Doc ImpossibleHoly shit. I just talked a cis guy on the internet down from "Let kids be kids" and got him to see why gender-affirming care for teens absolutely cannot wait.
This is one of my greatest achievements. I have a legitimate urge to take a victory lap.
Rachel@Impossible_PhD this stupid society kept me from tranitioning until my hair was a total disaster, I feel this in my bones
Riley S. Faelan@rachel If you ever find a time machine, give finasteride a try. It's technically a androgen blocker, but because of the roundabout way it does its work, it's usually not gatekept for AMAB girls (at least the closeted ones), and a GP might be willing to prescribe it as a hair preservation medicine. But it has (mild) other benefits for people who are not particular fans of dihydrotestosterone on their brains, too.
@rachel Sometimes, I really wish retroactive advice could be more helpful. 
legumancer Davy@legumancer Makes sense.
Because of the way finasteride works, it might possibly lead to a more optimal hormone balance for some people's brains than binary HRT. I reckon most of these people would be enbies of some sort, but, hey, Biology Is Messy, And Sometimes There's Exceptions.
@legumancer @riley I'm currently taking dutastride+Minoxidil which is helping I think, but maybe not quite enough
@legumancer In a better world, transition trial kits would be a thing that curious people can get at a corner pharmacy and see if they like them. @rachel
@riley @legumancer Ok vaguely related....
I found a forum thread a while back about "guys"* who were desperate to "fix/save" their hair from hairloss that they were trying basically DIY-HRT.
Hundreds of forum pages latter.... some of the "guys" were happily identifying as non-binary. Others experienced so much dysphoria from the HRT that they dropped it, or scaled it back. Turns out cis guys don't like the feminizing effects very much at all, not to mention brain fog from wrong hormones.
I found a forum thread a while back about "guys"* who were desperate to "fix/save" their hair from hairloss that they were trying basically DIY-HRT.
Hundreds of forum pages latter.... some of the "guys" were happily identifying as non-binary. Others experienced so much dysphoria from the HRT that they dropped it, or scaled it back. Turns out cis guys don't like the feminizing effects very much at all, not to mention brain fog from wrong hormones.
@rachel Yep. Finasteride is mainly accepted as a cis medicine because it leaves plain testosterone untouched (well, directly, anyway) and enough DHT around that most cis men can tolerate it relatively well, unlike binary transfem estrogen HRT.
@legumancer But it's not a controlled substance, so you might get away with self-increasing your dosage and refilling it a bit more often than prescribed.
@legumancer The primary difference between finasteride and dutasteride, btw, is, finasteride only blocks two of the three main T->DHT conversion enzymatic pathways. The third one stays functiona with finasteridel, even if taking a high dosage. Dutasteride also blocks the third pathway.