In my experience, the euphoria I felt at the beginning was huge. From small things like making a femme character in a game and dressing her up in little outfits. Shaving and having a smooth face would do it, too. Big smiles and glee.

Over time, the feeling of being constantly awash in dysphoria lessened, and those feelings are a bit more “normal”, in a way. Like … Making a femme character now is the default. It’s who I am and almost always what I will spring for.

Also, I got laser hair removal and my face is much smoother by default now, and I only have to shave every few days to cut off the white hairs.

Those feelings of joy are still there, but they’re so common it takes something huge to make me feel the same “level” of euphoria I did in the past.

But dysphoria hits harder imo since it’s much more rare.

HRT helped me a lot with this, less because of the physical effects, and more the mental. I had a lot of depression start lifting when I started HRT and it helped me feel things more strongly. The euphoria hit harder, as the dysphoria faded.

Huge disclaimer here, tho. “your mileage may very” is VERY real. No one account from any other girl’s HRT journey was just like mine.

The hard part will be figuring out what makes YOU feel the best and push towards that. This is your journey, and if that journey needs you to just reduce your dysphoria a bit before you can find your joy, then take pleasure in that feeling of being you.

Always remember also that gender isn’t binary. Testing out new looks can be helpful. Maybe your euphoria can be found in more gender non conforming looks, or nonbinary aesthetics. Maybe not idk.

The good news is that it’s up to you. Good luck, cat! <3