Prom Time

 

Image from Amy Kate
on UnSplash

I graduated from high school way back in 1967 and where I went to school in Ohio, going to prom was a big deal.

I was very shy and as it turned out my junior year in high school prom was my first date with a girl ever. I didn't even really ask my date out, it was pre-arranged by her friends who knew she did not have a date nor did I. So I was set up for success. 

Of course success for me was scary. I had no idea how I could ever spend an entire evening with a girl. What would I say? How would I even communicate? The only real interactions with girls were with my Mom. All others just seemed to be up on a far away pedestal I had invented. Then my gender issues came crashing in to make my problems even larger. All I really knew was deep down inside, I wanted to be the one wearing the pretty fancy gown rather than the restrictive monkey suit called a tuxedo. Worse yet, I had to spend my own hard earned money to rent a tux. 

It turned out renting the tuxedo was only the beginning of my expenditures. I was fortunate at the time to have had a very well high school paying job so my parents did not have to contribute much to my initial adventure with a girl. In order to go all out for the evening, tradition was the guy paid for nearly everything from flowers, to dinner at a supper club, to tickets to the after prom which was a way to spend the entire night out. What I didn't factor in was how much my date had to spend on finding a dress, having her makeup and hair done and of course locating matching shoes. All of the processes the girl went through for prom to me felt like a labor of love to me I couldn't have waited to try. 

My date's parents were doctors so Dad even went the extra mile and let me borrow his car for the evening. Needless to say, I was scared to death in my tux when prom time approached. Somehow I managed not to blurt out anything stupid when I was introduced to my date and let her Mom put the corsage on for me on my date's spaghetti strapped gown which I loved and told her so. Just didn't happen to mention just why I loved her dress so much as I wondered how it would look on me. Fortunately, we were meeting another couple for dinner, so I didn't have to feel so stressed about carrying any sort of a conversation myself. So far so good, my first date was coming off without a hitch and ironically I was able to experience some sort of transgender revenge when I went to the old supper club when it became a gay venue. I was there one night and was able to use the women's room completing some sort of gender circle in my mind.

By the time my senior year rolled around, I was a seasoned prom pro and ended up going to two proms in one night. Since I was dating a girl who went to a competing high school, we decided to go to both proms. I even drove my own car since she was familiar with it and I didn't have worry about asking my Dad for his car. Overall, I managed to have a good time since I wasn't so frightened of the whole experience. For the rest of my life, my prom experience was over. For better or for worse. 

Probably, my parents were relieved I was finally dating girls. I on the other hand wasn't doing anything to relieve my gender dysphoria. I still wanted to be my girlfriends and live their lives. My cross dressing tendencies continued all the way until I was drafted into the military and had to stop for obvious reasons. By this time, I had more to worry about than how I looked as a girl. I was looking at surviving college so I could stay out of Vietnam as long as I could.     

Today I see the young high schoolers seem to view proms as less structured affairs than we did so long ago. It's all for the best.

A Toxic Male?

Image from Jurien Huggins
on UnSplash.

As I transitioned from a male to a feminine life, I often looked back at my life as a guy to determine if indeed I was a toxic male in any way. 

Of course I immediately mentally recoiled when I thought I could be toxic towards women in any way. After all I had spent a considerable amount of time worshipping the women around me, wondering how it would be to experience just for an instance being a girl. How come I couldn't wear the pretty clothes and be the gender who was so admired by the other. The problem with me was, I went way past just admiring a girl sexually, all the way to wanting to be a girl physically.  

Did any of it make me a toxic male? No, I don't think it did. In fact, I think the opposite happened as I put women up on some sort of an impossible pedestal. By doing so, and adding the fact I was extremely shy, I never had much of a chance to interact with girls or women growing up at all. From my perspective, the feminine grass always looked so much greener. 

Since I was forced into the male camp, I needed to learn to exist and had to put up with sexist comments directed towards women from many of the guys I grew up with all the way to adult hood. Mixed in too were the bullies I needed to somehow co-exist with. I learned to bluster my way around the bullies without jeopardizing my inner transgender self to ridicule or worse. In order to do so, I participated in as many of the male activities of the day as I could such as sports and cars. It worked and I was left alone for the most part and I even dated a few girls along the way. Since it is prom season around here, I am always reminded of the two proms I went to in high school. Even though I was the perfect gentleman at the proms, I wonder if my dates thought perhaps I was a little too timid and took it personally. I will never know because one of my dates and first serious girlfriend before college later in life committed suicide years later when her husband left her. What a shame. 

As I started college and started to date more regularly, I really began to see the results of toxic males around me. Especially in the fraternity setting I was briefly in. Certain fraternities were expected to co-mingle and party with certain women and sororities only where I went to college. I found out very quickly I did not fit in with the frats social system. Which was a forerunner to me not fitting in with the strict layers I encountered at the first cross dresser - transvestite mixers I went to. I felt so out of place and the only toxic people I saw were the "A" listers who were doing their best mean girls high school impressions. Maybe their male toxicity was bleeding through. 

I completely learned how not to be a toxic male when I settled into a career in the restaurant business. Along the way, as I progressed into higher management positions, I needed to coexist increasingly with women. Both crew members and managers. I learned quickly female crew members had the tendency to build cliques (not teams like the men) to be successful and the women managers I knew had to be tough but fair to survive. I on the other hand needed to be on their side when it came to battling any toxic males at all. Looking back, I think male toxicity was the prime reason for letting someone go. Which included sexual harassment which is a topic for another blog post.

My only regret was I wasn't a more vocal advocate for women my entire life as a man. I could have certainly spoken up when another guy joked about a woman. My only excuse is I was so intent on hiding my interior feminine self, I was afraid to do more. Transgender women and trans men speak of the importance of allies speaking up for us. I feel the same way about standing up for women before I transitioned. 

One Gender Size does Not fit All

Image from Grae Phillips 
on Geraldo television show.

 If the truth be known, all the way back when I was a kid struggling to understand what gender I was on any given day, I would have been known as gender fluid. 

