Feminine Power Moves

 

Image from Gayatri Mohotra
on UnSplash.

When I first began to seriously explore the world as a transgender woman, I was stripped of all my male privileges and wondered what I could do to survive if I found myself in questionable situations.

The big answer I learned was to try my best not to get myself into questionable situations to begin with. Lessons learned at an early age by ciswomen everywhere such as trying their best not to jeopardize their own personal security from toxic men. When I first came out, I was used to going where I wanted to go, when I wanted to do it which led me into several tense situations. One from a much bigger cross-dresser admirer who had me in his sights in a narrow hallway where I could not escape and another time when I was approached alone on a dark city sidewalk by two men in front of a gay venue. Neither place I should have been to by myself, and I was lucky to escape without any real problems.

By this time, I was used to the only feminine power I had was having doors opened for me by men and I knew I was missing much more in life if I wanted to pay my dues and transition into a transfeminine world basically the hard way. Since I couldn’t afford to go through any of the expensive gender surgeries of the time and did not have any insurance coverage that would cover any facial surgeries, I needed to find ways to accomplish what I wanted to face on my own. I learned the hard way that I could do anything I wanted to if I set my mind to it. Or I passed out of sheer willpower according to my transgender girlfriend Racquel. All it really meant was I was able to work my way into living the life I wanted to live through more effort on my physical appearance through better makeup skills and wardrobe basics. The same things I noticed other ciswomen doing in the world who themselves did not really have “passing privileges.” I just came into my privileges as a woman from a different way.

Another difficult phase of my male to female feminization project was the impact of woman-to-woman communication which continually goes on in the world that men are not subject to. Or the world of non-verbal communication women often use between themselves. I even went to the extent of taking feminine vocal lessons which focused more on what I said rather than how I said it. The keys I was taught were mainly built around the passive aggressive tone’s ciswomen take such as “are you sure you want to do that” rather than the traditional male “don’t do that.” I got quite a bit of valuable gender information from the course to use on my path which was always full of male stop signs. To repeat what I just said in essence instead of giving me a stop sign, my inner feminine soul was saying do you really want to do this.

Of course, the answer always came back to me one way or another that I was on the right path, and I felt so natural doing it that I just had to keep exploring what was ahead around the next blind curve. It was at this point that I began to discover what I had suspected all along those ciswomen had more going for them than having doors opened by men. With the help of HRT or gender affirming hormones, I opened my world to a whole new universe of emotions and senses I never knew (or allowed) myself to have. I was the one who could reach for her coat without shame when she was cold when my thermostat went crazy with hot flashes at the same time. And I became the one who could cry a happy tear at the drop of a dime. If I needed to or not. It was all part of who I was as I began to explore my feminine power base I was developing.

As I always do, I cannot give myself much of the credit for doing more than just surviving in the new women’s world I was as I began to thrive and enjoy my new power base. As my new friends kept telling me, welcome to their world. I needed to be careful how I responded because I did not want to give up much about myself and shield my male past.

Thankfully, by this time I had given up all my male privileges and was excited to be settling into my new life as a transgender woman preparing to go fulltime into the world. By doing so, I needed to prove to myself that I was no longer afraid of being rejected as a trans woman. Primarily by men who resented that I had left the boys club behind to slip behind the gender curtain to play in the girls’ sandbox. Thanks, in no small way to my lesbian friends who showed me how to validate myself.

Somehow, I managed to give myself extra time to drain the remnants of my old male life drain away before I went all the way and gave up all my male clothes. Which was the symbolic way of me finally severing my male past altogether. As difficult as it was to give up all those decades of struggling in a life I did not like, the relief of doing it was amazing.

Before I knew it, I was enjoying everything I could in the new transfeminine life I had only ever dreamed of. I was fortunate that I was able to live through several severe gender-based self-destructive incidents that I paid my dues on and was able to move on to find a whole new set of powers.

It turned out that I was simply giving too much trust to male powers I was born into and never had a chance to do anything about it. When I did, I seized control of my true powers and never looked back.

 

 

 

 

 

The Power of Pride

Image from Brian Kyed
on UnSplash.

Once again, it is Pride month. Time for celebrations around the country and sadly also time for all the transphobes and homophobes to come crawling out from under their rocks to try to protest.

Over the years, I was a regular participant in Pride marches in Ohio. Primarily the large ones in Columbus and Cincinnati. Very early on, I did not feel as if I had a substantial place to celebrate the “T” in the LGB celebrations. The closest I came to who I was when I saw a group of drag queens or weekend cross-dressers painfully trying to navigate the sidewalks in their sky-high heels. I did not have anything against any group; I just didn’t fit.

Fortunately, over time, things began to change for the better as I began to see more representation from all aspects of the transgender community all the way to parade grand marshals instead of the usual collection of drag queens. It was then I began to enjoy people watching to see all the many layers of rainbow life come together at a big party.

I had different things happen along the way too, like when my future wife Liz made me a shirt that said, “I was a transgender soldier, I fought for your right to discriminate against me.” I wore it into a Veterans Administration exhibit and received too many uncomfortable looks to be happy at the reaction, so I moved on.

Then there was the time that one of the main restrooms was out of order at a Cincinnati Pride which funneled all who needed to go into one restroom. I thought it was funny that all the TERF’s in the crowd who were anti men (and trans women) had to use the same restroom as everyone else. Everyone else except a stray hornet or two took it all in good humor and even went to the extent of passing extra toilet paper up and down the line. For once I was happy that if I was forced to, I could still use a hated urinal since I still had the proper equipment. I did not have to because the men’s room was the one that was closed.

That was the year Liz, and I went on a Pride Pub crawl when there were many more gay venues in the Cincinnati metro area. For a small fee, we were able to ride on a bus to quite a few venues and had a great time. Especially since by the time we finished the route it was raining. Since it was the summertime of the year, I decided to wear my blue tank top, denim mini-skirt and sparkly flip flops (because it was so hot and humid) I was ready for the weather. By the time we were done, we were drunk, soaked and happy we let someone do the driving for Pride as we finished up in a gay country themed bar doing Jello shots. It was one of the Pride evenings I never wanted to end.

I had other fun times when I went to Ohio’s biggest Pride with my lesbian friends in Columbus. Again, I enjoyed my company and the people watching I was doing and I did see other transgender women in the vast crowd. For effect, I wore the trans military themed shirt Liz made me again, but I just wore jeans and flip flops to go with it because I certainly wanted to be comfortable for all the walking I knew was ahead. Ironically, I could have worn much less since by this time, the HRT gender affirming hormones I was on had provided me with a well-formed set of feminine breasts and I could have bought me a set of pasties and joined the lesbian “tit’s out” crowd. But I did not go to that extent to expose myself to the world.

