am-i-rreally-okaay

[am-i-rreally-okaay]

my dysphoria has been terrible lately, especially since its "that time" of the month. but to help with that, I made a cloth pad out of an old T-shirt and a towel. there's patterns online but they all use materials I don't have on hand and I'm not about to ask for these weird materials because I don't want to explain myself lol anyways, I cut out the shape of a pad and stuck a strip of rolled up towel inside it, and added some strips and a button to make sure it stays in place in my underwear, and yeah boom

also I told a friend of mine to stop apologising without stating what he was apologising for and also to just not because I don't want to hear sorry, I want him to respond. he's ignoring me now, left me on read and everything, so that's cool

honestly was already thinking about dropping him as a friend (again), and I'm gonna wait another day or so and if I hear nothing I'm just gonna ghost him. and, I wouldn't normally ghost someone but he's basically been doing that to me for a long time now so he can have a taste of his own medicine

[am-i-rreally-okaay]

also, I'm fucking bleeding (that time of the month) and I want to rip out the organ that causes it

[am-i-rreally-okaay]

idk if I ever mentioned this on here before, but I consider myself an age regressor. its very nice lol except I can't regress all that often.

but, today I walked up to a restaurant with my family and it was rainy and I almost stepped on a worm, so I slowed way down to avoid stepping on any more. of course, I didn't see any more lol but I felt little when I was looking down at the ground going fairly slow checking for worms

[am-i-rreally-okaay]

help, I kinda have a crush on my closest female friend and I'm fairly certain she wouldn't reciprocate those feelings so ehhh

[am-i-rreally-okaay]

lmao I got into a fight with my mom and it was so impactful because, while I'm sitting at the kitchen table as I write this, I moved all my personal belongings out of the "public" areas of this house, I plan on moving my guinea pigs upstairs as well once I rearrange my furniture a bit, and like, this extended as far as the 4 fucking dishes I own, 3 cups and a plate. I brought all my papers and books off the table, and the living room floor next to my pig cages, and the desk. the like 3 places I sit at in this house besides the couch, but I obviously don't write or anything while sitting on the couch.

I've had my suspicions for a few years at least, that my mom is at best emotionally manipulative and at worst she is just flat out abusive. I'm leaning more towards abusive, especially given the fact that I am jumpy at loud banging noises (even thunder causes this reaction) because of the amount of times she's been angry and just slammed things around. it'd be wrong to say she wasn't physically harmful in the past, even though she tries her best not to be. when I was 12 she dragged me out of the apartment by my hair and threw me on the floor of the hallway. I don't even remember what caused that, I just remember the pain of being dragged by my hair and I was honestly pretty scared.

I was on crutches a couple years ago for 6 weeks or so because of a really embarrassing clumsy moment, I fucked up my knee and it hasn't been the same since, anyways for like 2 days I felt a little special because I was physically impaired, but real quickly I began to be terrified of my mom in a different way because even though she hasn't put her hands on me in years I was struck by how easy it would be to just knock me over, so I learned to move quickly on crutches so I could move out of the way like I always did/do when I happen to be in her way when she's mad.

our argument last night occurred because she decided that she was gonna pull out the usual threats of taking away everything we love to "give us an incentive" or something to do chores, when she literally told us that we don't have to do chores anymore. I will say, we are not entirely innocent here, my mom basically gave up on us doing chores and that's why she relieved us of that responsibility, but what seems to be missing in her line of logic is that we don't do stuff without her telling us to, because none of us have the agency to do that. my brothers are pretty helpless, partially due to her parenting I'd say, and I don't do stuff unprompted because it feels like no matter what I do I always do it wrong. like, if I try to help do something/do it without being asked to, I get yelled at for doing it wrong, or at least I'm subtly shamed for it, and if I don't do anything at all I get lumped in with my brothers as lazy no good pieces of shit (to give my mom some credit, she has never said that, but that's how I feel about it). I'll be honest, I don't have a lot of faith in my brothers, and they really are lazy (self-admitted), but I am trying to do stuff to be better and I feel like being lumped in with them is ignoring everything I do.

anyways all this to say that I tried to talk to my mom this morning and she just, barely acknowledged me and while I guess I should've expected nothing less (civil but distant, lacking the usual friendliness), it really hurts for some reason.

