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dolariGrowing up Trans - Intermission #2 - My Chemical Romance
So, I've been on hormones for eleven years now, and my second puberty is long since over. And in fact, I've been through menopause a few times in those years. Not fun. So at this part of the narrative, now would be a good time to go over what changed after all those years on the sauce.
No, the usual caveats: This is what it did to ME. My biology and genetics determined how I came out, which was great in some ways (I'm a D Cup!) an bad in others (I'm still pretty hairy). And this isn't a primer on what it does to genetic women during puberty, it's what happens to a specific twenty six year old genetic male from San Antonio, Texas, when she starts taking them.
I'm going to seperate this into three seperate sections. Mind (it does really affect the way you think), Body (including the obvious changes), and Sex (being a woman or a man is a function of sex, of course it deals with this). I'll leave that last part behind a cut, or behind a "See More" break, but you may not want to continue, as this could get NSFW.
Your mileage may vary. Consult a physician before attempting this yourself. And, please...no gambling.
MIND:
The changes I experienced were very slow and a "creep" kind of change. It's like getting fat. You seem fine until one day your pants don't fit anymore. I didn't notice anything odd at the time, till something smacked me in the face.
The first one, was a reaction to children. One of the first real changes I remember going "what was that all about?" was grocery shopping , and suddenly hearing a baby cry out in fright a row or two down. I'd heard hundreds of babies, on hundreds of grocery trips, and just ignored them. But this time, I went all meerkat-scanning-the-horizon-for-trouble. And not knowing bothered me. "Is that baby allright? Is she okay? What's going on?" It made me more aware of children. Even to this day, if I hear a baby cry or squeal, I'm immediately more alert.
On a scale of one to ten, my emotions went to fifteen. I remember going out to see a movie, and during a sad part, I began to cry. That'd NEVER happened before. It wasn't like I didn't react before. If I saw a sad movie, it knew it was sad, and my reaction would be "Wow, that was a sad." But there wasn't more. Now, when I see a sad movie, there's a pit in the heart, the tears start to flow, and I'll cry. And those waterworks are hard to turn off. But it's not just sadness - when I'm happy, I'm ecstatic. When I'm angry, I'm a snarling mountain lion (which isn't much different than before, but even that is a bit more "sharp" than before). I also wasn't as on-edge as before, and there was a bit of inner peace. But that may have just been that I was making progress in life, and my tension level went down.
On a related note, frustration and anger really changed for me. Before the hormones, frustration always lead to "obsession" to what I was frustrated with. Suddenly, a puzzle I couldn't solve became the only thing in my universe. Obsession would lead to anger, if I couldn't figure that puzzle out. And anger lead to "violence." And by violence I don't mean punching people or clubbing baby seals - I mean more like "throwing the puzzle across the room" or "kicking a brick wall in frustration." On estrogen, frustration changed. That same puzzle would frustrate me. But instead of getting obsessed, I maintained a calm, which allowed me more time to solve the puzzle. If the frustration continued, and didn't abate, I'd cry. And the crying had that same release that I got from throwing that puzzle across the room or kicking a brick wall. In fact, once the cry was over, I still had an intact puzzle, and a tension release that could let me move on, or give me some more piece of mind to continue.
Communication with women became easier. Women's culture really promotes communication (the men's restroom is a quiet sombre place, the women's restroom is a chatty social club). And I really CRAVED that kind of communication, which is why Amy and I talked everynight for years on the phone for hours. I didn't get it with my men-folk friends, but I also wasn't very good at it with the women-folk:
Tom: "Hey, do you have a modem? There's this great thing called the internet."
BoyJenn: "Awesome - tell me more"
Tom: ::Miles of techncial jargon::
BoyJenn: "Rock."
JD: "Oh, I've had a rough day. There was another fight at the movie theater, and these kids were all over the place. And I was cramping so bad, I just didn't want to deal with it. I'm could use a night off and have some hot chocolate with a movie. Want to watch?"
BoyJenn: "BOE SHOODA."
JD: "..."
BoyJenn: "I LIKE JELLO WITH APPLES."
JD: "So that's a yes?"
BoyJenn: "UTINI!"
The estrogen helped a lot in that regard. It didn't flip 180, and make guys harder to understand, but there was this change in my head. Like someone decided at that point to put a babelfish in my ear, and suddenly it all made more sense, and there were layers to the communication (almost like the a subcarrier that said "You are a friend I like to talk with" running on the same frequency). I can't really articulate other than, I haven't said "Boe Shooda" in years.
