This might be a long thread so the tl;dr: I'm not genderfluid, I'm trans. You can call me Sera and use she/her pronouns. Name subject to change.

Folks who have been following me for a while will know that gender as a construct has always been weird for me. Really weird. [1/n]

Genderfluid felt like a safe label -- nice and ambiguous -- but if you asked me at any point in my life to describe my mental self-image, it would've been a woman. Literally without exception. I certainly feel it more some days than others, but not by much. [2/n]

I've always been scared to take on concrete labels. It feels both too final and also too easy to challenge. I'm not a *real* hacker. I'm not a *real* programmer. I'm not a *real* trans woman. I don't cry when I look in the mirror, so I don't have *real* dysphoria. [3/n]

But you know what? I get to determine this. This is a label I'm scared to take on, but here it goes: I am a trans woman. It says a lot that I'm more scared to tweet that than anything I've ever tweeted, for a lot of reasons. [4/n]

I hate my body. I always have and I've always felt like I always would. And that sucks but it's honestly not hard being an ugly guy. It's definitely hard being an ugly woman, and maybe even harder being an ugly trans woman. That... terrifies me. [5/n]

But now I know that my hatred of my body is -- at least in large part -- rooted in the fact that it just doesn't feel like me. I don't see myself in the mirror. I never have. And maybe I can make measurable impacts on the other things I dislike about my body if I fix that. [6/n]

I don't know what my transition is going to look like -- I need to work with a good therapist and my loved ones to make that plan -- but I know this is something I want to do. I have reservations, but all of them come back to fear. [7/n]

From now on, my pronouns are she/her. I'm gonna play with names until something feels right, but my leading contender is Serafina -- Sera for short. It doesn't quite feel right, but it's a start. We'll see where things land. [8/n]

Thank you in advance for the love and support I know will come in. I appreciate you all so much!

Finally, if you've made it this far, please consider donating to this fundraiser. @HaxieAshleigh is in need of help and she's wonderful. [9/9] https://gf.me/u/yszw54