The Second Act

 

JJ Hart doing Trans Wellness Outreach. 

Will the second act of life be better and more successful than the first? How many people even get a second chance?

That is the question I needed to answer when I finally shed my male life and entered a transfeminine existence. Since I did it at the age of sixty, I have had plenty of ground to catch up with. Many times, it seemed I never would. My internal gender clock was moving one step forward and two steps back as I attempted to transition. I had times when the picture was clear in my mind, and I was able to put it into motion. Such as the night I took myself out to see a major Christmas light display in a nearby village and was warmly accepted in my soft bulky sweater, leggings and boots. Then, as I rode the wave of gender dysphoria, I would do something wrong such as how I was moving. I am fond of saying, I looked like a linebacker in drag.

The problem was, if I relaxed at all going into the second act of my life, I had the tendency to fall back into old habits. I was learning the hard way over and over, to take nothing for granted in my new life. Many times, I tried and failed not to be too hard on myself since I was making up for a first act in my life which lasted so long, and I had to concentrate so much on it just to survive. It was around this time when my male self really began to set up roadblocks on my gender path. Suddenly, he began to see that this road I was on was not a phase or joke and I was deadly serious.  He started to ask questions such as how I was going to live in my second act with no job and how I was prepared to do it without the wife I dearly loved and had been married to for nearly twenty-five years. To be sure, all very real and very scary questions.

I put off deciding my life as long as I could as I attempted to learn if I could really live a transfeminine life at all. Were the obstacles insurmountable or not. Through it all, the one overriding feeling which kept me searching was the deep down feeling I was doing the right thing. I was headed in the direction I should have been going in my life all along and I kept going through the ups and downs of transitioning into my second act.

Once it was clear I was successfully transitioning into my second act, I needed to make sure I was doing it correctly. It turned out I had all the help I needed. In addition to the cisgender women I always mention, there was one important person I don’t mention enough. That person turned out to be very real and important to me. She was my inner feminine person who had been waiting for all those years and decades for her chance to fully come out into the world. Once she finally did, she knew completely what to do and what was ahead for my second act of my life. Mainly, all the nuances of life as a woman if I really wanted to go there. She knew the best part of my life was yet to come.

More importantly, I had finally made it through the bleak years when often I thought there would be no tomorrow. Or at least my dream of living a feminine life would never be realized. Often it set off a series of insecurities in myself which set back my life. Act one was bleeding because I could not get to act two.

When I finally made it to my second act, it was as if I had lifted a heavy weight off my shoulders, and I came to a point where I needed to be more understanding and approachable in the world. I could not get away with the old male ways of internalizing my feelings and start living again. If I did try to hide as a transgender woman, I would never have a chance to provide myself with a positive outlook to other women and not come off as an unfriendly transfeminine woman which was the last thing I wanted or was.

Since I was one of the few humans who ever had the chance to stop their life and begin again so there was no way I could mess it up. I needed to enjoy life and live it the best I could.  

Being Your Mother's Daughter

 

Image from Bence Halmosi
on UnSplash. 

What if your dream came true and you could have started your life as your mother’s daughter?

How would life really have been if it could have shared that special mother/daughter bond we can only see from afar.

As I changed my Estradiol patches this morning, I stopped to think how my mom and I would have gotten along if my gender world had been different. I know for sure; everything would not have been so rosy if I was living my dream. I remember vividly being able to sit back and watch mom expertly apply her makeup before she went out in public. Which her generation always did. I wonder now when she would have let me start experimenting with makeup if I was her daughter. I think now, I was wearing makeup before she would allow me to if I was in the feminine world I so dearly wanted to be in. I was also fairly sure I was shaving my legs sooner than she would have allowed.

The reason was, she probably never understood having a son who was really her daughter was all about. If I was her daughter, the pressure would have been on to conform to her ideas and rules. We were so much alike to begin with I am sure we would have fought continually. The gender grass always looked greener from the other side as I grew up. Especially when it came to the world of fashion. I had always admired the clothes girls around me were able to wear when I was stuck in the same old clothes.

It was not until much later in life when I started to really learn of the fashion problems my second and third wives had with their moms, did I begin to understand what they were going through. For example, my second wife told me several times about how she snuck out of the house with her skirt at one length (for parent approval) then when she was out of sight, she rolled it up to make it a forbidden mini skirt and supposedly mom never found out. On a more cruel side, my third wife Liz’s mom constantly harassed her about her weight. I can’t imagine how bad that made her feel. The closest I could come was if my parents ever berated me over a bad athletic play I made. Which they never did.

Overall, I wonder if any bond mom and I would have ever come up with would have been one existing of competition. I am sure my female self would have been struggling as much as my male self to gain any respect at home. All the way to the college I was going to attend. Mom was a graduate of an upscale public university in Ohio as well as being an active alum of one of their sororities. I am sure she would have pushed me (as her daughter) to follow in her footsteps, which would have been another problem.

I wonder if at any point in time, my dream of growing up as my mom’s daughter would have turned into a nightmare. Although, nightmare might be too strong of a term. Better yet, a struggle would have been better to use because both genders have their problems if they are over able to arrive at adulthood and claim the title of women and men. As I said, being a transfeminine person always seemed to be the best way to exist (for me) in life. I would never need to worry about being shipped to fight in Vietnam or summoning my courage to ask a girl out, among other things. On the other hand, I never had the opportunity to be asked out if I was a girl. Certainly, there was a positive give and take to both genders, but I was only seeing the good.

Would mom have taught me the basics of makeup? Or would I have learned it from girlfriends at weekly sleepovers. I am slightly biased, but I think I would have learned from my female peer group more than mom. Having never had the chance to learn, I will never know and since mom rejected any sort of discussion on my transfeminine life, there never will be any way to find out. She passed years ago.

It wasn’t until years later did, I have the chance to learn what I missed or didn’t when I grew up male. It finally took a group of women took me through the process of being a woman. In essence making up for what my mom missed doing. I inherited her stubbornness to do what was right and her ability to keep going until she arrived where she wanted to be. It would have been interesting if she had ever accepted the fact she had a daughter, not a son.

 

 

What a Rush!!!

 

Vintage Transvestia Magazine

I encountered a real problem when my cross-dressing urges went from being a real adrenaline rush, all the way down to what I experience now.

I do remember the process did not take so long for me and I should have known then my cross-dressing activities were much more than a harmless innocent hobby I was involved with. If I had the information available to me then which became available later, I would have had an idea I was transgender. Of course, back in those days, the internet had not been invented along with all the social media rooms which came with it. I was in the dark ages of information and was very sure I was alone in the world with my gender desires. I always give credit to “Virginia Prince” and Transvestia Magazine for initially opening my closet door and showing me there were others in the world called transsexuals and transvestites.

During times of depression with my life, I could always fall back to my well-worn issues of Transvestia to lift my spirits. Plus, I discovered groups hosted transvestite mixers in Ohio I could attend with the proper preparation. I was ecstatic! I finally had a chance to meet others like me. Little did I know, I did not get that completely right, but that is another story all together.