I'm not sure how much of this was lifting depression, or estrogen, but I swear colors got brighter, too. Suddenly Purple split into Violet, Tyrian, Royal, Thistle, Orchid and Heliotrope.
While I always found women beautiful, I also had a thing for guys. It was a mild attraction...I didn't find them so much "OMG HOT MAN HUNK" as "Mmmm...that's a nice physique." After hormones, "Mmmm...That's a nice physique" became "Wow. You're kinda hot."
BODY (minus the Not Safe for Work bits)
Now, my experience on estrogen is different than genetic women. The average women is on a hormonal cycle of three weeks of estrogen, one week of progesterone. There are several method of hormone replacement, one follows that same cycle, by cycling you through three weeks of estrogen, and one week of progesterone. The one I'm on is a solid steady diet of pregnancy levels of estrogen. Another is just a solid steady diet of progesterone. I have no idea why people use that one - progesterone is the hormone that makes you irritable during your period, and almost everyone I've known that uses it is...not fun to be around.
The first thing to change was my hair. This was a great relief. Honestly, I'd always wanted to be on hormones, but the real motivating factor was after washing my face, and noticing that an area of hair around my forehead was looking a little thinner than the rest. Women do not have male-pattern-baldness, and I sure as hell didn't want it. Starting hormones not only stopped the thinning, but it thickened my hair. It became stronger, and didn't fray as much. It didn't completely regrow it all back though. If you look at the top of my head carefully, while it doesn't look at all like I'm suffering any baldness, you'll definitely notice it's thinner near the front. Starting hormones made my hair change color. My hair before hormones was jet black. Afterwards, my hair was still black, but had red highlights in the sun, just like my sister.
Before hormones, I had a Robin Williams style fur pelt all over my body. Very thick and carpetish. It was a pain to shave off, and grew back quickly and thickly. Underarm hair was like Spanish Moss hanging from a tree limb. I had hobbit feet. I was HAIRY. The anti testosterones and estrogen did their best to take care of that. The thick curly pelt turned into a downy, but still somewhat thick, hair. Even my underarm hair thinned out from a thick bush to thin wisps. It actually dissapeared from most spots, but was still strong along my lower arms, and, sadly, my chest. I don't wear V-necks without needing to shave that downy hair from my sternum.
That's probably, though, a product of the testosterone still in my body. I'm on 400mg of Spiranolactone, the highest dose you can take safely. Most folks never have more that 100 or 200. But my testosterone count was so high that we kept pushing it up dose righ up tothe safe maximum. In the end, I still have much more testosterone than a woman (And more than most transsexuals on lower levels of spiro), but at levels that equal a boy who was just starting puberty and much lower before hormones started. Only thing that will fix that at this point is The Big Chop. Most of my friends lost their upper body strength on hormones - I did not, probably also a result of higher testosterone levels still in me.
True to the doctor's words, my smell changed. I went from smelling kinda of sharp and bitter, to a musky sweet scent. I smelled bad when I sweated as a boy, when I sweated as a girl it was actually kinda nice unless it was overpowering. Another "smack your olfactory nerves" surprise was when I was in a rush at work. One of the few habits I still have from being a boy is that when I'm in a rush, and I'm in private, I'll pee standing up. I know I shouldn't, but sometimes, (Like when I'm late for work, or I can't afford to forget where the blue portal links up to the orange one), and I don't have the time to take off half my clothes to pee. So I ran in, did my business, and suddenly realized "what's that wierd musk smell? Oh...it's THAT."
My skin softened and was no longer as rough. Its color evened out, and, I think, even got lighter (Which would make sense if my hair lightened as well). And suddenly everything was much more...tactile. I could feel every bump and crag on cinderblocks. I can feel every ring pattern on wood. Even the desk I'm on, I can feel paint grains over the particle board. The different textures of clothing became heightened. Wool and cotton finally felt "different." Things like velvet and silk were suddenly luxurious on the skin. The silky feel of pantyhose and tights up against the skin felt cool AND warm at the same time.
One thing I didn't expect was my waist shrunk! I remember from reading anatomy books was that women's smaller waists didn't come from shrinkage, but because as women had their growth spurts, the waist didn't grow with them. But sure enough, one day I put my hands on my hips, and there were little handrests waiting for me there.
