cassie 🐺

I have a couple answers to this that might be uncommon, personal, and wouldn’t have helped me in the early stages, but were the final nails in the coffin of this doubt for me and I haven’t ever worried about it since.

The first came a couple months after coming out. I noticed that I had already changed a lot, almost entirely mental. I couldn’t describe exactly how, but it felt like I really had done myself a favor and burned the bridges I needed to in order to take control of my life. At that point, I started to figure - well, if this whole being-a-girl thing doesn’t work out, who’s to say I can’t transition again? I couldn’t imagine going back to who I was before - I knew that if I was going to ever identify as masculine again, it’d be a retransition, not a detransition. And tbh if that ever happens I very much look forward to what new roads lie in front of me. It’s nothing to be afraid of - everyone I fell out with in the process of coming out was no real friend of mine anyway. And I know the people in my life now would have my back.

The second was that I developed pretty severe fibromyalgia after some time on HRT. I think I had it to a low grade before? But it definitely worsened to a disabling degree after about a year on hormones. It’s not a very well understood condition (and as a diagnosis of exclusion it’s probably not just one condition) but it’s a lot more common in women, which maybe implies it’s just part of how my body works on estrogen. So I had a choice to make - would I rather go off estrogen if it’d help with the pain? And the answer was a surprisingly immediate and definitive “hell fucking no”. Even with a new disability life was so much better. That’s the point I knew it was the right choice and I’ve never doubted it since.

I guess the way I’d tie this up is - it took a long while after I started giving it a go to be 100% assured I’d made the right decision. It is a leap of faith you will have to make without a guarantee - that said, if you’re thinking about it to this level your odds are probably extremely high. And you’ll know pretty quick if things like HRT are for you or not.

You might also benefit from nonbinary identity in the meantime to give yourself the space to explore any and all options. I landed on identifying as nonbinary but broadly transfemme - you can figure out the more specific parts of your identity later, just figure out what you want to explore in the present and you’ll get there with some time!

Best description of this I’ve read, thank you. It’s not a question about men directly, it’s a question about how women have to navigate a world with a small percentage of men that will hurt them given the opportunity.

I like the word “burgerpunk” to describe our dystopia not as neon lights and cool sexy cyborgs but more the aesthetic of a DoorDash ad.

internet discourse is so attention-seeking, contentious and unempathetic that I feel like it’s fostered a culture where people expressing hurt are routinely interrogated and doubted just in case they’re seeking undeserved attention. (because some people do!)

so, people are caught between a rock and a hard place. They can be honest about what burdens them in a way that leaves room for critique, and take the emotional damage that comes from the interrogation of their experiences. or they find extreme, bulletproof-sounding, “nobody could be ok under these circumstances” ways of putting their problems that aren’t in line with reality.

The former is honest but puts you at emotional risk when you’re already vulnerable. The latter is inauthentic but does grant the solidarity and support they’re seeking in the first place. I can’t really blame the people who pick door #2, especially when this decision is conditioned over long periods of social media use. It’s also in line with catastrophization, a common distortion many of us experience already.

notably, this has always been a common problem with how PTSD is understood, specifically complex trauma. many people discount their own trauma because it’s not the typical “got my limb blown off” image of trauma and they’ll occasionally be attacked for claiming they are traumatized. So they find more extreme ways to put their trauma that do get them the support they’re seeking. (and need!)

I don’t know what the solution to any of this is but I do feel it comes from a real place and I put the blame more on social media than the individuals, despite how annoyed I can get with people when I see it.

Especially considering a lot of the creative talent behind Valve’s acclaimed single player catalog are no longer at the company. Valve is a different company now and so their games will be different too.

Detective Costeau hasn’t figured it out yet, you haven’t even met him yet, he’s still sleeping off his last bender. Kim, on the other hand, already had your pronouns in his notes alongside a comprehensive psych eval

young men have been told that white men are the worst thing to be.

Ok, but try not being a man and see if people think that’s any better…

While this is true to an extent, from experience this line of thinking has its limits and is very easy to misapply. On the one hand, yes you can tell people their ideas do not gel with the vision of the project, and sometimes that’s the right call. And sometimes doing this a lot is best for the project.

On the other hand, even if a majority of the work is coming from one person, not only does your community learn your project, they also spend time contributing to it, fixing bugs, and helping other people. I feel it’s only to a project’s benefit to honor them and take difficult suggestions seriously, and get to the root of why those suggestions are coming up. Otherwise you risk pissing off your contributors, who I feel have the right to be annoyed at you and maybe post evangelion themed vent blog posts if you consistently shut down contributors’ needs and fail to adapt to what your users actually want out of your software. And forking, while freeing and playing to the idea of freedom of choice, also splits your userbase and contributors and makes both parties worse off. It really depends on the project, but it pays to maintain buy-in and trust from people who care enough to meaningfully contribute to your project.