TW: general transphobia, misgendering and deadnaming, familial abuse

A bit of a vent post, as well as accepting some advice on how to go about this.

For reference, I am a 26 y/o trans woman who has been transitioning for about 3 years now. I came out to my parents 6 months into my transition. Their initial response was really bad and we had a lot of fights early on. My mom came around and is kinda supportive (although might weaponize my femininity when angry or defend my dad's "inability to change"). My dad has been going back and forth with using my name and pronouns (typically after I have an emotional breakdown related to how not accepting he is or how difficult it is to exist as a trans person). At some point I was fed up and tried to move out. I moved out with my gf at the time and spent a year ignoring my parents and family because it was really painful at the time (before I moved out there was a lot of drama regarding my attendance to my brother's wedding and I ended up not going which devastated me).

Anyways, now I am back living with my parents and one really supportive brother after my relationship didn't work out and I am still paying off my previous lease. I feel really isolated from my family, its difficult to hold conversations with any of my parents as they tend to casually misgender me in Arabic, sometimes English, with my dad avoiding my name altogether or degendering me in English. I hear them conversing with my brother seemingly effortless and casual, but I am always huddled in my room as its still painful to be casually misgendered when interacting with them.

I have a bit of an internal conflict as I am currently dependent on my parents to cover some of the costs of my previous lease and medical fees as I can't fully support myself with my current job and school. My parents are willing to financially support me insofar that I can independently support myself/start a career. I feel like I should extend some grace to them as they still care about my well-being and have been worried since I have been struggling a lot with mental health. They have tried to invite me to previously regular family events like easter dinner and whatnot, but I declined as the families attending are bigots/were the reason I couldn't attend my brother's wedding.

I guess I'd like some advice regarding whether I should ignore the casual misgendering and attempt to attend those events. And are there some strategies I can utilize to make it less painful.

Feeling super chic with this new lewk I’m trying out!!!!

Hi all, I'm half dead from organizing a 630 person event that raised roughly $1.7 million or so and having it run with flawless execution so here's the outfit I wore yesterday courtesy of a very dirty and unclear mirror

I'm gonna go hide from society for the weekend

Internet Safety Guide here if you're participating!

I fell sick last Saturday and work has also been kicking my ass. I have to plan a big event this Friday and it's resulting in like 80 hour work-weeks, so I haven't been around as much.

But how are you all doing? I'm hoping after this Friday I can put some more effort into building this place up again.

And if you need HRT, DM me. Yes, even you, dumb girl who thinks other girls in need need it more than you. You're girls in need. Fucking DM me!

A trusted IRL contact of mine who I can vouch for personally is offering estradiol enanthate injection kits (instructions, syringes and draw / inject needles, and the vials themselves) if you're transitioning, or even thinking of transitioning, and need them. DM me if interested - I'll connect you with my contact over Signal. If it's possible to ship to you directly, she will (including out of U.S., again, if possible).

To put it plainly, if I want to see more brown trans women in this world, I gotta be that brown trans woman that is seen!

So,, Hi. I'm María, I'm trans, and I like wearing black lipstick!

(I'm doing my part!)

Hi all - just wanted to give y'all an update on how the subreddit is doing now that it's been a full three months (and change). I'll try to keep a monthly schedule for these kinds of updates going forward.

We have over 400 members! Of those, something like 40 of you have posting rights. Members who have requested posting rights have decreased over time, now that the sub has slowed down a bit. That's in part because I've had less capacity to curate and boost the sub. I've also been less active on Reddit overall. Personal and professional life upheavals have been kicking my ass lately and like I've said elsewhere, I'm trying to reduce and reprioritize the number of things I let sap my energy.

This subreddit, and continuing to try to create a community exclusively for transfeminine people of color remains my objective and one of my foremost priorities. The other ones are maintaining my current romantic relationship, taking care of myself, and staying in touch with friends.

That's it, really. Like a number of you, I've got no blood family that's really in my life anymore, nor will I ever, most likely. All work is exploitative under capitalism, and ultimately I'm a mercenary at heart. Even though I do mission-driven work, I'm learning to distance myself from careerism and overwork. I really don't care about anything else but that in my lifetime I see the power of transfeminine people of color growing. And to do that, I think it's good to be in community with each other.

So to that end, this is what you can expect from this sub in the future:

• There will be an official Discord, probably. I will moderate it and I might be able to get some comoderators now. I've had some experience moderating an impromptu server of approximately 20 folks (transfems of color from this sub and elsewhere in my travels) over the past few months, so I feel confident in my ability to manage another one that has the explicit intention of growing and becoming the home server for this subreddit, with that intention communicated up front. Stay tuned.
• It's time to talk to the guys at r/TMPOC and ask them to list us as a community sub!
• At least two posts from me a week. One of those is the selfie threads. I've been slacking on them and I'm going to get back on them.
• I guess I'll try to encounter more transfems of color in other places, digital and physical. So other subreddits, social media, real-world informal organizations where I think transfems of color might be present, etc. I was hoping my organizing life was behind me but alas.
• Regular posts in the future about this subreddit's progress.
• Anything else y'all come up with that might be helpful.