Along the way, I did manage making it to smaller Prides in places such as Yellow Springs, Ohio a very mellow, liberal diverse village who always manages a wonderful celebration of the LGBTQA+ world. One night in particular, I really wanted to see a famous local drag troupe (The Rubi Girls) perform. As luck would have it, I found a seat at the crowded bar next to a ciswoman who was dressed as “Debra Winger” from the “Urban Cowboy” movie, complete with the black cowgirl hat. Through our conversations, I never did find out if she was the real “Debra Winger” or not. Who knows, maybe I should have asked for an autograph but did not want to embarrass myself. As it was, I stayed through the show and donated what I could afford to the “Rubi’s” who at that time had raised over a million dollars for Aids research.

These days, the world has shrunk for me, and I must watch and envy the Pride celebrations from afar because our LGBTQA+ community has a lot to celebrate such as our resistance to and visibility from the politicians who want to crush us. It is sad that Pride encourages all the keyboard cowards to come out of the woodwork in their mom’s basement to harass us. I just hope my writing in such a small way keeps me visible when I can’t be because when I was younger and healthier I enjoyed the Prides I went to.

I also hope the crazies are kept under control wherever you go to celebrate your Pride because you deserve the chance to do it. In Cincinnati alone, later this month, they are expecting a turn out of three hundred thousand people.

I have resigned myself to the fond memories I have of Pride with the close friends I made around me. Together, they made the celebration so much better than they ever knew. Even if you are just beginning on your gender journey, you can celebrate Pride too. Since you are starting to face the long and difficult process of answering many highly personal questions. As you do, your Pride may become a better place to express yourself with others who accept you. I found it to be an amazing experience.

 

  

So Many Choices...So Little Time

 

Image from Drew Colins
on UnSplash.

One thing that I learned from experiencing decades of cross-dressing is that there were so many choices and so little time.

It all started when I had to scramble for any time, I could find by myself dressing as an imagined pretty girl in front of the mirror without discovery from my brother or worse yet my parents.  I was born as the eldest son into a very male dominated family, and I was expected to fit right in with that male mold. I had little idea at the time that I was destined to break that male mold during my life and it was not going to be easy.

Back in those days, I had very little income that I scraped together from doing household chores and a newspaper delivery route I had for several years. The first feminine items I could afford to buy on my own were makeup accessories but first I needed to figure out a way to get to a store undetected and then decide what to buy. After putting a lot of thought into my situation, I remembered that my grandma lived in town, fairly close to one of the old five and dime department stores that sold makeup. I used the excuse to visit grandma, then go and shop. Or try to.

The only problem with my plan was that my dad worked downtown close to the store I wanted to try to buy my first makeup in. I was tired of using my mom’s samples, That was all well and good until I gathered my courage and walked into the makeup selection of the store I was in. As I viewed the extensive selection of cosmetics, I almost panicked and walked quickly from the store. There were so many choices and so little time to choose anything that might help me during my novice beauty program. Somehow, I stood my ground and picked out some foundation and lipstick which fit in with my limited budget, gathered my courage and headed for the checkout counter. Just knowing I would get made fun of along the way. Amazingly, the person at the cash register did not give me a second look as she took my money and I was no longer a virgin in buying my own feminine supplies. I just wished I had more access and money to do more.

I would have more financial resources later in life along with the knowledge to go with it as I learned the fun of doing thrift shopping for just the right choice of clothes to add to my wardrobe.  Plus, the thrift experiences gave me a chance to be patient in many of the bigger stores with seemingly an endless supply of discarded fashion. When I took the time to try on a new item I had never tried to wear before, I had two benefits. I didn’t have to pay much for the item and two, I could see how well it either flattered my difficult to please male testosterone poisoned body or didn’t. It helped too, when I was able to streamline the shopping experience and give myself time to vary my day as a novice transfeminine person. Instead of just facing an endless amount of clothes. I actually had time to do other things like take myself out to lunch. Then, again I was faced with an almost never-ending choice of where I could eat. Since I had already tried too many fast food drive throughs with various amounts of success, I decided to step up my game and try to eat at one of the casual dining restaurants I had went to and even managed as a man. Since I was still on a gender time clock and had to be home by a certain time dictated by when my second wife would be off of work, I was still facing so many choices with so little time to enjoy myself as a transgender woman.

My plan was to just get by and improve myself a little at a time in a world of ciswomen I was just discovering. By doing so, I discovered that most ciswomen ignored me if I was dressing to blend in with them or were just curious of why I was in their world. Of course, I did run into the occasional TERF woman who hated me and wanted me out of her world, which I did. One way or another, I was encountering far more women in my quest to be part of their world than I ever did any men because I just wanted to be out of my long-standing membership in the men’s club and they knew it. The only thing I did know was that I was increasingly not so lonely when I went out in the world to my regular straight venues. All my lesbian places had closed up and the gay venues I used to go to just brought back bad memories of me being looked at as just a drag queen so I was stuck…just where I wanted to be and I was satisfied, until I went too far and tried too hard to be accepted.

In my search for acceptance, I began to become too overconfident in my ability to succeed a began to look for more choices of where to go in such a short ill-conceived amount of time. What I did was start going to redneck themed places thinking I could be accepted when I was not and even had the cops called me one night in a venue, I was just trying to drink a couple beers then pee before I went to another place I had been to a lot. It turned out that they would sell me the beer, just not let me get rid of it.

As it turned out, I was/am able to live a long life and see many of my choices gang up on me in a very short period of time. Destiny worked its magic and gave me a full circle of life to live with. Throwing in that I was a transgender woman just added a little spice.

 

A Humbling Gender Experience

 

Image from Katherine Hanlon
on UnSplash. 

For literally decades, any thoughts I had of living a successful life as a transgender woman, were only thoughts. I was never sure if I had any chance of making it. In fact, most of the time it seemed as if I was swimming against the current in a fast-moving stream of ciswomen, I wanted to interact with so badly, on their terms.

Doing it on their terms was my problem as I had always tried my best to be a strong student as a man of how all the women around me were living their lives. The main issue always was that I was only allowed to see so much of what was going on across the gender border. Again, because I was a man and had not yet paid many dues yet as a novice cross-dresser and not even a transgender woman yet. I still thought my real issue in paying my dues to be let behind the gender curtain came from my appearance in the world. Just being able to blend in with the ciswomen around me was good enough.