The estrogen not only widens your hips but tilts it back a bit. But only while you're young and growing. Once the bones fuse and lock into their shapes, they don't grow. While I had a slimmer waist, the hips did not fill out. But my thighs did. I no longer had the skinny thin thighs and knobby knees of guys, but gentle filled out curves. I retained the turkey leg calves, though - I shouldn't have ridden that bike so much as a kid...
My beard also slowed down growing, but didn't stop. I went from needing a shave in the morning, and another in the aftenoon, to one every day, and now one every other day (although I still do it every day cause I hate that stubbly feeling).
Body (The Not Safe for Work bits)
First, I'm going to answer the number one question I get from both men and women. I appreciate their wanting to learn, and curiosity, but it's one that makes me groan every time I hear it:
I do not have periods. I don't bleed from the tip of my penis. I do not bleed from my butt. And it doesn't store all up and get me sick.
But I do get cramps! While I don't have the organs women have that cramp up (hence, no periods), I'll get cramps in my lower back every couple of months. I just htoguht it was stress, but when I started keeping track of my hormones, I noticed gaps of about a four or eight weeks between them. I was kind of glad to know I had SOMETHING akin to a period...
I mentioned that I was certain I'd felt SOMETHING the day after I started hormones, and I'm almost sure that was the beginning of my breast growth. It wasn't like I went to bed and woke up and "BOING, there they are!" But it was a general sensitivity on the nipple and aureola. Clothing itched them a lot more. As weeks went on, the sensitivity almost became a kind of non-painful burning sensation. THEN they began to grow out.
I can't tell you how ecstatic this made me feel. If there's any gender marker women have that scream "I AM WOMAN", the most obvious and straightforward are the breasts (well, and the vagina, but the vagina is hidden away, even when you're naked...the breasts are just right out there and in some cases they walk into rooms milliseconds before the rest of you does). To know that my breasts were finally coming in was another commitment to my new way of life. JD would be proud to know these breasts couldn't just come off like my falsies did.
I grew rather...large. My grandmother had breast reduction surgery when she was older, and it seems I got her genes. Most transsexuals don't have breasts larger than their sisters or mother, mainly because they start hormones much later in life, and the later you start the less breast development you get. My mom and sister were C cups. My grandmother (on my dad's side) was...well...well endowed. It seems my breast development was based on hers, and I grew large and QUICKLY.
And I have a new appreciation for girls going through puberty. It's not enough that you're suddenly faced with the prospect of bleeding one week of every month until your fifty, but for the next few years as those breasts grow, they're going to itch, burn, shoot little arcs of pain as they grow, and generally ache. But your whole upper balance changes, Not only do those things project out, but once they grow to a certain size, they get their own minds as to where they want to go in relation to the rest of your body. Turn a corner too tightly while you're growing, and the next thing you know, you''re not only slamming your breast into a door frame, or cubicle wall, but you set up a Newton's Cradle of Mammary Physics. A hits B, B flies off on it's own, bounces back and hits A and the incredibly exaggerated explanation of the vicious cycle continues. And for the next five minutes you're on the floor holding your boobs in your hand while you're waiting for the ache to go away.
Unfortunately, like hips, their formation is based on how soon you start hormones. The later you start, the less developed they become. There's actually something called The Tanner Scale which measures puberty progress on a scale of 1 to five, where 1 is pre pubecent, and 5 is adult figured. My breast development stopped at about a 4. I do have D-cup sized breasts, yes, but they're not teardrop shaped. They''re conical and concave on top. They never really filled out correctly, and most likely never will.
Still - I wouldn't trade 'em for the world. And I'm bigger than my mom and sister. That makes up for development.
Testosterone is responsible for the length and girth of your penis. How long and thick it is is dependent on how it responds to testosterone, and the amount in your system. From wha tI could tell, before I was a boy, I was rather...umm..endowed. Not porn star endowed, but also not a tiny. Killing that testosterone (or as much as I could get rid of it) cause that thing to shrink WAY down. Girth and width. I went from something the size of a banana at full salute to the size of the first two knuckles of my thumb.
Erections slowed then stopped completely. Oh, sometimes it'd try. You'd feel it start up, then kinda stop, crouch and put it's hands on it's knees and say "Just a minute, I just need to catch my breath." Sometimes, if it actually managed to to get to full size, it was only about the size of my middle finger before it decided to call it a night right away.
::wonders how many guys are shifting uncomfortably in their seats right now::
The sex drive just dies on hormones. In "The Nightmare of Fifth Grade" I mentioned how every thought I had was "tinged" with sex, anger or challenge. As I got older that evened out, to a more "normal." After about seventh grade, not everything with two carefully situated globes (breasts, butts, watermelons, canteloups, maps with east and west hemispheres, geometery homework) yelled "SEX ME."
