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Trans Megathread for the Week of 10⁄28 to 11⁄3)
(hexbear.net)
K (189?–?) Soviet pioneer. From Kazan, Tartarstan, USSR, K was diagnosed as a ‘transvestite’ in 1937.
She was given permission by the People’s Court to wear female clothing, her identity papers were changed to her female name, and her name was removed from the military recruitment rolls.
She was featured in a 1957 gynaecology textbook.
M.G. Serdiukov. Sudebnaia ginekologiia I sudebnoi akusherstvo. Moscow: Meditsina 1957: 47-8.
Dan Healey. Homosexual Desire in Revolutionary Russia: The Regulation of Sexual and Gender Dissent. Chicago and London: The University of Chicago Press, 2001: fig 24.
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kinda sadposting
Really fighting the i am fundamentally unwantable thoughts today
. Literally only because I felt awkward earlier while at a friends place 
and now im just holding back the flood of thoughts and ruminations and anxieties. I just want to be comfortable with my friends, but ive got too many maladaptive processes, and my maladaptive processes dont interface well with everyone elses 
(i guess thats part of why their maladaptive now and not just adaptive anymore...).
spoiler entertaining my ruminations
I have a really deep seated belief that i am unwantable
. That any expression of wanting to be around me is a lie, or intended to be deceptive
. I know its not true, but, well, under duress we regress 
. And when im stressed or anxious or feel awkward my ability to counter that thought goes out the window. Like its not even a thought, its axiomatic 
. And i cant seem to do anything about it! Im aware of it, i try to counter it by ignoring it, by ignoring my discomfort, but it never goes away, and I dont know what steps to take to change that process.
People ask me about it sometimes, but i just
and tell them its nothing, im fine; I dont want to make my friends deal with my weird shit. Like, when im in these spaces I require an explicit "i want to spend time with you and will be sad if you leave 
" (yes the hug is included in the quotes, i require hugs) in order to not feel bad guilty and shameful for existing near my friends. But they shouldnt have to say that; i should be able to understand "feel free to hang out if you want" actually is an invitation, and not a thinly veiled attempt to get me to leave.
Fuck my brain
Here is a portrait I drew of me and my brain:
spoiler
Going to therapy can help with feelings of unworthiness. You are worthy of love just FYI. Ignoring it is not really an effective strategy as you've already surmised, you will have to confront these feelings - luckily, they're not true and you can find a therapist that can help.One of the strategies my therapist gave me for this type of rumination is every time you have a bad thought like "I am unwantable, I am unworthy, etc" is to think 5 good thoughts "I am strong, I am resilient, I am a kind person, etc." The good thoughts started settling in but also it was starting to get annoying to have to pick 5 out so often lol, so I was like reflexively shutting down bad thoughts. Maybe you have to dig into what is making you feel unworthy, maybe it's childhood stuff or something else, but you should explore that with a therapist.
There's some CBT (cognitive behavioral therapy) homework you can do about these kinds of beliefs. Step one is to list it out, rate how much you believe it out of 10, reframe the thought and then work on it with a therapist. As simple as it sounds, this can be quite effective and can be something you can do automatically. You can find examples by googling "CBT belief worksheet." A lot of people struggle with reframing at first, but you can get through it I swear.
::: spoiler ignore me, im being weird or some shit.
I know, and I am, its just hard to keep that internalized and axiomatic in the face of gestures vaguely at existence.
Part of the issue is that the unwantableness isnt the thought, its part of what the thought is predicated on. I rarely actively think im unworthy of something, its just reflected in my thoughts, if that makes sense. Like here my feeling was one of anxiety, of uncertainty; there was no thought. It wasnt until later that it clicked that this feeling was coming out of my struggling to be genuine with people, which itself comes out of my shapeshiftery masking to make people not hate me, and that comes out of my feeling of being unwantable. Its so far removed from my active thoughts that I dont know how to get to it, how to interrupt that process; i feel like I have to pull so many layers off to get to that axiom and question it and destroy it. And even then, it didnt arise out of nothing. It arose from social punishments meted out against me when I was a kid, from people leaving like they always do, from people being my friend out of pity, etc.
Idk, im mostly rambling at this point...
spoiler
Knowing that this is a faulty core belief (unworthiness) is actually a considerable step forward, because often people come into therapy feeling anxious and bad and so on but getting to the root of those bad thoughts is a few sessions deep. So it's good you've identified it! You've actually made good progress on your own, you should feel proud and should identify this strength of yours for self-awareness. A CBT worksheet will show a negative belief that you connect to a core belief and then you provide alternative beliefs.So when I say I think 5 positive thoughts for every negative, it doesn't mean every time a core belief surfaces that I think 5 positive thoughts (core beliefs rarely surface) I mean those distantly connected negative thoughts. Anyway, I think you could get tools like that to work for you with CBT focused treatment.
::: spoiler spoiler
I know what you mean, and i agree, but theres also that part of me saying, with a sardonic depressed tone, "i made good progress when I was 16. The more-than-a-decade since then has been me trying and failing to do anything about it (or anything at all really)"
And i do try to feel pride in the ways Im strong, but i often end up feeling terribly conceited for it yk?
Im really good at analyzing myself, at self-insight, at understanding the various internal processes occuring. But i cant make changes happen. Even when I know what to do, why it will work, and want to do it, i struggle to shift how I approach things, how I engage with things.
And like, ive done therapy, but not in a while and not cbt. Maybe something to look at, if i can ever figure out of health insurance and get some kind of job so I can afford it lol.
spoiler
I know you want to work on these feelings and that’s good, but in the meantime it wouldn’t hurt to ask your friends to reaffirm their love for you more often. Yeah we all want to not need to ask our friends to adjust a bit to our needs but also that’s why they’re our friends and they would probably love to adjust a little bit if they know it will make you feel more loved. There’s no shame in asking things like that, I would actually call it brave to be able to be open and vulnerable with your friends.