#DIY HRT

[selfoftheseus]

Periodic reminder rogaine (minoxidil) on your face CAN in fact help you to grow facial hair, with or without being on testosterone. Rogaine is available over the counter at drug stores, Walmart, and some grocery stores. The Walmart store brand can be very affordable.

It also has a really fun tingle sometimes! Especially if you shave first!

[let-there-be-tboys]

ONE MONTH ON T!!!!!!!🎉🎉💥🎉💥🎉💥

wow wow wow! god this is incredible. i’ve been at around 25-30mg per week and i’m already noticing a few changes:

voice: i think i’m cracking a little more? and it might be a little lower? but it’s such a small change i could be imaging it. i’ve been resting my singing voice due to a very strenuous concert/competition season that ended two weeks ago, but i’m going to keep working it more over the holidays, so we’ll see!

physical changes: HOLY BOTTOM GROWTH. Christ. they weren’t kidding when they said it happens fast. pretty weird, but i don’t hate it!

there are a few more hairs on my upper lip and chin, barely noticeable if i’m not looking super close in the mirror in good lighting. but they’re there!

chronic pain is the same as usual, i’ve started working out regularly (taking ADVANTAGE of the roids bro) and eating more protein. right now i can’t tell if it’s made any change but i feel pretty good!

orientation stuff: GIRLS. FUCK. AGJDHDJDHDBBFJEGDDHWJSHSK. i’ve identified as gay for a LONG time but yeah no i am slowly accepting that i like girls too. i’ve liked a few girls before T, never anything serious at all, but lately i’ve been more accepting of seeing a girl and thinking she’s pretty like THAT, not just like, aesthetically pretty

i’m still very much asexual, i don’t feel sexual attraction towards people, however my libido has increased a bit. i didn’t really HAVE a libido before so this is unfamiliar and strange. i have been surprisingly neutral on this. i don’t really care ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

mental health and stuff: craaaazzyy stuff has been happening in my life that’s like, outside of my control, so on the whole i haven’t been too great. but INTERNALLY, i feel so much better. more comfortable with my body, more confident in myself, generally happier!!!

i am so happy i started T, SO happy i made the leap of faith. it was scary, and it continues to be scary, but every week it gets easier :) every week it feels a little less like fear and a little more like excitement

[queerautism]

We're back at this being the entirety of the advice being given for Testosterone DIY HRT in a bunch of current threads about it. Genuinely sick of this.

And it's very dismissive of the legal risk as well, which is significant for many marginalised people in the US, like POC who already get disproportionately targeted by the cops.

[michaelmilkers]

in 2004 george w bush won the presidential election and promised in his acceptance speech to codify a federal ban on gay marriage. 30 states passed bans on gay marriage in the wake of his re-election. and then they fell. one by one by one. it has to get worse before it gets better.

queers. trans people especially. our attitude for the next decade has to be “we’re not fucking scared of you”. do you understand? this has always been at the core of who we are and what we do. we fucking move. we take up space or carve out our own with our bare hands. we take care of us.

do you know the other queers in your neighborhood? do you know who you can call at a bad time? do you know whose house you can crash at? do you know where you can go for a free meal? do you know where you can bring meals to the hungry? do you know the LGBT resources available in your area? do you know the informed consent clinics in your area?

do you know how DIY HRT works? do you know and have friends who don’t? do you know our history? have you read the works of james baldwin and leslie feinberg? are you equipped with knowledge about the forces that work against us? do you understand dialectical materialism? do you know what to say if stopped by the police? do you know what good opsec is? are your legal documents in order? do you know how to get them in order?

scream, cry, rot in your bed, do whatever you need to do to process this, then find something to do. do not fall into despair. in the face of extermination say “fuck you.”

[queeranarchism]

I'm seeing a worrying post about single/multi-use HRT vials going around. Please read this Queer Doc article instead.

The most important parts of this article are:

Check the ingredients. Vials without preservatives are intended to be thrown out after 1 use. Vials with preservatives are intended to be thrown out after 28 days.

Wash your hands, clean the table and disinfect injection surfaces (vial stopper, your injection site.)

Don’t let the needle or the rubber stopper of the vial touch contaminated surfaces.

Don’t re-use needles.

I would like to add:

In Europe you may also get single-use vials that are completely glass with a top that needs to be broken to access the medication. There is NO safe way to use these for multi-dosing.

Within the DIY community, you will find larger vials that people use for months. This caries extra risk but unfortunately a lot of people don't have much choice. Be extra diligent about hygiene and safety if you re-use vials for longer, understand that you've got more risk and do not do it if you are immunocompromised. Please consider changing your vial every 4 months if at all possible.

If you do get an infection you need to go to a doctor. Seriously. An infection deeper under the skin can not work itself to the surface and has a risk of entering the blood stream and becoming sepsis. This can kill you. Trans people will tell you that they had an infection and they were fine. They were lucky. You may be unlucky. Go to a doctor.

Normal injections often cause pain and a warm bump or hard spot at the injection site, with symptoms increasing during the first 24 hours and gradually getting less after that. Symptoms of infection are: pain, heat or a bump that continue to increase after 48 hour, oozing of liquid from the injection site hours/days after injection, fever, a rash spreading from the injection sight. If you get these symptoms go to a doctor.

Store your injection bottles, packaged syringes and needles in a dry, clean location, keep them away from food items. The packaging isn't fool-proof. If there is dirt on the package, do not trust the inside of the package. If the package is broken, do not trust the inside of the package.

