Happy? New Year???

 

Image from Kateryna 
on UnSplash.

Well, I was preparing in my mind last night to write my usual semi-positive post concerning the new year which is here...but.

When I awoke this morning, all was changed when I heard of and watched the news coverage of the terrible disaster in New Orleans. If you are not familiar, at least ten people were killed and thirty injured when a driver drove around barriers and crashed into a crowded Bourbon Street full of innocent people.  

Needless to say, any ideas I had about making resolutions for the new year such as coming out of a dark closet seemed to be pointless. I have always believed making a new year's resolution to live as your authentic feminine self-more than you ever have before is an honorable choice to begin a new year. I know also, many of you may have thought about pausing your gender transition because of the possibility of problems which might occur with the incoming administration.

Whatever you decide to do, please be safe doing it and do your best to have a happy new year. 

    

Dream On

 

Image from Darius Bashar
on UnSplash.

Last night I had a dream which may have signaled my subconscious mind has finally caught up with my reality. 

For the longest time, since I transitioned into transgender womanhood over a decade ago, I wondered why my dreams still had me as a man. All the way to people using my dead name with me. I woke up frustrated it was even happening at all. When I was very young, all the way to my teen years, I cherished the nights I could fall asleep and dream of being an attractive girl. Of course, when I woke up, I was very disappointed to learn I was still stuck in my same old male world. 

Years passed by and I proceeded to work very hard to resolve my gender issues but still had the same old male dreams. Who would have thought it would be this difficult to change me completely, including my subconscious dream world. For some reason, last night, the dream switch was flipped. As I said, even to the point of the world using my legal feminine name I changed years ago when I journeyed out of the closet.

Maybe the dream was reflecting all the tension I am feeling on my wife Liz and I's upcoming trip to the Florida Keys. Since it is a bus trip from Ohio, we will be traveling through several states not known for easily providing rest room privileges to transgender women. Not to mention, the possibility of encountering a stray transphobic gender bigot on the bus itself. Liz keeps telling me I am overreacting and just being paranoic. I hope she is right. Maybe last night's dream was a higher power telling me to relax and enjoy the vacation. 

Regardless, I am going to take a ten-day break from writing during our trip. It will be coming up this weekend and will give me a chance to refresh and start all over again when we return back to Ohio. 

During my vacation and beyond, it will be interesting to find out if my dream world has reached the tipping point to my authentic feminine self. Perhaps it is unrealistic of me to think ten plus years of trans womanhood could overcome nearly sixty years of living as a man in my subconscious mind. The whole process isn't the most trying problem I have to conquer. But it would be good if I could. Even in a dream world, I still do not like to be referred to as my old male name or be back living in a male world at all. 

Total erasure of my past is my goal. Although I cannot ignore all work my guy self-put into our life to set me up for success as a transgender woman, it is still a process I feel I need to complete. In the meantime, I know dreaming is a natural part of life. Now I can hopefully relax and look forward to a good night of sleep in my authentic world.  

All Hands on Deck

 

Image from UnSplash

As I progressed farther along my long and difficult gender journey, there were many times where I wished I had company to aid my path.

Even though I often whine and cry concerning the lack of assistance novice cross dressers or transgender women have early on in their progression, the fact remains we need to work our way through it and do the best we can with our fashion and makeup. Until I began to see positive results, I am sure I looked like a clown in drag. Still, I was alone with my thoughts. I am old enough to remember with "Virginia Prince" and her Transvestia publication first came to my attention. It provided me with the first real look at others who shared the same interest in being femininized and looking like a girl. I was mesmerized with more than a few of the cross dressers I saw in the publication. I so badly wanted to be like them.

For years as I worked alone to look more realistic as a cross dresser, I still yearned for feminine help. I thought any cis woman could help me because of their years of practice and interaction with their peers. When I was engaged in college, the opportunity to be dressed from head to toe as a woman by another woman finally came my way. Somehow, I begged my fiancé to do it even though I don't remember now how I did it or was so persuasive. I went all the way by even renting a motel room for all the pre-prep work such as shaving my body I would have to do. 

Once I shaved and dressed, I was excited to undergo the long-awaited makeup process. Since she wore quite a lot of makeup, I was confident she could do a great job. It was finally time for all hands-on deck in my young cross-dressing life. Back in those days, mini skirts and dresses were in vogue so I brought one I found and purchased along with panty hose, heels, and a long blond wig and started the transformation process. To say I was excited would be an understatement. Time flew by as she finished my makeup, and I headed for the mirror. Instead of the beautiful blond I thought I was going to see, I was actually disappointed. I could not see much difference in her efforts from my own. Even still, I acted as if I was really impressed with her expertise when in fact, I was impressed with how much I had learned on my own over the years. 

