Be Safe rather than Sorry

 

Toxic male from UnSplash

Before I begin this post, I have a disclaimer. I did not follow what I preached many times when I opened my dark gender closet door and ventured out into the public. I broke many unwritten rules I knew were true.

I will say, the times when I came out were much different than today. Not so much kinder and gentler to transgender women and trans men. Mainly, what I am referring to is the person at the top ruining the nation we have, and I don’t have to mention who he is. Basically, he is the top toxic male who empowers all the other toxic males who potentially can give us trouble. There is a real difference in just being laughed at all the way to being physically attacked.

In my case, as I always mention, my initial problem was drawing attention to myself rather than learning how to blend in with other women. I was fortunate I grew out of that phase quickly before I got into trouble other than just being laughed at.

Another of the main issues I encountered was how I was presenting myself once I was fairly confident, I could get by. What I mean was I was going out primarily as a single woman. Which is primarily something ciswomen just don’t do. They believe there is strength in numbers I just did not have. To make up for it, I tried to make sure I did not sit down next to a man if I could help it, and if there just happened to be a vacant seat, I tried to mark it is as mine. What I tried to do was use my cell phone as my major prop. Especially if it was during the warm weather months when I could not throw my jacket over the seat next to me and reserve it. Often, I would act like I was texting a potential friend on the phone who was going to join me. Anything to throw a toxic male off my path.

 I learned quickly when I discovered how much nonverbal communication went on between women that men knew nothing about. One night I had a prime example when a toxic man tried to strike up a conversation with me at one of the places, I was a regular at. When he did, I received a nonverbal warning from one of the bartenders I knew about him, so I rapidly left the venue before anything happened.

All of those methods I used helped me to survive in a new exciting world as I left the gay venues behind me and started to learn what the real world was all about. All very important points if I was ever going to make it to my dream of living as a transgender woman. My learning experiences turned out to be tremendous.

As I said, times have changed today and so much more is at stake for all of us. Whereas a couple years ago, a stranger would be less likely to say anything to you. These days, all of that has changed. There is more pressure on all of us to put our best foot forward as transfeminine people. I always mention the weight I lost when I first came out. Which helped me to buy more stylish clothes and obviously look better. At the same time, I began a very serious skin program which started every day after I shaved. I was doing as much as I could to improve my overall feminine self. All of it gave me confidence to move forward, which I needed badly.

Finally, I would be remiss if I did not mention the loss of your male personal security when you enter a new feminine world. Don’t take chances with your security by doing the things cisgender women already know. To the best of their ability, they try not to park in dark unmarked areas unless they have strength in numbers. As I read, in some areas, women even have to guard their drinks from toxic men trying to drug them. Can you imagine that? Well, you have to when you go through a male to female transition.

This entire post urges you to be on your game when you come out. Among other things, be careful how you carry your purse in crowded areas. It all adds a level of acceptance as a trans woman which goes far past your basic appearance which of course is important too.

In todays’ world, it is important to know your circumstances at all times, not unlike a cisgender woman who learned what to do around toxic males. Look at it this way, you will be a more complete woman ready to earn your place in today’s world.

 

 

Transgender Dreams

 

Image from Maximus Beaumont
on UnSplash.

Over the years, I experienced slow progress towards achieving my transgender background which I refused to accept.

What I did to exist with my gender dysphoria was to cross dress when I could, all the way to attending Halloween parties completely dressed as a woman every year. When I did, I could judge the reactions of the public to me. Eventually though, the part-time cross-dressing and annual Halloween parties were not enough. Which led me to explore more and more the world as a novice transgender woman. Being a novice, I suffered too many bumps and bruises as my world changed from male to female. Primarily because my male ego was suffering at the abuse he was taking when he tried to give up control to my long hidden feminine self. He thought wearing ultra short mini skirts would be enough to gain acceptance into a female world.

When just the opposite happened, he needed to grudgingly give up more and more control in my life so I could progress and even briefly thrive as a transgender woman. When I started to look around at other women around me and began to blend in with them, I started to be successful in my life.  In fact, I was too successful at times when I started to be accepted in the world. I began to look for more places to go to see if I could progress my life as a transgender woman. Keep in mind, at that time, living a life as a transfeminine person was still a distant dream. Fortunately, I was receiving enough positive feedback to keep moving.

I discovered most of the world did not care about me, even though I felt all eyes were on me as a woman. Women were looking me up and down to see what made me tick while at the same time, for the most part, men were ignoring me because I was not that attractive. I started to progress in my new gender when I began to have confidence in myself knowing the world could get over it when and if I ran into any problems I could survive. At the same time, I was improving my wardrobe and makeup skills, which helped me to improve my life as a transgender woman. All of a sudden, I realized I could achieve my dream of living in a feminine world, but I still had a long way to go.

Progression began to happen much more quickly, even though I had roadblocks on my path in areas such as communication. Naturally I knew women had an entirely different way of communicating than men. Direct communication was out, and passive indirect communications were in. I needed to learn quickly how to look another woman in the eye and try to judge what she was thinking about me.

Through it all, I had a wife and very active male life to deal with. Neither wanted me to succeed in my dream life.  At certain points of time, the noise of life around me was deafening and neither would step up to help me as I was trying to adjust to a new scary existence. I was alone. I thought. But I wasn’t, I had my long hidden feminine self to step up and help me. She took over as if she had never been forced into the background her entire life. She led me to be the person I should have always been.

I was able to progress through the final steps I needed to make to succeed. The combination of women friends, experience and hormones (HRT) provided me with the final push to shove my male self into the closet for good. Even still, the final decision to give all my male clothes away took a lot of thought. Finally, one night, I could take the pressure no longer and needed to make the move to live my dream. When I did, the pressure was off, and I had a new lease on life. Once I lifted the weight I had carried for so long, I was a new person and had progressed towards my dream. I also wondered what took me so long to make the move. Fifty years of cross-dressing and testing the world was far too long and my mental health suffered because of it.

