Was there Ever a Plan

Image from the JJ Hart
Archives

Looking back, I needed a very definite plan to follow as I transitioned into transgender womanhood. 

Similar to so many of you, I started my "borrowing" a few of my Mom's clothing when I could still fit into them. I would have added a sister in but I did not have one. When I became old enough to do it, I took on a newspaper delivery route in my neighborhood and combined my new meager funds with the allowance I received at home from my parents and with the money, I was able to buy a few clothes and my own makeup. Since we lived in a rural area outside of town, the plan was to stay a day or two with my Grandma who lived very close to stores *downtown where I could attempt to shop for what I wanted. The problem with the well thought out plan was my Dad worked downtown too and he was the last person I wanted to run into with my new "treasures." 

After I conquered my fear of shopping for cosmetics I did not really need, I was able to buy makeup which did not make me look like a clown. Another problem I had was, the only example I had of applying makeup came when I was able to watch my Mom do it. I wonder if she noticed me watching her. She was probably so entranced in her face, she did not notice I was entranced also. 

The older I became, the more entrenched the plan became. I was able to increase my small "collection" of feminine wardrobe and makeup as I went along and managed to hide it from my brother and the rest of my family. At the same time, I wanted to become better at the makeup arts and finding clothes which fit me. 

At the same time, I became comfortable with how I looked in the mirror and increasingly had thoughts of expanding into the world. I did try to come out fully dressed to one of the very few male friends who lived close by in the neighborhood but was quickly rejected and I scurried back into my dark, lonely gender closet. I stayed in the closet until several Halloween parties began to bring me out. From then on out, my plans really began to change.

During the parties, I learned how much I enjoyed my time out of the closet and I just knew I needed to figure out a way to live as a transgender woman without waiting for a whole year to go by. To do it, I knew I would need to start by telling my spouse what I was up to. So the plan was to find out what wife number one and two thought about me being a cross dresser before we were even married. It turned out wife one did not care and wife two was supportive to an extent which helped me along. 

The main rule I had with wife two was to never leave the house dressed as a woman. I started innocently enough before I veered off course and threatened our marriage of twenty-five years. I began going to women's clothing stores and malls where acceptance was easy to come by. Money was certainly more important than gender. I also would go to bookstores and even antique malls where I could browse with no problems to build my confidence. When my spirits went up, I planned ahead for my next big adventure which usually meant beginning to interact with more of the world as a transgender woman.

To do it, I began to stop and eat at restaurants along the way to make sure I had to communicate one on one with a server or bartender. Since I had an extensive background in the restaurant/bar business, I knew basically what I needed to do to survive. Just be nice, do not cause any trouble and tip well and I could be successful. 

From then on, I endlessly planned on what I was going to to next and how I could challenge myself in the feminine world. Sometimes I was successful, sometimes I was not but I always learned from the experience. In my life as a man, I had never really planned ahead on anything, so this was a big difference. Perhaps it was because I could not wait to try again to live out my dream of transgender womanhood.

*Those were the days of strong vibrant downtowns in many cities, including mine. Before malls took over and they tore the downtowns apart. 

All I Ever Knew

Circa 1940 image
of Virginia Prince

 Every once in a while I receive the question when did I know I was transgender.

The easy answer is I always knew but I needed to figure it all out. The more complex answer is I needed to figure it out after a series of transitions during my life. Two major ones occurred when I made the jump from from a very serious cross dresser all the way to a novice transgender woman. The second problem I had was back in those days, terminology to define a transgender woman or man had not yet been invented. Basically back in the pre-internet days when all we had was the preaching of Virginia Prince and her Transvestia publication which I could not wait to receive in the mail. Seeing all the pretty cross dressers just made me want to do more to improve my feminine appearance.   

I worked harder on my appearance than any thing I had ever done before and slowly began to see improvement over my testosterone damaged male body. It was all I ever knew. 

As I entered my transgender womanhood, I felt deep down inside I was doing all the right things, even though I was jeopardizing all the facets of my male life I had worked so hard to put together. What would I do when my family, friends and bosses discovered my deep secret. It ran so much deeper than just wanting to wear women's clothing. I wanted to be a woman and live a feminine life. 

