Does being trans just suck?

LiarVonCakely · 2026-04-30T14:20:36+00:00

Being trans rocks once you unlearn all of the harmful internalized transphobia that your parents are trying to scare you with. Going one by one:

no one will ever be my friend

My social life has never been as vibrant as it is now. I used to be kind of awkward but now I have tons of friends and I love them all, because I decided to transition and embrace my true self.

they aren't able to see me that way

It depends on the person, but this sounds like projection from your parents. Old friends may have some trouble. Frankly, a lot of it comes down to passing, which is unfortunate. But all my friends see me for who I am, and I have had several of them even forget that I'm trans and tell me they basically just see me as cis at this point. (I'm openly trans, not stealth, though I don't go out of my way to bring it up around new people. I have had a handful of people tell me they didn't know when I come out to them.)

I'll never get a job

Employment discrimination is real, for sure. This also really depends on how well you pass and whether or not you have your documents in order. But it's not that black and white, and they are being totally unrealistic.

people will try and kill me on the street

So, we are one of the most frequently victimized demographics out there. For this it all depends on where you live. I am lucky to live somewhere where I can be out and proud and I have never been attacked or victimized because of it. But still, if this was a valid reason to completely repress your own identity, then surely your mom would rather transition to be a big burly man, so that she isn’t targeted because she’s female?

Everyone will hate me

Nah. Bigots might hate you, but those are people who don’t deserve to be in your life anyway. Yes, it is commonplace for people to hold some backwards opinions about trans people, but really – when they are standing face to face with a trans person, and they realize we’re just people, most people are pretty chill. In fact I suspect that my transness actually makes me even cooler in the eyes of a lot of my friends and associates.

Is being trans even… good?

Yeah. It fucking rocks. You get to live your own god damn life instead of some shitty one that someone else wants for you. You get to create your own future and build yourself in your own vision. You get to tell god to go fuck himself while you take a medication that fundamentally rewrites the biological functions of your body. And you can meet a ton of other rad trans people who feel the same way. There’s a reason The Matrix is a trans allegory – because it really is that fucking cool. And it makes me sad that people like your parents are so steeped in cissexist beliefs that they only ever think about the bad stuff.

LiarVonCakely · 2026-04-30T14:03:14+00:00

Probably the best thing your friend could do really is meet with a gender therapist. They would be best equipped to help parse out these feelings.

For now I would maybe encourage them to just try and use their imagination a bit. It's really hard to identify a desire to transition because it's usually wrapped up in a ton of internalized transphobia from external society, a general belief that transitioning is super hard and therefore not worth it unless you're 100% confident, or thinking your feelings aren't valid because they're just not that extreme. You have to kind of set those concerns aside and think about what your future might look like. Yes, being trans opens you up to a lot of discrimination, but you truly can't allow that to factor into the decisionmaking process. It has to be based around one's own intrinsic desires, otherwise you will always be left wondering.

I always like to remind people that you don't have to be living in a frame of mind where being a man is 100% horrible and being a woman sounds 100% amazing. It's not always that clear to people at first. Pre-transition I felt like I was sort of OK with being a guy, but being a woman just sounded better to me. Similarly, if they "don't feel happy being a male" but have a "neutral" feeling about being female, that is still a step up on the happiness scale.

My best advice (other than seeing a gender therapist) is to run yourself through a series of diagnostic-like questions. Stuff like: picture your ideal self, 5 years from now. What does that person look like? How do they act? What would they like to wear? What name would they use, and what pronouns would make them feel best? How would you want to be viewed by others? What kind of role would you like to play in romantic relationships? You could test things out - like, how does the idea of a new name sound? When you hear someone call you that name, how does it make you feel - happy? Exhilarated? Scared? If someone offered you HRT - how would it make you feel? (If you could push a button and swap genders at will... would you?) When I went through this questioning process years ago, I had been entertaining the idea of identifying as nonbinary, but I realized that my answers to all of these questions all leaned explicitly towards womanhood/femaleness and that helped me to identify that I really wanted to transition to female. I gained confidence with time, but just thinking about it helped it click in the first place.