Despite having very very very close female friends guiding me through my girlification, there were still areas they would not go. I used both falsies and even waterbaloons to simulate breasts before I grew my own. Angie wouldn't let me touch hers to try and get a "base line" of how I could make more convincing ones. Despite seeing me in my underwear hundreds of times as I dressed, Amy would not get dressed in front of me. Why? "Because guys look at girls differently than girls look at guys." I took offense to that - my interest was purely admiration/education.
But after I finally scrubbed most of the testosterone from my system, I can see that they were totally right. It wasn't just that my sex drive normalized, it's that I got used to it and could control it. The feelings were still there, and I still reacted to them - I could just choose to ignore them by then. Testosterone is responsible for sex drive, both in men and women. When it got out of my system, that sex-filter dissapeared. THIS is what Amy meant, and I can see what she meant now, and suddenly all those movies with "Not now, I have a headache" also make sense.
Off hormones, I'd masturbate probably twice a day. Maybe three times if my body was being a jerk. On hormones? Maybe once every two weeks? Three? The urge just wasn't there anymore, and when the occasion fdid hit me, it was more of "I need a nice relaxing something..." As one of my trans friend's joked "It's like I got three hours of my day back!"
While erections aren't possible, orgasms still are. My boy orgasms were a lot of hard (har har) work that suddenly quickly pulled a trigger in tha started an orgasm in the back of my penis that shot out a (rapidly dminishing) kapow orgasm with every "pump" of semen. Then your penis just hurt to touch for a while, while it decided to take five. Well, usually more than five.
Orgasms on estrogen, though...oh, holy cow. HOLY BAJEEZUS COW. I'm not sure how close my orgasms are to womens' (since much of the stimulation comes from your vagina, and uterine contractions are a big part of the orgasm, and I don't have those), but WOW. Instead of working hard for a quick kabang, you just get this rolling rise of "Oooh, this is a nice warm happy feeling in your pelvis" that becomes "Oh, I need to stretch every muscle in my body cause every time I do that feels GOOD," to a toe-curling-back-arching-spread-to-every-nerve-ending-of-your-body orgasm pulse that explodes to every end of your body. And that doesn't just diminish. No it sticks around...and it feels like almost every move you make, wether it's just stretching, or rolling over, or spreading my fingers, becomes part of that orgasm (My thing is that I almost uncontrollably point my toes, and if I happen to get a cramp in my legs from that (rarely), THAT becomes part of the orgasm, too), and slowly slowly ebbs away...over about five minutes of warm fuzziness.
There's almost no semen when I orgasm. 99% of the time, there's just nothing there. If I go a while without doing the deed, occasionally a drop or two of clear something will come out...many minutes later.
And on hormones? I can have another right away. If I like.
It looks like we're just about out of time, so I hope you were all taking notes. There'll be a quiz on this at the end of the week. Your homework is to read "The Care and Feeding of your Gentalia" Chapters 3 and 4.
Class dismissed!
Growing Up Trans Chapters:
Preschool - http://jenndolari.livejournal.com/2238402.html
Elementary School - http://jenndolari.livejournal.com/2238626.html
The Nightmare of Fifth Grade (NSFW, and a bit TMI) - http://jenndolari.livejournal.com/2238939.html
Middle School - http://jenndolari.livejournal.com/2239155.html
High school - Year 1 & 2 - http://jenndolari.livejournal.com/2239578.html
High school - Year 3 - http://jenndolari.livejournal.com/2240215.html
High school - Year 4 - http://jenndolari.livejournal.com/2241302.html
Opening up to a Whole New World - http://jenndolari.livejournal.com/2242118.html
Intermission #1 - http://jenndolari.livejournal.com/2245139.html
The Boulton and Park Society - http://jenndolari.livejournal.com/2243005.html
The Birth of Jenn Dolari - http://jenndolari.livejournal.com/2243105.html
Life with Geri - http://jenndolari.livejournal.com/2244596.html
False Starts - http://jenndolari.livejournal.com/2244834.html
New Name, New Home - http://jenndolari.livejournal.com/2245871.html
The Real Life Test - http://jenndolari.livejournal.com/2246452.html
First Impressions - http://jenndolari.livejournal.com/2246872.html
Lone Star Rising - http://jenndolari.livejournal.com/2247894.html
So, I've been on hormones for eleven years now, and my second puberty is long since over. And in fact, I've been through menopause a few times in those years. Not fun. So at this part of the narrative, now would be a good time to go over what changed after all those years on the sauce.
