#nonbinary trans masculine

[gor3sigil]

Before starting T, when I socially transitionned, I was surrounded by radical feminists who saw masculinity as gross and inherently evil, something to avoid, something to make fun of, something to destroy. The other transmascs in my friend group, sometimes, told me that they didn’t knew if they really were non-binary or if they just were scared shitless of saying “I am a man”. Because they saw this as a betrayal to their younger self who had been SAd and abused.

I saw many of my masc friends and trans men around me hate themselves, not outing themselves as men because it would imply so so much, it was like opening the Pandora Box. Even when we were just together, talking about our masculinity was always coated with bits like “I know we’re the privileged ones but…”, “I don’t want to sound like I have it bad but…”, “Women obviously have it worse, but last time…” and we were talking about terrible traumas we experienced while taking all the precautions in the world in the case the walls were a crowd of people in disguise waiting to get us if we didn’t downplay the violence we faced, or like crying and being upset and being traumatized and afraid and scared and to say it out loud would make us throw up the needles we were forced to swallow every second of every day living in our skin.

Most of us weren’t on T yet, some of us were catcalled every day and harassed in the streets or in abusive relationships nobody seemed to care to help them get out of because they were “strong enough” to do it by themselves.

I was using the gender swap face app and cried for ours when I saw my father looking back at me through the screen. The idea of transforming, of shedding into a body that would deprive me of love, tenderness, and safety, was absolutely terrifying. I knew I couldn’t stay in this body any longer because it wasn’t mine, but I also knew that if I was going to look like my dad, my brother, my abusers, it would be so much worse.

5 years later and I’m almost 2 years on T, and almost 2 months post top surgery.

I ditched my previous group of friends. I was bullied out of my local trans community. But let me tell you how free I am.

I was scared that T would break my singing voice: it made it sound more alive than ever.

I was scared that T would make me less attractive: it made me find myself hot for the first time in my life.

I was scared that T would make me gain weight: it did. But the weight I put on is not the weight I used to put on by binging and eating my body until I forgot that it even existed. It’s the weight of my body belonging to me, little by little. The wolf hunger for life.

I won’t tell you the same story I see everywhere, the one that goes “I started going to the gym 8 times a week, I put on some muscles, I started a diet and now I look like an action film actor”, in fact if you took pictures of me from 5 years ago vs now I’d just have more acne, I’d have longer hair and still look like I don’t know what to do with myself when I take selfies.

But the sparkle in my eyes, my smile, tell the whole story way better than this long ass stream of words could ever.

I want to say some things that I wish someone told me before starting medically transitionning.

It’s okay to take your time. It’s your body, it’s your journey, if you don’t feel comfortable taking full doses and want to go slow, the only voice you need to listen to is your own. Do what feels right.

If you feel overwhelmed, it’s okay to take a break, it’s okay to ask for support.

Trans people are holy. Everyone is. You didn’t lose your angel wings when you came out because you want to be masculine. You are not excluded from the joy of existence, from being proud of yourself, from being sad, from being scared, from being angry. The emotions and feelings you allowed yourself to feel while processing what you experienced when you grew up as a girl and was seen as a woman are still as valid as before. Nobody can take that from you. If someone tries to, don’t let them.

It’s perfectly normal to grieve some things you were and had before you started to transition, like your high soprano voice or even your chest. Hatching is painful. You can find comfort in things that don’t feel right, so making the decision to change can be incredibly scary and weird and you deserve to be heard and supported through this. Wanting top surgery doesn’t make the surgery less intense, less terrifying, less painful to recover from. When it becomes too much you have the right to take a break and take some deep breaths before going on.

You don’t have to have a radical, 180° change for your transition to be acceptable or valid or worthy of praise. Look at how far you’ve come already. It doesn’t have to show, you’re not made to be a spectacle, you’re human and it is your journey.

Oh, and last thing, you know when some people say “Oh this trans person has to grow out of the cringy phase where you think that you can write essays about being trans or transitionning or just their experience because it’s weird” ? If you ever hear this or see this online, remember all the people whose writing you read and, even if they were not professional writers, helped you more than any theorists did ? If you want to write, do it. It won’t be a waste. It can help people. Or it won’t, and even then, if it helped you, that’s enough.

Love every of my trans siblings, take care of yourselves. You deserve the world.

[lgbtqtext]

[island-76]

Here's your reminder that AFAB doesn't mean that person has breasts and a vagina. That AMAB doesn't mean that person has a flat chest and a dick.

AFAB PEOPLE CAN HAVE DICKS.

AFAB PEOPLE CAN HAVE FLAT CHESTS.

AFAB PEOPLE CAN HAVE BEARDS.

