Expectations, Excitement, and Disappointment (pointless ramblings)

I have some bad habits. Things that aren't good for my mental health. I won't get into all of them; the relevant ones here:

• I look at /r/transtimelines
• I look at /r/transpassing
• I read other MtF girls' accounts of their progress
• I let myself get excited about every little bit of my own progress

These habits conspire to set me up for guaranteed disappointment. I've been on hormone therapy for 6 months now; my boobs are AA (yes, it's a real size, smaller than A) and show no signs of continuing to grow. The fat distribution on my face and in my body is still fairly masculine - especially in my body. 

Don't get me wrong, I've made a lot of progress. But sometimes it doesn't feel that way. When my nipples started to grow, I jumped with joy; that just prepared me to despair when they stopped. Same with my boobs, which I'm now despairing over for their lack of soreness, a sure sign of growth. I was just so excited when I could say "I have boobs," it never occurred to me that it wouldn't be constant growth. Even though I know it's in fits and starts, I'm constantly afraid this is as big as they'll get. I can see changes to my face when I compare pictures, but when I look in the mirror I still see a man. My belly flab isn't going much of anywhere, least of all to my hips. Even though I've seen tables and graphs of normally expected timelines, and I see that I'm basically within normal range (though these expected values put hormone changes as happening for 4 years - I want to be ready for SRS long before that, dammit!), I despair.

My other bad habits get in the way of feeling good about that sometimes. I see timelines and read about progress where girls are looking totally female at 6 months, or have B cup breasts before this point. I look down at my AA's and I'm not a happy girl. I see timelines where 2 months of progress puts my 6 months to shame. I rationally know these are outliers, but inside they hurt.

I get frustrated. Girls talk about their endocrinologists giving them 8mg of estradiol a day; mine won't let me go higher than 4mg and I worry what I'm missing out on, how much better my progress could be. Mine started me at 50mg of spironolactone; 100mg sounds like it's a more typical starting dose. And again, I wonder what I missed out on in those first months with all that testosterone still afflicting me.

Of course, the second my boobs start hurting again, the second my nipples become tender again, I will light up in incandescent optimism. And when it stagnates, just look at a few timelines and I'm back to despair. That's how I'm feeling down after all the excitement at 6 months. And again, excited going to 200mg of the spiro, feeling my boobs get a little soreness, now down again after it goes away.

I get excited and it sets me up for disappointment. I see better-than-average timelines and it sets me up for disappointment. I hope too hard and it sets me up for disappointment. 

I should learn to expect nothing, and then be happy (not excited) with everything I get.

/angst