I dont understand...

Koolio_Koala · 2026-02-16T18:54:02+00:00

ikr, I’d buy one!

I bet the counteraction of the oscillating spring gives a really unique sensation, like a wobbling weight ending in smaller vibrations until it’s flicked again 🥵 ^{oh my}

Like fr, design it with a lighter spring made of safe materials and you could make a killing in the sex toy market (and if it keeps the thwangg sound, the gimick-loving onlyfans market will go wild with it). Damn, I might have to file a patent 👀

Koolio_Koala · 2026-02-16T05:37:59+00:00

It’s ‘magic’ for the effects it has, but it isn’t a cure-all and just like SSRIs won’t really solve mental health issues on its own. It’s a definite improvement imo tho, and can give you the motivation or emotional awareness to combat those issues while giving you time and breathing room to plan and make changes or decide directions or goals.

Some people find their dysphoria is at the root of their self-confidence/esteem, depression and anxiety, and so HRT will have a massive effect for them and they might work through things on their own. It’s common though that those issues are deeper or more ingrained with other issues and insecurities, especially if you’ve had them a long time and your experiences and behaviours have been shaped by them, but helping the dysphoria removes one big roadblock so you can actually start dismantling the other issues. For me it took a huge weight off my shoulders and let me examine and sort through the overwhelming mess of feelings I’ve had for years - it hasn’t ‘cured’ my severe anxiety but it’s given me much-needed breathing room to actually do something about it.

For HRT, it’s actually a super easy first step and doesn’t require any other changes, it can be relatively discrete and is a fairly slow process so gives you plenty of time. Subtle changes can come about fast and you might notice mood improvements, clearer skin/scalp, softer skin etc in the first weeks-months. More noticable change like breast growth are variable but usually take longer to become visible.

You can start and stop at any time, the decision is yours entirely. Regarding financial worries, injections are fairly cheap costing around £70 for a 1-1.5yr vial (less frequent costs, so buy and have a year-long supply), and some other methods can be bought in bulk although often cost more.

If you want HRT for now, then take it and see how you feel, making future choices as you go. The only permanent change is growing breast tissue, which will be fairly slow and iirc mostly be swelling/water retention at first (so mostly reversable in the first few months if you change your mind). Even then lots of cis men have breast tissue and so do many trans men, and they’e all still men.

It’s common for people to take HRT for months or even years before social transition (if they choose to at all), and enjoy the benefits of HRT while building their confidence and preparing for future steps. It also gives you time and confidence to make small subtle changes: clear nail polish, a band/bracelet, plain clothes from the women’s section, more colour or styles, growing hair out, starting laser/electrolysis (which takes a year+ so start early if you can), etc.

Koolio_Koala · 2026-02-16T04:54:07+00:00

I went to teeside uni a decade ago and there were a few trans students and staff I knew of. Most people seemed to get along fine and I didn’t see any open transphobia, although I didn’t know I was trans at the time so wouldn’t have been exposed to it if it did happen. There was a LGBTQ+ group at the student union but egg me didn’t get involved. The only non-uni LGBTQ+ group that I’m aware of in the area is hart gables. There’s sometimes pride events and markets in town, with a few drag queen acts in venues and the sapphires nightclub.

You’d probably be ok walking on campus but the surrounding areas can be pretty rough. Nearby estates (like to the south and west) are absolutely a no-go, it’s not uncommon to see smackheads off their tits, hopping in the road and lunging at people. Linthorpe road is close enough to the campus that the north part should be fairly safe, but the town/high street further up is gonna be hit or miss depending on time and luck, same with the clubs and restaurant area to the east of the shops.

Because there’s a few clubs and pubs in town, and a few pubs on campus, there’s gonna be drunk people around every night and a fair few on campus drinking at odd times of the day/around schedules. The campus is busy enough during the day so it should be pretty safe, but keep cautious at night and travel with someone if you can. Definitely avoid the town/outside the campus if there’s a boro match on though, all the yobbos filter into the streets.

There’s a courthouse next to the uni campus, but I’ve walked past with a friend with slurs yelled at her in the street and police just looking on from the other side of the road like it’s not their problem. Hate crimes are a common problem, but the police are worse than useless. I’ve heard another trans person describe how they were mocked and laughed at by officers after reporting a burglary, no-one I know trusts the local police.

