I don’t feel like I have the energy for this anymore.

When I stopped T almost 3 years ago I wasn’t sure what changes would happen.

It was a very busy time in my life. I moved out of a city I’d been living in for a decade, got married, etc.

I changed my name to something more gender neutral “to keep em guessing” bc people were clocking me left and right for either side.

Well, that clocking hasn’t stopped. I tried to voice train and was doing well but eventually I just didn’t care anymore. Now I speak mostly in a lower register.

People side eye me when I go to the women’s restroom (something I thought they were doing before- nah dude you were just feeling anxious about being trans lol). Small kids ask their parents why a man is in the bathroom, etc. This is even after laser hair removal on my beard (RIP dude I miss you)

Even with the ramp-up of trans hate I can’t find the desire or energy to pass as a woman. But with E being my dominant hormone I am read most often as a trans woman, specifically. I love trans women and have nothing but respect for them especially after experiencing what it’s like to be read as one firsthand.

But the strength that they and detrans women have- the “well, actually this is just who I am so you have to deal with it” - that’s never rubbed off on me. I think it might be because I don’t feel particularly liberated by or in line with current body.

Now the depression is setting in. I’m in a hot state so it might just be SAD from being stuck inside, but I don’t know. I think it could be more.

I find myself missing so much about my old body, how it interacted with the world, how I was seen as “normal”. Administrative stuff sucks, sure, but my day to day interactions were much better.

There is no perfect path for me. I know this. It’s just the reality of being bigender, genderfluid etc. Im not sure what im going to end up doing, but it’s looking like a lean into retransition. Despite my fears about medical collapse, despite my fears about acceptance, despite my fears about political violence. Because I can’t do things simply out of fear.