Of course, gender fluid was a term which hadn't been invented yet. Anyone who was interested in cross dressing was branded as being a transvestite and even worse labeled as being mentally ill. In the middle of my gender vacuum, even I knew well enough I was not mentally ill just because I wanted to wear makeup and dresses. I hid my desires and hoped for the best, which mostly came when I was left alone to cross dress and admire myself in the full length hallway mirror at home. Most of all, I was trapped and could do nothing about it. Keep in mind, all of this was happening in the information "dark ages" before the internet and social media. The gender underground I was interested in came mainly from the pages of Transvestia Magazine and Virginia Prince. Even I knew the pages of the "National Enquirer" and other predecessors of Faux News who sensationalized cross dressers were not to be trusted.

Then came the barrage of so called reality television talk shows including, Donahue, Springer and Raphael. All of whom seemed to be pushing the theme of cross dressing husbands Except for the impossibly beautiful and talented "Grae Phillips" who put everyone else to shame. All of these shows probably did little or no good for my gender dysphoria except for publicizing the fact there were cross dressers of transvestites of all kinds at all. All I knew was I desperately tried to watch or tape every show I knew was coming up from my "TV Guide". My wife was trying to tape her soaps and I was trying to tape my talk shows and both kept us busy. Even though I still had to watch my shows in private attempting to learn anything I could about the outside world.

I did learn once again. my gender size was unique and did not fit all. In fact, I still felt out of place when I started to attend my first cross dresser - transvestite mixers here in my native Ohio. I discovered there were so many different levels of participation from transsexuals headed for gender surgeries down to the weekend cross dressing hobbyists.  For some reason, I was not part of either group and once again my gender size was not fitting in. The problem was, all of this happened before the transgender terminology was introduced. When it was and I started to have access to my first computer, I was able to research the term which was unknown to me. Suddenly I knew what had been missing my whole life, a gender size which fit me and I set out to discover more about being transgender. For me, it meant being part of a gender description which was somewhere in-between the spaces I had been in previously.

Even though my gender size did not fit all, finally I was able to locate my own niche to thrive in. Life became fulfilling, scary and exciting at the same time. I found out I was fine being who I was all along and it felt so natural. I was home. 

Tenacity of the Transgender Tribe

From the Jessie Hart Archives. I am
in the middle of two friends.

It's no wonder so many women don't trust a transgender woman's desire to play in their sandbox. In my case, it took me years to understand what my second wife was trying to tell me about being accepted as a woman in any form. It took more than just appearing convincingly as a woman to come closer to being one. I was far away from paying my dues and for the most part, she was against me doing it. So, I needed to step out on my own to discover the world on my own. Thanks to all the years of practice in front of the mirror with my makeup and fashion, I had a fairly good basis to work from as far as my appearance was concerned. The only real problem I had was living through my faux fashion adolescence when I tried and failed to dress as a teen girl. Once I made it through that point, I was able to blend in with other women  my age and discovered I had an easier time in the world.

The more I explored, I found I needed more and more tenacity to reach my goal of learning what living the life of a transgender woman could or would be like. At this point the true struggle began. Just learning how to communicate with other women on their level turned out to be the main problem. I learned the hard way women communicate on more levels than verbal ones and often say things of a passive aggressive nature such as, you look good...for a man dressed as a woman. Or they were just trying to find out what you were doing in their world. On too many occasions as I was learning my way around the sandbox, I ended up suffering serious claw marks up my back. Another way to put it might be to equate the acceptance process with trying to jump on a moving merry-go-round and claim the prize without doing any of the work such as having periods. Rejection was not rare. 

It was on nights such as those, I went home in tears wondering if my whole transgender dream was worth it. On those occasions, something told me it was and my tenacity kicked in. Even with more explorations to do. I just had to continue until I got it right. Finally I did and I moved along to adding gender affirming hormones or HRT to my list of exploring ways to better femininize myself. Perhaps then and only then did other women see I was paying my dues to be admitted to their world. I had the tenacity. 

As I reach the age of seventy five, I think now, more than ever before in recent history the tenacity of the transgender tribe of women and men is being tested. Here in my native Ohio, the gender bigots in the state legislature are once again trying to push anti-transgender restroom bills in the statehouse. Hopefully, once again, more rational minds will rise up and reject the measure. If not, I wonder how the whole law will affect me using the restroom which matches my transgender status in the future. Needless to say, I am scared.  I mean how will such a law even be enforced if I am just trying to go to the bathroom. I don't want to even know. All I do know is I won't go back to using men's bath rooms after more than a decade using the women's room. 

Finally, what the bigots don't realize is, the trans tribe has been around forever and is not going away. We just need to move forward as a group to fight. Once the bigots see we are not going away, they will have to find someone else to harass and our tenacity will prevail. 

Transgender Pressure Cooker

Image from Jeshoots.com. 

When someone writes or says something about me being a transgender woman being a choice, I have to laugh. 

I'm sure those of you who have gone through life the way I have with gender issues would agree. Primarily because we have given up so much to cross the gender frontier. Primarily, I am referring to losing family, spouses, employment and gender privileges to transition. Just losing male privileges alone is a major issue. Very quickly I discovered I lost a portion of my intelligence when by accident I became involved in a conversation with several men. I found I was not respected in their world until I finally got tired of being ignored and left the group. Then I began to not speak much until I was spoken to until I began to gain more confidence. 

When I began to be successful, the pressure to be even better as a transgender woman started to increase. For several reasons, my fragile mental health became worse as I started to try to live a life situated between the two main primary genders. In other words, I was stuck in a gender fluid universe I did not want to be in. Living one day as a man and the next as a transgender woman, nearly killed me.  It became so bad I needed to make a conscious effort daily determining what gender I was going to be that day. How was I walking and talking were just a few of the many gender considerations I was going through as the pressure kept increasing. 

All of a sudden, I was able to establish a whole new identity as a trans woman. I was talking to other women and building a small circle of friends which taught me so much about the world I so much wanted to be a part of. I kept going because the process became so natural to me and very soon the main source of pressure came from having to return to what was left of my male life. Even thinking about going back caused me stress and added pressure. 

Finally, I knew I had no way around it and never really had a choice with my life. As a gender therapist told me so many years ago, there ultimately would be no choice for me if I was a transgender woman. Sadly I did not believe her and stubbornly went on to fight a losing gender battle for years before I gave up and faced my gender reality. By doing so, I tried very self destructive measures including suicide and excessive alcohol abuse before I started to live my truth. 