Finally, I made the choices which should have been obvious to me all the time and decided to reach out and grasp my transgender dreams.

 

 

Restroom Adventures

 

Image from CDC on UnSplash

Since my wife Liz and I went away on a trip to New England for so long, I have several restroom adventures to share.

The main one I did not think of was what would happen when I needed to seek out an open handicapped stall to use because of my mobility issues. I needed all the help I could get to make my way around to get to the toilet.

The first big issue came in Boston, where I was not expecting any difficulties. The first problem came when the only elevator down to the restrooms was broken and I had to try to use a steep set of stairs to make it to the restrooms themselves. I guess I looked unsteady enough for a younger man to offer to help me down the steps. But I made it alone. Then I found the handicapped stall and it was empty. The only bad part was the lock on the door was very flimsy, but by that time, I had no choice but to try it anyhow. In the beginning, all was good, and I finished my business with no problems. Then I heard a mom and young daughter enter the room. At that point, I tried to pull up my leggings and get myself together before BOOM, the kid barged through my stall door before her mom could stop her. Fortunately, I had my leggings almost all the way up as the mom pulled the kid out of there and all was alright. I went ahead and washed my hands and swiftly exited the restroom with a slight smile on my face.

Another one of the positives which happened on the trip was I got a chance to work on my voice again. It turned out I needed a passable voice to get me by in the restroom which on occasion was really crowded. Several times I had to respond to someone inquiring if the stall was occupied. The last thing I wanted to do was respond to another woman asking if the stall was occupied with a man’s voice. I did well enough I guess because no one ever questioned me on it.  Which gave me extra confidence to carry on other conversations with other women on other topics.

No matter how many rest stops the bus made, there still were times when I had to use the toilet on the bus. It was times like these when I was happy, I could sit down to pee. If you ever tried to negotiate moving around on a motor coach, you know what I mean, At the least you have to be very careful and at the worst, you have to be really careful to check the seat before you sit down. Even though I have to give the Amtrak train we took from Boston to Maine passing marks for timeliness and comfort, the restrooms left a lot to be desired and in fact, one seemed to be flooded and out of use. Fortunately, I did not have to go and let another woman take my spot.

Similar to so many other bus trips we have taken, in a relatively short period of time I was accepted for myself and no indication of any pushback of any one on the tour except that one guy on the first day who made the point of pointing me out to his wife From then on, I ignored him and everything was OK. It seems there always needs to be at least on hater these days wherever you go sadly.

Traveling while transgender will always carry extra baggage and we did not even go on modes of transportation such as flying which brings with it a whole other set of potential problems. Once I conquered my rest room fears, I was able to bond with the other women on the trips, and all turned out to be a good move. I made it through mentally and physically, so we have another trip planned. The whole process keeps me challenged and aware of my transfeminine being alive and well. Which is what I need at my age of seventy-five.

The restroom adventures just turned out to be the icing on the cake, it even got to the point when other women were helping me to the restroom. I needed all the cisgender acceptance I could get to build confidence. In fact, I found myself in situations where I was in danger of outing myself. Which is a topic for another blog post. 

Change was Coming

 

JJ Hart

As I grew into myself, I learned the truth. Change was coming if I liked it or not.

Change was one of the reasons I loved the fall season so much. As the weather cooled off and football came on, I could go through my feminine wardrobe and see what I could keep and what had to be discarded. Plus, I can’t forget Halloween which of course is the cross dressers’ national holiday in October.

Sadly, as the leaves began to change and fall from the trees, the whole time was bittersweet for me. The worst fall I could remember was when I was on a six-month delay to join the Army and I was working at a small radio station in Bowling Green, Ohio. If you are not familiar with that part of northwest Ohio, it is very flat to the point that any hills are manmade. One night, I was just driving around feeling sorry for myself as I looked ahead to Army basic training and I was so sad as the leaves blew in front of me. If I could have cried, I would have, but tears were nearly impossible for me in my male pre-HRT days. Similar to everything else in those days, I internalized my feelings and tried to move on as deep down I knew change had to happen.

During that time, I almost outed myself to my roommates in the apartment I was staying in until I left for basic. On one trip home, I brought back one of my favorite outfits along with a wig and makeup to Bowling Green. One day when I left, I assumed I had hidden my belongings well enough to not be discovered but I was wrong, and one night when I was preparing to surprise a male visitor to the apartment, after I went to work of shaving my legs and face, I checked for my clothes, and they were gone. I certainly thought, for a while change was coming then it was not. No one said a word to me and very soon, I was off to play soldier anyway so nothing else mattered.

Back in those Vietnam War days, basic training was an intense team building experience when a few drill sergeants needed to try to get a bunch of raw recruits ready for possible combat. During this time, the only way I could keep my girl self-alive was to bury her deeply in my subconscious mind, So, when we were on long forced marches around Ft. Knox, I made sure I thought about the well-being of my girl and the changes we would go through after my military service was finished.

Looking back at the three years I served; the time now seems like a blur and when I was discharged, I came really close to making a big change then by picking my future wife up at the airport cross dressed as my transfeminine self. I even went as far as hinting as such when I wrote her a letter. (Remember those?) Again, my male self-won out and I decided not to, and my big change had to go back to coming again. I did not have the courage yet to face my gender truth and took the easy way out and went back to accepting all the male privileges I had earned.

It was not until I became a parent and had reached my thirties did change to me become a real priority. I will always remember my thirtieth birthday being my hardest because I still hadn’t decided what I was going to do with my life. Sure, I had employment and financial issues to be aware of but again the underlying big elephant in the room was what changes would have to happen with my gender. I knew it was never going to be easy to present well as a woman, and I needed to work extra hard to earn whatever passing grades I could achieve in the public’s eye. Once I made the mental changes to proceed, much of my work became cosmetic in nature.

I was able to move the elephant aside and set about learning what it would take me to really live life as a transgender woman and not just be the “Pretty, pretty princess” my second wife called me. As change set in, I learned very few trans women or women at all live the life of a princess and I had a lot of work to do to put my male life behind me.