It took me a long time working with makeup to learn each of us has a blank face to work with and we need to learn the best way to work with it. My fiancé was doing the best she could with the knowledge she learned from her own face, not mine. She was far from being a professional such as the help I finally received from a true makeup pro at a transvestite, transgender mixer I attended years later after I was discharged from the Army. He taught me lessons about my face I had never even considered such as which features to play down and which ones to build up. To this day, I owe him a huge vote of confidence and thanks.

It turned out the opposite happened with my fiancé. Due to knowing my deepest, darkest secret about being a cross dresser, she said I should use it to dodge the draft and stay out of the Vietnam war. There was no way I was going to do that, so we split up shortly before I was to leave for basic training. Actually, it was the best thing which has ever happened to me in my life. The pain it caused immediately would have been nothing like the suffering we would have gone through if we had stayed together.  

Looking back, at my life's work as a transgender woman, for the most part, it has been a solitary experience. Not having a female peer group to interact with and learn from was a problem to be sure but one I learned to work around. The end result was, I needed to be better than the next woman to make it. 

I Never Felt so Alive

Image from JJ Hart

 
One of the main reasons I found my way into transgender womanhood was when I was exploring the lifestyle of a trans woman, I never felt so alive.

It all started when I resolved one night to change my basic mind set from just thinking I was a part time cross dresser all the way to considering changing my mind all-together to I was a woman pretending to be a man, and I was so tired of feeling that way. All of my new thoughts centering on my gender led me to what I came to consider as my second grand gender transition on the night I went out to a venue to blend in with all the other professional women who were getting off of work. The difference was I did not just want to blend in, I wanted to be them. Even though I was petrified of what I was attempting, I made it through and even was accepted by all I encountered. 

The bottom line was I never felt so alive in my life and knew my life had changed forever. The problem was, in those days, I had serious male baggage to deal with. Similar to many of you, I had a spouse, family and good job to think about even though dealing with them as a male was pulling me down. Regardless, I kept on fighting and learning more and more about the femininized life I was considering undertaking. I was naive and thought I had achieved my goal of learning everything I could about living as a woman when I was just starting my path. I put all those years of just thinking my life would be just one of appearance. As my wife kept trying to tell me, I had a long way to go to learn what the life of a woman was all about. She was right, and I resolved myself to find out what she meant. 

Primarily, what I learned was a woman's life was very layered and difficult to experience because finding women who were willing to allow me behind the gender curtain were difficult to find. I was left to learn it all by myself until I reached a certain level of transition. In other words, I needed to pay my gender dues until I earned my path to the girl's sandbox. Often the route was bumpy, rough, and unforgiving but I lived and learned. Even though (as I always mention) I found friends to help me, I needed to basically keep my mouth shut and observe how the world around me was going about their everyday lives behind the gender curtain as women. 

Through it all, I continued to feel more alive than I had ever felt before as a male. I can compare the process to being guided by a searchlight in a gender fog which was my gender dysphoria. Call it gender euphoria or whatever, I could not wait until I could take the next step towards a complete life as a transgender woman. 

Pain

Image from Tony Frost
on UnSplash

Looking back, I don't think I write enough about the pain I felt during my life which was closely related to my gender issues. 

First of all, I was living in a world where nothing was ever as it seemed. Life had wedged me into living a male pattern I never felt a part of, and I could not escape. One of the problems was I was privileged in so many ways and was told constantly about it. After all, I was white, middle classed male child and all I needed to do was find a way to fit in. The pain was considerable when I learned I just couldn't. I did not have a choice, all I really wanted to do was be a girl.

Much later in life, when information began to become more available, my problem began to be known as gender dysphoria. Having a term was good enough but did nothing to relieve my pain. The only cure was to cross dress in front of the mirror and try to imagine how it would be to be a girl. I was successful in blissfully thinking I was headed in the right direction, until I started to head out of my closet and explore the world. When I did, the public took the mirror's place, and I was judged (sometimes very harshly) by an unforgiving world. Unless you happen to be a natural as a transitioning male to female person, perhaps you have been in the same circumstance of having to learn to present well as a woman. At times, the entire journey I was on seemed to be a steep insurmountable path. 

Still, I learned from the days and nights of pain I endured and kept on trying to improve my feminine presentation. My tears finally subsided, and gender euphoria set in. Maybe I could achieve my dreams of transgender womanhood. What I did not realize was how far I still needed to go. No matter how far along I thought I was with my makeup, hair and fashion, there were still hurdles to jump with communication and interaction in the real world as a trans woman. Plus, there was the very painful life I was leading as two genders when I needed to hide what I was doing from my unaccepting second wife. I always considered myself a very honest person, so being dishonest with her about my truth caused me great sorrow and pain but at that point I could not turn back.