I had no choice and needed to give up all the pressure I felt to transition into a feminine world before it all literally killed me. Thank goodness for all the friends and family I had who helped me through my difficult pressure packed days. The more good days I had with them led to my belief I could live my gender truth full time. Ultimately transitioning was similar to sliding down a hill towards a steep cliff for me. I had others around me who took the pressure off and made the landing a soft one.  

Gender Euphoria

My wife Liz on the left
From the Jessie Hart archives.

Sadly, gender euphoria is too rare for most transgender women and trans men.

For too many of us (including me) gender dysphoria rules the life.  Throughout my life when I get up in the morning to begin my day, a quick look in the mirror tells me I am living my external gender as yet another day as a guy and my gender dysphoria sets in. I describe my gender dysphoria as being a deep seated issue caused by my desire to live as my authentic feminine self. From then on my day is set on how it will go.

However, every now and then something comes along to reassure me I am doing the right thing with my life. It could be as little as my wife Liz referring to me as "she" all the way to a server calling Liz and I "ladies" at dinner when we eat out. Whatever the case, gender euphoria is brief and dysphoria is always lurking in the background. 

I think part of the problem is all the difficulty I experienced as I followed the path to living my transgender dream. In the days when I just considered appearance as my number one feminine dream, of course there were always plenty of other women (trans or cis) to compete with because they were far more attractive than me. My impossible dream was to do the best I could to survive in a sometimes brutal world as a novice cross dresser or transgender woman. Initially, I made the mistake of attempting to dress sexily to validate myself in the world. All too often, my attempts came off as trashy or even clownish. Plus, one night my wife had to rescue me from a huge man at a party who had pinned me against a wall in a narrow hallway. In no way was there any gender euphoria or feminine validation involved that night. Just my wife reprimanding me for not taking better care of myself ahead of time. Not to mention, she hated what I wore. In my mind, I was trying to keep up with the beautiful transsexual women who were there also.

Through it all, I managed to have enough moments of pure gender euphoria to keep my gender dreams alive. Very early on all the visits to mall and women's clothing stores provided me with positive one and one feedbacks with the clerks to think I was doing everything right as a novice feminine cross dresser. It took me many years to realize, the clerks were mostly nice to me because of my money. Years later, after I came out to my daughter, she told me of her days working at Victoria's Secret when the occasional man would come in shopping for lingerie in his size. Other clerks would refuse to wait on him but my daughter did and pocketed the commission. I could have been green and most of the clerks would have still liked me.

My mall days continued my gender euphoria to an extent I never thought possible. I used to go to the up-scale malls in the area in my very best business professional fashions. Including a very stylish black jumpsuit I loved with my black heels and blond wig. It seemed I never had any problems and my euphoria soared along with my confidence. Sadly, I normally found a way to push the so called envelope too far and get rejected in the world and my gender dysphoria would set in again.

It wasn't until I began gender affirming hormones did I reach the point of no return in my male to female gender transition. Regardless of what happened to me, negative or positive, I needed to attempt to move forward towards my dream. Happily, the feminine hormones improved my exterior image. My skin softened, my hair grew and my facial angles softened which made my whole presentation easier to do, since I needed to do it every day. 

Even with all the help. I still have the dysphoria/euphoria battle with the mirror every morning. Sometimes I win the battle, sometimes I lose but most importantly, I have learned neither aspect of my appearance should rule my day. Nothing is as good or bad as it seems.

Thanks to all of you who join me for my experiences! I appreciate you taking the time to stop by and even comment. It all means the world to me.

The Trans Process

Image from the 
Jessie Hart
Archives

Even though I write often concerning wanting to be a girl over the hated boy I had no choice over, the process just wasn't that clear cut.

I mean I didn't wake up one morning thinking Hey! I want to be a girl instead of the boy I was made to be. It was a process. The whole deal was beginning a sixty year (plus) gender journey. The path began innocently I thought,  with explorations through my mom's clothes and makeup to see what I could fit into and how I could look. At many points on the path I needed to process which stop signs I would obey and which forks in the path I should follow. It is important to note, not all paths were successful and I needed to backtrack many times. In fact, some of the stop signs I ran resulted in dismal failures and I needed to gather myself, get back to my cross dressing drawing board and get back in the game.

Often I wonder why I tried so hard to trust the process and try even harder on key issues I was facing such as my presentation. The answer is actually fairly simple. When I pursued and trusted the transgender process at every turn, the more natural I felt. I somehow knew deep down I was on the right path even though I had made some mistakes when I followed it. 

One of the important points to note is, no one sees the trans process, they just see the end result. You will get no passion points from most people who were not present when you were struggling as a novice cross dresser with your appearance or how you walk or talk. They weren't there to see the tears you shed when you failed or to be much of a peer influencer when you failed in your mind. Fortunately, the world has changed slightly in our favor with plenty of makeup tutorials and even entire chains of makeup stores to help us all survive in the world. But even still, all they see is you. No matter if the final product is the final product at all.

The disconcerting fact concerning the trans process is, it never seems to give up. Even in the final stages of our lives we face severe challenges to simply living as our authentic selves. Examples include being forced into a non forgiving assisted care living facility. As we know, it only takes one uncaring care giver to make a life miserable for an LGBT person. This extends all the way until death when gender bigoted family members refuse to honor our final gender wishes.

I suppose the most positive way to look at a lifetime of following the trans process is...at least it was never boring. All the times I was excited, yet petrified to follow my path will go down as some of the best and worst times of my life. 

Even though I have often questioned why I was somehow chosen to live as a transgender woman. Deep down I knew I had no choice.

Being Better

Photo from the 
Jessie Hart
Collection

Always attempting to be better than the next person was always part of my life. 

Nothing I did was ever good enough for my parents. If I received "B's" in a school course, my grade should have been an "A". If I made sports team, why wasn't I a starting player? These were just a few examples of how life went. I can't ever remember hearing an encouraging comment like way to go from my parents. Similar to so many other aspects in life, I figured it was normal and went on. Little did I know how being better would come back to haunt me later in life.