It was quite a humble experience when I found my appearance (and no matter how much it was improving) was not going to be enough. Even though the mirror was being kind to me as it told me I presented well, I was still stuck behind it as I still needed to put the image into motion. I was caught in the place where I looked good as a woman…for a man trying hard to accomplish it. I desperately needed to find a place where I looked as if I wasn’t trying to dress to impress. I was just being me. The problem then became who was the me I was becoming? How deep did my feminine desires run and where would they ultimately take me became the main things I thought about in my life. Every spare moment I had was spent either actively cross-dressing in front of the mirror or making plans of going public with how I looked and making the world my mirror.

As I learned the hard way my lessons on how to blend in with the world around me, often I was brutally laughed at and rejected by the world because I was dressing to thrill and not to blend. I guess I could say, I was humbled in the worst way by groups of teen girls in the malls I was just trying to shop in. My initial goal back then was to face my teen critics one-on-one until I failed completely or succeeded after many times of going back to my cross-dressing drawing board. It was like ripping a band aid off a mental wound and saying too hell with it and trying again to be successful. Until I was.

Rather than become overconfident at that point, I decided to try to build upon my newfound success and work on things such as how I moved and walked in heels. I discovered that every little discovery helped in my male to female femininization project such as keeping the old male scowl off of my face when I was out as a transfeminine person. No more scaring little kids away who called me a woman which was good but a mean woman which was bad of course. It was the last thing I wanted to do after working so hard on the basics of presenting as a passable woman.

The more I progressed on my path to living as me, the more humbled I became. Too many nights I came home in disbelief at the lessons I had learned from men and ciswomen in public as I struggled to fill out my gender workbook which was way behind the rest of the world I was dealing with. I learned men did not value anything I had to say unless I was spoken to first and women had their own way of communicating around men even if the men thought they were in their conversation. Just as a starting point. I also learned of a whole new lesbian culture I knew nothing about and where I could possibly fit in as a femme lipstick lesbian. As you can understand, the terminology and how I fit in came at me quickly and again I was extremely humbled to be asked to go to lesbian mixers where I learned a lot.

I learned also that women lead much more layered existences than men do, often built around dealing with men themselves. I did not have to worry much about that because I was not attractive enough for men to pursue me and after my lesbian friends taught me I did not need a man for validation, my life brightened considerably.

As I progressed deeper and deeper along my gender path, it became increasingly obvious that I could indeed achieve my goal of someday succeeding in a feminine world. Even though in many ways it did not resemble my initial dreams. In no way did I think I could maintain my sense of sexuality as I never made it with a man. In my own way, I maintained my own “Gold Star” status that many lesbians I knew maintained. The closest I ever came to getting any real attention from a “GS” lesbian were a few kisses.

When my new world began to open up, I was very humbled to be there at all. Along the way, I have survived issues such as severe depression and negative attitudes towards me from loved ones to stick to my dreams and goals. Remembering where I came from helped me form the strong building blocks to complete such a diverse and difficult change in my life. Using the negatives in my male life to build a transfeminine one was one of the best moves I ever made in my life as I made a complete circle back through all my male years to be the person I always dreamed I could be.

I was back to being me. The only transition which really mattered.

 

 

 

 

 

Stepping off a Gender Cliff

 

Image from my first salon
visit 12 years ago.

As I slowly began to become part of the world as a transgender woman, I felt as if I was sliding down a steep slope towards a deep cliff which I could not see the bottom.

Not being able to see the bottom of the canyon I was facing was probably the scariest part of coming out as my authentic self and being allowed to be behind the gender curtain with ciswomen around me. Along the way, I worried about the smallest things such as my appearance, all the way to how I sounded if I had needed to talk to someone else. Many times, in an emergency only because I was so unsure of myself as a novice transfeminine person. Sadly, I learned the hard way that as weak as my communication skills as a trans woman were, not communicating at all with other women was worse. Because not saying anything made me come off as being somehow stuck up or worse yet, bitchy.

Through it all, I came off sliding slowly down my gender path as I ignored several stop signs thrown up by my male self or my second wife who knew she was in danger of losing her husband altogether. For most of my journey at this point of my life, I was in the dark and used that as an excuse of why I had just ignored or run the stop signs I was facing. Whatever the case, I was living an exciting yet scary time of my life.

When I came out to my daughter nearly a dozen years ago, I finally had lost my grip on the small trees and vines I was holding onto during my steep descent into trans womanhood.  She surprised me by promptly supporting me and her only question was why was she the last to know, when in fact she was the first to know I was much more than a part-time crossdresser (as my first wife and her mother thought), I was actually a transgender woman who was afraid to admit it to the world.

Since my birthday was right around the corner, my daughter volunteered as a gift to me to take me to her hair salon/spa for a haircut and color makeover on my hair which had become long enough to work with. Even though the whole idea scared me to death, I took her up on the offer and she made the appointment which would forever change my life.

Before I knew it or could even entertain any thoughts of backing out the day was upon me and the next thing I knew I was with my daughter and her stylist looking at seemingly endless color and style combinations that I needed to choose from. Plus, I had to walk past a endless line of women in chairs who had nothing else to do but give me their undivided attention as I walked by, nervous as hell and trying my best not to show it. Fortunately, I had a complimentary glass of wine to calm me down as I chose a highlighted blond/red cut which all of us thought suited me the best.

Once I was done and allowed to see myself, I have to say I was impressed and knew why ciswomen everywhere put so much emphasis on taking care of the hair through salons everywhere. As I left, I felt as if I could skip my daily dose of gender affirming hormones because the estrogen was so thick in the air in the salon. As I said, it all added up to a day I will never forget thanks to my supportive daughter I could never thank enough over the years as she helped me pick out a new legal name change that my three grandkids could easily grasp. Ironically, the middle grandchild who was in the fourth grade had a teacher who was an out gay teacher in the school system and had my grandchild as a student. Then my daughter needed to explain the difference in their gay teacher and their transgender grandparent. As you can tell, diversity ruled in their house and went full circle when my oldest grandchild came out as trans.

As it turned out, I had nothing to fear from sliding off my gender cliff because it turned out I had built such a group of supportive people to help me when I fell. Of course, I always have to mention my future third wife Liz who along with my daughter turned out to be my best allies during my male to female feminization project. In fact, it turned out they knew me better than I knew myself and showed me the way to success. Liz in particular always told me that she never saw any male in me at all. Which in many ways provided me with the powerful shove down my gender cliff into a world I always should have been part of in the world of ciswomen. I don’t know what I would have done without the guidance of women such as Kim and Nikki also. I just know I probably would have kept up the male charade I was living longer than I did.

