One aspect as it seems like, I self-misgender when I see my own tells. It was so with smell pre-transition, with stubble pre-success of laser (somewhere a year in or so, a state change), it is so still with voice as I hear it myself, with torso rectangularity, and with genitals, whenever they emerge. This is something that happens in the day-to-day moments, and the effect pain-wise lies in the feeling of falsehood and unreality that the self-misgendering brings.
It’s possible to work around any trait; this I do with others, I parse others as who they seek to be. It requires a little mental work, but I do it as a matter of course. I can do it on myself too but it either is somehow harder, or it is how that then means I have to constantly apply a filter to my self-perception. Vigilance thing.
This is why tucking is good, it turns that need off when clothed. This is why I don’t relax well during sex when naked, I’m actively translating perceptions into other representations. Live transitioning the lived experiential and social body. Medical transition shortens or eliminates those paths. It successfully did for hair removal and a lot of the HRT effects so far. I actually have a mostly smooth face, feminine eyebrows, and breasts, such as they are. I don’t need to shift those perceptions around.
I’d want that for genitals too, so I wouldn’t have moments during the day, like when dressing or going to the restroom, or when being intimate or getting aroused, when I’d be reminded of tells and self-misgender.
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Then another thing, I’m sure I underestimate the pain and horror. Tiredness, pain, fear, no sleep, being drugged. Good part is, once it is started, I will be unable to stop it. I won’t have to choose to continue. I will have to. This is probably very similar to subbing. And reminds of Christ on the Cross, too. Thy will be done, not mine. Liberating from choice to be weak.
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Then noting a new fear. What if there really is a somatic counterindication? I’m deathly afraid of that, I realize. In the same way as I’ve feared so many other things. I’m wanting to get x-rays and everything done now already, though they would be useless, they need to be recent by surgery, just to know I will be OK, which is to say, that I won’t be denied. I won’t get them yet. But I’m realizing as I hope for surgeries that I will fear the chance taken away until they sedate me. So that’s a chance to practice fear management. I’ll try to ride them but to still feel them.
lost in transition 