#anyway. I did find time for the gender dysphoria to hit. STILL. who would have thought??

[a-very-fond-farewell]

went to the city, me. fell in love with ALL the pretty women, me. much struggle.

[iravaid]

Once again gripped by the curse of having your own oc as a blorbo.

More Biker as we get closer to artfight, ft. Daniel the asshole captain they're hooking up with (which could mean nothing), and Biker's estranged sister Tatiana.

More ramblings below

Regarding their masculinity, Biker initially had been incredibly dysphoric about their physique and how others saw them, involving poor mood, depressive episodes, wearing baggy clothes. Only after realising they were nonbinary did they find enjoyment in their masculinity and how it was presented, dressing in clothes that showed themself off. It was a change in framing: they're nonbinary and that gives them the freedom to delve into masculinity without the initial societal pressure to conform to a certain Kind of masculinity as someone assigned male at birth. Gender presentation on their terms, effectively. I don't know if this sounds contradictory to someone outside that experience, but it's a revelation I also experienced w/femininity.

They're half-Italian on their mother's side, and have thick, dark hair. Biker had had a couple sessions of lazer hair removal for their beard and body hair, but then the apocalypse hit. So while their hair is quite sparse relative to others, it still grows in. Biker is willing to shave with just about anything, so long as it gets the hair Off. They maintain a buzzcut for aesthetics, but also find their dysphoria goes bonkers when their hair starts to grow out. Will sometimes maintain a trimmed happy trail for the look.

Biker's got insane, prey animal anxiety. The kind that makes them aggressive and vitriolic, instead of fawning/freezing. Hit first before the threat can hit you, kind of deal. It can also make them incredibly verbally aggressive at times, as well. They're terrified of dying, and typically would do anything if it meant, at the end of the day, they survived. But then the get taken captive by a fundie, cannibal cult ingame and interrogated by their leader. Instead of giving up all they know in exchange for not being harmed, Biker's fear of death is overruled by their fear of losing the agency they were only granted post-apocalypse. Biker as a person did not exist until after the world ended, and they'll be damned if they lose that freedom again. So they lied, and fought, and suffered grievous wounds for it. They're immensely frustrated with themself, over it. But they're still here, at the end of the day. Even if Eve, the leader, left her mark in the place of burns spanning a concerning percentage of their body.

Biker used to privately ID as a gay man, until realising they very much loved women as well, but it was the clash of being loved As a man that repulsed them away from pursuing meaningful relationships with women and femmes. When they started ID-ing as nonbinary, they found attraction to women (and acting on it) much easier. Their relationship between their gender and their attraction to men is a different story and a little more dysfunctional, but Biker chases pleasure when they can, and things like questionable sex isn't out of the picture for them, before and after the world ended.

Kink and its subgroups was also a safe space for Biker (outside of gyms and places where they could admire masculinity), in exploring their sexuality and gender. They mostly occupied leather and bondage circles, but experimented in dom/sub spaces and impact play. They also consider all sex with them to be gay sex. So watch out 'it doesn't count because xyz'. Fun fact but there is so so so much motorcycle leather kink stuff on pinterest. I don't want it taken down at ALL it's just so funny to me to see those images fly under the radar like that.

Anyway. I hate them and they SUCK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! and yet. they remain in my head 24/7 and my dm is a cruel evil cruel evil storyteller who also wants Biker in a blender <3 mwah, she is also immensely talented and has facilitated this fixation and development of Biker into this character

[pupintransit]

Something fun i've noticed in the last couple days is that the novelty of my pussy has worn off.

I mean, realistically that's the goal right? You go through untold eons of feeling wrong about your body, you take the opportunity to correct it, and by X units of time it feels normal. Like you've always had this body, like walking around and simply vibing was always your reality. I remember that I possessed a penis and testes and i remember what they looked like on my body, but how they felt is becoming more and more of a distant memory.

My vulva feels natural to me now. I think all of the mental remapping my brain had to do in order to get accustomed to the change is over and done with. My folds and textures are second nature to me now, like i can look at myself in a mirror and think "Yes, I know what that part of me is supposed to look and feel like now, i don't actually have to reach down there to find it."

I reach down anyway of course. Have i mentioned how much fun masturbating is yet? I could literally do it for hours now and it feels just as natural as jerking my cock did. Moreso!

I'm taking a minute now and trying to remember the feeling of my balls dangling between my legs. I can describe it; sweaty, delicate, loose if the temperature was a little too warm. It sort of felt like a floppy stress ball that you weren't supposed to squeeze too tightly. I can recall, too, how those physical sensations made me feel, and remembering is making me physically uncomfortable already. Now though, when i turn my minds eye toward my body those sensations are absent. Of course they would be, right? I don't have those parts anymore. But I did for 30 whole ass years. It was a fundamental component of my being, and now i can only recall those feelings if i but an active effort into doing so. How dope is that shit?

I know folks who have said that their pre-op memories get changed ever so slightly after they get gender affirming surgery. Say you're thinking about a vacation you were on were the shower in your hotel wasn't working, and you get blasted with freezing water when it should have been nice and warm. That version of you would have your post-op or post-HRT body instead of what you had back when that memory was formed. That's so interesting to me! I'm not at that stage yet but i'm really excited to see if it's something i experience.

I think now's a good moment to mention something, and against my better judgement I'll probably write about how this relates to The Discourse™️ of my flavour of nonbinary, but your dysphoria doesn't actually have to be crippling in order to qualify to gender affirming care. I could still masturbate and wash myself pre-op without significant distress, for example. You don't have to "earn" it by proving you're sufficiently. If HRT or gender affirming surgery would improve your quality of life, if you can explain that without lying to your care providers and demonstrate you understand the medical risks, then that's all you need to do to "earn" your medical care. Anyone who tells you otherwise is lying to you, even if they themselves are transgender.

Especially if they themeselves are transgender.

If you're pushing back against nonbinary indenities, or people "inventing" new genders, labels, and definitions, or even just against kink in the trans community, i hate to tell you that it won't make the people oppressing us think you're one of the good ones. Us living authentically isn't setting the trans acceptance movement back, it's what it's supposed to allow us to do in the first place. I would really encourage you to rexamine why you have those beliefs, and why me getting a cunt installed as someone who passes as cisgender constitutes a net negative for our community.

Anyway that concludes the ranting portion of today's mini-essay.

Every time i think i've hit an apex with my joy it keeps getting stronger and stronger. This is the best decision i've ever made, not just because it made my body finally make sense to me, but because it made feeling normal so boring. I can't ask for a better outcome than that.

[occulticvioletdepths]

//god your character lore is terrifying. anyway what if camille didn't kill anyone?

// i was actually writing an au thing for this a while back! it's still in my drafts. i'm so sorry anon who sent that ask.

either way: no arson. no murder. no deal with uberto demian. camille would still flee to unova to get as far away from the sinclair estate as she could reasonably do. this poses a few new issues in her life.

1: lacking a feminine body, she'd be hit by crippling gender dysphoria manifesting in part as not seeing any worth in herself... and she probably wouldn't be able to get hrt for a long time, not knowing how the unovan healthcare system works.

2: probably a fear of showing herself in public. she wouldn't challenge the unova gyms for instance.

3: the sinclair family believe their child to be taken from them. take that as you will, but they want their child back. and they are not averse to dirty tactics.

camille's life would less be about avoiding legal consequences and more about avoiding eyes, as there's a definite chance they would send people to track her down.

calli would still intrigue her, and she would definitely try challenging her, but i'm unsure if they would've become rivals... if they did, though, romance happens (though calli would have much less of a difficult time confessing), and camille would... probably unhealthily devote herself to calli, deriving her own worth from her, which is a dynamic that... i'm not overly comfortable with, but not averse to writing.

ironically, calli would be more open to camille from the getgo seeing as calli still thinks camille is cis in the main scenario.

camille's story would be more about finding her self-worth and standing up for herself instead of what i have loosely planned for her now.

she'd probably be a bit more of a hex maniac to be honest, trying to find other ways to attain girlhood™ aside from what she did in the main scenario.

as for her pokémon team, maybe she would be lacking plagas depending on if she rejects uberto's deal earlier or later. melisma would be much, much more of a companion to her, like aurora is to calli.

also, less "death curse" jokes and more "i prophecise... a punch to thine face" jokes.

[your-beauty-never-scared-me]

let's talk about my gender

For a very long time, I've had a difficult time discerning whether or not I am trans. I guess we can start from the beginning. I was assigned female at birth. I was honestly fine with being a little girl. I was chill with whatever clothes people put me in. When I was eight or so I thought boys clothes were cool too and liked wearing ties like my dad. I also really wanted to join the military. I wouldn't say I definitively wanted to be a boy as a child because I remember loving the idea of makeup and dressing up, but I feel like it kind of went both ways. One distinct memory I have is telling my dad people would think I was a boy in the clothes I was wearing, but I was excited about it. Take that as you will.

I hit puberty when I was 10 and I absolutely hated it. Obviously periods were the worst of it. But this is where things get complicated for me. I can't tell if I really have or had true gender dysphoria, or if I just really hate/hated being sexualized. Even if I can't say anything definitively about my gender identity, I can definitely say that I've always been incredibly modest and have never felt comfortable showing off my body or trying to look "sexy". Not because I hate my body, I just feel a lot more comfortable when I'm covered up. Unfortunately, society inherently sexualizes the female body, which I realized, and it made me want to crawl out of my skin.

Another factor in all of this is that I was objectively ugly. Baggy masculine clothes made me an even uglier girl, whereas feminine clothes and makeup made me look like i was at least trying not to be ugly. People are nicer to people who they find attractive. It's science. But I knew that even before I knew it was science. I didn't, and still don't, care about how I'm perceived as long as people think I'm attractive. Femininity is something I wear so that people will like me and be nice to me. I think in a way it always has been. I don't necessarily feel comfortable in the makeup and women's clothing, but it makes people perceive me in a better light so I do it anyway.

I also started identifying as non-binary as young as 12. My friend told my about the label and I felt like it was a good descriptor for how I felt. I picked out a new name and everything.

There are two more things I want to discuss in regards to my possible trans-ness

Toxic masculinity.

People don't take women seriously. Especially tiny 5'0 women who are soft spoken. I think part of me hating my femininity is that I feel like I have no power, and that people don't listen to me. Not only me, but other women as well.

2. Sexual abuse

This is hard to talk about, bear with me. I already expressed how much I value my modesty and hate being sexualized. But I was 13 the first time an adult man did something inappropriate to me and it made me hate my new body. This basically continued until I was 18 and moved out.

Side note, if a single one of you asks why I didn't do anything about it or fight back or whatever, I'll rip your eyes out through your computer screen.

Anyway, I often question my transness because it's like... Do I really hate being a woman or do I just hate the things that have been done to me as the result of the oversexualization of the female body? It's a difficult thing to consider.

3. My partner is transfem.

I tend to try to fit in to what the people I love are like. I tend to mimic. In one of my past relationships, I basically convinced myself that I'd be happy as a housewife because that's what he wanted. When I entered this relationship (with my current, transfem partner), I had basically submitted to "okay, I'm just going to be a girl now, they like girls, I don't want to complicate things anymore, I'm a girl". As I got more comfortable in the relationship, I opened up about the fact that I had identified as nonbinary when I was in college and that I owned a binder and all that. Eventually that led to me being openly nonbinary in our friend group. And that's comfortable for me. But I'm worried that I'm just thinking about being trans because they are, and that I wouldn't be having this conversation with myself at all if they were cis.

Another caveat if I did potentially come out is that I wouldn't want my partner or our friend group to think that I'm just doing it to copy them or make them like me more. So I guess either way if I do come out or start HRT I would definitely wait to do it.