Before I knew it, she passed away and a new pain such I had never known set into my life. It seemed I learned again how death was forever, and loneliness would follow. What I did not realize was how life could go full circle if you are fortunate enough to live long enough as I was. Slowly but surely, the fleeting wisdom of age taught me life offered both joy and pain along the way. It just so happened in my life; gender played a very important part. 

Also, life taught me feeling gender dysphoria or pain helped me to appreciate gender euphoria or joy even more. Regardless, I need to point out my gender journey was never easy and required my utmost attention. So, I could survive all of my pain.  

I Never Felt at Home

 

Image from JJ Hart

Rarely, every now and then someone asks me when I knew I had gender issues. 

The answer I give everyone is I knew forever there was something wrong with me. I just did not know what. Plus, by the time I realized what was wrong, I felt as if I was alone in the world with my gender issues. I was very confused. As I grew through my teen years, I knew I wanted to be a girl but just did not see a path forward. 

Through it all, I kept searching for answers. I knew for certain I felt elated and natural when I cross dressed as a girl and never quite felt at home when I was with a group of males. I felt as if I was an outsider looking in. 

The older I became, the better I was at hiding my feelings. I tried my best to do all the usual male activities such as playing sports and working on cars. I played the male game well to hide my inner most feminine feelings but all along still felt like an intruder. It wasn't until I began to seriously explore my transgender womanhood did, I finally learned the truth, I was not meant to live a male life at all. As I recently wrote, I was stuck in some sort of a gender never-never land I was destined to never escape. I spent too much time pitying myself and playing the gender victim before I stepped up to face my problems.

In the meantime, the biggest problem I faced was deciding what to do with the increasingly immense amount of male baggage I was accumulating. After being discharged from the Army and finishing my second college degree, we added my daughter to the family, and I suddenly needed to become serious about beginning a career which I could support a family on. Then came the route I followed to a successful job I would probably have to give up if I transitioned to a transgender woman. As I advanced up the corporate ladder, at all the macho leaning meetings I needed to attend, I still felt completely out of place. No matter how successful I was.

Then there was the biggest piece of baggage of all which was my second wife. Although, she knew from day one I was a cross dresser, she drew a line in the sand when it came to any idea at all I was transgender and wanted to begin gender affirming hormones. She and my male self-formed a formidable pair when it came to any idea of me going any further towards transgender womanhood. When she unexpectedly passed away at the age of fifty from a massive heart attack, my male self-lost his strongest supporter and he just faded quickly away.

At the same time, I was building a new set of friends who happened to be women and lesbian and I had never felt so at home in my life. They embraced me for my authentic self while at the same time I relaxed and learned so much about womanhood from them. I never thought possible, life would ever be so fulfilling again since I was already sixty. It was well over a decade now and during the same period I met my current wife, Liz. 

Feeling at home for the first time in my life was the best possible feeling I could ever have. 

Expedition Transgender

 

Image courtesy JJ Hart

The half century journey I embarked on to finally come up as my true authentic self was certainly an expedition. 

As I always mention, my discovery began with going through my mom's underwear drawer and trying on nylons, bras and girdles I could still fit into before testosterone poisoning really set in. From there, I progressed into makeup and very slowly began to increase my craft. I did not really want to look like a clown in drag so I did the best I could. 

Life went by and so did my expedition. Sadly, for several reasons, I developed several coping mechanisms to mask my gender truth. I tried and tried to convince myself my desire to wear women's clothes and look feminine was just a harmless hobby and perhaps was just a phase in life I was going through. It took me years to realize the true phase I was going through was that I was a male at all. With sheer willpower, I managed to learn to play the male game fairly successfully and lived a life which shielded my feminine self from most all intrusions. I went into my dark lonely gender closet and slammed the door.

It took me years to have the courage to open my closet door and tentatively look around. When I did, my expedition took sudden and encouraging turns. The more I tested the public as a transgender woman, the more successful I was. I set out to sample as much as I could of a woman's lifestyle and discover my feelings on what would happen next. I tried going to gay and lesbian bars as well as big sports bars and found I could carve out a spot as a regular in a so-called straight venue. I also tried to go to various other places such as bookstores and other retail venues single women would go. In other words, I was obsessed with coming as close as I could on my expedition to seeing what a cis woman went through in her life. By doing so, I could make the final decision on where I wanted to go with my life, as a man or as a woman. 

