I’m 22 and still struggling with the question of my gender identity*.
I’ve realised that I’d be happier living as a female if I could just switch, effortlessly, but I’m not sure if I’m willing to deal with all the social repercussions.
*(I’ve wished I was female intermittently since childhood, but never really thought more of it until recently; when a friend I’d known for ages, who had presented as male, began her transition)
And I know that I’m, in many ways, more masculine-minded than I’d like.
Actually, that brings to mind a question I’ve been wanting to ask someone I don’t know IRL: if you have begun taking hormones, how much have you found them to affect your thinking?
Actually, that brings to mind a question I’ve been wanting to ask someone I don’t know IRL: if you have begun taking
hormones, how much have you found them to affect your thinking?
I started estrogen and androgen blockers just about five years ago, and have varied my dose and delivery method several times. Prepare for anecdata!
-Starting estrogen and spiro together was intense. I got very moody for a little while—I’ve been diagnosed with mood disorders years prior to transitioning, so it wasn’t anything new, but the frequency and severity of outbursts spiked for a little bit. My emotions didn’t actually feel stronger per se—once the initial spell wore off, I wound up describing it as a matter of nuance. It’s like learning to see new colors, new shades of distinction, between what were formerly a lot more discrete reference cases. The result was an easing of some forms of tension—it took the edge off my temper and left me a lot more calm and able to exercise rationality than I’d ever been.
Speaking of nuances: colors felt a little brighter, the world was just a touch more vivid (I’m autistic and schizotypal so it’s always been pretty vivid, but this added something), my sense of smell began to rival that of my mother (who’s one of the most olfactorily-sensitive humans I’d ever met up to that point) whereas before it’d merely been “okay”, my hearing picked up and my synaesthesia changed a bit. Emotion just became generally easier to process, and easier to experience—unless I was dealing with peak stress loads (unfortunately not uncommon with my life history), I might be more prone to exuberance or sadness but I also had a lot more reflective coherence about what they were, and could ride them out more easily.
The first time I had to go off (poor/uninsured), I got filled with endless, spikey, manic energy. It lasted a couple weeks before I was able to buy some more pills and resolve the shortage. My dreams the night after going back on were horrific nightmares.
-Upping the dose later made me even calmer, and more clearheaded. At my peak oral dose I noticed that the coolheadedness had a tendency to slide into depression, but a) I’ve always been somewhat prone to depression and b) my life became a surreal mess around that time, so it’s hard to know what to make of it all. I actually got an emotional “period”; at the far end of it I was even more levelheaded and indeed, somewhat flat of affect until directly engaged. At the near end of it, I was moody, shy and prone to volatile affectional feelings (my boyfriend at the time said I turned into a raging flirt around that time of the month).
-Going on progesterone a couple years ago removed the period and changed the texture of things yet again. For about a year, I was either calm and flat or sensuous and moody—I’d cry tears of joy at the drop of a hat, or spontaneously when having a tense moment, but it wasn’t sobbing or crying fits. It was basically the more-nuanced, this-will-pass-even-though-it’s-really-big-right-now thing I had early on taken to the 9th degree, with the emotions ratcheted up. It made reading books and watching movies really fun, and it shifted my interests somewhat toward sensory/experiential stuff. Eventually I replaced that with medproxyprogesterone due to cost—this made me so depressed I couldn’t stand to take it. Now I take neither of them, and the effects have passed.
-Injectable estrogen, the main distinguishing factor was dosage. At 5mg/week, I became seriously depressed, anhedonic, unmotivated and low-energy. This was reduced to 3mg per week a couple months later, which restored my mood stability, hedonic and adrenaline responses. Since then I’ve been more recognizably myself—occasionally moody or loopy, vulnerable to stress, but often calm and buzzy and pleasant so long as things are going even vaguely well.
Actually, that brings to mind a question I’ve been wanting to ask someone I don’t know IRL: if you have begun taking hormones, how much have you found them to affect your thinking?
I sought answers to that question before and I heard conflicting accounts, from zero changes to significant, but it’s important here to account for a causation bias. HRT often coincides with publicly coming out, which in many people can cause a rush of euphoria and a feeling of freedom while some inhibitions evaporate. In other words, many of the changing mental modes may have nothing to do with hormones at all; I’ve never taken hormones so far and yet I feel like a very different person from lucidfox[2008] thanks to my shifted system of values.
