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It's been five years! Each and every member of toot.wales is helping create #BetterSocialMedia, and we love sharing the joy.

To celebrate we are planning a road trip in June for everyone in the #Fediverse, whether you're on toot.wales, Mastodon, Pixelfed... anything!

Let's get together for some #TootUp fun, meet Jaz and the rest of Tîm Tŵt – and hopefully bring some friends and introduce them to our amazing community along the way!

Thurs Jun 8 – Jaz @ Swansea 4-7pm (Need a coffee shop nomination) Fri Jun 9 – Toot Wales Team @ Cardiff: 4-7pm Little Man Coffee, 7-9pm Dinner Sat Jun 10 – Jaz @ Carmarthen: 7-10pm Cwrw

View the itinerary

Register your interest

To get a sense of how many people might show up please register your interest here: https://forms.gle/YjpjF5WT55hQGoPNA

We can't guarantee we can be everywhere but if there's enough interest we will do everything we can to make it happen.

An online friend on Mastodon posted the following:

Some cis people mourn who a person was when they transition.

What they don't seem to grasp is that we mourn too.

In much the same way you might mourn if you woke up to learn that you were in a coma for two or three decades.

You're awake and alive, and existing now, but what of the life that would have been?

@sasha_strange@tech.lgbt

This is so important to understand. This topic usually comes up in the context of a parent mourning the loss of a son or daughter who is transitioning. The parent may feel that their son has died and have trouble recognizing their new daughter. This is a completely natural and understandable reaction. How the parent deals with it is the big issue. Does the parent deny the daughter? Does the parent welcome the daughter with joy and open arms? Does the parent have compassion for their child and help them through the transition, love and support them and think of their child’s well-being before their own. Do they have the maturity and self-confidence to realize that their child is not doing this to hurt the parent or embarrass the parent. Does the parent have the ability to deal with their own feelings while also helping their child?

As a parent my instinct is to protect my child against every danger in the world. My kids are grown and have moved out on their own, yet this instinct remains and I have to restrain myself from trying to fix everything and let them do it and learn how to be confident and self-reliant adults in the world. But I am always there for them.

A parent who thinks that their own feelings about their child are more important than the child’s own feelings about itself are narcissists. I can hear the phrases, “Why are you doing this to me?”, “What will the neighbors think?”, “What do I tell Aunt Karen?”, “Why are you being so selfish?”, ”You killed my son.”, “My son is dead”. None of these things do anything other than hurt the child.

I feel a better way to frame it is to realize my child has been suffering for so long. If they had any other long term medical issue, I would not be angry at them. I would not try to talk or threaten them out of being sick. I would seek professional help and do everything I could to help my child.

Much of this attitude comes from ignorance. Ignorance just means not knowing something and is understandable, as long as they seek to learn the truth. A parent that refuses to learn, or refuses to accept the truth of gender dysphoria is directly harming their child.

But, few people understand that the trans person also mourns. They mourn the loss of what could have been. If you are lucky enough to have realized your reality at an early age and were encouraged and supported in your gender exploration and presentation, you don’t have as much to miss.

Those of us who were unable to face their gender issues until adulthood, in my case, my 50s, have missed plenty. I grew up a boy. I did boy things, I wore boy clothes, played with boy toys, played boy sports, and was a Boy Scout. At the time I didn’t know any different. I didn’t mind these things, and some of them I enjoyed, but I was never happy, never satisfied, never content. I was not able to form deep meaningful relationships with friends. I knew there was something wrong with me and I was afraid of opening myself up to anyone. At the time I told myself I was boring and overweight, and no one would be interested in spending time with me.

I realize now that I didn’t know who I was. I wasn’t me, the all American boy. I was a confused kid. I spent my life feeling that; Insecure, unsure of myself and my place in the world. When finally, in my 50s, the truth broke through. I finally realized who and what I was. I was a woman, I should have grown up as a girl, and suddenly it all made sense. All those puzzle pieces fell into place. I now knew why I was so out of it as a kid and through the rest of my life.