also she told me to get out of her house so I guess that's my plan now. my plan is to take up as little space as possible in the public living spaces and start making money online or something. I'm not quite sure how yet, I'd like to start a YouTube channel, I like the idea of doing like, a let's play style Sims channel, while there is a lot of Sims content on YouTube it seems to me that its mostly review based stuff and not gameplay. I found one YouTuber who has a series going currently and the rest was all reviews of packs or rating the different packs or whatever.

well, that's all a work in progress. I'm scared to ask my mom for any help whatsoever, even though I an financially dependent on her and probably require some financial help to get started, plus y'know basic necessities for both me and my animals, and I can't move my guinea pigs upstairs without physical help. we built them a shelf for both the cages to sit on, but its heavy and so its probably near impossible for me to move it on my own, and my mom is the only other person in the house capable of doing any kind of manual labor. I can move the cages and the pigs myself but I can't move the shelf, unfortunately. I'm just scared of what she'll think of me basically isolating myself like I'm planning to do. the only reason it matters is because of how dependent on her I am.

on a semi-related note, I worry about moving out because I have guinea pigs, I worry about finding a place to stay while I own them, particularly things like apartments, even cat friendly places seem hard to find sometimes, and no place is explicitly guinea pig friendly

[am-i-rreally-okaay]

also I changed my name to Arje, as a temporary test. it won't really mean much until I tell people irl to use it, but I figure the internet is a good place to start

[am-i-rreally-okaay]

my plan when I wake up is to like, measure my body in oddly specific ways, and then draw my body onto paper to help with visualizing the costume

I also need to get a job because I'm not done looking at stuff and I'm already planning on spending upwards of $300 at least.

lmao why am I such a perfectionist

I decided that I want to be Herlock Sholmes (from Ace Attorney) for Halloween, so I started looking into putting together a costume.

something that pisses me off is that thing that happens with all "period" entertainment (games, movies, shows, you name it), which is that its historical-ish but not enough to actually use period things in all cases. and I get it, its a video game so they don't need to be realistic and historically accurate, but it'd make my job easier if it was lol

so I spent a couple hours doing that, taking notes and finding the necessary resources and yeah. and I've been awake since 10pm yesterday, and its 5:15pm now, so I feel dizzy if I move my eyes too fast (don't worry, I'm going to bed after writing this post) but all I want to do is figure out this costume lol

[am-i-rreally-okaay]

lmao why am I such a perfectionist

I decided that I want to be Herlock Sholmes (from Ace Attorney) for Halloween, so I started looking into putting together a costume.

something that pisses me off is that thing that happens with all "period" entertainment (games, movies, shows, you name it), which is that its historical-ish but not enough to actually use period things in all cases. and I get it, its a video game so they don't need to be realistic and historically accurate, but it'd make my job easier if it was lol

so I spent a couple hours doing that, taking notes and finding the necessary resources and yeah. and I've been awake since 10pm yesterday, and its 5:15pm now, so I feel dizzy if I move my eyes too fast (don't worry, I'm going to bed after writing this post) but all I want to do is figure out this costume lol

[am-i-rreally-okaay]

I think I'm going to try using TransTape again to bind my chest.

I always felt like I was just wearing a bra instead of binding, and it felt terrible. idk if there's anything to be done about that, but we'll see.

its 4:30am right now, I think I'll get in the shower in a bit to really clean off my body, and then we'll try a different application method and see how it goes lol

[am-i-rreally-okaay]

this post isn't recent and nobody follows this account anyways lol but I'd like to tie up loose ends

my cat did have cancer in his ear. we used the stimulus money from March to get him the surgery needed to get rid of it, and on April 2nd he had that surgery. he was there at the vet overnight, and then we brought him home. he looked terrible, half his face was paralyzed and he was all shaved and the stitches were fresh and yeah. he looks way better now, 3 months post-op, his fur's back, but his face is still paralyzed. that could be permanent, and I have to do twice daily eye ointment (because he can't blink) until it potentially solves itself. even if I have to do this for the rest of his life, its worth it to know he'll live for hopefully another 10 years (:

though he is having some issues now which may require a CT scan, which I don't think we'll be able to afford, so that's great.. I only hope its a minor issue, preferably a complete non issue, but worse case scenario his cancer wasn't truly gone and/or it came back

