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You can now access all my T4T meditations on my website using this link.
This is part 4 in a new series about something very real for so many trans and gender expansive folx: Waiting for gender affirming care.
Last week, I talked about medical gatekeeping. This week, I’m talking about subtle dysphoria and our own internal gatekeeping parts. (If your dysphoria is loud, stay tuned, I’ll be publishing a part on that experience soon.)
But for today, I want to talk about the more subtle kind of dysphoria. Instead of an avalanche, it feels like a slowly dripping faucet. Instead of a thunderstorm, it feels like a quiet rumble in the background. Sound relatable? You’re not alone. I’ve experienced it, too.
In this newsletter, I’m sharing a bit more about my journey, not because it’s going to be the same as yours, but to highlight how dysphoria is valid even if it shows up in ways that are counter to the cisheteronormative narratives about trans experiences. I started HRT six months ago. In the lead to making this decision, I became aware of parts that had a lot of opinions about whether my dysphoria was, in fact, big enough for me to deserve care. (Spoiler alert: it was.)
I’m trans and nonbinary. I’m masc-of-center, but don’t feel aligned or euphoric with a fully transmasc appearance or identity. I had much louder dysphoria prior to several gender affirming surgeries. Post-surgery, I was still experiencing dysphoria, but on a different scale. It was subtle and shifted. It was still distressing even if it was quieter. I wanted to start T, but wanted to start slowly, so I could track the changes and stop if and when it started to feel out of alignment.
I was afraid to say this out loud in non-gender expansive community. Especially right now, it feels like any hint of doubt, of exploration, of not knowing, is a gateway to the further erasure of access to gender affirming care and trans identities.
And I got to know up close and personal my own set of internal medical gatekeepers: parts that felt like because my dysphoria was subtle and didn’t fit into a neat little binary box, it wasn’t valid. (Spoiler alert: it is.) So much of cis narratives about the trans experience need absolutes. There has to be a definitive time that you know you’re trans. A definitive point at which you know exactly what gender affirming care you need. A narrative without doubts, without uncertainties, without nuance, for identities to be valid. Travis Albanza talks about this phenomenon in None of the Above: Life Beyond the Binary, when they write:
”I sit in the doctor’s office.
He asks, “So when did you know?”
I say, “Always,” becuase I’ve heard simplicity gets results.
Simplicity gets results when we face medical gatekeeping. But when our own parts internally gatekeep ourselves, we not only put ourselves back into a binary, we can experience a lot of pain. If you’ve been following this series, you know that eventually I’m going to talk about slowing down and getting to know your own internal gatekeepers. But for today, I want to share a couple of anchors to serve as reminders. To those of you whose dysphoria is loud and like an avalanche, you are valid. And stay tuned, as I’ll be publishing more about those experiences in a later series. And, to those of you who: Experience dysphoria that feels more subtle than what other trans folx are experiencing Experience something different from what our cishetnorm-laden society tells you your gender journey should look like Experience dysphoria that feels subtle, shifting, that ebbs and flows Experience dysphoria that you’re still trying to figure out
Remember:
You are valid.
You are trans enough.
You do not owe every question about your gender journey an answer.
You deserve safe affirming spaces to explore without fear of invalidation, gatekeeping, or pressure to have it all figured out. Subtle, loud, bombastic, intolerable, fluctuating, every trans person’s journey, and their system of parts, is unique. Including yours. In solidarity,
Eula ——
If you are interested in individual therapy, somatic coaching or 1:1 professional consultation, check out my services tab on my website for more information.
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