Transition and the Pursuit of Happiness
ฝัง
- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 6 ก.ย. 2024
- What's your relationship to happiness and growing older?
Follow me on TikTok: @arthur_rockwell
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I used to not be able to see myself in 5, 10, 20 years.. I couldn't imagine getting older as a woman. I couldn't imagine being a mom, or a grandmother, or a wife... I'm still early in figuring out my gender but I recently ran my photo through an aging filter and I can see myself being a little old man living in a cottage and painting portraits of my husband. 2023 was probably the worst year of my life. My dad was diagnosed with liver failure, I broke my ankle and got a blood clot in my leg and I just realized that.. I don't want to die a woman. And I kind of mourn that I didn't transition sooner.
I'm 34 and 2023 was a terrible year for me because of depression. I had thought about transitioning since puberty, but it took until I found out about nonbinary genders in my early 20s for me to feel like I could actually do it because I never felt man enough. I'm a gay trans man and have a lot of "femme" interests and tendencies. Every step of my transition has been really hard. I have a lot of anxiety and self doubt. Despite many panic attacks I managed to get top surgery, have a hysterectomy and get my name changed, but HRT has been really hard for me. I've been micro dosing and low dosing since 2020 but still only pass about 15-20% of the time. It took me losing my will to live to be able to throw myself into it completely as a last ditch effort to make life worth living. I'm on full dose T right now and my goal is to stick with it and never go off. I've never consistently passed as male and I NEED to know what that feels like! Its still early so idk how its gonna go but I have hope that I'll finally start to feel like I'm actually living my life instead of just watching it happen to me. I thought I could force myself to be content with my life as an agender sex-repulsed asexual that gets happiness from throwing myself into my hobbies, but the last several years have shown me that this isn't true. T helped be realize I'm not even asexual (and still a virgin at my age, ugh). I just get physically repulsed when someone is attracted to me for all the things that I hate about myself.
Sorry for this wall of text. I have a lot of feelings and felt like screaming them into the void. Feel free to ignore me.
Relate to a lot of this, thank you for sharing. Good luck with your goal, hope this year is the year you feel like you're taking life by the reins!
I relate to this a lot. As a teenager I only ever saw my future as an old man pottering around my house and I could not understand at all why I could only imagine that and couldn’t visualise at all a womanly future. It was extra confusing because I was much more feminine at the point trying to fit itn
I'm transitioning in my early 40s, and I definitely mourn not having done it sooner, but I try to tell myself that hey, at least I'm doing it now. And on the other hand, those experiences that I had as a woman made me who I am now, and I think I'm a pretty cool person, in a lot of ways, so even if I lost some things by not pulling the trigger much earlier, I gained some, too.
I'm sorry you had such a rough 2023- hopefully 2024 is better for you!
Wishing you the kind of future that you can imagine and look forward to ❤️
I resonated so hard with so much of this. I'm 18 years old and just started T a few months ago. When you mentioned the strange and wonderful feeling of not anxiously waiting for the next, better part of your life, I almost cried. I've felt that anxiousness my entire life and I've never heard someone put it into words as succinctly as you did. I will get there some day. Someday I won't need to wait anymore. Thank you sincerely for this video.
This comment really made me smile - I'm hopeful for you 🥰
Oh wow. I actually hadn't considered the fact that the past three years have been going by so fast because of transition! Thank you for the insight. I've been thinking about this for me too, life is just going by so insanely fast and it's almost scary.
That's cool to hear others have had this experience as well!!
Hey thanks for making this video. My testosterone appointment was just canceled, and it often feels like I have nothing to look forward to now. But I keep reminding myself that there are still good things that will happen, regardless of when I start.
Aww I'm sorry to hear that! You really do have so much to look forward to ❤️
I like the 'band camp' excitement.
Yeah, when bad things happen now it feels like I can deal with it because I am actually present in my own life. I'm so much more confident now that I know who I am. It's so powerful to be able to know yourself and live your truth.
