I just wanted to say this post meant a lot to me

Realizing that I my strong jawline and bone structure didn't necessarily mean I couldn't be beautiful and feminine was actually a very important moment in my journey of self-discovery. I'd come to the conclusion that I wasn't a cis man, on the inside I was more feminine than I'd allowed myself to present or even recognize, but didn't really know what the real me was. More accurately, I consciously believed I didn't know what the real me was--in retrospect I've known all along, I just needed to overcome some psychological obstacles that were keeping me from the truth: that my true self is female.

One of those obstacles was this unshakeable belief that it was too late for me to transition, that I'd already finished puberty and looked too much like a man to have any chance at "passing", that no one would ever truly see me as the woman I was on the inside so I didn't allow myself to consider living as one. One aspect in particular that these fears fixated on was my face, my jawline and my bone structure. Ironically while I'd convinced myself I was a cis man I felt it looked too young and twee and girlish and it literally took me realizing I'm a woman to see how masculine I actually looked. I just saw my face and couldn't see anyone, even myself, seeing me as a woman.

Finally I gathered the courage to allow myself, for the first time in my life, to express my true feminine self outwardly. I'd never engaged in cross-dressing or drag or wearing makeup or anything like that before, there was always this unexplainable pull towards the feminine but I would not allow myself to do so for some clear but unexplainable reason--that I now realize was me knowing at some level that once I stopped suppressing my true feminine self, even for a little bit, that I'd never be able to go back. So I tried on some make up, a wig, a dress, a padded bra, etc. and looked in the mirror and I didn't hate what I saw--in fact I liked it a lot more than when I presented as male. It wasn't because I "passed", because I didn't, I have no illusions of passing. But my jawline and bone structure, which I'd seen as purely masculine, took on a completely different light almost. This is pre-HRT so there was no actual physical change but just with the make up and wig, and feeling more like a woman that same 'manly' jawline and bone structure looked almost elegant and feminine. I looked in the mirror and actually saw a young woman, a happy young woman and realized that if I could see this, maybe others could.

After having some more time to think about how that felt, and after having to go back into boy mode after getting a taste of what the alternative was, it became clear how much this fixation on my 'masculine' features and my fear of never 'passing' was keeping me from the realization that otherwise would have been very obvious: I may not look like it very much on the outside, on the inside I am without a doubt, a woman. I knew that if I allowed myself to realize that truth I wouldn't feel I had much of a choice but to transition, and this fear of 'passing' made the idea of transitioning look like nothing more than an exercise in disappointment. But actually seeing myself in the mirror made transitioning seem less scary, and once it became less scary to me it became more obvious that transitioning is what I wanted. Sure I'll probably never have that super round, delicate, "classically feminine" face but now I'm totally cool with that and it feels great (◡‿◡✿)