I prefer tummy injections, but yeah it's a big deal, congrats on hrt! Take pictures to look back on!
Is that something approved by your doctor? I've only ever heard of them going in your butt or your thigh
trashgf is right I'm doing subq, shorter needle, injects into fat. Result is the same, it absorbs a bit different I guess but I feel much less sore.
Edit: You can also do subq on your thigh, but on the other side(ish). My partner does that, but I still avoid the legs. Subq also avoids larger bloodvessels. I had quit injecting for a while doing IM because of a..
CW: injection mishap spoiler
I did my injection as normal, but after doing my legs for a while in roughly the same place my skin was getting harder to pierce. I tried to inject, couldn't get the needle through, pulled out and put it through roughly a centimeter away. Still felt hard and it hurt, I pushed it through (here I know now I had hit a vessel, they are surprisingly tough) and did my injection.
When I pulled out my leg started gushing blood and I luckily had gauze and stuff nearby to help clean and contain it.
After that I switched to patches for a while. Those are worse and have their own annoyances. When moving in with my partner who knew how to do subq I went back and she does it for me (I know I am lucky.) There's almost no pain at all for subq, a good injection I barely feel and when done perfectly I don't even notice.
When doing subq though there is a greater chance to lose some of the oil, so z-tracking is more important. when you do IM the muscle soaks up the oil like a dry sponge. fat is slower and of course you are injecting closer to the surface of your skin, but yeah if you do it right subq is way better imo
Butt/thigh are for IM, tummy is likely subcutaneous
Hey, I don't have to be transfem to appreciate a good meme. :)
ooooh I wishwishwish needles wouldn't give such genuine life-threatening fear feels, otherwise I'd totally do that... Actually... Imma ask.
- OK, how painful is it?
- How much do u have to inject?
- How long do u take to inject fully?
- Does it get uncomfy cold under the skin?
- do u have to aim for specific part of leg?
- do u usually have problems with the needles
- how far do u have to inject?
- do u just press in and pull out, or did u actually have to 1. Push needle in flesh, 2. press rod to insert fluid into blood 3. Pull out again?
Content warning: me talking about uncomfy feels with needles. You may get nervous from this.
For me, I always, without exception, get crazy panic before I get injected, as in like, months before. Then the stress levels keep increasing over the coming days, i keep going between bargaining, acceptance and regret and seem a lot colder to everyone around me, to the point that they think I'm sick and hand me a puke-bucket.
Then, once the day comes, I may puke some times over the day, then when the actual moment comes, I usually first go "ah, that wasn't so bad", after which I fall onto the chair again, I lose my vision and hearing, I can't feel anything besides aggressive raindrops shooting onto my body from all sides, and I feel incredibly incredibly sick. After 2 - 3 minutes I can stand up again and I can go in about 5 minutes.BUT! If the needle isn't too long and aiming isn't too hard, doing it myself feels a lot more managable. Especially since I'm the one in control and I know what I'm doing.
okay so the process isnt that painful or cold for me, but i have high pain tolerance, however i hear the same from near everybody who does it.
im using estrodiol enanthate, there are different formulas that will have different doses, my dose is about 5mg of estrodiol a week, and that ends up being a rather small amount of actual liquid for my formula. there is a really good calculator for different formulas and doses here https://transfemscience.org/misc/injectable-e2-simulator-advanced/
i aim for the outer thigh, around where the muscle is closer to the skin than the fat, but some people do it in the butt, or stomach. there are two kinds of injections, im doing inter muscular, or straight down 90 degrees from the leg, but there is also sub dermal, where you go at 45 degrees and less deep. for my injections i go an inch deep or more.
i hold the needle like a dart, and do it all in one swift motion, stretching the skin and coughing as it breaks skin, it helps to not notice the prick of the needle. going in one swift and smooth motion is best, going slow hurts more. then i press down on the plunger and pull it out when im done.
there are more steps, this is the simplified version, there are much better tutorials online, i just wanted to answer some of you questions directly.
It sounds like what you need is an auto injector. I had the same life-threatening fear feeling and doing my injections was agonizing and took hours and involved crying.
I figured there had to be a better way. Turns out online you can find devices that will hold a syringe and stab it for you using a spring loaded mechanism. I spent like $80 on mine.
Definitely look into it. Injections only take a few minutes with one and there's no fear and less pain since it is a fast precise stab.
Personally I'm generally uncomfortable with needles, but not deathly afraid. I never look when getting vaccines or IVs. I got more comfortable with the idea of injections because my brother started a non-HRT injection that comes as an autoinjector and asked me to do those for him because he was too scared to do it himself.
I inject 0.2mL.
I spend a long time personally. I do IM injections*, but I can't do the stab in one motion. I've tried and I just sit there trying to get myself to do it and can't. Still probably less than 30 seconds for piecing the first layer of skin to having the needle out. Hard to tell since time probably seems to pass a lot slower.
Never got cold from it.
The outer half I'm the middle third is where you are supposed to go for IM. Not sure how subQ differs. I sometimes chicken out after it's like halfway in and just inject where it's at and that hasn't seemed to be a problem?
Push into flesh, push fluids, pull out.
Being in control helps a little I guess? I actually had have a medication I take by autoinjector and I kinda wish it wasn't an autoinjector. It's a short, thinner needle and I never see the needle, but it's still more uncomfy imo.
I don't like needles tho (> _ <)... is it really that noticeable of a difference from sublingual?
There is also gel, which I found worked fine even for monotherapy. The downside is you have to apply a lot, which is a pain.
Injections give you a peak and drop-off, which more closely resembles cis natural estrogen production. I don't know for sure if that is beneficial, but saturation is a thing.
I was told sublingual is one of the worst forms of hrt at this point. Basically shots > pills > sublingual
Edit: after doing research, it sounds like sublingual is more potent but also less consistent. Now I'm wondering if I can take my pills sublingually or if it requires a different formulation.
sublingual has a much higher absorbtion rate than other methods, but also will deplete in your system much quicker, you peak in about 2-4 hours and are back to normal levels within 6-8 hours for most people, so if you want consistent levels with sublingual you need to take it like every 8 hours, or every 12 but 8 is better.
gels can be inconsistent in measurements, so your dose can vary, but it likely isnt a huge deal, sprays get around this much better.
injections are cool because i only have to think about it once a week.
I was doing sublingual for a few years now and found it to be far more effective than taking the pills orally. It has a much higher bioavailability over oral, but can be a bit chaotic with how the estrogen levels spike throughout the day. Overall, at trough, my estradiol was fairly consistent and at good levels, but it was annoying to set alarms to take it so I have recently switched ROA.
Is there a risk of trackmarks?
Do you vary injection sites?
I'm sure there's a risk of them but I don't have any yet after a month, and I switch legs every time
I just switched from sublingual to injections today, and I can confirm. This bad girl (my right thigh) can fit so much estradiol! Honestly surprised how painless and fuss-free needles were for me, it went really well.