Perhaps the ironic part of them providing me a safe landing was when all the ciswomen refused to take any credit. The only response I ever got was welcome to our world when I tried to share stories about my first hot flashes, so I learned to keep quiet and learn how to protect myself when the expected gender crash happened. Because of women such as Min and Kathy, their initial invitations to their girls only nights out helped me to learn what life behind the gender curtain was really all about.

If I had known all I had learned earlier about being a transfeminine person, I would have definitely taken the plunge down my cliff earlier than I did. Not much I can do about it now as I am very much where I wanted to be and the plunge was not too bad after all.

 

 

Trans Girl's Dreams...Nothing lasts Forever

 

Image from Bruce Mars
on UnSplash. 

Nothing last forever in a transgender woman’s world, or does it?

Many of my life’s earliest recollections begin with the vivid dreams I had of being the pretty girl of my thoughts, only to be shattered back to reality when I woke up into my same old male world. Sadly, I remember thinking at the time how bad it was that dreams could not last forever. Why was I stuck with the impossible dream.

At the time, I thought too, it was a possibility that I was going through some sort of a phase that I would grow out of. As many of us know, we did not grow out of any sort of cross-dressing phase, I grew into a more transfeminine one. It turns out that thinking me wanting to be a girl was just a phase was as wrong as thinking I was truly crazy because of my gender issues. I did not really think I was crazy for just wanting to be who I was, but it remained a thought in the back of my head which back in those days was reinforced by the mental health community.

As life moved quickly forward as it always does, in my thirties and early forties, I began to really entrench myself in the physical world of newly found cross-dressers and transgender women around me. For the first time in my life, I discovered I did have role models in the community I could learn from. In their lives, they were approaching the world as if they were never going back to their male selves, so why couldn’t I. My impossible dream may not be so impossible after all as I improved my feminine presentation to the point to where I could blend in with the majority of ciswomen I encountered when I started leaving the mirror at home and heading into the world.

From there, I began to set up small bucket lists for myself. Once I completed one task as a novice transgender woman, I immediately set up another. Basically, I set my tasks up on what my observations of women were anyhow and how much I wanted to try them in my new world I was experimenting in. An example was when I began to go to the big bookstores as me to see if I caused any negative attention. When I didn’t, I began to visit their in-house coffee shop and even began to use the restroom of my choice. The women’s of course. I would have looked very silly using the men’s room the way I was dressed.

Another problem I had was focusing on my dream. Just exploring the world without a plan was not getting me anywhere. In order to progress towards my goal, I purposely chose a few of the most trying experiences a ciswoman could have. Like going to an auto parts store to see how I was treated. The scariest experience I ever had was going to a pick it yourself junk yard with my wife Liz to pick up a side mirror for an old car we had. It was a very hot and humid Ohio day, and I was worried about melting in front of the guys at the junk yard, but no one gave me a second look, and we were off with our mirror before I knew it. But to this day, I am still shy of going into male dominated spaces because I know of how women can be taken advantage of from my old days as a male.

By the time all of this was happening, I was having a sneaking suspicion that my desire to live full-time as a transfeminine person was never just going to go away. In fact, it was just going to become more intense.

As my third wife Liz became more serious, she wanted to travel to a few places she had never been to and some that she had. The easiest way to do it was to sign up for tours with a local Cincinnati based tour bus company. Over the years, we traveled from Boston and Maine and New Orleans to Mardi Gras and Florida in the south. The challenge for me was always using the restroom with a bus who majority of passengers were women. I had some adventures along the way such as one elderly woman commenting that I was using “their” restroom, all the way to being afraid of confronting two agitated women in an Alabama restroom and being afraid of being arrested by a “good ol boy” southern sheriff for just wanting to pee. To add insult to potential restroom drama, matters just got worse when I became non-mobile to where I needed to use a handicapped stall where there was one available. But through it all, I learned to be resilient, and the world was not such a bad place after all.

It was about this time that my gender life flipped, and I knew my male life was not going to last forever but my female one would last as long as I did. It was during this period I survived two trips to the hospital. One for Covid and one for pneumonia which were the most gender numbing experiences of my life. When the nurses asked questions about my gender status since I was still biologically a male and I had to put up with all the nudity which went along with my visits. From it all I learned that being nice to the staff was the best way to go and they would be nice to me.

I am sure that kid in the mirror would have never thought his life would have taken so many twists and turns if he chose the gender path that he did. Would he have done it? Sure, but would he ultimately have a choice, no. Being transgender was simply something that was built into him from the beginning and he never would have a choice in the matter. As soon as he could come to that conclusion, the better off he would be when he discovered nothing lasts forever.

 

Using yet Another Term

 

Trans Tennis Star
Renee Richards circa 1976.

Recently, I used the term “dead name” to describe my old male name which I legally changed years ago. Rather than using “dead name”, Kayla wrote in and responded by saying she uses “former tenant” when referring to her former self.

I liked the idea and decided to pass it along to all of you for your consideration. I mean it is not like we have enough other terms which have evolved and even disappeared over the years. If you are of a certain age, you probably remember when transvestite was used as a term to describe many of us with gender issues. Then there is the term “transgender” which (according to Wikipedia) was originally used in 1965 by psychiatrist John Olivien then popularized by Virginia Prince in the mid 1990’s. Which was when I began to hear about being transgender and how it applied to me.

It was not until I began to go to the old “Tri-Ess” social transgender-cross dresser mixers, did I really begin to grasp the differences in the terminology to describe myself which was becoming more and more important to me. During the earliest times I can remember coming out to anyone was in the mid to late 1970’s when I used the transvestite term rather than using cross-dresser which perhaps would have been easier for the other person to understand. At the time, I was selfish and was not so concerned about what the others thought about me as I was about preserving my male self and was not coming out to many others anyhow. I stayed with thinking I was a transvestite which was not as far along on the gender disruption order as transsexual which meant to me as wanting major surgeries to live fulltime as a woman. At my age, “Christine Jorgensen” was the first person I remember as a well-known transsexual when she published her autobiography in 1967. The year I graduated from high school, so I had a real interest in secretly trying to find a copy of her book and try to read it which I never did. The closest I ever came was finding a copy of the “Renee Richards” book “Second Serve” which was published in 1976. I found it interesting when I researched Richard’s book in Wikipedia, no reference was made to her being a transsexual woman, only a transgender one.