In the meantime, I read my brief moments of adrenaline rushes were really called gender euphoria. Regardless of the label, I still had a difficult time controlling mine. Most of my examples come from the time my wife and I moved to the New York City metro area. For some reason, she left me out on my own one night to go to a mixer out on Long Island. Much to my surprise, I had a difficult time being admitted to the mixer by two cisgender women running the door. I asked why I was not being allowed in and they said no real women were allowed and I needed to show them an identification card with a male picture on it to get in. I was shocked and promptly showed them my old male drivers license and had a great time…until the buzz wore off days later. Then, I became mean and difficult to live with because I was feeling sorry for myself because I felt increasingly sure of myself as a transfeminine woman.

About that time, Halloween rolled around again which gave me an excuse to leave my closet and explore the world as a trans woman. This Halloween, I was getting better at “costuming” to present well as a woman and not to thrill as a cross dresser. Again, I was able to be out on my own because my wife was not a fan of Halloween and by pure chance, I ended up in the middle of a group of cisgender women all as tall as I was and dressed about the same way. Again, I had a great time and was even asked to dance by a man who I wondered knew about me.

All I knew was gender euphoria was great, until I crashed and burned. Then I always slipped back into my usual gender dysphoria problems. It seemed I needed the constant reassurance of me being able to present well as a transfeminine woman just to get by. Which was no way to live.

In order to live, I needed to make difficult life changing choices such as exploring the world increasingly as a feminine transgender person. I needed to weigh the difficulty in what I was doing with my life with what would happen if I was discovered. To accomplish my dream, I began to make small mini “bucket lists” of things I needed to do, most to just see if I could and increase my gender euphoria or adrenalin rush. Surprisingly, very quickly again my bucket lists did not provide much euphoria but in their place, a deep sense of stability in my life. For the first time in my life, I even felt I could be happy as a person. Whatever I was doing as a transfeminine woman, I was doing it right. Or so I thought.

Naturally I was afraid to make the final move to sever all ties with my male self. I found myself wasting precious time as I was able to expand my own new world as a woman of my own making. I had successfully gone through transitions from innocent cross dresser, all the way to full time transgender woman with bumps and bruises I had earned along the way. But I learned from them and moved on to a better life. If I only lived once, I wanted to live what was left as a woman.

Sure, my initial doses of adrenaline did help until everyday life came in and rescued me. Now I have smoothed out my life with fewer peaks and valleys of euphoria and when I do experience the negative gender dysphoria, I am able to live with it much better.

 

 

 

It is Just a Phase?

Image from Claudia Love on UnSplash.

Have you ever been accused of just going through a phase?

Drawing from several comments from other transgender women and trans men, including myself, I have heard us being accused of just going through a phase when it comes to being transgender.

There was a time in my life when I seriously hoped I was just going through a phase when it came to my love of dressing in feminine clothing and makeup. I wanted it to be just an innocent hobby I could put down and walk away from at any time. As years went by, I found I couldn’t replace my so-called hobby with anything else in my life. I did the worse possible thing, I tried to internalize my feelings hoping I could somehow ignore them, and the phase would go away. Of course, it never did.

I always thought my mom knew I was trying on her clothes and putting on her makeup but never said anything because she thought I was going through a phase. Obviously, she was wrong! She never had the courage to call me out on what I was doing until I brought it up to her in a very ill-fated attempt to come out when I was discharged from the Army many years later. She quickly rejected my attempt to clear the air by volunteering psychiatric care. Of course, I refused her offer because I knew I was not mentally ill. I just wanted to live a transfeminine life on my terms. We never mentioned it again for the rest of her life but at least I tried to explain my deepest secret to her.

The phase idea came to be one idea I always ran from. I did not feel deep down my feelings were a phase but still was afraid to face the truth. I ended up moving many times and trying many new jobs just to try to outrun my gender feelings. It all was exhausting to my already fragile mental health. In fact, my initial gender therapist diagnosed me as being bi-polar when all along I thought I was just terribly depressed when I never thought I could achieve my dream of living as a full-time transgender woman. I was depressed when I considered the extreme distance I still had to travel, just not as bad.

As I still managed to progress along my gender pathway, I still encountered phases I needed to go through. The major one was what I called my teen girl dressing years. As I survived my urge to stuff my oversize male body into skimpy fashions, I was quickly laughed back into my closet several times before I learned the proper way to attempt to blend in with what other women my age were wearing. Easily, it was the most difficult phase I needed to deal with. Mainly because I was so stubborn.

It turned out the stubbornness I possessed was just what I needed to keep going. Deep down I knew I was in the middle of one of the most complex journeys a human can take, and I could be successful if I tried hard enough. It all meant I needed to earn my way through the feminine gatekeepers I faced to be allowed to play in their sandbox.  I was petrified when I needed to actually begin to talk one on one with other women. Very early on, I was frightened of their reaction when they learned I was not a cis-gendered woman. This was before I learned my path to womanhood was as valid as theirs. I just came to mine along a different path. Amazingly to me, the doors were opened to me, and I was permitted to play behind the gender curtain.

It was around this time when I began one of the most powerful phases of my life, when I made the correct decision to begin gender affirming hormones, or HRT. I say powerful because the new hormones I was prescribed by a doctor turned out to be everything I dreamed of and more. If anything, else, the hormones proved my whole life was not a phase. Now I felt as if I was arriving home in the deepest sense. If you compared my hormonal life as a circle, I was completing mine. The effects of HRT made me feel whole as a transfeminine woman. I could feel deeper, be more emotional and enjoy the world as never before.

I proved, more than ever before, my life was not a phase, I was much more than just a man putting on a dress. I proved all along I was a woman putting on a male face and clothes all along. At the least, I could rest easily knowing what my gender issue was all along. Not a phase but my life.

 

 

Pride Two

 

Cincinnati Ohio Pride

As you may remember, this is my second post celebrating this years’ LGBTQ Pride month.

To put the day into perspective here in the Cincinnati, Ohio metro area, over two hundred thousand people are expected for Pride today. In addition, in the past month, approximately five smaller Prides have already happened. All that gives you an idea of the extent of Pride which is going on around here alone. Which is impressive when you consider all the effort being put forward by a certain major political party (not called the Democrats) to erase us.

Perhaps the biggest challenge to most Prides is the financial one which is facing the organizers of all sizes of LGBTQ events, due to the DEI restrictions which sent many big potential sponsors scurrying back under their rocks in fear. The good news is that in my hometown of a very conservative Springfield, Ohio, all the way to the big Pride here in Cincinnati, have gone through the extensive process of finding alternative funding and succeeded. Successfully debunking the thought there was no support for the LGBTQ community.

The second big hurdle the organizers of Prides face is finding volunteers from an increasingly shrinking pool of people willing to lend a hand. Plus, threats to the community have played a hand in the shrinking pool of volunteers. Again, I am happy to report that Cincinnati Pride signed up seven hundred volunteers to help. Braving ninety-degree heat and humidity did not help finding volunteers either.