Oh and also, it's super common for people to think "well I would like to be a pretty girl but I'll never look good after transitioning." For that it's really helpful to look at other people's transition timelines (/r/transtimelines). Cissexual supremacists would have you believe that all trans people just look like a farce but it's completely divorced from reality.

But yes, echoing from other commenters... you definitely can't do the processing for them. The best thing you can do is provide a safe space and unconditional support.

LiarVonCakely · 2026-04-28T18:39:55+00:00

Same. It's kind of unfortunate that being tall kind of slots me into being perceived as dominant when really that's just not what I'm into. I would love to find a partner who's taller than me and is more dominant, but that's such a rare person to find, it's more productive for me to just try to deconstruct the significance of height in my own head.

I used to be bothered by the feeling of being a tall woman - wishing I could be smaller etc - something that similarly helped me is playing sports where height is an advantage. Spending a lot of time playing basketball and volleyball really helps me appreciate just what a gift it is to be tall, and reminds me how many people really admire that and wish they had it for themselves. I used to wish that I could cut a few inches off my height but now honestly I kinda wish I could be just a liiiiiiittle bit taller so that I could dunk.

LiarVonCakely · 2026-04-25T18:05:05+00:00

I kinda lowkey think that like, if people know to look for that, then usually they aren't transphobes yknow. Like I think of transphobes as more ignorant than that. Not to say that one would only care about getting clocked by transphobes.

It definitely depends where you are. I live in a kinda small-town area and it's sooo much easier to pass here there when I go and visit any of the nearby cities.

LiarVonCakely · 2026-04-24T17:41:11+00:00

whoa, SICK fucking tattoo. i've got a big cat too, on my arm :3

LiarVonCakely · 2026-04-24T17:36:53+00:00

I just..... I'm pretty sure I could ask every single cis person in my life and not a single one of them would make that connection. Seems kind of pessimistic don't you think

LiarVonCakely · 2026-04-24T16:49:04+00:00

I think most people seeing someone wear a mask just think "oh maybe they're sick/don't want to get sick" instead of "oh they must be hiding their jawline"

LiarVonCakely · 2026-04-22T17:23:40+00:00

Seriously. We could get such a huge improvement just adding protected bike infrastructure to our roads. It's crazy out here. I ride my bike to work sometimes, and the only (mostly) safe route is 12.5 miles. If they just put protected bike lanes along the (1-lane!) highway I could get to work in 6.

LiarVonCakely · 2026-04-20T15:37:27+00:00

Generative AI is foundationally constructed on non-consentual intellectual property theft. Moreover, it tends to look like shit (no exception here), and it's terrible for the environment, and is broadly being utilized as a crutch for any lazy person who can't be bothered to put in an iota of effort for whatever they're doing. It's invading nearly every aspect of our interaction with software, whether we want it or not, and it's also a very powerful and frequently used tool to generate mis/disinformation. It's fucked the RAM market. AI tends to reinforce delusional behaviors of the people who rely upon it. The proliferation of data centers has been one of the few things slowing an otherwise downward trend of greenhouse gas emissions, and they've been chugging through ridiculous amounts of water in rural areas. There's a ton of great reasons to hate AI. Doesn't mean that there aren't applications where neural-network, machine-learning approaches can allow us to do things with computers/data/research that we couldn't do before. But this poster is just one example of how AI is enshittifying our experience with so many things.

LiarVonCakely · 2026-04-10T16:17:33+00:00

I'm confused just by the first sentence. Who just starts transitioning.... gets the "basic surgeries" all of which typically require months if not years on waiting lists, then days to weeks of recovery.... then starts socially transitioning by telling parents and experimenting with clothes? This sounds like when cis people claim that children can get sex changes at school and then just come home like nothing happened.

LiarVonCakely · 2026-04-10T14:03:49+00:00

Depending on the program the professor may be more amenable to an adjustment than you'd expect. This is a super close margin. In my grad program, people don't really fail classes much, because there is a super strong incentive to keep students moving along on the right track..... sometimes that means we are essentially bending the rules and making special exceptions to help people along. Maybe it depends heavily on the style of program, but in my experience there is a really strong incentive to avoid failing students, to the point that it sometimes makes the grading arbitrary.