Check the ingredients of your vial for allergies. Injections are oil-based and that oil can be peanut-oil, soy-oil and other things that people might have an allergic reaction to. If you have allergies, know which oil you're putting into your body.

[trans-axolotl]

would people be interested in a post about DIY hrt from a harm reduction perspective

[campbellbeans]

given recent events, the NHS deciding to conveniently "lose" my entire medical record and attempting to restart my entire transistion progress at a different GIC is especially frustrating anyways:

[deadeyedfae]

For the 3rd time, hopfully the last time 💜

[taliabhattwrites]

Less Fearmongering about Testosterone, Please, Or: There is no "Boy HRT"/"Girl HRT" Dichotomy

Hello folks, I'm a trans woman and I'm on testosterone gel.

As an immigrant to a regime that is currently setting trans standards of care on fire, there is no way I can acquire any of the drugs I need to put in my body through the official channels. I've been on E monotherapy (weekly injections, no T-blocker, works out really cheap and I have a few years' worth stockpiled) for a while now, and started T-gel about a year ago.

We initially grabbed it because my wife was interested in microdosing and I decided to do so with her (though she's on injections now). Most feminizing HRT regimes nuke our T levels to lower than the healthy range for cis women, and that frankly isn't good and can lead to various health issues. T is, ultimately, just a hormone, and even if I had too much of it in the past, I still need some of it to be healthy. One noticeable effect for me is that it's helped a lot with my energy levels.

In terms of acquisition, T is actually relatively abundant compared to E because a lot of cis men buy and take steroids, while most cis women who need E are just getting it prescribed by their doctors without much fuss. Our community is the only one that really has a need for E-compounders, while the population of people who consume steroids is way higher.

Funnily, our biggest challenge in acquiring the gel was just finding a forum that would point us to a gel supplier instead of just insisting that "Gel doesn't lead to enough gains, bro! Here just buy these injections." All very well-intentioned advice, of course, but that was very much not my goal and not what I needed.

Where I am, it's legal to purchase and own T, just not to sell it. T possession is not particularly harshly cracked down upon, given that its use amongst a certain crowd is basically an open secret. Gauge your level of risk but ultimately, the official policy on trans existence is discouraging transition and making it harder for us to be able to change our sex. A friend from Germany showed me this extract that explicitly advocates for therapy to dissuade bodily transition:

It's from the guidelines for transition-related care by the association of German health insurances!

If you can get it from a doctor, good. Do that and don't forget you'll constantly have to advocate for yourself. Even if you can, however, you should frankly have your back-up options sorted out, because we live in times increasingly hostile to transitional care, and we all need to have fallbacks.

Maybe the world will eventually become less trans-eliminationist, but in the meantime, transition is always going to carry with it a certain level of risk. All I can really advise is to take charge of your own bodily autonomy, to decide how you want to shape your sex, and if you feel like you can't currently do that, to start making plans for when you eventually can. That kept me going for five years in the closet, and eventually paid off.

Good luck, and death before detransition.

[elierlick]

The Guardian DIY HRT hit piece finally came out and there's something inspirational about it. It's not the article itself. Our community came together over the past month to warn one another not to speak with them - and they couldn't find a single interviewee doing DIY!

[quinnhills]

🚨🚨🚨

Idaho's ban on gender-affirming care for all trans and non-binary people takes effect tomorrow

Lives have been and will be lost because of anti-trans legislation

Please share these resources to get folks the care they need:

[selfoftheseus]

Has anyone made a Forcemasc post like this yet

[genderqueerdykes]

i would strongly suggest anyone considering DIY to instead investigate states with shield laws! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transgender_rights_in_the_United_States#Displacement_and_sanctuary_states

"A number of states have passed laws protecting trans people and their families, as well as their healthcare providers, fleeing anti-trans states, from extradition." essentially, these are jurisdictions that have committed to NOT respecting federal orders that violate transgender human rights. it is very unlikely they will comply with orders to cease issuing HRT OR testing. even if you DIY in your home state, you may be able to access a planned parenthood (many do hormone tests, and many prescribe hrt!) in a sanctuary state so you can have things like your liver enzymes tested, along with basic physical changes like blood pressure.

i personally live in vermont and while it isn't all whiskers on kittens, there IS a LONG tradition of vermont dissent against federal injunctions. idk if i'd suggest moving here (the jobs are bad, the housing is worse, our winters and flooding are intense, and most of the state is an intense food desert) but specifically university of vermont's hospital has a really solid presence and any specialty you could want, including in-hospital plastic surgeons that do various genderful surgeries, as well as gynecology and hormone management. vermont medicaid also is REALLY good. if you are unemployed, for any amount of time, you qualify as long as you live any amount of time in the state. there are no copays. prescriptions are $1 each, no matter what. UVM has eaten almost every smaller practice in the area, and they take medicaid. the local planned parenthood also has a special fund for helping pay for gender affirming care for those who don't have insurance and can't afford it. i know moving is not ideal ever but it's what i did about a decade ago and it's not bad for sure !

Pride Center of Vermont also exists if anyone wants a local org to chat about this sort of thing with, on weekdays during week hours they have a warmline open and are generally very kind and helpful.

thank you so much for this information!! i really appreciate it, i was not aware of this! i feel like this can help a lot of people already living in the United States, or people looking to move here!

[queerautism]

X

@TownTattle on twitter: Susanna Rustin is apparently the Guardian journalist approaching trans people for an interview about DIY.

She’s a card-carrying TERF. Do not engage with her.

[queerjoys]

as things get harder and harder for transgender people, i find its important for people to share this link

[incognitopolls]

DIY HRT: purchasing and using hormone replacement therapy without a prescription.

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