I’ve been “officially” questioning my gender for about 3 months, but I already owned exclusively men’s clothing and had had a men’s haircut for years. I never tried to pass for male, though. That’s all changed, now. I’ve begun binding daily, given myself a new haircut, attempted to adopt more of a masculine posture and mannerisms, and tentatively tried to practice speaking in a lower register. And, all this work has resulted in my being taken for male about as many times in the past three months as I have since I first started wearing men’s clothes over five years ago- which is to say, it’s happened three or four times.

Three or four times in three months is nothing to sneer at. It suggests that my appearance is more masculine, and less clearly butch lesbian, than it was previously. I’m 5’2″ with significant hips and no testosterone; one cannot expect miracles. So I believe I’m moving in the right direction with my presentation. But, at the same time, trying to pass has been one of the most anxiety-provoking, discouraging experiences of my life (well, my life as I have been living it in the past six or seven years or so- the homeless shelter was significantly more anxiety provoking and discouraging, as was the eating disorder treatment program). I absolutely hate the feeling of trying and failing.

For the past six or seven years I’ve tried desperately trying to avoid the possibility that I might be transgender. In large part, this was because I had no idea that passing as male was a likely outcome of testosterone for most female-bodied people. The FTMs I’d seen, met, or heard about had all been either pre T, avoiding T, or unable to take T for various reasons (most were young, in high school or college, and new to IDing as male). These guys didn’t look like men, they looked like butch lesbians. The one guy I met who really did look like a dude was intersex and had easily passed for male even before transition, which significantly clouded the issue.

Now, let me take a moment to say that there is absolutely nothing wrong with looking like a butch lesbian. I happen to think butch lesbians are totally hot- in most cases, because I’m into women, I think butch lesbians are a hell of a lot hotter than passing trans men are. But the trans guys I was most aware of didn’t look more like men than the butch women did, and I couldn’t imagine anything more humiliating than having other people think that I was trying to look like a man, but doing a shitty job at it.

I’ve never been much good with failure. I was an obese teenager in high school, then I started trying to lose weight, and 12 months later I was a full-on anorexic. That’s the sort of hyper-focused, competitive, uncompromising mentality that I seem to have been saddled with, for good or ill. It can be a huge boon, at times- for instance, it allowed me to start a career as a professional journalist despite having earned my BA in psychology and then spending my post-college years in eating disorder treatment centers and homeless shelter- but it was also pretty directly responsible for landing my post-college self in eating disorder treatment centers and homeless shelters. And, it’s why I wouldn’t, couldn’t let myself be trans. Because when I thought of trans people I imagined these sad sacks who were trying desperately to convince people that they were something that everyone could see they weren’t, and that simply could not be me.

So, I avoided everything to do with trans people. I avoided learning about transition, I avoided ever thinking about my gender identity, and I assiduously avoided saying anything to indicate that, deep down, I suspected I was probably more like a trans guy than a butch woman. (I also convinced myself that all butch women felt the way I felt, which is something I continue to struggle with).

Eventually, this attitude caught up with me. Maybe it never would have if I hadn’t styled myself an LGBT journalist, but I found that it was nearly impossible to avoid learning anything about the trans community while pursuing that particular profession. To my total shock, I found out that testosterone gave most of those who took it solid results, allowing them to fully pass as male even if they looked pretty damn female beforehand. All of a sudden, the main obstacle to my considering transition for myself was lifted!

I’m not sure there was anything that could have stopped what happened next from happening. I’ve fought against it, but the truth is that I really can’t stand looking female. As long as I believed that it was something to be endured, I did so as stoically as possible. I was even happy, and part of that happiness was a stubborn insistence on not having any drama about my body image or my gender identity. But, once I knew that passing really was an option, and that I wouldn’t always have to look female regardless of what I called myself, that’s changed. Even if it’s a hard road that’ll take years for me to complete, I can’t help wanting those physical changes. I’ve been trying to come up with another reason to keep stoically enduring, but it’s hard going. I want people to look at me and see a man. I’m not sure I can ever be comfortable without that, knowing that it would be possible.