Looking back at a dramatic monologue I wrote only 5 months before starting T when I still thought it was impossible.

Hi all! I am officially 9 months on T. I am finally consistently being he/him ed over the phone at my job as a front desk employee at a community college.

I wrote this last December while coping with the new social sphere of FL. I've come very far regardless of my geological location and I want to share my hope and experience with you.

CW/TW: child sexual assault mentioned briefly but not in detail.

I remember being sized for my first real bra. I was 9. I’d been wearing training bras for a year. They helped at first. They kept the sensitive nubs encased in soft cotton, keeping them from rubbing on the inside of my shirts. It was hard to get used to shoulder straps, but it was better than the alternative: pain and mosquito bites poking through my shirt. And I also liked how flat they made me. They pushed down the itty bitty boobs until they were nothing. I thought the relief was just my not wanting to be a woman yet. I just wanted to be a kid. And that was correct, I didn’t want to be a woman. I wanted to stay as a little kid. I didn’t want to be treated as anything different. And I grew to resent my breasts and hips as I got older, physical invitations to the clingy eyes and hands of grown men and their sexuality, something I wanted no part in. But yes, I wanted to be a kid.

But no amount of wanting and wishing stopped my child-like features from maturing into the shapely curves of a woman. And that’s what I am now, regardless of how much I detest it. Every day now, for over 12 years, I’ve woken up and felt the lumps on my chest with a stab of concern. But the blade softens and swells into liquid lead, sitting heavy in my belly and chest. It feels grossly similar to feeling the lump in my neck and knowing it was cancer. But with my cancer, it came on so slowly, creeping in and adjusting me slightly day after day. With breasts, it feels like one day, they were there after years of a mostly neutral existence.

I started dressing in more provocative clothing when I was 14. I had started dating this girl and she’d told me she loved boobs. For once, I didn’t feel horribly disgusted by them. For once, I was okay with someone knowing I had them. It felt different than Justin commenting on my boobs when I was a kid. And obviously, there’s the predatory aspect of it. Someone appreciated my body in a somewhat age appropriate way as opposed to my literal child rapist liking them when I was still in fucking training bras.

But it felt nice in a way. It was an attribute I had that she liked. I also realised around this time though that people treat me better when I dress a certain way. The more hyper feminine I am, the more I show off my form, the more make up I put on and the more girly my accessories, the better I do socially and romantically and even in places I didn’t expect. Strangers are nicer to me. This hit me really hard when I moved to Florida. I spent a few years as a teen dressing like a butch. I was honestly quite comfortable with it. I bound my chest every day. I wore men’s clothes. I almost always wore a hat too. It felt nice, but people treated me differently. I was ugly to them. It’s something I could somewhat get away with in Washington. The attitude towards beauty standards and heteronormativity are quite different there. Standards are looser and more inclusive overall. But that doesn’t work in Florida. So, this March, I bought make-up again.