well....for most "transgender" people, hrt isn't indicated. from your question i'm thinking you might have made more sense if you'd used the appropriate word..."transsexual". hrt is indicated for most transsexuals.
when talking about hrt a great many women over feel their expectations and over estimate the effects they actually get. it's a way for us to feel better about ourselves and i'm not really all that troubled by that...the truth is the truth so if hrt makes you feel better about yourself...that's a good thing....it should.
there is the case to be made, though, that we skew the expectations some may get...thus, in the end, have some people feel worse about themselves because they just "don't measure up" when compared to some of the panacea's we often read on line. i think the psychological impact of hrt is at least as much and maybe even more powerful than the physical effects.
i think that the younger you are, the less your body has been devastated by testosterone....the better your "mileage" as leah puts it. if hrt is prescribed prepubescent then the effects are enormous...life changing in a big way....that's the optimum time to begin. but for most of us....that didn't happen and unhappily isn't likely to happen to all but a tiny percentage in the near future. it hasn't happened with you and it didn't happen with me.
remember...hrt is an endocrine application. it affects those things in the body that are largely controlled by that system...your skeletal structure is not affected, your bone structure will remain as it was genetically grafted. if you are big in that area, you will remain big...that's just a curse that most of us have to learn to live with....we are bigger in structure than most of our c-peers. again, the longer testosterone has had to dominate all your features the more difficult they will be to change. if you are fully formed it's not likely that you will actually see any great changes...they will be subtle...some breast growth, some softening of the skin, some realignment of muscle to fat ratio.....these things aren't usually all that dramatic in a physical sense....but they help! they help in the visuals but even more...they help in our psychology...we "feel" more feminine in appearance and therefore we project more femininity in our lives.
i don't mean to sound like a party pooper....i think hrt is the first among the most wonderful things that have happened to us in this and the past century...it's affirming and necessary...for transsexuals. i hope you'll think of it...not as an independent thing...but as a beautiful part of an holistic conception of transition itself....it's a part of a miracle, not the miracle itself.
much love and hope. pj