About that time was when I began to seriously feel as if I fit the definition of a transgender woman more than any definition, I had ever seen before. I was somewhere off in a never-never land between being the cross-dresser I always perceived myself to be and the transsexual self which was rapidly disappearing as a term.

For me, at least as I “matured” into a “transfeminine” person which supposedly first appeared in a “Tapestry” publication from Tri-Ess in 1985. About the time I was seriously looking for ways to escape my gender closet. Also the time for me when I began to have serious access to the internet and social media which over the years was to open many new doors for me as well as many new terms such as the use of LGBT at all as many more letters were added to support different gender communities. In my latest search, I found the term is up to LGBTQIA+ to include all the variations on the gender spectrum.

Then there is gender fluidity which I have known a few people who have described themselves as such over the years. In fact, we had a gender fluid person attend our support group meeting here in Cincinnati years ago who went only with their middle initial as a name and refused any of the traditional he or she pronouns. I often thought maybe I was actually gender fluid growing up on the days I wanted to be a girl instead of the boy gender I was born into.

In another support group years ago, I mentioned another group catch phrase centering around Hormone Replacement Therapy or HRT. I called it HRT and Andi gently reminded me that a better, in-depth term, would be gender affirming hormones which made sense to me and I try to use both to this day.

Now I get to throw another gender term into my years old trashcan thanks to Kayla. I will never have to use a term I always hated anyhow to describe my ascent to being a successful trans woman in a world of ciswomen. Which, for the sake of staying with the theme of this post simply means a woman who was born female and still identifies as a woman.

I suppose the meaning of all these labels simply shows what a complex community the LGBTQIA+ really is and the most important thing is that you find the little niche you need to survive in. If you can follow all these changes, you deserve all the progress you have made. When push comes to shove all these terms are just semantics and you deserve more as you enter your authentic life.

I know there are other labels I have missed. I hope I have covered the major ones that helps us all and my “dead “name is now truly dead.

 

 

 

 

Destination Unknown

 

JJ Hart and wife Liz on Right.

Through most of my life, I have taken the path less traveled to an unknown destination. Many times, I have thought I knew where I was headed, only to be faced with many stop signs in my way. It was like the night I took the night bus to Ft. Knox, Kentucky to begin my Army basic training. All I really knew was I did not want to be there and I would be in for more unpleasant situations than I wanted to count. All without my precious feminine wardrobe, heels and makeup to fall back on.

To make matters worse, some of the other men on the bus were not so silently crying about their fates which were coming up, quickly because before we knew it, the bus arrived at the not so beautiful, winter-time hills of Ft. Knox and we were greeted by drill sergeants and loaded from the bus into our waiting barracks. In a small way, I guess I was fortunate that I had two friends who were drafted ahead of me into the Army who told me what to expect and gave me some sort of confidence that I could successfully survive whatever was ahead.

Actually, for me, basic training went fast seeing as how I was facing an extended period of my life without the feminine fallbacks I had always known to get me by. Keep in mind too that the Army in those days was deeply gender separated and there were no women to interact with anywhere where I was at all in basic training. So, I was forced to do all my interaction with other men which I had never been good at. It turned out to be a learning experience I will never forget and even gave me extra insight about how competitive men interact with each other when there are no ciswomen to show off for.

Through it all, my inner super repressed feminine self was busily recording all of this for use later on in my life. Any spare moment I had when I was doing some sort of a mundane task in the chow hall for dinner like peel potatoes, I was given the chance to day dream off to the future and think of the new car I was going to buy with the money I was saving because of Uncle Sam taking care of everything I needed. I dreamed of buying a new wig and clothes and making it a point to slowly drive past my first fiancé who had rejected me when I was drafted into the military. She thought I should have tried to get out of serving because I was a cross-dresser. Which was close enough to being gay for her to get me rejected from duty.

When my three years of military service was up and I returned to the world I knew before, I returned almost exactly where I was with my cross-dressing when I left. The only difference was when Halloween rolled around and the newly restored Ohio Theatre in Columbus was having a costumed “Spook Out” with their newly restored theatre organ providing the background sound live for the silent version of the “Phantom of the Opera.” It was an opportunity for me to jump out of my dark gender closet and present my true self to the world for the first time since I was a civilian again. For the evening, I was the long blond-haired woman in heels and a minidress which of course included my freshly shaven legs and new panty hose. Outside of the heels beginning to bother me as the evening wore on, I had a wonderful time. Especially when I had the chance to see and appreciate the other costumes.

From there, the only problem I had was thinking about waiting another long year to be able to come out of my closet and express myself as a transfeminine person. I had just spent three years of my life waiting for my freedom from the Army and I did not want to wait anymore. My solution was to open my closet door and have the courage to come out on my own and not wait for another year. I knew in order to do it; I needed to take my feminine presentation standards way beyond what I was doing for Halloween if I was ever to make it in a world of ciswomen. Certainly, I made mistakes along the way as I stumbled out of the closet but managed to maintain the balance on my heels to get by in the world.

Thanks to previous life lessons I had learned to rely on myself, my inner female finally had her chance to come out and shine in the world when I started out evenings to go out and be by myself and ended up talking to other curious ciswomen wondering what I was doing in their world. I had learned to outgrow my shyness around strangers and become a social person, so my “plan” worked to perfection. I did not have to go out anymore to be by myself and my previous unknown gender destination was becoming clearer to me.

For the first time, I was able to see ahead of myself for future reference the stop signs I would face. Such as what was I going to do about all the male baggage I had managed to build up over the years against my will. If you are trans, you know what I am talking about such as spouses, family, friends and employment to begin with. Along the way, I have written entire posts about the power of stop signs and what they mean to transgender women and transgender men. I can only say, when you have negotiated all your stop signs and reached your unknown destination, you will have reached your own little utopian space because it feels so natural to you. At least it worked that way for me.

Thanks for reading along!

Any comments are always welcomed! 

 

 

Hey You!!!! Meeting Myself in the Middle

 

Image from Adam Winger
on UnSplash. 

For me, meeting myself in the mirror was never easy to do. While the group of boys I grew up around were blissfully doing boy things without a problem, I was struggling with the idea that I wanted to be a girl.

Sadly, for the longest time, I thought that someday I would have the chance to outgrow what would become for all to call gender dysphoria. For me, I was just a kid with problems I had no idea of how to conquer. Through all this time of my life my favorite quote to pass along was when some adult asked me what I wanted to become when I grew up, I could never tell the truth and say a woman as I lied and said a doctor or a lawyer. The only thing with certain that I knew was I would get an immediate trip to the psychiatrist if I had ever told the truth compliments of my parents. 