Sadly, I am far beyond my ability to volunteer in any way for any of the area Pride events. My lack of mobility inhibits my ability to make it to the event at all. So, I must participate from afar.

It is also important to me that the “T” or transgender letter which we constantly battle to recognition for, is being seen at Pride. I know, in the beginning of the time I started going to the celebrations, it seemed the Drag queens dominated the scene and there was little to no participation from transgender women and trans men. Over the proceeding years after that I was pleased to see more and more trans people enjoying the day.

In actuality, our celebration on a personal level for Pride should be a year around process. Even if you are still deeply trapped in your closet, in the future, you never know what the future will bring. I am a willing example of having my gender future turn on a dime and I could live my transfeminine dreams.

One way, or another, take the time to pause and think of all the transgender pioneers who have paved a very difficult path for us all. This is your day!

What Did I Miss?

 

JJ Hart at her first Girl's Night Out

Often, I am sad when I see a group of young girls playing. All too often, I wonder what I missed when I was growing up.

I then remember all the times in school when I was forced to play with the other boys and not join the girls’ group to learn what they were up to. Essentially what I missed was the chance to fill out my own gender workbook.

Since I believe women are socialized and not birthed, the early interactions of the girls robbed me of getting a head start towards my own unique womanhood. So, my gender workbook remained mostly blank for years, until I could claim the experiences, I needed to begin to fill it out.

Ironically, as I write about often, the greatest majority of my first interactions with the public came with other women. Then, I did have a chance to start to catch my gender workbook up as the other women indirectly (and directly) shared the pluses and setbacks of their times growing up and passing the gatekeepers into being treated as a woman, not just a female. At the time, I was so afraid of testing out the gatekeepers to see if I could be admitted that I never tried. Instead, I hid my desires, until I was sure I could make it. Still, it was very difficult to make it because of my continued shyness around strangers which was compounded by my transfeminine life. There just were not many like me in the world to pave the way.

As I began to pave the way, I needed to smooth out my journey. First, I had to figure out a way to properly dress my testosterone poisoned body so I could present well as a woman. To do so, I needed to become a regular at all the area thrift stores, as I shopped till I dropped for just the right fashion piece to add to my growing wardrobe. Once I did that, I could continue building my own path to maybe discover what I had missed not growing up as a young girl.

Surprisingly, as I began to be invited to special girls’ nights out, I began to learn I was not missing out as much as I thought. I discovered what I always had thought was true. Takeaway the talk of sports and business which men talk about and add in softer subjects such as family and friends, and I could indeed survive the new world I was in and not sit around like I was a hermit. I needed to hit a middle point of being interested in the conversation and adding in just the right amount of conversation. Such as, I found I could still talk about my daughter and grandchildren and still be relevant to the rest of the group.

What I was doing was skipping ahead in my workbook to sections which would include usage of the women’s restroom. I learned the importance of looking another woman in the eye when I met her because I could on the new side of the gender border I was on. My workbook said I could and should to survive and even thrive. I knew I had made it to some sort of a gender promised land when I was asked by other women to make the “sacred” journey to the rest room.

Even with all this happening, I was still frustrated by all the sections of my workbook which were blank. Deep down, I knew I could never reclaim the early years I had being forced into the male square hole I was in when I knew all along, I should have been in the round female hole. Perhaps the most frustrating part of the whole process was, the more I was forced into the male side, the more I was rewarded into acceptance. I refused to throw away my transfeminine workbook anyway and just hid it during times when I was forced into the Army during the Vietnam War.

For some reason, my workbook always resonated with me as I went through the down times. It was my shining light when I needed it to be. I just overcame the beginning chapters which were missing. My path to womanhood would just have to be different and in many cases more difficult than the average cisgender woman. I had to be better just to survive in a new world I was just learning about since I was not allowed to learn about it early in life. As I watched the other girls around me, often my jealousy grew because I never had the chance to wear pretty clothes or gossip with the other girls.

I learned my gender workbook was fragile too and could be changed or corrected at any time when I had misread certain situations. Which I write about often. I just stored the information away for use later. I am still adding to my workbook to this day.

 

 

Build the Plane before You Fly It.

 

Image from Miquel Angel
Hernadez on UnSplash. 

Early in my life I learned to build my gender plane before I tried to fly it.

When I was simply admiring myself in the mirror, life was easy, or so I thought. I could apply my makeup and put on my mini-skirt and journey to the mailbox, hoping the neighbors would not see me. Through it all, the mirror lied to me and said I looked wonderful even though I did not even have a wig. Even still, I kept going. Mainly because we lived in a very rural area and no one saw my mailbox adventures.

I suppose, during those days, I was merely experimenting with clothes and makeup, the same way any other young girl would do. The problem was, I had no one in my peer group to criticize me and help me to learn what was correct with make-up and fashion and it showed. I was attempting to fly my gender plane before it was fully built. The mirror never did any of it for me. It was simply there to tell me how good I looked.

It was not till much later in life, did I begin to replace the mirror with public feedback when it came to early adventures going out in the world as a transfeminine woman. I vividly remember all the nights I quickly returned home wiping the tears away after being followed by someone and laughed at. Mainly from teenaged girls. Somehow, I needed to keep taking my plane back to the drawing board to attempt to see what I was doing wrong. The good news is, I did begin to figure it out. I was dressing for the wrong gender. Trying to please men, when I should have been trying to please women. Out went the sleazy, ill-fitting clothes. Replaced by more sensible clothes as I did my best to cover my male poisoned body.

It worked as I began to blend into the world, as I gave myself the chance to experience my reality for a change. I was similar to the Wright Brothers during their first flights; I was not going far but I was doing it. During this time, my flights grew dramatically longer. I was finding my way out of the clothing stores where all they cared about was my money, all the way into restaurants where I had to interact with staff on a one-on-one basis. I was discovering how well my plane was built or not. Surely, I was still experiencing my ups and downs, but I was having more of the positive side of life.

The problem was, on my male side, he was still having success in his world with a very successful job. So, he wanted no part of helping to build a new gender plane. I was forced to build around him. Which made for a very shaky foundation. Especially for my already frail mental health. It hurt me deeply when I was flying high and he brought me back to earth with a crash. He even took me as far as an ill-fated suicide attempt.

In the short, and long term, I survived him and continued to build my plane, every time I thought I was done, there was more to do as I studied the nuances of living a transfeminine life. Adjusting to being passive aggressive alone to other women was a big adjustment, not to mention the communication issues I faced in the new world I was in. Other women were very curious about me and wanted to know what I was doing in their world. Very soon, my air space became very crowded with new people, mostly all women.

Many times, starting all over in life became a major challenge for me. I needed my plane to provide me with a better view of what was really happening in my life. I had too many fake, mean people to beware of. Even after all these years, my plane was still very fragile. Before I moved ahead any further, I just had to build in the inner strength I needed to pursue my dream of living fulltime as a transgender woman.