AFAB PEOPLE CAN HAVE DEEP VOICES

AMAB PEOPLE CAN HAVE TITS

AMAB PEOPLE CAN HAVE PUSSIES

AMAB PEOPLE CAN HAVE CURVES

AMAB PEOPLE CAN HAVE HIGH-PITCHED VOICES

Don't let AMAB and AFAB become the progressive binary

[genderqueerdykes]

happy pride to every male & masc queer who feels alienated from the community during pride month. many places are taking to create "she+" and "femme & them" type events that conflate non binary identities with womanhood without creating similar spaces and events for mascs & men, leaving many trans men and mascs to feel totally alienated because their is no designated day or space for them to celebrate. while it's great to celebrate femininity & womanhood, we should be celebrating queer manhood and masculinity alongside it. it's important to have groups and events for all members of our community

if you feel alienated because you don't fit into these spaces, happy pride to you. happy pride to the butches and lesboys who don't feel safe going to lesbian events because of this. happy pride to trans mascs & men who don't have a space to go or a day to celebrate themselves. happy pride to non binary queers, genderqueer people and gnc people who are not feminine or female and have nowhere to go. happy pride to masculine and male intersex people who can't exist in the spaces they want to.

happy pride to cis masc and male queers who feel completely estranged from the community. happy pride to trans girls who are also men who cannot express their manhood at the risk of people using it as a weapon to misgender you. happy pride to the bigender and multigender people who are have to prioritize their feminine or female identities in order to make other people "feel safe." happy pride to the genderfluid people who don't get to talk about their masculinity or manhood. happy pride to the masc gays who feel alienated

we deserve to celebrate ourselves as well. take care of yourself this pride month

[midwestemokilledmygrandma]

everyone knows that cis people need to be less weird about trans bodies but trans people also need to be less weird about trans bodies. no one gaf if ur scared of bottom growth or thinks its weird. keep that shit to urself. ppl keep talking about normalising trans people who don't medically transition but like. don't normalise not wanting to medically transition to the point that medical transition is stigmatised bcs you guys r freaks about trans bodies. no one cares u think that either ftm or mtf bottom surgery is ugly or weird looking. keep that to urself

[actualalivecreature]

not femininity or masculinity but a secret third thing (faggotry)

[ftm-radio]

[SCENE: driving back from my appointment]

dad: ...am I going to have to teach you how to shave?

me: uh yeah! at some point, lol

dad: hm. well I can show you the way I prefer, with mug soap and a brush, because the aerosol cans are just no. I showed your brother my way and he likes it a lot better too...

dad: [rambles for a bit]

dad: ...it's really just another chore, you look in the mirror and go 'ugh I have to shave soon' so it's just one of those things you do every once in a while

me, externally: haha yeah, I can't wait :]

me, internally: he's talking about this like it's no big deal, it's not weird at all,,, he doesn't mind the idea of teaching me despite the fact that he never expected to be doing this with me,,,, he's my dad and he supports me even if he doesn't completely get it,,,

[one-hell-of-a-showtime]

Hey, a blog I used to follow (nonbinary support) reblogged a post talking about how “trans men are the men of trans people” and I really advise all of y’all to stay away from them. It scared me, because I’ve been following them for some time, and they’re supposed to be for nonbinary support. You cannot support nonbinary people while also being transandrophobic. You can’t. I unfollowed them, and will probably block them like I did with another blog, a popular sex ed blog, and I’d really advise y’all to do the same. Trans men are men, but they are NOT privileged over other groups because of them being TRANS MEN. Nobody is privileged for being trans!

[ridibulous]

Hey. Hey. You. Person with breasts who's considering mastectomy and feeling anxious that they'll regret it after. Consider the following:

- No longer having to accomodate your chest when wearing clothes

- Being able to publicly go topless (ex. for swimming)

- Don't have to worry about bras and other supports

- Back pain from a large chest? Who's that?

- Laying on your stomach just got easier

- Less worry about potential breast cancer, especially if you may be at risk (if you are, talk to a doctor about it, prophylactic mastectomy is awesome and reduces the chance of cancer way more than FTM top surgery)

- You could get rid of your nipples, if you wanted

- And you could just get them tattooed on... or have a blank slate for whatever art you wanted instead

- Being able to move around (running, going up/down stairs, etc) without feeling any jiggle

- And if you wanted the appearance of breasts? You can wear fake boobs as long as you want, and be able to take them on & off whenever you want. And they can be any size, too. It's a much safer option, as opposed to binding.

If you really want it, why are you hesitating? Be happier built in your own image, instead of the one other people want to paint on you.

[canigetahuuuuu]

"My daughter is completely fine"

Your kid is edging to forcemasc scenarios on tumblr

[uncanny-tranny]

I think it's incredibly important to remind folks on testosterone or folks who want to reverse patterned baldness about their options, but man, does it sometimes suck wondering how much of our insecurities about our hair stem from backwards beliefs that to strive towards beauty is not only preferable but "makes you good."

As someone with a rather masculinized body pre-medical transition, patterned baldness has always seemed neutral. Hair is incredibly important (hell, much of my own energy is spent on my hair because I like it), but the pressure to have hair, to have hair the "right way" is something that I absolutely loathe.