I am going to condense this essay into a pros and cons style list for TLDR's sake.

Reasons why I think I could be trans

I don't have an inherit attraction to the feminine aside from wanting to be perceived as an attractive and likeable person

Never hated my more masculine features like body and facial hair

I don't actually like looking like a girl

I HATE my voice

I like how I look with my binder on

I've never really resonated with the "wife and mother" thing (although there are plenty of cis women who don't either)

Despite the fact that I hate a lot of other men and a lot of things about male culture, I still kinda want to be one anyway.

Reasons why I think I might not be trans

maybe I just want the authority that men have and to be taken seriously

I like makeup and nails

I don't really have bottom dysphoria?

Maybe I just want to escape being sexualized and the things that happened to me

There's a lot to consider. There's a lot that complicated. But everything takes time, and with time I'm sure I'll sort my gender out. Or maybe I won't and I'll still be happy regardless because I am alive and life is pretty good, all things considered.

either way, I hope you have a good day.

And if you're trans or questioning, I hope you have an extra good day.

[sorry-apsalar]

Get With the Time Already

Another Ao3 prompt: "so uh i like trans fry and maybe i was thinking fry could be dysphoric and bender comforts him in his own way ig??"

Disclaimer: while I have personal experience with gender dysphoria it's not as intense as I know many other people's are. So this might not be the most accurate depiction of a trans man but I did my best. I have also never worn a binder (though I have done some research on them) so I might not have properly portrayed that either in my mentionings of it.

Content Warning: this fic includes blatant discussion of boobs, gender dysphoria surrounding them, and transphobia (Fry incorrectly assumes Bender is going to be transphobic)

~

Fry had only just began putting on a clean pair of clothing when the door burst open behind him. He snapped around to see Bender pause in the doorway as his eyes found Fry. Knowing immediately what he was looking at, Fry flinched and immediately snatched the jacket off the top and pulled it up to hug to his chest, covering himself.

“Hey Bender. Uh… what’s up?” he said, trying to keep the tension out of his voice as he forced a smile. Maybe Bender hadn’t seen? It was kind of dark in here so perhaps he hadn’t had time to make anything out?

“Have you always had boobs or is that a new feature?” Nope, Bender had for sure seen then. Dang it!

As always, people knowing about his chest made Fry feel worse about it. Perhaps that was due to the fact that it brought the issue to mind when normally he tried to forget about it whenever possible. Regardless he was now officially uncomfortably aware of his chest and Bender now knew his secret.

He was bound to find out about it one way or another eventually. Bender was his roommate, coworker, and best friend – up until this anyway, who knows if that would still be the case afterward – after all so they spent quite a bit of time together. So it had been only a matter of time before Bender saw him naked or caught him without his binder on since he couldn’t wear it all the time. It still sucked that it had to happen though. Perhaps Fry should’ve told him on his own so it happened on his terms instead of just randomly like this. Too late now though.

“Uh… Fry. You okay?”

Oh shit, Fry had just been kind of standing here frozen, hadn’t he? Oops. “Uh… I’m fine.” Faking nonchalance was hard when he didn’t even know how Bender felt about the whole thing yet. “Yeah. I’ve uh… always had them. … Or not always but ever since I hit like puberty and stuff.”

Not wanting to look at Bender anymore, Fry turned away and let the jacket drop to the floor. He turned to the closest to pull a clean set of clothes – he was almost out, meaning he’d have to do laundry again soon, ugh – and resumed dressing himself.

“Oh, I get it,” Bender said in his usual tone of voice as if unaware of how uncomfortable Fry was – though knowing Bender it was possible he just didn’t care. “You’re one of those people that don’t like having boobs.”

“Yeah. That’s one way to put it.” Fry wasn’t normally one to feel self-conscious about things but gosh pulling on a binder when someone else was watching certainly made him feel a special kind of uncomfortable. He had no other choice though and better to get it over with sooner rather than later because Bender didn’t seem inclined to leave any time soon. “Uh… how mad are you about it?” Best to just ask that outright to figure out where they now stood with each other.

Bender scoffed. “Why would I be mad about it?”

Fry snapped around to look to look at Bender again. “Because… because… guys aren’t supposed to have them and that makes people mad a lot of the time.”

“What moron told you that? Lots of men have boobs.”

“Well uh… I guess sort of on bigger guys but… that’s different.” Even despite Fry’s less than healthy diet and lazy life style he was still somehow too skinny to have those kinds of boobs.

Bender gave him a look like he was stupid. “I forget sometimes that you come from the unenlightened ages. In modern day lots of human men have boobs, some get them removed, others don’t, no one cares either way. I’m a robot and even I know that. Seriously Fry, get with the times already, you’re just making yourself look dumb.”

As he finished pulling his jacket on, Fry took a breath to reply to that but… what was he supposed to say to that? “It’s uh… really not a big deal anymore? Being trans and stuff.”

“Yeah. Literally the only people who care are some of the assholes in the head museum and even most of them have gotten over it by now.”

That didn’t make Fry feel less dysphoric, especially since they were still talking about it and thus he was still thinking about it, but it did make him feel better. Even if, that being the case was obvious in hindsight; things had been trending towards being more accepting back when he came from. Far, far slower than he’d have liked but a thousand years was a long time so of course a lot of progress had been made in that realm just like in every other area of society and science.

“Anyway,” Bender continued, “you going to continue to be upset about it or are you going come out and watch TV with me? ‘Cause the new episode of All My Circuits is about to start and I’m going be mad if I miss it because I have to continue to explain why you being trans literally does not matter to me or anyone else.”

Fry almost could’ve run over and hugged him but refrained for now. He was going to have to ask more about this later – surely getting top surgery and other such stuff would be far less of a hassle these days, right? – for now though… “TV sounds good.” He wanted to watch the episode too and could use a distraction while he took some time to digest this new information and the fact that Bender now knew and that that was okay because not only was he cool with it, he was indifferent to it and didn’t see Fry any different because of it.

[infernalrevenge]

A Self-Made Man (Karl Heisenberg Trans Headcanons)

(CW: mentions of gender dysphoria, misgendering, unsafe binding, and other unsafe transition practices.

Also, PSA: DO NOT try binding with bandages or duct tape. Use a proper binder that is correctly sized for you. Do not be like Karl here, who will eventually learn from his mistakes.

Anyway, enjoy!)

Figured himself out around the time he hit puberty, more specifically when he heard about what AFAB people had to go through during it.

Basically his thought process about it was "What the fuck? What the fuck?? I don't like this, I don't like where this is going, mission abort, MISSION ABORT--"

Had to deal not just with gender dysphoria but also the painful Cadou experiments Mother Miranda imposed on him. HOW FUN.

Even when he wasn't on the table being picked and prodded, when it was time to "go home" and recover, he could barely even look at himself without feeling like himself.

It was pretty much only by the time he was (physically) 15 that he had had enough. If he was going to suffer under the bird bitch, he better at least be seen the way he wanted to be.

He insisted on being referred to as a man, and wasn't afraid to correct anyone who either made a mistake or deliberately does so.

If they did it on purpose -- and he knows if they did -- then he starts yelling. Just fucking screaming. Very loudly.

If they keep trying to talk without using the right titles and pronouns, then he would yell over them. Repeatedly. Without fail.

He doesn't have full control of his magnetic powers yet so this was the best he could do. And it's not like anyone would dare to try anything physically with him, not with Miranda on "his side".

As soon as they get it right though, he's just quiet and nodding, though with a seething glare that said "Don't ever try me again, fucker."

It was very effective.

The huge baggy coat that he still frequently wears was sort of just his version of a "dysphoria hoodie". It did the job.

When he was younger, he got his hair cut short every chance he could. He thought it made him look more manly that way, and people would take him more seriously as a man with short hair.

Did a lot of dangerous things (unknowingly) while trying to medically transition on his own. It was mostly because he was too impatient to do actual research then.

Tried binding using the tough bandages the Benevientos kept around their house because he wanted his chest to be AS FLAT AS HUMANLY POSSIBLE.

Moreau and Donna had to talk him out of it when they found out, only after he kept passing out during every family meeting since he started.

Donna instead gave him a proper binder when she did her own research on trans essentials. Karl thinks it doesn't get him as flat as the bandages did but at least he could breathe now.

He still wore it for days at a time though, which was also very terrible. He was incredibly lucky that his healing factor helped him not get fucked up in the long run.

Obtained testosterone from the Duke, who for some reason didn't question it, but without proper prescriptions so he just started injecting willy-nilly all because he did some cursory research about how it can masculinize bodies.

Once again had to be talked out of by the Duke and Alcina (back when she still cared about his well-being) when the former found out about what he was doing with it.

Was forced to see a doctor close to the village lest he lose his supply of boy goo.

Isn't afraid of injecting himself when necessary. One time he tried using his powers to do it with no hands. He almost missed and didn't do it again after that.

Has a few tattoos that inconspicuously also served as marks for his injection sites.

Definitely tried performing top surgery on himself. Alcina had to wrestle the scalpel out of his hands.

Like he was READY, he had an anatomy book on one hand, he had already marked on himself what and where to cut. He looked at a mirror and thought "okay titty go bye bye"

But alas, Alcina had to ruin everything. (She didn't ruin anything, Karl would've probably given himself an infection if he tried slicing himself open.)

In a way though, he found out that his "siblings" cared about him and how he approached his transition. It was kind of sweet.

Mother Miranda cares so little about Karl that him transitioning was no big deal at all. As long as she could still use him.

(He thought it was kinda funny but also sad that she had no regard for him whatsoever that she ended up indirectly supporting him instead. It was a weird way to look at it.)

When he finally did get surgery (safely and legally), his mutation helped him heal ridiculously fast. What would've been a few weeks of recovery and months of scar healing instead lasted just under a month.

Which was great for him because he wanted to get back on his feet as soon as possible. When he was up and running just two days after surgery and could remove the drains and post-op binder, the doctor was too bewildered to even speak.

Whenever he was alone in his factory, you bet your sweet ass he's shirtless 99% of the time. Dude didn't threaten a surgeon pay for surgery not to show off his nips.

Like most things in his life, his name was actually something he never thought of during his transition.

He didn't have that big of a problem with his deadname surprisingly, and he just kind of relied on everyone referring to him by his family name. Even Miranda only ever called him Heisenberg.

Though the thought of distancing his old self from his new self was appealing. Getting people to forget who he was before and being known as someone else, as who he was now -- yeah, that sounded good. So he decided on...

Karl.

Short, simple, and a name that pretty much no one could fuck up saying. It was perfect.

He rarely ever heard it when he was called, but finding it scrawled on Miranda's notes while he was snooping around one time almost... made him smile.

(Did she care? Or did she also just think it was easier to write than his deadname? Meh, oh well. Best not to dwell on it too much.)

Doesn't care for getting bottom surgery, but does want to get a hysterectomy. The potential for periods is always going to be a bitch.

Started growing out his hair when his beard was filling out. He thinks long hair is quite high maintenance though and he doesn't want it to get in the way of his work so it never goes past his shoulders.

Loves talking just because he loves how his voice sounds.

Proud of who he is and his journey to get where he is today. He only learned the term "transgender" recently, and once he did, he thought "Hey that's me!"

If anyone tries to be even the slightest bit disrespectful to him and his gender identity...

...they're getting thrown down the cellar with Sturm.

"It was your choice to be an ass, it was my choice to see you sliced to bits. Have fun!"

