Trans

Hey. It's really shitty that on top of fighting for your life, you gotta deal with dysphoria, too. It's not fair, and I'm so sorry.

I wore a lot of cute fem knit hats when I went through chemo, and that helped. I also leaned into clothes that emphasized my beautiful new-to-me fem figure, so if someone was going to misgender me it would have to be on purpose because they were an asshole and I didn't care what they thought.

Surprisingly, my loving spouse taking lots of pictures helped a lot, then, and later. I was surprised by how fem I looked even when all I could think about was my big lumpy dome and face elbow that other people called a nose (it's smaller than my dad's cis wife's, but try telling my brain that).

Hopefully this helps. You are beautiful.

Fuck cancer. Send cancer into the fucking sun. I believe in you.

Ps: there are LGBTQIA cancer support groups out ther, and they can really help. Here's one such org.
https://www.cancer-network.org/

My hair sucks (trying to fix that, though I’m sorta having trouble having any hope).

I’ve found some head coverings that I like, silk scarves and stuff.

:/ sorry, I know how much it sucks, I hope your hair regrows quickly!

I don't have any advice about it since I've never lived anything like it. Here's a virtual hug 🫂

Firstly, yeah it's really hard. The only thing you really want is your hair back and everything short of that will feel like its not good enough. I'm not trying to change any of these feelings, just talking aloud here. Take whatever you want from it.

• Dont underestimate the power of hats! It took me a while but i've found a few cute cap styles that are more femme than your standard baseball cap but still very casual and not too "dressy" so i can wear them everywhere. It gives me a bit of a tomboy look and maybe that's not something you want. But im way more confident in them than i would be without them.

• Everything you're feeling about wigs is valid and I'm not trying to tell you to feel differently, but I'll share some of my experiences with wigs in case any of it feels relevant to you:

A huge thing for me was realising how much internalisied crap was knocking around in my head that made me feel things like "it's not real therefore its bad / cringe" or "everyone else can tell and they all think its cringe". Examining those feelings in me revealed that they were nothing but internalised bullying, phobias, and other unhealthy social bullshit around what a "real" woman should look like. This poisonous attitude that says only those who win the genetic lottery are deserving of beauty and self-acceptance, and anyone using anything "fake" (fake hair, fake nails, fake tan) is somehow delusional or pretentious or cringe. I do not feel those feelings about other people, even if i did, I'd immediately recognise them as coming from a bad place, but for some reason I expect the rest of the world to feel those things about me. I'm trying to kill my internalised misogyny, transphobia, etc because if i let them win I'd never transition.

Imagine how you'd feel looking at another person who was trying a wig out. Would you sit there and think about them what you thought about yourself? Would you even notice? If so is that a feeling you'd want to nurture or a feeling you'd try to understand and minimise? If your hair looks like a wig, but still makes you look and feel better than rocking the bald look, is that still a bad thing? Why do we feel this way about wigs? Is that coming from a good place? Every person who confidently and unashamedly goes about their days wearing wigs makes it safer and more accepting for all the other people who want to or need to wear them for any reason.

• Finally, I don't know if you've tried this already but some wig specialist places will give you an appointment a lot like you'd get at a hairdresser. You can try on a bunch of stuff, get stuff fitted specifically for you. There are a ton of people in your situation and these places will have helped many of them. The physical sensation with a wig will always be a bit different, a bit intrusive maybe, but my brain can get used to it after a few hours and I even forget I'm wearing anything. Everytime i catch myself in the mirror it makes me happy. Obviously i wish it were just my real hair, but feeling better than i did before is better than feeling shitty constantly, even if it's not the perfect solution. Small improvements are better than no improvements for me.

None of this is easy, wishing you every happiness in the future, rooting for your intrepid little hair follicles on their journey back, and wishing you smooth sailing in your recovery too. <3.

My mom always preferred baseball caps. I thought her head was adorable and I enjoyed it when her head was just hanging out.