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Talking to Mom About HRT

Discussion in 'Gender Identity and Expression' started by MaybeBenji, Mar 20, 2019.

  1. MaybeBenji

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    Hi,
    I'm ftm transgender and came out to my mom a little over a month ago. I'm seeing a therapist and will hopefully get my hormone letter soon. My mom was supportive when I told her but hasn't started calling me "he" or "Ben" yet because I live with her and my sister and haven't told my sister yet. I'm going to tell my sister soon, she'll probably be supportive.
    I don't know how much my mom knows about being trans and what it entails. I think her understanding is the basic of change your name, get surgery, be a boy now. I don't know if she knows about HRT. How do I go about talking to her? I want her to know before I start hormones so she knows what I'm doing. She's supportive of me being trans but I'm kind of worried that telling her I want to go on hormones will be too much. I'm worried that she won't get it and will think I'm nuts for wanting to inject myself with hormones. That's probably dumb because she just wants me to be happy. When I came out to her, she seemed relieved that my constant unhappiness has an underlying cause. She has told me that she will support me no matter what because she's afraid that the alternative is me being gone.
    So, yeah, anyone have any advice on how to bring up HRT? Should I wait until I get my hormone letter and show it to her? Like, "Here, this professional thinks the best thing for me is medical treatment and I agree."
    I haven't found a doctor for my HRT yet because my therapist is helping me find one. The usual doctor she sends trans patients to moved away so she's trying to find another one.

    Thanks,
    Ben
     
  2. denouement

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    You could just say "Mom, I'm starting T, peace out," and that would let her know you're starting. But it sounds like you also want her to understand why you need to do this, and that's a bit different conversation. The thing you have on your side is-- she wants you to be happy! You know this is something that will help you and make you happy. So, you just have to explain that to her.

    So Step 1: Start the conversation. "I'm going to start testosterone." Yes, it's that simple. Yes, it's nerve-wracking and very hard to get the words out of your mouth, but once you manage to say it, you can't take it back and you'll have to have the conversation.

    When I talked to my mom, I started by sitting her down and said, "Hey, I'm planning to start testosterone. I wanted to let you know because you're important to me and I want you to be involved in this part of my life."
    I didn't phrase it quite so nicely in the moment, but that was the gist of it.
    Step 2: Tell her what HRT does.

    I explained to my mom that testosterone would basically put me through male puberty, and then walked her through the effects and the risks as I understood them (so she would know I had thought of the potential "worst case"). I did my best to explain why each effect would help me or why I wanted it.
    For example, my main point was that taking T would eventually stop my period. I had always hated my period (she knew this from, well, my reaction to it over the years), and unlike birth control T would also cause other masculinizing effects. As another example, T would increase body hair. She knew I hadn't shaved my legs/etc for years, so I told her how happy and confident having that body hair made me, and that I would love to have more.

    This was a concern for me as well. After coming out to her originally, my mom and I didn't really talk about it. I certainly had never talked about my dysphoria... it's something I don't like to talk about for obvious reasons. Because of this, she didn't really understand how I felt when I said something like "I'm uncomfortable with my body." But... the reason you're starting T is because of your dysphoria, right? So to really understand why you want to take hormones, she will have to understand what dysphoria is and how it affects you.

    Explaining why you want each effect will show her how T will help "fix" your dysphoria. Now you need to explain that your dysphoria is something that needs to be fixed.
    Step 3: Explain about your dysphoria.

    I just ran right down the list of how my dysphoria had affected me over the years. Depression symptoms, never left the house, terribly socially anxious, "spaced out" and was forgetful (I mostly coped by disassociating), terrible hygiene and only wore baggy clothes for a long time, wasn't able to do active things like sports because I felt the need to bind. I used to cry uncontrollably almost every day because I was so stressed/anxious/dysphoric. I haven't gone swimming in over a decade because I didn't want to wear something as exposing as a swimsuit.

    Everything we discussed was something she had known about at least in passing or by observation. But finally instead of trying to hide it or brushing it off, I was very open about how awful I had felt, all the horrible thoughts and so on, and explained it was all due to dysphoria. At the time I think she had taken everything to be typical teenager/young adult stuff, but having it all laid out in one go got across how it had affected me over the years. It was really hard. I cried a lot. But it was something I had always wanted to tell her, too, so I did.

    I repeated that taking testosterone would change my body in a way that would alleviate my dysphoria. And without the dysphoria weighing on me so heavily, I would be more confident in myself and could start to be a healthy, normally-functioning person.
    You don't have to get super personal or go into gritty details like I did, this is the chance to explain how dysphoria has affected your life, and the ways T can help lift some of that weight off you.

    Step 4: Q&A
    She will probably have some questions and concerns throughout this conversation. Just answer as you go.
    Step 5: Hugs
    You will probably need one at this point. And then you're done!

    For me, this was a big conversation (maybe 2-3 hours), but my relationship with my mom is a lot better for it, and she 100% supports me because she knows exactly why I need to do this.

    Sorry this is an incredibly long post, but I hope it's at least a little helpful. I hope your talk with your mom goes well however you decide to do it, and you can start T soon!
     
  3. MaybeBenji

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    Thanks for the reply! I wasn't expecting such an in depth response and I really appreciate it. I'm hoping to have the conversation soon so this is a big help.
     
  4. BradThePug

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    I know that there are some good resources out there for parents about transgender identities. That may be helpful in explaining the idea of dysphoria if you dont want to go into details all about yours. I also know that when I told my dad that I was going to start hormones, he was concerned about the safety of them. So it may be good to have some information about the effects of hormones as well.
     
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