[krovav]

07•07•16💉// 06•18•18 🔪

5 years on Testosterone // 3 years post-top

----

[he/him] | Instagram

Ok, full disclosure, it feels so bizarre to be at this point in my transition. It took me a while to get HRT, and even shortly before I started testosterone, I was half-convinced I would never manage to get to even 1 month, let alone 5 years.

I figured I would take some selfies with facial hair for this milestone because I hardly ever show any of the hair growth I got from T—largely because I'm not a fan of it, but I think these came out nicely.

[CW: dysphoria, suicide ment. etc from this point on]

Transitioning has been a bit of a rollercoaster, but definitely one of the best decisions I've made in my life. While I still have my struggles, I have never been more at home in my own form than I am now.

Lately I've been thinking a lot about my identity, and some of the final puzzle pieces of "self" have been falling into place. I have always been a very feminine person; I do not fit the mold of trans guy who did all the "boy" things as a child. I was stone-cold serious about my dolls, I regularly got mani-pedis, I wore dresses and heels as if they were a second skin.

That changed dramatically when I hit puberty and the dysphoria (tm) started to set in, and suddenly I was overcompensating with hypermasculinity. Masculinity was my armor, the only thing keeping away the suicidal storm cloud invading my brain at all times. I didn't care if I hated how I looked if it meant that a cashier every so often would call me "sir".

But that was the most stifled time of my entire life. Not only was I lacking the knowledge that trans people existed and so also lacking the ability to define my own experiences, I was in turmoil over the clash of my interests and my need to feel "like a man". Sexism is a hell of a drug.

I've been working for years to shake off the chains placed on my self-expression by society's definition of being a man. I would tell myself that, sure, I wanted to do x thing, but if I do that, I'll never pass. And, sure, T and top surgery would magically make it so that I always pass, as long as I follow all these strict rules and never enjoy my life ever again. Passing is very much presented as the end-all-be-all to transitioning, so it's understandable that many trans people, myself included, have little set as a higher priority than being the "most" of their given gender.

But the reality of my transition has been that I don't always pass, even when I'm performing masculinity to the nth degree, because everyone (particularly uninformed cis people) has their own idea of what women and men are "supposed" to look like. And for a while that really plagued me. I was so happy and fulfilled with the changes I was seeing, I felt so much less dysphoric, so why were other people still seeing me as female? And that would push me further into feeling the need to be masculine, and over and over again I would just have it confirmed that I needed to work harder to be seen as a guy. That the dysphoria I was going through was somehow my fault for not working hard enough to pass.

What I've realized over the course of a year or so has been that it isn't and has never been my job to validate my identity to other people. If I'm making myself happy, if I'm relieving my own dysphoria, it does not in any way matter that some random person at the grocery store thought my long hair equaled girl, or that I get stared at in public restrooms, or that other people find it awkward when they get my pronouns wrong.

It is my job to take care of myself. It is my job to wear things that make me feel good about myself, either because they are simply comfortable or because I love the way they look. It is my job to make myself happy.

It is my job to learn to cope with my dysphoria in whatever way works for me, and to never let someone who doesn't even know me dictate who I should be to be valid as a man. I know who I am, and I always will.

Anyway, if you want to throw some spare change my way, it would greatly help me achieve my next transitional step (getting a hysto). I will link some payment options below, but even if not, interacting with my posts helps too.

https://ko-fi.com/nekromancy

https://venmo.com/krovav

https://cash.app/$Krovav

[buckybarnesbingo]

BBB Week 6 Roundup!

Little bit late, Mod Meg was on vacay over the weekend.

Title: Cute Quaterbacks Collaborator(s): Tori/samandbucky Link: AO3 Square: B4 - Sharing Clothes Rating: Teen Ship(s): Steve/Tony Major tags/warnings: AU, School, Fake Relationship, Protective!Bucky Summary: Steve and Bucky grew up as childhood best friends and are now roommates in college. Bucky dares Steve to bring a date to one of his upcoming football games after Steve suggests he could date anyone he wanted to. Enter Tony Stark. Word count: 1767

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Title: The Curse Collaborator(s): Tori/samandbucky Link: AO3 Square: K4 - Kiss Rating: Teen Ship(s): Bucky/Clint Major tags/warnings: Fluff, Established Relationship, Magic, Curses Summary: Clint gets hit during an alien attack with some dark magic, Bucky and Steve can't wake him, so they go to the only person they know who can undo the curse: Stephen Strange. Word count: 1364

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Title: A Regular Harry Houdini Collaborator(s): Bird Link: AO3 Square: K4 - Prisoners/Captives Together Rating: Teen Ship(s): Sam/Bucky Major tags/warnings: Minor Episode 5 Spoilers, Post-The Falcon and the Winter Soldier, Captured, First Kiss Summary: “You know, if Steve kissed me in the middle of an escape attempt, he would bring it up after,” Sam said. “I thought we weren’t talking about Steve,” Bucky grunted, closing his eyes. “I’m going to take a nap.” “I can’t believe you’re pretending to take a nap right now.” “I’m 106, Sam. I’m allowed to fall asleep whenever I want.” Word count: 1365

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Title: K5 Card B096 Soulbond Collaborator(s): Rufferto Link: Tumblr Square: K5 - High Fantasy, Curses, Shiny Sword Steve Rating: Teen Ship(s): Stucky Major tags/warnings: Fantasy Warrior Bucky, Curses, Art, Sword Steve Summary: When Bucky went off to war Steve was cursed into a sword. Bucky managed to find him because they share a bond but he's cursed. Bucky now carries Steve into battle wherever he goes looking for a way to have Steve at his side again. This was done on Hot Press Water Color Paper with Windsor & Newton and Arteza paints. I don’t much like the scan, there’s something always lost when a watercolor image is scanned but I will try some other time to get a better photo of it. Word count: none it is art.

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Title: Benevolent Overlord Collaborator(s): IndigoNight Link: AO3 Square: K1 - Bucky Bear Rating: Gen Ship(s): Bucky Barnes/Steve Rogers Major tags/warnings: Fluff, PTSD, Codependency, Alpine the Cat Summary: “Hi,” Bucky says, wincing a little at how hoarse and rough his voice sounds from disuse. The kitten just hisses at him again, huge green eyes narrowed into slits. “Yeah, I get it,” he agrees with a grimace and a commiserating nod. Word count: 4921

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Title: I'm James Buchanan Barnes Collaborator(s): e_hytes Link: Tumblr Square: C2 - Art Style: Black and White Rating: Gen Ship(s): No pairing/ship Major tags/warnings: #buckybarnes #wintersoldier #jamesbuchananbarnes #mcu Summary: A drawing of Bucky/Winter Soldier black and white Word count: N/A

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Title: Someone Like You Collaborator(s): Nicnac Link: AO3 Square: C4 - Prison Rating: Mature Ship(s): Bucky/Reader Major tags/warnings: Enemies, Uneasy Allies, Hydra Agent Reader, Negotiations Summary: Taken from their SHIELD prison cell, the reader finds themself alone with The Winter Soldier negotiating for their life. Word count: 2693

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Title: Sambucky Incorrect Quotes Collaborator(s): snowstark Link: Tumblr Square: U2 - Partner-In-Crime Rating: Teen Ship(s): Sam/Bucky Major tags/warnings: Enemies to lovers vibe, Humour Summary: “Bucky, we tried things your way already.” “No we didn’t.” “I did it in my head and it didn’t work.” Word count: N/A

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Title: darling, you’re the one i want in paper rings Collaborator(s): cyanica Link: AO3 Square: C5 - teasing Rating: Gen Ship(s): steve/bucky Major tags/warnings: first time, demisexuality, period-typical homophobia, fluff, friends to lovers Summary: "Okay, I don't know why I’ve never – you know!” Bucky said after a moment, a soft laugh spilling from his lips – something so genuine and bashful, that Steve wasn’t so sure what to make of. “You're just – you're the only one I've ever had eyes for. You're the only one I’ve ever wanted.” Or, whatever deity had constructed the fragmented pieces of their souls together, they were made of the same smithereens, and Steve was sure he had known that as a child, holding Bucky’s slightly larger hand and accepting that they were of the same love, without even knowing what such a concept was. Word count: 1630

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Title: Unexpected Alliances - Chapter 4 Collaborator(s): PoliZ Link: AO3 Square: C5 - Lending a Hand Rating: Mature Ship(s): Stucky Major tags/warnings: Fantasy AU, enemies to friends/lovers, referenced/implied torture Summary: Buckthorn’s refusal to use his fae magic to support his captor’s cause has left him battered and broken; when he is given a dangerous shifter as his cellmate, they overcome their differences to become allies and perhaps something more. Chapter 4: Upon reaching the shifters’ camp, Buckthorn meets another of Stephen’s companions who seems to have a chip on his shoulder when it comes to fae folk. Word count: 1034

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Title: A Story Told in Flesh, Chapter 3: Together In Dreams Collaborator(s): ChrissiHR Link: AO3 Square: B2 - Rocket Racoon Rating: Explicit Ship(s): Bucky x Darcy x Steve Major tags/warnings: Big Swingin’ Dick!Steve, smut, nsfw, dream sex, sex positive Summary: Bucky and Darcy get massages and discuss Aesir medical treatments; Darcy has an erotic dream about Bucky & Steve. Word count: 1270

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Title: Written In The Scars (On My Heart) Collaborator(s): IndigoNight Link: AO3 Square: K5 - Just Do It Rating: Explicit Ship(s): Steve Rogers/Bucky Barnes Major tags/warnings: Past Rape/Non-con, In Heat (but not A/B/O) Masturbation, Sex Toys, Mildly Dubious Consent, Body Worship, Self Body Worship, Rimming, Fuck Or Die (sort of), Porn with Feelings, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, PTSD, Inability to Orgasm, Body Image, Reference to Past Medical Experimentation, Self-Lubrication, Touch-Starved, Touch-Averse Summary: He swallows hard, struggling with himself one last time and losing. “I need your help,” he manages to whisper, voice cracking. The air in the room immediately changes. The wound up tension drains out of Steve, his posture and voice going soft. “Sure, Buck,” he says, cautiously moving back toward him. Bucky can’t move, his arms locked tight around his knees, and he can’t lift his gaze higher than Steve’s knees either. Steve pauses when he’s still a few feet away, squatting down and angling his head in an effort to see Bucky’s face through the curtain of his hair. “Anything. What do you need?” It’s everything Bucky can do to hold still, every cell in his body vibrating with the need to throw himself into Steve’s arms. He opens his mouth, but his throat sticks and he has to swallow again before he can force the words out. Slowly, by sheer force of will, he drags his gaze up to meet Steve’s eyes. “I need you to fuck me.” Word count: 41k

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Title: Acceptance is the first part of Healing Collaborator(s): Laevateinn Link: AO3 Square: C4 - Denial Rating: Teen Ship(s): N/A Major tags/warnings: 1e3 : Power Broker, TFATWS coda, TW for : implied sexual abuse/assault, dissociation, PTSD, flashbacks, Angst, hopeful(ish) ending Summary: "You good ?" Wilson asks him, after he fought against eight men. "You okay ?" Wilson asks him, when they get to Sharon’s house. "You hurt ?" Wilson asks him, when they get out of the car. Yes, Wilson. All good. Now if the guy could shut up and carry on, that'd be great. Why would he be "not fine" anyway ? It's not as if anything that happened that day hasn't happened before. Word count: 906

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Title: The Maze Stumbler (Moodboard) Collaborator(s): Turtles Link: Tumblr Square: B3 - Labyrinth Rating: Teen Ship(s): Darcy Lewis & Bucky Barnes & Sam Wilson Major tags/warnings: Bucky Barnes, Sam Wilson, Thor, Cocktail, Labyrinth Summary: Something, something, Thor spikes the punch at the party and they all decide to re enact the Maze Runner… or something like that. Sam and Bucky wake up in the middle of a maze, nothing but Darcy’s voice in their ear giving them directions and critiquing their methodology Word count: N/A