No, the usual caveats: This is what it did to ME. My biology and genetics determined how I came out, which was great in some ways (I'm a D Cup!) an bad in others (I'm still pretty hairy). And this isn't a primer on what it does to genetic women during puberty, it's what happens to a specific twenty six year old genetic male from San Antonio, Texas, when she starts taking them.
I'm going to seperate this into three seperate sections. Mind (it does really affect the way you think), Body (including the obvious changes), and Sex (being a woman or a man is a function of sex, of course it deals with this). I'll leave that last part behind a cut, or behind a "See More" break, but you may not want to continue, as this could get NSFW.
Your mileage may vary. Consult a physician before attempting this yourself. And, please...no gambling.
MIND:
The changes I experienced were very slow and a "creep" kind of change. It's like getting fat. You seem fine until one day your pants don't fit anymore. I didn't notice anything odd at the time, till something smacked me in the face.
The first one, was a reaction to children. One of the first real changes I remember going "what was that all about?" was grocery shopping , and suddenly hearing a baby cry out in fright a row or two down. I'd heard hundreds of babies, on hundreds of grocery trips, and just ignored them. But this time, I went all meerkat-scanning-the-horizon-for-trouble. And not knowing bothered me. "Is that baby allright? Is she okay? What's going on?" It made me more aware of children. Even to this day, if I hear a baby cry or squeal, I'm immediately more alert.
On a scale of one to ten, my emotions went to fifteen. I remember going out to see a movie, and during a sad part, I began to cry. That'd NEVER happened before. It wasn't like I didn't react before. If I saw a sad movie, it knew it was sad, and my reaction would be "Wow, that was a sad." But there wasn't more. Now, when I see a sad movie, there's a pit in the heart, the tears start to flow, and I'll cry. And those waterworks are hard to turn off. But it's not just sadness - when I'm happy, I'm ecstatic. When I'm angry, I'm a snarling mountain lion (which isn't much different than before, but even that is a bit more "sharp" than before). I also wasn't as on-edge as before, and there was a bit of inner peace. But that may have just been that I was making progress in life, and my tension level went down.
On a related note, frustration and anger really changed for me. Before the hormones, frustration always lead to "obsession" to what I was frustrated with. Suddenly, a puzzle I couldn't solve became the only thing in my universe. Obsession would lead to anger, if I couldn't figure that puzzle out. And anger lead to "violence." And by violence I don't mean punching people or clubbing baby seals - I mean more like "throwing the puzzle across the room" or "kicking a brick wall in frustration." On estrogen, frustration changed. That same puzzle would frustrate me. But instead of getting obsessed, I maintained a calm, which allowed me more time to solve the puzzle. If the frustration continued, and didn't abate, I'd cry. And the crying had that same release that I got from throwing that puzzle across the room or kicking a brick wall. In fact, once the cry was over, I still had an intact puzzle, and a tension release that could let me move on, or give me some more piece of mind to continue.
Communication with women became easier. Women's culture really promotes communication (the men's restroom is a quiet sombre place, the women's restroom is a chatty social club). And I really CRAVED that kind of communication, which is why Amy and I talked everynight for years on the phone for hours. I didn't get it with my men-folk friends, but I also wasn't very good at it with the women-folk:
Tom: "Hey, do you have a modem? There's this great thing called the internet."
BoyJenn: "Awesome - tell me more"
Tom: ::Miles of techncial jargon::
BoyJenn: "Rock."
JD: "Oh, I've had a rough day. There was another fight at the movie theater, and these kids were all over the place. And I was cramping so bad, I just didn't want to deal with it. I'm could use a night off and have some hot chocolate with a movie. Want to watch?"
BoyJenn: "BOE SHOODA."
JD: "..."
BoyJenn: "I LIKE JELLO WITH APPLES."
JD: "So that's a yes?"
BoyJenn: "UTINI!"
The estrogen helped a lot in that regard. It didn't flip 180, and make guys harder to understand, but there was this change in my head. Like someone decided at that point to put a babelfish in my ear, and suddenly it all made more sense, and there were layers to the communication (almost like the a subcarrier that said "You are a friend I like to talk with" running on the same frequency). I can't really articulate other than, I haven't said "Boe Shooda" in years.