During that portion of my life, I basically went into attack mode, doing every thing I could to learn how being a transgender woman would affect me. Every free moment I had, either I was out in the world as a woman or day dreaming of the times when I could. Naturally, I learned a lot, good and bad about what life had in store for me if I kept on going towards my gender dreams. I found the grass wasn't always going to be greener on the other side of the gender border as I lost all of my male privileges but hadn't gained any of the female ones. 

Soon I learned, it was truly all I ever knew. Somehow I was born to be feminine and not masculine. Which meant years of struggle to right the gender wrongs I was living. The struggles on occasion were crushing and keeping going was very difficult but I did. Probably because I was behind before I even started. I was born into a very male dominated family which had very few girls to play with. Plus, I never had any feminine characteristics myself to begin with. Add it all up, then include me never having any girl time with anyone all teamed up for a rough start for me on my gender journey.

Even still, my gender path was all I ever knew and staying on it finally made me successful. 

Trans Woman in the Sisterhood

 

JJ Hart on left out with Friends.

I write often concerning my gender transition into transgender womanhood. 

Sometimes I wonder if I emphasize the complexity of doing it. Securing a place for me in an unwanted male world seemed to be so simple. Men have just a few power bases to interact with as they proceed through life. Such as money, or athletic prowess. Plus many males never have the chance to grow into manhood at all and never mature into quality human beings. 

Women face the same hurdles. Many females never make it  to womanhood. Which is a socialization process. Transgender women face additional obstacles during their journeys to be accepted into the sisterhood. As my second wife always told me, I did not really know the gender processes cis-women go through and she was right. I had not earned my right to be there...yet. It was not until I made it out of the mirror and into the world did I begin to learn what she meant. In many ways, she forced me to learn it on my own without her help. She was much wiser than I was but I was stubborn and determined to learn on my own about what being truly accepted into the world of women meant.

First of all, I needed to discover women operate in a parallel universe than men and somehow I needed to slide behind the feminine curtain and learn from other women how their world was run. I discovered that just like men, there were the alpha women who once they accepted you, you were in. With women, the difference was they were much more layered than men. Take appearance as an example. While I started out obsessing on how I looked, other women around me were noticing how I acted. I needed to walk a thin line with my communication efforts with women. On one hand, I was the quiet observer of what was going on but on the other hand, if I was too quiet I was coming off as too aloof or worse yet, bitchy. In the end, I was able to walk the communication tightrope and survive in a new exciting world as a transgender woman.

The biggest surprise I continued to have was how layered the whole experience was and is. Take conversations about children as an example. Women who have birthed kids share a special bond with other women who have done the same. I needed to interject my daughter and grandchildren experience on occasion without going too far. I felt the entire process femininized me and kept me behind the gender curtain. Being apart of the group was good. 

After awhile, being in the sisterhood had it's rewards. I mostly socialized with two or three cis women all the time which kept any potential problems from materializing. I was able to be protected from being a single woman out by herself and learn about the life I wanted to live in the meantime. One evening at a time, I was earning my way into my own level of transgender womanhood. Many times the process was scary. Such as the evening I went to a pro-football game with friends but the offer was too good to turn down no matter how frightening the situation was. Since it happened when I was first climbing away from my dark closet into the world. 

In so many ways, I owe several women friends whom I always say helped me more than they will ever know. They ushered me into being a trans woman in the sisterhood. 

Ironically, it was only the beginning as I needed to keep building on the feminine experiences I was having. A prime example was when I moved in with my wife Liz in Cincinnati. When I did, we started to attend small meetup groups with total strangers which added to the layer of meeting and being accepted by other people. The entire process for the most part was very positive and a great way to immerse myself even farther into the sisterhood. 

It is In Your Nature

Image from Hannah Popowoski on 
UnSplash

Following my fifty year battle with my gender issues, I just gave up and went with what felt so natural to me and completed my transition into transgender womanhood.

It was certainly a long drawn out journey of self discovery. It was full of ups and downs as I gained my footing along with confidence as I learned to just be myself. Looking back, I don't know what took me so long. Perhaps I can blame it on my male self wanting to hold on to the lifestyle he worked so hard to survive in. He put up quite the battle before giving in. But give in he finally did. 

When I finally began to explore the world, I learned how much of it was run by women and in order for me to survive, I needed to get along one on one with the other women around me since men rarely showed me any interest as a person. Women on the other hand were curious why I was in their world and I was somehow valued for being there. Perhaps it was my honesty showing through, which I gained from jumping the gender border into their world. I don't know for sure but I loved the attention I was getting. 

