Dysphoria worse than usual at the moment.

[kaberett]

I am not getting on terribly well with the sensation of binding at the moment, but I am also not getting on well with not being flat-chested.

I am remembering that a year ago I pinned up my hair and put on a short tousled wig and people - even people who've known me for years! - were not recognising me to the point of reading me as male (and MAAB) or MAAB and genderqueer. I am going through another phase of being incredibly damn tempted to cut off all my hair because it would immediately change me from getting universally gendered female to much closer to a 50/50 split. And yet it is deeply important to me to expand the space of the legible, and I actually prefer my hair as it is probably (because it's very little work, because not needing to either cut it or get it cut myself at regular intervals, etc).

Gender is hard and I just want to have had top sugery already.

Comments

[rootsofthestories]

I just wanna say that I understand entirely and feel you so hard this entire post. My hair is short already but I am still read as female by most people and it pisses me off. I need to get a new binder but I've been feeling so, so very Not Female lately that it just makes me depressed to interact with a good portion of people I know.

[alexseanchai]

This.

[sorrillia]

*offers hug*

Good luck! (I wish having long hair was enough to get me read as female assigned at birth.)

[jelazakazone]

I love that you live on the border/boundary. I am sorry that your body is causing discomfort.

[(Anonymous)]

Much sympathy. I seem to be getting cramps a lot more than usual lately, and they always come with a wave of "I'm not even supposed to have a uterus, why does it hurt?" I suspect it's getting to the point where I say fuck it to trying to find a time that's convenient for work to get it cut out and just do it as soon as the NHS will provide.

[foxfinial]

Many sympathies re: hair.

[rmc28]

<3

[vass]

*sympathy*

(I haven't gotten binding to work for me yet. They move around under the binder, and it's not visible, but it feels weird and distracting and more annoying for me than just having boobs. Also I don't like the way the binder's fabric rubs against my clothes, or means I can't feel them.

I want detachable breasts. I'd wear them on special occasions and leave them in a drawer the rest of the time.)

[sfred]

Enormous sympathy.
I was talking in a group conversation but mostly to one friend at the weekend about how strangers seem to gender me as the same as whoever I'm with (I just look queer?) - and another friend's response was "How on Earth could anyone think you were a man?!" (because chest). I really dislike it when that happens.

(My upper back is too fucked to bind such a big chest. I have envy of anyone who can bind and anger at assumption that anyone who wants to can.))

[wildeabandon]

I was a bit wtf?!? at that.

[sfred]

It's very typical of the person saying it to let everything spill unfiltered out of his brain and through his mouth, and he doesn't read LJ/DW so likely hasn't picked up on my articulation of my gender identity - but yes, still a bit wtf.

[pretty_panther]

♥

[jedusaur]

Really, long hair is less work for you? Not to say that cutting it would solve anything, nor that you should have to do it even if it did, but my experience of long hair was way more work than short. For me personally, spending twenty minutes at the hairdresser every three or four months is a small price to pay to essentially eliminate daily maintenance. (My current style looks fine with two swipes of a comb, as opposed to the 5-10 minutes it used to take me to get all the tangles out.)

Sorry, I know that's not the point here. I wish the world did not make the assumptions it does. :( *hug*

aaand a differing experience...

[shehasathree]

Long hair is absolutely less work for me. Short, my hair looked ridiculous without product in it (it just puffed up everywhere), and required frequent trips to the hairdresser. Long it just needs occasional brushing and getting tied up - and it doesn't really get tangled as long as i keep it in a plait while i sleep. The whole thing takes about 2 minutes, and if i'm having a bad day i don't even have to do it every day.

[shanaqui]

I do find my shorter hair easier than when I had long hair, but wow, 3-4 months? I can barely go three weeks without needing mine trimmed. I feel like I need a mower.

[shanaqui]

♥

Gender is hard and I just want to be more malleable with replaceable bits so I can switch and change to suit my brainthings. If only the universe had a Kickstarter for changes to mammal body plans like that; I'd back it to 100% somehow for all our sakes.