To accomplish my dream, I needed the friends I had found in my new life to do it. I always mention the Liz’s, Kim’s and Nicki’s of the world who helped more than they ever knew. It was all of them who finished building my plane more than I did and I will be forever grateful for them coming together to save me.

Growing up, I built plenty of model cars to look at and even race, but nothing helped me to prepare for the greatest building experience of my life. A gender transformation project which took me decades to complete. In fact, I am still working on it to this day even though I have been fully out for over a decade now. There was more building than I ever thought possible to start all over again with my life.

 

Catching Up

 

JJ Hart, Hot Summer Day.

This morning was a day to catch up and run errands.

Because of the continuing heatwave we are under here in Southwestern Ohio, I needed to get an early start. For example, it is nearly ninety degrees (F) before eleven AM with heavy humidity. So, by early I meant the pharmacy I was going to did not open till nine o clock. Plenty of time for me to have a leisurely morning as I got ready. By getting ready, I did not mean I had to go to any elaborate means to do it. Basically, all I needed to do was shave closely, apply moisturizer, makeup and brush my hair. I figured the least which would happen to me was I would see two different people in drive thru’s.

Of course, I was wrong because my second stop involved an up close and personal interaction with a coffee shop employee who was taking orders outside the window since the equipment had broken down in the heat. It turned out all my built-in paranoia of meeting strangers was unfounded for at least today.

First, the guy at the pharmacy had the personality of a cardboard box and could have cared less about me. And, as far as the girl I interacted with personally with the second drive thru went, she was very nice to me, and I felt as if I was welcome.  Especially since she knew I (assumed) I was transgender. Whatever the case, I felt good as I headed home before the traffic became worse again.

Speaking of going out, my wife Liz and I’s trip up to Dayton, Ohio during the upcoming Fourth of July weekend is rapidly approaching. My daughter is having a graduation celebration for her family. My oldest grandchild graduated from Ohio State last winter and is coming home from hiking the Appalachian trail before she takes a job in Maine this fall. In addition, my youngest grandchild is graduating from high school, and her husband is receiving his MBA. The event is being held outside, so I need to plan accordingly. I have picked a very feminine top to go with leggings and flats so I can be appropriately feminine without going overboard.

It does not seem possible, but the next big event is Liz and I’s big trip to New England in the fall. Just like that, another summer will have gone by. At my age, there is no way I should be wishing time away. As my mom was fond of saying, age is like a roll of toilet paper, the closer to the end you come, the faster it goes. As with most things mom told me, she was right.

It seems, no matter how small the public interactions are, when I am positively impacted, the better my life is. It is like charging up my gender battery. I constantly need it. Such as the positive interaction I had today.

Painting a Picture

 

Image from Vinicus Amix
Amano on UnSplash.

During my life, I have never been accused of being an artist. In fact, I would mess up drawing stick figures.

The best thing I could do was connect dots. Which I needed to do quite often in my gender conflicted life. Basically, the main dots I needed to connect were, was I a boy or a girl. It ended up taking me far too long to finally connect those dots and attempt to draw my gender picture.

When I began to experiment with makeup, I learned the basics of facial artwork and even I could make myself look better in the mirror. Mainly, though, I struggled along until I summoned the courage to request a makeover from a professional makeup person at one of the transgender-cross dresser mixers I went to. He did a miracle job and transformed me into a woman who I only had dreamed of. Most importantly, he was able to explain to me what he was doing in a step-by-step format that even I could understand. I looked so good, I was invited along by the “A” listers, as I called them when they went out to explore other venues after the mixer was over. I even got the last laugh over all of them when a man tried to pick me up in a venue we were in, and they were not.

Sadly, the success I felt from the mixer did not last long when I had to go back to the real world, I was a part of. When I did, I became mean and nasty to my wife and others around me. All the way to almost losing jobs because of my attitude. No way to paint a picture. Somehow, I needed to get better before I self-destructed my life.

I hung on until I did get better when I had the chance to leave my closet more than once a year for Halloween parties. I was aided by the fact that my artwork with makeup and clothes continued to improve until I looked better than some sort of a circus clown in drag. I simply had to if I was ever going to have the chance to live my dream. Through it all, it did occur to me how difficult the process was going to be. I was painting two pictures at the same time, one as a transfeminine woman. One as a successful man. The stress of doing so nearly killed me. Being a man was easier because of all the white male privileges I had gained but being a transfeminine woman felt so exciting and natural when I painted her.

By the time I had gotten this far, I found I had painted myself in a corner. I could see the finish line for a change, while at the same time, I had a wife I loved, a family I loved and a good job to protect as a man. Decisions, decisions were wearing me down. Primarily because it was so frustrating to me to have worked so hard throughout my life to paint two pictures, only to have to finally choose between the two. What I did was let the public choose which picture they preferred. Since my transgender woman had an unfair advantage, she won the contest easily. She got to start all over again and learn from all the mistakes her male counterpart made and go from there. Time and time again, the public picked her.

Putting the finishing touches on my feminine portrait proved to be easier said than done. First, I needed to come out of my closet to what was left of my blood family. I received a 50/50 reception when I was accepted by my daughter and rejected by my brother. By this time both of my parents were deceased. Predictably, both coming out events were scary and quickly resolved. My daughter wondered why she was the last to know while my brother did not have the courage to stand up for me to the rest of his extended family. We have not spoken now in over a decade. Sad but true, he never wanted to see my finished portrait. Conversely, my daughter and I are closer than ever.

But then again, are our portraits ever finished until we die. Shouldn’t we always be making small upgrades the best we can? Plus, age should put us in a better position to do it. Sure, painting two completely different gender portraits at the same time was difficult and at times required tons of skill to keep one hidden. But somehow, I was able to gain the artistic skill to make it happen.

The powerful draw of an overwhelming dream was all the motivation I needed to become a better artist and provide the background I needed to live a life as a transgender woman.

The Biggest Lie

 

Image from Dave Goudreau 
on UnSplash.

Sadly, the biggest lie I’ve ever told in my life regarded my biggest truth.

The lie of course, regarded my gender identity. For simplistic reasons I could say the problem I faced early in life was having a complete lack of information to lean on. It was back before the internet information years, and I thought I was the only boy in the world who wanted to be a girl part of the time.

To compensate for my cross-dressing activities, I was prepared to lie my way through it. If I was ever caught red handed because of leaving lipstick on my fingers. Due to whatever circumstances which were beyond my control and very lucky, I was never caught by my family. Although I always have wondered if my mom somehow knew but hoped my fascination with her clothes was just a phase I would grow out of. The best part was, I never was caught or questioned so I did not have to lie my way out of an ill-advised trip to a psychiatrist. Back in those days, being a transvestite (the term which was used) was a mental illness problem. Not something I wanted to face. So, I hid in fear.

As I weighed the two alternatives, fear or lying, I chose to internalize the fear I was feeling every time I put on feminine clothes. Once again, I was able to put off lying to the one biggest person in my life…myself.