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Title: The Maze Stumbler (Fic) Collaborator(s): Turtles Link: AO3 Square: C1 - Stranded Rating: Teen Ship(s): Darcy Lewis & Bucky Barnes & Sam Wilson Major tags/warnings: Thor's Asgardian Booze, a labyrinth, Dubious Timeline, Everybody Lives, Crack Summary: Don’t drink Thor’s Asgardian booze. Ever. Word count: 1657

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Title: 5 Times Steve Received Plums from Natasha or Sam and the 1 Time Steve Realized the Plums weren’t from Them Collaborator(s): Girl_Back_There Link: AO3 Square: K5 - Bucky/Steve Rating: Teen Ship(s): Bucky/Steve Major tags/warnings: 5 + 1, Bucky and his Plums, Angst and Feels, Steve Rogers Needs a Hug Summary: Steve keeps finding plums in his hotel rooms or his bag. He thinks it is Natasha or Sam trying to be a good friend by making sure he is eating and keeping up his energy in the search for Bucky. Each plum he finds reminds him of Bucky growing up in pre-WWII New York. The times they would give each other a plum as a way of saying “I’m sorry” or “I love you.” Word count: 2998

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Title: Faith and Desire and the Swing of Your Hips Collaborator(s): IndigoNight Link: AO3 Square: U2 - French Kiss Rating: Explicit Ship(s): Steve Rogers/Bucky Barnes Major tags/warnings: Crossdressing, Nonbinary Steve Rogers, Oral Sex, Body Dysphoria, Gender Exploration, Supportive Flirting Summary: “You look gorgeous, doll,” he drawls, dragging up as much of old Brooklyn as he can to infuse into the words. Steve startles, even though the doorway and Bucky in it are clearly reflected behind him in the mirror. Steve’s eyes flick to him and away again, his face going pink from the tips of his ears and spreading all the way down to his chest. He fidgets with his skirt, hands smoothing over the folds of it self consciously. “It looks a little silly,” he mutters, chewing on his already chapped lower lip. Word count: 5470

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Title: Stay Collaborator(s): Bird/plutosrose Link: AO3 Square: C3 - Free Square Rating: Explicit Ship(s): Sam/Bucky Major tags/warnings: Post-Canon, First Time Summary: “So, are you keeping the outfit?” Word count: 1919

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Title: It's Not a Miracle You Need Collaborator(s): UisceOneLove Link: AO3 Square: Y3 - At a Crossroads Rating: Teen Ship(s): James "Bucky" Barnes/Steve Rogers Major tags/warnings: Post-Endgame, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Hopeful Ending Summary: Sitting out on the dock of Tony's lakehouse while the others slept, Steve thought about where he was expected to go from here. It's a good thing Bucky's around to help him see where that can be. Word count: 1584

[arceneades]

Why I Love She-Ra (2018)

I watched She-Ra after my YouTube feed had been inundated with She-Ra for a couple of years. I just sort of wanted to know what it was all about. People were talking. I was curious.

I think the first time I felt like crying was during the theme song the first time I saw it.

“We’re Gonna Win In The End!”

This was a queer show. I knew that. And... well, I grew up in the 1980s. And people, we are winning. We are winning this fucking fight with the forces of fucking darkness, some of which were in my own mind and heart, and it has been a long god damn slog but we are winning.

In the late 1990s and early 2000s, I worked for a company that published a phone book (yes, a printed book, with phone numbers in it that you could call. It was a different time, okay?) that was targeted to the gay community. Specifically, it was a yellow page directory with advertisements for restaurants, and florists, and plumbers, and towing services, and any other business that you could think of that were paying money to let gay customers know that they would be treated like fucking human beings by that business.

That book doubled in size every year for 4 years. Because we were winning.

It took decades to go from the Defense of (straight) Marriage Act to nationwide acknowledgement of marriage rights. But we got there. Because we are winning. And I care about this fight.

So, yeah. I’m in. Let’s go. We’re gonna win in the end.

The feels did not stop. I cried during “Promise”. Well, I mean, of course I did, I’m not an inhuman monster. I cried during the battle of Bright Moon. I cried for Catra when Shadow Weaver left her, when she hurt her friends, when her pain and rage tore the world apart. She just kept breaking my heart. I wanted her to make just one good decision.

She did, of course, and I cried about that too. I knew what was coming with “Corridors” but it killed me anyway, Adora’s “no, no, no” just bruised my soul.

And “Save the Cat”? Adora’s righteous fury and the power of her love for Catra... again. Tears.

Maybe it was just 2020. Maybe my emotions were just close to the surface. I don’t know. I HURT for those kids. I wanted them to be okay. I still want them to be okay.

But I also felt seen. Seen in a way that... was different.

I was a middle aged, cis-gendered, straight white male. And this show was hitting me, and hitting me hard, and I didn’t know why. I was invested in this love story. I was invested in the war. I knew they were the same thing.

Not unusual, I suppose. I’m a Jane Austen fan. I like love stories. I like it when main characters get together. I’ve read Pride & Prejudice more than twice. But I don’t feel seen when I do.

Part of it was Catra. We all probably have some Catra in us. I might have more than most. It’s taken a long time to get some of my more extreme behaviors under control, although my rage and trauma tends to direct inward, not outward.

Part of it was Adora. I love characters that reflect fierce protectiveness, a part of us that wants to stand between the universe and the people we love and say “No, You can’t hurt them. You can’t have them. They. Are. Mine.”

But hey, you know, Tony Stark has that vibe in “Avengers: Endgame” and even dies to protect what he loves and while that speaks to me, I don’t feel... seen.

Tony Stark is played by Robert Downey Jr, an actor I grew up watching. Avengers is essentially built for me to watch. Literally, I am the target market, me and the kids I’m going to bring to the theater. I don’t feel seen. Marketed to, maybe. But not seen.

Which led me to wonder why a love story about two lesbians who are too young to drink, set in a world where it is not only okay to be a teenage lesbian but it isn’t even worth commenting on, meant so very much to me.

And thinking about that reminded me of something. Which is that when I was super into Second Life, a decade or so ago, I always used a female avatar. Always.

And it felt right. Perfectly right. And I had a lot of conversations with trans people who were also using female avatars because it helped them get along with their dysphoria. A feeling I don’t have. Of course.

I mean, sure. I prefer playing female avatars in games. That’s totally a cis-het thing to do, right? You know the joke, “If I’m going to be staring at an ass, it might as well be a nice ass.”

Okay, so maybe, just maybe, I did sort of decide that I wasn’t a man during that time. I wasn’t sleeping. I was depressed. I hated my job. Totally understandable. My friends straightened me out, shamed me out of that. Maybe that wasn’t the nicest way they could have approached that but I got shamed out of it, didn’t I? If I were actually trans, that wouldn’t happen. Right?

And I like being male. Well, I like the privileges that come with being male. I like having the upper body strength, and I find other men to be sufficiently terrifying that I wouldn’t want to... take off the armor. Not around them.

Yes, maybe, just maybe, I would prefer to have sex as a woman, given the option. That doesn’t make me trans, it just means that I really feel at home around lesbians and want to be a part of their world. Totally normal cis-het feelings there. It’s not like I would actually transform into a woman if I had a magic wand. I mean, not permanently. Not all the time. Just, you know, sometimes. When I wanted to take the armor off. Just when it felt safe.

Totally. Normal. Cis-Het. Feelings.

I mean, obviously I don’t want to be a woman. I don’t want to carry breasts around, for one thing. Looks uncomfortable. I like having just muscle up there instead, thank you very much. And I’m super comfortable with short hair and a beard. It’s a good look for me. I wouldn’t want to look different. I’m happy with my hormone mix. So, there you go. I’m a boy. 

So why don’t I want to be one?

This argument has been raging in my skull forever. Am I a boy? I’m not a girl. I like being able to grow a beard. I’m as Dad a Dad as any Dad on the face of the planet. I don’t want breasts. But... I sort of do want hips.

When I first started questioning my gender, as far as I knew, there were two options. And neither of them fit. Because what I am is non-binary. A fact I would not know if Noelle had not made SPOP, and I don’t know how I can possibly thank her enough for that.

And according to the kids on the enby lesbians server, I’m a non-binary lesbian, which explains the fact that I’m on my fifth Subaru, but doesn’t explain why I don’t currently share my life with a mixed breed Labrador.

I am queer. I felt seen watching She-Ra because I was seen. On Etheria, everyone would use my pronouns. On Etheria, my friends would have helped me through my gender crisis. On Etheria, even in a war, we love and accept each other for who we are. We see each other.

We’re not on Etheria. But I believe we’ll get there.

We’re gonna win in the end.

[occasionalrpmemes]

Will Wood: the Normal Album Sentence Starters

lines taken from the 2020 album.  edit as desired.  tw: violence, disordered eating, gender dysphoria, mental illness, substance abuse, suicidal ideation, death

01.  Suburbia Overture: Greetings from Mary Bell Township! / (Vampire) Culture / Love Me, Normally

“Trick or treat.  Merry Christmas.”

“Howdy neighbor!”

“Thank you Jesus!”

“It don’t look like survival, but buy now or die.”

“You’re not alone.”

“The lights are on, but no one’s home.”

“Takes a village to fake a whole culture.”

“Home is where the heart is- You ain’t homeless, but you’re heartless.”

“It’s the safest on the market.”

“You still gotta watch where you park it.”

“Give me your half-life crisis.”

“I can tell that you know where paradise is.”

“Parasites don’t care what your blood type is.”

“A snowflake only matters in a blizzard.”

“Everyone knows that nobody knows that.”

“Well, word gets around on hit number stations.”

“Smile and wave, boys, kiss the cook, live laugh and love, please pass the pills.”

“It’s only culture.  It’s only culture.  It’s only culture.”

“Didn’t they want your blood?”

“Why apologize when you turn blue and cold?

“Hey, fuck your culture.”

“Do you know the difference between blazing trails and slash-and-burn?”

“Hey, you’re only mortal.”

02.  2econd 2ight 2eer (well, that was fun, goodbye)

“The devil made me do it, but I also kinda wanted to.”

“Forget bored stiff, I got rigor mortis.”

“My third eye’s open and I like what I see.”

“If you knew what I knew, if you saw what I see- ”

“But I got facts and I’m not afraid to use ‘em.”

“I’m getting better one forever at a time.”

“If sick is defined by what’s different, well then pull the plug out and let me die.”

”Who I am, I choose through all the things I do.”

“If it rhymes, it’s true, but I hate poetry.”

“Well that was fun, goodbye.”

03.  Laplace’s Angel (Hurt People?  Hurt People!)

“Have you ever died in a nightmare?  Woke up surprised you hadn’t earned your fate?”

“Have you ever felt like Atlas, threw your back out on the axis, and collapsed and threw the planet away?”

“Nobody dies agnostic.”

“Nobody dies agnostic, but we still dial 9-1-1.”

“Am I really that bad?”

“Whatever you think of me, if you were in my shoes, you’d walk the same damn miles I do.”

“With my head up in the clouds, I can see so much ground.”

“From up here, you look like ants in a row.”

“It doesn’t take a killer to murder.  It only takes the reason to kill.”

“The difference twixt fate and free will is whether you’re singing.”

“You wash your hands of where you’ve been until you flood the second floor.  Neatly fold your skeletons, but still can’t shut the closet door.”

“The only ones in need of love are those who don’t receive enough.”

“You could break an angel’s fall, and ignore the Devil’s call.”