The way I see it, given that puberty didn’t manage to shake my core identity and shape me into someone who isn’t me, then it’s highly unlikely that hormones will.
I sought answers to that question before and I heard conflicting accounts
I think I can explain why that might be the case. Testosterone is the “male” hormone; estrogen is the “female” hormone. However, both guys and girls have some amount both hormones. It could be that those who are transgendered tend to have more of the hormone associated with the opposite sex, so adding more of that hormone would not do as much.
It could be that those who are transgendered tend to have more of the hormone associated with the opposite sex, so adding more of that hormone would not do as much.
The question is about the percentage of transpeople with originally raised hormone levels—otherwise it’s a hasty generalization. Surely if this was really the case, they’d display physical differences from their biological sex all along—for example, transwomen would look more feminine then cis men even before any hormone therapy?
I think you’re right, that probably would be the case. I’m not sure about looking more feminine, but there would definitely be other characteristics that would be different.
This has already been shown in other areas, such as the digit ratio and gay men performing closer to females on certain physical and mental tests.
However, I don’t know if there are any studies like this done for transgendered people.
On gender-related interests, a study by Richard Lippa found that trans people scored in between cis men and women for gender-related traits (i.e. GD, or “gender diagnosticity” of interests or occupational preferences).
In general, these contrasts show that M-to-F transsexuals scored similarly to gay men on all measures except for self-ascribed femininity, which was considerably higher
for transsexuals. In contrast, F-to-M transsexuals were significantly more masculine than lesbian women on all measures except for instrumentality and expressiveness.
The digit ratio study is generally regarded among transpeople as “a load of bollocks”, and that’s putting it relatively nicely. There are a lot of problems about it, and I know people who angsted about not matching its conclusions before stopping caring.
Research has tried to infer people’s exposure to prenatal testosterone levels indirectly by measuring body characteristics thought to be related to prenatal testosterone. One such characteristic is the ratio of the lengths of the second and fourth digits of the hand (i.e., the index finger and the ring finger; Manning et al., 2000). Women tend to have shorter ring fingers relative to their index fingers, whereas men tend to have longer ring fingers relative to their index fingers. Index-to-ring-finger length ratios correlate with people’s occupational choices, fertility levels, dominance, and sexual orientations (Lippa, 2003a; Manning, Scutt, Wilson, & Lewis-Jones, 1998; Williams et al., 2000). These findings suggest that prenatal testosterone levels are linked to adult gender-related behaviors.
The Wikipedia article on digit ratio also cites a ton of research showing correlates.
Well, my digit ratio should have me squarely in the cisgendered heterosexual male category.
I’m trans, female identified in day to day life, queer (not especially picky about gender of partners, even less picky about what they have in their pants)… it’s one anecdote, but I’m gonna go out on a limb and suggest that the digit length criteria failed bigtime where I’m concerned.
I myself lack the experience to present a coherent argument against it, but ask any trans community and you’ll get dozens of replies.
There are some objections that I can present on the fly, though. For one, there is no evidence that sex hormone level or this unobservable “brain gender” is the most important factor contributing to digit ratio. The very Wikipedia article you linked claims, among other things, that there is more ethnic variation than gender variation.
And while this is not an argument against the validity of the research, we must be wary of drawing backward inference between observable physical phenomena and correlated social phenomena. As I mentioned, I know transpeople who were depressed when their digit ratio “didn’t match the expectation”, irrational as it may be. It should be considered, at best, weak evidence.
I think (she said, speaking as a transgendered person) that the angst has a lot to do with a more pervasive sense of self-doubt among many trans people. When you have to do something fairly subversive and controversial just to feel like yourself, and can expect an enormous amount of social pressure (ranging from passive-aggressive to literally life-threatening), and you’ve spent most of your life likely to have no coherent idea of other people like you...yeah, it’s kind of tempting to search out validation in those ways. I think this is why some trans people would love to have a diagnostic test for it—strikes me as a bit self-defeating though.
