feminism 101

before i started T, i very much thought of it purely as a set of physical changes, but that’s not even close to accurate.

…rather — maybe it’s more accurate to say that a LOT of mental health stuff was wrapped up in the physical part, in much more foundational and fundamental ways than i previously thought. i really didn’t appreciate how much dysphoria was fucking with me until i finally managed to (mostly) crawl out from underneath it

some of the more surprising ways things have changed have been purely mood-related — i’m much happier and more energetic, i’m less horrified by basic life things, i’ve lowered my dosage of brain meds pretty substantially — and others have been more fundamental to the sort of person i am? like —

• for one thing, i’m just nicer. now that i’m not miserable, i’m more generous than i was before, and i resent it less when i do things for other people.
• i like kids way more! taking off the gendered pressure that i Must Want Children because Biology makes me a lot more patient and less existentially freaked out by them
• i’m a better feminist (see title). for pretty much my entire life i had a really hard time wrapping my head around the idea that people actually like being women, or at least don’t mind it. it’s constrained my life in so many ways! but being out from under the crushing weight of expectation has made me less judgy about people i think are doing it wrong, and more willing to see different perspectives, and less disgusted by — okay this is going to possibly sound bad, but — i was pretty horrified by my own breasts and definitely that affected how i thought about other people.

i think i did pretty okay tbh wrt being generous and empathetic, but no longer dragging that big psychic weight has made me a lot better at it/has made it a lot easier to do? which is really nice tbh!