#bottom dysphoria is starting to get better which... i had my doubts would EVER improve. like it's that bad

[alastors-wife]

Dysphoria is such a painful and life-consuming thing but personally? I feel like it also makes the positives of transitioning stand out that much more.

I love being able to hear my own voice and see myself in the mirror and see that I'm slowly starting to become the person I actually am and have always wanted to be.

[yoshidaspan]

My earliest memory is of myself wishing to have the attention of my lifelong best friend, Levi. At the time, Levi and I were playing with a boy who was a year older than us, Austin. I don’t remember what was happening specifically, but I do remember what I was feeling. I was filled with a sense of longing. Longing for Levi and Austin’s attention. For their approval. That is the farthest back in my life that I can remember.

As a kid, I was...eccentric. I liked weird stuff, preferred to be by myself, and constantly felt out of place. I was different on a fundamental level. I wanted the approval of others, but was filled with terrible insecurities and self doubt any time I would try to interact with anyone. I saw normal jokes and social interactions as people despising me. It didn’t help that I was extremely skinny, had almost no sense of self worth, and had a terrible speech disorder which made it hard to connect and communicate with people.

I was also filled with a burning competitive spirit. I had to be the best. At everything. I had to be the smartest, the fastest, and the most dedicated to anything and everything under the sun. This was probably cause by living in my brother’s shadow and the fact that I was a pretty smart kid academically. Whenever I wasn’t the absolute best, I felt a crushing weight come upon me. But I did my best to hide it. I put on a smile and shoved all the bad things I felt deep inside me. Again, this is all still happening when I am very young.

I started looking to see what would make me feel good about myself. I looked at television and books and all of my hero’s. And it all boiled down to one thing; dating. Everyone that I looked up to as a kid had one thing in common. They all got the girl, whether that was by finding “true love” or by being the cool guy that dated every hot chick in school. (My main hero’s were drake from drake and josh and aang from avatar). So at the ripe old age of 11 I started dating. Or at least tried to convince girls to go out with me. But again, I was the weird, socially awkward kid who learned how to interact from watching tv and reading Percy Jackson. I tried to be funny but just came off as slightly rude and majorly annoying. And here is the worst part. I blocked out all the feelings of self doubt and hate and just shoved them deep inside me. To stew and fester and remain unresolved.

I also repressed a lot of my childhood memories because of how much I hated myself. Any failed social interaction or attempt to ask a pretty girl out immediately for locked up in some dark corner of my brain. So a lot of this is “revisionist history” because I can only go off what other people tell me and what bits I remember.

So I kept dating. And dating. And wishing someone would pour their self into me and make me feel like I was valid. Until I got to one girl. One girl who I absolutely fell head over heels for. And that was a girl named Mikalyn. Mikalyn was sweet and beautiful and above all caring. She cared about everyone she came across. I tried for a solid year and a half to get her attention to no avail. And so I was crushed by the weight of my self hate and blamed my body image and lack of social skills. And so I did what I do best. I shoved down all of my feelings and looked for the next girl. Since I still wasn’t over Mikalyn, I went for her best friend, Rachael. And I had improved on my outward facade that Racheal actually agreed to date me. It was actually in the middle of dating Racheal that I fell for another girl. And I fell hard. Borderline stalker and definitely unhealthy. That girl was Brynnan, and we will be talking about her a lot more.

At this point I’m in the eighth grade and still have almost crippling feelings of self hate that I am barely suppressing. But along the way, I have found three safe havens from all of these feelings. And those safe havens are martial arts, music, and writing. And while they all made me feel better about myself, they also brought with them huge challenges and repercussions. Martial arts was and is amazing because of the pure level of dedication and heart I put into it. It was physical and helped me with my body issues. It let me beat out some of my aggression and intense feelings I had been holding inside me. It fuels my competitive spirit. Music was amazing because it allowed me to pour my feelings into notes. It let me be good at a skill. It was meditative and let my flex my creativity. Writing let me be my true self and actually feel my feelings.

