Interruptions

 

Image from the
Jessie Hart archives. 

As I was seriously pursuing a life as a fulltime transgender woman the interruptions I went through made life very difficult.  

What happened was I was still attempting to live life as a man and a woman, I found I favored one gender over the other. The gender I favored of course was my feminine side. When I was out in the public's eye, I felt so natural and so alive. As I continued down my path, I became obsessed with improving my presentation as a woman. I had so far to go to try to perfect moving as a woman, not to mention any new communication skills I would need to get by. I was able to work on all of my gender issues approximately three days a week before I needed to revert to my old relatively macho male self. 

The problem immediately arose when I was forced to go back to my ingrained male ways or all the male type walking and talking guys do to survive. In order to be successful again as a guy, my path to femininity was interrupted and I felt as if sometimes I needed to begin all over again when I switched back to my newly preferred gender. When I did, I had to work harder to maintain what I had earned previously. Working harder allows me to explain more in depth a recent post I wrote here in Cyrsti's Condo called  "Trying too Hard." From the post I received several comments (thanks!) alluding to the fact I somehow mentioned working too hard to be a presentable transgender woman was not something we all go through as trans women. What I really believe is we have to work much harder than the average cisgender woman to earn our way in the world. Among other things, we trans women didn't benefit from growing up feminine. With no feedback on how we looked or how we acted. 

Of course too, all the interruptions I experienced on my gender journey just became worse the more I attempted to do to follow my path. It was so frustrating when I was mentally celebrating the evenings when I felt I looked and was able to act correctly as the person I increasingly wanted to be. Those were the evenings I felt my entire image worked. My makeup, hair, clothes all were on point and I was able to walk in my heels without falling or looking like a linebacker. Sadly, the next morning I would need to make sure I had removed all my makeup and had gone back to walking as a man. It was tough on my fragile mental health as I felt like a juggler trying to keep all my balls in the air. (No pun intended). 

Somehow, someway, I made it through this toxic time of my life. Ultimately, I used all the internal frustrations I was experiencing as motivation to move on. 

Moving on became a theme in my life for once I didn't use the theme to escape, I used it to move myself forward into a new gender world I had only dreamed of. Finally free of all interruptions.