As I always say, age entitled me to a chance not to outgrow being a cross-dresser but did give me the opportunity to meet myself in the middle and start to mature into the transgender woman I am today. Before I did though, I needed to come up with an understanding of what the middle of being me really meant. What made it all so difficult was that my male life when it was going well it was very good, but when it was bad, I wanted out immediately. As I ran to my makeup, dresses and heels for comfort in the mirror.

The middle began to be harder and harder for me to find when I left the home mirror, gathered my courage and headed into the world as a transfeminine person. Many times, I could almost see and sense my middle person in the public mirrors I was still using to build myself up in places such as clothing stores in the malls and changing rooms I had started to use in all the thrift stores I was shopping to discover the latest fashion item I could wear. I was never any good shopping for women’s clothes as a man, as my feminine self-wanted to do it all and make all the final choices for herself.

In addition to fighting for the middle with my male self, I needed to fight my second wife for the rights to her husband. Like my male-self, my wife was a formidable opponent to any idea of me transitioning any further into the feminine world I increasingly wanted to live in. In many ways, she held all the gender cards because she knew I was a cross dresser when we met but never/ever agreed to me going past that point as she said she did not sign up to live with another woman. For whatever reason she never liked the transgender woman I was becoming and passed away before she could meet the finished product I had become. I don’t blame her because she just got caught in the middle of me not wanting to admit to what I always knew deep down…there was actually no middle point to me, I was destined to eventually live my life among ciswomen as an equal transgender woman.

The problem was, getting to the point of realizing all of this was easy to write about and harder to do. The biggest mistake I made was thinking my gender balance between male and female was so good that I could live as both in the world. While I maintained a long-term marriage and a good job. Trying to go all in on both genders cost me my already fragile mental health as I was still trying to do my research in the public eye about which gender direction I wanted to go. Long story short, I found without too much trouble I could carve out a new feminine life without the world questioning anything about my old male life. As I surveyed the world suddenly, I could see gender possibilities opening for me that I never thought possible before.

During this time in my life, I think I met myself in the middle too fast and tried unsuccessfully to slow my progress down until I could figure out what to do about the rest of my life. Primarily my second wife and my very lucrative job. Plus, on the other hand, I had put this gender teeter totter in motion, and it increasingly looked as if I could not get off. I kept up the old male charade I was forced to live as long as I needed to, and with the help of a few ciswomen friends, I was able to find a new middle point in my life as a trans woman. Which seemed to work well, until HRT or gender affirming hormones came my way, and the balance of my life was changed forever.

I had always viewed the possibility of me taking the gender altering hormones as a line of demarcation of me never going back to my old male life and it was. From the obvious growth of my breasts and hair to the overall softening of my skin and facial lines the changes came fast and furious and again I was forced to move up my timeline to discard (or give away) all my old male clothes and set my sights on a new bright future. Away from all the uncertainties of going back and forth between the two main binary genders of womanhood and manhood. My lifetime of juggling identities went away, my mental health improved as I entered the world I had always dreamed of my entire life that I had finally earned my way into.

The “earn” word is important here because of all the trial and error (mostly error) I put into finally facing the reality of my true gender and forever stopped meeting myself in the middle. Was it worth it? Sure, because I ended up not having any choice after all.

 

 

 

 

Who Had it Easier

 

JJ Hart

The most ridiculous understatement I ever made to myself was thinking how much easier women have it in their lives than men do.

Those were the simpler days of just envying all the girls around me for their ability to wear pretty clothes when I was stuck in my usual boring male attire. As you can tell, my adolescent thought patterns about gender were much shallower back in those days. All I knew was I was having issues with going through male puberty and all its hair and added angles to my body while the girls were adding all the curves I so desperately wanted. It was about that time when I started to further torture myself by having dreams of being a pretty girl when I just had to wake up again to the same old world, I was so tired of at such an early age.

Another benefit I saw from the outside from being a girl was on the dating front. From my ultra shy vantage point, boys had to do all the work to chase a girl but gave it no thought to be a girl with no boys having any interest in you at all. It seemed all my ideas came from the problem I had for years of not being allowed to see behind the gender curtain to go through the insecurities of a girl’s puberty. As their bodies ramp up the necessities for possible childbirth later in life.  Which leads me to this, the incredibly short period of time a ciswoman has to level out their hormones and have the chance to live a so-called normal life. First, they have to go through puberty which shapes their bodies then go through child birthing years which strain their bodies and then go through menopause to reduce all the hormones again. Not to mention all the monthly menstrual periods most women must live with too.

In the days when I was busy with just being the “pretty, pretty princess” as my wife called me, she was taking me to task about never experiencing the so called downs of being a woman because I just wanted to appear as one, perfect my makeup and wear my pantyhose and heels as much as I could. For years, I went on clicking my merry way in my heels not giving much thought to what she was telling me. It was not until many years later that my heels finally led me to a path where I could finally learn what she was talking about.

Essentially, what I was able to learn from being a transgender woman and being able to live on both sides of the gender border was that both genders have their challenges. That humans are born as male and female, then get socialized (if they are lucky) into men and women. We transfeminine persons just were born into an unwanted male gender and were socialized into our chosen lives as trans women. The whole process gives us a deeper understanding of the world as we look into who has it easier in life, ciswomen or men.

Since the socialization process of being a male was what I was born into proved to be partially successful one for me, I have always thought men have had it easier. And women have it harder because they must put up with men. Even though, my gender dysphoria issues made me difficult to live with as a husband, I somehow have always found a woman to make the journey with me. Someday, I will have to write a post on the differences of my three wives during my life.

As I continued in vain to find the easy way out in my life, being a guy was the way to go as I found success in being able to bluster my way through in many situations and in others wondering how I would approach them as a transgender woman.

Finally, my gender travel took me behind the gender curtain where I could hear firsthand the experiences of all my ciswomen friends. It was not until then did I realize the grass was not always so green on the other side of the binary gender border. The only problem I did have was reversing all my experiences in the conversations we were having from male to female, so I did not out myself to my friends. I knew I was beginning to be successful when strangers outside of my circle of friends began to ask me questions on what to do about getting along with their boyfriend. I was flattered that other women had trusted me with their problems and were looking for input.

My own socialization journey had taught me that neither gender had it easier. Stereotyping here, men largely bluster and run when they can’t get their way and women are left to raise the kids and pick up the pieces. It is difficult to take such a complex subject such as gender and not stereotype something about it at some point, so I apologize.