It was in my nature, because I had always valued the women friends I had over the very few men friends I ever was capable of having. I just did not fully ever recognize why until I was fully allowed to play in the girl's sandbox. Before I was allowed in though, I needed to earn my way in. I had to show my true nature was feminine and I needed to learn the rules of a brand new gender game. For example, I found myself in a world where passive aggressiveness ruled and a smiling face did not mean it was a friendly face. Much different in the world of men I was used to. It all was more of a mental game than I was used to also as I tried to anticipate where another woman was coming from. Especially when I came down to interacting with their men. On a few occasions, I came too close and felt the claw marks down my back for doing so.

The whole process just made me stronger and more confident in the woman I was becoming. Quickly I felt as comfortable in the new world I was in as I learned how the gender game was played. Women are more apt to form cliques than men who form teams and instead of finding the alpha male for acceptance, I needed to find the alpha female who was running the clique and I was in. 

Once I was in, my life became so much easier. Primarily because I did not have to fight being two genders anymore and the inner woman I was hiding for so long had her chance to run the show. She took to the process naturally. The only thing she did not do was harass me about why it took me so long for her to take over. Which she had every right to do. More importantly, I found she was a good person and got along with people including the all important world of other women. Essentially I found I good set and enjoy the show.

Of course before I could enjoy the show, I needed to understand the process of how to blend in with the world as a transgender woman. It was difficult putting my old male ego aside and realizing I was never going to be the most attractive woman in the room, I could present well enough to survive if I had the confidence to do so. 

What I really learned was, it was all in my nature to do so and if I relied upon it, I would be fine.

Engineering the Envioronment

 

Image 
JJ Hart.

As I transitioned into an increasingly feminine world, I faced many difficult issues.

I was keeping very busy with all the new sights and sounds I was facing. It was all so exciting while at the time, all so scary. Here I was trying to survive in a new gender world I so desperately wanted. Basically, with no training as I was only a very serious observer of the world of women and was never allowed behind the invisible gender curtain. 

I found out quite early I needed to engineer my own environment. Mostly, as I said, I was flying blind and needed all the help I could find. I was immersed in losing all my old male privilege's. I survived losing a good portion of my intelligence and learned how to be mansplained on many levels along with changing how I viewed my own personal security. Instead of thinking I was safe in unlighted dark spaces, I began to look for safer well lighted areas. All lessons cis-women learn at a young age. 

Once I learned I could basically dress to present properly with other women where I was going, I began to engineer more places to go to test my future into transgender womanhood.  Sometimes I was successful and other times I wasn't, mainly because I chose the wrong venue to go to. For example, bookstores were more gender friendly to me than redneck bar venues where single women rarely ventured anyhow. It took several hard earned lessons such as having the police called on me before I learned my lesson and stayed in more friendly environments . Again, experiencing what cis-women already knew. 

Ironically my journey took me to the spot some call the impostor syndrome. It occurred at all times and without notice. Such as during girl's nights out and other times when I was succeeding in living in an exciting new world. It was frustrating when the feeling slipped in which was telling me I should not be there at all. Ruining the good time I was having. 

The whole process forced me into pursuing and engineering whole new levels of my gender existence. Once I thought I had controlled everything I needed to learn to live my life as a transgender woman, something else arose to prove me wrong. Communication as a trans woman with the rest of the world who were primarily other curious women became a strong focus of mine. If I could communicate properly with other women, I had a leg to stand on to survive in my dream life, without it, I had nothing' and the time and effort I had previously put in would go for nothing. 

I was never an engineer in anything else I tried in life so all of this was new and different for me. I was also a bit of a quitter when it came to finishing a project. Completing my journey into transgender womanhood was easily the most difficult and extensive project I had ever contemplated finishing. All along the process just felt so exciting and natural, I had the best and worst times of my life as I kept on going until I reached my dream goal.

Finally, I learned the environment I was in could be trans friendly for me.  Hopefully, in the new world we are facing in the future, we can maintain it.

Breaking the Gender Chains

 

Image from Arlem Lambunsky
on UnSplash.

For years and years I blamed myself for my transgender issues. 