All was well until I was discharged from the Army and returned to civilian life. Once I did, I began to pick up where I had left off with my gender issues. I even went as far as almost telling my first wife who was also in the Army and was being discharged several months after I was, to expect a totally different me when we met again. I was totally thinking of meeting her as my transfeminine self. As much as I secretly wanted to, deep down I knew I was not ready for such a big move, so I hid my feelings again and lied my life away, for a while.

You know what they say about lies, the more you lie, the more you have to. Just to stay above water. Before long, I was drowning in my own personal lie, until I met my second wife. She was much stronger than my first wife who never said anything negative to me at all considering my gender issues. I often thought wife number one would not protest at all if I told her I was leaving for a period of time for sex realignment surgery. She was just too easy, and I divorced her to be with my second wife who also knew of my cross dressing. Which started out good but deteriorated

I say deteriorated because my second wife did all she could to support my growing gender issues until I had outgrown both of us. All of the times she encouraged me to go ahead and rent a motel room and spend the day out as a woman taught me valuable lessons. First and foremost, I could make it in the world as my feminine self after all. Then, the big lies started as I began to go out on my own when my wife was at work, from the house. Which was something I told her I would never do. By doing so, I began to live the biggest lie of all, as I was increasingly aggressive in my attempts to do more and more in the world away from my masculine self.

Naturally, the tailspin I put our marriage into put a strain on both of us. Especially when she caught me going out. When she did, a massive fight would break out for days until somehow an uneasy truce would be called. At times, things would be so bad, my wife told me just be man enough to be a woman. The problem was, I was still lying to myself thinking I could keep my married life balanced with my transfeminine one. I just was not that good a juggler to do it. Again, mainly because I could not face my truth.

Sadly, my second wife passed away before I faced my truth. Being the wise one in the relationship, she knew me better than I knew myself. Pushing me to pay attention to what it really meant to be a woman.

Now I just wish I did listen to her and went ahead and transitioned. Sure, it would have been difficult but living the life we lived was difficult too and I could have started living with a clear conscience. Being the stubborn person that I was, I kept on living a lie until I could take it no longer and finally made the move into a life I could enjoy as a fulltime transgender woman.

By the time I transitioned most of the important friends I had known (including my wife) had passed away. Leaving me alone in the world to carve out a new life in my sixties. It would have been very difficult, but I wish I had listened to my wife and been man enough to be a woman sooner.

 

 

Building Bricks as a Trans Girl

 

Image from Marcus Spiske
on UnSplash. 

If nothing else, my long life has been a series of gender building blocks.

Ironically in my youth I spent hours building small houses with a set of plastic building blocks I was gifted. That was until I discovered the joys of mom’s clothes and began to admire myself in the family’s hallway mirror. Little did I know, from those humble beginnings, I was heading towards building a lifetime of building blocks. Transphobes as well as other assorted bigots were ruining my early days as a transfeminine woman. Which meant I needed to sort through my gender bricks until I could survive.

Very early on, I knew I needed to build a strong closet. To quote a famous “Doors” song, I was a “Rider on the Storm.”  Somedays my storm would be less as my gender dysphoria subsided on others it was unbearable and all I did was think about the next time I could cross dress in front of the mirror. It was on those occasions; the mirror would play tricks on me and tell me I was an attractive woman. I say tricks because on a good day, I had not mastered the art of makeup or fashion. I needed to be persistent in my building blocks because I would never have been successful if I did not. My dream of living a life in a transfeminine world was proving to be much more difficult than I ever imagined.

It turned out my wife was right, I did make a terrible woman until I paid my dues, but I couldn't pay my dues until I built enough gender bricks to be allowed behind the gender curtain to learn the nuances of doing it. One thing I did know was that I was my gender journey of a thousand miles did begin with that single step in front of the mirror. To keep up with my journey, more and more bricks would be needed for me to succeed. Once I was behind that imaginary but so real curtain, I became a complete sponge to be the best transfeminine person I could be. Some days I was thrilled to be where I was and on others, I was scared to death. Building a new life from scratch with very little help proved to be intimidating.

I learned and became better at dodging the barbs and smirks of the haters in the world. I had built enough bricks to replace my old gender closet with a new one which was built to last me. The new closet was good enough to take me to the point where I could authentically begin a new life as a transgender woman. Which meant I needed to be better than the average cisgender woman just to get by.

The women around me who helped me build my new gender fortress were the gate keepers who never knew how much they helped me live my dream. I was able to layer my feminine experience all the way to success.

Little did I know when I was a kid trying on my mom’s clothes for the first time, how far I would need to go to survive. My last adventure turned out to be my best.

 

The Big Risk

 

Image from Joshua Rawson Harris
on UnSplash.

When you jump from one of the main binary genders to the other. In my case of course it meant leaving all my hard-earned male privileges behind and move into a largely unknown world.

The risk was tremendous the farther I went along. Mainly because I was accumulating an increasingly amount of male baggage. Such as family, house and good job. At the same time, I was perfecting my transfeminine appearance, which encouraged me to move forward in the world. To be sure, I was involved in being tested with a double-edged sword. Or which way should I go? I spent many wasted hours trying to obsess over my future, which was still very vague. At that point I did not even know if I could even exist in a fully transfeminine world. On nights I was accepted by the public, gender euphoria told me I could. Then, on the nights I was rejected by the public, I thought there was no way I could ever live my dream, and it would remain just that…a dream. A dream which never would go away. 

Through it all, the idea of risking all my existence remained with me and naturally scared me to my bones. I was hiding away my biggest secret and even though I did internalize it well, it was a drain on my mental health. Which is a side story I tell often because it is something I think more transgender women and trans men can learn from. At least I hope so.

Something else, I don’t think the average person understands about us, is this is not a casual joke to us, and we just cannot stop putting on a dress on a whim. We are ready to risk it all to live an authentic life as our true selves. Free from our closets. The problem was at the end of a day out, most of us must go back to our old unwanted male selves (or female selves for trans men). For me, it was always a heart-breaking experience as I tried desperately to maintain my male façade for my wife and work.  The only alternative I had was to attempt to live part of my life as a trans woman and the other half as a macho man. It tore me up.

The entire process just became worse and worse when I began to carve out an all-new life in a feminine world. The more success I felt, the less I wanted to go back to my old life and began to research the prospect of living my lifetime dream. In fact, all I can remember all I really wanted to be when I was young was, I wanted to be a woman. Which of course, I needed to keep to myself. I was miserable as I felt as if I was the only boy in the world who felt that way. It took me years to learn I was not the only male in the world who wanted to be female and was prepared to take the risk to do it.

I was able to find a couple of real live acquaintances who took the risk, almost, so I could judge what it meant for me if I decided to follow in their footsteps. I say almost because one the transsexual women I knew was a very attractive retired firefighter in Columbus, Ohio and had a very good pension to live on. The other trans woman I knew was even more attractive in her own right and a very accomplished electrical engineer and would always find a job. I had a good job but not one which would carry over to a gender transition. So, I had much more to consider, not to mention neither of the women I mentioned were in a serious spousal relationship and I was. Right in the middle of a twenty-five-year marriage. I would later come to know how similar yet drastically different our transgender community is.