I am sure that no matter where you are on your gender journey, you will encounter your own set of standards when it comes to the male and female genders and where you fit. It will certainly be an interesting journey with many individuals trying to tell you to stop. At that point, you must decide if maybe you have had it more difficult than either of the two main binary genders you have encountered. Many of them simply will not have the understanding it takes to approve of your journey, and you will have to move on. But, on the other hand, there could others who approve of you and even want to help. Just be careful that you know which is which.

When it comes right down to it, that girl you envied from afar in study hall, all the way to the woman whose fashion and passing privilege you admired so much both had their own problems to deal with. You just must get behind the feminine gender curtain to figure out just what they were.

 

 

 

 

When I Quit Recognizing Myself

 

Image from Vinicus amiz
Amano on UnSplash

When I thought of the subject of this post, I thought that was an easy topic. From the very first day I had a glimpse of myself in the family’s full-length hallway mirror I partially thought I did not recognize who I was looking at. Sadly, even with all the work I was doing to look like one of the pretty girls I admired so much, I still looked like my male self-wearing a dress with makeup. Most likely, the biggest problem in looking like a girl back then was the lack of access I had to my hair. I was cursed in being raised in an era when young boys’ hair style was short or shorter and a crew cut was considered a longer style. Dad took my brother and I to the barber with him every couple of weeks and we got our burr haircuts without question. If you don’t know, burr means almost no hair which was decidedly not what I really wanted on my head. I had no choice but to go along with the program, and had to use my imagination, along with a towel when I cross-dressed as my authentic self. Who was just learning to express herself. Even if it was only to be to myself.

It turned out to be years later that I began to be skilled enough to begin to match my exterior self with my feminine inner feelings. I had help from a professional makeup artist I will never forget who had the skill set to show me what I doing wrong with my makeup and the verbal skills to explain to me how to improve my life through ideas such as foundation basics to cover my beard and contouring my face to bring out the highlights I did not know I had. When he was finished, I truly did not recognize who I was looking at in the mirror. Plus, I really enjoyed all the compliments I received on my appearance from several of the attendees at the transgender-crossdresser social mixer I was attending. Once I was given that basic skill set to make myself up, I was able to start buying higher end cosmetics which flattered me even more.

In many ways, for a while when I did not recognize myself in the mirror, it scared me. Because I was losing touch with all my male past which had made me…me, for my entire life. I was shocked the first time I lost some of my basic male privileges I had always taken for common I would have such as my intelligence when I talked to men and my personal safety when I found myself in contact with a toxic one. Quickly, I needed to come up with a plan to support my new life as a transgender person without the old ways which I had been successful with until I could develop new ones.

Of course, too, there were my usual problems dealing with gender dysphoria when I thought I had done a wonderful makeup job only to see my male self-looking back at me in the mirror. Then, to add insult to injury, if I was being successful in navigating the world as a transgender woman, my impostor syndrome would set it. Impostor syndrome to me made me feel as if I was an impostor in the world of ciswomen and should not feel as if I belonged there at all. Who knew, just being a trans woman would bring all the baggage with it. When I ceased to recognize myself, I learned all the rest the hard way.

Even with all the new roadblocks, I began to do more than just survive in the new feminine world I found myself in. I began to thrive as I started to carve out a new exciting life where no one knew anything about my past as an unhappy man. I never let on to my past except to let strangers know I had been married in my past and had lost my spouse to a heart attack without ever mentioning which gender she was. As well as mentioning I did have a daughter when it came to family discussions. Technically, even though I did not birth her, I was in the delivery room for her birth which was as close as I could come with the circumstances I had to deal with.

Finally, I arrived at the point when I cherished the times when I did not recognize my old self and hated the times when I could still see his image slipping through when I looked for the first time in the morning in the mirror before I had a chance to put on any makeup. Rather than feel anymore of the pain of gender dysphoria, I got to the point of thinking I was stuck with what the world had given me as far as my appearance went. The idea I used worked well because I felt I never looked as bad as I thought and certainly not as good as I arrived at the point where I was erasing my male self for good.

I would be remiss if I did not mention the role gender affirming hormones or HRT played in all my progress in my lifetime male to female femininization project. While the hormones did not make me anymore or less of a trans woman. They certainly made me feel the process more. Almost immediately, as my skin began to soften and my breasts began to grow, I began to feel emotions flow through my body that I had never felt before in my life. My facial angles also began to soften, allowing me to do less contouring with my makeup when I went out was one of the good things which happened. Along with me not recognizing myself when all a sudden it was me who was reaching for her coat saying she was too cold in a venue, and I was not making it up.

I guess you say I covered about as much ground as I could erasing my old male self without going through any major (or minor) operations. But I did make it to the point where I did not recognize any of my old self anymore.

 

 

When Nothing Else Mattered

 

Image from Klara Khokhlova
on UnSplash. 

Perhaps, similar to many of you, you have been described as selfish when you pursued your gender desires. I know, I was by my second wife as she told me many times my desire to be a pretty cross-dresser in my life was not all about me.

During this time of my life, sadly or not, all my spare thoughts and time dedicated to my cross-dressing activities, so yes, it was all about me. I did my best not to be that way, but I was failing miserably. Especially when I figured it out, I could leave the house as me and do a portion of the household chores such as grocery shopping. I figured by doing so, I was helping my wife and at the same time helping myself.

The more proficient I became at doing my new portion of some of the weekday household chores, the more I felt that nothing else mattered to me than my quest to explore my inner femininity. Increasingly, I broke the rules and made excuses to leave the house and explore the new, natural and exciting world I was experiencing.

As years always do, mine flew by in a blur as I became more proficient in perfecting my feminine appearance and it began to be more apparent to me that the life as I was living as a man would have to be sacrificed at some point if I wanted to pursue my dream goal of living as a transfeminine person. That is when I began to fall back on my ill-fated male habits of internalizing all my feminine feelings. Hoping that eventually, they would just go away. Compliments of my latest purge of my cross-dressing belongings.

Very soon, it became evident that all the purging in the world would not rid me of my deep-seated gender issues and nothing else began to matter, not even the massive fights my second wife and I were having when she caught me out of the house as myself. I would go to any extent possible to try to mend the wounds from my breaking the promises not to ever go out again unattended, all the way to promising I would go to a therapist in Columbus, Ohio who specialized in gender care to attempt to solve my “problem.” Even then, I would not listen to the therapist who told me that my gender issues were not a “problem”, and there was nothing she could do about them. I made the mistake again of thinking there was something radical I could do about how I was attempting to live my life. I could keep trying to sneak out of the house and try to learn more about my possibilities of living life as a transgender woman, while at the same time continue to live with my wife. She always know I was a cross-dresser but was completely dead set against me going any further towards being approved for gender affirming hormones (HRT) and living as my authentic self.

