New York details its plans for encouraging p2p social media.

Yay! Glad you like it! It took me several sessions to do everything below the neck at first. That was before starting hrt so it was terrible. I remember slowly eating dark chocolate in between short breaks to counter the pain. Hopefully you’re still happy with the epilator and get to unlock the euphoria soon! There’s always some pain for me but the bliss kicks in so hard and fast it doesn’t even matter.

I just learned that cacao contains anandamide, one of the endocannabinoids, so maybe eating the chocolate helped train my body to deal with the pain? Who knows!

Fortunately, there is a cheapish laser salon in my area that works well for my face, but some women have told me that they get their laser done by the students at a cosmetologist school that’s even cheaper. It might be worth looking into whether that’s available in your area.

An epilator works great for the rest of my body, and my skin feels much better to me after the hair has been pulled all the way out. It only really hurt the first few times. After that the pain turned into pleasure. Seriously, it feels so nice that I have to remind myself to not just bliss out. My sense of general happiness even stays improved for days after as well! Try the epilator. But don’t use it on your face!

Don’t dare use this one on your face, but some folks make their own electrolysis setups. It will cause scaring if you don’t know what you are doing.

Perhaps a kids styling doll head might work?

Behold the elder-lore, once sung 'round internet campfire tales of yore! /j

Transfeminine Science has a thorough discussion of the concerns:

These suggestions include progestogens having known antiestrogenic effects in the breasts, animal studies finding stunted mammary development with high doses of progestogens, clinical publications cautioning against premature introduction of progestogens in female puberty induction due to concerns about possibly stunted breast growth, clinical use of progestogens to treat macromastia in cisgender females, poor breast development with estrogen therapy in cisgender girls with a disorder of sexual development that results in high progesterone exposure, and breast development with estrogen and CPA (a very strong progestogen) typically being poor in transfeminine people.

Folks very much are starting earlier now! A recent paper noted that, “[m]ost patients who started progesterone began after 1-6 months on a standard GAHT regimen (59.3%).” But only two women were doing rectal administration in that study, which is what everyone online says works best.

My first year of hrt was all diy. I added progesterone after a bit more than eighteen months of slowly increasing estrogen, with the advice of a doctor, around seven years ago. At the time my dose of e was 6mg/day buccal, and p was 100mg/day oral for the first six months, then the other way. Maybe a year after that, a different doctor increased p to 200mg and eventually started me on injections around four and a half years ago. It’s been more than eight and half years now since I started hrt. The younger woman I was when beginning would be thrilled with where the girls have ended up, but I’d still like them a bit bigger.

been on e for a several months now

It kind of blows my mind that folks are starting progesterone so early now. The old lore was to wait at least two to three years due to fear of stunted growth.

Maybe just use your MP’s selfie or ID? use-their-id.com

Brits can just use-their-id.com.

You might enjoy Surfraw, the Shell Users’ Revolutionary Front Rage Against the Web. I once used an old laptop like that with byobu and w3m but all the keybinds became tiring. Now it’s just a soon to be e-waste interactive fiction interpreter.

Are you familiar with the Buddhist teaching of The Arrow?

When touched with a feeling of pain, the uninstructed run-of-the-mill person sorrows, grieves, & laments, beats his breast, becomes distraught. So he feels two pains, physical & mental. Just as if they were to shoot a man with an arrow and, right afterward, were to shoot him with another one, so that he would feel the pains of two arrows; in the same way, when touched with a feeling of pain, the uninstructed run-of-the-mill person sorrows, grieves, & laments, beats his breast, becomes distraught. So he feels two pains, physical & mental.

The mental pain is due to our resistance, repulsion, anger, or hatred. Often this resistance takes the form of judgement and anxiety. What are you gaining by holding on to this resistance? Is it worth it?

Thich Nhat Hanh, in his exegesis upon The Arrow in No Mud, No Lotus (p. 46), writes:

…there is real danger attached if you don’t have enough to eat or can’t afford necessary medicine. But you don’t need to make this suffering worse by spinning stories in your head that are much worse than the reality… It’s important to remember that everything is impermanent. A suffering can arise—or can work itself out—for anyone at any moment.

Instead of throwing good energy away on condemning yourself or obsessing over what catastrophes might be lurking around the corner, you can simply be present with the real suffering that is right in front of you, with what is happening right now. Mindfulness is recognizing what is there in the present moment. Suffering is there, yes; but what is also there is that you are still alive…

What has happened to you is wrong, but none the less there is still joy all around you if you choose to find it. I hope that you do! Please take a look at these links and reconsider.

Your severe mental illness might qualify you for disability! That could help with getting the medication covered.

Would you be able to work as a server in a restaurant on your days off from your non-profit work? The tips can be really good in the nicer ones.

Have you explained your situation to your boss? Maybe you could get a raise?

In your situation two different events are taking place. The first, losing healthcare coverage, is not of your own doing. The second, your reaction to this fact, is something over which you have agency. It is within your ability to choose how you respond.

If you are sick or injured, it is your responsibility to get yourself to the doctor or hospital. This is no different but merely more difficult. Have you called your doctor’s office for advice on your situation? Have you called manufacturers of this medication to ask if they have a reduced cost option? Have you looked online for cheaper sources from abroad?

The worst-case scenario is that you and your partner have to sell all your possessions, buy some one-way tickets and move to a different state.

I wish more cis folks knew that to me, simply being me, is as normal as being themselves is to them. I’m not a walk on the wild side, nor a walking queer chyron. I’m not your token, your conversational curio. I’m not your unicorn!

You’re welcome! Glad I could help!

In case you missed it during a break, finding steady ground has a nice guide on building resiliency during resistance. You are not helpless!

A uBlock Origin filter list could do that for you.

Sedona would be an interesting place to celebrate the winter solstice! Some friends who once lived there invited me to go camping in February at a “vortex point”. It was a really nice experience but a bit chilly at night.

Dialectical behavior therapy has helped me with suicidal ideation. DIY’ing it without a therapist might be difficult at first but the game is to observe your initial thoughts and feelings about whatever is happening, challenge those with reality testing or more helpful alternatives, then reach a synthesis which serves you instead of harms you. My time with therapists was almost a decade ago so this might be a terrible explanation but it’s the best I have at the moment. Suppose for instance that a motorist blows straight through a stop light long after the light has changed. My habitual thoughts and feelings will likely be full of disgust. This is everything wrong with the world all at one: the capitalism, the cars, the Anthropocene, the selfishness! But maybe my assumptions about the driver are incorrect, maybe it would be helpful in this situation to try to empathize with that driver. What were they feeling and thinking? And what about everyone else that’s around, are they interesting right now? What is stopping me from observing without judgement but instead acceptance? Somehow this helps me get back to awe and wonder even in the horror.

You likely have some unhelpful habitual thoughts and feelings on top of the shit life syndrome of living in a vehicle. I’m sorry you’re struggling now. You deserve better! I enjoy reading your contributions and I’m glad you are here. Hopefully you overcome this soon.

Welcome and congratulations! Plume and Folx offer telehealth services and therapy for a monthly fee.