How Medical Transition Opened My Creativity.
I came out at 12, about to be 13. I chopped off my hair. I started binding around age 14. I socialized as a boy. Throughout middle and high school, I enjoyed the arts. I was in the band, a part of the theater stage crew, and took art during my last two years of high school. When I graduated from high school in 2023, I drew in my sketchbook here and there, but I would go months without creating. It was November 2024 that I switched to injections. I had already been on testosterone for about 6 ½ months, low-dosing with the gel method. By upping my dose and using a method that better absorbed the testosterone for me, I was finally getting to cis-male levels.
I finally felt creative. I started working on projects. I remember being in the craft store, and seeing this large pad of bristol paper and buying it because I wanted to make art in a larger size. This was new to me, as I wanted to work in smaller sizes and draw my favorite duck species. Not only did I start to work larger, but I also decided to go to school for art, starting that January 2025. So I went in about a year on hormones, and I had no clue about my identity with my art. That I just wanted to create. While in my classes, I still had some creativity to make art of my own. I feel the need to make things.
My theory is that giving myself the right levels of hormones and quieting my gender dysphoria enough to allow me to express myself properly in the things I create, but also in how I dress. I would not be where I am today without HRT. I got to be this creative man. Something that should not be radical but is. Going through puberty knowing I was a boy was hell, and it squelched my self-expression because all I wanted to be was not seen. I never had the chance to explore my creativity because I wanted people to respect me as a man. But now, I don’t care because I look in the mirror and see a guy.
My art has definitely changed. I have not created fan art in a couple of years now. I have moved to abstraction and switched from digital to more traditional mediums like oil paint. Though I primarily work in ink now. Through my journey of finding my creative voice and settling into my masculinity.
Leave a Reply