Here’s a letter I wrote to my girlfriend to come out, I’m ready to start HRT but it doesn’t feel right to start without telling her; I’d appreciate some feedback and support as I want to give her this letter today.

(name),

I’m writing this because as you know I handle difficult conversations poorly. So I thought I would write a letter to you to better explain then we could talk after. Anyway, I wanted to explain the reason I’ve been feeling sad lately.

I’m transgender. I’m sorry I haven’t told you sooner, I started to experience dysphoria in middle/high school. Around the same time I started to wish I was born a girl. I vividly remember my mom asking me if I wanted to be a girl, and despite wanting to say yes my fear led to an instant reaction of no.

Since then, for the past ten years or so, I’ve been repressing it. It would come and go in waves, for awhile I could ignore it, live life and be happy in my male body. But the feelings would always come rushing back, always a bit worse than the last time. I’ve been stuck in this vicious cycle for the past decade. My dysphoria would come back, but then use I’d external factors to repress it, my family, friends, and everything else.

In this last cycle, which has been going on for the past 8 months or so, I haven’t been able to repress it. The dysphoria has gotten so much worse, I can barely function, my mental state has been severely deteriorating. I’ve been researching the process of transitioning and what was something that was once a wild dream seems like my only path to happiness. At this point, everything makes me dysphoric, music, television, people, being outside, everything. I realize I have a choice, I can’t go on repressing this. Either I accept who I am, and take the necessary steps to make my body match my gender, or let this eat me up until I have nothing left.

I’m just so sorry to tell this to you, I wish I wasn’t this way. I just want to be normal, I wish I could just be a happy man, but I can’t. I tried so hard to repress this, but I can’t go on like this. I’m sorry I can’t be the man of your dreams or your husband, I tried, I really did, but I can’t keep going on like this.

I don’t know what this means for us; I understand completely if you feel hurt or betrayed. I’m happy to talk with you about it now, to answer any of your questions. If you feel like you need space or feel like you don’t know if we can go on I understand to, I just hope no matter what happens we’ll remain friends. I’m sorry again I haven’t been upfront about this, I honestly thought I could repress these feelings, but now I know that repression is taking me down a path I just can’t continue on.

In the spirit of full transparency, I also need to tell you that I am not straight. Over the last few years I’ve realized I am probably bi. I know that might seem weird to include but I felt like I should just lay all my cards on the table so you have a better understanding.