OK, I'm bad at making threads about myself lol. I'm genderfluid. I'm pretty certain about that lol, as I switch between gender identities quite a bit and have pretty severe body dysphoria when I'm female (like now). Also pan, because everyone is lovely. I only really clicked with it a few weeks ago but it fits and it's really provided me with the label I needed to explain my identity to myself. I'd had several occurrences in the past where I identified as trans, usually for about a week, and always had a large degree of dysphoria like 80% of the time. I've got literally no idea how to come out to people (I know that at least my mother, whom I live with, will be supporting as she's been supportive of the LGBTQ+ scene heavily in the past) and will probably be attempting that as I begin to deal with it myself. The only people that know are a few of my online friends (who mostly all have gender issues or are gay anyway, which is why I spoke to them) and a technician at my school who stalks my Twitter. But we'll cross that bridge when it comes to it. For now, I've absolutely no idea how to cope with the utter hatred of my physical appearance 80% of the time. Hormones and surgery aren't an option because I'm still a minor. I'm going to have a haircut in like 3 days and I don't know what to say because I want to grow it out. Do I get them just to trim it or will that attract too much attention? Is there a fem-style cut possible with my hair? I'll post a link at the bottom once I've finished typing. Is that even something worth doing currently? I think it would probably dispel some of the anxiety about my appearance and since it's reasonably short male-me would be happy too, hopefully. And how on earth am I meant to cope with the mis-gendering from everywhere? Aahhhhh! And my voice sucks. Seriously. All the courses and stuff I found take months to do and I don't think I could even make that sort of commitment to do something daily, I'm that bad.
Well I think a theme of what I'm going to say here is don't rush into things too quickly, especially when it come to anything medical as a lot of it is irreversible and people change; Your gender exploration is proof of that. Now that is not to say be overly cautious but think about what you do. Like you said it only clicked a few weeks ago so give yourself time to try stuff and find yourself; For a lot of people that takes their whole lives. So, first question, coming out. I've got two methods I usually recommend. 1) write them a letter and leave it someplace they will find it. Doing it this way is good because it doesn't demand an immediate reaction from them; They get time to think about it and figure out what they want to say before doing so. 2) invite them to go on a walk or a hike or a drive. When you aren't too far off from being back tell them concisely and tell them they can ask you anything. I prefer this one if you know the person will be supportive as face to face conversation carries so much more power than anything else. Now as for the content. I wouldn't say definitively that you are anything but saying something like "I think I might be <insert label here>" or "I'm going to be experimenting with my gender." That way if you decide your feelings have changed you haven't set any expectations for yourself. Second, coping with dysphoria. Now this is a fun topic isn't it. I've got a few ideas on this but the biggest thing is experimenting with stuff until you find what makes you comfortable. For me that was tucking and wearing women's things when people couldn't see it (I would often wear panties and a flat bra under my other clothes and at night sleep in women's pajamas, and every once in a while I would shower in a swimsuit.). These all helped to hide features that caused dysphoria and being hidden didn't cause too many problems with self consciousness. Also, as hard as it is, accepting yourself as just you can help. Sure you are in the process of changing but all you are before and after is just simply you. As for the hair specifically, Google image search is fantastic. Here are two searches I tried and perhaps you might find a style there: 1) Pixie cut 2) Androgynous hair Now voice. Lets see. I think I've got some advice that can help you sound more feminine but again it's not necessarily an instant thing. 1) More air. If you exhale more air as you speak it will sound more feminine by removing a lot of the bass in your voice. 2) Sing. I love music and so when I would drive places I'd put on a song with female vocals and try to sing along to practice. I found this helps more with what to say rather then how to say it. Different gender stereotypes tend to say slightly different things to pass the same message on. 3) Intonation is huge. A woman saying something often has much stronger intonation while a male is much more monotone. 4) Finally, I' t's much easier to change what you say and intonation than it is to change the average pitch of your voice and besides, female voices aren't always that much higher. For me for example I can talk in my basically natural voice or falsetto but I literally can't make noise at the pitch that I used to consider the ideal voice for me so I changed what I said and that made it much better. Cause screw commitment to that kind of stuff right? Well I hope at least a little of this helps you and if it does and you have more questions you can always let me know best of luck to you.
There won't be anything medical for a long while, I'm afraid. I'm not sure if I'd go ahead any surgery anyway, except perhaps if you can just get straight up removal? Letter sounds good to me, I'm not the best at speaking to people... I'll try and draft something and maybe throw it up here somewhere first. No idea where I'm going to procure those, lol, but it does sound a good idea. Hmm. They look workable, at the least. I'll speak to my hair-person about getting one of those rather than my usual mess. Thank you. We-ell, I can try one and four but my voice is actually quite deep, especially when singing. I can barely sing along to Lou Reed, to be honest. My voice just kind of caps out at a low C. And yes, I'm absurdly monotone. I don't really see that changing, I'm not really capable of processing the emotion behind speech. I just... say it. But yes, it was very helpful. Thank you. I'll give some of your suggestions a shot and hopefully it doesn't go too badly.
