Reflections from a Trans Man after Fourteen Years of Hormone Replacement Therapy
After reaching fourteen years on testosterone, and fourteen years into my transition, I’m sitting here, a trans man, trying to remember the moments that led up to my very first injection. Sometimes I take my past for granted and
avoid self-reflection, but an anniversary or helping out a fellow trans man is always a good time to think about how things have changed, and what I have learned now that I’m over decade into my transition.
The needle never really stops intimidating me. I like to pretend that I’m tough, and that it doesn’t bother me anymore, but I would be kidding myself. I engage in this injection ritual every fourteen days and will continue administering the shots for the rest of my life. T will forever be part of my journey.
The weeks before I started on hormone replacement therapy the main emotion that ruled my day-in / day-out activities was terror. This may come as a surprise to some and a moment of connection for others. I knew that starting testosterone was something I wanted, but I was terrified of the changes that would make my transgender identity no longer a secret, a wish, or a desire. Once I went of testosterone my body would change and people would notice. Of course the whole point of going on"T" is to have the body changes, to have the voice drop, to have people use "Sir", "He" or "Buddy" instead of "Ma'am", "She" or "Lady". But preparing for that first appointment where I would receive my prescription for testosterone and administer the first injection, where I would the wait for the unknown was overwhelming. While I waited those very long two weeks questions kept cycling through my brain: How will people react? Who will turn their back on me? Who will embrace me and call me by my chosen name? How will my parents and family interact with me as my physical appearance continues to change? Will I be happy? As weeks moved into just hours and I was closer to being a man on the outside, shedding any last part of being read as a woman, I feared that my continual anxiety around going on hormones meant that I was not ready for this step in my transition. I then began to question if I was even transgender at all.
I am standing here now, fourteen years later, and all I can say is that taking that very hard step into my doctor’s office and then putting that very big needle in my leg for the first time, was the strongest I have ever felt in defining my own journey and my identity. Within milliseconds of the T rushing into me, filling my leg muscle and soaking into my tissue, I felt the fear being pushed out of my body by a warming rush of happiness. As the day pushed on, and I limped around the city with a very sore leg muscle, I knew that although my maleness was still invisible to the naked eye, it was growing inside of me and would slowly blossom for everyone to see.
When people learned of my new identity and the hormonal treatments that were core to assisting me, questions began to pop up. Will your personality change? Will you become angry? Will you die younger? Do you need to continue on hormones the rest of your life? What happens if you get off of testosterone? Will you ever want children? Are you sure they are safe to use? What if you get cancer? . . . and the questions contined. My main answer when the barrage of questions hit me was, “I’d rather live even just five years as me, than another thirty to fifty as a person I was never meant to be.” This helped some people, but others continued to stay focused on the concreteness of my decision and how that would play out in the future. For those individuals, I can now report that my personality has stayed the same, I have never been an angry person and (unless driving) do not see that changing. Any one of us could die at any given time, could testosterone be the cause of that, maybe, but research is showing it is safe and effective for longer term use. And if kids happen into my life, they were meant to be part of it, if not, it wasn’t my time on this planet to be a parent outside of the people I’ve mentored over the years.
With all of the fears around hormones, the longer I have been on them, the more uneventful my life has become. In my experience, after the first three years of being on testosterone not much changes. - Much Love - Inspirational Transguy