The last major change I put myself through was the hormonal one when I started gender affirming hormones. The HRT allowed me to sync up my external and internal selves and live a more productive life as a transfeminine person.

Dressing for Success

 

Image from Mohammad Nadir
on Unsplash. 

During my earliest days when I was forced into being a boy, anytime something negative or even challenging happened to me, I would run home and seek solace in my soft and colorful feminine clothes.

Soon I called the cross dressing I was doing, dressing for success. Mainly because I felt better as I did it. The sad part was, very soon the feelings of gender euphoria went away, and I was back in my unwanted male world where I was expected to succeed. During that time in my life, I was able to barely keep my head above water and still slowly improve my feminine basics in such things as the makeup arts. I guess all those hours of watching my mom apply her “face” as she called it, came back to help me. This was the 1950’s when women took their appearance much more seriously than today. All women were expected to dress for success.

As I barely stayed afloat with my cross-dressing challenges, it soon became more evident to me that there was much more going on with me than met the eye in the mirror as I tried to appreciate myself. It was about that time, when the internet showed up, and I was able to research terms such as gender dysphoria and transgender. Suddenly, I discovered who I might be and certainly found I was not all alone. It all started to make sense why my urge to cross dress never really seemed to go away. It was always with me in the back of my mind.

Soon, as I joined the world as a novice transgender woman, dressing for success largely depended on if I could go out into the world and blend in. I began the easy way by trying my hand with shopping mall clerks who for the most part were only nice to me for the money I needed to spend so I could be more fashionable and feminine. From there, I branched out to challenge myself by stopping to eat lunch and face servers one on one to see how I did. I did well, and very rarely did I have to run home and wonder what I did wrong and go back to my gender drawing board. I did not realize it but what I was doing was replacing my mirror time with time in front of the public. A very valuable learning experience as I discovered venues such as coffee shops, bookstores and even antique malls where I could shop and relax.

Each experience helped me to learn more about myself as a transfeminine person and then dress for success from it. To quit being so flamboyant with my wardrobe and wigs became my new goal as I was settling into my new life. People began to know me quicker, so I needed to be better in my approach to dressing for success. I learned I did not have to lose any of the enjoyment I experienced as a trans woman; I just needed to follow the lead of the cisgender women around me. I did not necessarily have to dress down for the grocery store and up when I mixed with the professional women out for a drink, but it helped me to feel better and relax. Plus, heels and hose would have certainly not worked when my lesbian friends, and I got together.

At times I even took my dressing for success to the extremes to be able to judge what the public was thinking of me. I used to wear my best sunglasses so that strangers could not see my eyes and tell I was looking at them, but were they looking at me? And one of my favorite “props” to use when I went out to be alone was my cell phone which I always had handy when I turned out to be the only woman at the bar. That way, I was trying to show anyone else I had someone else on the way, and I was saving their seat.

To be sure, dressing for success as a transgender woman was always a more complex process than doing it as a man. From undergarments to accessories such as jewelry, wigs and purses, women naturally lead a more layered life which can be reflected in the way they dress. I certainly had many more compliments on my outfits as a woman than I ever did as a man. Primarily, it was because it was something men never do and often, many cisgender women used compliments as simple conversation starters when they were curious about me.

As with all cisgender women, dressing for success is something transgender women must learn. The problem being we come from such a vastly different background to do it. Almost none of trans women had the benefit of peer pressure and a mom to guide us through the initial makeup process. Our workbooks were blank when we started our gender journeys. Playing catchup was not a fun game to play for me as I found making up my face was different than painting model cars. Most certainly, dressing for success was a lifelong experience for me.

 

 

Why Would I do this to Myself?

 

JJ Hart, Club Diversity
Columbus, Ohio.

Even though it has been years since I have been asked the question which asks why I am transgender, I withheld all my sarcastic comments such as I found my gender dysphoria in the bottom of a cereal box and thought of a concise truthful answer.

The truth is I had always known but was afraid to accept it. In the meantime, I set out on a slow, often torturous process to reach my impossible dream. To all the naysayers I interacted with, I just wanted to say, if I was not serious about switching male to female lives, why would I do this to myself. I knew early on I brought a lot of the problems with the public I faced on myself because of my novice attempts at presenting myself to blend into society with other women. I was coming off like a clown in drag, rather than someone who was seriously trying to jump the gender border from male to female. I was not playing around.

As my old male ego suffered, my feminine ego persisted and finally I did better in the world. I think too, the world took me seriously for the first time and did not have to ask the “why” question. I discovered too, that most of the world was just doing their thing and could care less about me if I could just blend. As I did blend in and began to carve out a new life for myself, the “why” of what I was doing became more personal and pressure packed. I was risking a successful male life I had worked hard to achieve, in order to live a new life which was so scary and at the same time felt so natural. I was having fewer people ask me why I was doing this transgender trip to myself.

Which brings up the question why any of us would transition ourselves if we were not desperate to do it. As an example, my own personal example was all the self-destructive behavior I put myself through including suicide and alcohol abuse. I was a living example of why I would do all of this to myself to be a transfeminine person. I was serious about what I was doing and needed to continue up the gender path I was on.

What helped me too was when I began to see the same people more than once. Since I was easy to remember, strangers began to put a name to my face, and I began to become a regular in several of the straight venues I went to. I just followed my tried-and-true idea of if I was friendly, did not cause any trouble and tipped well, I would be welcomed repeatedly.

The farther I went along my gender path, I began to wonder what sort of a transphobic gender bigot or female TERF would even question why a transgender person does what they do. Such as making all the sacrifices we must make to live the life we desire such as risk losing family, spouses and employment. Slicing off a major part of our life and starting over is intimidating enough without the naysayers questioning it.

On the other hand, there were things I wanted to do to help my feminine transition along such as losing nearly fifty pounds and beginning to take better care of my skin. Suddenly, I had access to more fashionable clothes which fit better, and my makeup was easier to apply. All because I took the time to take care of my transfeminine self. When I did so, even the haters I still encountered needed to get over it because I was more secure in myself. Even though I was increasingly successful in the world as a transgender woman, humans are like sharks, and every now and then I needed to fend off any unwelcome attention I might have attracted.

