Shy-loves-you 💌

actually wrong in this

one, but may I add

I love you being trans I love you trans women i love you gender exploration I love you self discovery

[link to the Reddit post]

[ID: two screenshots of a reddit post on r/offmychest by user awaythrowjessie, titled "My girlfriend made me realize I'd be happier as a woman". it reads as follows:

I am 33, born male, and have had major self image issues my entire life. I hated seeing myself in mirrors, pictures, you name it. I honestly thought it was kinda normal so I just accepted it.

Now about 3 weeks ago I was at my girlfriends house, we have been dating a little over a year now, and have plans to move in together soon. Now recently she has shaved her head to support of her friends with cancer (side note thenl treatments for that friend are going very well). She had since bought some wigs to wear while her hair grows back out. We were joking around as I have male pattern baldness, and when she went to the bathroom I jokingly threw a wig on and waited. She came our, saw me we laughed for a bit and she said "you know I think you'd make a pretty girl" we laughed some more but those words triggered something in me.

Cut to a few night's ago she asked why I've been acting weird lately and I just told her how i was feeling. She said "alright let's do this " and when I asked what she told me she was going to give me a bit of a makeover and put me in one of her dresses and if i liked it then good. I was nervous and asked what if I did like it would she still be attracted to me. She just responded with "Baby you know I'm bi, guy or girl you're still mine." Her words reassured me honestly i love her so much.

Anyways she finished the make up, fitted a wig on me perfectly and got me in a dress and even helped me put a bra on and stuff in a little so i could see what breasts would kinda look like on me. Now I expected to see myself in the mirror, laugh this off and move on right, but I didn't. She did an unbelievable job, like I looked like I had been born a woman, and when I saw myself in the mirror for the first time in my entire life, I liked what I saw. I probably stared at myself for a good 10 minutes before she finally asked me something. She asked what I wanted to be called. After a few seconds I said Jessie, I always like the name Jessie. She whispered in my ear "well Jessie, you look beautiful." And that was it, I knew this was who i wanted to be.

I'm nervous now though, my friends will accept it but my family are, well let's just say not very progressive. But this is what I want.

[link]

[ID: A screenshot of a Reddit post from r/offmychest by user awaythrowjessie, titled “I went out as Jessie for the first time and I was honestly surprised”. The screenshot reads: Hello everyone, this is an official follow up to my previous post that went viral and caught me off guard.

So me and my girlfriend, (Who has officially agreed to disclose her name lol) Emily, had gone shopping for me to get me outfits and the like. Earlier today i put on one of those outfits and officially faced the world as Jessie for the first time.

To say I was nervous would be an understatement. We went to our local mall and I was almost shaking, thankfully Emily calmed me down and said if anyone said anything mean to me she'd handle it, then playfully threw up her hands like a boxer lol. We stepped inside and started walking around going in stores and I noticed something, no one was staring. Like at all. I live in an area that still has issues with LGBTQ people so I was afraid of staring or aggressive people. But none of that happened. People greeted me, the store workers were kind and nobody looked at me like I was weird. I felt comfortable, and Emily even said she saw someone check me put, though i doubt that.

This was unbelievable to me and honestly I felt like myself. I feels nice that I can go out without worrying about Judging eyes.

in aotearoa, june isn’t our pride, it’s theirs. marsha p johnson and sylvia rivera are their historical figures, not ours. the phrase that “you owe your rights to Black trans women” is true there, but here we owe our rights to (mostly) Māori historical figures. i have the freedoms i do because of the legacy of an entirely different set of people operating in an entirely different context at entirely different times.

But because of american cultural imperialism, most queer people in Aotearoa don’t even know our own queer history. Carmen Rupe, Ngahuia Te Awekotuku, the Dorian Society, Gillian Laundon, Georgina Beyer, and the Wolfenden Association are some of our queer history. We should know their names! we should know what they did for us! but because of the power of the american imperial machine, we don’t.

our national pride month should be july, the month that the Homosexual Law Reform Act passed in 1986. our two largest cities hold their pride festivals in february and march, respectively. american queer history has very little (or nothing, depending on who you ask) to do with our queer history. anecdotally, from my own queries, queer youth in aotearoa know more about american queer history than our own.

This Tumblr post is the first time someone has explained to me *why* I couldn’t feed them before those instances.

every single time i have had to say, "i understand that if he had food or water, he could aspirate it into his lungs under anesthesia. i am not lying to you." THEN someone would make a little note and i would stop being repeatedly asked.

not a single time was that risk explained to me. the only reason it came up was because i already knew. i still don't understand why it isn't standard pre-op counseling or pre-op check information, when me as a parent acknowledging the actual risk also put THE MEDICAL STAFF at ease because i conveyed that i had informed understanding as reason to not lie about giving my kid food.

The Amur Leopard and Clouded Leopard (which recently celebrated its 50th cub born at the zoo!)

The Sumatran Tiger

The Red Ruffed Lemur and Ring-Tailed Lemur

The Cotton-Top Tamarin and White-Cheeked Gibbon

The Colobus Monkey and De Brazza’s Monkey

And the Mexican Spider Monkey!

I had to turn this off, but it's something that allows Windows and anyone using your device to generate text/images.