As I doubled down on my cross dressing efforts again I found nothing I did was good enough. The main problem I had was I was always playing catch up to the other women. They all benefitted from growing up around a peer group which judged them with basics such as makeup and wardrobe. Of course I needed to learn all of it on my own. 

Perhaps one of the most frustrating aspects of the entire transgender process was not only did I need to learn the appearance process on the fly (with no help), when I ended up going out in public, in order to survive I had to be better than the women around me. Perhaps one of the bigger compliments I ever received from my second wife came when she actually asked me to help her with her makeup one night when we were going out. Although she never said it, I knew I had somehow arrived in her eyes as a person who knew her way around makeup. 

It turned out, I was only scratching the surface. Before I utilized the benefits of hormone replacement therapy to grow my own hips and breasts, I resorted to silicone breasts and foam hips to give me a more feminine form. I simply wanted to be the attractive blond woman in the bars I frequented. It worked as I was noticed in a few of the lesbian bars I went to, as I was approached my other women much more masculine than I was. My confidence soared and I felt as if I was finally making in roads into looking better than the next woman. Even though I was transgender. Then it occurred to me I had to be better to just survive as trans. 

Through it all, my natural upbringing kicked in and I thought being better was just part of the game. After all, any cis woman could throw on any old shirt and jeans and go out and no one would question her gender. If I did the same, I would be busted or clocked instantly for being a man in a dress. As unfair as it was, I understood because I had been living with the rules my entire life. In other words, I was up to working harder to achieve my goal of living fulltime as a transgender woman. Which was becoming harder and harder with each step forward I took. I always understood women led a vastly different gender life as men but I didn't understand how much until I set out to prove I could do it every day.

I was primarily blindsided by the communication aspect of feminine interactive conversation. I needed to learn the basics of reading  someone's emotions through their eyes and not their words. Plus, let's not forget the power of a woman's passive aggressive nature. Too many times I remembered trusting another woman only to be stabbed (or clawed) in the back. The whole process taught me  quickly I needed to get better. A feminine public presentation was one thing but being allowed to play in the girls sandbox was another. 

In remembering my post from yesterday, I still need to remind myself of who and where I am as a trans woman. Just a small thing as a smile turned out to be a huge deal. But I was used to knowing I needed to be better. Picked myself up and went from there.

Just Smile!

Image from Vicki
Hladynets on UnSplash

 Even though one of the first things I learned when I began to experience the public first hand as my feminine self was everyone was looking at me, sometimes I still forget the consequences. 

This morning I was reminded.

It happened when I went with my wife Liz to one of her doctor's appointments. While I waited, I was facing the receptionist and was oblivious to what was going on until I looked up and she was looking at me. The mistake I then made was instead of immediately smiling my hello at her, she smiled at me first. The whole process took me back to an incident I had years ago with a young girl when I was shopping in one of my favorite clothing stores. The girl ran around a rack of clothes and all of a sudden we were face to face with each other. I must have scared her because the next thing that I heard was Mom, look at the BIG woman. I thought well at the least she didn't mis-gender me, until she said the BIG MEAN woman. I then realized I needed to make a major change in my feminine presentation.

The change I needed to make was how I used my facial expressions. Here I was putting all the effort into my makeup and wardrobe, then I ruined it all by keeping that old male scowl on my face. Especially with other women, I was immediately outing myself as a cross dresser or transvestite. I certainly needed to change the way I was presenting myself to the world. Especially since I was discovering more and more I needed to deal with both genders differently. Specifically in the women's restroom I learned if I led with a small smile in my presentation, it was exactly how the other women did it. Also, it was all right to lead with a smile because I wasn't dealing with the old confrontational world I had to live as a male. I resolved to make my smile a go to effort with other women I encountered and it worked. Even though they may have considered I was transgender, if I smiled first, they didn't consider me a threat. 

Perhaps this morning, my excuse was I hadn't had any coffee yet so it was early and I was grumpy. It doesn't matter. I should have never forgotten one of my basic rules of presenting in public. As a woman (transgender or not), we are always on stage and need to remember it. Men bluster their way through life while women finesse it.  Just another example of how the rules change when you cross the gender border. 

Sadly, no matter how hard I try, sometimes I have a tendency to slip back in to old ingrained male habits without even thinking. Back in the old days, I could simply stop people from interacting with me with a look. The difference now is I want to invite them in as a woman but only if they are another woman. I didn't this morning and I feel bad.

The positive is I realized it and smiled back hoping to manage any damage, Plus, I will have a chance to see her again during the next appointment. Certainly. I will be sure I make the first move and smile with a hello.

It's All a Dream

 

Transvestia Cover from
the year I graduated 
High School

When I began my gender journey years ago, little did I know many of my dreams would become a reality. 

In the midst of being so young, all things were possible but at the same time impossible. Here I was so all alone in my very dark, isolated closet thinking I was the only one in the world who wanted desperately to be a girl. I would be years away from my first "Transvestia" Magazine where I learned there were actually many others like me called transvestites. Plus, from that point forward, I had other cross dressers to compare myself to. After all, there were so many others who looked wonderful and I could only dream of looking like.

Then, "Transvestia" opened the door to more one on one interaction with other transvestites by publicizing social mixers I could actually attend because some were close enough geographically to be there. I did go and was exposed to a whole new world I never knew existed. There were cross dressers trying to hide their feminine side with cigars and cowboy hats (way before the Urban Cowboy movie) all the way to the impossibly beautiful transsexuals' who I couldn't believe were ever male at all. Through it all, I still had the impression I did not totally belong in either group. I could dream of looking as good as the second group I mentioned, but getting there was going to take me quite a lot of work. 

Ironically, the mixers led me to networking myself to smaller groups of like minded individuals in Columbus, Ohio which was a much shorter drive to where I lived but far enough away I would not be recognized as a version of my male self. Back in those days, he was standing directly in the way of all my feminine dreams and making any progress difficult to maintain. In many ways, he and my second wife were allies against my authentic self who so much enjoyed the new interaction she was having at the small parties she was attending in Columbus. Those attending again included anyone from cross dressers admirers to lesbians to transsexuals headed for genital realignment surgery. I was able to learn from them all and wonder what future path my life could take. Following the parties, I would spend days daydreaming of the next one and would I be able to get time off of work to actually go. With or without my wife who was normally the only spouse who attended the small mixer. I could sense the whole evening was not enjoyable for her.

