Shell

The most important work of a trans person is done internally. You can take all the necessary external steps to align yourself with your desired presentation as early as possible but without that internal alignment the dysphoria risks continuing

We have been programmed from birth to accept a version of ourselves which is not easily altered and so most of the hard work is going to focus on achieving internal congruence. There is no getting around redefining ourselves according to our internal compass and leaving behind the dictates we were told should form part of our identity.

I had more tools at my disposal physically than I realized but the most difficult part was the self acceptance and getting rid of the fear of rejection. Working on those aspects was far more important and increasingly showed me that the physical presentation was the least of my worries.

Our shell is the manifestation of what lies inside so we work on that first. The more we understand this, the better off we'll be.