I cannot handle the idea of my cat dying at all, he's my only tether to this world that stops me from throwing myself into traffic or something, and I've thought for years now that once my cat dies I'm killing myself. I've never really changed my opinion on that. I don't think I'll be able to live without him

I'm so angry

my cat has a very high likelihood of having cancer in his ear, and the main source of treatment is surgery that's too expensive and has no guarantee on how long he'll live post-op

I feel cheated somehow, because he's fairly young (no more than 4 or 5 years old) and he's supposed to be with me until I'm 30, but instead its most likely he'll die before I turn 20, at least without treatment

I hate life, and it seems to hate me too

[am-i-rreally-okaay]

I'm pretty proud of myself tbh

when I was 15, I struggled a lot with my body image (and honestly still do), and as a result on my main account I used to follow a bunch of thinspo blogs because I was (attempting) starving myself and I'm still not quite sure if I'm out of the woods yet with my disordered eating tendencies

but now, at age 18, exactly 3 years later (give or take, I had a huge mental breakdown about this time 3 years ago) I don't see those blogs post anymore (I wonder if they got deleted?) and instead I follow agere blogs, who post cute and childish things and it makes me feel 10x better

I hope one day I can explore age regression for myself, but for now I have to make due with following the blogs and enjoying the things they post (:

[am-i-rreally-okaay]

I have some options to consider

I turn 18 in March

I learned just yesterday that there's a Planned Parenthood in a nearby town, and we go there often enough anyways. I'm excited because this means I can in theory start HRT via informed consent shortly after I turn 18

I greatly prefer informed consent vs traditional therapy pathways because I've been out/living as male for about 1.5 years, and I feel like that gives me enough experience to decide that I want to further my transition. I also feel like with my experience trying to go the traditional way, I'm trying to convince someone else that this is the right choice for me, and I don't like the idea of trying to persuade my therapist to write me a letter because I'm bad at persuasion, first of all, but secondly I'm worried she's gonna say I'm not dysphoric enough for hormones

anyways, I have a major issue with starting HRT ASAP which is mainly, I'm concerned about my fertility.

I desperately want biological children, but I'm extremely dysphoric with the idea of going through pregnancy, so the only other alternative is to freeze my eggs. first of all, that sounds equally dysphoria inducing, but its only for a few weeks vs 9 months, but its also not cheap lol

starting HRT is a good way for me to start being more independent, because I have a lot of anxiety over getting a job when I'm not on hormones as well as with my current legal name, and if I get a job I can save for these fertility treatments, but I'm concerned going on testosterone will ruin my fertility so idk

[am-i-rreally-okaay]

I'm so angry

my cat has a very high likelihood of having cancer in his ear, and the main source of treatment is surgery that's too expensive and has no guarantee on how long he'll live post-op

I feel cheated somehow, because he's fairly young (no more than 4 or 5 years old) and he's supposed to be with me until I'm 30, but instead its most likely he'll die before I turn 20, at least without treatment

I hate life, and it seems to hate me too

[am-i-rreally-okaay]

within the last 6 months or so I've felt very flip-floppity about my identity. I identified as NB twice for about a month each time, in between those times as well as now I gravitated back towards being a trans guy

when I really sat down and thought about it, I realised I "changed" my identity because I have a strong interest in historical fashion, particularly women's fashion, and I wanted to wear it. but perhaps more strongly, I felt like trying to slowly ease myself back into "being a woman" I'd eventually feel comfortable calling myself a woman and be able to just live a cis life. as well as the fact that I have/had a massive crush on a straight man, I felt like maybe that would increase my chances of being with him

as far as that last point goes, you'd think I'd learn lmao I've postponed coming out/transitioning for other romantic interests and it didn't work out for me, both because I'm still dysphoric (obviously) and also because we just weren't compatible for whatever reason. my gender doesn't really change that. I've resolved to watch my feelings better and to not do that again

so I've since decided to stop being flip-floppity on my labels, and to start fucking acting like it. this means I'm getting rid of a lot of clothes, mostly what I've kept since I was 14 and started dressing differently, because I didn't want to get rid of it for different reasons

so first I have to sort my clothes by gender (or more specifically, how people are likely to gender me if I wear it) and get rid of whatever I deem too "feminine" with some exceptions. after that, I have to go through my "masculine" clothes and decide what I do and don't want

the real purpose of this is that I have a deficit of clothing and I'm trying to quantify what I have, but it requires a lot more than I originally thought and I'm kinda but not really looking forward to getting rid of all this stuff

at least if I get my closet/wardrobe in order I can focus on other parts of my life, right?