The pressure I was feeling to take the final risk continued to build. Aided by the success I was having in dealing with the public, I was encouraged to take the final risk in my life. At this point, destiny stepped in to show me the way. My two major stopping points were my second wife and what I would do for an income after I transitioned.

My wife tragically died, leaving me with one to speak of to object to me leaving my old life behind and beginning a new one. Then, by that time, I was in reach of being able to retire on early Social Security income plus what I could sell online. In many ways, the lightning did come right before the rain for me and then the sun came out. When it did, I could see my dream life had arrived and I could live how I wanted to.

 

 

 

A Trans Girl in the Arena

 

JJ Hart at a Witches Ball. 

Or, should I say, a scared trans girl in a new arena.

As I started my gender transition from male to female, I truthfully did not have an idea of the complexity of what I was getting myself into. I had closely studied the ciswomen around me for years to try to see what made them tick and how they survived the challenges in their lives. I also learned the hard way; I could only go so far until I was allowed behind the gender curtain.

My first initial shock when I entered the arena of life as a transfeminine person was everyone would be looking at me. Sure, I was used to the fact that all men looked at women and judged them, but I was not prepared for women doing the same thing and even more so. Since I was never the most attractive woman in the room, I did not have to worry about most men giving me a second look. Except those men who desired me for what I was, a transgender woman.

Women were a completely different deal. I found quickly how another woman could look you up and down, and head to toe. Judging me without saying a word. It took me awhile to get over the experience and plan for it. If I was going casual or professional, it did not matter, I needed to be perfect in my presentation. From accessories to shoes, I needed to shine, or blend. In other words, I needed to be better than the average ciswoman to survive in the new arena of life I chose. An arena where everyone noticed who I was or wasn’t.

After the initial shock wore off, I learned that this part of my new transfeminine life was just something I needed to get used to. For the most part, I was used to men shunning me and women showing interest in me because they were curious what I was doing in their world. I ignored the men and concentrated on the attention I was getting from the women because I was learning so much from them about how to survive in the new gender world I was in. Sure, I suffered several bumps and bruises along the way, but I survived and moved forward. Sometimes quickly, sometimes slowly until I found my way.

Being a trans girl in a big arena surely brought on a new set of challenges when I lost all of my male privileges. Such as my right to personal security and my right to express myself to the best of my ability. I was used to being able to scare off most all of potential physical danger as a man, which of course was all lost as a woman and I was nearly attacked several times before I learned. Also, being excluded in conversations simply because of who I was became a common place. Both aspects of my life were something I did not quite bargain for when I entered the new arena I was in.

The nuances of living in a new arena became a common place for me. As I transitioned from cross dresser to full time transgender woman, I knew I was in the right place, and I could see the so-called finish line ahead. Or so I thought.

Now at the age of seventy-five, I can see the finish line but for the most part it has nothing to do with my gender arena. The finish line I am seeing has to do with my own mortality and how my family will remember me. In many ways, I am the unintended role model for my transgender grandchild who is facing an uncertain world. I say unintended because I had nothing to do with my grandchild’s life choices. They (choice of pronouns) are just fortunate in that their parents are so supportive of the life choices they make coming from such a diverse family environment.

I believe we will never stop transitioning in our lives. We keep transitioning all the way to the grave as transgender women and trans men whose families refuse to bury the trans people as their authentic selves. The final battle and insult. The arena never seems to be quiet at all.

At the least I could say, the journey to the gender arena and the successes and failures on how I survived were never boring and not something the average human will ever know. Perhaps, it is part of the reason we have been demonized by a certain political party when most of the population has never met a transgender person. If they ever stepped into our arena and saw our life firsthand. They would know, we are not such monsters after all, just average people trying to make it in the arenas we chose.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A Trans Girl and her Hair

 

JJ Hart and Mega Hair. Most of
it is tied up behind my head.

Certainly, one aspect of life transgender women share with cisgender women is the love of their hair.

Very early in my life and for years following, like so many novice cross dressers, I had no access (financial or otherwise) to buying a wig, nor did my mom wear one. I was stuck wearing a towel around my head and imagining I had beautiful flowing hair.

I needed to wait until my college years before I could afford to buy a wig, which supposedly was for my fiancé who I desperately wanted to not like it. To me, it was long blond, thick and beautiful, and I couldn't wait to try it on. I was still firmly in the closet to her in those days, so I needed to figure out an excuse to wear it.

Finally, I could not take the pressure any longer and came out of my closet to her and asked her to dress me head to toe as a woman with (you guessed it), that beautiful hair to finish off my outfit. As it turned out, that one day of satisfaction of cross dressing would come back to haunt me later. To make a long story short, she held my gender issues against me and threatened to leave me if I did not tell the military draft board, I was gay when they came after me during the Vietnam War. We broke up when I refused her demands and fortunately, I got to keep the wig. Years later, I found I received the better end of the deal.

After I was discharged from the military, I did have the financial resources to purchase more wigs and was able to be successful on occasion when I did not simply try to buy the longest hair in the wig shop, I went to. I normally traveled at least fifty miles to get to a quality venue to purchase a new wig. I was obsessed with my hair; it was the crowning glory of all the work I put into my fashion and makeup. As with many other aspects of learning to blend in with the other women around me, I took the wig obsession too far. I was beginning to be involved with the public far too often to change wigs every day. They were beginning to know me looking a certain way and I needed to stay on course to carve out a niche as the new transfeminine person I wanted to be. My clown wigs, as I called them, went into a storage bin, only to be seen again on Halloween…maybe.

The biggest jump from there came when I started to grow an amazing amount of my own hair when I started gender reaffirming therapy or HRT. The prescribing doctor told me that I would grow a lot of hair, and he was right. He noticed at the age of sixty, I had no signs of male pattern baldness which I carry over to this day.

Another person who noticed my hair was my daughter and for my first birthday following coming out to her, she offered me a trip to her upscale beauty salon for a color and style of my new hair which was all mine! Naturally, I was scared to death to go but the experience opened so many doors for me. The main door was the understanding of why so many women make a priority of going to a hairdresser to look good. As I soaked up the atmosphere at the salon, I thought I could skip my daily dosage of estradiol tablets I was on at the time were not needed because of all the estrogen in the air. Even though I was still frightened, I still loved it as I was the center of attention for my hairdresser and my daughter who was hovering nearby.

From that point onward, wigs were in my past and I needed to concentrate on my own hair. An immediate problem was I couldn't see the back of my head and did not have a wig head to rely on to turn the hair around and see the back. It did not take me long to master the art of holding another mirror up, catching the reflection in the main mirror so I could see the back of my head. Initially, I compared it with seeing the dark side of the moon.