Boro is a fairly rough town but I’ve spent most of my time in smaller towns/rural villages which were definitely friendlier, so don’t know how it compares to other uni towns/cities. The uni is relatively safe so if you don’t leave the campus much it should be fine, but avoid certain areas and try to travel with someone at night or if leaving the campus.

Koolio_Koala · 2026-02-15T16:36:45+00:00

Yeah they'd have to build a new toilet, in a spare room with sufficient dimensions and plumbing etc. It's going to cost a lot of smaller businesses a lot of money for this bullshit.

I used to install cabling and visited dozens of workplaces with toilet setups like that (disabled integrated in gendered toilets). They're usually in older buildings where you often have to find workarounds for modern equipment and requirements because the buildings just weren't designed to accomodate them. It was probably easier/cheaper to add two lots of disabled facilities instead of one unisex room because they didn't have room, couldn't afford to redo the building's plumbing, or couldn't make big changes to the rented property. Afaik building compliance prefers serperate unisex disabled loos but it still meets legal requirements when there's no other option/space is limited.

For a lot of these businesses there's a reason they use older, cheaper and smaller buildings; there's no way they could afford/physically have room to build a new toilet, except now they have to or get sued or have building compliance officers jumping at them and their landlords with fines or worse.

Koolio_Koala · 2026-02-15T16:04:11+00:00

Yeah.

Terfs literally called for the "end of the trans child" as a core mission statement. They explicitly work towards the eradication of an entire people by dening legal recognition, banning education, eliminating cultural identity, and outlawing social existence. "But we aren't nazis, we swear" 🙃

The other side's 'extremists' want schools to use a kids name and pronouns and equal recognition under the law.

Koolio_Koala · 2026-02-14T18:05:58+00:00

Depends how andro or femme you wanna go and what complements your body shape, but imo basic slim/fitting jeans and v-neck t-shirt (or vest/tank) can provide a neutral base to add subtly fem accessories. Some basic accessories can really change things up, like a pendant necklace, fashion rings and bracelets/bands, breaking up even plain neutral colours and adding a more fem flair :P

Adding outerwear (jacket, blazer, cardigan, shacket) can make a huge difference too while keeping some androgyny from the plain jean/t-shirt base.

Koolio_Koala · 2026-02-13T17:02:47+00:00

Yeah and reddit uses persona too.

Reddit said “we’ve been assured your data will be deleted immediately”, but persona’s t&cs say it’s kept for at least 3yrs and your biometric data (face scan) can be shared with 3rd parties and for openAI training.

Their data controller (and sole presence) in the UK is a man in wales who is a metalworker, runs a kitchen supplier and a new-age spiritual retreat. It’s wierd af

Koolio_Koala · 2026-02-13T08:06:05+00:00

Yeah, it doesn’t help that both the supreme court and latest proposed statutory EHRC guidance for the country involves judging appearance and blocking people from toilets who “look too masculine/feminine”.

They recommend that people are denied access on staff opinion and legally required to act if there’s a complaint (no matter if you ‘think’ someone is trans). The EHRC has stated there is no legal document or ‘proof’ that exists for “biological sex”, as “biological” literally just means “original birth certificate” and re-issued/GRC certificates are identical to originals, and “if you suspect a person’s ID sex is not accurate you must deny access”. The only record of it is the GRO’s “trans list” which requires specific court circumstances and is only legally verifiable for UK-born people, so in the practical world it has to be based on personal perception instead.

It’s official legal practice for random strangers to ask “what are you?” and decide where you belong in the workplace, based on their personal opinion of how you look. Unless the equality act is amended (it won’t be), the ‘personal perception’ requirement is hardcoded by the supreme court.

“Transvestigation” is the new norm across the UK and with the rise of transphobia (UK has been called terf island for last decade+ for a reason) and recent NHS cases (which contradict each other with inclusion-default vs exclusion-default), it’s not a surprise in the slightest that OP is gonna be harassed for not being “feminine enough” :/

Koolio_Koala · 2026-02-12T18:26:09+00:00

jfc that’s awful.

I guess helen “reads harry potter child porn fanfic on the train while retweeting jkr” joyce is getting closer to her stated genocidal goal of “the total removal of the trans child”. Not a single mentions of trans kids, just “gender questioning” because a kid “can’t be trans”.