“It’s a small hell after all.”

“Man, no more than animal, is made of moral chemicals.”

“If you were in my shoes, you’d see I wear the same size as you.”

04.  I / Me / Myself

“I’ve been feeling lightheaded since I lost enough weight to fit back in my skin.”

“Am I pretty now?”

“For some reason, I find myself lost in what you think of me.”

“I wish I could be a girl, and that way you’d wish I could be your girlfriend, boyfriend.”

“Am I pretty enough to lie to?”

“Just little old me in a big, big world.”

“I’ve been feeling lighthearted since I gained enough weight back to cover my bones.”

“You’ll be walking out early, but the show must go on.”

“No, I know that I’m wrong.  But I love how you’re on my side when I cross that line.”

“It’s been a point of contention between myself and this body that they stuck me in.”

“The privilege of being born to be a man.”

”I am quantum physics; my witness brings me into existence.”

”Am I pretty enough to love back?”

“Am I pretty enough to fucking die?”

“I wish-”

“Don’t you think that there’s a chance that you could live without it?”

05.  ...well, better than the alternative

“My daughter’s growing up.  She’s gonna be a lot like me, but I don’t wanna be at all like me.”

“I don’t wanna be at all like me.”

“You’re telling me I’m holding up eleven fingers.”

“Stranger things than death can happen.”

“Everybody knows that nobody knows that.”

“Everybody’s in on everybody’s business.”

“This isn’t my first Christmas, I know mistletoe when I see it.”

“Baby, could you play along with me?”

“Baby, would that be alright with you?”

“When we find out what’s wrong with me, could you tell me how I’m right for you?”

“Could you tell me how I’m right for you?”

“Could you tell me if I’m still pretty?”

“If they could see the future back when times were simple...”

“If everyone’s sick, well then, nobody can catch it.”

“Everybody’s all up in my god damn business.”

“This isn’t my first kiss.”

“It’s better to be lost than loved, now, isn’t it?”

“Everybody’s all up in my motherfucking business!”

“This isn’t my first anything.”

“After all of that’s been done to me, could you tell me how, could you tell me how, could you tell me—”

“What’s so wrong about what’s wrong with me?”

“I’m just trying to do what’s right by you!”

06.  Outliars and Hyppocrates: a fun fact about apples

“Did you know that the hole in the apple didn’t come from the outside in?  It was eaten from the core and out to the skin, and that’s why you’ll never find the worm in it.”

“The disease is defined by its treatment.”

“You people make me sick.”

“Who’d want to be human anyway?”

“Why’d you come into this world or come out that way?”

“Isn’t it funny?  Well, not "ha-ha" funny, but y’know, funny.”

“I doubt that you would even if you could change.”

“You think it makes you special, but it makes you strange.”

“The things that make you special are the things that make you strange.”

“I am the shadows cast aside by gallows, and you the red-hot sky.”

“And if you’re believers, then why would you grieve for the dead, instead of a devil that you never prayed for?”

“Too weird to love, too scared to die.  Too alien to take you home.”

“Who’d want to belong to anyone?”

“I mean, what do people even do?”

“If you love me, let me let you go.”

“Five more minutes, please?  You wouldn’t believe the dream I just had.”

07.  Black Box Warrior - OKULTRA

“Bless the torpedoes!”

“For what?  For what??”

“For what it’s worth, if it was going to kill you, boy, it would have by now.”

“There’s no more looking back, it’s looking up or looking down.”

“Wonder if Christ-Consciousness would charge a cancellation fee.”

“Auf wiedersehn!  Au revoir!”

“Hello, welcome.  Why don’t you take a seat?  Get comfortable, relax, take a second if you need to.”

“Now, what’s bothering you?”

“Well, why don’t we start at the beginning?”

“Growing up, how was your relationship with the fundamentals of conscious existence?”

“Did you die before your day?”

“You got a better idea?  It’s about the best we could come up with.”

“What, you think ideas spread because they’re good?  No, they spread because people like them.”

“So here we are once again.  Holding, as it were, a mirror up to your mirror.”

“I guess it’s just something people do!”

“You learn to be an animal instead.”

“I never did think you better than this.”

“It’s you who are the problem.  Not the things you do, but something sick inside.”

“Boy, you really is defective.”

“Offer up your innocence, please ignore the side effects.”

“You’ve lost your mind and almost lost your life before, so you’ll be fine!”

“Why would you want to look back?  I mean, it’s no good looking back. So try to look forward now.”

“For what it’s worth, if they were gonna get you boy, they would have by now.”

08.  Marsha, Thankk You for the Dialectics, but I Need You to Leave.

“They could prescribe you any illness you’d like if you define the terms of your ailments.”

“A crow don’t know the smell of carbon monoxide.”

“How many years have you been on that couch?”

“Your draw a line in the sand where it ends and you begin, but the tide rolls in, so who knows?”

“A little identity never hurt nobody, but lately you’ve been focusing too much on yourself.”

“How many milligrams of you are still left in there?”

“Back in my day, we didn’t need no feel-good pills and no psychiatrists.  We just drank ourselves to death.  And god damn it, we liked it!”

“What’s a symptom, what’s a flaw, can it be both?”

“Well, I suppose that’s an answer.”

“Would you give up your humanity for just a touch of sanity?”

“They’ve discovered a cure for the symptoms of being alive.  It’s a painless procedure with a low rate of failure, but very few patients survive.”

“And a little conformity never hurt nobody, but lately I’ve been worried that you’re losing yourself.”

“What’s my prognosis?”

“Disease is in the eye of the beholder.”

“Tell me ‘so it goes.’”

“Better safe than sorry, and we both know the danger.”

“So doctor, could you run another test?”

“If our harmonies don’t sync, we can change our voices.”

“Don’t heed no evil wills of moral nihilists.”

“Don’t you make me waste my breath.”

“GOD DAMN IT!”

“Does aspirin kill you with the pain?“

“You’re not your thoughts, you’re not your brain, you’re just the character you’ve made.”

“What seem like separate body parts come together to believe they’re you, and not just chemistry.”

“It’s not the way that you were raised, or what the advertisements say.”

“It’s not what you pay for, what you pray for, what you want, or what you say.”

“Something tells me that you need, forgive me now if I misspeak--”

“Something tells me you prefer to be sitting there flipping through those old issues of People.”

“Well, that’s our time.  See you next week.”

09.  Love, Me Normally

“In lipstick on the mirror are the lyrics to my obituary.”

“Crossing my eyes, dot my T’s.”

“I was delivered holding scissors.”

“I live deliberately, I’m a quitter.”

“I never agreed to participate in this game.”

“Won’t follow my dreams, cause they all got me waking up screaming.”

“I’d rather be normal.  Yes, so normal.”

“I suggest that we keep this informal.”

“A normal human being wouldn’t need to pretend to be normal.”

“Well, I guess that’s the least that I owe ya.”

“C’mon, c’mon, and love me normally.”

“If I could live in third person, well, I don’t think life would be much worse than it is.”

“Is it courageous or escapist to leave the quarantine when you’re contagious?”

“It may just be a cold.  And besides, I don’t wanna get old.”

“I drank myself to death to be the afterlife of the party.”

“When the afterparty came, I was rolling in my grave.”

“Now, this is the part of the song where I talk to my audience.”

“There’s something I want from you hepcats tonight.”

“I want you to look to your left.  Look to your right.  Your twelve o’clock, three o’clock, six o’clock, nine o’clock, rock around the clock tonight–”

“I want you to find those points of no return, those singularities, those burning rings of fire in the beautiful pupils and the beautiful eyes of the beautiful boy, girl, neither, both, or in-between that you brought with you tonight.  And I want you to tell ’em how you really feel!”

“Jam that square peg in the round hole in their hearts!”

“You love them exactly the way that everybody else is.”

“I was nothing before, so I couldn’t have asked to be born.  I’ll be nothing again, so what am I between now and then?”

“Is there nothing to fear?  Cause shit’s getting weird.”

“So to God who made this man: you better have one hell of a plan.”

10.  Memento Mori: the most important thing

“If you’re lucky you’ll be surrounded by the ones that you love, when the lights in your eyes fade and life flashes by.

“One day you’re going to die.”

“Heaven, hell, nirvana, nothing, no one knows how it ends.”

“Rest in peace— or pieces.”

“Read your horoscopes, your palms and tarot cards.  But either way your destination ain’t very far.”

“You could drown, or choke, or burn, or be hit by a car.”

“What doesn't kill you makes you stronger, but something will eventually.”

“One day you’ll look back at the life that you lead.  No more future left to fear that you’ll have the past to regret.”

“But your worries will be over if you truly realize— one day you’re going to die!”

“Take it away, hands!”

“In the fabric of time and in the vastness of space, a billion amounts to nothing in infinity’s face.”

“Your life never mattered, so who cares if it's a waste?”

“Well, one day you’ll be not even a faint memory.”

“You’ll never know what it all means.”

“Just keep this in mind: that everything and everyone goes with the passage of time.”

“No need to fear, ’cause when it’s here, you won’t be alive.”

“Try not to think about it!”

“So if you only have one chance, you oughta try your best to live as you like.”

[carlyraejepstein]

potentially upsetting topics: sui, gender dysphoria, abuse and parents, sex

Elliot Page’s coming out rescued an awful day. Its wording is unbelievably powerful, a comment I have made once before and will continue to do so. In it, he so strongly encompasses the fears, the sorrow, the rage, but most importantly the determination and the defiance of not only him but every trans person. I hesitate to use the word “community” because it implies a certain connection that might just not be there; I play a bit of Counter-Strike but I don’t consider myself part of the Counter-Strike community; yet when I read Elliot’s words I feel solidarity, I feel a pull to the trans community that I often don’t feel I pay my dues to, and it feels good, really good. Like I said on Twitter once, other trans people being, existing, living, is just rad. Inspiring, even, despite how that word has been worn out by cis people.

However, there’s a certain something that Elliot didn’t write, for Elliot never wrote “I am a man”; only his name, and pronouns, how he wishes to be referred to. Of course, we cannot possibly know what this omission means or does not mean to Elliot, but it’s something that concurred with a shift in how I perceive my own gender.

I remember first properly ruminating on gender in 2012 or 2013. My understanding was primitive, coming from Wikipedia. Once I knew what transgender or, given the time period, transsexual, the curiosity never really went away. I knew at this point about transition, and I knew about deed polls because of my resentment of my parents, I knew about HRT and I even knew about the GICs. I felt compelled to be an ally in that turbulent period in both my life and in the online culture I immersed myself in from around 2015 to 2017. At this time a friend was going through their own transition and seeing them gave me pause for thought; partly pride, partly worry but a small kernel of imagination, wondering if that could ever be me. It was when I went to sixth form, with its environment permitting greater yet still constrained self expression, that I felt gender dysphoria hit me with its full weight. Thinking, wondering, worrying about being transgender has been the central dialogue of my internal and external monologue ever since. Not a day passes where I don’t think about the dysphoria I feel over my continued closet-dwelling and the malignantly gendered properties of my body. On a January morning in 2019, at my very lowest point, motionless under the covers, I gave myself a choice between transition and death, and I chose transition.

It’s been a complex journey. When I was 13 I shortened my gender neutral name to make it more masc (which I have now happily embraced as my middle name). I leant into the deepening of my voice because I thought it gave me authority, conditioned through the harsh words of people from public Team Fortress 2 servers. I’ve done almost everything under the sun that gets people to say “I’d never have known!” when you come out to them; I worry that I still do and that nothing has changed. I’ve gone and cross-dressed when my parents were out, and I’ve been traumatised by Susan’s Place. I am autistic, no one who has met me can escape that fact; not that I would want to, and as a consequence I am so much more confident in my presence on the internet than I ever have been in the flesh, despite me still not knowing how to make friends; hence I’ve ended up trying to piece my transition together through 4chan (I know, bad) and Reddit and Twitter.