I know my experience with hair turned out to be very lucky in my world of genetics. While I did not have to put up with expensive wigs, going to a hairdresser is certainly not cheap. Plus, for me at least, I think the ability to go without wigs was one of the most important aspects of me presenting well as a woman.

Maybe it was karma making up for all those years I had to have short hair, when I was finally allowed to grow it out. Whatever the case, I share with women everywhere, trans or not, the importance of having good hair. Plus, you can still have great hair with your wigs, if anyone asks if it is your own hair, you can truthfully answer, yes! I bought it.

 

Jumping Through Hoops

 

Image from Jennifer Mela444
on UnSplash. 

The more involved I became in the transfeminine world, the more I found myself jumping through hoops. Many times, in my heels.

It seemed, every time I became comfortable enough in my transgender womanhood, something would come along to set me back. Sadly, most of my setbacks came at the hands of my deceased second wife. She was accepting me as a cross dresser but recoiled and drew a line in the sand when it came to any idea, I was transgender and wanted to move forward to gender affirming hormones. As much as I wanted to argue (or plead) my case, she still said she did not want to be married to a woman.

It was my fault I did not have the courage to tell her she already was married to a woman. Like it or not. So, since I lacked the courage to follow my gender instincts, I did the worst possible thing and tried to hide all my activities such as leaving the house dressed as a woman. One of the things I promised I would never do. But, as hard as I tried to hide it, she always would somehow catch me coming home when I was cutting my time away too closely. To save what was left of our twenty-five-year marriage, I went as far as seeking therapy. I went to therapy mainly to provide my wife with an idea I was jumping through another hoop to save our relationship.

I have therapy to thank for helping me to strengthen my mental health, but my wife never knew it was not helping our marriage. In fact, one therapist even told me she could do nothing about my desire to be a woman at all. Leaving me with no hoop to jump through at all, and I would have to find another way. In the meantime, I knew just sitting around the house admiring myself in the mirror was not going to cut it in any way. Once I had jumped the hoop and was successful in the public’s eye, there was no way I could ever go back to my old life.

Deep down I knew, I had to keep pushing forward as I set gender goals for myself such as taking the giant step of leaving the gay bars and seeing if I could be accepted in sports bars. When I found out I could, I was ecstatic and kept on going. However, through it all, jumping through hoops was never easy as I kept on doing stupid things such as overextending the water-balloon breast forms I made in my pre-silicone days. Of course, I had one of them break and created a mini flood at one venue I was a regular in. As I said, I needed to very quickly upgrade to silicone breast forms to prevent any future disasters. I had enough other problems to worry about. Such as, what was the new person I was creating be like.

Suddenly, I was beginning to understand when my wife called me the pretty, pretty princess and told me being a woman was more than just looking like one. Most importantly, I was in the middle of learning exactly what she told me. When I was going to my venues and socializing as a transgender woman, I was jumping all the hoops I needed to get by. More precisely, I was learning the layered life a woman lives when men think they are running the show. On more than a few nights, I became so tired of jumping hoops, I just gave up and headed home exhausted.  Along the way, I was facing passive aggression from ciswomen who really resented my presence at all. I learned to leave the other women behind and move on to people who at the least did not dislike me. Life was too short to waste it on bigots and haters.

Tragically, my wife passed away before she was around to meet the new and improved me. It would have been interesting to see if she recognized I took her up on her advice. I tool a crash course on her instructions that a woman was far more than appearance. My period of exploration was intense and to the point and I could deflect my future any longer. I needed to take it upon myself to finally achieve my lifelong dream of living a transfeminine life.

My hoops became so much more real than the earrings I was wearing. I was finally in the process of paying my dues my wife had talked about. What she never told me was, I would have to be allowed behind the feminine gender curtains to really could do it. One led to the other and while it was never easy, similar to jumping all the hoops I needed to jump, I made it. Heels and all.

 

Here we Go Again

 

Image from Pau Casals on UnSplash.

A very short and sour post coming up:

Here we go. The convicted orange felon and his minions in Washington, DC, are in my life once again. For those you who don’t know, I am a Vietnam Era veteran who is under VA medical care.

Now, in addition to staff cuts, he has given permission to Veteran’s Administration doctors and presumably other personnel to not treat transgender patients. According to the “Guardian” here is how the unhinged executive order reads:

“While medical staff are still required to treat patients regardless of race, color, religion, or sex, new rules at the VA have explicitly removed protections based on political party affiliation, marital status, and national origin, The Guardian reported Monday. Huh? The staff is required to treat me, but they are not going to if I am trans or a democrat?

To be clear, in my long time VA medical care history, I have yet to be discriminated against in any way because I am transgender. I would hate to see that change just because the incompetent head bigot wants it to.

What I will never understand is what a total crazy man is doing in my life trying to ruin it. He has no business doing it. I guess what frustrates me the most are the transgender women I know who voted for him. Saying he would not be that bad. Well, he is, and I hope you are satisfied.

Maybe he needs his diaper changed more often since his birthday military parade was such a failure. And he decided to take it out on veterans everywhere who had faithfully served their country. Which is more than he ever did.

I better end this post now before I get into more trouble than I ever thought possible.

 

Making Gender Decisions

 

JJ Hart

Living my truth as a novice transgender woman proved to be more than I bargained for.

Like many of you, I started innocently enough as I rummaged through my mom’s clothes for anything I thought would fit me. Too soon, I found I had fallen in love with the feel of feminine clothes such as undergarments and panty hose. The biggest problem I quickly encountered was the buzz I felt when I cross dressed in front of the mirror just did not last. In the space of a couple days, I yearned to repeat the process of doing my best to look like a girl, repeatedly. I did not know it then, but my mind was attempting to tell me I was transgender and not a cross dresser. In those days, the transgender word was years away from being used or understood.

When I finally reached the age to go out on my own, the mirror remained my best friend. All the way to the point of going places where I could enjoy seeing my transfeminine reflection. I would even go to the big home improvement stores to check out their mirror selection when in fact, I was checking me out and reinforcing my feminine image in my mind. Finally, even my simple search for gender acceptance proved to be too much to take on a regular basis. I needed the public to be my reflection which mattered the most. Or I began to interact with more clerks and servers on a one-on-one basis to see their reactions. The more I explored, the more confident I became, and life became so much easier. In fact, too easy.

The first main discovery I made was the fact that women were much more interested in me than men. It did not matter, if the woman was a clerk, a server or a stranger off the street, they all seemed to share a curiosity of why I was in their world. Many times, there was too much curiosity going around on both sides, I was as curious about them as they were about me. It was about this time when I began to really live my truth as a transgender woman. I always reasoned too, more than a few strangers were drawn to me for that precise reason. They knew I was living my truth. Certainly, there were haters and bigots along the way, but not enough to slow me down. I ended up learning to stay clear of them very effectively.

Confidence was always my key as I learned to live my truth. I knew I was transgender and anyone who paid close attention at all to me, knew I was also. With that out of the way, we could get down to real life and very soon the typical stranger realized I was not the normal cross-dresser they saw on television on one of the many talk shows. I was real and not evil in any way. It worked with other women I encountered and almost never did with any men. So, I was satisfied with my results. I was kicked out of the men’s club and that was the way I wanted it. I guess you could say I was in some sort of a new layered gender reality as I tried to live my new truth.