I’m trans, identify as female (technically also genderqueer/third-gender in some contexts, but it’s more an internal thing of anthropological significance than something I display), have been on hormone therapy for a number of years, and it’s only in the last year that my T levels dropped from “high even for a cis male” to “really low even for a cis female.” In other words I spent literally my entire pospubescent life up until recently with very high testosterone. So I doubt it’s that.
That’s good information, however it does give me one slight niggle.
The way I see it, given that puberty didn’t manage to shake my core identity and shape me into someone who isn’t me, then it’s highly unlikely that hormones will.
I suspect that puberty did shake my core identity and shape me into someone who isn’t me (as I was prior to puberty). But as you point out, when the hormonal influx coincides with other life-changing events, I shouldn’t assume it was the hormones influence.
I’m attempting to improve my luminosity at present, so hopefully my next hormonal change I’ll document properly :-)
I’m 22 and still struggling with the question of my gender identity*. I’ve realised that I’d be happier living as a female if I could just switch, effortlessly, but I’m not sure if I’m willing to deal with all the social repercussions.
*(I’ve wished I was female intermittently since childhood, but never really thought more of it until recently; when a friend I’d known for ages, who had presented as male, began her transition)
And I know that I’m, in many ways, more masculine-minded than I’d like.
Actually, that brings to mind a question I’ve been wanting to ask someone I don’t know IRL: if you have begun taking hormones, how much have you found them to affect your thinking?
I started estrogen and androgen blockers just about five years ago, and have varied my dose and delivery method several times. Prepare for anecdata!
-Starting estrogen and spiro together was intense. I got very moody for a little while—I’ve been diagnosed with mood disorders years prior to transitioning, so it wasn’t anything new, but the frequency and severity of outbursts spiked for a little bit. My emotions didn’t actually feel stronger per se—once the initial spell wore off, I wound up describing it as a matter of nuance. It’s like learning to see new colors, new shades of distinction, between what were formerly a lot more discrete reference cases. The result was an easing of some forms of tension—it took the edge off my temper and left me a lot more calm and able to exercise rationality than I’d ever been.
Speaking of nuances: colors felt a little brighter, the world was just a touch more vivid (I’m autistic and schizotypal so it’s always been pretty vivid, but this added something), my sense of smell began to rival that of my mother (who’s one of the most olfactorily-sensitive humans I’d ever met up to that point) whereas before it’d merely been “okay”, my hearing picked up and my synaesthesia changed a bit. Emotion just became generally easier to process, and easier to experience—unless I was dealing with peak stress loads (unfortunately not uncommon with my life history), I might be more prone to exuberance or sadness but I also had a lot more reflective coherence about what they were, and could ride them out more easily.
The first time I had to go off (poor/uninsured), I got filled with endless, spikey, manic energy. It lasted a couple weeks before I was able to buy some more pills and resolve the shortage. My dreams the night after going back on were horrific nightmares.
-Upping the dose later made me even calmer, and more clearheaded. At my peak oral dose I noticed that the coolheadedness had a tendency to slide into depression, but a) I’ve always been somewhat prone to depression and b) my life became a surreal mess around that time, so it’s hard to know what to make of it all. I actually got an emotional “period”; at the far end of it I was even more levelheaded and indeed, somewhat flat of affect until directly engaged. At the near end of it, I was moody, shy and prone to volatile affectional feelings (my boyfriend at the time said I turned into a raging flirt around that time of the month).
-Going on progesterone a couple years ago removed the period and changed the texture of things yet again. For about a year, I was either calm and flat or sensuous and moody—I’d cry tears of joy at the drop of a hat, or spontaneously when having a tense moment, but it wasn’t sobbing or crying fits. It was basically the more-nuanced, this-will-pass-even-though-it’s-really-big-right-now thing I had early on taken to the 9th degree, with the emotions ratcheted up. It made reading books and watching movies really fun, and it shifted my interests somewhat toward sensory/experiential stuff. Eventually I replaced that with medproxyprogesterone due to cost—this made me so depressed I couldn’t stand to take it. Now I take neither of them, and the effects have passed.
-Injectable estrogen, the main distinguishing factor was dosage. At 5mg/week, I became seriously depressed, anhedonic, unmotivated and low-energy. This was reduced to 3mg per week a couple months later, which restored my mood stability, hedonic and adrenaline responses. Since then I’ve been more recognizably myself—occasionally moody or loopy, vulnerable to stress, but often calm and buzzy and pleasant so long as things are going even vaguely well.
