XXY: Personal Experience Using Estradiol HRT

It has been several years since I started self treatment with Estradiol hormone replacement. At the beginning I started with very little, and over the years as my body adjusted to the changes I have slowly raised the amount I take from .025mg topical daily to now .2 mg topical daily. This works out to for an average sized ordinary person of about 40 pg/ml (scale of 0-400 pg/ml for an ordinary woman) per .1 mg topical application. My pretested before starting estradiol was about 100 pg/ml on the same scale. So now, I'm replacing about 80 pg/ml, and have a much lower level of testosterone about 1% of scale. What this all means is that I have replaced my body's natural production of estradiol and lowered the amount of (generally toxic) testosterone produced. My testosterone level started at 4% of scale (about 0-1200 ng/dl), it is now about 1%.

When I started this process, I was told a great many stories about what would happen to me. For example:
a. You will become a girl.
b. You will develop breasts (no kidding, really?.. I already had breasts).
c. You will lose your capability of acting rationally (a doctor actually said that.... he was male).
d. You will no longer have to deal with rampant acne. (TRUE!)
e. You might retain more bone, and thus no longer be on the watch list for osteoporosis...

Actually they didn't say E, I chose to take Estradiol for two reasons, D because I wanted the acne to end, and E, because being 35 and being concerned about osteoporosis seemed stupid if taking Estradiol would fix it. Well it did... I'm no longer in the danger range for osteoporosis or osteopenia. Indeed, I made such an Amazing Remarkable recovery you'd think the medical community would call it a miracle. Actually the results were swept under the rug. Oh well, not my problem, my rescue. :)

So here we are years later...
a. I am not a girl, I am Intersex though, I was born this way, I have not significantly changed because of Estradiol.
b. My breasts are still my breasts... no significant changes there. :)
c. Rational thought.. hmm.. what was he trying to say, I wonder?
d. Acne, is gone, as suspected although resisted by EVERY single doctor the cause was excessive levels of testosterone. Which I might add my body cannot use in more than tiny quantities, like every other male can and does. Its not odd, I have a more female orientated physical system. It is only unusual that a male doctor cannot imagine someone allegedly "male" not being all Male.
e. Within 6 months of starting Estradiol and progesterone (I've since stopped the progesterone, tests ongoing), my bone density increased more than 3 medians. This should suggest that I was lacking something either estradiol or progesterone provided. You would think so...

Hi .. :) I'm Onnineko, the "guy" who works for fortune 500 type companies, who fits in more or less. For one thing, I look like a 24 year old kid though I happen to be almost 40, just like any other female I don't look my age. Learning to sing did wonders for my confidence of speaking too, which helped a great deal with my work.

The only downside that I have noticed is that when the patches, I use Vivelle Dot .1 mg patches, start to wear off the effects are immediately noticeable: my memory starts to fade, as the level of estradiol drops lower I feel strong sense of paranoia, the sense of something being wrong becomes acute, the sexual disconnection felt with gender identity dysphoria becomes more clear. In all feeling ones personal connections to stability, intellectualism, and general feeling of well-being slip away is truly terrifying, that is when it can be remembered. It is entirely possible to notice the change and forget, and then feel the paranoia lightly and then forget, and then it gets steadily worse until eventually memory kicks in and prompts changing those forgotten patches. Darn is it hard to live life on a 3 day leash. But its worth it.

Every minute lived without the devastating effects of too much testosterone, with enough estradiol, makes the world stable, removes the pain, engages memory, and enables me to live a normal fair life. To be able to engage in feelings like happiness and even sadness at all, like an ordinary person does is a wonder to me, even now years later.

I think back what it was like living a life that had no meaning, was wrong in every physical sense, and one which was only a step ahead of suicide every minute that I lived. Nothing at all could convince me I should stop taking estradiol at this point, going back to that is death. As the level of hormone falls, so too would feelings, memory, and every other function but basic survival and raw tortured intellect. I wonder if that what serial killers feel, the emptiness, the rawness, the lack of feelings or regret.

I wonder... if environmental hormone suppression is part of the cause we have behind people who cannot cope with living in a normal sense. But that matters not to me.