Learning to Live

Hormones, hair and why every transgirl should own an epilator.

Mon, 17 Jun 2013 00:29:00 -0400

Hey girls,

You remember when everybody was like “Pills make your body hair thin out, and eventually you’ll have girl pattern hair” and you’re so excited, but a year later things are still not so different. And I mean, you shave all the time, you fret over the little imperfections, you wish you didn’t have hair on your chest.

You need an epilator.

Everybody knows, to some degree, that shaving doesn’t really restart the hair follicle growth - it just lops it off. And old-wives tales aside, that’s pretty good for short term results. But those hairs that you’re lopping the tops off? They’re hairs you had when you were pre-HRT. Those’re man hairs, baby. Waxing is a great solution for this, but can be pretty expensive - and home waxing is sticky and gross and easy to mess up - and don’t even get me started on chemicals. Those’re my experiences, anyway. Why am I talking about waxing, what does that have to do with this? Well, waxing restarts to the hair growth cycle, which your body will replace with lady-hairs (and sometimes not at all). And so does epilation.

Epilation you can do yourself at home, requires no cost except for the initial investment, and gives you lady-smooth skin, while plucking out your male-pattern hairs. There’s just one thing…

It hurts. Holy fuck does it hurt.

But beauty is pain, so suck it up, buttercup. Go get your fine booty into the shower, warm, lovely, and give your body a good soaking - warmth opens up the pores and makes the hair a little easier to pluck out. Don’t use any product on the area, though - I’ll tell you when to do that. So jump out of the shower, find a nice spot - I love my balcony - that’s preferably not carpet, cause there’ll be little hairs flying everywhere. Make sure to pull your skin taut, work in one direction (against the grain) and tell yourself pretty legs pretty legs pretty legs over and over and over.

It’s worth it, I promise.

Jump in a cold shower afterwards, to close up all your pores, and then dab dry your skin. Apply some product, baby oil is great, or any of your favorite moisturizer. And relish in your wonderful, smooth legs.

You can epilate mostly everywhere, too - but avoid your pits unless you’re masochistic as hell.

Epilation is cheap, too! You can get epilators in stores that will last you for the rest of your life for about $40. I paid a little more ($99) and got this bad boy, because it has an electric razor attachment and is all sorts of amazing, but you can get something like this for less ($39).

You can expect between four and six weeks of smoothness with epilation, and the more you epilate, the longer between epilation. The following day you might see some stubble, but just run over that again - it’ll be the hair that was just beneath the surface when you first did your run.

rosenview: Whoa buddy, time for another wig giveaway. This is...

Wed, 12 Jun 2013 22:53:00 -0400

rosenview:

Whoa buddy, time for another wig giveaway. This is for a curly brown wig I got off eBay a few months ago (if I find the listing again I’ll be sure to link it here). It’s been too warm to ever really wear it, and since I’m moving soon I figured I’d give it away and have one less thing to pack.

Here are the rules, they’re pretty simple:

One like, one reblog

No need to follow, but you might want to if you enjoy reviews of everything from BB creams and circle lenses, to wigs and nail polish. Or if you just like looking at pretty clothes.

Feel free to enter no matter what corner of the world you’re from! However, if you live outside the US please be willing to pay for shipping.

Bam, that’s it. Giveaway ends on June 24th, 2013. The winner will be picked using a random number generator and then contacted via ask box.

REBLOG AND I WILL DRAW A CHARACTER BASED ON YOUR BLOG

Wed, 05 Jun 2013 05:39:42 -0400

paopu-tan:

I’M PRETTY FUCKING SURE I’M GOING TO REGRET THIS BUT I WILL GLADLY DRAW A CHARACTER BASED ON YOUR BLOG FROM THE 5 SECONDS I WILL STARE.

The art style will most likely look like this

so yeah i’ll probably stop when it becomes too much or whenever I just decide I don’t want to do it anymore. But i’m pretty confident this won’t get that much notes anyways.

MAKE SURE YOU CHECK YOUR URL TAG TO FIND IT IF IT’S DONE.

Here's something about self medicating. You may think it's safe and easy etc. But if you do it, and you have contraindications that you may not know about it can be extremely dangerous even fatal.

Mon, 22 Apr 2013 11:00:46 -0400

I address all this in my post - the contraindications for something mostly benign like spironolactone are minimal. Avoid high potassium foods, try to avoid alcohol - keep your fluids up.