Possibly, the most important answer to the “why” question came when I decided to seek a doctor’s help and begin gender affirming hormones. Naturally, the decision on HRT was a major one and not a decision to be taken lightly. At the time I started hormones, I was leading a healthy male life which would have to change. I knew all along, I had come too far on my gender path to turn back now and quickly learned I had made the right decision to start HRT. My life blossomed as never before, and I never missed my old male body and emotions again.

By this time, I had married Liz and settled into a transgender dream world I never thought I could achieve. I guess I was to the point of if I could dream it and could do it. Which is a topic for another blog post altogether.  Plus, I had answered the question once and for all of why I wanted to do this to myself. It was fulfilling my own personal destiny.

 

Long Labor Day Weekend

 

Image from Anna Storsul
on UnSplash

Labor Day weekend is upon us in the United States which gives us an opportunity to take an extra day off and think about what got us here and how close we are coming to losing it.

Even though I have never been in a union myself, I am an amateur historian and know what unions did to transform this country. All you need to do is some basic research on how bad working conditions were in the steel industry as well as coal mining and elsewhere to see what unions brought about. So, on Labor Day, I salute them.

Elsewhere, the weekend this year features some beautiful weather with sunny blue skies and very low humidity for a change around here in the Ohio River Valley (Cincinnati.) Of course, the early fall like conditions won’t last forever and soon we will be back into summer’s last call. In a couple of weeks, my wife Liz and I will be headed for the East Coast, Boston, Maine and more so I am hoping for the reasonably good weather to hang around until then.

By now, you may be asking what does any of this have to do with being transgender? The answer is it has everything to do with being myself as a transfeminine person. Since this marks our fifth bus tour over the years of hanging out with other cisgender women waiting for my chance to use the bathroom, I still have lingering paranoia with using women’s rooms which goes back to my earliest days of cross dressing in public. Even though I have not had any problems in the past with anyone else, I still have the idea it only takes one bigot on the bus to ruin my trip. At least, this time we are traveling through more liberal blue states, so I won’t have that to worry about. As I said, my lingering fear is subsiding, so I can concentrate on having a good time and seeing the sights of New England. The last trip we were on a woman asked if Liz and I were sisters, so you cannot get more validation than that.

Closer to home before we leave, tonight we are going to dinner at our favorite restaurant with her son. It is another venue I have rarely ever been misgendered in and have never had any serious problems. It always feels good to just exist and enjoy myself since I worked so long and hard to get here as a transgender woman. The more I can fly under the gender radar in today’s world, the better I feel.

Before we go, I will have to shave closely, apply moisturizer, powder and lipstick before I change out of my The Ohio State sweatshirt and into a frilly feminine top and brush out my hair. All of which are still fun for me to do. Not just something I have to do to present better in the world.

Finishing out the day, it will be time to head home and watch the end of summer Cincinnati fireworks display. The display is always huge and attracts nearly a million people on both sides of the Ohio River. Back in the day, when I was younger and another person, I used to come down every year for the Booms. But age and mobility have caught up to me, taken their toll, and we just watch them on television now. Then let the out-of-control neighborhood idiots set their fireworks off and scare the animals and any near veterans with combat PTSD. Out of the two cats Liz and I have; one hates any sort of loud noise.

As with many other holidays, Labor Day presents yet another milestone in my transgender life. I can remember quite vividly when I used alcohol on holidays to dull the pain of not having the chance to spend them as my feminine self. I was fortunate to have escaped my closet and the control alcohol had on me before it was too late. It turned out it was all in front of me all along if and when I had the courage to reach out and seize my opportunity to transition and just be me.

I guess you could say, I needed to labor to do it, but it was worth the effort. When we toast ourselves tonight with our Margaritas, I will propose a toast to all the work we three have put into to where we are today. And, to all of you, no matter where you are today, have a chance to pause and celebrate the gender journey you are on, or have yet to do. Buckle up! It is one hell of a ride. 

Out od Sight...Out of Mind?

 

My wife Liz on left and daughter on right.

Most if not all transgender women and trans men go through phases in their life when they think gender issues are out of sight and out of mind. It is not entirely different than the moves some state legislatures (Ohio) are going through to try to erase us in the public’s eye.

If you read my posts at all, you know how I feel about that. Trans people have always been around and always will be. Attempts to erase us will be futile. On a lesser but just as important level, we try to erase ourselves by purging our lives too. I know the guilt of being a cross dresser or transgender woman became too much for me to handle and I threw out most of my treasured feminine wardrobe and makeup. Out of sight, out of mind I thought.

In the long term and the short term, none of my purges worked because I refused to accept my true self. I had my life all backwards and I was not a man who cross dressed as a woman, but a woman who cross dressed as a man. Until I figured it out, I kept trying to hide the obvious. Of course, it did not help as I started with two gender strikes against me. I went through birth as a male and then had to go through male puberty and suffer from what I called testosterone poisoning. My body kept the bullies away and allowed me to play sports but caused me torment when I was in front of the mirror trying to be a pretty girl.

As life went on, I thought for the most part I had learned to live with my gender dysphoria the best I could. To this day, though, I wished I could be a “normal” male. How much better could my life be if I could socialize with the other males around me without feeling as if I was an outsider. I grew tired of being an actor inside my own skin. The only thing I could do was mentally try to get rid of my feminine self. Taking me full circle back to why I was keeping all those clothes, wigs and makeup anyway. It took me by throwing them away to understand exactly what the problem was. It was not a problem unless I it made one, which I was by purging again.

Deep down I knew I was wrong and very shortly I would be re-stocking my fashion and make up to try my best to present feminine again to myself and the world. However, I was very stubborn and my male self-hung on way too long refusing to give up on his hard-earned male privileges. Life could have been much easier by staying where I was in the gender world, but it was just wrong, and I couldn’t. The more I lived as a transgender woman, the more natural I felt, and I never wanted to go back into the male world I had made the best out of.

