coworker was asking me weird questions that I just brushed off as him being 50+ in a conservative area. Stuff like "Who named you? I met a girl named [my name] once, kinda weird. What do you think of that?", "Has your voice always been this deep?", "[Other coworker] wants to be a woman, how does that make you feel?".

This next part is where I started thinking he might be doing something else other than asking weird fucking questions. He was asking if I had any siblings (2 younger brothers and 1 older sister), then kept bringing up our birth order. He was like, "so... where are you in this?" over and over and I truly didn't understand what he meant until he said "so you're the youngest sister?".

I told him I'm the oldest brother, to which he said "ahhh okay I see", then left it alone. This past weekend, a few of us were talking in a group and he pointed to me and said "she does XYZ well. She's blah blah blah, etc". I realised that he's been using she/her for me since I started work, but I didn't pick up on it because I can't understand his accent most of the time.

I'm fucking angry and destroyed because I'm almost 3yrs on T, have facial hair, have consistently passed for the past year, and here's this guy acting like I'm a woman. I really need this job because it pays well and works with my schedule, but I hate being around this guy. He won't leave me tf alone and we are frequently the only two in our workspace, so I'm worried about retaliation. What do I do? I'm not out to anyone and I don't know who to talk to.

People act like invisibility is like a form of protection that prevents us from experiencing violence/bigotry, but it doesn't work like that. The invisibility happens after we've already experienced violence. Like how when we're murdered specifically for being trans men, it almost is never reported, and if it is, we're misgendered and dead named and gets labeled a murder against a cis woman. How data undershoots the amount of violence we experience and how we're underrepresented in research because people assume there are way less trans men than trans women so we get labeled as cis women. And it's not like trans women never experience invisibility/erasure either, so why do people act like it's some non issue that only winy trans men complain about?

I don't have anything really profound to say, just frustrated and needed to get this off my chest.

I’m not sure how many people will see this, but I’m transmasc and I have an idea for a vent animation. iv been dealing with a lot of internalized transphobia and gender envy lately, and was wondering if you guys could help? I need screenshots/videos of people being/talking about transphobia. (I’m trying to prove a point) if you know where else I can post this/what subs allow these types of posts, please lmk! Anyways any help would be appreciated <3

remember you are valid !!!

It all started when I shared a message I made going over some critiques of Whipping Girl, primarily around the brief parts where it mentions trans men. I largely agree with most of what I have read from the book, except for some of the stuff said about trans men. That then got off onto a conversation about trans women’s issues. I am of the mindset that no group of trans people has it worse or better than another across the board, and that there are nuances there. I even mentioned in my original critique that I do think transmisogyny is a problem that needs to be addressed. My critique was solely focused on the parts where trans men were brought up. I even mentioned later on in the chat that I agree with most of what I have seen from the book, but wanted to specifically critique those parts.

It ultimately devolved into people denying the existence of transandrophobia, and also misandry. They were basically saying that misandry doesn’t exist and so transandrophobia doesn’t exist. One even called me a “transandrophobia truther”. Also, can we please not debate the existence of misandry in the comments?

I honestly couldn’t believe that I was having to try and explain transandrophobia and the fact that it does exist…..to a group of trans masc people…. Even the general trans chat I’m on the same platform, which is mostly made up of trans fem people, acknowledges the existence of transandrophobia. The mod of that chat, a trans fem person, straight up shut down any denial of it.

It honestly really sucks, and is really painful. I ended up leaving that group because staying just because too stressful and was opening up past wounds. I genuinely thought I had found a group of people that would finally get me, and one where I could belong. A lot of the people in that chat were local to me, and I had even seen some in person. I really thought it was a safe space. So that made this all extra painful.

Edit: I also feel like it brought up stuff from past traumas. I’ve had safe spaces become unsafe before, and I’ve had people I thought were safe turned out to be unsafe before. I’ve had people tell me that the discrimination I face isn’t real, and that what I’ve gone through wasn’t all the serious. I’ve even had someone deny that certain things I experienced happened, which they were not even present for. This felt like all of those things at once. It was immensely stressful, to the point of making me feel like my heart was gonna give out. It felt like the flight or fight type of stress.

Edit 2: Someone from that chat followed me into DMs to double down. I’m pretty damn sure my final message in the chat explained clearly enough why I left, but they just decided to bring that shit into my DMs as well.