Most of the fear surrounding self-medding comes from 50 year old transgirls who say things like “tranny nation” and who didn’t have the resources available to research that we do right now.

Self-Medication 101 (For Transsexual women)

Mon, 22 Apr 2013 01:02:38 -0400

Why self-medicate?

There’s a whole lot of reasons to want to self-medicate. For some it can be a desire not to wait, not to go through the drama and rigmarole. Who else is going to know you better than you? If you’re a girl, you’re a girl. You probably know that well enough. If you don’t, then think about it some more. Other reasons might be that you don’t have insurance, or you don’t want people to know or you’d just prefer to have control over your own regiment.

Cost
Expected cost will be ~$30 per month, but you’ll need $91 upfront and that’ll get you roughly 3 months worth. That’s at a dose that’s probably sufficient for most girls to start out with. You can ramp up dosages and introduce other more esoteric meds as you go, but the basics will be that you’re on 100mg of Spironolactone and 2mg of Estradiol Valerate per day.

Stuff to Know
Your blood pressure will drop after your spiro dose, so have something salty to eat around that point. On that, you’ll find yourself craving salt in general and that’s okay because you’ll have an excess of potassium from now on. What’s that mean to you? Cut out any dark soda from your diet. Seriously. Scrap it. That stuff’s dangerous now. Bananas, too. Everything else is pretty okay, though. Keep your water levels up to account for the higher salt levels. And understand that you’re going to be going to the bathroom a lot because spironolactone is a pretty potent diuretic. Oh, if you drink or smoke a lot? Cut it out. Your liver is going to be processing a lot of hormones now, and smoking inhibits the effects of Estradiol.

There’s also the infertility thing. That’s a thing, too.

Note: Many people like to point out the increased risks of DVT with estrogen pills, but understand that those risks have only ever been linked to Ethylestradiol and equine estrogen, andnever in any conclusive manner to Estradiol Valerate.

Ordering
Head over to here and grab a bottle of 100 for $46. Then go here and add a pack of 84 for $45 to your cart. Shipping is free. Total cost will be $91 for 84 days worth of pills. Expect about a two week delivery time to most anywhere in the US or Australia. I’m not sure about anywhere else.

Doses
Pick a time of day that you’ll be awake both the AM/PM variants of. I use 11. You can use 7 or 8 or whatever you like. For effective hormone replacement, however, you need to be consistent. You’ll be taking one half of a Spiro pill (they’re scored down the center) along with one pretty blue Estradiol pill in your AM dose. In the evening, take the other half of your spiro pill. That’s going to give you 100mg of Spironolactone and 2mg of Estradiol per day, which is enough to get results but not too much that your body will freak out and spike your T-levels in retaliation. It’s important to split your spiro across the day because spiro only has a primary mechanism of action of about 10 hours anyway, so you need the split dose for full suppression.

Future
In three months, it’s probably not a bad idea to get a female hormone level panel. There’re private pathology places that can do this for you for around $55 without insurance. You can use the results to gauge where you are vs where you want to be. Raise your doses accordingly, or stay with what you got. It’s up to you, and that’s what self-medication is about. It’s all up to you. Your body. Your choice.

Notes
If you’re on the fence, still, then only order and take the Spironolactone. It’ll suppress your testosterone and stop you getting anymore masculine. It won’t inherently feminize you on its own, though, and you need a primary sex hormone eventually. You can stay on spiro for upwards of a year without any permanent changes, though. So if you’re on the edge of deciding, then you might want to just order Spiro and not Estradiol

To all my transgirl friends who want a lower calorie option to...

Wed, 17 Apr 2013 00:37:09 -0400

To all my transgirl friends who want a lower calorie option to milk (and of course we have to avoid soy): this stuff is amazing. Just. Amazing.

Two years apart; started transition literally two months after...

Sat, 13 Apr 2013 02:49:19 -0400

Two years apart; started transition literally two months after the first picture. Back then I was 450lbs and had no hair on my head; I’d shaved bald with a straight blade for six years. I wore a wig for the first 18 months of my transition, 24/7, religiously, and only now have I started to try and feel okay with my real hair.

And you know what? I feel real now. Not pretend, not like I’m hiding. Real.

