This question comes up all the fucking time: That’s very normal, same thing happened to me. Honestly, every step I’ve taken in transition has increased the gender dysphoria I felt towards anything about me that is even remotely tied to my agab. I’d say before I came out my chest dysphoria was about 2/10, after coming out but pre T was about a 6/10, now it’s a full on 10/10 and nearly unbearable.
The amount of anxiety "gender dysphoria" and "passing" causes seems a sure indicator that these are external values and norms being imposed on individuals. "The tyranny of the 'shoulds" is a phrase many therapists are familiar with, and it refers to the constant pressure we feel to conform to external, (familial, societal or both) and possibly oppressive norms and values. We accept these norms and values as "right" so we expend time and energy trying to embody them. The more narrow, unrealistic, and dehumanizing these norms and values are, the more anxiety and frustration we experience trying to fulfill them.
I wish I had a psychological term for this phenomenon but, basically, once you start experiencing shame towards a part of yourself, avoiding that experience of shame makes those feelings worse. I started to have more negative feelings about my breasts after I started binding. I kept them out of the way so that I could think about them less, which made the situations in which I was forced to recognize their existence (like swimming) feel unbearable. It's a kind of avoidance conditioning where the aversive keeps getting worse until you do something drastic like have surgery.
The amount of anxiety "gender dysphoria" and "passing" causes seems a sure indicator that these are external values and norms being imposed on individuals. "The tyranny of the 'shoulds" is a phrase many therapists are familiar with, and it refers to the constant pressure we feel to conform to external, (familial, societal or both) and possibly oppressive norms and values. We accept these norms and values as "right" so we expend time and energy trying to embody them. The more narrow, unrealistic, and dehumanizing these norms and values are, the more anxiety and frustration we experience trying to fulfill them.
Gender OCD
I wish I had a psychological term for this phenomenon but, basically, once you start experiencing shame towards a part of yourself, avoiding that experience of shame makes those feelings worse. I started to have more negative feelings about my breasts after I started binding. I kept them out of the way so that I could think about them less, which made the situations in which I was forced to recognize their existence (like swimming) feel unbearable. It's a kind of avoidance conditioning where the aversive keeps getting worse until you do something drastic like have surgery.
Thanks again Eliza
Am I correct in reading these remarks as all being written by girls or young women?