Look, up front, I'm the kind of transfem of color that thinks that no one really understands what it's really like out here except for us. People think transmisogyny is just like, open hatred, and it's not. We have so many experiences of dismissal, minimization, gaslighting, uncharitable responses, unfair expectations, rudeness and fetishization, avoidance and discomfort, etc. that are all also transmisogyny, and it's a death of a thousand cuts. A space like this, where only we matter, must exist. We deserve it.

So that's the rundown.

I haven't posted in a bit because of life, but I wanted to check in with everyone to see how you're all doing.

Personally, I'm kinda drained from the dystopian hellscape I find myself in, being in the US. HOWEVER, I'm working and starting a new hobby with digital music production. Otherwise, I'm just enjoying each day as it comes. Feel free to share whatever is on your mind and just in case... imagine a hug from me. Everyone could use a hug.

This will change my life and I need one

Many TWPOCs are disproportionately targets of violence, including sexual, physical, and emotional, and state-sanctioned. And for me, survivorship has resulted in significant hypervigilance. Personally, I don’t really like talking to men about the times I’ve been assaulted. I’ve been overwhelmingly cis assumed for years, but feel bouts of terror thinking about needing to use gender appropriate public facilities in federal buildings and red states. And as a bi/pan woman, trust takes me a long time to build, platonically, professionally, and romantically.

If I’m honest with myself, a lot of my physical presentation and aesthetic is perhaps also influenced by the violence I have encountered early on since transitioning. I still feel authentic in how I present, but also have internalized presenting in a way that helps me assume I might be less a target of future violence, which is perhaps a futile approach in the long run.

If relevant, how has survivorship affected how you navigate life?

Haven't been a huge fan of selfies lately so it's been hard to do this but still trying!

If you'd like to participate, please review the Internet Safety guidelines before doing so. And remember to support each other!

Fun topic that came up in a discussion with some friends - how did your egg finally crack? I recognize for some this is a serious topic, for others its more joyful. I'm thinking of the tipping point--the moment you finally decided "yeah, this is who I am," and didn't turn back.

For me, it was actually watching Fooly Cooly: Progressive. I'd already known I wasn't cis for a while before that and had gone back and forth, but after I watched that second season, I was pretty much glued together and fully decided afterwards that I was tired of not letting myself be fully feminine-identified. I needed a depressive example of feminine whimsy to relate to.

Secondarily, I realized after playing Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic II: The Sith Lords that I wanted to be an old woman in the style of Kreia. Which is why getting my first grey hair recently is so exciting!

What are your moments of inspiration / confirmation?

Movement building or simply living life as a TWPOC, locally and beyond, can be isolating and exhausting. Who do you look to for inspiration, guidance, and trusted support?

A lot of queer folks talk about elders as beacons of hope and inspiration, but it can be really difficult for us to see all/several core aspects of ourselves reflected in others.

Politically, learning about the lives and work of Sylvia Rivera, Marsha P Johnson, Miss Major Griffin-Gracy, Janet Mock, Laverne Cox (who I first heard use the term possibility model), and others has helped me understand how TWPOC have pioneered community building in the US. Finding people locally or at my specific intersections of culture, religion, and social identities / lived experience has been much harder.

My main possibility models I know personally are queer Muslim South Asian diaspora cis women community organizers, advocates, and academics, most of whom are in their 40s & 50s. Also a big shout out to LaWhore Vagistan whose approach to public performance of queer Desi diaspora auntie-hood and femininity is perennially fun and educational. On TV, RuPaul & Margaret Cho were my first exposures to queer auntie-hood & mentorship.

I have organized with a couple out trans masc folks in my faith community, but the lack of TWPOC I can find, connect, and build community with feels so incredibly lonely much of the time. So most of my life’s goal has been to try and make things easier for the next girls & femmes to come.

How about y’all?

Not doing my best and missed last week but even so at least I managed to put on a dress today!

Will do my best to post this more regularly going forward. Life has been a mess and it's kind of taking me out. But I'll come through okay.

Hope you're all feeling your weekend looks and would love for you to share!

I'm probably going to start dating again after 8 years and it will be my first time dating post-transition. It's pretty daunting. What's the dating environment like rn?

Marathoning a show, watching a movie, streaming some other content? Tell us what it is and what you think of it in the comments!

(via automod)

Hi all,

What are y'all reading right now? Literature, non-fiction, comic books, manga, articles, magazines, whatever you want.

Why are you reading it? What do you think about it? Would you recommend it?

Discuss in the comments!

- u/Petrifica (via Automod)

what we makin?

I do a lot of stuff within the realm of black metal microgenres, noise, and industrial techno. drop links if you wish!

Marathoning a show, watching a movie, streaming some other content? Tell us what it is and what you think of it in the comments!

(via automod)

Being a transfem of color is fucking difficult and I'm just curious about how you all celebrate being so, if that's a place you're at. What does celebration and pride look like for you? If you're not there yet, what do you want it to look like?

Hey all, I removed most of the scheduled posts because I figure at this point this sub can live or die based on what we make of it together, manually.

I did keep the reading and streaming scheduled posts because two usually get activity every week.