Gender Dysphoria and Body Dysmorphia

CW: gender dysphoria and body dysmorphia/ disordered eating

In seventh grade we had a journal prompt to list three things we hate and share one out loud. “I hate showering,” I said.

The class erupted in a chorus of “ewww” and “gross.” I was overcome with deep shame and slumped back into my desk. I wanted to be swallowed by the earth and never heard from again. That was my most embarrassing moment.

I’ve thought about that moment over the years and why I hated showering in middle school but it wasn’t until recently I realized it was because I didn’t want to see my rapidly changing middle school body naked.

I have struggled with disordered eating and body dysmorphia since December 25, 2004 when I got a pair of chocolate corduroy pants for Christmas. I ran upstairs to try them on and when they were too small, instead of thinking the pants were the wrong size I thought I was.

Unlike most socialized female people who starve themselves under the pressure of unrealistic Victoria’s Secret model beauty standards, I was the opposite.

I wanted to look like a boy.

I starved myself to be my own puberty blocker. In middle school I knew that body fat produced estrogen and estrogen was the “lady hormone” and that was the last thing I wanted.

I cut my food intake and exercised a lot to stay lean and strong, like a boy (I also believe I lived with undiagnosed adhd and the hyperactivity part compelled me to exercise because I couldn’t focus any other way. This remains true today).

I started giving away my snacks at lunch because I felt my breasts growing and hips widening and I was willing to do whatever it took to stop that.

I cut my hair short from grades 6-10. I was obsessed with boy clothes. I was obsessed with beating the boys at sports. I only had male friends until college. I envied them.

When a family member was in the hospital, the old woman with poor eyesight in the bed across the hall thought I was a boy. Her family apologized for insulting me but I took it as a compliment.

I wanted pants that fell straight like I had no hips and shirts that fell flat like I had no boobs. While most girls were stuffing their bras in the bathroom with toilet paper, I was secretly making my own binders out of ace bandages until high school when I had to wear sports bras. I made sure to buy them two sizes too small to flatten my chest as much as possible. I didn’t buy a “real bra” until college and the struggle of finding one that wasn’t lacy or padded made me physically ill.

My freshman year of high school I was probably undiagnosed anorexic but I was running fast and winning races so nobody cared to notice. Inevitably, puberty hit that summer while I wasn’t running and I put on some weight.

When I returned to sophomore XC season my times in the 3 mile were a minute slower. The coach from the opposing team approached me after a race and said, “wow, you’re a woman now!” That night I went home and refused dinner. I stopped eating until my weight and times came back down and junior year I was the fastest girl in the city but I didn’t care about proving I was fast. I was desperate to prove I was not a woman.

My freshman year of college was one of the most stressful of my life. I gained 20 lbs over the course of six months and when I came home for the summer my mom’s friend’s first remark was, “my, you certainly have grown into a woman!” The shame and disgust with myself I felt that day in seventh grade swallowed me again so I starved myself all summer trying to shed the “voluptuous” feminine qualities I had grown into that year.

Since coming out to myself as trans non-binary a year ago I’ve realized that my lifelong body dysmorphia had everything to do with my gender identity. I wanted to stop developing “feminine” qualities because I never felt feminine.

But gender is not just physical. I don’t have to punish my body for genetics that make me APPEAR “feminine” to the world because it’s not how I feel inside.

I know who I am. I know I am trans and non-binary. I am loud and clear about that in person and online. If you choose to project your narrow definitions of “masculine” and “feminine” onto me and other trans and non-binary people that makes you transphobic. We are as diverse and unique as the weather.

I’ve found healing in my gender expression and self love practice. I am sharing these intimate revelations in the hopes that someone may resonate with this story and feel less alone. Ideally I hope that everyone, regardless of gender identity, will take this as an invitation to learn about and love ourselves better than before