Jode’s Top Surgery Transgender Journey

My name is Jode Wells, and I am a transgender female to male. I came out as transgender when I was 25, slowly to my friends, then my family then publicly. I started to realise I was “different” when I was very young. I remember asking to be a boy but it was never acted upon, I was embarrassed and couldn’t understand why this couldn't happen, I guess you could say I had a stereotypical “Tom boy” upbringing, there was a lot of pressure on me to wear stereotypically female clothing, which made me very uncomfortable and didn’t sit right with me at all. As I grew older, I started to learn about transgender people, and as soon as I realised finally, something fit me, I was a man, born with not quite the right body for me. After coming out to my family, and living as male, I felt far more comfortable and confident in myself, I finally felt I had found my true self after hiding it for so long. I have recently gone private and paid myself to access the hormone treatment to receive testosterone as there is a 4-5yr wait just to been seen on the NHS, I manage to fund and access hormones privately within my monthly income. I have been referred to the NHS gender clinic but I am a very long way off getting seen to where I comfortably want to be in my body, I was so excited to finally start my journey and life on hormones so that I can begin my journey in the right body but sadly even with the physical changes of the hormone therapy is not enough to remove vital body parts and my eating disorder fights to keep me at a low weight so my breasts shrink! I have been binding my breasts for a very long time. Binding is an act of binding ones chest safely, to flatten ones chest and give the appearance or reduction of chest presence, it helps trans and non binary people to feel more comfortable. This has caused me a permanent rib bruise and pain, every single day I have to bind to “pass” as male, and it is extremely painful and restricts my breathing greatly. It means I have to stop using the gym publicly and even some social activities impacts my daily life immensely. This is the reason I have made a fundraiser for my top surgery. I intend to put as much of my own money into this as possible along with the private counselling I am undergoing but I was told by friends and family that this could help make things happen sooner, as this is having serious complications with me having to be admitted to hospital because of loss of important electrolytes and constant weight loss just to make me feel slightly more comfortable in my body. Every time however that I end up in hospital I am being set back and comes at a price for my mental health to so if there is anything more important to me right now it is to go private and get my name on the list for phase one of my surgery. I don’t want people to feel sorry for me but this is something so important to me with there not being enough help or support for the Trans community and waiting lists being pushed further back due to COVID this is the time I could really do with some help! It doesn’t matter how big or small of a donation it is just a little will go a long way for me and allow me to live the life I deserve comfortably in my body. The wait has been agonising for me as my dysphoria continues to prevent me from doing things I'd like to which worsens the longer I spend in a body which doesn't align with my brain so this is my reason for once again pursuing private treatment.

Thank you for everyones support and non judgement so far within my journey but to make my life worth living this would mean the world to me. I understand that donating to something like this can be questionable because it is a lot of money that is being asked for and there are other pages that do require more attention but this is a horriblelife to live when you dont feel your in the correct body, any support will be massively appreciated and if I can share my story and help others in return then it will be a worthy cause to share my story.