As my expedition transgender progressed, I found myself in a face-to-face decision on beginning to take gender affirming hormones or not. Since my only real opposition to beginning the hormones had passed away, my ultimate path was clear, and I sought out a doctor for approval. He checked me out and determined I was healthy enough to begin HRT with minimum dosages of Estradiol and a testosterone blocker and my life changed forever. All the changes which occurred would fill another blog post themselves. Perhaps the biggest overall surprise was how quickly my body took to the new hormones. So fast, I needed to rethink how quickly I was going to have to change the timetable of when I ultimately wanted to finish my expedition and enter my own transgender womanhood.

I learned the fact of the matter was, I was always living a gender lie. I had refused to accept the fact I was always deeply feminine and was forced into a male lifestyle from some cruel twist of fate. All the time I thought I was a man attempting to be a woman was wrong. I was a woman attempting to be a man.

I wish I could have a portion of my life back to re-center my expedition and start all over again.  

 

Merry Christmas

Leg Lamp from the "Christmas Story"

 Doesn't seem possible another year has flown by and here I am writing another Christmas Day blog post as the "Yule Log" plays on the television behind my wife Liz and me.

Earlier this morning, I cried tears of sorrow and joy. The sorrow came from remembering the times of my life when my family was strong, and we had festive Christmases. Plus, I am old enough to remember how much fun it was when the downtown was vibrant and glowing with its holiday decorations. Now around here at least, the downtowns have been replaced by sterile decaying malls or outside shopping centers. I even cried when I recalled the life my ex-brother and I shared. 

Now, the tears of joy. Slowly but surely as I began to think about the present, I shed tears when I thought of the love I feel for Liz and how fortunate I am to have someone to love me in a season where so many others, especially in the transgender community just don't. When my brother and his family rejected me during the holiday season over a decade ago, I found a new family with my daughter and Liz. I know I am blessed.

On this Christmas, I also make sure I watch a couple of my favorite classics such as "It's a Wonderful Life" and Ralphie's "The Christmas Story." Ralphie is especially special to me because the time period it represents is roughly the same as mine growing up. The only difference is, instead of the BB Gun Ralphie so desperately wanted, in my case I received the gun but did not get what I wanted, a doll baby. It is poetic justice, I guess.

Regardless, I hope you have a Merry Christmas with blood or chosen family and thanks for joining me!

 

Getting What you Want

 

Image from Aiden Craver
on UnSplash.

This is not really a Christmas post, even though in many ways, it fits in well with the season. 

As I was growing up, I vividly remember being asked what I wanted to be when I grew up into an adult. I also remember lying and saying something like a lawyer or doctor. Anything to make my parents happy without telling whoever asked, I really just wanted to be a girl when I grew up. An answer such as that would have landed me in all sorts of trouble.  

I progressed through life doing my best to navigate a very dark and bumpy gender road without much help from anyone except the occasional therapist. Through it all, for the longest time, getting what I wanted was a faraway dream. During my gender journey, I faced all sorts of problems such as my reoccurring issues dealing with my feminine appearance. Like so many of you, I needed to learn the fashion and makeup arts all by myself with no one to help. Back in those days, there were not the plethora of on-line makeup videos and special makeup stores to help a novice cross dresser along.

Then there were the up close and personal meetings I had with the impossibly feminine transsexual women I met. Interacting with them made me feel again how impossible my dream of becoming a full-time woman of any sort would be. However, it was about this time I began to take better care of myself, so I had a chance of becoming a better feminine version of myself. 

I dieted and lost nearly fifty pounds and began a regular skin routine which really helped with using less makeup and achieving better results. Suddenly, there was a light at the end of my presentation tunnel which was not the train. Maybe I could get what I wanted after all. At that point, I really became serious about exploring the world as a transgender woman. The rest as they say is history. When I did gather the courage to enter the world, I found I could survive. I discovered a great majority of the world did not care and a smaller percentage was just curious and amazingly enough, a smaller percentage yet respected me for living my truth. The bottom line was I survived and became better at life as a transgender woman.

When I did survive and relaxed, I saw my reality shining through. Maybe, just maybe, I could shed the shackles of my old male existence and live my gender dream. I could answer finally my own question of what I wanted to be when I grew up. A woman. To further the process along, I was able to begin gender affirming hormones which femininized me even further. My facial lines softened, my hair and breasts began to grow, and my emotions softened to the point where I could cry freely for the first time in my life. Through it all, my body was asking me what took so long to start HRT.

Looking back, getting what I wanted was the most difficult trip I had ever taken in my entire life. Pure perseverance and destiny helped me along to a full-time life away from my old unwanted male self, into a life I always wanted.