As much as my gender daydreaming threatened to disrupt my everyday life during the days following the party, I still found time to do my job well. As well as dream of my next move. Which was could I ever think or dream of considering a life as a full time transgender woman. The term was just being coined at the time and to me it meant a new freedom from the old belief transsexual's needed to complete their gender surgery, sever all ties, then move away and just disappear. Perhaps there was hope for me yet.

Through the small sliver of hope I maintained over the years, it was true I could have the life I had always dreamed of. I was able to carve out a life in what I considered to be a feminine dominated world. Gone were the days of trying to please my old male self with how I dressed and in came the days of dressing to blend with the majority of the women I encountered in the world.  It all led to me considering and beginning hormone replacement therapy and really changing my life away from my old male self. Basically as far as I could without surgery. 

What I really learned through it all is if you can manage to live long enough, life is but a circle and some dreams can come true if you can stay the course. Which essentially what happened to me.

Fun and Games?

 

Image from Itai Aarons 
on UnSplash

Far too many instances these days I read about someone saying being transgender or having gender dysphoria is a choice.

For those of us who have (or continue to) suffer through our own gender issues, we have never had a choice. The problems with our gender meshing with our authentic selves is much more than just thinking we could put a dress on us and the world would be so much better. If only it could be so easy. Quite early in life I learned just looking myself in the mirror as a girl was a fleeting idea. Not only did I want to look like one of the girls I envied so much, I wanted to actually be one of them. Such a radical idea was to lead me into a lifetime quest to live as a transgender woman. A term which still would be years away from being invented as I looked into the mirror. 

When I look back at the whole process, it was never fun and games because the pressure was on to conceal my cross dressing from my parents and only brother who was a couple years younger than I and very curious. Very few times I remember being able to actually relax and enjoy what I was trying to accomplish. Which brings up the question, why do it? The answer is simple, because I had no choice. Deep down, something kept me driving towards being feminine, at least in appearance, It would take me years longer to learn the finer points of moving around and succeeding in the world as a transgender woman. Most of the time, the process was very painful and very few times exhilarating. I was at once guarded and afraid and out and happy on others. The night I went out to see the Christmas light display at a nearby restored mill comes to mind. 

I wore my fuzziest, warmest sweater along with leggings and boots and out I went to test what it would exactly be like to see the lights as a woman. Along the way, I even became brave enough to stop and order a cup of warm hot chocolate to thaw out. The whole evening turned out to be very satisfying because everyone I encountered seemed to be nice to me but even still wasn't what I called fun and games.  Plus, the twinkling lights were brighter and certainly more fun to see. 

It is also not fun and games when you have to deal with the up's and down's of having gender dysphoria. Often the process was similar to taking a continual ride on your favorite roller coaster. You spend so much time effort and money to prepare your image as you climb to the  top of the coaster. Then you feel the exhilaration on the first steep downward slope only to hit the bottom and be depressed again. After all, gender dysphoria is a deep dark place place to be. Especially when you combine it with a bi-polar disorder like I did. Often my mood roller coaster spent way too much time at the bottom until I reached out for help.

Just once I wish someone who thinks being transgender is a choice would have to experience our existence. Why would a person give up the gender privilege's they worked so hard to accumulate during their lives? The partial answer is it takes a person who can grasp a complex situation to accept a trans woman or man. Often we are still trying to understand our selves.

One thing is for sure, the journey for us has never been easy, is not a choice and is never fun and games.

Gender Willpower

 

Image from the Jessie
Hart Collection

Over the years I made at least two major mis-conceptions and spent precious time attempting to over compensate. 

The first big one was I was a male to female cross dresser. When in reality, the opposite was true, I was a female to male cross dresser. I was forced into dressing like a guy to survive in a world I never really accepted. It took an enormous amount of willpower to maintain an image of being a well adjusted male in the world. Too much as a matter of fact. Every time I snuck around to build a  small collection of my own feminine wardrobe items and makeup, I would then build up the courage to "purge" (throw away) my stash and feel good for several days when I "manned up" and got the gender monkey off of my back. Sadly, most of you know what happened next. The gender pressure would build again and I would begin to rebuild my small wardrobe and makeup collection. If I didn't, I would become irritable and very nasty to live with as I attempted to make everyone around me as miserable as I was. 

The second major misconception I encountered was when I was much older and entered a phase called my "twin spirit" time. It was about this period of my life when I began to be exposed to a life source advanced by many of the ancient native tribes. Some of them believed and accepted multi gendered individuals. Some of them to the point of viewing them as special citizens in their tribes. At the time, I thought Wow! this is for me. The problem was later on I found I wasn't a true twin spirited person because all along I rejected my male side and was only influenced in the public's eye by the testosterone poisoning I had gone through. So on the outside, I looked the part of a total male.  Again I spent most of my time and gender willpower trying to fight the cards I was dealt as a transgender person.

Again and again I was stubborn and tried to "purge" my femininity out of my life. No matter how hard I tried, the results were still the same. In a short period of time I kept going back to the mirror and enjoying my cross dressed image. 

Finally, I left the mirror behind and became fairly proficient in being out in the public as a transgender woman. My willpower was beginning to shift from fighting my gender changes to one of acceptance. When I did, I was able to decrease the pressure I was putting on myself to conform to a male-centric life. The main discovery was I was correct  in  was when I thought deep down I was always born to be a girl and something went horribly wrong. When my willpower went to the positive side, I was able to build the life I was always destined for. 

In the end I realized gender willpower was always a powerful human emotion and one which is taken for granted from the majority of the population. Once I arrived at the place now on my own gender journey, I can now allow all of my willpower to send me in the right direction. To live out the rest of my life as a fulltime transgender woman. 

I Couldn't Take It

 

Image from Adam Jicha 
on UnSplash

The process of completing my male to female gender transition admittedly took me many many years. Over fifty to be exact and the whole process took a toll on me. 

During the time, I experienced many peaks and valleys on my way to living my ultimate dream. My attempt was to try different scenarios to see if I could pass successfully as a woman in the public's eye. As I said, I experienced many failures and returned home to cry my eyes out. Through it all, I was still determined and kept going back to the cross dressing drawing board to try harder. Thankfully, the more I tried (and learned) the better I became at my presentation. The better I became, the more I wanted to try.