I did not have access to the proper information to know otherwise. I thought somehow I was addicted to seeing myself in the mirror as a femininized person. The chains of being a male person weighed heavily on me. It was not until much later in life that I had the chance to learn I was completely wrong and I had never really had the choice to attempt to break all the chains which were restricting my life. All of this occurred in the pre-internet years and it was not until I bought my first computer did I finally began to see there were others just like me who struggled the same way in life.

At approximately the same time, I began to meet more and more diverse individuals in the new LGBTQ community. Primarily, I learned the difference between cross dressers and transgender women and men. Those involved in pursuing a life in transgender womanhood were much more serious than the average cross dresser who was actively embracing how they appeared as a woman. I was able to meet several impossibly feminine transgender women who embraced being a woman, not just looking like one. At the time I was intimidated and wondered if I could ever make the jump myself. Plus, I knew before I attempted such a radical move, I had quite a bit of work to do on myself.

I became the mistress of excuses of why I could not break my gender chains and move forward into the great unknown. What would I do about the remnants of my male life and what if anything would I do about my sexuality among with other important parts of my life. One thing I knew for certain was my desire to live as a fulltime transgender woman was more than an addiction because the process felt so natural and affirming. The entire process was stressful and damaging to my mental health because I was firmly stuck between the two main binary genders.  I would have not wished the stress I was feeling on my biggest enemy and the worst part of it all was  how I needed to internalize my feelings to the world. 

Life was so black and white at the time. Half of the time I was in the darkness of being chained to the wall of my old male life as I daydreamed of the lighter times when I could explore again and again the times I had as a woman. 

Through new woman friends and a good therapist, I was able to break out of my old gender chains and live my dream. Proving time and time again I was living the life I was meant to live. In no way did I have any lasting attraction to just wearing woman's clothes. The clothes were just a larger indication of how I wanted to live my life and were an external view to the world  which enabled me to open gender doors which were previously closed to me. 

I could not believe after the chains were broken and the new doors were opened, how much brighter my world became. Somedays I wonder if the wait was worth it. 

Good News from the Doc

Image from JJ Hart.

Yesterday was my Hematology appointment at the Cincinnati Veteran's Administration hospital.    

The hospital itself is surrounded by other medical facilities mostly owned and operated by the University of Cincinnati, so space is at a premium which means parking spaces are also. Even though we have a handicapped placard for the windshield, sometimes spaces close by to the door are not close enough for me to easily walk to. Regardless, I was going to try to make it yesterday with the help of my new cane. Plus, in addition to the walk to the door, I knew my wife Liz and I were facing an equally long walk once we arrived in the hospital.

I was scared and was running on extra energy as we finally made our way to the medical department where the appointment was scheduled so we actually were there ahead of time. I was scared of what the doctor would tell me about my platelets being down again from my last bloodwork. Of course, then I began to read up on what it meant and Leukemia was one of the possibilities. Then I started to build all sorts of negative bridges in my head about my mortality. So my blood pressure and nervous energy was at an all tine high when I finally met with a medical team of three. One doctor and two other fellows, whatever that meant. I was hoping for the best and expecting the worst.

It turned out almost all my worry was for nothing . I had  what was called an iron overload in my body. I have had it before and it seemingly went away for years before coming back to haunt me. It used to be I needed to go for regular blood draws called "phlebotomies" which brought the iron problem under control. So instead of Leukemia, I have too much iron in my system again which can cause fatigue, joint pain and skin discoloration among more serious issues.

From the doc, I was then sent down a couple of floors to the vampires so they could do more bloodwork before setting me free. I should mention through it all so far I was treated with respect and was never mis-gendered. I was referred to as Ms. Hart or my first name all through my visit to the VA hospital...until the very end. Just as I was leaving the bloodwork room, the woman said "thank you Sir.' Ruining my perfect day in the gender department. 

However, I was not going to let one person spoil my medical and gender euphoria I felt when we stopped off for lunch on the way home and we were referred to as "Ladies"  again. 

I am sure, I will get back my bloodwork today and will find out when my first phlebotomy in years will be scheduled. Hopefully I will feel improvement soon because Liz and I are planning a trip to the Florida Keys in January and more energy along with less back pain would be a welcome relief. As I will need all the gender euphoria I can get to help me along.

