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| JJ Hart Discovering her Needs I am in the first row on the left. |
When a want turns into a need, sometimes you can feel it. Other times, not so much as if it sneaks up on you from behind.
As I began to wear dresses and makeup as a young boy, for
the most part, it was because I wanted to do it. Cross-dressing just relieved
the pressure of my unwanted everyday male world. It did not take me long to
figure out my want was much more than just a casual appreciation of women’s
fashion and makeup. I did not know it
then (and the term had not yet been widely used) that I was transgender more
than a cross-dresser. I could not feel the change because I did not have the
gender knowledge to do it.
Life began to change for me when I started to cross-dress
for the thrill of it and attend Halloween parties. The parties ended up
teaching me the basics of being a woman in public around people I knew, and I
wanted to take it a step further by not having to wait another year to try
again to get out of my dark closet and into the world. That is when my story
turned out to be dark as I was not met with many positives by the public as a
novice trans woman, cross-dresser or whatever you would like to label me as. To
too many people, I was simply a man in a dress and clown makeup. I learned the
hard way to get back to my drawing board and work harder on my feminine craft
to find out if I was ever going to be able to succeed at all at my dream.
I also learned that if I was ever going to find success on
my gender path, I was never just going to make it by just thinking it was just
a want. It had to become a deep-seated need. I went back and dieted, worked on
my skin and did everything I could to improve my testosterone poisoned body. All
it really taught me was how much deeper I needed to travel along my gender path
to make it at all and I needed to do it very badly. As the pounds melted off, I
was able to find more stylish feminine wardrobe items to fill out my fashion needs
and dress for success to blend in with the rest of the ciswoman crowd. Who I
learned the hard way, were the people who ran the world I was attempting to be
a part of. Or I could go casual if I needed to and a more polished business
look when I needed to upscale my appearance. Fashion-wise I was learning that looking
the best I could and blending in with the public at the same time was a definite
need not some sort of a frivolous want just to justify something I wanted.
The more I tested the world as a transfeminine person, the
more I needed to do to help myself along in the learning process of just belonging
in the world I always should have been a part of to begin with. It was a real
chore just to put the mirror image I thought I had perfected into the public
and into motion to see how it worked. For the most part, I was improving to the
point where I needed to start trying to communicate with the world as a more
complete trans woman. As I always point out, the communication challenge to me
was immense because I had always been a lazy communicator in my life. By that I
mean, I had never really had to listen closely to what another man was telling
me. I knew instinctively how to respond to another man but was clueless when it
came to woman to woman talk. Which I always had known was different but how
different I did not know until I was made aware of it. For example, for the
first time ever in my life I needed to really stop and listen to whomever was
talking to me. Were they trying to point out danger to me or just being
friendly as a ciswoman who was curious of me or a toxic man who just viewed me
as some sort of a fetish object.
Quite possibly, the communication aspect of my male to
female femininization need passed my desire to be as attractive as I could as a
transgender woman in the world. Instead of just wishing and wanting to be accepted
as an equal by the other ciswomen I met, I needed to make it a priority. I even
swallowed my pride and took female vocal lessons to make the process easier. It
was difficult, but I think I gained enough confidence to help with my overall
presentation and life.
I was helped too when the pressure to succeed was relieved
here and there by the new success I was having in the world carving out a new
life which on one hand to be terrifying and on the other feeling so natural
like I was coming home to the self I always should have been.
I found I did not discover all my true self until I could
step away from me for a minute to look at how far my gender path had taken me. After
years of experimenting and trying different things, I finally achieved my need
to be allowed to play in the girls’ sandbox and I was not disappointed with
what I found there. Even though I had to put up with the occasional hater or
TERF who wanted me out, but the majority of women made me feel welcome in their
world and that was all that mattered to me.
The sandbox provided me with firm lessons and reassurance in
what I was trying to accomplish in life. The want I always felt was always a
hidden need which took me years to realize was my true problem in life to solve.
I hope you can realize your true wants and needs on your
gender path also and life becomes easier for you if you are searching like I
always was.
