Hello, I’m Mariah Andrews, from Laughlin, Nevada. After being on HRT for only 18 months, I am considering discontinuing HRT and going completely non-op. My doctor thinks my excessive weight gain within a two month period is related to my hormone intake. I got a job in a local casino as a maid and I do a lot of walking and lifting and developed more strength in muscle. My arms and legs are firm and hard, so hard that you can shatter glass on my arm and not cut me. I wonder if HRT is actually doing the opposite of what I expected it to do for me?
Then again, I was never male-looking in my life. I am 27 years of age, but my friends all say I look 35-40. Throughout my life, I never had high levels of testosterone to begin with. My T-levels, prior to HRT were very low, below 300! My estro-level for a male was slightly higher than normal too. This is the truth. I never had an adam’s apple, I never had much body hair! I showed no signs of baldness. I was always mistaken for a girl when I was a guy because I always wore my hair long.
These factors also lead me to stopping HRT because of the fact that I’m finding out that it wasn’t necessary. I am starting to feel that I’m not needing to prove anyone anything. I now feel that peer pressure led me to starting HRT because all my T-friends were on hormones and I was the only one who wasn’t. Yet, I was the most passable one always. Other T-girls envied me, even those who took hormones for years, yet I never took hormones until last year.
I’ve always been a girl in my heart and was living the role pretty much for about a year or two before I started HRT. I never had any problems except at school because I started attending as a male and when I transitioned in front of everone, people took offense. But had I never been known to be a guy, I probably would have never had a problem, period.
At work, I have no problems, period. They all know and are cool with it. Even the H.R. knows, because when I had to do a background check, the topic was unavoidable. It’s none of their business to know if I was on hormones or not, or even if I got the surgery.
And another truth about me: I have always had very tiny male genitalia and my female friends around me says that I’m pretty much unnoticable: they’ve been telling me that for years!
So, in my case, why do I have to bother with HRT? I even fooled the hormone doctor who started me off! He thought I had taken hormones previously, but no.
I’ve always been a girl but I now feel that I don’t need to try to prove it in any other way other than just being myself. Am I alone in this feeling?
Mariah
I am a FtoM non-op.
My own decision due to health concerns.
I have always looked a bit more male than female (I look very much like my dad). I was asked constantly as a kid and a few times as an adult (when I thin, as I had a small chest) if I was a boy or a girl. I have a lot of body hair and facial hair, but its so blonde it can be hard to see. I’ve always had a buldge down below. Made girls jeans uncomfortable and akward and I had always tried to hide it before (I had often been teased for it in my highschool years).
Lately, I have been trying to work up the courage to try chest binding. One of my trans friends said I would pass for a male easily without HRT or anything.
Reading this has made me a lot happier with my decision. Thank you.
Thanks for adding your thoughts to this, Dray! I’m happy to hear this article spoke to you.
What if I want to continue HRT but don’t want the surgery?
That’s OK! Surgery is not required.
This was awesome to stumble across this. Ill admit im clueless to transtioning i didnt even know about HRT till last year. Please dont laugh at me but i thought crossdressing surgery was the only things you can do. Now i know better and hope to live my life insted of what people expect of me. I want to start hrt as soon as i can afford the vists to a GT. But being the only transwoman i know in real life. Advice is from the net only, i have got soo many mixed comments when i mention being a lesbian and not wanting SRS. I have been called a perv, ignored, called a “shemale,ladyboy” even told to give up and just be a man, as if i just get to pick. Seems online at least there is this book in what a girl is. I must have missed it because im more like lora croft with mixed up equipment lol.