I would be remiss if I did not bring up how intensely difficult all of this was to the progress of my mental health therapy. Per norm, my therapist said it best when she told me there was nothing, she could do about my wanting to be transfeminine. If I wanted to enough, I would make the sacrifice to do it. All my visits were pointless until I faced my own gender reality. My excuse continued to be, leaving my male life with all the comforts of the privilege I had built up was very risky, so I continued to put it off until it was almost too late and I tried suicide as a solution.

Naturally, the attempt did not work, because I am here writing attempting to help others with similar gender issues as mine. I learned I wanted to live and needed to make the right choice with my life to do it. I was stubborn and waited until the age of sixty to make the change from living a partial male life to a full time female one. All the lessons I absorbed along my long gender journey came back to help me in my final decision. I still remember vividly, when I sat alone and decided to donate all my male clothes to thrift stores and give up my male life forever. A tremendous weight immediately came off my shoulders and I knew I had made the right decision.

 

 

 

 

Father's Day

 

Image from Tim Mossholder
on UnSplash.

Father’s Day always brings about a set of conflicting emotions in me.

First, I remember my dad. He was a powerful figure in my life. He was a part of the “greatest generation”, served in WW II, survived the great depression and ended up being a self-made man. He ended up eventually building his own house from the ground up and retired as a vice-president of a bank he worked at for years.

The conflict came in when it came to expressing any emotions to his family. Primarily he was shy in expressing anything to my younger brother and I. He was a strong provider but a weak father figure in many ways. I think now, he was doing the best he could with what he had to work with. His generation could only give so much.

As fate would have it, my brother and I were able to overcome dad’s lack of emotional leadership or guidance. We both were very hands-on in how we raised our children. I have a daughter, and he has two sons to raise. Any of you who are regulars around here know how fortunate I am to have a very diverse and acceptable daughter. I must have done something right when I raised her.

Here is an example of what she has done to accept me over the years. From day one, when I was scared to death to come out to her by blurting out, I was transgender. She responded by doing several things including a shopping trip (which I turned down) all the way to inviting me on a trip to her upscale beauty salon which I accepted, my mantra became when I was scared to do something, go ahead and do it. Because of the amount of fear I felt on the day I went to the salon to have my long hair colored and styled.

Now here is the part of the story with my daughter gets a little messy with some folks. When I first transitioned, I went from Father’s Day to “Parent’s Day” which was fine with me. Then, suddenly, my kid started to honor me on Mother’s Day with no prompting from me. Initially, I was too embarrassed to accept such an honor but when I received the same honor from my wife Liz’s son, it stuck with me.  

  In addition to be so honored, my daughter had worked with me to pick a new legal name which would be easy for the grandkids (three) to grasp and remember. In a short period of time, I came up with a new name which was a throwback to family names of the past I had admired. My parents had given my male name as a tribute to the doctor who successfully delivered me. They had gone through three still births before me and were ready to give up and adopt a child until I came along. The problem was that my dead name was going to be very difficult to feminize so I went in an entirely different direction.

What I chose, with the input of my daughter, was to slightly feminize my maternal grandfather’s name and use it as my first name. Then, for my middle name, I chose my middle name as my mom’s first name when I buried my hatchet with her and honored her for all she did for me. If she is up in the sky looking down on me now, I wonder what she would think about my life now. Which has nothing to do with Father’s Day.

I would have chosen part of my dad’s name if it had been possible. His two names (like mine) would be too difficult to femininize. No chance for Charley to be changed to Charlene is an example. My point is that I don’t want to underrate the effort dad put into being my father. As I said, I have forgiven him because of the tools of fatherhood he received did not live up to my expectations. I guess through it all, I knew he loved me in his own way

Even though I have been removed from the Father’s Day agenda and moved into an arena I never thought possible, I still appreciate all I was given to me by my dad, even though he is long departed, he never knew he had a daughter not a son. I never had the courage to bring up the subject to him before he caught dementia and passed away. I labor under some sort of an idea he may have accepted me, unlike my mom.

Sadly, throughout the transgender world, so many trans children are never accepted by their parents. Leading the way to higher rates of transgender suicide.

Whatever is the case for you, I hope you have a great Father’s Day.

 

 

A New Day

 

JJ Hart, Dining Out. 

This post is a little shorter than the recent ones I have posted but no less important and it involves last night's trip to a restaurant venue we always go to.

It seems, every day is always a new day for me. Last night, my wife Liz met her son for dinner at our favorite restaurant where we dine approximately every other week.

As luck would have it, since the venue is large, we have had the same server several times before. About three visits ago, I wore my new Margaritaville T-shirt I bought during our winter trip to the Florida Keys. Even though I thought it was appropriate to drink a Margarita when our regular server promptly called me the dreaded “sir” word. Sadly, my Jimmy Buffett Margaritaville shirt was not feminine enough for me to pass the gender test. So, I needed to relegate it to just wearing around the house. I was sad.

Last night was different. I wore one of my most feminine lace trimmed tops and our regular server seemed a little gender confused but did not call me “sir” and I was satisfied. Also, one of my favorite things about the venue is I never had any problems with being mis-gendered by anyone. I could just relax and be myself. It was one of the first venues where I could sit and ponder the old days when I struggled to exist as a transgender woman at all. I was revitalized every time I went. Which made it a new day.

In many ways the process taught me how far I have come in living my gender dream, but in so many ways can not give up or relax the process. Even though I don’t wear a lot of makeup, I need to make sure I wear the basics every time I face the public. No pun intended. The moment I let my guard down; I could be reverted to the “sir” word I worked so hard to put behind me.

In many ways, when I transitioned from a cross dresser to full time transgender woman, I knew every day would have to be the new normal for me. There would be no more planning ahead three days or so for the special days when I could face the public as a transfeminine woman. I would be doing it every day. I went into a major wardrobe expansion mode. Just to keep up being in a new gender world. As soon as I dropped my guard at all, I would risk slipping back into the world I waited so long and worked so hard to get out of. Fortunately, I was very paranoid about doing it and I was able to translate my fear into positive feelings about what I was trying to do.

There were many steps backwards on my journey to discover how uplifting and pleasurable my life could be at the age of sixty when I seriously began my transition. The longer I was able to live this new life, every day turned out to be exciting and I was less vulnerable to outside threats to going back to my ingrained old male life. Eventually, life took care of itself as I found new friends and part of my family accepted me. I was able to live long enough and escape the self-destructive behavior I exhibited. Life was just a huge circle, and I was on the slippery side of the circle. I could risk everything to selfishly live my life and make everyday a new one. Or stay the same and wither away.

Naturally, making every day a new day was a challenge. Waking up every day addressing a new life was all I asked for and all I ultimately received. It was who I really was and proved to be a wonderful overall experience of gender transition.