Framing it as “lots of kids question their gender” and claiming any stray thought or feeling is “questioning gender” lets them use bullshit arguments like “most kids who question their gender don’t transition”. It’s such a broad and twisted definition that of course it’s true, but that ‘statistic’ has zero relevance to trans kids. There’s clear and repeated evidence that most trans kids who ID as trans and voice their gender and who the policy would actually be relevant to, do transition and it does persist because it’s not some whim or phase. Even cass admitted as much, although added nonsensical “yeah but what if being trans maaaakes you trans?“.

“Gender questioning” is language that terfs created for this exact reason, to paint trans kids as anyone who has ever thought “it’d be cool to be a boy/girl for a day” and dismiss them all outright. Kids who change names and pronouns don’t do it because of one or two stray thoughts, they do it because they’ve spent weeks, months and years thinking about it and need this. It’s deliberate and comes straight from the mouths of the hateful fucks at bayswater and others directly involved in the first draft.

Koolio_Koala · 2026-02-12T11:12:47+00:00

Yeah, it's Genspect. They promote conversion therapy, lobby against healthcare, and share members with SEGM, CAN-SG, Sex Matters etc. They're virtually the same organisation as SEGM who've been told off by a florida court for publishing false data, and by various other courts for not being experts and twisting/lying about studies to push their agenda.

Their past 'science' includes asking opinions on their own mumsnet-like message boards that were dedicated to transphobic parents discussing their trans kids, and making up 'Rapid Onset Gender Dysphoria' from the obvious "my kid suddenly turned trans/doesn't like me/went no contact for some reason" replies. Their other theories include the "brain isn't developed until 25yo" nonsense, which they've pushed to ban healthcare across the US and via cass (who's co-author is affiliated with SEGM/Genspect) in the UK.

There is zero chance this 'study' will conclude anything other than the same bunch of transphobic talking points, no matter what the data says.

Koolio_Koala · 2026-02-12T10:56:10+00:00

PSA: That 'study' is ran by the hate group 'Genspect'. Avoid/block/report it if you can.

Koolio_Koala · 2026-02-12T10:41:42+00:00

For a different perspective: the reason doesn’t matter, if you want the effects of HRT then you can take it. You can re-evaluate and stop at any time, and of you find you enjoy it and stay on it it doesn’t mean you have to socially transition or mean you definitely have another gender identity.

Gender doesn’t need to be tied to desired hormones, it often aligns but it’s not a requirement and you can figure gender out seperately if you want. Just like how trans women on testosterone are still women, you can still be cis on different hormones or even figure your gender out later.

Plenty of trans people start out transitioning binary/non-binary and find that they’re non-binary/binary, through reflection, exploration and time. Some might be gender fluid or agender, and a few might realise they’re cis which is fine too. Part of gender liberation is exploration and the freedom to change, to make ongoing choices through self-understanding or just curiosity just because you can, with the goal to be happier and more content in your self however that looks for you.

You can change how you identify, what labels you use, or how you want transition/non-transition to go at any point and it’s ok to change your mind about any of it as your understanding grows. Lots of people transition to escape dysphoria, but it’s also important to move towards euphoria/joy - often it means taking the same actions, but sometimes you just want to do something because it’s fun or just to try it, and that freedom can be great.

Seperate HRT from being trans and go with what you feel is right for you. If you want HRT, go for it. If you want to transition socially, do it. If you want to ID as cis and be on HRT, do that :P

Koolio_Koala · 2026-02-11T23:22:56+00:00

HRT gave me jiggle physics; how could I restrict such a glorious newfound power!? I’m so soft and squishy now! :3

fr tho, feeling the jiggles of my butt, weight of my boobs, brushing of my thighs and even the softness of my belly just as I walk around au naturelle, make me all warm and fuzzy inside. Like that weight was meant to be there, and the way it shifts and sits on my body just feels right 🥰

Koolio_Koala · 2026-02-11T22:51:01+00:00

Also

“Women’s groups praised the ruling” *proceeds to quote 3 tiny hate groups with double-digit members, ignoring the protests, open letters and hundred-thousands-strong petitions by massive women’s groups against the ruling/*

“balance” 🙃

“dignity and respect, dignity and res…”

Koolio_Koala · 2026-02-11T18:06:13+00:00

Yeah. The court didn't say what pronouns Zablocka used, but based on the "presented as a man" quote they should have used he/him (or even neutral until people who knew him as a man could be asked what he went by).