1000%! The lows are SO much easier to handle
I'm SO happy that you're happy! Hope it just gets better and better! You deserve it!😊
Being someone who's transitioning about fifteen years older than you did, your comments about this cycle of anticipation and these finite moments of happiness, as well as the feelings of always being ready to move onto the next step really resonated. I look back and recognize this sensation of almost living life outside of myself for a very long time. Not all of it, for sure, but big chunks of it, and now that I'm coming into myself, there really is this new feeling of... proximity? Self awareness? I'm not sure what to call it, but things feel much more real, in a lot of ways, than they did before.
Even though I wish I could have lived them post-transition, my late 20s and early 30s were pretty great as far as coming into my own professionally, having cool experiences (and the disposable income to enjoy them), and meeting cool people. It was great, and I'm excited for you to have your version of that. And as someone who married an academic I can say that no, PhD students (in the US, anyway) never enjoy their programs this much, so it sounds like you hit the jackpot!
Yes totally! Things feel more "real" is a great way to put it. And aw yes, I really do feel grateful for my program 🥰
This gives me a lot of hope. I’m 22 and only 1 year on T and I can’t wait for this stage
new fear unlocked: happiness (euphoriphobia?)
[am half joking but stagnancy is terrifying and that level of happiness had always been a pipe dream to me but nowadays i find myself happy way more often and fully]
There actually is a thing called cherophobia which is the fear of happiness.
The fear of the future is natural. But you will never loose what you have, you will only gain. The friends you have will always be your friends even if they don't see you as much. The new experiences waiting for you can be just as good or better then what you have now. Don't think of difficulties right away, trust that good things can happen. You may be surprised at how good the future can be.
I love your energy ❤️ I'm in my 40s and can relate to a lot of what you've said. Magically, as time passes, you do just feel happy and ready for all of the transitions and different phases of life. You think you're never going to move past a phase of life but it does happen and it's very beautiful when it does. Then you look back on your 20s with fondness but are happy with where you are now. It's so lovely to see someone who is positive and enjoying their life 😊
Awww yes that's exactly what I'm hoping for ❤️
I relate to this so hard!! I started transitioning in college (HRT 2018, graduated 2019) but between covid, being in a really conservative college and going into a really traditional industry, and not getting proper trauma therapy until 2021 I felt my life getting better but I still couldn't get away from feeling "stuck".
My life isn't "stuck" anymore. It goes by so fast. I've gotten into birding and become friends with people who only a few years ago I would've been terrified of interacting with because what 60+ year old puts up with someone asking to be called they/them? I got into photography this year because I went from NEVER using my phone camera to being incapable of stopping and appreciating every bit of beauty in this world I'm surrounded by.
Learning to love yourself is a challenge, but it's so worth it. Having the body I want made it possible for me to heal, and between borderline and other mental health issues that was its own adventure, but I've grown so much for it.
Your videos always feel like a celebration of your transness and it honestly really inspires me and brings me so much joy. I'm considering getting a very atypical bottom surgery (seeing a surgeon next month) and while I'm terrified because I know so few people who would even consider what I want, I know how happy I am today could've only been possible because I took a chance on myself and listened to my feelings and started HRT before I "knew". I remember being 6mo on HRT, hiding and living as a man with a bunch of men in tight quarters onboard a ship for 3+mo. Hiding my growing breasts from them, terrified they'd call me out and demand to know. Doing medical exams and hoping the nurse assumes I'm fat, and doesn't notice the fact that my chest was very obviously budding. It was during that trip that I realized I wouldn't give up my transness for the world, it felt like the only part of myself that was truly real, truly me.
It's been an adventure (turns out not being a woman makes it complicated) but after 6 long years on HRT I had long ago forgotten what it was like to live before. I'm so happy today, even when applying to jobs and deciding when I want to tell a potential employer about my they/them pronouns, even when random strangers see my tank top or jeans and assume I'm a man occasionally. Life isn't perfect, but that's what makes it life. And I'm so damn happy for that.
Thank you for making these videos 💙 you highlight the love and queer joy that exists so purely out here, that so many people don't know is even possible.
My only advice for making those moments last longer: mindfulness. Be as present as possible, take it all in. Accept it as fleeting and embrace it. Birding and photography have made me appreciate the beauty of those fleeting moments, and to be honest, if they lingered or I clung too long it probably would lose the beauty.
I hope you find every aspect of life you want; I'm sitting here today just accepting and processing that I might get to die with the body I've always wanted, and get to live a full complete life before then, but the completeness of it is just so unimaginable. Find beauty and joy in the mundane, and you'll always be surrounded by it.