Here’s where we get to the mourning. I began to realize all the experiences I missed growing up. I didn’t get to do the girl stuff. I didn’t make friends with other girls, have the sleep overs, learn the behaviors and mannerisms of being a girl. I didn’t get to learn all that fun girl stuff, like fashion and makeup along with the not so fun stuff, like heartbreak and periods and so on. Of course, I am not reducing girlhood to these few things, I am trying to give some examples.

I realized that I will never get those experiences. I will never know what it is like to be a young girl, a teenage girl, a young adult woman and an adult woman. I now hopefully get the chance to experience being a mature woman. I particularly think about my high school and college years. That is the time for lots of confusion and problems, but also joy and freedom. I had a ’79 Jeep CJ-7 that I loved and always had the image of driving with the top down and my long hair blowing in the wind, looking good, feeling good. Doing that as a boy was great, but not the same in any way.

One TV show that appealed to me back then was the Mary Tyler Moore Show. That is who I wanted to be. That was the life I wanted; a young, single, confident, capable, and intelligent woman. Needless to say, I missed out on that fantasy. My daughter is living that now and I am envious of her and I support her as much as possible.

The feeling of missing out on a childhood, lost experiences never to be found, is real and painful. It really is mourning a lost life. Parents, friends and others should be aware of this and be supportive.

The joy a trans person experiences when they accept themselves is profound. They may appear almost giddy and full of life. But underneath, next to the fear of coming out and the reactions of the outside world, is also the disappointment of realizing all they missed out on in their life. While they are celebrating the birth of their new self, they are mourning the lost childhood they never got to know.

Every human who has ever lived, that had a secret, had to decide whether to share that secret with the outside. This conundrum is not exclusive to LGBT+ people, but that is what I want to discuss. My personal experience is with the T part of that initialism. Coming out is a deeply personal decision and one that everyone must make for themselves. Add in the issue of transitioning and it becomes even more difficult. First a disclaimer, I would never make light of the struggle of the L, G, and B. Perhaps I am being naïve in this blog post. I have not had any of the experiences of a gay person coming out and living their authentic life. I do not know their struggle and I cannot know their actual journey and compare it to mine. There are many similarities, but I want to draw attention to one big difference. They can choose who they come out to, and they can generally walk in the world without drawing attention. They come out once to each person they choose to tell.

A Trans person has the same issues with regard to who to tell, but deciding to transition will mean coming out every time they step out the door. A gay person can come out to their family and still go into work the next day without worrying that everyone else will know. A trans person will come in to work looking very different from the day before, and they will be noticed. You can’t choose to tell just your family and close friends if you plan to transition.

So, that is what I am struggling with now. I’m sliding out of my mid-50s. I’ve spent my entire life playing the part of a man in society. It is all I know. I’ve been pretty convincing. I’ve nurtured relationships, and built a business in that guise. Coming out to family is doable, but transitioning and living as my authentic self has some serious potential pitfalls. I have no experience being a woman. I’ve known that I wasn’t right my whole life, but I didn’t get the opportunity to socialize and interact with the world as a girl. How am I supposed to do this?

The first is the fear of looking absurd. Some AMABs can appear very convincing when presenting as a woman. Not so much for me. First, I am 6’ 2”. While not impossible, that is way out of the norm. Second, I weigh too much, way too much. Even if I lost the weight, I am not a slight person. I will stand out. To put the cherry on top, I wear a size 15 men’s shoe. That is a hard enough size to find for men, women’s shoes in that size are rarer than hen’s teeth. Surprisingly women’s stores seem to do well for “extended sizes” and I can find stuff to wear.

So, assuming I got the clothes right. The hair, makeup, whatever. I’m still a giant presence and will never be able to blend into the background the way I have wanted my whole life.

