this is along with name, race and other demographic information

They don’t have a gender field, and it really feels like they are just reducing sex and gender down to “you are what you were assigned at birth”, and then hiding behind amorphous medical “reasons” as justification …

  • dandelion (she/her)@lemmy.blahaj.zoneOPEnglish
    1·
    2 months ago

    hm, how does taking a natural supplement relate to the discussion about DIY risks? I’m sorry but I’m having such a hard time following or connecting the dots here … were you at any point using DIY HRT and did that ever overlap with the medical problem, or is your point more broad that having medical supervision generally would have helped?

    • E.L. Redwine@mastodon.social
      2·
      2 months ago

      @dandelion

      I have to say, even under doctor supervision, I had issues with the patches; the glue burned my skin so bad that the scars lasted months.

      I am now taking sublingual pills and they work well for me but I still need to be monitored for kidney and liver issues because of the aforementioned damage caused by my own experimentation.

      So, yeah, I was trying to share my experience as a cautionary tale about the pitfalls of trying to figure it out on my own.

    • E.L. Redwine@mastodon.social
      1·
      2 months ago

      @dandelion
      It is possible that I am misunderstanding your definition of DIY. To me, DIY would refer to buying estrogenic supplements, whether in pill, cream, or liquid form, and self-administering.

      Example: I first tried liquid supplements from a vitamin store, then moved to pills when the drops did nothing. The pills helped a little but, yes, without medical supervision, I ended up with life-threatening issues.

      • dandelion (she/her)@lemmy.blahaj.zoneOPEnglish
        1·
        2 months ago

        oh, no - DIY means you buy actual estradiol, either produced in a lab or compounded by amateurs in a home lab - but either way it’s not estrogenic supplements, but actual estradiol - real medicine.

        No phytoestrogens are helpful for feminizing, no supplements can replace hormone replacement therapy. With DIY you are still getting bioidentical hormones, you’re just not getting them from an official pharmacy with a doctor’s prescription, the difference is that you are buying it from the grey-market (or in the case of DIY testosterone, from the black-market).

        So no, I wouldn’t consider what you did DIY, and I’m so sorry the supplements caused liver failure, that is genuinely heart breaking :-(