you will likely get relief from GD with HT

[melissaK]

Its 3:00 am. I'm awake. Caffeine? Sensitivity to my OTC allergy meds? Or? FB, email, some online news, I surfed my way here. I take that as a sign that underneath my insomnia is the same old stuff. GD has shown signs of escaping containment.

As some of you recall, I don't come here often anymore, I have been doing a pretty good job of living in the middle* - on HT, out to closest friends and family only, and I found a middle ground with my wonderful wife. But, I am here at the forum nonetheless. Am I slipping into some denial based behaviors again? Some part of me trying to sneak back into the completely straight life? That always triggers GD. And like R. Dean Taylor sang about Indiana, "Lord I can't go back there."

So, living in the middle means balancing my HT so I have female traits and keep male sexual function. I have been doing this balancing act for years, and it is always tricky. If I blast all my T away, I have no GD, but then my wife is unhappy as I have no interest in traditional male role sexual encounters. And lately, I have been doing the opposite, cutting the anti-T and trying to keep more sexual function. Yes yes, I know all about cake and eating it too, like I said it's a balancing act.

When it's civil hour I will talk this out with my wife, she is a partner in this and we have a year old pact to talk EVERYTHING out. As many of you know, we lead secret lives until we come fully out, and then our revelations destroy the trust our spouses once had in us, and that paradigm was true for my wife and I. Total honesty and joint decision making is the only way we can think to keep our relationship working post coming out.

So I suppose the whole point of this post is to say what all the TS here know, and to confirm what all the TS literature says, you will likely get relief from GD with HT. Do less than full HT and you will likely get less than full relief from GD.

OK, self run therapy session done. I'm going back to bed I think. :)

(*Oh, I know some think the middle is a foolish place to try to be, but I remind such naysayers that per the language of the SOC, "The SOC are intended to be flexible in order to meet the diverse health care needs of transsexual, transgender, and gender non-conforming people. . . .individual health professionals and programs may modify them.")

[Jorja]

First of all, HRT is not always what it is cracked up to be. Yes, many do get relief from taking HRT. However, there are some that get very little to no relief from HRT. Remember, what works for one doesn't always work for all.

So you made the decision to take the middle path. Good for you. You made a decision and you have been able to stick by it. Who are any of us to say different one way or another? If it is working for you, that is all that matters.

[samantha rogers]

I get this completely Melissa. Your situation sounds very much like mine. In the middle. And I know exactly what you mean about trying to balance the hormones, it isn't easy.

[vikki2020]

The middle is not that bad----it's a nice place to sit back, and think about the next move. I can relate to your thinking, Melissa. But--I'm still undecided about HRT, and right now, it doesn't seem necessary. I'm going to work, as a woman, and being able to be who I am at home,also--so, it's been working fine for me. Still,have to put on my boy pant's occasionally, and do "guy stuff",lol! I'm pretty happy where I'm at for now, but, I know I'll always want to move forward.

[KellyJameson]

"Holier than thou" people are tedious and insecure whether they are transsexuals or not.

Personally I wish no one had to transition including me, even if I'm happier or at least no longer self destructive with happiness sprinkled in.

I never had a sexuality to lose so in that area there was nothing to hold on to.

I don't know why or where my identity as a woman came from but it was and is as real as any physical object. I could never convince my brain that is was not female but male even though I did everything I could thing of.

For me GD was experienced from trying to convince myself that I was something I was not and trying to live accordingly, which created massive amounts of "tension" inside me which lead to all sorts of problems like anxiety and depression but really the list is an endless stream of negative experiences.

I do think for some they can bring up to their conciousness the understanding of this tension and find ways to resolve it without completely transitioning and I actually think of these people as the lucky ones.

Transsexuals have been around forever but medical transitioning is a fairly recent offering so somehow others must have learned of ways to cope in the past to survive.

I'm not a "real woman" if you define one as whose body was meant to be able to bear children as reproduction from having xx chromosomes but being able to live in the world and the mirror as one is satisfying because the tension is gone so it seems to be "enough"

Testosterone was never right for me and this is certainly true sexually in that you could say my sexuality was "inverted" from my brain being opposite my body so my sexuality "could not line up"

Whose to say how my identity conflicts would have been affected if my sexuality lined up with my body ? I tried to bend my sexuality to fit my identity but it only made matters worse plus I needed to suppress the testosterone to escape its psychological effects and I have always had low numbers concerning androgens but it was still wrong for me physically.

Many of my psychological and emotional problems were very similar to women who suffer from PCOS.

I still think my identity would have overcome my sexuality because it was there before my sexuality but it would have drastically increased my suffering as that tension between body and soul, between sexuality and identity.

I think you are experiencing similar struggles as I did but perhaps it is less severe in your case and you may be able to make it work.

I just could not go against myself any longer as the person I knew myself to be and I had to bring this person out into the world.

In my opinion a great deal of this experience is chemical as how we are affected by hormones over the course of our lives and I have always had a problem with the effect of testosterone and for those that don't they may be able to walk that middle path.