Increasingly, the male purge was looking to be the one I was going to attempt to make. I was sick of living a gender lie, and I wanted to reverse my idea of living. I wanted to feel “normal” again but this time around a group of cisgender women. Flipping the gender script on my life was the most difficult thing I had ever attempted to do, but somehow, I made it through the female gatekeepers and did it.

In my new transfeminine life, I was rarely out of sight and out of mind. I had a lot of help to do it who I will never forget. I had spent my whole life chasing a dream and had finally achieved it. As I symbolically and literally gave my male clothes to charity, I stopped to remember the entirety of what I was doing. I was giving up the male side who had dominated me for so long. To be sure, he had served me well, but it was time to go, and this final purge was a triumphant one for my transgender woman who had waited so long to live. After all, she had her life taken away several times when she was purged nearly out of existence.

She survived and so did I and everything in her power to make things better. When I worried how I would be perceived in a new world. She had my back when it mattered, and it did. Even in the days when she had to give me quite a bit of tough love. She had to watch me grow through my ill-advised teen cross-dressing years into a presentation I could be proud of or at least satisfied with.

Out of sight, out of mind never worked for me.

 

 

Gender Immigration

 

L'eggs said it best.

With all the negative publicity being brought to the new immigrants to this country by the orange felon/pedo in Washington, I thought it might be time to connect the dots to my own immigration. A gender one.

My immigration plans began as a vacation. I was tired of the male world I was competing in and taking a break as a cross-dressed girl in makeup was a great way to escape my life. Little did I know, from these humble beginnings, I was starting a lifelong journey which in many ways, I am still on over a half a century later. Had I known, I would have ever attempted to undertake such a radical immigration.

Early on, I was just looking to grab the so-called low hanging fruit of cross dressing. I enjoyed the feel of the clothes, all the way to the thrill of hose on my freshly shaven legs. Then, I slowly began to realize so much else was happening. Increasingly I wanted to be more and more like a girl and started to wonder about pushing my male self out. It was difficult because I came from a highly male dominated family. As I pushed forward, my immigration into the feminine side of life became more intense. I tried my best to acquire new more fashionable clothes and even bought my own makeup and panty hose. Do you remember the “L'eggs” panty hose which came in plastic egg shaped containers which it seemed you could buy everywhere, and is still made today. I learned the hard way; how easy it was to destroy a pair when I unfortunately ran one of the legs. Ruining my outfit.

Progression was slowed by a late-teen collision with serving time in the military due to the Vietnam war. Obviously, I could not bring any of my “stash” of women’s clothes or makeup with me, so I was stuck. No more gender immigration for at least three years of my young life. There were several major positive things which happened for me while I was stuck being a man in the Army. A prime example was all the traveling I was able to do around the world in places such as Thailand and Europe (Germany). The whole process enabled me to keep my mind off my gender issues and set me up with the idea I could outrun my problems. Which, of course, turned out to be impossible. Which should be the topic for another blog post.

After the Army, my life changed again as I entered the world of parenthood. Being a parent of a daughter was an unexpected but pleasant surprise, and my gender immigration was put on hold briefly again. I say briefly, because I discovered my transgender issues ran deeper than I had thought. My presentation as a novice transfeminine person was coming along. My first wife did not care, and I was able to explore my potential future as a gender immigrant at events such as Halloween parties. Each party to me represented a chance to see how I was being accepted as a woman in society.

After a few years, I ended up divorcing my first wife and marrying my second. She also knew about and accepted my cross dressing from the beginning of our relationship but never accepted me being transgender as I immigrated towards being a woman. My male side was like being the Titanic, slowly sinking and then picking up speed with her fighting me all the way. It turned out, the issues I was facing were like the tip of the iceberg. With most of it being hidden from everyone. Including me. She tragically passed away before the final resolution in our relationship was ever decided.

When she moved on to the other side of existence, it was left up to me to decide the future of my immigration. I had certainly paid my dues by taking on all the menial and not so menial work of being a woman. I was on gender affirming hormones and was living as much as I was able as a transgender woman, so I was close to filling out my immigration papers and was ready to go into a world I had only dreamed of. My presentation had improved to the point where I was not the most attractive woman in the room, but I could handle myself to the point where most of the world just did not notice me. So, my immigration was more successful than I ever thought possible.

Perhaps the best part of immigrating was learning to accept and love myself for who I really was. Which meant all the hassles I had over the years as I tested out the world, made my immigration worth it.

 

 

Closing the Circle

 

JJ Hart at Club Diversity, Columbus, Ohio.

Very quickly when I opened my gender closet door and looked out, I noticed a whole different world I would have to conquer if I was to survive.

To begin with, I was slightly overconfident with my ideas because I had spent so much time studying the girls around me. I was jealous of their pretty clothes and how the boys chased them. I so badly wanted to run in their circle but as we all know, that was not going to be possible for years to come. To begin with, there were so many smaller circles to negotiate before I could advance. So many, I could barely keep track of them all. I had a LONG way to go.

To put it all into perspective, if you remember the Hula Hoop craze, with the round hoop you put on your hips, arms or even neck and spun it around. I was so uncoordinated, I had a difficult time playing with one as I grew up. If I could not even spin a simple hoop around my hips, how was I ever going to accomplish anything vastly different such as changing my gender identity. For the most part, I was naïve and did not understand all the complexities I was facing. While I was obsessed for years looking like a woman, I should have been obsessed with knowing what a woman was really all about. I remained too new to the gender game to be allowed to enter woman only spaces, or what I refer to as the girl’s sandbox.

