Whenever I explain to people that I have 'dysphoria,' they're always inclined to ask "what is that?" Well, in standard definition, dysphoria is a state of unease, or a general dissatisfaction with life. And sure, if you put it like that, then I guess we all experience dysphoria on some level or another. Girls in the mirror, looking at a picture of a model and themselves. Boys who see men with ripped bodies and jacked arms, getting every gal or guy to look their way effortlessly. Kids who see others with better toys, all those things can sort of be described as dysphoria. And I wish that my problem was as easy and simple as those things.

But no, no. My dysphoria is this brain-numbing sensation when I look in the mirror. It's this voice telling me in my head that nothing I see belongs on my body, to shred it off, tear it away, bleed it out until there's nothing left but this picturesque view of who I really am beneath bared out to the world. It tells me that this version of me, physically, is so far from good enough that it could make even Donald Trump look like a saint in the seat he sits at currently. It tells me that I am never going to be who I wish to be because I cannot make the world see what I see. It is a constant reminder that I have been royally screwed in the self-satisfaction of being enough for me.

Dysphoria is binders that hurt to breathe in, Ace bandages that keep my chest so compressed it may be doing more damage than good for my insides, but my brain is satisfied for that few seconds of pristine flat surface with just the hint of pec muscles popping up from around the beige cage I have put myself in. It is the pain of spending hours bound up to match the face and the voice to the body I am stuck in until insurance men and women behind their desks deem me appropriate for a surgery I will not be able to afford any time soon. It is the sinking fear that I may never taste the freedom of a perfectly built chest that matches my heartbeat.

My dysphoria comes in the form of fear in many ways. Fear that she will stop loving me if I do not become the man she envisions when we get ready for the day, flattening away my chest in the mirror and picturing something else there, something we both crave and yet... she presses kisses to every inch of my skin to assure me that's never going to be the case. And that fear calms. It's the fear that my children will one day see, and know, that the man raising them is a freak of nature. At least that's what their friends will tell them, they will not understand, they will shun me, they will hate me. But a hug from my boys, and the world quiets for now.

My dysphoria is the roar in the back of my head, loud and deafening that everyone knows. Everyone can see right through my poorly put together facade of manhood that I've attempted to put together, that I am not this alpha male that I want to be, and that I am nothing more than a sham. It is the snickering laughter I think I hear around every corner, it is the pain in my heart from wishing and wanting for years and years. It is my faith challenging my belief in my brain that the picture in my head is more accurate than this body that God built just for me. Accepting that God's mistakes aren't mistakes at all, just accidents that are a part of the journey to get you where you need to be, but why is this journey so much more difficult for me than for others, is that just selfish?

My dysphoria is the reminder that my family cannot accept me fully, though they love me so. That people will still use the words she, her, girl, female. And those words stab through me like white hot fire, flaying the skin around the entry point and bearing my pain out into the world. My dysphoria is the sincere soul-ripping feeling that I will never belong anywhere because I don't even belong in this being, in this body. Man is the only one who measures time. Man is the only being that worries about what he will do with his whole life. I worry about how I've wasted so much of mine feeling overwhelmed just by walking into the daylight.

And I worry about how long it will be until I can feel home anywhere other than in the dark of my room, wrapped in the arms of the woman who loves me, even though I have a hard time doing the very same.