The next fear is rejection. My wife knows and is broadly supportive. She does not want me to tell our kids because she is afraid it will emotionally harm them. We have a 28 year old daughter living on her own in NYC and a 23 year old son pursuing a PhD in Albany. They are both well educated and very liberal. My son has a couple of friends who are non-binary, so he is well familiar with the concept. My daughter gets along well with his friends as well as having her own LGB friends. My wife is particularly worried about our son feeling betrayed and abandoned by his male role model. That he will feel he has been lied to his whole life. At first I didn’t think that would happen, but now doubts are creeping in and my wife’s worry is eating into my psyche.

Then there is my father. He is 93 years old now, still going strong, but won’t be around forever. He and I have built a business together over the past 28 years, so we see each other every weekday and get along well. One positive is that one of our clients confided in him that they have a grandchild who is trans. Then his, I guess you would say, girlfriend has disclosed that she too has a grandchild who is trans. So, he knows it is a thing and it does not repulse him. He is definitely confused by the phenomenon.

When he told me about these two kids, my reply was that they just needed love and support and they would do fine. I didn’t make a big deal about it, but inside I was screaming, We have a part time secretary/assistant who has worked with my dad for 40 years. I overheard the two of them talking over lunch and her saying that she was so glad they were past the stage where they have to worry about these things. I gave a little internal chuckle at that.

I have lots of thoughts about telling him and how it would play out. You see, when I was about 12 or 13, he walked in on me dressed in women’s clothes. I had snuck some of my mom’s stuff. He demanded to know what I was doing, and as a terrified kid, I said, I don’t know. He told me to take it off and then he came to my room and again asked and I again said I didn’t know. He said don’t do it again and don’t tell your mother. And that was it. Needless to say, it didn’t stop the feelings and the desire to dress. It continued on and I was just more careful.

But from that day on, I lived in fear of that coming back to bite me. Fear of him saying something. I knew it was wrong, weird, and perverted. I was terrified of messing up, making a mistake and him bringing the incident. I have likened it to the sword of Damocles, hanging over my head. It wasn’t until recently that I was able to work through the trauma associated with it. I can say that EMDR worked amazingly well for me.

So, what do I imagine would happen if I told him. I think he would believe me. I think I would break down. I worry that he would feel guilty about the incident, if he even remembers it. Since he is aware of the “condition”, I don’t think he would be hostile. I would like the chance to discuss it with him and explain what I was dealing with growing up, but I don’t want to blame him or make him feel guilty. I know he already regrets traveling for work so much and not being home all the time. I hold no ill will, my parents did the best they could and it was pretty good.

He is 93, still very healthy, but age is most certainly catching up. He is not the most steady on his feet and uses a walker sometimes. He has developed prostate cancer, but if you last until your 90s, a man will get prostate cancer. It won’t kill him. He’s also developed a basal cell carcinoma behind his ear. Also treatable. Pretty amazing since he spent a lot of time outside and never used sunscreen or wore a hat. So, a part of me wants to just wait it out and I won’t have to tell him. But, his mother lived to 103, and I am getting older every day.

Then there is my sister. She’s 2 ½ years younger than me. We had a younger sister who died at age 30 from epilepsy. Anyway, my sister had difficulties growing up. She’s been exposed to every lifestyle out there and would probably deal fine with it.

I don’t have much more in the family department. I have one sister in law, who I think would be fine. I have some cousins I haven’t seen in over 5 years. My mother in law and her sisters might be a problem.

The next huge issue would be work related. I am essentially a small business owner and my business requires a personal connection. There is no doubt some of the people we work with would not be receptive to a trans person. We would certainly lose business. I can’t inflict that on my father and I can’t afford that. So, that is another big hurdle. If I worked for some major company, they would likely have policies in place to protect employees and I could probably transition with minimal disruption. Not so when your business relies on personal connections. So, before I do anything I will have to cultivate some more business with LGBT+ friendly people.

I am fortunate enough to be physically large and strong enough and mature enough to not worry too much about bullying. I know that is a major obstacle to younger people coming out. I had a bit of verbal bullying about my weight as a kid, but I never really faced any physical bullying. Actually the only time a kid did try to bully me was in junior high school, I picked him up and held him against the school lockers and suggested he stop the behavior.