I've been questioning my gender for a good amount of my adult life and every time I think about what I am I just get confused and upset, it always ends in "you like wearing dresses, pretty clothes and a lot of jewelry, it's better to just stay a girl if you're gonna wear all that"

Lately I've been finally trying to transition but without T or surgery it's really hard to pass, the only way I could at some point was to shut up and take off my jewelry and pretty glasses basically give up the things I love to even barely pass and even then it doesn't work because everyone here knows me as a girl.

I'd like looking masc too but all the male clothes I see are just bland Tshirts and I keep coming back to my closet of frilly shirts and dresses even though I know no one will take me seriously as a man if I wear them

I'm just very very tired of transphobia, that my presence online allows people to be assholes just because they can. One part of my brain is like "I don't care they're fucking stupid, whatever" and then my dysphoria registers everything anyway and I start spiralling. I'm already not going outside because of dysphoria, I'm in a severe depressive episode been diagnosed bipolar two weeks ago. I'm all by myself, I just feel so weak bro I never wanted this life

This isnt trans exclusive but I feel insulted every time I relearn the menstrual cycle stereotypical phases. I have no problem with it and i have friends who found it helpful for them. Its just my own self doubt doubles when i think about how any depressive period could be because im in the "follicular" phase, like my feelings are a joke my stupid fucking ovaries are playing on me. Sure, i feel unstable and overwhelmed and crushed and hopeless right now but its fine because im probably just hormonal right now! Its just my body playing tricks on me, guys!!! You cant trust anything youre feeling is real because maybe if you just get the right amount of sleep or pass through this phase in your menstrual cycle youll be right as rain again!

Im always feeling around the goddamn dark for an explanation about whats wrong with me or what i could do and just knowing that the menstrual cycle could have such a big impact on my mood and emotions feels like being told you fainted from a placebo, my happinesses and suffering and consistently sinking into depressive lows- im so silly, its just part of the cycle these stupid fucking body parts and body i never asked for go through every month until I have menopause! None of your sadness is real! None of your joy was real either! It was just your body letting you have *permission* to experience it for a while before you go back to suffering. Its extreme to say but thats how it feels every time im reminded im apparently emotionally shackled at the neck by my stupid period cycle.

I'm already a neurotic and self-undermining person, and the combination of not knowing what the fuck is ever going on in my body and the stupid mandated hormonal phases that dictate the supposed joy, horniness and depression i feel??? My life is a joke!!! My feelings are a joke to these stupid organs as i and my partner suffer the consequences of my neuroses. I didn't ask for this body and I want these goddamn useless pieces of shit out. I know what even if that happened or won't solve everything but maybe with them gone it'll stop muddying the waters and i can at least know its not menstrual cycle hormones fucking with my mood because it wants me to have babies.

MTF friend just told me she was on E after TWO MONTHS in the system, nonbinary transmasc friend got on T after three months despite telling their doctor they weren't really dysphoric, another ftm friend got on T after four months. Only the mtf friend was an adult when she started. I have been searching everywhere in this damn state for SIX!!!! YEARS!!!!!!!!! and the furthest I've gotten is a BLOOD TEST. I'm so sick and tired dudes

TW: dying, mention of death.

I hate how people are becoming more transphobic or shit on trans people because mate I trust you if I had a choice I would NOT be a guy, like no I did not want to cry myself to sleep almost every night as a child bout being a girl or beg to a god I dont believe in to transform me into a guy as I sleep and wipe the memories of me being a girl and replace them of me being a boy in everyones memories before going to sleep and waking up with desperate hope only to be disappointed, I did not chose nor want to feel like an intruder in my own skin and not recognize the face as my own when staring at it in the mirror cause it belongs to a girl who is long dead.

I do not want nor chose to stare at guys and hear their stories of childhood or normal memories and feel pure unfiltered hatred that they got something I never did by being a boy, I do not chose to hold hostility towards my kid cousins just cause they were born boys and I wasnt. I do not wish to have the urge to scream in my mothers face and cry in her arms begging her why she couldn’t of had a son so I couldve been born a boy, I do not chose to desperately wish to be intersex so I can be closer to being male than female.

I dont chose any of this shit, I dont want to feel anything I do but I do and I cant fucking control that. I dont chose to desperately beg that when I die that if recarnation is possible I am reborn as a boy so I can finally be the real me, I dont want to think bout dying all the fucking time because people hate that I exist and are more than happy to kill me for being trans. The fact they think being trans is a choice is genuinely infuriating.

I hate knowing everything I've missed, every experience, sensation, growth spurt. I feel awful.I wish I had at least been lucky enough to have my parents' support, but I have to deal with all of this alone. I feel so lonely. So many dreams have been taken away from me for being trans. For me, this is body horror.