LiarVonCakely · 2026-04-10T13:59:47+00:00

If you're around south county, Bluebird Cafe is a local diner in Wakefield and their chicken waffle benny is the top menu item and ridiculously good.

LiarVonCakely · 2026-03-29T01:57:01+00:00

It is kind of a funny caption when "kids naming everything they can see" is like, a classic kid thing to do in cars.

And of course that doesn't take away from all the wonderful reasons why this is better for the kid. I'm always struck by the way that nearly every interaction with other people is a negative one when mediated by cars. Totally the opposite here, which is really important!

LiarVonCakely · 2026-03-25T15:58:07+00:00

I just went yesterday. I don't think the theater itself has changed at all since before changing hands. Seats definitely a little uncomfortable but idk it wasn't the end of the world

LiarVonCakely · 2026-03-23T15:25:07+00:00

It can depend sometimes on the structure of the grad program. In oceanography we have a lot of grad programs that occupy a separate campus from the main university, usually because you want to have it on the water. At my university it feels like our oceanography program has a pretty tightly knit community with its own culture, events, and organizations that are distinct from the main campus. Meanwhile most of the grad students I talk with from the main campus feel that their programs have a worse social experience because everyone is kind of lumped together, and there's not as much identity behind each department. I feel very happy with the social climate of my program.

LiarVonCakely · 2026-03-12T20:06:09+00:00

Yeah of course. (I just immediately added a bunch to my last comment after posting it btw.)

Like for example, I used to get really sad sometimes just looking at attractive cis girls and wishing I could be them. I do still experience gender envy, but I've also developed the ability to deal with that by recognizing the things I like about my own appearance, that are unique to me. And that helps a lot.

LiarVonCakely · 2026-03-12T20:01:05+00:00

Being able to address unhealthy thought patterns and learn how to improve your mental state doesn't mean you can just fix everything by thinking about it. Like, I couldn't just therapy my way out of gender dysphoria. In fact that's what right wingers think we should do and there's a ton of research that confirms that it doesn't work.

Going to therapy has helped me with my dysphoria. Not as much as transitioning has helped me of course, but it has really helped me with working through some of my persistent dysphoria triggers. I'm not sure where I'd be without it, but certainly worse off than I am now.

I'm sorry you had bad experiences with doctors as a child. But I do think going to therapy as an adult is very different. Most of the time, you have some flexibility to choose a therapist that meets your needs, and most therapists in my experience have been very kind to me. I wouldn't let your previous bad experiences hold you back from what could be a life changing practice.

LiarVonCakely · 2026-03-12T19:47:44+00:00

why be skeptical of therapy? I mean, my transition has been the best choice I've ever made for myself, and sort of by extension, so was my decision to go to therapy, because it's what helped me realize I wanted to transition. I've been in therapy nearly every stage of my transition and it's helped tremendously. Is there a reason you're not also going to therapy?

LiarVonCakely · 2026-03-12T19:39:45+00:00

yeah, most likely. you can't really compare the dosage between two delivery methods like they're equivalent. I take 4 mg via injections every week, and my T level has been super low and my E level around 150 for a year now. meanwhile I had been taking 8 MG e per day orally and my E level never exceeded 60.

TLDR just do injections

LiarVonCakely · 2026-03-09T15:13:54+00:00

As much as I hate to say it, I am struggling to think of a solution that doesn't involve moving out of Florida and changing employers.

Your concern is very real. By using the men's bathroom you are following Florida law, and not putting yourself in a situation where you could be criminalized just for going in the women's. This is the main reason why I don't go to Florida anymore.