So, these are some of the obstacles to transitioning that trans people face. Were I just gay, I could still tell a small group of people and continue on my way. I wouldn’t have to tell the world. It wouldn’t be obvious just looking at me that I was gay. But, if I want to live as my real self, there is no hiding. Oh, there I go, the grass is always greener, right? I apologize if I am making light of anyone’s experience. However, that is the place my brain is right now.

One of the effects of growing up as a repressed and suppressed trans kid is a lack of confidence and identity. You never feel like you belong anywhere or to anything. You don’t know who you are. You never feel like you are entitled to anything. You’ve never earned an award. You give, but you feel you shouldn’t get. All these other kids seem to know who they are and what they want to do. They go through life with confidence, with a direction, with a plan, with a future. They knew how to relate to other kids. They weren’t afraid to be silly, stand out, show off, and have fun. They wanted attention, they wanted to be noticed, That idea was anathema to me.

I was a shy kid, I could not, for the life of me, take the initiative in any social encounter. I still can’t. I wasn’t weird or off putting, just withdrawn and scared. In school when we had to pick a partner for a project, or pair off for something, I “knew” that no one would want to pair up with me, so I held back and ended up with the odd person out.

I learned early on to never stand out. You did not want attention. For some it resulted in bullying, for some it resulted in praise and reward, for some it would result in punishments, but I knew, for me, it would result in inquiry leading to exposure. I was hiding something. I didn’t know what it was, but I knew it wasn’t acceptable. There were butch girls and femme boys in school, and they stood out as different, especially the femme boys. I didn’t dislike them, but I sensed something about them, perhaps a kinship, but I didn’t want the attention. So I avoided them.

Here’s one example of my social anxiety. In 2nd or 3rd grade everyone had to learn to play the recorder. I was not good at it. I got “hot cross buns” down pretty well, but after that, I was lost. After a certain amount of time, we were put into some sort of recorder club that was going to play for the school and parents. I absolutely refused to participate. I remember the music teacher talking to me in private, and I remember her being very kind, but did not want to do it. I knew in my heart that if I went up there I didn’t know the songs and it would be a disaster. I would draw attention to myself. So I never joined this recorder club, but I do remember that we all had a recital for the parents and I stood on the risers and moved my fingers and never blew any air into the recorder.

In 4th grade it was real instruments, and I got the trumpet. The same thing happened. I managed the basic stuff, but never progressed. Again, after getting past a certain page in the music book, you joined the school band. I refused again. That was the end of my music career. I do remember one incident; I was walking home from school with my trumpet. To get home we passed the high school and as I did, I was looking down at the ground and swinging the trumpet case. I didn’t see the parked car, and my trumpet case bumped the bumper of a car. This was the mid ‘70s, cars were built like tanks and I certainly didn’t bruise the car, but the adult driver hopped out and was really upset. Giving me what’s for, and I distinctly remember him telling me to “go home and tell your elders what you did”. My elders? Weird.

Anyway, back to the thesis. This deep feeling of not knowing who you are leads to that lack of confidence and your feeling of not being worthy of things you are entitled to. You are afraid to stick up for yourself. I absolutely never sought out help in school when I was struggling. I was terrified that if I admitted to a teacher that I didn’t know something, the teacher would be very disappointed in me, and would wonder how I could be so ignorant, and then things would begin to unravel because I had opened myself up to inspection and my failures would become an open book. From grade school to law school, I did what I could by myself. As a result I didn’t do as well as I could have.

I didn’t participate in much either. I played little league baseball. I was not good, but for some reason I felt comfortable and played through 5th grade. After that they got serious and I dropped out. I wouldn’t play any other sports, because I didn’t know how and if I showed up, not as advanced as the other kids, I would be ridiculed. In junior high, my father encouraged me to try ice hockey. I wouldn’t do it. By the end of high I had actually started playing and I love the game.

This feeling persists to this day. When I finally accepted that I was trans, a huge weight was lifted from my soul. I wanted to go to a mountain top and shout it to the world. But, obviously I didn’t. I knew that was a bad idea. When my therapist encouraged me to say out loud, “I am a woman”, during a session, I had a very difficult time.

