29 March 2024

Hello and thank-you for looking! Perhaps you are considering a transformation?

coming out, being myself

There are so many practical difficulties!
Perhaps you’re looking for an insight…or considering what is involved in gender reassignment.

Firstly, these pages are not designed to give medical advice, nor will they. What IS here is a journal of what I have found in the first months of my transformation. The practical problems: clothes, shoes, makeup, body care to name just a few.

This site tracks my personal story.
I hope some things are useful to you, especially if like me you are starting from page one!


I have suffered with gender dysphoria all my life. I have been married, had a child, a career but not the life I should have had… until now. The options were never there for me…or many many like me I am sure.

When asked ‘why now?’ I reply: for every 20yr. old wanting to become a different gender there are as many in their 30’s 40’s, 50’s, 60’s and 70’s who want it just as much…but never thought they would get the chance; or worse never even knew it was possible.

I live in the South West of England, and have lived other places in Europe.

Everything written here is first hand…I’ve done it…suffered with it, regretted it, enjoyed it or worried about it. With products I have bought and tried, I’m going to be brutally honest. Some are good, others a total con and a waste of time and money. More than the money is the disappointment, the lost hope…and for that I will slam any product that is ‘snake oil’ and believe me there are a lot!
I suppose many see trans people as an easy and vulnerable target, that cheating or lying to them is fair game. Well it isn’t, if you sell a product and it doesn’t do what it says it does…you get your money back. Would be nice to remove those products from market altogether wouldn’t it.

my journey by: Alex

Some of the topics I am looking at:

My transgender story

‘out’

This photo in 2014 changed everything

Back in 2020 I wasn’t me. I didn’t know then that this one photo of me at a friends birthday would trigger the end of acting male…

Here I saw on the outside what I had always seen on the inside.

Reaching this point in life has been a confused and frustrating journey for me. On the inside I have always been female, I have always known that. The challenge was to keep that hidden from the world.

Why?…a fair question, the answer is two fold in my case: firstly back in the day I knew little or nothing about gender identity or what all those internal struggles, conflicts, needs and emotions were all about. I never spoke of them or let them show…I just kept everything locked away. Secondly, what could I do about them anyway? I was the gender I was born with and there was no other option…that was that…well where I grew-up at least.

I’ve been married, had a son a career and many other things. Life has been good but I’ve never been truly me; I’ve never been truly anyone. I’d like to say I lived a secret life…but that isn’t true, I just lived in a vacuum, being whatever was appropriate never truly me.
I think a quote from, ‘Excalibur’ puts it exactly, as King Arthur drinks from the Holy Grail:

‘I did not know how empty was my soul, until it was filled.’

That is the past, I have awoken.

At this site (and later, TikTok, Youtube, Instagram feeds/videos I hope to do) I will share how I found the real me, perhaps that will help others. Some things done on my road to being a woman have been a mistake, others a joy…I’m going to share them all though, you can learn from mistakes too.

My name here is Alex (Pinkbutterfly) my name across platforms. That gives me a little privacy…I hope that is ok with you?

A little deeper insight:

Gender dysphoria

I’ve had this since puberty but only found out what it is and how it is diagnosed about 2 years ago. If you have it…you know what I mean when I say it crushes any value or worth you have in your own appearance or visual sense of identity. Looking in a mirror, a self reflection in a shop window or now…with the curse of the selfie and being tagged…any and all of these fill me with self loathing.
Who is that man in the image?
Yes I know it isn’t a great shock to see I’m male but I feel like a square peg trying to fit a round hole. It isn’t ever going to happen and everytime I see myself it is as if for the first time…and it’s depressing and can take days to get over. Yes I am talking clinical depression.

I’m not going to dwell on the mental health that gender dysphoria is. If you have it, you know, if you don’t…it probably makes no sense. It occurs in both genders male and female. If the inner you doesn’t match the gender of the outer you…I’m with you…it’s a living nightmare I know.

When I say ‘you know’ that isn’t strictly true in my case. I’d never even heard the term before 2019. All I have always known is that I am female. I have always done female things, have feminine characteristics, emotions, primarily only felt at ease in female company. If I had been born female…I would have turned out exactly as I am now…without the self loathing of course. I think I will leave it there on this topic for now.

What triggered my change?

me 2014

It might sound ridiculous, this photo of myself changed my life! Just so feminine, just a glimpse. In itself not a big deal but it left me stunned and elated at the face that was the real me. How could such small facial changes create my woman?

What exactly it triggered is a longer story…the seed had been planted some years before.

The reality key…a key to a part of me I hadn’t consciously had access to before. Once I turned that key and opened the door…everything I truly was came flooding out.
All my life I had been blindly searching and knocking at closed doors in an attempt to uncover the real me. I knew it was in there but not what it was; it seems so obvious now. I’ve always known I was female…and now here was the face to go with it!

More than anything I actually like myself in this photo…that is really me, the self I always see inside. I’ve suffered all my life with gender dysphoria, now I knew over the following weeks that I had to release this person. Sounds a little shallow to base all that on a photo? Not at all I have never doubted the decision to transgender…never once not for a second. It was just the trigger, I’ve never been this happy either, it’s like my cage has been opened.

Is this common though, do others live their life in this coma of identity?



Perhaps…but all trans people are different so who can say what is a good trigger or not. I call it my ‘Berlin wall’ moment. After the first blow with that photo hammer, the happiness came tumbling into my life and that bloc was was gone forever. Certainly not an easy life now but it’s mine and I want it.

There are many many other factors and events in my life that fell into place as this wave of realisation swept over me; too many to list or explain here. Certainly the last eight years of, issues, identity crisis, trauma, depression and confusion make more sense.
I was ‘Bluebutterfly’ for many years, a symbol that repeats in my artwork and life, a repeating symbolism, a clue for me to pickup on…which so far I hadn’t. Now the FaceApp photo was the blunt clue, the defining moment in my self awareness.

So that’s my story…so far

…no need to dwell on it. This site is a celebration and documentation of the greatest journey of my life…and like so many other trans people out there doing the same thing, or thinking about it…here is my story.

‘Transpeople are only, 1 in 20,000, so not so many of us.’


I hope you find it interesting and informative. It may not show you what to do…but it might stop you from making some bad mistakes. If that is the case I will be happy that I have shared with you X.

Alex