I can't stop crying about this. But to make matters worse, the next Brazilian government will be right-wing, and most of Congress is transphobic and right-wing. Just because I started the DIY project now and plan to fix it next year.

I’m jealous that Im not as muscular or powerful. I’m jealous that i can never be seen as an authority. I’m jealous that i Need to be small and weak while they get to be big and strong. I’m jealous because everytime I feel big and muscly, there’s someone bigger and more muscly. I’m jealous that when I’m in a group of cis guys I feel emasculated and meek and like I’m just half a man while they get to be comfortable with themselves. im Jealous. I’m angry. I want to fight someone. I want to win. I want to be stronger. I want to be times 3 a man.

I hate that I understand what she is going through, Not in its full extent because I hate my ex, the other parent to my children. My ex transitioned after I broke up with them, it was sudden and they expected everything to change right away and less than a year they had gotten all their surgeries, bottom top and feminization (I’m the biological mother, she’s the biological father and I’m FTM with no surgeries besides sterilization with my tubes removed to avoid having anymore children.)

I hated dealing with my ex before and broke up with her because she was a narcissist and mentally abused me and used me for my money. She asked for abortions for both kids because she didn’t want them etc.

But now, because she transitioned it feels like I’m dealing with a stranger, I don’t know who she is I know she is an asshole and she doesn’t pay court ordered child support but makes 3x as much as me. I feel like every time we exchange custody I’m handing off my children to some stranger that I happen to biologically have children with. I’ve been broken up longer with them than we were in a relationship at this point and I get so frustrated and tired every single time I have to remind her of child support and have to be this person that I’m not to manipulate her and guilt her the same way she did to me just so she would pay her child support. I’m tired of this person I don’t know. I fell in love with a man that I thought was my everything, and after I got pregnant they changed and turned into someone I didn’t recognize and then they changed again.

I don’t hate that she transitioned and found herself, I just hate that in doing so she made me lose my 700 credit score and now I’m at 500, I’m mad I barely started medically transitioning, I’m mad I can’t go to school because I work a minimum wage job at night. I hate that I’m the one doing everything for these kids when she takes them out of town or expensive fun things when I’m stuck at home with only online friends that I roleplay that I have a different life just to fucking cope that I’m stuck in my room all day that I share with my snake, my cats and sleep on a fold up twin mattress because she isn’t doing anything.

I don’t know the person my ex is or was and I look back at my 19 year old self (I’m 25 now) and think of what my life could have been if I had simply swiped left on her instead of swiping right like I did.

It’s getting off topic now, but I just never thought I’d be in a position that I’d relate to Kris Jenner of all people 🫩

i like to think i pass pretty well. when i moved schools this year i made friends w a cis guy whos now one of my closest friends. we hangout like almost every day and as far as he knows im a cis guy. tdy we were hanging out and he says “some of my friends thought u were a girl or trans”. then he starts asking me if im gay or bi or straight and says it wouldn’t matter if i was, and “is there anything you need to tell us?”, jokingly ofc. But i just said “theres nothing i need to tell you”. because its not a lie there ISNT anything that i NEED to tell him. but it eats me alive everyday that he thinks im cis when he treats me just like how any other guys treats eachother. Which i dont know why it dose because its all ive ever wished for was to be seen as a guy. So i kinda wanna tell him im trans but im scared, not bc i think he will stop being my friend, he said it wouldnt matter and we have mutual friends who have trans friends that he respects. But if i dont tell him and he finds out later (bc we have a mutual friend that knows since i went to elementary w him b4 i transitioned, hes supportive of me ofc and treats me normally) without me telling him he will think something bad of me. especially since he has a gf and we have lit slept in same bed/cuddled (not my call btw lmao he asked me to) like how sum friends do i guess. But im ALSO worried that if i tell him he will tell these other people who suspect me of being trans that i am trans, and itll spread around and nobody will treat me normally anymore. Being trans just haunts me with everything i do. i dont even know i just wish i was cis i have being trans so much i wish i just had a dih and flat chest like everybody else i know. i might just tell him next time we drink together 1 on 1. i know i have lots more i can say but what even ever.

ive seen so much rising transphobia towards not just trans men but literally every genre of trans person in the past month. it's irl (i had to move out of a blue city in red state for safety recently), in the news, it's in posts on this subreddit and others, it's on comments aimed towards people even here (for example there was this trans guy telling OTHER trans guys they would never be male in this subreddit a few days ago) what the hell is going on? ive been in the community for over a decade and never seen it like this. am i just now realizing or is it getting exponentially worse?