I know in my heart that I am a woman. But, 50+ years of hiding and being conditioned to be a man makes it very hard to assert myself as a woman. I don't feel like I have the right to claim girl status. In our support group we begin each meeting with an introduction where we say our names and pronouns. I have always said that I didn't care what pronouns people used for me. I don't feel that I have earned the right to be referred to as she/her. I have finally been able to say I like they/them.

Sadly, I personalize a lot of the nonsense that is peddled by the anti-LGBT brigade and the TERFs. Despite knowing that most people support trans people and feeling this same way about others, that a Tans girl is a real girl, I can’t own it for myself. I am terrified of being confronted and told I am not a girl, that I am an abomination, a disgusting pervert, a pathetic little man, a Shrek like ogre trying to fit into a dress and heels. I look absurd and should be embarrassed. This is internalized transphobia and it is insidious.

My therapist had to write a letter for me recommending voice therapy. In it she referred to me as she and her. It was very surreal reading the letter and knowing it was about me and that I was a girl. I really liked it and it felt good.

As I write this, I have been on estrogen for about 15 months. I haven't made any outward attempts to appear female. Everything I have done can be explained. I'm letting my hair grow out. I have always wanted long hair and plenty of men wear their hair long. Alas, I am thinning on top. I saw a dermatologist today who is getting me on a treatment plan and hopefully that will improve the hair situation.

I have made some progress, I have come out to my therapist, my wife and a multitude of doctors, not to mention my support group family. Two years ago that would have been unthinkable. No one has pointed at me and screamed. But the doctors are professionals who understand the situation and are compassionate, and the support group are all in the same boat. The next people to tell would be the rest of my family. Two adult children, my 93 year old father and my sister. I don't think any of them would shun me, but I am sure it would get weird. More on that topic in a future post.

The fear of drawing attention is still very strong. It is holding me back in my development. There are other factors holding me back, but this is a big one. I have a strong block on doing anything to draw attention to myself. Transitioning would certainly do that.

Tŵt staff routinely boost toots to help your content gain visibility using boosts, featuring your content on #DyddDilyn or #MidweekMindful, and approving your content for the Explore pages and the Trending list.

Please note, to be included your content must meet our Code of Conduct and follow our guidelines: – no swears without a CW – media files must have alternative text descriptions – no links to Twitter or Meta-owned properties

If you'd like to nominate someone for Dydd Dilyn/Follow Friday please DM @teamtoot

While I am on this explanation kick, let’s get some terminology down. If I get anything wrong, or missed some important terms, let me know.

Transgender: (Not “a transgender” or “transgendered”). Someone who is transgender feels that their gender identity does not match their assigned gender. They generally suffer emotionally from this, and it is referred to as dysphoria. CIS or Cisgender refers to someone who is not trans. “Cis” is a prefix from Latin meaning “on the same side”, which is the opposite of the prefix “trans”. Cisgender is someone who feels comfortable with their assigned gender.

Assigned Gender is the gender you were given at birth, usually based on a cursory glance by the doctor or midwife, or whoever delivered you.
AMAB means assigned male at birth. AFAB means assigned female at birth.

Transsexual is an old, out of date term that was intended to refer to transgender people. It has a negative connotation to most people and is not preferred.

Non-binary or NB or enby, refers to someone who knows they don’t fit into the strict male/female definition, but rather somewhere else on the spectrum.

Gender fluid, is an NB who’s gender identity is not fixed, but can change depending on their feelings at the time. It could be day to day, hour to hour, or year to year. It is flexible.

Gender Nonconforming or Gender Queer is anyone who doesn’t feel they match their assigned gender and/or don’t fit in the binary system.

Transfem or Trans Woman is a transgender person who identifies as a woman. MTF refers to a male to female transgender person.

Transmasc or Trans Man is a transgender person who identifies as a man. FTM refers to a female to male transgender person.

