A New Day

 

JJ Hart, Dining Out. 

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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.       

Scared to Death

 One idea I do my best to dis-spell is the idea my Mtf gender transition has been anything but easy. I believe some people are led to believe it was from many of my posts. Most certainly I experienced more than my deserved share of quality experiences but on the other hand many of the experiences required me to be extremely courageous to even attempt. Plus, if the truth be known, some should not have been attempted at all. 

I believe the  most scared I have ever been happened the first night I had determined I was not going out as a cross dresser. I was going to try as closely as I could to see if I could be accepted as a feminine person. If not a woman, the closest I could come. Over the years I have not been shy writing a description of the evening. To make a long story short for those of you who may remember, I ended up sitting in my car in the venue's parking lot a half hour before I could summon the courage to go in. Once I finally decided to go forth with my plan, I knew all I had to do was get past the hostess stand and grab a seat at the bar. 

Furthermore, my grand idea was to dress as a professional woman to blend in with the other women who frequented the place when they were done with work at a nearby upscale mall. For the evening I chose my black pantsuit, black flats and long over the shoulder straight blond wig. To finish my look I did my best to add a tasteful reasonable makeup application. 

Photo:
Jessie Hart
Collection

As I wrote, my plan was just to find a seat at the bar which had seating on three sides with two big ornamental wooden posts at the front of the bar. I was lucky, I managed to secure one of the only seats remaining by chance next to one of the posts. I remember sliding into the bar stool and all the while wishing I was invisible. Of course I wasn't and very soon I was waited on by what turned out to be a very friendly bartender who turned out to be one of my regular servers as I returned many times over the years. 

Surviving the first experience only emboldened me to try more. The problem was, the more I tried different venues to see if I presented well enough to get by, the more I found just weren't accepting. In a couple I was asked to leave and even had the police called me in one place. None of it was easy as I explored the world. 

The world though was different back in those days. The public was more likely to be more vocal to their resistance of having  a transgender woman in a non gay venue. In fact, it was difficult to be accepted as anything more than another drag queen in many male gay bars. To make matters worse, the term "transgender" was new too.

As I look back on my explorations I wonder what drove me forward. My best idea is I was driven internally by the strong desire to explore living a feminine life. The more I lived, the more natural I felt so I knew it had to be right.

I can't stress enough how good it feels to have managed to survive all my life experiences and come out the other side, alive, well and living full time as a transgender woman. I also can't stress enough how frightened I was on so many occasions when I was exploring my journey. My message is to try to relax and enjoy your own gender journey. It can be so worth it to be yourself. 

Inspiration

 I will be on the road  today participating in a master's level Sociology class.

Here is a bit of inspiration in the meantime:

 

Changes

 It took me a lifetime of living to partially understand what we all should know. Life is but a series of changes. Once we quit changing we die. 

Years ago, due to financial considerations and other excuses, I put off needed dental work. My excuse was I didn't think I would outlive my teeth since everyone around me was passing away. Well, I proved myself wrong and now this week, I need to pay my dues and go to the dentist. I can't even speculate what will happen.

Interestingly, I am filling out the information forms ahead of time on line and quickly I came to the gender portion. I was given the usual binary choices of male and female and a third choice of "unspecified". I chuckled to myself thinking now I was unspecified? 

It's a big week for changes. Today I have a virtual appointment with my endocrinologist which is all about changes to my body. Hopefully, the visit will be all positive because I am pleased with all the feminine changes going on in my body. Even my breasts seem to be fuller these days. As mentioned, my dental appointment for dentures is tomorrow and my therapist virtual visit is Wednesday.

I haven't figured out yet if being older brings on a resentment towards change. Perhaps it's the idea I have already been through that before, why should I have to do it again?

When you consider the pain, suffering and fear which comes with gender dysphoria and being transgender, how can anything in life compare. 

Changing your gender has to be the most difficult process a human can attempt besides being born and passing away.