[am-i-rreally-okaay]

something that's been bothering me lately is that idk if I pass or not

I never go out in public alone so there's no opportunity really for someone to gender me personally. but I find this really difficult because if I need to use a public restroom I don't know which one I should go in. I also have super extreme anxiety so the idea of going into the men's bathroom, while more appealing than the women's for obvious reasons, is also fucking terrifying. idk how accepting the area I live in is, but I'm scared of potential aggression/violence and it makes it impossible for me to feel like I can go into the men's bathroom

it was a blessing to find a gender-neutral bathroom while I was out and about yesterday, but unfortunately the only other one I know of is in Walmart and I'm not at Walmart often, and I'm definitely not at this other business often, so I'm still kinda screwed

I worry that even after I start testosterone I won't have the confidence to go into the men's, but I'm sure once my voice drops and stuff I'll definitely feel a lot better about it

completely unrelated lol but I turn 18 in a couple months, but I still feel like a 15 year old boy. I have plans in place for after I turn 18 to start my medical transition but I hate feeling like a young teen boy, it sucks lol

[am-i-rreally-okaay]

I find it very difficult to get out of bed in the morning

tbh idk why I get out of bed, there's no reason to do so except to use the bathroom lol

I feel this super heavy weight which is the reality of my body and how much I wish I could ignore it. I also sleep in nothing but my boxers because the shirts I wear as pajamas/comfy clothes are quite baggy and I find that the fabric gets caught on my chest and it gives me super intense dysphoria

but this adds an extra layer of dread of waking up, because then I have to put on a shirt before I can even get out of bed

[am-i-rreally-okaay]

after the waistband, its the thigh bands (?)

then we sew the waistband to the square

(I tried to make it center, and all the "seams" are going against my body. this is a personal decision, so you can choose whatever you want)

then we sandwich the thigh bands between the two layers of the square

pinned that into place, and repeated on the other side

stitched it down

and that's it!

honestly, this felt very liberating somehow. I struggle a lot with my independence, and I hate asking my mom to spend money on me cuz money's tight, so yeah. honestly I picked up sewing to make stuffed animals lol but having a more productive use for it helps a lot with feeling useful, and not so depressed

also worth noting

if you place the "seam" of the thigh band in the sandwich, one side of the tie will be shorter than the other when tying it on yourself. this is less of an issue for me, but its something to be aware of for sure. a good way to combat it is to make one strip longer than the other, but make sure not to get it mixed up then lol that's partially why I didn't do that, I'm scared I'd sew it on backwards lol

I just spent an hour making this thing for the tutorial so I hope its appreciated by somebody lol I'm joking, as I said before I needed to make more of these for when I shower, I still have to make a couple more but idk if I have enough fabric tbh

anyways! onto the tutorial lol

Materials

fleece (I recommend fleece because it stretches a bit, but any fabric could work in theory) (I also use 2 colors to spice it up a bit, but you can use just one too)

needle/sewing pins

scissors

thread

Instructions

Step One

take some fabric and cut a rectangle

I have no idea what the size of this one is, but I'd guess 14 x 8 inches or so

you're gonna cut that into strips

you need 7 strips, possibly more if you're bigger. for reference, my hip measurement is 40-41 inches, idk the measurement around my thigh so I can't tell you that, sorry

after that I pinned together the pieces as they get sewed on

3 for the waistband, and 2 for each thigh

Step Two

green square! lol

this one is 3-4 inches on both lengths, and its two layers cut on a fold to make it easier to sew

I throw a couple pins on the sides so that when I fold it it doesn't slip, and then we fold it and make a cut

this cut is about an inch long

then you're gonna take that, unfold it, and make two more cuts of equal length to make a +

I then pinned the top and bottom slit (for me that means the fold on the square is on the bottom) and stuck my packer in it to make sure it fits

(no pictures of my packer sorry lol)

Step Three

now we're gonna sew it all up, starting with those slits

then the waistband (ft. my cat)

(the stars are where I sewed, its pretty hard to see otherwise)

to be continued