My pokeball sized new toy…

Wed, 27 Mar 2013 10:48:11 -0400

My pokeball sized new toy…

TW: Rape & Children. Pro Choice Truth: Teaching kids about rape

Tue, 26 Mar 2013 05:33:34 -0400

TW: Rape & Children. Pro Choice Truth: Teaching kids about rape:

choosechoice:

kissingunderspiderwebs:

elfstaranymore:

I’m not gonna write a big detailed masterpost on this topic, because it’s not a major area of expertise for me. I just want to point out a couple ways people screwed up in teaching *me* about rape.

One was that in kindergarten, we were taught that “no one should touch your private parts except your parents or a doctor.” This is fucked up for two reasons. One, a LOT of sexual assault on children is done by parents and doctors *precisely because* these people have easy access and are considered “safe”. Two, they should have taught us that ANY touch on ANY part of your body that you don’t consent to is not okay.

The other was that at some point, when I was maybe 8 or 9, I heard the word “rape” on TV and asked someone - I think my mom - what it meant. She refused to tell me, maybe because she thought it would scare me, maybe because she just didn’t want to talk to me about something involving sex. Kids NEED to know that rape is a thing, because kids can be raped. It’s a thing that happens. And if a kid is old enough that the word “rape” has entered their consciousness, they are old enough to be told what it is. You don’t have to go into graphic detail and give them nightmares. All you have to say is that rape is when someone does something sexual to another person without that person’s permission, and talk about how that relates to what you’ve (hopefully) already taught them about how people shouldn’t touch you without permission.

This is one big reason, by the way, why I am vehemently anti-spanking and anti-other forms of coercion in childcare. Teaching children to never say no to an adult, teaching them that their bodies are the property of people who are bigger than them, etc. - this is a big part of rape culture. I would rather see children who aren’t “well-behaved” but have an understanding of personal boundaries than children who believe it’s acceptable for a bigger person to push a smaller person around. Everything you do to a kid influences the values they internalize, and I want kids to know that shit doesn’t fly. Not only because they need to know they deserve to be safe, but also because someday THEY will be the big people who have the power to abuse someone else.

Bolded, yes, THAT.

This is so incredibly true and important.

Those children of course then have no concept of actions having reactions and consequences and grow up to believe they’re entitled to get away with anything…

abdreams: I need cuddles :-( cuddling

Sun, 24 Mar 2013 05:30:52 -0400

abdreams:

I need cuddles :-(

*cuddling*

katiedreamsincolour: manhating-babyeater: deeplezstonerwitch: ...

Sun, 24 Mar 2013 01:35:31 -0400

katiedreamsincolour:

manhating-babyeater:

deeplezstonerwitch:

genderterrorist:

OMG WHAT IS THIS FROM?!?!?!?!?!?

seriously, what is this from?!?!

Okay, it looks like this is from a UK show called Shameless

it looks like its the US remake

So. Fucking. Cute.

“Sure, I can control my bladder, but with my busy social...

Sat, 23 Mar 2013 23:47:55 -0400

“Sure, I can control my bladder, but with my busy social schedule, why should I?”

HEY! Listen! Does anybody have the Keep Calm & Take it like a little girl picture handy?

Sat, 23 Mar 2013 06:00:22 -0400

Do any of my transgirl friends here know how well "butterfly" vibrators work for those with external plumbing?

Sat, 23 Mar 2013 04:57:48 -0400

So is anybody interested in proof reading and providing critical advice and feedback on a story in progress?

Thu, 21 Mar 2013 23:29:58 -0400

It’s about a boy coming of age and realizing he’s a girl. Ideally, we’re going to submit it for publishing - but not having a lot of external feedback makes it difficult to figure out what needs work.

Njoy plug?

Tue, 19 Mar 2013 19:20:36 -0400

http://www.njoytoys.com/products/pureplugs.php

Honestly the greatest thing in the world.

Prostrate exam /and/ breast exam. #transgirlproblems

Tue, 19 Mar 2013 13:18:28 -0400

recessruckus: ladrina: bacon Wow this is beautiful I...

Tue, 19 Mar 2013 03:33:06 -0400

recessruckus:

ladrina:

bacon

Wow this is beautiful

I haven’t had bacon in over a year…someone needs to bring me bacon. now.

I have never had bacon. Vegetarian all my life. Am I missing out?

Anyone feel like calling? Lonely as hell tonight~

Tue, 05 Mar 2013 23:45:42 -0500

This came in the mail today…

Tue, 05 Mar 2013 12:38:07 -0500

This came in the mail today…