Just another happy post transition guy chiming in. Objectively, one could say my 2023 was not great since I'm changing career and had my stressors, not to mention having to deal with some unresolved grief... Except I'm actually living life now and wanting to engage with it. My worst days post transition would have been the best ever to pre transition me. Like, sure not every season in life is going to get a five star rating, but every day I'm just so fucking glad I get to do it as Me and nobody can ever take that away from me.
Lily Alexandre on here did a great vid on endings and post transition that was a bit dark but I could resonate. Youll intuitively decide when its time for the next thing. And who says there isnt something *even better* in store for us?
I loved her video!! And wishing you a joyful 2024 ❤️
Your videos are incredibly inspiring to me as a 21 year old trans man. I have been on testosterone for a good year and a half and got top surgery last year. I’m at the point in my transition where I can’t really say I’m at at beginning, but have realized a lot of the work I have to do is more mental than physical at this point. Listening to your experiences and hearing you talk about your life and transition gives me so much hope for my future self and for the future that I am building for myself. Thanks for doing what you’re doing.
Thank you so much for this comment! Hearing what my videos mean to be people really motivates me ❤️
I’m still mourning the fact that I am no longer my old self, especially considering me feeling like I experienced every good and bad feeling in high school and graduating whilst also figuring out me as a closeted trans person living and breathing at the age of 19. I feel like even though I miss my old self, I can’t act like that going forward because it won’t help me grow as a person. What you are describing seems really fulfilling yet scary at the same time and I weirdly want to experience it.
I'm 21, pre-everything and Russian. For me my future looks dark right now. Arthur, you're shining with happiness. You're my only hope that things will get better, thank you! ❤
Aww hoping things get better for you soon ❤️❤️❤️
Hey, being a 25 year old at 25 years old is a good thing! :D And I think "recognising that you're happy in the moment and enjoying that moment" isn't an immature thing :)
As a PhD person who wanted to scape being a PhD person, despite having a reasonable advisor, a stipend, and friends... I'm just so happy to hear of one person who enjoys their PhD student journey. You are the first person that I've heard a positive take on being a PhD student. I HATED being a PhD student, HATED academia in the States, and couldn't be happier to be done with it. I would have never been the person saying how I was gonna miss the dining hall. Despite really liking the Italian lemon cake they had occasionally.
I'm graduating high school this year, and I feel that now, after accepting my transness, I see my future with so much more clarity. I always knew that I wanted to go into STEM, but I could never see myself actually happy in that career, or really any aspect of my life. I kind of regret spending my entire K-12 experience so depressed and confused, but I'm looking forward to adulthood more than ever! Seeing you thrive as a trans academic makes me think I can do it too
Hey
I’m a 18 year old queer trans guy. Have been for 3 or so years now. Cant transision for some time though cuz of the cost.
Have started to recently doubted my transness. My therapist and i came to the conclusion that its probably some internalised problems. Talking about being a guy with unsuportive parents and living in a generally unaccepting enviornent really does things to a man.
But you have generally described what it is like to be with my queer friendgroup for me and boying around in general. Thank you. Hope my experience will be similarly joyful.
My brain be like: "Done with the identity crisis" 😒
Me: "Now what?" 🤔
Also my brain: "Time for an existential crisis" 😈
Also me: "Ah, crap, here we go again..." 😮💨
Arthur be like: *About to live in a breakfast commercial* 🤩
Ahahah yes next thing I'm gonna be selling you cheerios 😎
@@arthur_rockwell
You are more like a Fruity Loops type of guy. 🤣🤭
Yesss
@@arthur_rockwell
Covered in milk. 😂
I really relate to so much of what you've said in this video - the feeling like you're always waiting for the next thing, never relating to others'sadness of endings because you're just ready to move on. The sense of distance and disconnection from people. Always preoccupied with people liking me. I feel like I'm always waiting for something that never comes.
I'm currently questioning my gender. I don't know if these feelings for me are down to CPTSD or gender stuff. But this was the first time I ever heard someone else share these feelings and it felt really good to hear, especially that you don't feel that way anymore and it's possible to get out of it. Thank you so much for your channel and sharing your experiences.