RLT or Real Life Test is an antiquated term that was used in the past to see if a trans person was serious about their trans-ness. The idea was that the person would spend a year living as their preferred gender before a doctor would prescribe hormones or surgery. The requirement was removed from most treatment protocols within the last few years.

TERF or Trans Exclusionary Radical Feminist is the phenomenon of feminists who believe that trans woman are not “real” women and do not belong in women’s spaces and do not deserve equal rights.

Queer refers to anyone who is not heterosexual or cis. It is an umbrella term for the wide variety of people across the identity and orientation spectrum.

Intersex is a medical condition where the person has indeterminate sexual organs, or elements of both male and female reproductive anatomy. It is generally a result of a genetic anomaly in the sex chromosomes. The person may or may not experience any dysphoria. These variations are considered normal variations in humans, and corrective measures are not needed. Some doctors and parents sought surgery on intersex children to make them appear to be male or female. There is no guarantee that the child will grow up with the gender identity forced upon them and such procedures should be avoided until the person is of age. It is estimated that an intersex condition occurs in 1-2% of the population. The term hermaphrodite is not an accepted term for intersex.

Bottom Surgery or SRS or GRS or GCS or GAS all refer to the procedure to make a person’s genitals match the appearance of their desired gender.
SRS is Sexual Reassignment Surgery GRS is Gender Reassignment Surgery GCS is Gender Conforming Surgery GAS is Gender Affirming Surgery

Vaginoplasty is the surgical procedure to remove male genital tissue and create a vagina, clitoris and labia.

Phalloplasty is the surgical procedure to construct a penis and is often done in conjunction with several other procedures to remove the female anatomy and make male anatomy.

Top Surgery refers to bilateral mastectomy on FTM and breast augmentation on MTF.

FFS or Facial Feminization Surgery refers to the surgeries performed to make a person's face appear more feminine. There is also FMS Facial Masculinization Surgery.

HRT or Hormone Replacement Therapy is the combination of medications and hormones used to help a patient reduce their dysphoria and gain some physical characteristics of their desired gender.

Estrogen or Estradiol is the female hormone given to MTF patients. It is available in pill form, sublingual form, in a patch, via injection and as a topical cream.

Anti-Androgen is a medication that blocks the production or effectiveness of testosterone. The most common is Spironolactone aka Aldactone. Others include Finasteride aka Propecia, Flutamide, Cyproterone acetate, and Bicalutamide. Occasionally Progesterone is used.

Testosterone is the male hormone given to FTM patients. It is available in pill form, as an implant, in a patch, via injection, and as a topical cream.

Deadnaming refers to the practice of people calling a transgender person by their former name. It is considered insulting and if done intentionally or maliciously, a deliberate attack. It can cause dysphoria, distress, anxiety, embarrassment, and even danger.

Transphobia is the hatred or fear or transgender people.

Internal Transphobia refers to the feeling a transgender person can have towards themselves. I difficult part of the journey of a transgender person is self-acceptance and the deeply ingrained attitudes of society can interfere with a person’s progress.

February is Low Vision Awareness Month

Vision impairment, including low vision, affects hundreds of thousands of people on the Fediverse, including me. Vision impairment can make it hard to enjoy the visual media that gets posted to Mastodon and the wider Fediverse, especially if it's a screenshot of text.

Adding a simple description takes a few extra seconds, and can make everyone's experience so much more enjoyable.

We know that not all apps are helpful in showing you how to add alternative text descriptions, and we know that not all apps do a great job of showing it if it's there, but to raise awareness we are going to blur or highlight your media on Fridays in February.

To simulate what some see all day every day, on Fridays we are going to make any media with no description just a little bit blurry or add a highlight border for a few hours.

Don't be offended, we aren't editing your pictures, they will show up 100% normal on Saturday and every day after that, but on Fridays, if your photo looks a little off, please consider adding a caption next time. It won't affect everybody nor every app, but hopefully just enough that we can stimulate some discussion.

To get help using captions try the #AltText hashtag or the #Alt4Me hashtag. And we know not everyone can add descriptions, this is not a rule, just a temporary way to raise some awareness of a larger issue, hopefully to see an overall increase in the number of people taking the extra couple seconds to add a caption.