Then in the middle years of my life when I began to explore the world more and more as a transgender woman, it seemed I had too many hoops or circles in the air. So many, in fact I kept making wrong choices such as the wigs I wore and how I misconstrued how I needed to look to blend in with the public. Instead of dealing from transfeminine strength, I was dealing with my old male ego hanging on and causing problems. I was stuck in my so-called teen cross-dressing years until I rapidly outgrew them in my thirties. Better choices of fashion and makeup helped me to overcome my testosterone body flaws and blend in with the other women who may have had traces of my problems with their body too. Even with all my newfound success, I was still having a difficult time closing my circles. My major problem was I did not completely realize how difficult it would be to stop a life and start over from a completely different point.

As I chased my Mini skirted tail, I had plenty of time to consider what I was doing with my life. In fact, too much as every spare moment I had, I was daydreaming of the next time I would spend as a transgender woman and what I would wear. I am surprised now I had kept my mind on my job enough to be promoted to an upper management position. I would love to have a portion of the time back I wasted. Perhaps, the sky would have been the limit for my male life, but it was not to be because I could not stop until my gender circle was closed.

It finally took a close circle of cisgender women around me to help me through my crisis. My current wife Liz in particular who told me she had never seen any masculine in me at all when I was still living part time as a man. It was the final shove I needed to reach out and close my transgender circle for good.

I don’t think I gained any physical coordination from transitioning, but I am sure I gained mental help when I long neglected woman side took over. I found part of feminine privilege came when I was allowed to participate in a softer side of life which did not revolve pushing and blustering my way through. My new circle involved more mental gymnastics with other women to see where they were coming from, as well as dealing with a passive aggressive side of life.

Not going in circles anymore was a wonderful experience. All my trial-and-error times in the world as a novice transgender woman came back to help me when I made the final transition to where I always wanted to be. No more spinning hoops to deal with which were destroying my mental health. To be sure, all of my bi-polar depression issues did not go away but the overlaying gender issues did. It sounds easy for me now, but all I needed to do all along was listen to my true self and close my gender circle.

 

 

In Over my Head

Image from Alexander Mass
on UnSplash

In the beginning, it was all so simple. Pick something, I could squeeze into from my mom’s closet, try my best to wear her makeup and go from there. Very quickly though I found I was getting in over my head as I began to sink into my own personal gender quicksand.

My first problem was hiding my small but growing collection of feminine fashion. In addition to my parents, I had a slightly younger brother I needed to deal with. Somehow, I managed to keep the darkest and potentially most destructive secret I had away from him, I wanted to be a girl in the worst way. I had no way of knowing then how many times I would be in over my head as I chased my dream. Primarily because I had no way of knowing looking like a woman was just the first step of a lifetime of gender learning. As I like to say, my gender notebook was blank when I received my copy, and I needed to catch up the best I could.

I began by studying the women around me who were my age the best I could. It was all I could do at that time to keep myself from setting myself up for failure when I finally was able to escape my dark, lonely gender closet and explore the world for the first time. When I did, I was naïve and confident I would have no problems. After I was sent home crying after being laughed at, rudely I knew I was in over my head with a lot of work to do. For some reason, for the first time in my life I knew I could not give up and I refused to quit. I kept going back to the drawing board until my makeup art improved and I began to learn the benefits of dressing my self properly as a woman of my age and build. Suddenly, I began to pull myself out of my quicksand and began to move forward again towards my dream of living as a transgender woman.

Ironically, as I moved forward, I ran into many other obstacles in my way. Was I pushing myself into a world which was ready for me or not was one of the main questions I had. The more involved I became in the world as a trans woman, the more I needed to be accepted into women only spaces. The only way I would ever know was if I could conquer my fears and try. As I pressed on, somedays I was more successful than others, but overall, I found I was accepted by other women. The times I found myself in over my head as a novice transfeminine person were primarily when I was approached improperly by men. There were times I needed to run home and rework my gender notebook after close ugly calls with men. I learned quickly, those close calls did not validate my worth as a woman. They did provide me with an insight of what women go through in their lives and I learned fast.

As I was adjusting to the new life I was destined to live, It seemed as if the lessons I was receiving kept coming faster and faster. I learned from my lesbian friends how to validate myself as a woman and from men, what not to do. At no point in time was any of my life easy at this point, but it was scary and exciting at the same time. My dream became so close I could reach out and touch it. If I kept out of the quicksand and kept my head above water, I could make it. The hardest part was still yet to come as I was coming increasingly closer by the day to separating from the male life I resented for so long.

The final decision to change was brought on by my choice to seek out gender affirming hormones or HRT. As I urge everyone to do, I sought out medical approval before I went down the radical path I was on. I was approved, put on an initial minimal dosage and before I knew it, changes were happening which made me a highly androgynous person. One look in the mirror told me that I had made the right decision and I wanted to move past the minimal dosage of HRT I was on.

I can’t say I haven’t found my way in over my head in recent times because of the type of person I am. Did being transgender aid in it? Who knows. We all have our choices to make, and they are all tempered by the people around us. Some are fortunate and have discovered feminine gatekeepers such as spouses were there all along. While others are destined to go it alone. Whatever the case, try to not get in over your head and do the best you can.                                 

  

In Over my Head

 

Image from Wilhelm Gunkle
on UnSplash.

As I thumbed through my new feminine workbook, I sadly discovered there were no chapters on what to do if I got in over my head. In my well-built male world, I had been able to figure out strategies on what to do in times of duress. I could choose to stand and fight, try to bluster my way through, or just run from the problem.  None of which was available to me anymore on the gender path I was on.

Even though I was blessed with a healthy male body which was slightly bigger than the norm, I had hated the changes testosterone made to it when I had no choice but to go through male puberty. Very quickly, I grew past the sizes of my mom’s clothes I was trying on and had to find other ways to build my wardrobe on the very limited budget I was on. My newspaper route money, along with the small allowance I got for helping around the house, just didn’t go far. Still, I was able to sneak out of our rural home under the pretense of visiting my grandma who lived downtown and do some shopping for makeup and hosiery. I just remember how incredibly overwhelming the makeup selection was and how much I was over my head with my selections.

