Image from The Blow Up on UnSplash.
It is easy to say, there is a
major difference between just surviving and thriving as a transgender woman or
transgender man.
During my very long gender
journey, I spent most of the time just surviving. Mainly when I existed by
admiring my femininized version in the mirror. I did not understand at the time
the difference in wanting to look like a girl, I wanted to be a
girl. The entire process caused me huge amounts of duress and ruined
my fragile mental health. Primarily because I had no one to explain to me how
there were many others who were suffering in their own closets. In those days,
there was no internet to provide any information whatsoever. No one to connect
with at all. On some days, the loneliness was unbearable.
Still, I survived and
continued to follow my own path. I was able to do what worked for me and
gradually was able to join the public flow as my own extreme novice version of
being a woman. As with any other newcomer, I paid my dues as ugly as they were.
Along the way I kept thinking about what I was doing. Why would I ever consider
trying anything as crazy as actually following through on my feminine desires
to live a transgender dream.
Following a certain tipping point
I went through, my desire to do more than just survive as a transgender woman
became too much to handle. I was becoming increasingly more mentally unstable
and self-destructive to the point of attempting suicide when I could take my
life any longer. Fortunately, I was not successful and then set out to do more
than survive.
I knew enough to know what I
needed to do. Make a deeper dive into myself and explore my own femininity. I
also knew I had to leave the mirror behind and substitute it for the world. To do it,
I had to set my fears aside and look the other women I inevitably faced as the
primary gate keepers in their world. A primarily had to learn the basics of
passive aggressive behavior. Was another woman really letting me into her world
or just acting as if she was. I learned the hard way to have eyes on the world
from behind my back.
By succeeding in the world in my
transgender womanhood, I was essentially carving out my own niche. Primarily
because most of the world had never seen a transgender woman at all. When I
immediately established, I was not a scary person at all up to no good,
normally I received a good reception from other women, not men. With
women at least, the gate was open for me to walk through. With men, my
interactions were few and far between as their frail sexuality was threatened. I
adjusted to my new world very easily and thrived more than I ever thought I
would.
Suddenly, nearly all my spare
time was living as my feminine self and when I was not, I was thinking about
her. Or why was I wasting my precious time as a man when I was thriving in my
new world as a woman. Each evening, I was out I had the opportunity to discover
more and more the nuances I would need to thrive in the world as a transgender woman.
Still, some nights I was still struggling to take everything in as my senses
were barraged from many different angles. Specifically, when I started gender
affirming hormones. From that point forward, I was able to attempt to sync up
my internal with my external self. As I thrived, my mental health improved as I
was finally able to live as my true gender self.
With age, I learned life is, but
a big circle and I was able to find my way into thriving more than surviving.
Many days, it was a struggle but finally finding my way was certainly worth it
in the long term. Since I spent such a long time just surviving, I felt so much
better in my new life.
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