If you operate a Mastodon server and would like to join in, simply choose an option (blur with unblur on hover, red dotted border, caution tape) from this CSS snippet to add to the custom CSS in your server settings and let your membership know using some of the educational links below.

It will take a minute or two to show up, and you can quickly remove it later in the day.

Learn More

• https://mstdn.social/@feditips/107757781709598274 – thread on adding Alt Text
• https://mastodon.art/@Curator/109279035107793247 – another thread worth reading
• https://mastodon.ie/@mastodonie/109398218679478019 – one more great thread
• https://botsin.space/@PleaseCaption – friendly bot reminds you to add descriptive text
• https://webaim.org/techniques/alttext/ – a five minute read on how to add good captions
• https://tips.vivaldi.net/tip-174/ – how-to for Vivaldi Social and Blogs

Examples

This is what images will look like with the blur added:

Here's the red dot border option:

Here's an image that's not loaded, so the alternative text shows up:

Here's some #Defaidodon with a description

Participating Servers:

• https://artisan.chat/
• https://fandom.garden/
• https://flipping.rocks/
• https://mastodon.art/
• https://mastodon.thomaspreece.net/
• https://oliphant.social/
• https://queer.garden/
• https://revachol.city/
• https://toot.wales/
• https://vivaldi.net/

Participating? Let me know –> @jaz@toot.wales

I find it shocking how ill-informed some trans girls are about their transition. I’m one of those people who researches everything to death. Before I accepted myself, I was obsessed with trans-ness and learned all I could about the science, medicine and history of trans people. Now that I am transitioning myself, I obsessively research the various options, medicines, and procedures that are available to me. I like being well informed.

I attend a bi-monthly support group for trans folks. It runs the gamut from questioning to fully transitioned and it is filled with some of the most supportive and lovely people. However, it also has some people who really should know more than they do.

One example was a girl who had been on oral estrogen for a few years and was approved for bottom surgery, yet, when the topic arose, was unaware that estrogen was also available as an injection, a patch, a topical, and sublingual. She really had no idea.

Another surprising, but not as egregious example was when a girl asked what dysphoria and dysmorphia were and what the difference was. I can understand this, but dysphoria is such a key word for our community, I was surprised.

So, I thought I could at least provide some explanation of those terms.

Dysphoria is a general sense of unease about one’s self and/or one’s life. It can arise in many contexts, but for us it is gender dysphoria. You don’t feel right about your gender. You look in the mirror and what you see doesn’t match what you feel. Your body seems wrong. You don’t feel comfortable in your own skin.

Dysphoria can range from mild to extreme. There has been recent debate online about whether you need to suffer from dysphoria to be trans. I’m not a gatekeeper and won’t tell someone who says they don’t feel dysphoric that they are not trans, but I suspect that they do feel it on some level. But, it is possible to be transgender and not feel any dysphoria about it.

Dysphoria is what people are feeling when they say they were born in the wrong body. Or that they “hate” a particular body part and wish it was gone or replaced with the corresponding part from the other sex. It can drive some to physically harm themselves, and others can feel so ambivalent that they never seek corrective surgery.

Dysphoria is the symptom that treatment is based on. In the past, “gender identity disorder” was a diagnosis, and medicine sought to treat that disorder. It laid the “blame” on the person’s gender. It labeled it as a mental disorder and stigmatized the whole community.

The presence of gender variance is not the issue. In fact, gender variance is considered a normal variance of human development. It is the distress that it causes that is the issue. Psychologists use the term ego-dystonic, which means “thoughts and behaviors (dreams, compulsions, desires, etc.) that are conflicting or dissonant with the needs and goals of the ego, or further, in conflict with a person's ideal self-image.”

Medicine now uses the term “gender dysphoria”, describing the symptom that needs to be relieved rather than the underlying “disorder”. Treatment is now designed to relieve that symptom, usually through affirmation of the person’s desired gender. So, hormone replacement therapy, social transition, name change, gender change, gender confirming surgery, all help the patient suffer less from the dysphoria.