From that point, the better I became at being transgender, the better my chances of trying to live a fulltime life as a transgender woman became. The problem was my entrenched male self was fighting every gender move I made. He did his best to discourage me and did it well. After all, he had a lot to lose. Such as an entire life he had worked hard to create. Friends, family and employment were all at stake. So the pressure was intense to somehow stay the course and try to live a life stuck firmly between the two primary binary genders. 

The problem was when I was living the life of a transgender woman, I felt increasingly natural. I had a deep seated feeling all was right in my gender world for a change. The process should have brought about a welcome change, when in fact it was causing extra pressure. As much as I tried to avoid it, I could see ahead I would have to make serious decisions in my life. If I was ever able to salvage what was left of my mental health. Dealing with the pressure had led me down the road to self destructive behaviors including suicide. After my suicide attempt, I made a very unhappy decision. I decided to purge (or get rid of) most all of my feminine belongings, grow a beard and live fulltime as a guy. The whole process was designed to please my second wife who told me any number of times she didn't sign up to live with another woman. You regulars know within a year after I purged, she passed away unexpectedly from a massive heart attack at the age of fifty. 

At that point my life entered a new stage of being totally alone. Between wife one and two, I had been steadily married since when I was in the military approximately thirty years before .Through my tears, I reached out to my feminine inner self for comfort. Off came the beard and on came the makeup as I set out to rebuild what was left of my life. It took awhile for my confidence and mental health to improve as I was suddenly able free to explore a world I had only ever just dreamed of. The pressure was relieved and I could finally enjoy where I was headed again and I could take it. I didn't want to self destruct. 

Set Back to Come Back

Tom on Left with the Author
at a Witches Ball. From the 
Jessie Hart Archive

I have always rooted mainly for the underdog in most things I follow. Especially in sports. Nothing is as thrilling to me as seeing an underdog come back and win. Unless it is against one of my teams.

Lately, as we approach and go by the Fourth of July, there are no more visible underdogs these days as the transgender population. We are easy pickings or low hanging fruit for many politicians who have chosen not to know us at all. Then seek to gain votes by using lies against us. We are even still the weakest link in the LGBTQA+ field because of many reasons.  Primarily because we do not have the economic clout of the gay community. 

However, I didn't want to write a political post today, because you regulars (thank you) know where I stand on the subject of a certain political party which peddles hate of all kinds rather than offer any constructive legislation. Here in Ohio, where I live, they are even leading the charge to change any amendments to the state constitution away from a simple majority just ahead of a vote on abortion this fall. Needless to say, I will be voting no on the issue (one )to keep changes as a simple majority.  

Other than our rights taken away from us, I have other reasons to have rooted for the underdog in my life. The biggest one for me was facing up to the fact I was transgender at all. I took many years of gender experimentation to realize I was deep down a woman all the time just trying to act like a man. It finally took my wife Liz years ago to kick me over the cliff for the final time. I discarded all my male clothes, began hormone replacement therapy and never looked back on my old unwanted male lifestyle. Little did I know ten years ago, the amount of potential hate I could be facing today. Like it or not, I need to beware of my surroundings more than any other woman.

During the period of my life when I was making many mistakes with my presentation it made it more difficult for me to navigate the world as my authentic self or transgender woman. As I said, I still needed to make the final determination I was trans to begin with and what did it mean to me. I was fortunate enough to be just stubborn enough to keep trying when I was rejected as a transgender woman. Plus I found friends who helped me along. They helped me to come back strong when I was set back. Being the underdog they were rooting for, I needed to make sure I was worthy of their attention by doing my best to become a quality person. During that time, I became quite the gender "observer."

These days, as I have written,  I am trying to do more in the transgender community as far as out reach goes. In fact, in addition to the Alzheimer's committee I am going to serve on which spot lights diversity, I signed up for another Veteran's Administration group yesterday which will spotlight VA trans veteran care. My goals for participating in both are if I can help anyone who comes after me, it will be worth it. I don't want them to suffer the setbacks I did.

My setbacks were many and varied and can be turned into comebacks if I can help others in any way from my experiences. I just hope I can.  

 

More Hormonal Results

 

Image from Kareya Saleh
on UnSplash 

As I look back on my most recent posts, I discovered I left out one of my major changes when I started hormone replacement therapy.

The other major difference I left out was how the world around me started to appear. All around me, everything seemed to suddenly soften. All of it occurred at the same time the angles in my face were beginning to soften also, so perhaps the whole picture was a part of a bigger outcome. And the larger outcome was clear, the minimal (at that time) dosages of estradiol were working and I indeed was becoming more feminine. So quickly in fact, I was forced to change my timetable to when I planned on coming out to the world as a transgender woman. 

The in between step which unexpectedly took place was how quickly my overall appearance began to change. I went from a macho guy to androgynous person faster than I ever imagined. When I did, I began to consider when I was going to tell what was left of my family about my plans to complete a MtF gender transition. Since my parents had long since passed on, as well as other key individuals in my life, my "to tell" list was relatively small. 

I started with my daughter which turned out to be easy as well as a huge success. Her only comment was why was she the last to know. In fact, she was close to being the first to know since her Mother only knew me as a cross dresser or transvestite and her Step-Mother fought me every inch when and if I ever suggested I was transgender. So the topic was rarely if not ever brought up. My daughter's ultimate reaction was she wanted to take me out shopping which I declined since I already had a growing feminine wardrobe or treat me to a visit to her upscale hair spa for a makeover when my hair became long enough. Which turned out to fit perfectly in for me as a birthday gift. 

Just when I thought everything was going to be easy with my transgender coming out process, here comes my brother (only) and his family to ruin everything. After telling him I was trans, my invitation to the family Thanksgiving dinner was revoked. It especially hurt because my second wife used to single handily feed an increasingly large family for years on her own and here I was being shut out for wanting to live as my authentic self on the holiday. Since that time, now over ten years ago, we haven't spoken since. Even still, I was fortunate in that my daughter's family (including in laws) and my wife Liz's family have filled the void. I did not need or ever miss my brother's support anyway.

