The Transgender Day of Reckoning

Image Courtesy Elisha Ventur
on UnSplash

Finally I couldn't take it any longer. My gender issues  were getting the best of me and doing a better and better job of ruining my life. I had to make a decision to save myself. On one hand I had my old male self to deal with who had done an admirable job of keeping me afloat in an existence I didn't really want to be in. Together, we were able to carve out a life which was fairly successful. Even culminating in the birth of a daughter. Around this time was when I was seriously exploring if I could live a feminine life also. Also was the key term because I found out the hard way I couldn't live my life in a situation where I lived a couple a days as a man and several days spending all of my spare time being a woman. 

Finally it became increasingly evident to me the only real obstacle to me living as my authentic feminine self was my wife of twenty five years who I loved dearly. So much so months before her unexpected sudden death, I made what I thought was the ultimate gender sacrifice by putting away my make up, wigs and clothes grew a beard and again tried my best to live a masculine life. Spoiler alert, It didn't work for tragic reasons. 

First of all, trying my best to live as a man was making me extremely sad. As a result I tried to hide myself in a bottle which in turn led to overeating and weight gain. I ballooned my body up to two hundred seventy five pounds. Of course, before all of that was an ill advised suicide attempt  which fortunately I did not do a good enough job with. My intense sadness was destined to change when as I said my wife suddenly passed away. All of a sudden, the door was thrown wide open for my feminine inner self to have her chance in the world.

I remember the night I decided to listen to her as vividly as if it was yesterday when in fact it goes back to 2007. After taking the time to dress in what I considered to be a nice outfit complete with wig and makeup, I sat by myself in one of my favorite venues sipping on a drink pondering my future. All of a sudden a calmness came over me and I felt as if the weight of the world was lifted from my shoulders. The answer to my ultimate life question I had put off for so long was now clear to me. There was nothing stopping me from living my dream. To live fulltime as a transgender woman. Clearly I heard this voice tell me what took so long. 

From then on, the transition doors began to swing open fairly easily. I was fortunate in that my Veterans Administration assigned therapist had LGBT knowledge and could look past my bi polar issues and treat my gender ones. She was instrumental in helping me begin my hormone replacement therapy. From then on, there would be no looking back as I had my legal name changed as well as my VA gender markers.

My day of reckoning most likely had a sweeter ring to it because I waited so long to step up and take care of what always came natural to me. I was just too scared to accept the consequences. When I did, I was on the road to finding true happiness with myself.