Dysmorphia, on the other hand, is a feeling that a body part is distorted in some way, despite scientific evidence. It is a mental illness involving obsessive focus on a perceived flaw in appearance.

Often it is described in the case of a person with anorexia nervosa who, despite being thin, sees themselves as fat.

In men, it tends to manifest itself as an obsession that their body is too small or not muscular enough, and they work out constantly to try to become more “manly”.

Dysmorphia, in many ways is the more debilitating and difficult condition to treat and manage, since it is not based on a realistic view. A person with dysmorphia may be mere skin and bones, but they see themselves as fat, clearly a false perception. A person with dysphoria may see a man’s genitals, but feels they should be female. They are not denying the truth that they have male genitals, but they believe they are the wrong ones. Dysphoria can be relieved through affirmations, medications and surgery. Dysmorphia is a more difficult condition to relieve, and may require a lifetime of therapy and medications.

So, friends, I urge you all to learn more about yourselves and your feelings. If you are Trans, get involved in your treatment. Learn about the process and the history of Trans people. Look into the social and political issues surrounding Trans issues and be proactive with your doctors, get involved politically and in support groups. We are a group currently under attack and the more of us who are involved, the better.

Starting in November 2022 we have seen an influx of members seeking to migrate from Twitter to Tŵt Cymru. We are very happy to accomodate the move and are glad to welcome everyone, however we are now seeing a large number of accounts exhibiting various habits that are disruptive to the community. Of particular note is the unmonitored use of a Twitter crossposter, a means to automatically post Twitter content to Tŵt.

We understand many people are testing the Mastodon waters and are worried about losing their Twitter community. However, our public timelines are not intended for absentee tweeters pushing content into the public feeds that includes non-functional Twitter usernames, bot spam, and high volume retweet content that is only available on Twitter.com, a site many of our membership prefers to avoid.

Personal accounts registered on Tŵt are generally intended for engagement, not broadcast. Our members expect to be able to engage with you and your posts. If you wish to use both platforms and plan on using a bot of some kind to mirror content from Twitter, the following rules will apply beginning Monday January 16th, 2023:

1. Do not crosspost retweets or quote tweets to Mastodon. Only crosspost your original content, your personal tweets. These settings should be available in your crossposter settings.

2. If you are a high volume tweeter you must post Unlisted or Followers-only. This setting should be available in your crossposter settings.

3. If you are not monitoring replies to your crosspost-connected Tŵt account you must mark your account as a bot. You can accomplish this by visiting https://toot.wales/settings/profile and check the box that says “This is a bot account” – this is a way to tell followers that the account mainly performs automated actions and might not be monitored.

Starting on January 16th, Tîm Tŵt will reach out to any account that appears to be an unmonitored account. If we get no response after a week, we will try one more time to contact you. If we still cannot reach you, we will limit the account such that your toots will be restricted to those accounts that follow you; they will not appear in our public timeline. You will be searchable and messageable. In very rare instances where the volume of unmonitored content is considerable, we may suspend the account.

Additionally, any message that we see from Twitter containing irrelevant spam or tweets that are solely images of text with no alternative text option will be reported and deleted. For example, if you use fllwrs.com to tweet about your follower count and it is crossposted to Tŵt, we will report and delete the toot. Accounts posting excessive spam may be limited or suspended.

If you have questions or feedback about our approach to this issue please comment here: https://toot.wales/@jaz/109625492544360829

Going forward we will be posting our donations and expenses to this URL: https://github.com/tootwales/documentation/tree/main/finances

We operate three managed services: Mastodon, Pixelfed, and WriteAs, for which we pay managed hosting fees.

In addition we have four domain names with annual fees, and some administrative fees to operate the non-profit.

Cyber liability insurance is the only other major expense, and will be reflected in the New Year.

As of November 2022 we have seven volunteer staff who take no money from the charity, but if donations increase we will consider a stipend or a wage as the service becomes self-sustaining.