The Sapphics' Guide to Punk Radicalism

It’s almost the exact same story. Absent dad. Mom that took it out on me. The expectations. The performative masculinity. Ran out at 16. Was homeless for years. I couldn’t come to terms with the transness and buried it.

I was barely a step away from turning into that. It was all there. The resentment. Internalized misogyny. Stuck to masculinity like a sinking ship and pushing everyone else off like it was the only thing keeping me alive. It lead to two suicide attempts.

One talk with someone who knew me really well is all it took for me to break. To finally accept it. That’s where it goes different for me. Jax never made that leap, but fuck she was so close. She didn’t want to go in the end. She wanted that time. I can’t believe how lucky I was to live long enough to reach that point. It let me fix things, gave me the time to work on myself and confront all of the horrible things I’d done and was doing to myself and others. I found community. Found love. Became the woman I always wanted to be. And so many others of us never got there.

If anyone out there is seeing anything familiar in this, please, please don’t wait too long to talk. Find someone. Anyone who will listen. Hell, talk to me, I’m here for you. I know it’s hard, but the only way we survive is together.

The answer is: the uterus isn't what causes your period, it is effected by your period. What causes your period and what causes trans women's periods is the same thing: the endocrine system.

HRT changes the sex of your endocrine system. Feminizing HRT makes it a female endocrine system, giving us a 28-day hormone cycle just like cis women. At the end of that cycle, the hypothalamus floods the body with prostaglandins. Those are what cause all but one of the period symptoms, because they make muscles inflame and contract. They are what make the uterus shed its lining, they are what cause intestinal cramps, they are what cause body aches, they are what cause headaches and migraines. The only period symptom not causes by the release of prostaglandins throughout the body is depression, and that is caused by your endocrine system simply not processing as much estrogen and from simply feeling like shit.

So, the only symptoms trans women don't get every 28 days is menstrual cramps, because yes we do not menstruate since we don't have uteruses. But migraines, depression, body aches, intestinal cramps, and the infamous "period shits" don't exactly add up to us having any better of a time. Except we have to pretend that we're fine and nothing is different because no one believes that we get periods, not even cis women.

The God of War Laufey gameplay trailer came out just yesterday- and I was genuinely so hyped. Not only was the combat and visuals an absolute masterpiece, but the lore potential was insane. The mask Faye looked at was the mask Odin was trying to look through- meaning Odin was trying to study the 'Everywhen'/Afterlife of the gods. There's crossovers between different mythologies- and not only that, but we get to see HER memories of Kratos from HER perspective. We get to see her life- her legacy- from HER perspective. Not just her best traits- but also her flaws, her deeper thinking, her fears, and perhaps even a further look into her life before she met Kratos. But the MINUTE I hop on YT or social media? Every video and their mother is yelling "WAAAAAHHHH THIS ISN'T REAL GOD OF WAR BECAUSE THE MAIN CHARACTER IS A WOMAN, THIS IS FORCED DIVERSITY" The mere existence of a woman protagonist to you is 'forced diversity?'

I'm genuinely sick of people doing this. Y'all did this with Ghost of Yotei. Y'all did this with Supergirl. Y'all did this with MJ in Spiderman 1 and 2's Insomniac games because she was an important character. Y'all did this with almost ANY character who was a minority in literally ANY way, shape or form- and it's genuinely exhausting to see. If y'all don't like the upcoming God of War game because you prefer the source material? Okay- fine. Just as people are allowed to like things, people are also allowed to dislike things.

But if you don't like it JUST because Faye's a woman? Feel free to block and unfollow me- I don't give a damn. Because that's not an 'opinion,' that's just straight up sexism. If you call the existence of a realistically written woman main character in a game 'forced diversity,' it'd be easier for you to say that you consider women accessories or novelties and not actual fucking people.