My body seemingly took to hormone replacement therapy as if it should have been on the new hormones all along. Destiny was on my side. It was a shame I needed to wait all the years I did to finally go through the gender change. Since all the time I used up as a male wasn't all bad, I was able to experience much in life while at the same time I obsessed on experiencing everything a hormonal change could do for me. The whole process helped usher me into a softer gentler more beautiful inner world.   

Trust the Process?

Summer Maxi Dress from
the Jessie Hart 
Collection 

So many times when I had reached the point of utter desperation with my gender dysphoria, I wondered what was ever going to become of me. I just had too much of the powerful and seductive draw of the strong inner feminine being who lived within me. She constantly battled the male world which I was born into and for the most part wanted nothing to do with.

All of my battles led to well publicized bouts of self destructive behavior such as using my car as a possible suicide object by driving way too fast and drinking way too much along the way. Unfortunately, my drinking was subsidized in a good way to a masculine pursuit in my family.  My Dad was known to finish his day everyday with a shot (or two) of whiskey. Attempting to out drink him became an unreachable goal for both my younger brother and I. While it never worked with Dad, the entire drinking process provided me with yet another gender façade when I was dealing with others. Plus, the faux level of bravado I found with the alcohol enabled me to initially coming out as a transvestite to friends of mine, all the way to relaxing me when I was attempting to face the world out of my gender closet as a novice transgender woman. The whole process added to my problems with the mirror I was experiencing. When I was intoxicated and staring at myself in the mirror, I was guaranteed to see what I wanted to see. An attractive woman ready to be seen by the public.

My love of the alcoholic came to very much of an abrupt halt when I was pronounced with possible liver problems by my Veterans Administration doctors. I was surprised outside of a few slip ups, I was able to leave my love of alcohol behind. I was able to trust the process and know I would be better off without the one super destructive aspect of my life which was my drinking. These days, I rarely have more than one beer a month. 

As far as my driving goes, I have become decidedly a defensive driver at my age and I have a strong vested interest in being a safe driver while I am behind the wheel. I feel as if I suffered too many close calls when I was younger to tempt fate anymore. The prime example was when I easily could have seriously injured myself and my brother when I rolled a car at a high rate of speed when we were going to college classes one day. I certainly had a guardian angel riding with me that afternoon when I was trying some self destructive behavior

The reason I was able to move away from such poor choices when it came to my lifestyle was when I was able to complete my gender transition I was happier in life.  Or, when my woman took over, she was running the show and did away with all the self destructive nonsense I was participating in. Even though for many years it was very difficult for me to trust the gender process I was slowly becoming so satisfied with my life I wanted to prolong it as far as possible. A honorable pastime.   

Living the Trans Dream

Summer in Ohio
from the Jessie Hart
Collection

Every so often I have the chance to sit back and wonder how I ever made it to the place in life I have arrived at now. I spent so many years living a mostly frustrated male life, wondering how it would be to permanently cross over the gender frontier and live life full time as a transgender woman. For the longest time, I thought I would never make it to the point where I could ever live my dream. 

In the beginning and during several years following, I went down the same rabbit holes as other cross dressers or transvestites I knew. The same old male egos showed through our fancy feminine clothes to reveal we didn't know much about being women at all. Just doing our best to look like one.  Finally I came to the point of knowing I wanted to discover more in depth just what I would be facing if indeed I decided to try to complete a MtF gender transition. Before I knew it, years and life had slipped away and destiny opened a few doors for me which enabled me to transition fully. Recently I received a comment from fellow blogger Paula Godwin who described her journey a little different:

" For those of us who transition later in life it is "interesting" when we get the revelation that after spending the first 50 (or so) years of our life trying to work out if we are a woman at all, that then we suddenly have to work out what sort of a woman. Although having said that I'm not at all sure how much choice we actually get in the matter, much like being Trans at all, I suspect that much of what sort of a woman I would turn out to be was not a choice but an inevitable!" 

You can read more from Paula by following her "Paula's Place" blog here or by checking out my "Do You Wanna Hook Up" section of the blog which contains her latest post.

Thanks for the comment and I too spent fifty years or so exploring being a woman at all. Then when I decided I couldn't deny my feminine nature any longer, jumping into the world and out of my closet was quite the experience. The first lesson I learned was all the years I thought my appearance as a woman was the most important facet of my life just wasn't true. I had no knowledge of all the other facets of a woman's life she had to live through on her path from being just a female to being a woman. My second wife so profoundly put it during a huge fight we were having about me being a crossdresser, that I made a terrible woman and she was not talking about just how I looked. At that point I was forced to put my male ego aside and seriously consider what my wife was talking about. The entire process of learning more concerning women's lives was difficult because I was shielded from what really went on with women because I was still presenting nearly fulltime as a man. In other words, I could not be trusted with secrets until I made the huge step of coming out as my authentic feminine self, which was sensed and embraced on many levels by several of the cis-women who befriended  me. 

During this period of gender discovery, much of my life was a blur as I increasingly set my male self aside and allowed my woman self to flourish. As Paula put it so well, it wasn't a choice, it was an inevitable. 

Climbing the Gender Ladder

Image from Armand Khoury
on UnSplash

As I always point out, changing genders is an incredibly difficult and intricate task. For those of us who struggled for years just to fit in as part of the male world, undoing it all and joining the feminine side seems to be insane. Who would do that? Of course being a transgender woman or man, you would know the answer. We had no choice . All of it makes the thought pattern ridiculous to think we made a conscious choice to give up one life to transition to another. Again, we made the choice but often the decision involved a life or death situation. Which is what happened to me.  "JoannaS" recently commented on a similar idea I would like to share:

"What you are describing is incredibly common for a trans person as they advance into their identity. The focus on externals drops off and the internals become far more important. You have passed that awkward stage which is akin to another puberty and stabilize into every day living"

 Thanks for the comment! Looking back I think my advancement through another puberty and the stabilization process into living as a transgender woman was similar to climbing a ladder, then jumping off. At first it was difficult to shed all my male weight I was carrying around. Literally I took weight off to look better in my clothes and figuratively I had all the ingrained male responses to society I had picked up over my many years of living. An example would be I needed to replace the perpetual male scowl I had perfected to keep people away and replace it with a more feminine softer look. After all, the last thing I wanted to do was to have people think I was grumpy and/or unreachable. 

