I'm pre-transition (neutrois) and have always been scared of making friends because there's always been someone in the group who wants my female body, which sets off my dysphoria. How do I stop them from doing this?
Basically, I've handled it in the same way I've handled PTSD. From what I've seen, working with GD like one might work with PTSD helps. Judging yourself won't help. Be compassionate with yourself. Part of that is honoring what your limits are, having boundaries and engage in self-care.
For me, working with either PTSD or GD looked like learning to be aware of what was going on emotionally inside my body. I took up a practice of vipassana because I found that trying to force PTSD or GD to be something other than what it is makes everything worse. Some do well with meditation while others connect to their body states in a more kinetic way (running, painting, etc). The point is that as I learned the contours of my pain, the less it seemed to be an enemy. As the relationship with my pain became less adversarial, the more I was able to tolerate, understand and work with it.
For me, I was never able to command myself to feel differently - especially with something as visceral as PTSD or GD. I found that a great deal of my suffering was caused by my unskillful strategy of trying to force myself to somehow feel different. There's the stress of the what if stories I'd tell myself, the stress of "ugh, I freaking out again. WHY CAN'T I BE NORMAL!?!" and the stress of beating myself up for what I judged as emotional BS.
Letting go of trying to control something like PTSD or GD through force of will and instead honoring the fact that my 'scars' were very real and that they can and do hurt from time to time was a lot like putting down a bag of bricks that I'd been carrying around. GD is part of the trans experience. There's no way around that. For me, self-care looked like being judicious with the people who I chose to invest my time and attention in. I needed to know that they would understand that I really did suffer terribly with GD and that it meant that I had to make accommodations for that reality.
A skillful mental health professional, a support network, learning a way of directly working with GD via meditation, art, exercise, etc, learning boundaries and self-care is what helped me get through transition.
For me, working with either PTSD or GD looked like learning to be aware of what was going on emotionally inside my body. I took up a practice of vipassana because I found that trying to force PTSD or GD to be something other than what it is makes everything worse. Some do well with meditation while others connect to their body states in a more kinetic way (running, painting, etc). The point is that as I learned the contours of my pain, the less it seemed to be an enemy. As the relationship with my pain became less adversarial, the more I was able to tolerate, understand and work with it.
For me, I was never able to command myself to feel differently - especially with something as visceral as PTSD or GD. I found that a great deal of my suffering was caused by my unskillful strategy of trying to force myself to somehow feel different. There's the stress of the what if stories I'd tell myself, the stress of "ugh, I freaking out again. WHY CAN'T I BE NORMAL!?!" and the stress of beating myself up for what I judged as emotional BS.
Letting go of trying to control something like PTSD or GD through force of will and instead honoring the fact that my 'scars' were very real and that they can and do hurt from time to time was a lot like putting down a bag of bricks that I'd been carrying around. GD is part of the trans experience. There's no way around that. For me, self-care looked like being judicious with the people who I chose to invest my time and attention in. I needed to know that they would understand that I really did suffer terribly with GD and that it meant that I had to make accommodations for that reality.
A skillful mental health professional, a support network, learning a way of directly working with GD via meditation, art, exercise, etc, learning boundaries and self-care is what helped me get through transition.
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