When I started taking the first doses of hormones I became very emotional. Not because of the new hormones being introduced into my body, but because I was beginning the path to living my authentic life. These emotions had their ups and downs. The ups out weighed the downs, but when I felt down it wasn’t because I wasn’t making the right choice. It was because I had to deal with little things like people using the wrong gender, the wrong name, and the wrong pronouns. I think the worst experiences came when I had to deal with social services such as social security and the county office. They unfortunately don’t have a place in their systems to mark preferred pronouns and preferred names so no matter how many people I explained it to it didn’t get fixed. This needs to change so that gender nonconforming people don’t feel uncomfortable when accessing these vital services that can mean the difference between homelessness and being in a safe place.
During the first month of hormones I remember saying to my friends and family that it felt like a cloud had started to lift from my brain. I used the word cloud to describe it because before hormones I had to deal with extreme depression and anxiety caused by my gender dysphoria. When I went out after being on hormones for a month I started confidently correcting people on gender pronouns, and started to insure that friends and family called me by my proper name and used the correct pronouns.