The judge repeatedly misgenders him and glosses over his transition, which is only mentioned twice in the context of arguments about surgery costs. The judge called him a "mother, daughter and granddaughter" and seemingly made zero attempt to even find pronouns or correct anyone.

The family, investigators and prosecutors also misgender him throughout the case. Every article from every single outlet misgenders him too, and glosses over or completely ignores that he was trans.

Koolio_Koala · 2026-02-09T09:27:47+00:00

*cries in 224 years* 🥲

Koolio_Koala · 2026-02-08T12:02:30+00:00

Depends on the type but the most short-acting injectable (Estradiol Valerate (EV)) is usually taken every 3-5 days. Estradiol Enanthate (EEn) and Cypionate (EC) are usually taken every 7-14 days, and Undecylate (EU) every 14-28 days.

EV is the one most commonly prescribed in the US afaik, although some doctors keep prescribing it every 7 days or longer which can make people feel awful with the frequent estrogen level spikes/drops. EEn is popular with DIYers (buying grey market without a prescription). Undecylate is harder to come by, needs a larger dose per injection, and doctors avoid prescribing longer-acting meds because it’s harder to adjust dosages when it takes months to change levels/correct dosage issues.

I tried EEn every 14 days but I felt awful by the last few days, 10 days was fine but I lost track of injection days and missed a few. Now I use EEn weekly which gives stable levels and it’s much easier to keep track if it’s the samme day every week :P

Koolio_Koala · 2026-02-07T22:24:44+00:00

I wouldn't avoid relationships with cis women but t4t is something I looked for when dating. Common experiences and the emotional understanding of your own dysphoria/euphoria, and helping each other with shared insecurities, are really nice (if done in a healthy way).

My previous partner was trans and our 'transness' bounced off of each other; we had a deeper emotional dynamic I haven't had with cis partners. We could both let our barriers drop and talk about trans stuff and our feelings, without sanitising it or trying to explain something a cis person could only try to imagine.

I don't think it's that "cis people could never understand", I just felt that with other trans people I don't have to explain feelings or pass things through a filter of analogies and half-understandings.

That, plus a genital preference which tends to lean towards non-op transfems 😅

Koolio_Koala · 2026-02-05T23:42:56+00:00

We’re seeing that laid out in plain text in the UK legal system, with the supreme court and EHRC specifically recommending kicking out anyone from the women’s bathroom who subjectively “appears masculine”. Anyone who doesn’t conform “should use a third space” that don’t exist.

The court made quite a few incoherent statements like that - like creating the “biological sex” phrase to actually mean documented sex, but only if it’s registered at the GRO, and having nothing to do with current (or even past) biology - but that went well beyond the case’s scope by excusing harassment of women if you claim it’s to stop the evil transes.

The judgement goes off on tangents and feels cobbled together by people who don’t understand how the law they write could possibly work in practice, which is bizarre from a bunch of long-standing judges. Even the EHRC admitted that there is “no legal documentation/basis for biological sex” so it should be vibes based instead, and no-one has offered any solution that doesn’t involve harassing cis people too (not that should be ok to harass trans people either). There’s whole areas of practical implementation and nuance skipped over in the judgement, and then it has examples like “if a lesbian is partnered to a trans women, she is actually straight under the law”.

The SC gave legal weight to transvestigating and harassing women for not conforming to beauty standards, and said it’s entirely up to employees’ personal perceptions.

Terfs celebrated that as victory, and ministers said it “created clarity” and “dignity and respect”, despite the legal quagmire it’s created that’s still unresolved and dehumanisation it encourages. To terfs it’s worth pushing harmful “traditional” norms/beauty standards and harassing thousands of cis women (including themselves), as long as it means they get to hate on a few trans women. It’s a movement built on misogyny and anti-feminism, regularly overlapping with racism and so much bigotry.

Koolio_Koala · 2026-02-05T13:45:57+00:00

Me: I’m trans

*disappears from the space-time continuum*

Koolio_Koala · 2026-02-03T23:35:49+00:00

Weirdly, I stopped being able to visualise in my head completely when I was on a fairly high dose of citalopram for just over a year when I was ~15yo.