After I was able to smuggle my purchases past grandma and my family, then I needed to work earnestly on how to apply the makeup I bought and not look like a clown. After looking in the family mirror and feeling like a clown in drag, I knew I was in over my head and just had to find a way out, or in as it turned out. I wanted out of the male world and into a feminine world. The mirror was wearing off, and I needed to improve my presentation, or I was doomed to forever occupy a male spot in the world where I knew I was not in over my head. The white male privileges I was building up were just too easy to not take advantage of. Ironically, all the good I was accomplishing in the world with my family, friends and job was frustrating me because, deep down, I did not want it.

What was happening was my frail mental health was being destroyed by all the gender ripping and tearing I was going through. One day I was a successful man and the next I was working to present my self as a woman was very destructive to my everyday existence because the whole process took me back to my gender fluid days when I was a kid. Back in those days, no one knew about the gender fluid term, or used it which put me in over my head before I even really started in life. Remember, I grew up in the pre-internet dark ages when anyone who cross dressed was considered mentally ill. At least I knew, even though I might be alone as a transvestite (another term from the dark ages), I was not mentally ill.

I barely survived the dark ages when I did learn there were actually individuals like me who wanted to dress as women. I would be remiss if I did not mention Virginia Prince and her Transvestia publication at this point. It was my lifeline to the cross-dressing world and opened my closet for the first time. When the light came flooding in, at first, I was blinded, and it was difficult to find my bearings. My first transvestite-crossdresser mixers I went to left me more confused than ever before. I knew I was in over my head when I saw and occasionally chatter with a few of the ultra-feminine women who I could see no masculine traits at all and on the other hand, I knew I was innately more feminine than many of the cross dressers I met. So, I left with more questions than answers.

I was caught in the same place for years as I explored the world looking for myself. Surely, along the way, I found myself in over my head as I transitioned but I kept going anyhow. Too stubborn to quit and waste the new feminine privileges I was working so hard to gain. To use another example, I threw myself into the deep end of the gender pond before I had learned how to swim. I gave myself no choice but to make it. Fortunately, all the mirror time working on my presentation as I wanted to be like the beautiful cross dressers I saw in Transvestia came back to help me. If I could present myself to blend in with the world, it gave me one step up to make it as a transfeminine person.

I certainly was in over my head enough to earn my right to play in the girl’s sandbox, and fill out my gender workbook.

 

Transgender-When Life Throws you a Curve.

 

Image from Chu CHU on UnSplash.

It’s baseball season as we head down to the “dogdays of summer” around here in Cincinnati. As I have mentioned many times, the gender gods allowed me to take my passion for sports with me when I transitioned from male to female. This year, I have been completely emotionally immersed in the Cincinnati Reds professional baseball team. So much so, sometimes I feel guilty about my involvement.

Overall, though, life threw me a real curveball when it came to sports. For several reasons, athletics helped me to keep the bullies away, since I was doing “boy” things. As I played, I found I could not hit well at all, primarily a curveball and resorted to running home to my dresses and makeup to feel better about my failures. And I did, which solidified my deepening idea I should have been a girl all along. Dressing in my pretty feminine clothes certainly felt better than crying in the shower after I committed a key error or struck out to end the game.

As time went on, I faced the reality of non-athletes everywhere, life had thrown me a curve ball I just couldn’t hit. Somehow, I just needed to adjust and become the fan I am today and quit being a victim. I think perhaps it was my Army duty which took any idea of self-pity away from me. So what if my draft number was twenty-three, I would just have to enlist for three years to make the best of it. Plus, the entire routine of basic infantry training took any idea of being a victim away from me. At least I was not one of the guys crying on the night bus to Ft. Knox in the middle of a Kentucky winter. Somehow, I would have to make the best of a situation I did not want to be in.

It turned out, that idea carried right over into my gender dysphoria. The older and more experienced I became as a transgender woman, ended up clashing with my increasingly successful male life. Life had thrown me a gender curveball, and it was not fair but the problem was mine to deal with.

Initially, I kept striking out on my path to transgender womanhood. I was woefully unprepared for the world I so desperately wanted to enter. The path was quite dark with many bumps and curves, so I needed to be careful with the high heeled steps I was taking. Perhaps the most important problem I faced was when I was completely outed as a man in a dress was quickly going home and attempting to figure out what I was doing wrong. Was it my fashion, or my makeup, or what?

This time I refused to be fooled by a gender curveball and hung in there until my life began to change for the better. Slowly, I was being accepted as my true transfeminine self in the public’s eye. I was not hitting any home runs yet, but I was making contact with the public and was successful.

Incredibly to me, the more contact I was making, the more I needed to make. In particular, women were curious what I was doing in their world and drew me into conversations which were uneasy for me in the beginning. Life was throwing me curveball after curveball, and I became halfway decent at making contact with the strangers I met. I think too that after the public met me, more than a few of them reacted to the fact that I was a person who was living with their truth. Then I needed to catch up and respect myself for living my truth. Which was difficult for me to do for years.

Ironically, at that point, I went to work for a company which would not accept any of their successful managers being victims. I carried their training over into my real life and was better prepared for any and all setbacks I encountered. I began to see my supposed setback in life just could be a positive if I made it one. Not so much different than when I went to Army basic training wondering how I was going to make it without my cross-dressing crutches.

After immersing myself in the world of cisgender women, I came out as a better person. Certainly, well rounded in how the two main binary genders interact with each other. I could not ever make it as any sort of an athlete, but it turned out I could as a transgender woman. A journey I came to respect many times along the way.

 

You Make a Terrible Woman

 

JJ Hart on left. New wife Liz on right.

As I was initially coming out of my intensely lonely and dark gender shell, I dealt with quite a bit of guilt. Especially when my wife called me a terrible woman. I initially thought she was referring to my looks, which she told me she wasn’t.

My second wife was also fond of telling me coming out was all about me which as I look back on it, she was right. My transition was all about me, and I was completely immersed in it. Every time she even made the slightest move to interact with me, I shunned her as I was scared, she was just going to be negative. To be successful, I needed to do it alone it seemed.