By the way, you are really cute - you look like young Damon Albarn :P
A lot of the times I feel like there's no hope left. It's really hard for me to imagine life in the future and everything you're saying, because it all feels scary and overwhelming right now. I'm just scared and a lot of the time I doubt whether I'm a trans man or not, which makes this difficult (especially because I only started figuring things out at 18, and I'm 19 right now). Watching your channel helps me a lot though, Arthur. I like seeing some positivity in trans spaces :) if you have any advice I would be happy to hear it
I’m 18 trans and in Arkansas and this video gives me so much hope. This makes me motivated for life
Awww yes you have so much to be excited for ❤️
im so tired of waiting for transition. im 16 and ive been out since i was 12 and all i do is wait. my life is on hold and i dont enjoy anything because dysphoria is everywhere. i hate it. i wish those years will pass by fast and ill be able to love life again.
Hope to god this’ll be me. I’m about to leave high school and I experience happiness a lot like you did at that age, I can’t even imagine feeling joyful multiple days a week lol
Life gets sooo much better after high school! You have lots to look forward to 🥰
This is so nice for me to here, I’m questioning trans, depressed etc and my main fear is that I won’t be happy because no one is, so thanks for sharing and helping me realise I can be happy and giving me hope
I found your channel recently and I just gotta say you are providing the type of content I didn’t know I needed in my life. It feels like we are at trans group therapy together lol -I often find myself reflecting on my own journey while watching. This video hits on a whole other level❤️🔥
Awww I'm so happy to hear it!! ❤️
I started transitioning on 2022 (I’m 24 btw) and I was still so depressed cause I was in the closet with a lot of people and didn’t know how to get out of there. Last year I had the amazing experience of moving to Italy for a year and that really help me to kinda start a new version of me , the actual honest one and like u said this year has passed so fast. Now I’m coming back home with tons of new challenges that scare me a bit but I know I’m not the same sad person that left my country a year ago so I’m excited for what comes next! Also like u said I’m so happy with myself, like how I look and can’t stop seeing in the mirror when my whole life that frightened me so much. It’s kinda weird cause I never thought I would feel this but it’s nice. Keep making this awesome videos I love them❤
Thank you!! ❤️
this makes me so happy. im a junior in high school and i just switched from a private catholic 200-person all girls school to a 2,200 person public school. ive accepted the fact that even though i KNOW the public school is better for me, im never going to have a good time in high school. waiting to transition feels unbearable and i dont have any friends, but im so so excited for college when i can pursue my interests, come out, and transition
its also weird bc i dont rly see myself as an adult. ive had multiple teachers ask where we (as the students) see ourselves in 5, 10, 25 years, but i just dont. and its scary to feel like i might end my life at some point but there is a strong part of me that just knows that i can have hope for the future and that i will make it out of here
I want to get to that point, that's amezing, im happy for you
you are so relatable! i'm a mainer too hha
Helll yeah 🦞
👏👏👏 I am soooooo happy for you 💚🙌
Hearing you talk really keeps me going❤ i hope u have a nice day :D
As a soon to be 25 year old I can relate sm. I have never been this happy and present in my life (at least since being a kid) and it is sth I am so very grateful for. And it is 100% connected to being in a place where I can be myself. It is scary how strainless it feels to have the weight lifted and it makes time go by really quickly. Loved your thoughts on this! Kinda makes me nostalgic in advance for life right now hehe
Hello I'm 24yo and a bachelor's student for almost 6y now and have 2 more ahead 😂 that's bc I'm kinda stuck with my transition and constantly switching schools to feel a little bit happier
And I'm very glad and grateful to hear your story and experience, that gives hope, tyvm 😊😊😊
for what it's worth, I think time tends to slow down when I am having new experiences (e.g. being in a different city every day for three days will feel different to walking around the same city for 3 days, or three days working on different projects vs 3 days of working on the same kind of thing). Something about being able to clearly distinguish one moment of experience from the next is important I think