Through the process, as I climbed higher and higher on my new gender ladder, the more I understood again how I was afraid of heights. What would become of my life if I left all of my old male self behind and all the privileges I had accumulated. As, as Joanna said, when I finally was able to pass through another puberty, my thought processes cleared out and began to see what privileges a feminine life could offer me. The main benefit or privilege was I could feel natural in the world. Especially following beginning hormone replacement therapy, my universe went through a very real and welcoming softening. Sure my outward appearance softened with my skin but my inward feelings became more understanding to others around me as the effects of testosterone went away. 

What I couldn't understand was  why my male self was still fighting so hard to still hang around and control part of my life. The farther up I climbed along with my increasing ability to exist and communicate with my new world, still, there he was still tagging along. I needed to fight constantly to not dress for him but to blend in with the world was one example of many. Finally I climbed too high and was able to see my new feminine gender world for the wonderful future it offered. I just needed the courage to jump. What was left of my male self was telling me the landing would be a rough one and even result in a disaster. At the same time my suddenly stronger inner woman, emboldened by all her recent successes was pushing me to take the final leap of faith and jump.

You all know the rest of the story. I did summon up all the courage I could to live my life as a full time transgender woman. What I didn't realize how many new found women friends I had to help me into their world. It made me wonder again and again why I waited so long to jump off my gender ladder. 

Writing Your Own Script

Image from Brad Starky on
UnSplash

 It could be argued very few human beings ever have the chance to end one part of their life and start over legally without doing something completely wrong. As a transgender person, woman or man, we are blessed with the opportunity to do so.

Years ago, during our eleven year build up to becoming a married couple, my wife Liz said to me one day I had the chance to build a new person and what exactly would they be. Initially,  Liz referred to just my outwardly feminine appearance. Would I be a girly girl wearing makeup and dresses all the time or would I be a more "normal" woman in her mind who dresses up for mostly just special occasions.  At the time I had to consider what she was asking. Most certainly she was right in I had the chance to finally live my dream to live as a full time transgender woman. Little did I know then how many new changes or transitions I was in store for. 

The main one came when I threw out or donated all my old male clothes. I decided when I did, I formally made the transition from serious cross dresser or transvestite to a new transgender woman. Just going from occasionally changing my appearance  to living it was a huge change. When I did it, I knew gender play time was over and among other things, it was time for me to consider contacting a doctor and checking out if I was qualified to begin hormone replacement therapy.  At that time, changes to my life began to come at me too quickly on occasion. I did of course locate a doctor in suburban Dayton, Ohio who gave me a physical (which I passed) gave me quick advice on how my hair would grow as my sexual urges went away and basically sent me on my way with my introductory prescriptions to minimum dosage estradiol and testosterone blockers. Timing turned out to be everything when Liz and I got together for a New Years Eve date and I took the first dosages and started my future as a happy secure transgender woman. Before it all could happen, many changes would have to happen first.

The first major change was my hair did grow as fast as my breasts and I was able to stop wearing wigs for the first time in my life. I was so fortunate in that no male patterned baldness ran in the family. My biggest problem was being able to see the back of my head in the mirror so I could see how my hair looked since I couldn't fall back on simply turning the wig head anymore. Ironically, the rest of my feminization process was happening faster than I anticipated. With my budding breasts and softer skin, I started to appear very androgynous suddenly. I was pushed along into a world I wanted to be part of but was still terrified to join and write my own script.

As I began to dress as a woman daily, the desire to spend an inordinate amount of time on makeup and frilly clothes went away. Right or wrong, I began to fall back to the "every woman" casual look of jeans (or jean skirts) loose flowing tops to hide my thick torso and flat shoes for comfort. Liz's initial question was answered, I was certainly not a "girly-girl". It turned out, my fashion sense was going to be the least of my problems when I transitioned into a woman's world. All of a sudden, I had to exist the best I could in male dominated spaces such as auto shops and even car junk yards. I had quite the upbringing. Communication still was my biggest problem to conquer. 

Even though I tried my best to ignore men, they still make up a sizeable portion of the population which I needed to deal with. I don't think I have ever totally overcome all of my communication fears but I have been able to at least face them. 

Writing your own script for the second time in life can be a terrifying yet exciting experience. One most humans never have the opportunity to attempt. Very few can say they threw out the bad and brought in the good when they had the chance to live a life they often just dreamed of.       

It's Easter Weekend

 

Hand Beaded Trans Beret from
LizT Designs on Etsy

This weekend features the special observance days of several major religions around the world. As I was raised in a semi-serious religious home, we didn't do much for the Easter Christian religious observance. Of course I remember quite vividly how much I disliked  dressing up in the male restricting clothes such as a tie which I hated so much. I would have rather worn one of the pretty bright colored dresses all the girls my age were able to wear. At the time, the earth seemed to be tilted unfairly in the girls direction. 

Today, in a sense, I get just a bit of revenge on my past. My wife and I are attending a Jewish observance that we were invited to at my daughter's mother in law's house. Appetizers will be served before the formal observance which was well attended last year by mostly friends of my two out of three grandkids. Unfortunately, my grandchild who is transgender probably won't be there today because they live with their partner in Virginia which is quite the trip from Ohio. 

For the day, I have decided to brighten my wardrobe up for the Spring weather we are finally now beginning to see. I am wearing a sleeveless very light sweater top Liz handmade for me paired with my patterned bright colored leggings. I even went all out and put in my long unused earrings which again Liz made for me. Plus to spotlight my transgender status in this time of uncertainty, I am wearing the trans hand beaded hair beret which again was made by Liz. If you are catching a theme right now, you are right. Liz is very talented. 

So, in my own way to get even with the mean old days when I wasn't allowed to wear anything bright colored to Easter observations. I am going light and bright.  The only drawback is if I am going to be warm enough. I have decided to throw caution to the wind and wear my bright sleeveless outfit to the Jewish observation of "Seder". While I am not Jewish, my daughter is and it will be good to see her. 

Whatever what religion you may happen to have an Easter observance with this weekend, I hope you have a good one.