I'm not here to judge people who don't want patterned hair loss or baldness, I'm here to say that those traits will never make you lesser. Not only is it neutral, but it is also just as worthy and beautiful.

[gor3sigil]

One day, I'll talk in depth about how it felt to be the only trans drag king in my local scene surrounded by radfem cis kings who only wanted to make fun of masculinity and how it led to me giving up because I faced more transphobia and misgendering in the few nights I performed, by cis queers, than ever in my life.

It was AWFUL. I just never wanted to perform anymore because the TOXICITY of it all was disgusting.

And I love drag with all my heart, but when you get she/her'd IN DRAG KING, spend your time being belittled because you're a drag king (because let's face it drag kings don't get the credit they deserve) by other performers or because you're transmasc by cis drag kings and you can't find any place in the scene if you do anything else than mocking masculinity, fuck it. I hope I can perform in the future but it won't be in this scene.

[erinelliotc]

A few years ago I used to be that annoying "transmasc lesbians don't exist, this shit is harmful and invalidates both transmascs and lesbians" person, and now I'M the transmasc lesbian. Seems like the tables have turned, huh?

I've spent so many months, years, trying so hard to fit into these categories that I saw so many people talk about as if it were the definitive truth, and this shallow and simplistic vision seems to be gaining a lot of attention and traction here in Brazil. Isn't it ironic to free yourself from cisnormativity and heteronormativity and all these binary boxes to find yourself again trying to fit into other boxes and norms that don't actually describe your experience correctly? Because your experience with gender is so chaotic and confusing (as expected of a nonbinary identity, and even more so if you're neurodivergent too) that there's no simple way to describe it. Then when you find out what describes this, people say you can't identify yourself that way because two or more of your identities are "incompatible". I see people treating non-binarity as if it were an exact science, as if it were math, as if it were something simple and logical, as it is precisely the escape from what has been established in our society as the only two possible options, generating countless identities within a gray area outside this black and white vision, so of course it's something complex, abstract and subjective.

EDIT: One of my reasons for thinking this way was that I ignored that the transgender experience and the cisgender experience aren't and will never be equivalent. It's obvious that a cis man can't be a lesbian, but the same doesn't go for transmasc people, and I thought that admitting that was the same as being transphobic, denying the masculinity of transmascs, denying their male identity. I already had a debate on Twitter because people didn't want to admit that trans men and transmasc people in general can suffer misogyny and male chauvinism (as society can still see and treat us as women) because they also saw it as the same as saying transmasc people are women. The identity of trans people is a very complex experience that involves a series of factors that cis people will never experience. We cannot equate the trans experience with the cis experience.

I thought identifying as a butch lesbian was enough to describe my masculinity, but I realized that I felt like it didn't encompass everything I felt, I still felt like something was missing. Preventing and depriving myself of identifying with more explicit masculine identities was actually making me feel bad and dysphoric. So yeah, I've been avoiding identifying with male-aligned identities because I thought that would mean having to stop identifying as a lesbian, and I didn't want that, and I don't really feel like calling myself straight makes any sense.

I have a text in Portuguese talking about my experience as a butch lesbian, and I feel that now it also serves to describe my experience as a nonbinary transmasc (the part where I talk about not identifying with "traditional masculinity", but with a "different type", like "soft masculinity", is directly related to the fact that, in addition to being nonbinary, I don't identify as a man, I don't feel comfortable with the term "man", but rather with "boy"). I spent a few months wondering whether I was libramasculine or boyflux, and I ended up deciding that if I can't identify which one I am, maybe it makes more sense to just adopt both identities, maybe I am both then! I'm tired of trying to fit into supposed rules about being nonbinary. This is exactly how non-binarity shouldn't be. I'm supposed to feel free, not trapped again. My identity is my identity and that's nobody's business.

[sissyfembois-world]

[genderqueerdykes]

feminine and masculine do not mean Woman 2 and Man 2. feminine is not not a synonym for woman, masculine is not a synonym for man. stop recreating the binary for the 823904823095820952th time this is clown behavior

[midwestemokilledmygrandma]

they/them is not an all-inclusive pronoun that you can use to refer to anyone just because it is gender neutral.

the very basic sentiment of "don't misgender people" seems to go over even the heads of trans people and cis people alike when it comes to they/them pronouns.

not everyone wants to be called they/them. if someone strictly uses she/her or he/him or she/he or neopronouns etc. anything that is not they/them.... using they/them would still be misgendering. in the same way calling someone who doesn't use any other pronoun that pronoun would be misgendering.

You don't get a free pass to call people whatever pronouns you want to call them rather than the pronouns they use just because they them is a gender neutral pronoun.

also not all nonbinary people use strictly they/them pronouns or they/them pronouns at all.

i feel like this is very simple yet is misunderstood by a lot of people