 |
| Image from Jon Tyson on UnSplash. |
Often, I hear the words courage or bravery kicked around when it came to mentioning someone coming out of their closet into the real world.
In my case, I would have to replace either of the words with
just being afraid of what would happen if I did not pursue my gender dreams of
living as a transgender woman. Mainly because I was so self-destructive when it
came to causing self-harm to my unwanted male self. I drove too fast and
recklessly, drank way too much and even tried to actively kill myself once
because of my gender dysphoria.
Especially after I had the rare chance to talk to my friends
who survived brutal combat in the Vietnam War, I reserved the terms brave and courage
for them. Because in many ways, I was just doing what came naturally when I cross-dressed
in front of the mirror at home. It turned out staying in my own little feminine
world was very easy until I began to want to see if I could stretch my luck and
actually leave the house looking as close as I thought I could to a pretty
girl. The only reality I did know was I was scared to death.
Little by little, my fear began to subside, and I wanted to
expand my explorations to bigger and better venues such as the malls which were
just beginning to come into their own back in those days. Still. I didn’t think
I was brave enough to do it. Or was I just being stupid by risking losing everything
that I worked so hard to build up in my male life. My ego dictated that I did
not dwell on the stupid aspect of trying to femininize my testosterone poisoned
body. I just wanted to blend in with the rest of the ciswomen I envied so much.
As much as I was being abused by certain segments of the public, I began to use
another term to describe myself and that was stubborn. In fact, I think that
would be a great title to a new PBS show (Public Broadcasting System) called
the “Stubborn Cross-dresser.”
As I continued on my gender path towards finally being
allowed to join the girls’ club, my stubbornness in trying new things was both
a blessing and a curse. A prime example was when I was trying to hang on to my
teen fashion sense way too long. It was a curse, and my blessing came along
when I became stubborn enough to keep going back to my cross-dressing drawing board
until I fixed the problem and became able to blend in better with the women, I
wanted to notice me. After the death of my second wife of twenty-five years, I
was desperately lonely and did not want to attempt to build another life as a
man when the possibility of building one as a trans woman was right in front of
me. If I was brave enough to take advantage of a life I had only dreamed of.
Was I going to take the easy way out and try to be a man again or build upon
what I had learned as a novice transgender woman became my major question to
answer.
Finally, I needed to “man-up” and be a woman as my second
wife used to tell me and when I had the courage to do it, I felt a deep
happiness in life I never had before. In fact the feminine privilege I found to
be the most pleasant was the fact that I was allowed the opportunity to be happy.
For the first time in my life, I was able to align my sun, moon, and stars so I
did not have to fight a gender battle on two fronts which kept me unhappy and on
edge. I positively loved my new life along with my first chance ever to just be
happy with what I had.
If you are one of the many gender conflicted individuals trying
to decide if and when you will make the ultimate choice to go for the gender
border as a trans woman or trans man, my only advice must be, look deeply
inside yourself for your answer. Your answer is there If you are stubborn
enough to find it. Life is like an old merry-go-round and often it is difficult
to slow it down to see the real world spinning in front of you. And if destiny
puts you on the right path to do it, you can discover a group of well-meaning
friends (ciswomen or men for you trans men) who can help you along. Making you
a better person than you ever thought you could be. I would never have thought
that the gender dysphoria that I felt would end up causing me so many problems
in my life.
Before your life ends and you move on to whatever other place
of existence you believe in, you have the basic right to be happy. You can deal
in semantics and call your gender journey as being brave or having courage all
you want but the end result is you being the natural person who you always
should have been.
Somehow, we have been chosen to lead a different life’s
journey than most of the others in the human race. Call us brave or courageous
if you want but as a tribe, we are doing what we were always been destined to
do. It is just too bad we are met with such resistance by haters in the world.
As well as the gatekeepers who want to keep us away from our chosen genders. When
I speak about gatekeepers, immediately radical feminist TERFs come to mind who
have no business in ours.
Best wishes on your successful gender journey and summoning
enough courage (if you want to call it that) to get out into the world and live
your best life.
Thanks again to all of you who join me in my experiences,
and I hope we can all learn from them. I apologize to all of you who have
commented. I am a little behind getting back to you because of technical problems.
