I've Got Someone for That

 

JJ Hart on Left, wife Liz on Right. 

Maybe you have seen the commercial on television where a group of men seemingly have an answer for a friend who can solve a certain problem. To a point, then they are all stumped on what to do.

I saw the commercial again this morning and applied it to my path to living a transgender existence. My basic idea was, I did not ever have someone to provide guidance in all my gender issues. In the pre-internet days, which I write about often, I needed to rely on publications such as “Transvestia” or “Tapestry” for any real information on having someone to help me understand what I was going through in my life. I was overjoyed for awhile when the magazines helped lead me to actually meeting in person others at cross-dresser-transgender mixers which were close enough to me so I could attend. Surely, (don’t call me Shirley my name was Karen back in those days) I could meet someone there who I could explain my gender issues to and feel as if I had someone to confide in and help me.

In reality, even after I went to the social mixers, I still did not come away with feeling like I had someone to be my friend. No matter how you defined what the publications called me. A transvestite or a cross-dresser, I just knew I was different and still belonged in the group of men in the commercial who were stumped on what to do. That defined the new groups I was meeting for the first time.

Since I could not find a friend at the mixers, I withdrew into myself and did the best I could cross-dressing and dreaming of a better day in front of the mirror. I was stubborn and kept on attending socials until I began to be invited to smaller parties at a house in nearby Columbus, Ohio. The parties were very diverse, and I learned a lot from the others around me and even developed acquaintances who shared my gender path. Or so I thought because a few of them took a sharp curve away from me and went as far as having gender realignment surgery. Back in those days when you took such a radical step, you were expected to leave your past totally behind and start all over again and I started to drift away from them. Very soon I was stumped again and very confused on where I was going as a transfeminine person.

The only thing I knew for certain was my sexuality did not change when I entered my feminine world. I even was attracted to the very few lesbians who were attending the parties I was going to, and often we would briefly leave to visit other lesbian friendly venues in Columbus. At least it was one small feeling I knew I could count on.

Through it all, I did have someone who was my second wife. On many of the party nights, she would accompany me which sometimes was bad and sometimes it was good. She was the one who saved me from being trapped in a small hallway by a huge admirer one night, which was good, and other nights her presence hindered my ability to expand and test my feminine personality. Sadly, I learned more about myself when she was not around as I considered her my best friend most of the time. She was not the person I needed all the time though, which created huge problems in our long-term relationship. She always knew I was a cross-dresser but drew the line if I drifted towards any of the transgender women at the party.   

At that point, I did feel like I did have someone who understood what I was going through at the party but had the feelings rejected at home. The worst part of the whole thing was, I had gone too far with my transfeminine experimentations to ever turn back but I tried to have the best of both worlds. Save my marriage on one hand and live a part time life as a trans woman on the other. I still carry the guilt coming from the number of times I broke my promise to my wife and left the house dressed when she was at work. I have always described it as cheating on her, with myself.

One way or another, I was gaining confidence in my feminine self to continue to build a new life which felt so natural because for a change I had someone to lean on. For those of you who don’t know, my second wife passed away suddenly from a massive heart attack leaving me with a huge hole in my life along with a truck load of guilt which I could never make up for.

In her sudden absence, I fell back on the only person I knew who could help me as I decided to end my male life for good and live out the remainder of my life as a trans woman. It turned out all the labor of love I put into my femininized life came back to help me because I had all the hard work of refining my presentation behind me. I had a working knowledge of what to do to survive in the world of alpha ciswomen. I just had to refine my new life to a point where I could thrive with new friends. When I had reached new milestones in my life such as HRT hormonal changes, I was met with welcome to our world and knowing smiles rather than masculine scowls and glares. I loved my new life.

The only problem I had was I took too long to transition across the male to female gender border. It turned out I had someone all along to help me if I ever gave her the chance. I was stuck in the good old boys’ male privilege club way too long and it was hard to give up. Once I found someone like my wife Liz to point out the obvious to me, I knew for sure I had that special someone and I could live an authentic life as a transgender woman.

 

I Got Scammed

 

Image from Markus Winkler
on UnSplash.

Years ago, I discovered I was scammed when I attempted to climb my gender path towards my dream goal of living completely as a transgender woman.

My first mistake was believing what I saw in the mirror when I was cross-dressed as a girl was a true indication of what I really looked like. The mirror was more than capable of lying to me by telling me I looked attractive, when I really looked like a circus clown in drag. It wasn’t until I began to go out in public as a feminine person, did I find out the brutal truth of how far I still had to go to present well as a novice cross dresser in public. Rather than create attention to the way I looked, I needed to blend in with the average ciswomen around me and just get by.  I was scamming myself to think otherwise.