Perhaps the biggest reason I am not out is the time when I decided I would come out to my mother as trans. When we were in Munich we had walked past a pride parade, and when we got back to the apartment I revealed off hand that I was bi. My mother chided me for not telling them before hand since it was “polite” to do so, as if it were not my choice to make because, as I still believe to this day, it’s not a big deal and it’s none of their business. But I decided this time it was important, and that I could trust her. It turns out that just like every other time, trusting my mother is a bad idea that is guaranteed to cause me pain every time I make that mistake. She told me that because she “knows more about [me] than [I] do”, that she thought that I was just straight up wrong, couched it in rhetoric about how she thought that I was too weak to be trans, and quoted the shockingly offensive “autism is extreme male brain” theory to me. It was really devastating at the time and I think it still affects me to this day, especially as she constantly tries to worm her tendrils back into my life after I moved out.

But enough about my mother; she is a fucking flat out abuser. She has emotionally abused me, and undoubtedly my brother, all our lives. I was relieved that my dad chose not to react aggressively as she did, but with a modicum of respect and agreement not to make such a big deal out of it, something I would never expect my mother to match. In the middle of writing this piece I had to decide that I could not do it any longer, and I would never let her back into my life again.

Where that conversation in late 2018 relates to Elliot Page’s statement is my mother’s purported belief that “you don’t have to define yourself as a man or a woman”. Going past the fact that she is lying, since her tolerance for all trans people is thinner than the grey hairs on her head going on the basis that she couldn’t bring herself to say one positive thing to her own daughter that afternoon, it struck me recently that I can more eloquently describe my gender through elimination rather than a label. I am happy to call myself a woman, a trans woman, and I don’t feel as if I really am wavering in or around the binary. But what I can say for definite is that while I have been a boy for almost all my life, and am holding onto that, I am not, and never will be, a man.

Where that leaves me is that I am not a man, but must I be a woman? If I am perhaps not a woman, am I non-binary? No; it doesn’t feel right. However, if I attach just a convenience to the label woman, I can give myself that flexibility in how I feel and how I present myself, and perhaps the biggest example of that is how in recent months I have made peace with my voice. It is not really a femme voice; I hit vocal fry just speaking normally. But I know how to be expressive with it; it is my voice that I have honed over 19 years after all. One day I want to find someone who will help me upgrade my voice (and yes, upgrade) but keeping it means I fulfil one cool thing about being trans, and that is saying fuck you to the very existence of the gender binary. I keep this voice out of necessity, but I’m still trans femme, I am still a woman and I still want my facial hair zapped off.

As well, I reserve the right to say I used to be a boy. Not a man, but a boy. That’s why they call it boymoding, right? How else can I describe the first 17 years of my life? I can be a boy all the same now, although I may be pushing it aged 20, and at the point at which I am really stretching that concept which at this point I am adhering to solely for my safety and comfort, I shouldn’t need to use it anymore. Wishful thinking, of course.

I think we should consider why we use “man” and “woman” in the first place. From my perspective they are simply words to describe people with two different sets of primary and secondary sexual characteristics, convenient because, well, being cis is unavoidably common. But they are not discrete, as we so often have to reiterate using intersex people as an unwilling crutch, where one does not occur in the other they are so often analogous and often they overlap! Supposedly 60% of teenage boys develop further breast tissue, and 40% of women have some form of facial hair. Thinking that the two are discrete gives rise to the idea of “biological sex”, a concept developed by cis people either to misgender trans people in a way they think is philosophically rigorous, or to reconcile their tenuous support for trans people with a continuing belief in the gender binary. Personally I would like to smash the concept of biological sex to bits because it is not useful to us. At the very least it may describe one’s primary sexual characteristics but bottom surgery exists, and I don’t happen to think that it is “mutilation”. I don’t need to argue that “biological sex can be changed”; they are not discrete categories, and I don’t need to move between them, or seek validation for having moved between them. It is not a helpful generalisation for bodies, diverse as they are.

I must add that as a trans woman the fact that I may have a penis doesn’t mean that I use it in the same way as a man. I use mine to pee, primarily, and it’s definitely not going inside anyone except myself any time soon; a whole zine was written about how trans women fuck and use their bits to fuck, so I definitely don’t need to anyway.

Another bullshit concept is “biological destiny” or “biological reality”, although I will give less breath to this one because at it’s core it is fundamentally misogynistic, and it so often is divorced from any sensible definition of reality. It’s like if I had to have my arm amputated and then someone came up to me and said “you’ll always have two arms, you were born with them and you’ll die with them”.

I’ve heard and thought a lot about gender abolition but it seems to me that its proponents expect that like the state, gendered differences will just disappear over time. But I don’t want that to happen. If the binary is done away with I don’t want gender to disappear I want it to flourish! Because gender is beautiful, men are beautiful, women are beautiful, and everyone in between or outwith are beautiful. On the other hand, me and you don’t need to be men, or women, or call ourselves non-binary to be beautiful. Being trans is about cultivating your own beauty and your own identity. When cissiety demands that the only identity and presentation we’re allowed is one that corresponds to what they decided was between our legs when we were born, why give ourselves only one other choice?

I don’t really know how to end this piece because I wrote one half of it one day and the other half a couple of weeks later. At the very least I’m glad I can attribute my peace with not necessarily being a woman but a femme to Elliot Page, and not my rotten bastard mother.

[inserttemptitlehere]

An unasked for “moderate” take on TERFs v Trans rights

Nobody asked, I might get cancelled for this (probably by both sides), and honestly I don’t have much belief that this will even be read by many people. But it’s frustrating seeing people being condemned for reasonable fears and requests and I just feel the need to put my opinions out into the ether just to have them out there and so I can stop dwelling on them every time I see stuff like this happen again. 

Like, I just want to slap all the TERFs that purposefully misgender people and spout transphobic rhetoric. And I want to shake everyone who labels anything that complains about misogyny specific to cis women as TERF-y. God.

It seems like many “TERFs” are not actively malicious (although many definitely are), but are merely women who’ve been sexually assaulted or just been ground down by the patriarchy and are understandably (although not necessarily justifiably) scared/upset at the thought of any person with a male body coming into their safe spaces or into their fought for institutions. Whereas most trans people just want to live their lives and be accepted as the gender they identify as without wanting to cause any harm to anyone (although again, there are some they definitely do). 

I personally found much of JK Rowling’s recent essay to be fear mongering, but given that she suffered abuse from her husband I could understand and sympathize with why she had those fears even though I disagree with her conclusions about the actions society/government should take regarding them. I honestly just feel sad for her. I feel sad that the experiences she’s been through have made her so scared. I feel sad that despite the millions of dollars she’s donated to charity and work she’s done to make the world a better place she has now hurt so many people and this action will be what she’s remembered for. I feel sad that the extremely angry responses she’s gotten will most likely only solidify her fear and perpetuate her actions that will most likely cause more hurt for more people.

I’ll also say that her original tweet that sparked it all was valid! It is dehumanizing to reduce people to their genitals (ironically something people say TERFs do) and it erases the fact that almost all of these people are targeted because they are women. And it feels somewhat sexist as I’ve never seen an article refer to a certain group as “penis havers” or “semen producers”. I can, however, still see how it would be exclusive however to only refer to “people who menstruate” as “women”. A better wording would’ve been “women and trans men”. Because then no one would be left out. And don’t @ me about that somehow leaving out ‘trans women’, because guess what, there are cis women who don’t menstruate! If we can recognize that “Not all men” is a bad take, why on earth are we accepting “Not all women” as a correct one?

Look, not all cis women menstruate. Not all cis women can or do become pregnant. But we still label these as generic ‘women’s issues’ because they affect a large portion of women. But it should go both ways! I believe that makes the gross femininity trans women need to perform to qualify for hormones a ‘women’s issue’ and the difficulty of getting insurance to cover said hormones a ‘women’s issue’. Because they’re issues that affects a large portion of women. Heck, I know most Transmen find the fact that some TERFs include them in their feminism irritating, but I’m also fine with including specific issues affecting the ones that don’t feel that way as ‘feminist issues’.

I am 100% against misgendering people, am 100% supportive of including trans women’s specific issues as part of the overall fight to help women, and I will happily state “transwomen are women”. But, I do agree that there are a handful of cis women spaces/institutions that it becomes morally grey to accept transwomen into without any sort of provisions. Especially given the fact that if there were absolutely zero strings attached to legally identifying a certain way, then there are definitely cis people who would abuse the system. Personally, I don’t think we should completely structure our society based on these fears - although I can again understand the people who have not had as privileged of a life as I have feeling differently (even if I ultimately disagree with them).

Anyway my take on said spaces/institutions:

Bathrooms: Single parents of opposite sexed kids already use the opposite gendered bathroom to teach them how to use it (and should be allowed to). If a cis man wants to rape you in a bathroom that you’re alone in, I don’t think the societal norms are really going to stop him. And since trans people just want to use the bathroom in peace, let them. Maybe it’s because I’ve never felt comfortable peeing in public and thus never felt the bathroom to be a ‘safe space’, but I’ve never understood the argument against this.

Changing rooms: Go where you identify. If you start acting like a creep, then there should be some course of action to either get you banned or limit your access to said changing room. That policy should hold for cis or trans people.

Women’s support groups: Already made my opinion on this clear I hope. Although I will say that if talk about certain genitalia/bodily functions is triggering, it’s not right to shut down all discussion regarding those things for the other people there. Instead we should have, you know, trigger warnings so that everyone can either prepare themselves accordingly or leave the room and no one is triggered or feels like they are unable to talk about their issues.

Rape shelters: It is 100% valid for a cis woman that was a victim of rape to not want to share their space with someone with a working penis. If there is absolutely nothing that can be done to make said person feel safe, then it should be the right of the shelter to refuse long term stay to the person causing that issue (through no fault of their own) - although the shelter should do everything it can to make sure the trans woman has a place to stay/go. On the other hand, if a trans woman was already there before such a victim, it would not be right to toss out the trans woman to grant access to the cis woman who has the problem with them.

Sports: I personally don’t know enough of the science behind it, but it seems to me that bare minimum they shouldn’t be allowed to compete without doing hormone therapy. And even then the skeletal differences and remaining hormonal differences may still prevent things from being reasonably fair (although I wouldn’t know). It’s definitely not fair to let a trans person pre-hormones compete on the team their gender matches with. Honestly, in an ideal world we’d somehow have an objective way to sort sports into co-ed groups based on athletic ability similar to how weight classes work for wrestling.

Prisons: Non violent crime? Go where you identify. Violent crime? Sorry, gotta go based on your sex (unless you’ve had bottom surgery). It is immoral to lock a convicted rapist with a penis in a cell with women who have no way of getting away from them. I mean, maybe we could have ‘wings’ for trans people so they could go to the prison they identify as and they’d just have separate cells. But until that becomes the norm, the few violent trans criminals should not be allowed to go where they identify.

Kids: Not an institution, but definitely a hot topic. Personally, I think only puberty blockers until they hit adulthood and extensive therapy to make sure that they are in fact trans. Admittedly JK Rowling’s essay about this bit sounded a bit like, “The spooky trans cult is coming for your neurodivergent and gay children!” But it did have small feeling of truth to it as well. As a GNC, cis, autistic woman who had dysphoria as a teen I also worry that I might have been incorrectly diagnosed as trans if I’d been born later. But I don’t think it’s something we as a society need to be extremely worried about or use as an excuse to make things harder on trans kids and adults. We just need to make sure that kids get the therapy they need to sort out whether they’re trans or just having the common dysphoria you have as a teen and chafing against gender roles. We can rubber stamp adults if they want, it’s only kids that should have to go through some minor hoops.

