Claire Xen  🏳️‍⚧️ 🏳️‍🌈 🧙🏻‍♀️ BLM  🏴 🚩

I would sometimes envy woman for being "allowed by society" to dress in a certain way, or use certain body language, etc. But this was only brief moments, and I always thought it's not such a big deal and not worth doing anything about, especially considering ... 2/

... especially considering that I also had this crippling depression and considering that I always only planned on living for just a few more years anyway. Just enough time to finish whatever projects I was working on right now. 3/

I was 39 (last year) when I realized that I would probably never going to actually kill myself and that I had to plan for decades of more life. I was devastated because I knew that would mean that I had to live with decades more of depression. At this time the depression ... 4/

... the depression was making it impossible for me to have a regular in person contact with other people. I had to "preserve my energy" for the important interactions and then spend time in solitude to "recharge". I didn't understand that this was because it did cost me ... 5/

... cost me enormous energy to present as men. But because I realized that year that I had to plan for decades to come I realized I probably should transition to do something about the obvious gender dysphoria, still not seeing the connection to the depression. 6/

Only in the days and weeks _after_ I had made this decision the fog lifted and I realized that the depression was gender dysphoria all along. Now the depression is completely gone, just from transitioning socially (!). I still have this longing for being more ... 7/

... being more passable, and there's a lot of anxiety about the path ahead. Maybe that "clear identifiable dysphoria" is even a bit worse now, that I have transitioned socially but haven't done anything else yet. But I feel infinitely better than just a few months ago. 8/

I wish more information on this would have been available to me, and my parents and teachers, when I was a teen. There were signs, but neither I nor the people around me understood them. This has improved so much since then. In part through trans visibility on social media. 9/