At a sci-fi convention in Akkad now. I was here last year, my first. Then the main focus was on Battlestar Galactica, almost the whole cast was present. I had never seen the show, but I realized I had to, and that there was a particular character I had to cosplay the year after, that is, right now. This was in many important ways a transition-related need, for a lot of reasons. Back then I was 3-4 months on HRT and not so confident.

This character, Number Six, is important in many trans-related ways which the creators surely did not intend. She is a (humanoid) Cylon, a robot/AI that branches to multiple individuals who in turn reincarnate in new identical bodies if killed. The Cylons were created artificially by humanity but rebelled, and after a war against them, they are truly hated. When it is discovered there are human-looking Cylon infiltrators (some as sleeper agents), those are seen as subhuman, non-persons, artifical, machines, not real persons, who can be tortured and killed without any moral burden.

The specific character is further extremely femme-coded – bombshell blonde in revealing clothing, seductress infiltrator, with most of her significant screentime as a ghost presence in the head of a male character. She is also very competent, very dangerous, instrumental in destroying human main civilization, and she undergoes a lot of trials and sufferings which are also coded feminine – rape, pregnancy, miscarriage, and her objective of being able to birth or nourish a child that will bear the Cylon people forward is core to her plot.

All of this contributed to why I needed to cosplay this character. A very high bar for attempting performative and symbolic femininity, as a challenge and test of my own capacity. But also the duality of actually being a highly competent and dangerous immortal genocidal machine. And the fundamental struggle, so trans-like, of not being seen as a “real woman” but as somehow fake, artificial.

It is also my first serious cosplay, and first real femme cosplay. And I knew for all the above reasons, it was beyond crucial I would be understood as doing cosplay – a woman portraying a woman character – and not crossplay – a man portraying a woman character as a drag thing. The character has already attributes making this especially challenging – signature red cocktail dress, blonde hair, almost no makeup, no signature gimmicks or accessories. Meaning I’d have to use just simple clothing and my own body to portray a different person (who is a tall cis woman) well enough for recognition but without any hint of irony, faking or artificiality.

Going about this then required some challenges. The most important I did anyway already – another year of hair removal and HRT. I planned to have lost more weight to be slimmer, but did not succeed – will try harder now. As for the dress, I had great help from my partner who sewed it for me, got lots of compliments for it.

The hair was a major issue. Going blonde was costly, though at least I am not worried I am hurting the hair so much – I got complex protective formulations which seem to work. Bleaching eyebrows worked well. But the haircut is shorter, always a major dysphoria risk. Moreover, I recognize this year that keeping my hair out instead of in a bun makes the long shape of my face more apparent, accentuates squareness of hairline, squareness and width of jaw; I feel I look significantly more masculine with my hair loose, so that was already a major fear to have to face.

Similarly, for the character’s look I needed to skip during the cosplay (two more days to go now!) wearing glasses, lipstick, heavy eye makup, nail polish or eyebrow pencil; she has a cold “natural look” but all of these things I have come to rely on significantly to feel my face and form look more feminine. Going without them has been really frightening, at least at first. Would I look like some drag-performing man in a dress, performing this ironically as mere play-acting, not as an identity with respect to the gender dimension?

Add to this the most recent advances in my facial hair removal. Since two months I do only electrolysis, no laser, no shaving. I let the few straws there are grow so the electrologist can catch them next time, but that means having some long hairs here and there, most white and soft but some darker. This also scared me – how close must a person get before they can see them and notice? So facial hair, no makeup to speak of, a non-flattering hairstyle and a non-flattering body, when I need to come across as perfectly authentic for a high performative bar. Plus my voice still being quite deep.

That said… it actually went really well, this time. I feel confident. I feel OK. I don’t know how I am read, but I received smiles and compliments, was not challenged, and I sort of see even now under these circumstances a woman in the mirror, if one not so happy for her facial shape. No-one challenged me in changing room to the sauna (did not let them see my bottom parts while in there). I feel uninhibited in moving around, being real, being present. It’s as though I can recognize the flaws and limitations, but feel that I can ignore them and make others ignore them also.

So… it worked. I did it. And I now feel more confident still in “casual” femme presentation. I am who I am regardless, and I am beginning to expect to be read as a woman without having to jump through quite so many hoops. Maybe I expect too much still, but the fact I expect it is valuable and changes my self. And this marks also how my body has changed. It really has.