transponderings

Tag: gender dysphoria

  • To PhD or not to PhD?

    In 1997, I abandoned a PhD in mathematics, which I had begun in 1993. It had started to go seriously wrong in 1996, if not earlier, but I persisted for a ridiculously long time with the illusion that I could still finish. I was completely unaware at the time that a combination of anxiety, depression,… Read more

  • Image, mirror, selfie

    Time for a proper blog post drawn from my cabinet of writing ideas. This one seems apt, since – according to Twitter – today is #NationalSelfieDay. Unhelpfully, the hashtag doesn’t tell us which of the couple-of-hundred-odd nations of the world celebrates this day. (It is, of course, the United States – a country that could… Read more

  • Hoarse and hair

    In The longest journey, I bemoaned the nine-month wait between my first gender identity clinic (GIC) appointment and starting hormone replacement therapy (HRT). I didn’t mention the other NHS-funded treatments I started in the meantime, namely speech and language therapy (SLT) and laser hair removal. I had planned to write separately about each of these,… Read more

  • Then was not the time

    — Why on earth am I doing this at this age? — Because you’ve been on earth while it’s gone round the sun that many times. — Um, no, that’s not quite what I meant. — Oh, I see. You mean you think that what you’re doing isn’t appropriate for someone who is no longer… Read more