Finally, on being “Gender Critical”. I have to say, the idea of smashing the concept of gender and everybody just living as they are with no societal expectations for them to be one way or another based loosely on their biological sex sounds wonderful. I’m just upset that so many who support this concept are so transphobic because technically in that future there would be no ‘trans’ people (except those that suffer dysphoria) and they feel this gives them the right to act horribly towards trans people. I did recently talk to some TRAs who explained to me that, unlike ‘Gender Critical’ proponents, their ‘gender’ model is split into multiple components. That you’ve got your biological sex (your parts), your gender identity (what you feel you are), your gender presentation (how you dress and act), and gender roles (how society expects you to act based on your gender). So it seems to me, that we can still reach a version of that wonderful future that doesn’t erase people. Smashing gender roles and the idea that there is a ‘correct’ way to present as a gender would achieve ‘female liberation’ while still allowing for people who still desire to identify a certain way. We shouldn’t completely do away with gender, just the things that society expects from it. 

[tammyhybrid21]

THybrid’s Mummy Rant(pt 1)

ALRIGHT!

Sooo…

I kind of said I would be organizing a big giant analysis and rant on this character-- Because I have many, many feelings. Buuut I think this is probably going to be something that just ends up diving into a lot more for the context I do have. Both in terms of the movie, and the research I've been rolling around in--

So-- before I put this under a cut/readmore, can I put some context into this?! And by context--

I mean in general I would not be here if Mummy hadn't been the one Netflix had for the Movie's preview. Mummy is why I'm here, just because whoop. That's a character design that CALLS ME! So yeahh-- that out of the way…

First Impressions:

Sooo… in the first movie Mummy is… only in the last third, roughly of the movie. Which is a crying shame in all honesty because for me he steals the show from that point. AND we get to see SO MANY Sides. Like, just… there's a bit to unpack here, and it also leads into more of my Autism squee talk--

But I don't think I could even really articulate everything in a straight cohesive manner so I'll sort of sum it with the most important screencaps.

Soooo, I have a lot to say… and a picture says a thousand words… but especially here and okay, so those screencaps are… not exactly all the story, but they say a lot for what they say. And then you can compound that specifically with the research that I have… again, been just rolling in. Because GIMME!

Sooo anyway, let me talk about these screencaps while my brain is turned on. Because I feel that all of these are important! Including that first glimpse! Because like-- what you need to understand is-- Do you know how hard catching something like that is?! And how did he notice it. Which like, that's probably a sensitivity thing, but specifically! That would whistle on the way down!

Then!

LET ME TALK ABOUT MASKING!

Like just-- all these next pictures and moments! They bring up Masking. Because look at him when he's first approaching, first seen in full. He's threatening, intimidating(up until Tadeo spots him and it's just scream for them both) BUT THEN IN PRIVATE! Clapping, flapping, and well, we can watch Movie 2 with a very specific lense based on a piece of WoG I found…

But even those next few screencap moments--

Like, Mummy is important, BUT there are rules of how you're supposed to present yourself. Like look at him! Look at him in front of the guards! How Paititi is revealed and even the lead up, like, he has a good shift from the slight goofball to commanding and then to intimidating and just…

Snap fingers and the guards respond(which then with movie two… boyyyyy I want to know what happened). And as much as we think that hug is intense…

And then look at the shy nervous child. WHICH I'm going to bring in a moment or two from the Series, Descubre con Tadeo(which is a fun watch even if I only get like, maybe a fifth of the content).

He's insecure and nervous… and we related it to being like… first day of school jitters. BUT THEN he-- also has a perfect shift here as well.

Put on your professional voice! And like, I suppose some things could be argued in terms of Mummy's antics in the second film. But I just… have too much more to say that the whole movie kind of feels like.

"FIRST TIME I AM FREE!" in terms of how Mummy is running around and just having fun! You ever just want to cut loose mate?! Scream, or go wild… but like… with the second movie I have other places to just go, WAIT?! What happened?! And also just analyze moments that are… well…

But like, number one is a background moment actually(and I hope so muuuuch that it means something in movie three please)

LOOK AT TADEO'S CONSPIRACY BOARD!

Like I'm just here like, Mummy?! What did you do?! On his trip over, which for all is kind of implied/feels like a B-Line, and I have… other thoughts and feelings on that. But like, the conspiracy board! Mummy! Also considering that the English Localization has Tadeo in Chicago(and I want to know if that's true for everywhere--) As an aside in this moment, can we just appreciate the jump of quality in the animation between the movies?! Like ahhhh the details! I just hng-- And some things in the whole animated series as well…

Edutainment.

WHICH features BOTH Mummy and Tadeo just special interest dumping. And it's A++

He also hums the theme song in his take over episode, and dances and is just ahahahahah

Which, this is one of the two Mummy just-- yanks the show for himself moments… The other has him playing with everyone else as dolls and I just--

Yes

Gender

Which look, I've been going off some level of fluidity for him! Since I watched the second movie and he just-- STOLE THE SHOW! And the credits sequence, I have… a lot to say about his around the world trip but most of that ultimately amounts to disorganized screaming about the fact that he starts the travel with only one dangling earring and ends it with two to speak to the guards--

And that then goes into--

ANYWAY--

Genderwise, I've been informed that there's a WoG confirmation of nb, which… Good Representation! Even if I have personal… bad, yucky, awkward feelings about the term, if that's the confirmed canon term. Well. My personal dysphoria with the term specific aside.(Non non, it always feels like--) NO WONDER I HELLA RELATE!

For those not caught up-- I myself identify as Agender. Which is a nb-spectrum gender, or as I refer to it as when trying to explain. "Gender, yes". I have a gender, and that gender is yes it's something and exists. But like, I'm not tied to the binary of Male-Female, not really. Sooooo--

If Mummy is confirmed nb, which, I will be source hunting for sure.

Well, his relatability to me just skyrocketed EVEN MORE!

Like I'm sorry, you don't understand! That's super important on MANY levels. Not just for the rare gender to be highlighted. BUT!

Mummy is very Autistic Coded. More on the female stereotyped Autism as well-- and then FOR THE BIG THING! He's Inca!

Like, do you people even have a scale for the important points that he's hitting here?! (And if we add apparently spoken about Asexuality?! Excuse me!)

Like I don't know how much I could say on how important this is representation and character wise…

Sooo

Moving on.

Inca

Sooooo… this is probably something dumb to tack onto the end but. I'll be the first to admit it. I'm… coming from a culturally blind/naïve perspective but-- it's something intrinsic and important to understanding Mummy as character. He's from a cultural background I honestly don't yet know enough about. (Can I ever know enough though?!)

He's an Inca. And more than that-- WoG seems to have implied, he's Royalty, whiiiiich puts into perspective some of those screencap moments and brings about a host of interesting research topics for me to just gleefully dive into and roll around in.

BUT

With that contextual framing.

This dork, and this moment-- and thinking about how he's got the pull in the first movie to boss the guards around. Just like-- Make decisions and call the shots… and more to me…

Who put the cufflink there?! SPECIFICALLY?!

Because like, all he said was "keep it safe"

I also really, really want to know if there's some cultural significance and nuance I'm missing here, because hooo boy. As far as I have, this is basically just subtle nods and confirmations that he's royal, possibly even the recognized Auqui of their set up here(which as of movie two, possibly no longer the case).

I also have a lot to say about THIS:

In terms of the half a dozen or so resources that have STUFF to say about Handshakes to the Inca(albeit there is more than just a handshake buuuut). But this is already 11 pages in word and honestly, I don't think I could explain things in a nice and tidy context for all my FEELINGS that I have.

Sources:

Screenshots taken by myself and a friend

Tadeo Jones & Tadeo Jones 2: El secreto del Rey Midas

https://www.telecinco.es/tadeojones/descubre-con-tadeo/16940/ For additional character screenshots, albeit had to find some of it on Youtube.

WoG on Mummy's implied Royalty: https://www.animum3d.com/blog/animacion-3d-tadeo-jones/ (And English translation C&P feat. Google Translate: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1DPhIuurqtx7QJm1df31cviHsqDEgKH5t9MVstJZHpRw/edit) Point of NOTE

With the designs and the script in front, you start to shuffle ideas, by his golden dress, his hat and his cape you imagine that he is someone important within his clan, that should give a sublime aspect to his behavior, as if he belonged to royalty, someone with a refined attitude and manners, are ideas that do not have to be evident or definitive, but in some way help to set parameters when shaping your personality.

WoG on Gender & Sexuality: Still on the hunt, right now more fandom news(please gibe me the source!) FOUND: https://elcultural.com/Enrique-Gato-y-David-Alonso-El-reto-ya-no-es-sorprender-sino-crear-empatia-con-los-personajes & https://www.ecartelera.com/noticias/41656/pelicula-aventuras-definitiva-tadeo-jones-2-equipo/5/

My son asks me many times if Mummy is a boy or a girl and it's all at once. It's absolutely ambiguous and that also makes it a lot of fun.

“For us he is asexual and we really like playing with it.”

Conclusion:

WATCH THESE MOVIES PLEASE!

And get the culture being represented by one of the characters RIGHT!

[headfullofstories]

Truly Monstrous Luck - part 4

After half an hour or so of sitting alone in the dark, I decide to go out and explore some more. I put my journal in my backpack and fish out my binder, taking off my shirt quickly to slip it on over my head before throwing the shirt back on. I decide to leave my bag here, lock my room behind me and walk as quietly as I can down the hall of rooms. There are a few other people milling about, most walking the opposite direction, most of them giving me odd looks as I pass by. I keep my head down and let my feet carry me through the winding corridors. 

Eventually I find myself back in the greenhouse, moonlight spilling in through the glass ceiling, shifting and shimmering through a layer of water blocking this place from the rest of the world - is this Turtle Pond? Or some other body of water?

The butterflies are all asleep, but now lightning bugs populate the air. They hover in the air effortlessly, tiny stars filling the great big space of the greenhouse. They start to float around me as I walk in and take a spot over by a pond full of lily pads and lotus blossoms. I sit there for a few minutes, examining the greenery floating on the water, when I hear a voice behind me say, “Damn, I’m usually the only one in here this early.”

I jump several feet to the side, turning to see who just spoke. A girl with moss in her hair and piercing orange eyes stands in the doorway. She walks over to me, and I see that her feet are bare and covered in vines and greenery, decked out in dirt covered overalls and a light blue t-shirt. She studies my face for a moment, crouching down so we’re eye to eye. My breathing is shaky and erratic as I try my best to calm myself down and slow my heart rate down. Her eyes narrow as she takes in all of the details of my face. I chew on my lower lip nervously, hoping to ground myself a little more. After looking at my face for about 10 seconds, her eyes wander down towards my neck and land on the bite mark imprinted in my skin. As soon as I register this, my hand flies up to cover the mark as her eyes widen. 

“You’re a new vampire.” She remarks. “Been almost a year since we’ve had one of you here.”

I give a shaky nod and slowly uncover the bite mark again, sitting up straight as she backs away. “I’ve had a really bad 24 hours.” I mutter as I begin to fidget, hitting the heels of my hands together. “Being in here has made me feel a lot better. I was in here earlier and I ended up getting covered in butterflies.”

She gives a slow nod. “Well, if the insects all like you this much, I guess I can trust you.” She reaches out a hand, “my name is Calla. Resident dryad.”