This video is **incredibly** helpful to me right now. I had to pause multiple times while watching to process things you said as things clicked in my own life. No wonder I'm feeling unexpectedly upset about something ending - I'm not used to things that make me happy happening very frequently at all. I'm 22, with one semester left til I graduate uni and move into the next stage of my life. And for once I'm not anxiously waiting for things to end. There are practical things that make me look forward to it - full time work will mean I can move out of my parents' place, I won't have to deal with uni assignments anymore. But I'm looking forward to the savouring of it, in this last semester. I finally understand the comment my boyfriend made a few weeks ago about looking forward to getting to do more of the whole dating while in uni thing, the cute messages throughout the week, the meeting up on weekends, working on assignments together, etc. I realise I'm holding onto happy times more intensely and longer than is healthy, because I'm scared to move on from the happy thing and then be without for months or a year even. But happy things keep happening. And I can do things to make those happy things happen more regularly. I've grown pretty comfortable in my current transition state and easily and openly express myself now. I don't have to deal with getting misgendered or deadnamed anymore (except relating to legal name) and haven't for a while. I guess I haven't stopped to properly appreciate life as it is. I genuinely feel excitement about just getting to live and experience mundane things, and want to do more. And that's such a difference from before, where I distracted and dissociated as much as possible, just waiting for time to pass. I realised lately I slipped into that old habit again, but I want to get out of it. I actually like my life now! I want to savour the moments while they last, while knowing that I will have more of them, so many more of them. It's great. And if I'm actually participating in my life, then I can savour and enjoy the good things rather than that feeling of a missed connection, a missed opportunity. Thank you so much for this video, and for being so open about where you're at.
This makes me kinda curious. I'm 19, 1 year on T now. I dropped out of school when I was 14, and this year I'm gonna go to college. It's gonna technically be my first year with an irl social life as a man. Kinda scared (will they even believe I'm a man? Lol I would prefer not to say I'm trans) but it's an exciting idea too.
I want to transition. I know I’ve been really unhappy with my life for a long time. The one thing holding me back is I’m like 5’3. It shouldn’t matter but I would feel so out of place as a man at that height. This probably sounds ridiculous but it’s really been eating me up.
The shorter the king, the taller the crown, brother ❤
I know many amazing 5'3" guys - cis and trans :)
@@arthur_rockwell thank you for saying that. I just have this idea in my head that I never have a chance of being seen or treated like a normal guy because I’m small and i can’t tell how rational it is.
This video is amazing. -39
I am a trans woman.
The way you are describing it is just sooo relatable and I love it so much ❤
The background level of joy and happiness, and the joy of just spending time with people as myself post-transition... it's all so good ❤
The million moments that happened since transitioning and joining this wing of the queer community in person, as myself, just had this year (I am 1 year in), made it fly by, but also it's been so eventful it takes up a huge perventage of my memories. Pre-transition life just had a different tempo and a different vibe, with me looking forward to very rare things that had nothing to do with society and other people or my true self...
Honestly, I don't even wish I was a cis woman anymore. I am satisfied with where I'm at so much that I want this to keep going forever, I want to keep being happy forever, and I want to take those next steps and actually integrate into society as my true self (currently in Russia and stealth at work because of that, moving to France this year and I'll finally be able to breathe and be free)
"life has a different tempo" is a beautiful way of putting it 🥰
@@arthur_rockwell OMFG you replied! You are absolutely awesome and I love your videos ❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️
Dude, I really appreciate your channel. You’ve had such a thoughtful approach to your transition. And wisdom doesn’t have an age, btw.. ;-)
You’re awesome. Keep rockin 🤜🤛.
Hi!
Hi!!
me too :)
hello from one trans Arthur to another!
what, you studied economics? I'm studying economics! Omg I 100% am going to become the most prominent economist ever so that you would notice me
Just one thing, there's no use in insisting that the good things are coming to an end. Maybe our experiences are always complicated because it's not certain what we make of them and therefore things are not ever "exciting" or not so. Like some situations are preferrable to others, sure, but idk.. I take comfort in the idea that if things were never that good, then the pressure is off for them to be good in the future. And even if they're not perfect, we can make good things of them like we always do. We'll be alright.
It's a small world!! If you end up doing a PhD I'm sure you'll see me around :)
Hi how are you and your partner to in some states have law on the book. That gives LGBT people the right to be happy and i see that you are happy one you are very looking guy and two you have a partner byrobert
you have downs in the thumbnail