Transgender Teen Survival Guide

Lee says:

This post is about getting a binder without your parents knowing, and the general concept can apply to anything you want to buy online.

Method 1: Pre-paid Visa Giftcard

Open a private window on your browser and pick the binder you want online, add it to the website’s shopping cart and start to check out until you find how much it costs with shipping and tax. If you don’t have access to a computer at home, use one at the library.

Save up enough money to buy the binder. Make sure you have a few dollars extra for the extra fee of buying a prepaid card, which can be around $4 (this varies!).

If you have a debit card but don’t want your parents to see the purchase, withdraw money from your account and use the cash to buy a prepaid card. You can say you just wanted to have some cash in case you needed it.

Go into a store and buy a prepaid VISA gift card. They have them at lots of stores, even CVS. (You can also ask a friend to do this if you can’t walk/bike/get a ride to a store on your own) Here’s what to do if you don’t have a location near you that sells VISA gift cards.

Prepaid credit cards require you to be 18 to open an account, but you can purchase prepaid gift cards at a grocery or other store at any age and use them wherever Visa, MasterCard or AMEX are accepted. These gift cards, which aren’t reloadable, usually carry an activation fee along the lines of $4.95 for every $50 increment. You usually find them in denominations of $25, $50 or $100.

Figure out where you’re going to get it shipped to, since you’ll need to put an address when you buy it.

Ship it to a consenting friend’s house or an accepting relative, if you have one.
Ship it to your own house and try to get the mail yourself.
If the parent gets to the mail first, say you bought a present for someone. If you’re going the pretend-present route, order it near a real birthday for someone or a holiday like Christmas. You may want to go to a store in person first and buy an actual physical present to then gift to cover up that it wasn’t in the package. You could also ask a friend to lend you a shirt, tell your parents you won a shirt in a giveaway or bought it but decided to give it to a friend as a present, then give the shirt back to the friend.
Get a PO box if you’re going to be getting things in the mail frequently.

Buy the binder online. Put the name on the card in the payment section of the website. Clear your internet history if you’re at home and didn’t use a private browser window. Make sure the invoice is sent to an email that only you have access to, or a disposable email (just google “disposable email” and there are a ton of options!

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Hide it when you get it. Handwash it when it gets dirty. Or start doing your laundry yourself. Wring it out and hang it to dry in the back of your closet. Bring it in a bag with you to change into it when you’re out of the house.

Method 2: Amazon Giftcard

If you can ask for an Amazon gift card as your birthday present, you can buy a gc2b binder using the “AmazonPay” option in the checkout!

Load the gift card into your Amazon account
Go to the gc2b website
Find the color/length binder you want on the website. Choose the right size. Click “Add to cart.”
Scroll back to the top of the site, click on the bag icon to go to your cart.
When you’re in your cart, scroll to the bottom. You’ll see three buttons, PayPal, AmazonPay, and checkout. Click “AmazonPay”
It’ll bring you to a log-in for Amazon. Log into your account, then pay.

You could also pay using Amazon, but select your Amazon payment to be charged to Amazon PayCode if you don’t have any Amazon gift cards, and then pay using cash in-person at a Western Union.

Or you can buy an Underworks binder on Amazon iself, then pick it up at an Amazon Locker at Whole Foods or a different location.

Underworks currently has these binders listed on Amazon:

Method 3:

Ask a friend with a debit/credit/gift card to buy you a binder if you give them the cash!

You can also check out on the Gc2b website with PayPal if you have any friends who have a PayPal account.

You can also use AfterPay to split up the payments into 4 increments so you don’t have to pay the full price upfront, but if you don’t pay on time you’ll be charged extra so this is something you should be cautious about.

What does the packaging look like?

Free binders for trans people:

Point5CC
The Binder Project
Gender Gear (Canada, not free but $5 each)
Search “binder giveaway” on Tumblr and keep that tag tracked! Also check out blogs like @Binder-giveaway-reblogs.
Local LGBT organizations or support groups may have free binders that have been donated by other trans folk, especially if they also have other donated clothes available so check in with local resources first since it’s usually easier to get a binder from them in person than it is to go on a waitlist for a non-local organization and get something shipped online.

Binding without a binder:

Sports bras: Ren made some sweet info on binding with two sports bras- see part one here, and part two here. Here’s a post about asking for a sports bra. You’ll want to use this type, and here are some brand recs. There is a ribbed sports bra modification prototype here, but it may not be safe, so we recommend Ren’s method for now.
Camisoles: We also have a post about binding with camisoles
Tape: KT or TransTape binding
Padded shaper: This post describes a padded undershirt to help make your chest less noticeable by filling out the other areas.
Dance top, swimsuit, compression shirt: Dance tops or one-piece Speedo sports swimsuits, and athletic compression shirts can also compress the chest a little.
Clothing: Clothing to wear to help disguise chest

Followers, feel free to add on!

themoonsoldourmemories said: As for getting money to buy the gift card, take out a couple dollars here and there when you buy something from stores that have a “Cash Back” option. No more than $10-$15 at most, though many places offer $5 as an option. This will make it show up on your bank statement as a purchase at that store, rather than a withdrawal.

byakuyathehedgehog said: I just want to add that while this will probably work in most cases, a private/incognito browsing window isn’t enough to hide your activity if your parents actually know how to work your router, which can show all traffic from all devices on your network, including through private windows. A good solution would be to use a VPN or proxy, so that your actual activity remains hidden, or using public WiFi at a library or restaurant if you have a portable device. Similarly, if your parents have any kind of child monitoring or web filtering software on your computer, your best bet would be to find another device to use.

bigmouthlass said: Check shipping policies carefully; some package services don’t deliver to PO boxes, or some PO boxes don’t allow packages, just paper mail.

settheexample said: You may also have a place near you where you can have things shipped. UPS and Fed-Ex usually have the option to ship to their local store and pick it up there, or a place like Mailboxes Etc. is another possibility. If ordering from Amazon, they have stores in some areas, too.

gtfomyufo said: in Australia if you go to the auspost website you can get your packages sent to either a parcel locker (24/7 access for 48 hours) or the local post office (available during business hours for about 14 days iirc) for pickup. they will send you a text when the package has arrived. if any of your packages are already being sent through auspost with a tracking number you can reroute them to one of these locations, but you can also use an auspost account to get a custom address, which will allow parcels to be sent directly to your nominated pickup location. this is the page you can find more info: https://auspost.com.au/receiving/alternative-delivery-addresses

Posted on July 29, 2017 with 22,447 notes