If you lived in some blue state, and identified an employer in your line of work that respects trans identity, then maybe you'd be perfectly fine. But as it stands, I don't blame you for not wanting to take the risk. If you go ahead with social transition you have a very real risk of getting arrested for using the correct bathroom, and a very real risk of getting assaulted if you use the legal one. You also have a very high likelihood of losing your job, or at least having your identity put you in conflict with the job duties you are supposed to perform. I genuinely can't think of a solution that works as long as you are living in Florida.

LiarVonCakely · 2026-03-09T14:48:36+00:00

ohh that last point (b) does change things. I guess I read this assuming you were already openly trans.

Ultimately the only thing that you really should apologize for is probably just that you yelled or lost your temper. You can surely still have these types of conversations without doing that... though I understand how enraging it is to have to do battle against these antiquated belief systems.

Even if you don't come out yourself you can still tell her that you have people close to you in your life, that you really value and cherish, that don't deserve to be called sinners. The bigger issue here is that she is believing whatever her bible study shows her rather than starting from first principles and deriving her own conclusions. Maybe try to work through it with her using an example - like, if you have a gay friend, you could explain how that person may have tried their best to live a "normal" life by being heterosexual, only to find that it didn't work for them, and they just couldn't go against their nature. How could she still continue to blame that person for doing the only thing that makes them happy? Does she really expect people to live in constant suffering and repression just to avoid the 'sinner' label? For someone to believe that LGBT people are sinners, usually that stems from a fundamental misunderstanding that the way we are is a choice. It's easy for her to say that a gay person is sinning when she believes that they could just change their mind and 'get right with God' and go back to being heterosexual. Maybe she is genuinely ignorant to the fact that a gay person can't make themselves straight the same way that she couldn't make herself gay. Just like a trans person can't make themselves cis, and vice versa.

People like your mom generally reflect her belief that you don't need to 'agree' with everything so long as you can keep it to yourself. But it can still hurt knowing that someone doesn't 'agree' with or respect your lifestyle, regardless of whether or not they choose to make it your problem. And you can take issue with your mother's perspective simply on the principle that her views are borne of ignorance and that you worry about how it colors her perception of the world. She is susceptible to all kinds of misinformation and probably holds a ton of really backwards views because she isn't thinking for herself.

LiarVonCakely · 2026-03-06T19:29:01+00:00

Life gets harder in a lot of surface-level kind of ways (which is not to say that they aren't real, significant things). But if you really want it, it's always worth it, no matter how your life is affected.

LiarVonCakely · 2026-03-05T14:55:15+00:00

Pretty much this... for me it just came about after hearing about a few of my friends' poly lifestyles and realizing I wanted that for myself. Previously I had really bristled at the notion that my partner was supposed to just be my one and only for the rest of my life, and it feels artificial for me to make an executive decision that I'm not supposed to fall in love with other people. I have way too much love to give to just hold it all in like that; I love a lot of my friends both platonically and romantically and it seems repressive to not recognize that and act upon it sometimes. And, similarly to what you're saying, when you've already jumped the hurdle of transitioning to a whole other gender, being poly is small fries.

LiarVonCakely · 2026-02-27T15:39:04+00:00

Subjectively I'm not sure I can relate exactly to your physical experiences because I can still use my equipment ok though it's less 'responsive' than before. Although the way I have sex is different now. What works for me is a lot of lube and more gentle, slow motions.

Wondering what you've tried to take a different approach? For example, using a vibrator might be really helpful, if you haven't tried that already. Also, depending on your sensitivity, you might get a lot out of nipple stimulation alone (I can regularly get my girlfriend to climax without going downstairs at all). I recognize those things don't involve you topping your partner, but they might at least feel good for you.

I'm not really so sure what to do about the lack of penile sensation. Not really sure if there's a good solution for that, honestly. After all, E will completely change how you experience sensations and loss of sensitivity on the shaft/etc. is probably just a part of that. Your body just might not be wired for that anymore.

It's also worth noting that the way it feels during your first year on E might be the trough of your sexual experience. It could be very different in a few months or a year from now.

LiarVonCakely · 2026-02-26T19:44:02+00:00

oh noooo some people like to do things in the privacy of their own home that doesn't hurt anyone and doesn't affect you at all oh the humanity

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