I sought answers to that question before and I heard conflicting accounts, from zero changes to significant, but it’s important here to account for a causation bias. HRT often coincides with publicly coming out, which in many people can cause a rush of euphoria and a feeling of freedom while some inhibitions evaporate. In other words, many of the changing mental modes may have nothing to do with hormones at all; I’ve never taken hormones so far and yet I feel like a very different person from lucidfox[2008] thanks to my shifted system of values.
The way I see it, given that puberty didn’t manage to shake my core identity and shape me into someone who isn’t me, then it’s highly unlikely that hormones will.
I think I can explain why that might be the case. Testosterone is the “male” hormone; estrogen is the “female” hormone. However, both guys and girls have some amount both hormones. It could be that those who are transgendered tend to have more of the hormone associated with the opposite sex, so adding more of that hormone would not do as much.
The question is about the percentage of transpeople with originally raised hormone levels—otherwise it’s a hasty generalization. Surely if this was really the case, they’d display physical differences from their biological sex all along—for example, transwomen would look more feminine then cis men even before any hormone therapy?
I think you’re right, that probably would be the case. I’m not sure about looking more feminine, but there would definitely be other characteristics that would be different.
This has already been shown in other areas, such as the digit ratio and gay men performing closer to females on certain physical and mental tests.
However, I don’t know if there are any studies like this done for transgendered people.
On gender-related interests, a study by Richard Lippa found that trans people scored in between cis men and women for gender-related traits (i.e. GD, or “gender diagnosticity” of interests or occupational preferences).
The digit ratio study is generally regarded among transpeople as “a load of bollocks”, and that’s putting it relatively nicely. There are a lot of problems about it, and I know people who angsted about not matching its conclusions before stopping caring.
What are the problems with digit ratio research?
From Gender, Nature, and Nurture by Richard Lippa:
The Wikipedia article on digit ratio also cites a ton of research showing correlates.
Well, my digit ratio should have me squarely in the cisgendered heterosexual male category.
I’m trans, female identified in day to day life, queer (not especially picky about gender of partners, even less picky about what they have in their pants)… it’s one anecdote, but I’m gonna go out on a limb and suggest that the digit length criteria failed bigtime where I’m concerned.
I myself lack the experience to present a coherent argument against it, but ask any trans community and you’ll get dozens of replies.
There are some objections that I can present on the fly, though. For one, there is no evidence that sex hormone level or this unobservable “brain gender” is the most important factor contributing to digit ratio. The very Wikipedia article you linked claims, among other things, that there is more ethnic variation than gender variation.
And while this is not an argument against the validity of the research, we must be wary of drawing backward inference between observable physical phenomena and correlated social phenomena. As I mentioned, I know transpeople who were depressed when their digit ratio “didn’t match the expectation”, irrational as it may be. It should be considered, at best, weak evidence.
I think (she said, speaking as a transgendered person) that the angst has a lot to do with a more pervasive sense of self-doubt among many trans people. When you have to do something fairly subversive and controversial just to feel like yourself, and can expect an enormous amount of social pressure (ranging from passive-aggressive to literally life-threatening), and you’ve spent most of your life likely to have no coherent idea of other people like you...yeah, it’s kind of tempting to search out validation in those ways. I think this is why some trans people would love to have a diagnostic test for it—strikes me as a bit self-defeating though.
I’m trans, identify as female (technically also genderqueer/third-gender in some contexts, but it’s more an internal thing of anthropological significance than something I display), have been on hormone therapy for a number of years, and it’s only in the last year that my T levels dropped from “high even for a cis male” to “really low even for a cis female.” In other words I spent literally my entire pospubescent life up until recently with very high testosterone. So I doubt it’s that.
That’s good information, however it does give me one slight niggle.
I suspect that puberty did shake my core identity and shape me into someone who isn’t me (as I was prior to puberty). But as you point out, when the hormonal influx coincides with other life-changing events, I shouldn’t assume it was the hormones influence.
I’m attempting to improve my luminosity at present, so hopefully my next hormonal change I’ll document properly :-)