I grab her hand, which is rough and covered in calluses. “I’m Victor.”

“Well, Victor, do you have any interest in magic?”

“Magic?” I echo, and all of the air is suddenly pulled from my lungs. “What… what kind?”

“Depends on where you get your magic from.” She responds. “You seem to have a real affinity for nature, have you ever had any interest in druidic magics?”

“C-can I even… channel nature magic? I’m not… alive anymore.” I ask, fidgeting getting slowly worse. “Do you need to be alive to use life magic?”

She thinks about it for a moment, shifting to a sitting position. “I don’t think so. I’ve never met a druidic vampire, but you seem to have a strong connection with this place.”

I manage to largely control the fidgeting, but my eyes wander to the lightning bugs floating in the air. “I think… I’d like that.”

“Great!” She smiles, “You probably have stuff going on today, being new and all, but I’m here most nights if you want to talk.”

I give her a thumbs up, then get up and start to walk around looking at all of the different planter boxes. 

As morning light starts creeping through the glass ceiling, an hour or so after the lightning bugs have settled back into their hiding places, and Calla has located herself up at the top of a cherry tree and is currently browsing her phone, Arthur ducks his head in through the doorway. 

“Hey Victor, you free?” He inquires, “Yvonne said you were probably in here.”

I nod and pull myself to my feet. I turn and wave good-bye to Calla, who gives me a 2 finger salute in return, then run over to where Arthur is waiting in the doorway.

“No backpack?” He asks, and I shake my head.

“No, I came down here at 3AM. Didn’t think I’d need it.”

“Jesus kid, did you even sleep last night? You still need to sleep, yknow.”

“Yeah, I fell asleep at like, 7:30 or something yesterday.” I assure him. “I woke up at 2:30 and got restless after a little bit.”

“Thats… actually more sleep than I usually get. Good job, kid.” He remarks, lightly patting me on the head a couple of times. I smile at that.

We set off down a new set of hallways, away from where I’ve mainly been until now. There are more people down this way, and most of them don’t even bat an eye when they see me. I’m glad that they’re not staring like everyone else I’ve met so far, but the number of people in the enclosed space of the hallway makes me a little nervous. Most of the people are a lot taller than me, too, and some of them look like they could snap me in half like a twig. I stay close behind Arthur, trying to take up as little space as possible. 

We walk for a few minutes, the floor slowly sloping upward, before stopping in front of a room labelled “Office.” We walk in and Arthur gestures for me to stay put by the door as he goes up to talk to a man with ram’s horns and lavender eyes sitting at a messy wooden desk. They talk for a moment before Arthur turns, waves me over, and starts down a short hallway going deeper into the office. The layout of this area reminds me of the offices at all of my old schools, and I don’t know if I like that… at all.

“You good?” Arthur asks, turning around to face me. I shift in place for a moment, before looking at him and giving him an uneasy shrug. 

“This place has the same layout as my old school offices.” I mutter. “It’s making me a little nervous.”

He nods sympathetically. “This place is a lot better than a school office. They actually care about you here, and the lady who schedules all of the gender confirmation surgeries has her office in here.”

My eyes go wide. “We-we’re already scheduling that?” I gasp, starting to hit the heels of my hands together excitedly. 

“Well, why would we put it off if we could schedule it now?” He smiles. “Besides, the faster we get this scheduled, the earlier your appointment will be, and the less likely you’ll be to fuck up your ribs by binding too long.”

I might actually start crying right now. My vision goes out of focus for a moment, and I start bouncing on the balls of my feet. 

“Uh, kid?” He asks, a nervous lilt to his voice. 

I look straight into his eyes, smile creeping across my face. “I’m just… so fucking excited about this.”

His expression softens, and he gives me a nod. “Being a vampire kinda sucks ass. Dysphoria sucks even more ass. There’s no cure for vampirism, but if you get rid of the parts of you that make you dysphoric, it makes immortality a little more bearable.” 

We stand out in the hallway for a few minutes before a woman pokes her head out of the office in front of us. Her eyes are the color of fire and her ears are long and pointed. She has long white hair and pale skin - not vampire pale, but pale enough to be odd.

“Arthur, good to see you.” She says in an unnervingly calm voice, then looks over to me and smiles. “Who is this young man?”

“This is Victor. He’s new.” He sighs. “We’re looking at getting him in with the top surgeon over at Moonlight.”

“Excellent!” She exclaims, “Why don’t you come in and sit down?”

Arthur heads in first and I follow close behind him, nervous of this new person; she gives me really bad vibes. 

The office is clean and smells like rubbing alcohol; it makes my head hurt a little. There’s a pair of cushioned wooden chairs on one side and a spinning desk chair on the other. Everything is organized - the macbook, paperclip box, and pencil container sitting on the desk look like they were aligned with the edge of the desk with a right-angle ruler, and the mesh waste paper bin is empty. The entire energy of the room makes me deeply uncomfortable.

 As soon as I sit down I pull my legs up into a criss-cross, and the woman grimaces a little, though she says nothing. I start tapping my fingers against my legs, and I have a hard time focusing on any one thing in the room.

The woman clears her throat as she begins to talk, "So, Victor, you're interested in top surgery?"

My focus snaps to her immediately and I nod my head vigorously. "Very much so. The… thought alone of people seeing my chest makes me nauseous and just… having them makes me really uncomfortable."

She nods, and opens up her laptop. "And… how old are you?"

"Twenty."

"Do you have any legal documents? An ID?"

I shake my head. "My wallet got stolen yesterday, and I didn't have a driver's license or a social security or health insurance card or anything like that anyways."

"And that answers my third question." She mutters as she types. "And… you are a vampire, correct? When were you turned?"

"Yesterday." I mutter, "at 10:30AM or so, I think."

She continues to type for a few more moments, then starts to mutter under her breath before speaking again. 

"Okay, Victor, the soonest appointment I see here is September 15th. Does that work for you?"

My eyes go wide. "That's… that's only 3 months away."

She nods, and repeats the question. "Does that day work for you?"

I nod vigorously again. "I don't have any prior obligations anymore."

"Excellent!" She smiles, types a little more, and closes her laptop again. "Victor, you are all sorted. It was good to see you again, Arthur. Make sure you're remembering to take care of yourself."

"I will." He sighs, and stands up. "Well, if that's all, Victor, you were going to see your brother today if I remember correctly."

I nod, and quickly get up to follow him as he heads out the door. 

"That was Eleanor." He says once we leave. "She takes care of all of the medical expenses and legal stuff around that.”

“I don’t really like her.” I remark. “She reminds me of the therapist my parents sent me to when I was 14. She said I was a crazy little girl and that I’d never be able to function at a normal capacity, but refused to give me any diagnoses.”

He gives a sympathetic nod. “Well, Eleanor’s really nice - she takes a little while to warm up to new people, but she’s a good person.”

“That’s nice to know.” I mutter. “I just hope I don’t end up being an exception to that niceness. That happens to me a lot.”

He lets out a deep sigh at that. “Some people just attract misfortune. And it fucking sucks when you’re one of those people.”

“There are people that have it a lot worse than me.” I argue. “I had a perfectly fine life and the access, money, and ability to take testosterone and wear a binder.”

“Kid, yesterday you were unemployed, homeless, and had no money, not to mention that you were effectively murdered.” He points out. “That sounds fucking horrible, and your suffering shouldn’t be discounted because other people ‘have it worse’ than you.”

“I wasn’t homeless. I got evicted, but I could’ve just stayed with my brother. And I called my bank to cancel the card that got stolen, so technically I’m not broke, I just… don’t have access to my money right now.”

“I don’t care how much you try to belittle your struggles, Victor, I’m not changing my mind.”

“I… well, you’re not changing my mind, either.” I grumble.

“We’ll see.” He mutters. “I can be very persuasive.”

[oliverwithoutthetwist]

So...

It happened.

I came out to my parents.

12 days from now, I will officially start my T journey.

There was no running away from it. It had to be done.

My parents know now.

.

-How I did it-

Called my dad yesterday.

Told him they needed to know something really important and difficult to share.

Started crying.

Said, for the first time, that I loved them dearly.

He said that, whatever it was, they wouldn’t leave me. No matter what.

So, I sent them an email each. I couldn’t bring myself to say the words out loud so I wrote them a letter so they could read all about the struggle and issues I have been facing for years.

Told them to only call me tomorrow. If they wanted.

He asked if they at least could send me a message.

I said yes.

And so… I waited...

.

Ended up getting a message from both. They didn’t say much, only a sentence each, but both still said they loved me very much and would always will. They had never said this before. We have always been very awkward people. Never had the guts to say these sort of things, even though we do in fact feel them.

.

.

.

-Today-

.

Dad:

My dad called.

And we talked.

He was definitely still shaken, he even cried (first time I witnessed that).

He didn’t believe me when I told them that I’ve known this for years. He thought this was something I had recently found out and thought to be the blame for all my mental issues.

It’s not recent though.

I’ve known and hidden this for more than 12 years.

Still, he was not convinced.

He blamed the professionals who had diagnosed me with “gender dysphoria” and who had “convinced me” I had it.

He wasn’t aggressive by the way, he was just attempting to make sense of it all.

He then shared he was worried about my future. He didn’t believe someone would want me for a romantic partner. He also kept saying I would never look male, that I would always look something “in between”. That’s definitely not true. And there are loads of examples (with pics) of other FTMs to prove my certainty.

He also said no one would hire me in the future.

Not because of transphobia but because I’m only 5ft.

I’m an actor and never had any issues finding work when I looked like a girl.

He thinks being 5ft and female doesn’t affect me being hired.

But being 5ft and male… does.

Couldn’t care less though (that is… if what he said is in fact true).

I’m also a director, started being one in 2016, and always had great reviews from others and, in 2019, one of my plays actually found its way to number six in the list of the top 30 shows of the year. That’s quite an achievement for a very young director (my show was listed higher than others from well-known people). Oh yes, and, of course, no one can stop me from continuing to create my own work. Also, people in my work field LOVE the trans thing, it’s considered to be “cool”. Kinda annoying that but it will, very likely, come in handy in the near and distant future.

But yes, I love working as an actor for others but I’m ok with only being one in my plays.

I know that, no matter how I look, I will always be the trans actor/director.

Well, at least, I’ll still be alive.

So, even if I didn’t transition, no one would hire me because I would be dead. 

Yes, it came to that.

.

Mom:

I’ve just finished talking to my mom.

She refused to speak about the subject.

She wanted to talk only in person.

So we ended up discussing other things, like films and tv shows.

But yeah...

Didn’t speak about it with her.

Have to wait until Sunday.

I’m going back home just to see them.

It’s going to be tough and bloody as hell awkward.

Oh yeah, she also cried.

I’d also never witnessed her crying.

.

.

.

-Final thoughts-

I think they’ll come around but it’s gonna take some time.

They were both calling me by my birth name by the way.

I didn’t say anything about it.

They’re still very shaken.

Didn’t want to make it worse.

.

It appears that forcing myself to act “female” all these years didn’t help.

I used to deny the possibility of transitioning to male.

I used to prefer death over being trans.

A successful suicide attempt was soon to come before I finally accepted the truth and came out.

My turning point was when I hit (another) extreme depression phase and ended up saying the words “I’m not a girl" to myself and out loud, while having a panic attack.

Never thought I’d still be here right now.

And definitely not as the boy I am.

.

.

.

Oh and… that’s me yesterday.

Don’t care about the fact that I actually look female-like in this pic. Wanted to share it anyway.

This was taken right after I cried my balls out (yeah… my inexistent ones) as I waited for them to finish reading my letter. It’s not an attractive picture.

.

And yes, today… no neon blue or yellow