I thought about transitioning.

Yup, I'm telling this story.

I thought about transitioning.

I have wrote, rewrote, and edited this post more times than I can count.

I was going to ease into this topic to not sound click baity, but I just can't.

Generally, I post whatever I want with no second thoughts.

However...

This absolutely fucking terrifies me to write. Which is why I know I need to.

If you've followed me for any length of time you know I talk a lot about the identity part of branding. Every client I have had uses the words "identity crisis" when they list their problems out to me.

I was no exception to this.

A while ago, something happened to me with some of the personal relationships in my life that made me do some deep digging. Really deep.

One of the issues I struggled with for years, was competing with men. Being a lesbian, that feels like the default setting. Most of my friends are men. I like women. I like more masculine things than feminine. I'm an honorary dude. A lesbro.

I get confused for a guy all the time. I put on muscle quicker than most men. I have a deeper voice than most women...

And then a narrative started to play. "What if you're not an honorary dude? What if you're a real dude. In a women's body"

And good fucking god did this spiral me out of control. Holy shit what if I am! What if I've always been and I'm just now realizing it!

I should get top surgery. I should do HRT. Wait, no HRT is bad. But if I'm gonna do it....

You can see how this becomes a problem.

And then, while this was going on and I was struggling with my own identity... I ended up in the ER. Was told point blank I had ovarian cancer, and that given it's size it may have already started to spread.

"Fuck... Is this a sign? Cause I mean, if they take my ovaries I HAVE to do HRT. If I live that long."

Thankfully, I get the news it is not cancer. It's a tumor. But a hysterectomy will be needed. Again, the thought went through my head.. "is this a sign..."

It wasn't but what followed was. I got bored while I was in the hospital. I did two things.

I started a Twitter account. And I signed up for a dating app.

We'll come back to the bird app in a moment, but this dating app I signed up for was a lesbian only dating app.

I sifted through dozens upon dozens of accounts of men in dresses with lipstick, claiming the title, before I finally got so fed up I deleted it.

The narrative that plays in your head now is that you're a transphobe. But the thought of maybe wanting to transition at the same time is a hard concept to grasp.

Something wasn't right.

Bird app: I start being more active on it, while these thoughts are running through my head. I come across a tweet, talking about "same sex attracted only" lesbians. The comment section was a shit show. But, this was a slight glimmer of hope I'd soon see.

Shortly after this a friend of mine transitions. MtF. I supported it. Until I saw a post with the caption. Something about "your friendly neighborhood lesbian"

It infuriated me.

My entire life I have competed with men. The only time I didn't have to, is if a woman was a lesbian. We don't even get that now? We don't even have that title? We get no space to ourselves?

"Fuck this."

I got back on the bird app to find that many people were mad over the same thing I was, and there were people who were detransitioning, begging and pleading people not to do it to begin with. Sharing their horror stories of doctors who didn't ask any questions, and sparing no detail in their storytelling.

This is where I stumbled on Buck Angels podcast. This is where I found medical professionals that were set in stone on speaking out about the issue and not pandering to the crowd.

This is where I found out I wasn't alone in how I was feeling and my opinions on the matter were very very real concerns. Concerns from women who had been raped, beaten, and abused by men before, that were vocal about bio female only spaces.

Straight men sneaking their way into lesbian only spaces isn't new. But them doing it and getting to call it progressive and brave is new.

Two weeks pass. It's time for my follow up appointment.

Surgeon says everything looks great. Tells me "we left your ovaries, everything else is gone." I said, without thinking about it, "yeah so no HRT."

She gives me a very funny look. She asks "how do you know what that is"

I wanted to go down this rabbit hole. But I decided not to.

"Body builders use it. It's like steroids if you don't actually need it, but not as intense"

"Oh, that makes sense." She said.

Why the fuck did I say that? It's not untrue. But... That's not why I know what that is.

I struggle with this and some time passes. I continue to do this inner work stuff everyone talks about and a golden nugget of info comes to me.

I don't compete with men. I compete with myself. In literally everything.

Huh.... Yeah I do don't I?

(Side note: there was way more to it than this, I'm trying to speed this up.)

Catching us up to date, I had a conversation with Jenna yesterday. We're talking about this whole predicament. I'm talking about how awful I think it is that we just give kids HRT and never ask hard questions before we do.

She was aware of the struggle I'd been through, and thank God she was. She talked me off a ledge. We were mad at each other over it for a while. But I'm glad I came to my senses. I really put her through the emotional ringer. Prayers for Jenna, for real lol.

She said "so, with your friends you've seen it with, what do you think the issue is?"

I thought about it and said "I honestly think if you boil it down, it's a sense of belonging. It's more complicated than that but to make it short, it's identity issues"

I said that out loud and damn near died.

I was so CLOSE.

With Thrill, Brand Identity. It lights me up, and I love the work. But I knew it was never why I was put on god's green earth.

Feel & Fury. Again SO CLOSE. Omg so close, but no, my target audience isn't men exclusively.

My health and fitness stuff I've so fallen in love with. Again, a piece of the puzzle. So. Close.

But now. I think we're on it.

This scares me. It really does. And that's how I know it's right. Your calling is going to crush you.

I asked Daphne, who read my birth chart to confirm. She did. "Haley, your whole chart screams identity stuff."

I was secretly hoping she'd say no, so I'd have an excuse. "The stars are not in position for this tribute!" (cookies for you if you get that reference)

Lol the stars said fuck you, start today.

I don't know what it looks like.

I don't know how to do this.

It's something I need to let unfold naturally as all of this did.

But I know one thing for sure. I'm tired of seeing kids injecting shit they don't understand, for validation they don't need, from people they don't fucking like anyway.

I'm sick and fucking tired of people leading these kids the wrong way, cause we're too afraid to get called a transphobe or a terf, or whatever.

Cause that confused kid at one point was me. And at 29 years old, I could have pulled the trigger on a dangerous choice.

But I had one hell of a support system. A real one. Not one that kissed my ass, said "yassss OMG be you boo do it"

A real one that said "Haley are you sure you want to mutilate yourself for this? How about we just dig into the fucking problem for real"

If I can have any impact on this world. It is that. I want that. I want others to have that. I don't care if I do it for free.

The last thing a confused person needs is validation.