I am sure the progress my wife saw in my overall presentation made her feel insecure about the future of our marriage. No matter how guilty I felt about the journey I was taking without her, deep down I knew I had to stay on my path if I was ever going to have a chance to achieve my dream of living as a transgender woman. Which my wife was dead set against.

As I progressed on and on the guilt grew, I was having. Here I was jeopardizing a good marriage, family and job just to wear women’s clothes and makeup. My problem was, I was still refusing to accept the truth about myself. In other words, my desire to be a woman in any sense of the word ran much deeper than just looking like one. When my wife told me I made a terrible woman because I hadn’t paid my dues past looking like one, I knew somehow, I needed to set out to learn what she was talking about, regardless of the guilt involved. To survive, my transition had to be just about me, and I stubbornly pushed forward.

The problem was, the more guilt I felt, the worse my mental health became. I did not know who to listen to, the world at large or the person I was closest to. The world at large was slowly coming to accept me as a transfeminine person while my wife was as standoffish as always about my progress. What she did not know was I was making the strides needed to prove I was not a terrible woman and in reality, a fairly likeable one. Or at least I was trying to.

Time marched on, and my guilt increased to the point where I committed suicide or tried to. When I failed, the entire self-harming episode left me with further problems with my guilt and mental health, so I sought out therapy. Fortunately, I found a good therapist who understood depression and the transgender community, and my life began to improve again. My therapist told me it was alright to feel guilt about the gender transition process and sometimes you must leave loved ones behind so you can live. Beyond all of that, she taught me extreme gender dysphoria was difficult to deal with and before long, our in-person meetings at the Veteran’s Administration were between her and my authentic self. What a relief!

My guilt subsided as my joy increased in my life. Sure, I still had rough spots to contend with, but with my overall knowledge of the world and what to expect, I knew I had finally overcome my fear of actually “making” a terrible woman. In reality what happened was I had the chance to live my way through what my wife told me and in addition. I was not making anything. I already was a transgender woman and had always been. I was just guilty of trying to hide it and internalize it too long. Surely, it was all my fault, and I never had the chance to apologize to her because of her untimely death from a massive heart attack at the age of fifty. I wanted to show her I had paid my dues in the world, and, at the least, I hoped we could be friends. Actions speak louder than words and I know she would never back off from saying I made a terrible woman and in turn at least like the new me.

In life, we rarely have a chance to make a second impression, and it has been nearly an impossible one for me since most of the people I knew as a man (that mattered) had passed away. I needed to concentrate on the new acquaintances I met as a trans woman who never knew my old male self who in his own way had passed on also. Since I did not have a difficult time making and keeping friends in my new life, I must not have been a terrible woman after all.

Buckle Up!

 

Alpha Gatekeeper Hope
Who Let Me In!

If you are a transgender woman or trans man and you have been transitioning along your gender path for any length of time, you know there are plenty of highs and lows to prepare for.

I know on my gender journey; I have had to buckle up for many rough roads ahead. I have many examples I write about often such as being told to leave one venue I started to go to when I decided to leave the gay bars behind and go to mainstream straight venues. I went home in tears like when I was laughed out of malls by groups of teenaged girls when I first attempted to go out in public. For a long time, I never thought I had a chance of living my transgender dreams at all.

Deep down, something told me to fasten my seat belt and keep trying to succeed. You see, the problem was all along in my life, if something went wrong, I ran to my skirts and put on makeup to make it go away. In these cases, I had nowhere to run, so I had to get it right. I was in a corner, and I couldn't get out without a lot of work. It turned out to me, the whole process was a labor of love, and I felt good going forward on my gender path. The problem was I was still quite naïve about what I was facing and thought success could be found if I just was able to present properly as a woman. To try the new world out I was in, I went to all sorts of different situations. Examples were when I went to a downtown festival and an outdoor concert just to see if I could. Following painstakingly applying my makeup and choosing just the right clothes, I managed to be successful at both, and my confidence soared.

When I did, my frail confidence was shattered again when I learned the world was curious about me as a transfeminine person. It meant I would have to really buckle up and do more than trying just to look like a woman, I needed to communicate like a woman. All of that turned out to be harder than it sounds (no pun intended). I found out quickly that women operate on a different wavelength than men. Men use a more simplified straight forward approach to communicating with each other and other women. On the other hand, I discovered I better refine my listening skills, plus be aware women communicate with each other on non-verbal wavelengths. Also, eye contact with other women became very important too, if I was ever going to be allowed to play in the girl’s sandbox by the alpha female gatekeepers.

As with anything else, I needed to allow practice to become perfect if I was ever going to succeed at reaching my goal of living as a transgender woman. To do it, I needed to forget my unreachable dream of being able to present so well as a woman that anyone would ever think I was cisgender. To begin with, testosterone poisoning had taken all of that idea away from me. I needed to re-buckle up my expectations and know the best I could do was follow my path as a woman from a different background. To succeed, I needed invitations from cis-gender women to their girls’ nights out so I could observe and learn how other women acted when men were not around. Naturally, I needed to put what was left of my male ego behind me when I had to buckle up and attend several of these meetups. My primary example came one night when I was invited along with a group of servers where I went to, to another upscale venue to party. They were all young and attractive and immediately were surrounded by attentive males, leaving me by myself and my drink. I learned a powerful lesson that night why certain attractive women tend to hang out together.

I was fortunate as I traveled my gender journey, I had key alpha females to help me with my seatbelt. As an example, I have added the picture of “Hope” who ironically gave me hope for my future dreams. She was the first bartender I ever met who went out of her way to be kind to me, all the way to introducing me to her lesbian mother who I stay in touch with to this day. Hope led the way for me to be accepted by others and thrive in the girls’ sandbox, and I will never forget her for it.

My main message is, no matter how many bumps and bruises you may suffer along your own gender journey, just try to securely fasten your seatbelt and make the trip as interesting as possible. Just remember, not many are able to make the same journey and achieve their dreams of living as a transgender woman.