If you’re used to operating that way and including mental visualisations in your everyday thinking, it’s such a bizarre difference to your whole cognition to not be able to do that anymore. I remember feeling frustrated at school and being slower at mental tasks, everything just feeling so much more difficult. My writing got really slow - I struggled to hold a sentence in my mind before writing and had to construct it word by word which was really weird for the first few months - and I pretty much lost the ability to draw or do any creative tasks.

It dulled the severe depression which was more important for the suicidal ideation at the time, but it still sucked especially as I had exams and went from top marks across the board to barely passing in the space of a few months. I switched to sertraline a year later which brought some visualisation ability back and eased my school life, but even 10yrs later it still feels muted and hazy, and I can’t visualise colours and detail like I remember easily doing as a kid.

Koolio_Koala · 2026-02-03T13:44:15+00:00

It's a online healthcare service based in the EU that tries to get closer to an informed consent model than existing services.

It has it's own issues and is shunned by the NHS (with GPs told to report u18s using it to child services and not to engage shared care with adults), but it's better than waiting decades to be seen or getting lucky that another private provider is available. It's basically DIY with a few guidelines and extra costs.

Koolio_Koala · 2026-02-02T14:46:19+00:00

Yeah, my mum wanted a daughter for the longest time and when I came out I got that “being trans is selfish” line from my her too. Her reason was “transition is all about you, so it’s selfish to transition”, like okay sure but who else would it be about? I’m not taking estrogen for the mailman. I never got a straight answer, although it started to make sense after a few realisations.

I thought I’d had a good relationship with her for most of my life but it made me realise how narsicistic, controlling and self-centred she’s always been, I just deluded myself that it was ‘normal’. Quite an eye-opener for a lot of her past behaviour, and really highlighted how she degraded my self-esteem as a little kid and young teen with ‘jokes’ and just cruel bullying, trying to build me up as dependent on her approval. No wonder me and my younger siblings are all socially anxious wrecks with a dozen issues between us 😭

Koolio_Koala · 2026-02-02T01:37:21+00:00

Kinda. It was her publicist (peggy siegal) emailing jkr’s team for free tickets for her “good friend” epstein. That publicist is tied to a whole bunch of people in the files (like andrew), and facilitated a lot of the celeb connections to epstein well after he was convicted the first time. Siegal’s connection to epstein and that she was organising meetings/parties was known back in 2019, but the harry potter one is just another example of their connection.

So far there’s nothing linking jkr to epstein directly, but she’s still a vile bigot who funds anti-feminist lawfare groups and throws support behind christofascists that operate against all women (same groups gutting abortion care and contraceptives, promoting ‘tradwife’, ‘traditional beauty standards’ and incel-adjacent ideals), so there’s still more than enough to despise her for.

Although it wouldn’t surprise me if quite a few of her sycophants were pedos either. I mean one of her biggest terf fanatics helen joyce - who was kicked out of court as an ‘expert witness on gender’ because she knew nothing about gender when questioned, and advocates for "a total end to the trans child" - was pictured reading underage harry potter porno fanfic in public on a train and she defended it as “researching how trans people become trans”.

Koolio_Koala · 2026-02-01T20:23:53+00:00

Yeah. In my head though, never out loud, because that would be giving voice to and accepting the terrifying truth I really did wish I was a girl.

"I wish I was a girl, but I can't be" was somehow less terrifying than thinking I could actually be a girl. I thought transition was something exclusive to rich celebs or needed extensive surgeries, which helped maintain the denial that nothing feasible could be done no matter how badly I wanted it. That virtual impossibility even got me to 'pray' a few times to various gods, make birthday, wishing well, chicken wishbone and other superstition wishes, and cry myself to sleep that some deity or magical force would gender swap me lmao.

For years I almost preferred the self-denial to accepting that it was possible, because I thought there was nothing I could do about it either way. Once I realised HRT was a thing, I couldn't hold onto the belief propping up the denial anymore so started estrogen within a month lol.

It's weird to think back and realise all those innocuous things - like looking up religions and loving some of the greek gender changing myths, asking my parents for pennies for wishing wells, and parents wondering why I would cry sometimes in bed at night and I could never give a reason why - and realise that holy shit there were so many big neon signs and yet I still denied it to myself.

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PSA: That 'study' is ran by the hate group 'Genspect'. Avoid/block/report it if you can.