But martial arts caused me to work myself to exhaustion. Music made me wish I was cooler than I was. Writing made me realize how broken I was inside.

Because I was now aware that I was messed up and was broken inside, I couldn’t deal. I tried to shove everything down again but it just came back up again. I was still chasing Brynnan. I was barely passing classes. I was failing in every aspect of my life. And so, little by little I killed my emotions. I stopped feeling. I went numb. Brynnan started dating a guy named Colton. I made a few terrible mistakes and only went to martial arts sporadically. I only played bass when I was in band class. I stopped writing.

Amidst all of this, one video changed my life. It resolved my body issues. It opened my eyes to who I truly was. Who I can’t deny I am. It made me feel alive and...happy. Truly happy for the first time in a very, very long time. And that was Jacksepticeye’s playthough of a normal lost phone. In the game, our protagonist discovers that he is not a he. That “he” is transgender. And that resonated deeper within me than words will ever describe.

And then Colton put Brynnan though He’ll and back. Brynnan’s family life imploded. Her entire world had shifted. And so she started doing one thing that would change both of our lives forever. She cut herself.

I wanted to feel again. And not just this numbness that was occasionally interrupted by searing pain and immeasurable sadness. And so I tried to get closer to Brynnan. So I cut myself. And a new world opened to me.

It was addicting. I felt like I was in control. I felt something again. And I felt like I was powerful. I couldn’t stop. Line after line was carved in my skin. I was writing again. I could feel again. Pain, but this time pain that I controlled.

My relationship with my parents worsened with every passing day. They found out about my gender dysphoria and snapped, saying it was an abomination and that I would end up nothing but a crack whore. I just desperately wanted to belong, to feel loved, and to find myself.

I eventually met a girl named Lauryn at a Speech, Drama, and Debate tournament. Even as I still had feelings for someone else, I was really just looking to be validated, to try and pour out some of the intense emotions in my heart, and to have someone by my side. Lauryn and I quickly started dating, and almost as quickly broke up. But it turns out that Lauryn had a LOT of the same problems that I did, and we quickly reconnected and got into a very serious relationship. We both loved each other, but I fell for her in a way that scared her. I claimed that I was willing to do anything for her and wanted to spend the rest of my life with her.

It was during this time that two important things happened. I turned 18, and immediately moved out of my parents house into what would become affectionately known as The Rug, with three of my best friends on the planet. And it was when I decided to pursue a career in the military.

My time in The Rug was my first taste of freedom and with that came a lot of responsibility and the beginning of rock bottom. I was stressed from working 40 hour work weeks on top of trying to just barely pass my senior year of high school. I started smoking weed with my friends to help relax. Lauryn came from a family of stoners and would join me nearly every night, out under the stars. But Lauryn and I started to fight and feel as though our relationship had a deadline, as I would soon be leaving for boot camp, and she would be going off to medical school.

We broke up. She ended things. And I truly hadn’t known what it was like to be heartbroken before then. I felt utterly alone. I had pushed away a lot of my friends to spend time smoking with Lauryn. I only saw my parents once every few weeks, and our relationship was practically nonexistent. So I turned to drugs. I started smoking weed more and more, as well as cigarettes. I was showing up to work high, and put every dollar I had ever saved into the habit. But I had found a new group of people to be with, who listened to my problems and provided my support. Slowly but surely I picked myself up and put the pieces of my life back together. I was still smoking almost every day, but I had a group of friends and had a handle on my depression. (Even if it was because I was just numbing it with drugs, I didn’t want to end my life for the first time in years)

And then I left for basic training. I was going to become a Marine. I went through three months of Hell, but it gave me two things that I had longed for all my life; Self confidence and self love. And now, I no longer feel gender dysphoria. I’m confident in who I am and truly do love myself. But I can still feel the weight of all the pain I carried inside for so long. I can still feel the icy claws of depression gripping my heart. I may be a lot better now, but I am a long way from healed, and I am terrified that one day I will be right back where I was.