Perhaps the biggest problem was I was not sure what my authentic self really was. I knew I loved my second wife as much as the day I married her years before, but I really was not sure of how deep my transgender issues were going to run. Plus, all the research I was doing into a new life, jeopardized my old life which at times was not so bad because I was accumulating all the male privileges such as wife, family and job that I did not necessarily want to get rid of. The whole situation just mentally tore me up as I did not know what gender I was going to be from day to day. Was I going to try to be my true self or go out into the world again and “act” like the strong man I was not.

It all led me to feeling completely detached from the world and wanting to end it all because I felt so worthless to everybody. Fortunately, after I hit rock bottom, I got help from a good therapist and was prescribed medications which helped my on-going Bi-polar disorder and anxiety. It turned out my anxiety was triggered in many ways by my gender issues so that was easier to solve, but my depression was not so my new meds really helped. Giving credit to where credit is due, my help came through the Veterans Administration health care system and as luck would have it, I was teamed up with a therapist who knew what she was doing when it came to depression and LGBTQ care.

By this time, my second wife had tragically passed away from a major heart attack leaving me totally alone with my thoughts. Quickly, since nothing else mattered, I took the path of least resistance into my own form of womanhood. All those dues I was paying as a cross dresser working with my appearance came back to help me when I could hit the ground running in my heels (not really) and concentrate on rounding out my persona of the trans woman I wanted to me in the world of alpha cis women around me. I was able to see and learn from what they did to make their lives more fulfilling as women, and I wanted to do that too. I was having fun while at the same time was secretly learning everything I could from the ciswomen around me.

Most certainly, nothing else mattered when I sought out approval for my gender affirming hormones from a doctor I found in an LGBTQ newspaper. Along with the hormones, I was putting my new life together by legally changing all the gender documents I could with the VA and in the civilian world. Very soon, my old male life was in my past and my “dead” name faded away.

The only thing that did matter was building a new life with my third wife Liz, a lesbian ciswoman who accepted me for what I was. I could not let a second chance such as that pass me by.

 

 

Gender Evolution

 

Image from Hoite Prins
on UnSplash. 

Sometimes I think I give the wrong impression when it comes to my reactions to cross-dressing as a whole.

In reality, the last thing I want to do is put myself up on some sort of pedestal because I have survived my own personal gender wars and evolved from a young boy experimenting in his women’s clothes to living full-time as a transfeminine person in the world. After all, I was the one who spent nearly four decades cross-dressing my life away trying to make a final decision on which way my life would take me. So, saying “just a cross-dresser” would be totally wrong for me to do. In fact, cross dressing saved my life from taking off the overall pressure I was feeling from living my gender conflicted life. Just the slightest glimmer of hope I got from the mirror was all I had to get by and I used it to the max.

As I look back from the journey I took from wearing my mom’s clothes when they still fit me, all the way to getting rid of all my male clothing altogether (except my Army uniform), it was quite the lifetime of evolution. Sadly, not all the times were good, but they were all deep learning experiences. Such as all the times I was dressing to thrill myself. Not to properly attempt to blend in with the ciswomen around me. Very difficult lessons to learn as I needed to put my faux teenaged cross-dressing years behind me quickly if I ever wanted to be a success. I was far from being a teen girl since I was in my thirties with the testosterone poisoned body I was working with. I needed to evolve and do it fast if I was ever would be able test the idea I could survive as a transgender woman, leading a successful life.

Suddenly, out of the clear blue sky which was my existence more or less back in those days, something mentally clicked in me as I was preparing to go out into the world one night. As I slipped into my panty hose and heels, put on my makeup and wig, my whole thought pattern changed. I was no longer trying to just go out and successfully present well as a look-a-like ciswoman, I was going out to fit right into their community as a novice trans woman. The thought hit me like a thunderbolt and scared me to even think that way, but I could feel my life making a seismic shift for the better. If I could be successful, which still was a big question.

I am not shy about writing about one of the most exciting nights of my life went I went to mingle with a group of professional ciswomen who worked at a nearby mall. I don’t know what scared me worse, the fear of being recognized as an intruder and embarrassed or the fear of knowing if I was successful, I could never go back to the male life I was starting to evolve away from. I just know I was so scared I thought I would need an oxygen tank to help me breathe when I went in the venue to mingle with all those young attractive women.

You can probably guess what happened from there. I was very successful and knew my future as a cross-dresser was behind me as I had evolved into a novice transgender woman. Complete with two new straight venues I had established myself in as a regular. Something I never thought possible just a few months before when I was frequenting gay venues getting mistaken for just another drag queen. I should be more appreciative towards the reaction I received from the gay community because their attitudes sent me flying to places, I knew and enjoyed as a man. If I had evolved enough as a trans woman to do it.

At that point, my evolution into being allowed behind the women’s gender curtain was forced fed to me quickly. Mainly from other women who I met and wanted to help me adjust to the world I so desperately wanted to be a part of. Sometimes, I was overconfident and was sent back to my gender drawing board when I tried to go too fast, too soon but I never had to go back to the days when I was learning to adjust to the world outside my closet as a cross-dresser. Every angle I pursued in the world seemed to be new and exciting as I learned my feminine lessons well. You might say, I was the ultimate gender sponge because I was finally realizing my gender light at the end of the tunnel was not the train and a good life as a transfeminine person was certainly possible if I kept evolving. All the years of worrying about my future I had wasted in my life were just that…wasted and I needed to move on.

Better yet, I learned the world of ciswomen I was evolving into was worth every bit of the work I had put into it. Sure, I did encounter a few haters, bigots and TERF’s (ciswomen who hated me) but with my newfound confidence I had evolved into, I could quickly ignore them and get along with my life. If I got to the point where I ever needed my new friends to step up for me, they would but I had made it to the point where I could fight my own battles if I needed to.

In many ways, I see the evolution of transgender women and transgender men as the future as now the genders seem to be blurring for the younger generations. Maybe when the old white men finally die out, their bigotry will die out with them. Right now they are scared of the potential a trans tribe carries to understand what goes on both sides of the gender coin and we will be allowed to evolve back to where we were with native American cultures which honored us. But that is an evolvement topic for another time.

Thanks for reading!