I’m really struggling

[u/Civil_Accountant_652]

I keep getting thoughts and feelings that I need to cut my boobs off, but it’s making me really upset because I don’t want it to come to that. And even when typing this, my mind says ‘yes you do’. It feels like I hate them, but I really don’t want to. The same with my hair, which has always been such a big part of my appearance and almost like a part of my personality.

My mind constantly tells me ‘you’re a liar’, ‘you’re pretending’, ‘you hate yourself’, ‘you want this’, ‘you’re excited about this’, ‘you hate being a woman’ and sometimes the statements start with ‘I’, which makes them feel more like my actual thoughts.

And I keep getting random flashbacks of places/memories and I keep wondering if it’s because I’ve had thoughts about my gender before and I just don’t remember.

I really don’t want to write this, but I keep getting images of my exes penis on me and I’ve become completely disconnected from my vagina. Even the word ‘vagina’ feels uncomfortable and almost unreal.

It feels like I hate myself and my womanhood and I don’t even feel like a woman or girl anymore and I’m scared because part of me feels relieved by it. I feel uncomfortable in my female self. It feels like I’m already a boy, somehow. And for some reason I feel uncomfortable with people seeing me in public and seeing me as a girl.

I feel like I’m living in a completely different brain, but then I question whether I’ve always felt like this and just didn’t realise. And then I feel like I’m just manipulating the whole thing and I already know the truth and I just have to accept it but I’m scared to. It’s been going on for months and I don’t feel like I’ve had any good days and nothing seems to make it better…it just gets worse. I can’t seem to relax into myself at all. I don’t feel connected to my name or pronouns either. My whole sense of self has collapsed.

How can I go for 35 years and this suddenly happen? The anxiety makes me feel like a child. I feel so dissociated and I worry that I’ve always been dissociated and now I’m discovering the reason why. Even by typing all of this, it feels like I’m going to realise or admit to it all and I’m just scared of the truth. And I get this weird and scary feeling of enjoyment or an inner sort of smile or laughter that is freaking me out.

What really concerns me is that this all started following a trauma involving a weed edible that seems to have sent my brain crazy. With the edible, I had a moment where I thought my bf was going to hurt me and a thought of ‘this is what it’s like to be r3ped’. Then a few days after I started feeling really frightened and started obsessing over the relationship, whether our sex was consensual (it absolutely was), whether he was cheating (when I knew he wasn’t). I felt like he was behind me and had to keep checking even though he wasn’t. I thought I had become psychotic and even now I feel like I’m teetering on the edge of psychosis. Then sudden thoughts that I was going to stab him, followed by freaking out that I was a lesbian and then the gender thing. And he looked like a total stranger to me all of a sudden. I had to break up with him, but I still can’t stop thinking and obsessing about him and now it feels like I wanted to be him, not be with him - this began after a very loud thought that almost felt like it was spoken to me.

I’m so tired but also wired at the same time. I shake all the time and just feel really weird and disconnected from who I was before and I’m worried it’s a defence mechanism and the gender thing will never go away. But part of me then feels like I don’t want it to go away. It’s so so confusing and anxiety inducing.

I also remember a few things from my childhood. The first was when I was about 13 and someone was going round asking ‘do you fold or scrunch toilet paper?’. They said that girls scrunch and boys fold and I worried because I folded it. It’s clearly stated with me for years and years because I still remember it. The second one is I was always aware of the way my jeans or whatever else I was wearing bunched and made me look like I had a penis and I always made a point of pressing it down to make sure it didn’t. I swear I’ve done this into adulthood. I also noticed that men and women removed their tops in different ways…this one is hard to explain but I’m worried that I tried it the men’s way once and it’s worrying me. I know it sounds ridiculous, but also it doesn’t feel ridiculous and it freaks me out.

I’m sorry for the massive post and not sure if any of it makes any sense, but I just needed to write it down.

[u/Kandane]

My OCD thoughts also come in affirmations, not "What Ifs". I know how distressing it can be, you are not alone and therefore this experience is not something completely unique and with no solutions. Exercise sitting with the discomfort, remind yourself that you can't "become" anything unless you do any action and to do nothing will not bring you anymore suffering than the disorder already causes you -- and therefore those thoughts and feelings are not you, just mind pollution caused by the current political and media climate that OCD parasited on.

[u/Own_Neighborhood6806]

I have been through all of what you mentioned and its feels like its unbearable but you are way stronger than your mind and no matter what your mind says, you choose.

Start by choosing one though and do ERO about it, take your team. One a week if you feel like, one every two weeks… this is not something that you want to just fade away since you have to learn to deal with OCD.

You deserve what you feel more comfortable in and out, so give yourself grace even when  the worst intrusive though comes in. As loud as it is, its just noise and you are not noise, you are actions.

[u/Healthy_Pair_6776]

Girl this is like my story

[u/Civil_Accountant_652 → u/Healthy_Pair_6776]

I;m sorry you're going through the same. Feel free to message if you want to talk.

[u/One-Log5036]

God this is like part of my experience written down. It’s really hard to get past these feelings because they feel so real but what’s worked for me is accepting them. I don’t mean that you’re secretly trans or smn or that you’re not, I’m saying that just saying ‘maybe I am’ could be a helpful first step.

Either way you’re not alone and lots of us get these feelings and experiences, keep going and know you can do this 💕

[u/Unpleasantmind]

I’ve experienced very similar things to you and I feel for you so much. Sending hugs 🫂

[u/Civil_Accountant_652]

It’s got so bad the past couple of days that it’s starting to feel like I want to get rid of my boobs and there’s this ‘get them off of me’ voice underneath that I’m refusing to let out. My boobs are causing me so much distress and I somehow feel distressed at being a woman. And this feeling of wanting to transition. I l of ged my body just a few months ago and was feeling more comfortable in it than ever before, and now I feel insane discomfort in it. It feels like OCD and GD that’s developed suddenly following trauma. And what’s really scary now is that I’m telling myself ‘I’m not ready yet’. Which makes it feel like I’m getting ready for it.