I'm not sure how much of this was lifting depression, or estrogen, but I swear colors got brighter, too. Suddenly Purple split into Violet, Tyrian, Royal, Thistle, Orchid and Heliotrope.
While I always found women beautiful, I also had a thing for guys. It was a mild attraction...I didn't find them so much "OMG HOT MAN HUNK" as "Mmmm...that's a nice physique." After hormones, "Mmmm...That's a nice physique" became "Wow. You're kinda hot."
BODY (minus the Not Safe for Work bits)
Now, my experience on estrogen is different than genetic women. The average women is on a hormonal cycle of three weeks of estrogen, one week of progesterone. There are several method of hormone replacement, one follows that same cycle, by cycling you through three weeks of estrogen, and one week of progesterone. The one I'm on is a solid steady diet of pregnancy levels of estrogen. Another is just a solid steady diet of progesterone. I have no idea why people use that one - progesterone is the hormone that makes you irritable during your period, and almost everyone I've known that uses it is...not fun to be around.
The first thing to change was my hair. This was a great relief. Honestly, I'd always wanted to be on hormones, but the real motivating factor was after washing my face, and noticing that an area of hair around my forehead was looking a little thinner than the rest. Women do not have male-pattern-baldness, and I sure as hell didn't want it. Starting hormones not only stopped the thinning, but it thickened my hair. It became stronger, and didn't fray as much. It didn't completely regrow it all back though. If you look at the top of my head carefully, while it doesn't look at all like I'm suffering any baldness, you'll definitely notice it's thinner near the front. Starting hormones made my hair change color. My hair before hormones was jet black. Afterwards, my hair was still black, but had red highlights in the sun, just like my sister.
Before hormones, I had a Robin Williams style fur pelt all over my body. Very thick and carpetish. It was a pain to shave off, and grew back quickly and thickly. Underarm hair was like Spanish Moss hanging from a tree limb. I had hobbit feet. I was HAIRY. The anti testosterones and estrogen did their best to take care of that. The thick curly pelt turned into a downy, but still somewhat thick, hair. Even my underarm hair thinned out from a thick bush to thin wisps. It actually dissapeared from most spots, but was still strong along my lower arms, and, sadly, my chest. I don't wear V-necks without needing to shave that downy hair from my sternum.
That's probably, though, a product of the testosterone still in my body. I'm on 400mg of Spiranolactone, the highest dose you can take safely. Most folks never have more that 100 or 200. But my testosterone count was so high that we kept pushing it up dose righ up tothe safe maximum. In the end, I still have much more testosterone than a woman (And more than most transsexuals on lower levels of spiro), but at levels that equal a boy who was just starting puberty and much lower before hormones started. Only thing that will fix that at this point is The Big Chop. Most of my friends lost their upper body strength on hormones - I did not, probably also a result of higher testosterone levels still in me.
True to the doctor's words, my smell changed. I went from smelling kinda of sharp and bitter, to a musky sweet scent. I smelled bad when I sweated as a boy, when I sweated as a girl it was actually kinda nice unless it was overpowering. Another "smack your olfactory nerves" surprise was when I was in a rush at work. One of the few habits I still have from being a boy is that when I'm in a rush, and I'm in private, I'll pee standing up. I know I shouldn't, but sometimes, (Like when I'm late for work, or I can't afford to forget where the blue portal links up to the orange one), and I don't have the time to take off half my clothes to pee. So I ran in, did my business, and suddenly realized "what's that wierd musk smell? Oh...it's THAT."
My skin softened and was no longer as rough. Its color evened out, and, I think, even got lighter (Which would make sense if my hair lightened as well). And suddenly everything was much more...tactile. I could feel every bump and crag on cinderblocks. I can feel every ring pattern on wood. Even the desk I'm on, I can feel paint grains over the particle board. The different textures of clothing became heightened. Wool and cotton finally felt "different." Things like velvet and silk were suddenly luxurious on the skin. The silky feel of pantyhose and tights up against the skin felt cool AND warm at the same time.
One thing I didn't expect was my waist shrunk! I remember from reading anatomy books was that women's smaller waists didn't come from shrinkage, but because as women had their growth spurts, the waist didn't grow with them. But sure enough, one day I put my hands on my hips, and there were little handrests waiting for me there.
