I’m feeling so sad and uncomfortable in my own skin today that I’m struggling to work.
Work has often been a lifeline for me. I think one of the many reasons I’ve always been drawn to the hard sciences, especially to maths and physics, since the youngest age, is that it has always felt like a lifeline to me: 2+2 is equal to 4 no matter what my mood is like or what is happening in the world, and focusing on maths & physics has often allowed me to get completely absorbed in the topic forgetting my own woes.
My scientific work has definitely been helping me in these past days, too — to the extent that I’ve started writing my textbook immediately after breakfast in the past few mornings, skipping journaling and/or blogging.
Even today my work is helping me stay afloat but I can definitely feel the effort I have to make to focus on it and how slowly it was progressing this morning.
The main reason is that gender dysphoria is biting again.
I have recently noticed that my small breasts have gotten bigger — being relatively small, any change is very visible, at least to me. And this has just thrown me for a loop. For an awful loop. Here I am, strongly considering top surgery to get rid of my breasts ASAP, held back only by the fear of the long months of recovery (which would entail a temporary loss of my athlete identity, a whole other can of worms to worry about), and my breasts decide to get bigger… what the heck?!
I have also gotten weaker, lost muscular strength, overall, and the two effects might be related, as in a general loss of muscle mass (turning into fat) due to my reduced level of exercise.
I know that from the outside this can sound like a “first world problem” or even a “non-issue”, but for me it’s a big deal because it undermines both my gender identity and one of the most important aspects of my personal identity (i.e. me as an athlete).
I had nightmares about it last night and today I’m at the point where I’d like to hide and not show myself in public with this body…
I’m not going to hide, I am going to take myself to the gym to exercise this afternoon, but it’s going to take all the psychological energy I have today.
The Little Prince and the Fox 