Kaneli, Finland (he/him)
“At age 18 I finally stopped beating around the bush and readopted the trans man label."
Was there a definitive moment you realized you were trans? How old were you?
It was a slow process. As a child I never quite understood the difference between boys and girls, seeing them more like different species altogether. In primary school I was always a bit of a tomboy with a heavy side of "I'm not like the other girls", only partially because I didn't fit in with the rest of the kids and was heavily bullied and isolated. In 4th grade, at age 10, I declared myself a boy without fully understanding what that means. I told my "friends" at the time to refer to me as a boy and for my birthday I asked for "boy toys". My fondest memory of childhood is actually from this era of radical self-exploration, when I got to buy a very cool shirt in the boys aisle of a supermarket.
In early middle school my very close friend had a friend who had come out as a trans man. It made me feel jealous, I wanted to be able to be trans too but I didn't think that I was "trans enough", so to say. The side of the internet I was stuck on at the time was constantly preaching that you have to have absolutely debilitating physical dysphoria to qualify as trans, and being a late bloomer in every sense of the word, I only had social and mental dysphoria at bearable levels. I accepted the term trans man at around 8th grade, at age 14, but stayed more or less closeted as my family didn't accept me and I wasn't sure what my next steps should be.
High school came around. l noticed one guy in my group who seemed really shy, so I decided to befriend him. We had a lot in common on the surface. I assumed we'd just be friends, but he very soon confessed romantic feelings for me. In a naive moment of "what's the worst that could happen", I said I reciprocated. Not that I didn't like him, I did have some very mild romantic feelings for him, but I wouldn't have done anything about them. Those feelings grew stronger over time, even though our relationship is better described as a relationsh*t. I was scared of coming out to him because I didn't want to lose him, so I convinced myself that "compromising on my gender" is worth it. It didn't work. In a bid to allow myself to at least not be a woman, I tried convincing myself that I am nonbinary and came out as such, at least to him. Still, I was miserable. Eventually everything fell apart and I had to redo the process of discovering my gender all over again. I did develop a liking for feminine things (especially clothing) during the quarantine, which felt like it ruled out being a binary trans man outright. I was going from one label to another, from nonbinary to genderfluid to an unlabeled partially masculine gender. At age 18 I finally stopped beating around the bush and readopted the trans man label.
How soon after did you start to make changes? What were these changes?
My earliest purposeful change was in 9th grade when I cut my hair from butt-length to a Karen-cut. Before entering high school I redid my wardrobe, going for something of a business-casual look. Late in the relationsh*t I started regularly cutting my hair again, this time into a proper short cut. These were more or less the extent of my changes until 2023 when I finally got admitted into the gender identity clinic. Thanks to encouragement from my wonderful counselor there, I made the bold move to change my name and later the gender marker once self-id laws got reworked. Now I'm waiting to finally get approved for hormones, which is a doozy where I live...
Have these changes started to make you feel more comfortable in your life and body?
I definitely feel more comfortable socializing now that I've socially transitioned. My friends have always been supportive and my mother has begrudgingly started supporting me as of recent. Can't say much for my body, though. Straight or wide-ended pants help, but I still don't feel particularly comfortable in my own skin. I really, really can't wait for hormones and a mastectomy.
What would you tell your younger self? Would you do anything differently?
I'd definitely tell him that dysphoria is way more complicated than what he was taught at the time. I'd tell him to look into resources to potentially get on puberty blockers, as those would've saved me from a lot of the pain that I endure now. I'd also explain to him that expression is different from gender, that you can enjoy being cute and "feminine" while being a guy.
Is there anything else you'd like to share?
-
Have the gender-affirming steps you’ve taken impacted your overall happiness and sense of well-being?
Yes.