The estrogen not only widens your hips but tilts it back a bit. But only while you're young and growing. Once the bones fuse and lock into their shapes, they don't grow. While I had a slimmer waist, the hips did not fill out. But my thighs did. I no longer had the skinny thin thighs and knobby knees of guys, but gentle filled out curves. I retained the turkey leg calves, though - I shouldn't have ridden that bike so much as a kid...
My beard also slowed down growing, but didn't stop. I went from needing a shave in the morning, and another in the aftenoon, to one every day, and now one every other day (although I still do it every day cause I hate that stubbly feeling).
Body (The Not Safe for Work bits)
First, I'm going to answer the number one question I get from both men and women. I appreciate their wanting to learn, and curiosity, but it's one that makes me groan every time I hear it:
I do not have periods. I don't bleed from the tip of my penis. I do not bleed from my butt. And it doesn't store all up and get me sick.
But I do get cramps! While I don't have the organs women have that cramp up (hence, no periods), I'll get cramps in my lower back every couple of months. I just htoguht it was stress, but when I started keeping track of my hormones, I noticed gaps of about a four or eight weeks between them. I was kind of glad to know I had SOMETHING akin to a period...
I mentioned that I was certain I'd felt SOMETHING the day after I started hormones, and I'm almost sure that was the beginning of my breast growth. It wasn't like I went to bed and woke up and "BOING, there they are!" But it was a general sensitivity on the nipple and aureola. Clothing itched them a lot more. As weeks went on, the sensitivity almost became a kind of non-painful burning sensation. THEN they began to grow out.
I can't tell you how ecstatic this made me feel. If there's any gender marker women have that scream "I AM WOMAN", the most obvious and straightforward are the breasts (well, and the vagina, but the vagina is hidden away, even when you're naked...the breasts are just right out there and in some cases they walk into rooms milliseconds before the rest of you does). To know that my breasts were finally coming in was another commitment to my new way of life. JD would be proud to know these breasts couldn't just come off like my falsies did.
I grew rather...large. My grandmother had breast reduction surgery when she was older, and it seems I got her genes. Most transsexuals don't have breasts larger than their sisters or mother, mainly because they start hormones much later in life, and the later you start the less breast development you get. My mom and sister were C cups. My grandmother (on my dad's side) was...well...well endowed. It seems my breast development was based on hers, and I grew large and QUICKLY.
And I have a new appreciation for girls going through puberty. It's not enough that you're suddenly faced with the prospect of bleeding one week of every month until your fifty, but for the next few years as those breasts grow, they're going to itch, burn, shoot little arcs of pain as they grow, and generally ache. But your whole upper balance changes, Not only do those things project out, but once they grow to a certain size, they get their own minds as to where they want to go in relation to the rest of your body. Turn a corner too tightly while you're growing, and the next thing you know, you''re not only slamming your breast into a door frame, or cubicle wall, but you set up a Newton's Cradle of Mammary Physics. A hits B, B flies off on it's own, bounces back and hits A and the incredibly exaggerated explanation of the vicious cycle continues. And for the next five minutes you're on the floor holding your boobs in your hand while you're waiting for the ache to go away.
Unfortunately, like hips, their formation is based on how soon you start hormones. The later you start, the less developed they become. There's actually something called The Tanner Scale which measures puberty progress on a scale of 1 to five, where 1 is pre pubecent, and 5 is adult figured. My breast development stopped at about a 4. I do have D-cup sized breasts, yes, but they're not teardrop shaped. They''re conical and concave on top. They never really filled out correctly, and most likely never will.
Still - I wouldn't trade 'em for the world. And I'm bigger than my mom and sister. That makes up for development.
Testosterone is responsible for the length and girth of your penis. How long and thick it is is dependent on how it responds to testosterone, and the amount in your system. From wha tI could tell, before I was a boy, I was rather...umm..endowed. Not porn star endowed, but also not a tiny. Killing that testosterone (or as much as I could get rid of it) cause that thing to shrink WAY down. Girth and width. I went from something the size of a banana at full salute to the size of the first two knuckles of my thumb.
Erections slowed then stopped completely. Oh, sometimes it'd try. You'd feel it start up, then kinda stop, crouch and put it's hands on it's knees and say "Just a minute, I just need to catch my breath." Sometimes, if it actually managed to to get to full size, it was only about the size of my middle finger before it decided to call it a night right away.
::wonders how many guys are shifting uncomfortably in their seats right now::
The sex drive just dies on hormones. In "The Nightmare of Fifth Grade" I mentioned how every thought I had was "tinged" with sex, anger or challenge. As I got older that evened out, to a more "normal." After about seventh grade, not everything with two carefully situated globes (breasts, butts, watermelons, canteloups, maps with east and west hemispheres, geometery homework) yelled "SEX ME."