I will have much more later as we get closer to the date, in the meantime, I have some iron to get rid of.

Finding your Happy Place

 

Image from Priscilla du Preeze
on UnSplash

These days you may think finding any sort of happiness as a transgender woman or trans man may be impossible but it is not.

Take this morning for me as an example. As I was getting dressed and viewed my bare thighs before I put on my pants, I had forgotten how nice it is to view their increasingly femininized form thanks to the use of gender affirming hormones. In other words, I have developed my own hips, finally following years of hormonal usage. In many ways I took the slow cautious route when I started down the medical transition path on the advice of my doctor. He advised me to take minimum dosages until we could judge the effects on my body.

At the age of sixty, my body took to the new feminine hormones wonderfully and naturally. Soon I was put on higher doses of HRT and bigger changes began to take place rather quickly. I had set up a semblance of a timetable of when I wanted to shed all my male clothes and live fulltime as a woman but it turned out the timetable was a waste of time. What happened was I became very androgynous looking in a very short period of time. While I was developing an increasingly noticeable set of breasts, my skin began to soften which in turn softened the lines of my face. So much so that anyone who knew me from before would notice the difference.

Even though I was shocked at the rapid exterior transformation of my body, the whole process felt so exciting and natural I could not wait to do more and more as I accessed my new transgender womanhood. It all meant setting up new plans and timetables on who I was going to tell and when. By this time in my life I had outlived most of my family and close friends, so telling many people was not going to become a problem. I had even retired so I did not have to worry about transitioning at a job. All of this left me with two main people to come out to. My only daughter and only slightly younger brother. 

I knew at the time, I had a better chance of succeeding at telling my daughter the truth about me than my brother. My daughter was much more liberal while my brother's in-laws were right wing Baptists and I figured he would sell me out to appease them. It turned out I was right on both accounts. I found my happy place when my daughter totally accepted me and was down when my brother did not. I took my fifty fifty win/loss record and moved on.

To this day my happy place continues with my daughter and her extended family. In fact, my wife Liz and I just accepted an invitation to Thanksgiving dinner at my daughter's Mother-in-Law's house which makes up for the decade long snub from my brother. 

As the holidays approach, I hope all of you can find a happy place to celebrate with family, blood relation or not. In the transgender community, often we find the best family in non traditional situations. It is a wonderful time of the year to discover or re-discover a new happy place for yourself.

Outreach in Transition

Paula from the UK.

Recently, I received this comment  from long time reader "Paula" who is from the UK: 

"Here in the UK we are all pretty nervous about talking to journalists, especially TV journalists as so much of what is broadcast is at best negative and at worst downright attacks. Having said that the work you are doing is important, as more and more of us approach our dotage with more of us out than ever before elderly LGBT+ care will be more important than ever."

Thanks for the comment Paula and after a weekend to think about doing the interview, the voices in my head told me to shy away from doing it. Due to me mostly listening to the voices I have in my head and going forward, after seeing our new president in action, I have decided to dial back much of my outreach activities and be more careful of the crazies who are popping up. 

Hopefully, none of that will impact the blog in anyway which I am still dedicated to and I remain true to my initial vision when I began this writing journey over a decade ago. I wanted to share my transgender experiences with anyone who could benefit from them. 

Looking ahead at my own future, I am fortunate to be surrounded by a supportive cast of transgender allies who could help me when  potential difficult situations arise. The main one I can see happening is if tRumpt and his minions try to meddle with my Veterans Administration health care which could mean I would have to seek out a new more expensive source for my gender affirming hormones. I will have to jump off of that bridge if it ever happens. 

A  much closer bridge to jump off of for me is coming up Wednesday when I go to my Hematology appointment. Following my last round of blood work, I was told my platelets were low again and I needed a consult. Never a good thing to hear when you are seventy five like I am but I will see what they say coming up very shortly. 

One way or another, I thought I would keep you all involved with what I was doing with my curtailed outreach attempts. Most certainly I will continue my Cincinnati Alzheimer's diversity committee work I do and as I said continue to write the blog which has undergone so many changes over the years. When I look back on any of the early posts I wrote, they were mostly appearance related whereas today the posts are lifestyle intensive.  

May we all survive the future the best we can. In the meantime, thanks so very much for reading along with my experiences. Hopefully they can help you in the best possible way.