Despite having very very very close female friends guiding me through my girlification, there were still areas they would not go. I used both falsies and even waterbaloons to simulate breasts before I grew my own. Angie wouldn't let me touch hers to try and get a "base line" of how I could make more convincing ones. Despite seeing me in my underwear hundreds of times as I dressed, Amy would not get dressed in front of me. Why? "Because guys look at girls differently than girls look at guys." I took offense to that - my interest was purely admiration/education.
But after I finally scrubbed most of the testosterone from my system, I can see that they were totally right. It wasn't just that my sex drive normalized, it's that I got used to it and could control it. The feelings were still there, and I still reacted to them - I could just choose to ignore them by then. Testosterone is responsible for sex drive, both in men and women. When it got out of my system, that sex-filter dissapeared. THIS is what Amy meant, and I can see what she meant now, and suddenly all those movies with "Not now, I have a headache" also make sense.
Off hormones, I'd masturbate probably twice a day. Maybe three times if my body was being a jerk. On hormones? Maybe once every two weeks? Three? The urge just wasn't there anymore, and when the occasion fdid hit me, it was more of "I need a nice relaxing something..." As one of my trans friend's joked "It's like I got three hours of my day back!"
While erections aren't possible, orgasms still are. My boy orgasms were a lot of hard (har har) work that suddenly quickly pulled a trigger in tha started an orgasm in the back of my penis that shot out a (rapidly dminishing) kapow orgasm with every "pump" of semen. Then your penis just hurt to touch for a while, while it decided to take five. Well, usually more than five.
Orgasms on estrogen, though...oh, holy cow. HOLY BAJEEZUS COW. I'm not sure how close my orgasms are to womens' (since much of the stimulation comes from your vagina, and uterine contractions are a big part of the orgasm, and I don't have those), but WOW. Instead of working hard for a quick kabang, you just get this rolling rise of "Oooh, this is a nice warm happy feeling in your pelvis" that becomes "Oh, I need to stretch every muscle in my body cause every time I do that feels GOOD," to a toe-curling-back-arching-spread-to-every-nerve-ending-of-your-body orgasm pulse that explodes to every end of your body. And that doesn't just diminish. No it sticks around...and it feels like almost every move you make, wether it's just stretching, or rolling over, or spreading my fingers, becomes part of that orgasm (My thing is that I almost uncontrollably point my toes, and if I happen to get a cramp in my legs from that (rarely), THAT becomes part of the orgasm, too), and slowly slowly ebbs away...over about five minutes of warm fuzziness.
There's almost no semen when I orgasm. 99% of the time, there's just nothing there. If I go a while without doing the deed, occasionally a drop or two of clear something will come out...many minutes later.
And on hormones? I can have another right away. If I like.
It looks like we're just about out of time, so I hope you were all taking notes. There'll be a quiz on this at the end of the week. Your homework is to read "The Care and Feeding of your Gentalia" Chapters 3 and 4.
Class dismissed!
Growing Up Trans Chapters:
Preschool - http://jenndolari.livejournal.com/2238402.html
Elementary School - http://jenndolari.livejournal.com/2238626.html
The Nightmare of Fifth Grade (NSFW, and a bit TMI) - http://jenndolari.livejournal.com/2238939.html
Middle School - http://jenndolari.livejournal.com/2239155.html
High school - Year 1 & 2 - http://jenndolari.livejournal.com/2239578.html
High school - Year 3 - http://jenndolari.livejournal.com/2240215.html
High school - Year 4 - http://jenndolari.livejournal.com/2241302.html
Opening up to a Whole New World - http://jenndolari.livejournal.com/2242118.html
Intermission #1 - http://jenndolari.livejournal.com/2245139.html
The Boulton and Park Society - http://jenndolari.livejournal.com/2243005.html
The Birth of Jenn Dolari - http://jenndolari.livejournal.com/2243105.html
Life with Geri - http://jenndolari.livejournal.com/2244596.html
False Starts - http://jenndolari.livejournal.com/2244834.html
New Name, New Home - http://jenndolari.livejournal.com/2245871.html
The Real Life Test - http://jenndolari.livejournal.com/2246452.html
First Impressions - http://jenndolari.livejournal.com/2246872.html
Lone Star Rising - http://jenndolari.livejournal.com/2247894.html