Sadly. The scamming continued unabated until I woke up to the true world around me. My life was restricted by outdated thoughts I carried through from my still very active male self who thought dressing sexily was the way to go. The only good thing that happened during this part of my life was that I went through my cross-dresser “adolescence” fairly quickly and began to attempt to dress my testosterone poisoned body the best I could to hide my flaws. I was aided by fashion styles back then which favored miniskirts, bare legs, opaque stockings with oversized sweaters. I was even able to continue a version of the fashion basics when I changed into a bohemian style denim mini along with a flowing loose top to hide my oversize male torso. For once, fashion trends were playing in the right direction for me and my scamming decreased from my male self and the public.

At that point, I shifted my emphasis on where I was going when I was learning the world for the first time.  Initially I chose more malls and safe places such as coffee shops and bookstores until I got bored and chose other venues to go to at night when I began to sneak out of the house when my wife was working. At first, I was satisfied with going to a few male gay venues in downtown Dayton, Ohio. Even though I did not like the overall atmosphere of the places, I kept going because I thought they were safe. That was until I was stopped on a sidewalk outside one night by two men looking for a handout and I was lucky I still had a five-dollar bill to give them, so they left me unharmed. I learned a valuable lesson that all ciswomen knew which was to always be careful of your surroundings and I never went back there again unless I had friends with me.

I also felt I was scamming myself and wasting my hard-earned money by going to gay venues at all. Lesbian bars for the most part were fun for me for a number of reasons. Including the attention, I would receive on occasion from a few of the other patrons. Male gay bars however just treated me like any other drag queen which I hated. I even had a hard time being served which drove me away. It was then; I decided to stop being scammed and take my business to straight sports bars where I knew I could enjoy the atmosphere if only I could be accepted.

I was surprised how quickly I was accepted at venues I used to frequent as a man, and I felt comfortable in. The difference in venues was in the straight sports bars, other women wanted to actually talk to me. Which opened up a whole new world of possibly being scammed by ciswomen and their passive aggressive behaviors. I don’t want to recall how many times I went home with claw marks on my back after I assumed another woman’s smile actually meant she was being friendly with me. That scam became old quickly and I learned to be careful in the world in a whole different way.

The biggest scam of all came when I learned I was not a man cross-dressing as a woman, I was a woman cross-dressing as a man to get by in a life she never wanted. If I had only learned that earlier in life how much easier I could have made it on myself. No such luck, as I was destined to be scammed by a world and my male self into thinking I was doing the right thing by fighting hard to keep my manhood. These days, I am older and wiser when it comes to scamming myself and have accepted the transgender truth, I always denied myself.

As I wrote in a recent post, I would not recommend the path I took towards achieving my dream because the world has changed since I did it. Harsh anti-transgender politicians have made it harder to come out in the world as well as making it harder for some of us to exist at all. (Like in my native Ohio). Hopefully though, the younger generations seem to be resistant and blind to the bigotry of their elders and there is hope for the future. That was, none of us will have to worry as much about scamming ourselves or each other about who we truly are. Just people who have been around forever and are trying to live a basic, honest life.

One way or another, the path we have chosen as transgender women and transgender men is much more difficult than the average person next door. And I can add scammers along with stop signs, blind curves and steep hills on our route to finally discover who we are with the opportunity to live it. It just makes it worse when we learn the person who was our main scammer was ourselves.

As always, thanks for joining me in my journey. Any comments, claps or subscriptions are always welcome!

 

I Had to do Something Right

 

Image from Mark Farias on Unsplash 

In my dark days of confusing cross-dressing, I vaguely knew I was doing something right. Or at least I thought so because I could not wait to try it again.

Looking back, it was the brief moments of gender euphoria which clouded all my doubts about my gender and kept me going. Even through the nights when I was the laughingstock of teen girls in malls, a little voice kept telling me to keep going and eventually I would improve my overall feminine presentation so that I would blend in and not get noticed. Along the way, I even needed to lower the expectations I was putting on myself to keep going. I was never going to be the most attractive woman in the room, but at least I could still be like most ciswomen I saw and live a decent life. Even though I started to feel this way, I never gave up the idea I could do better with my makeup, fashion and hair so I could survive. Simply because I was enjoying the experience so much.

Later on in my life, doing something right extended to my interaction with the world as a novice transgender woman. I was surprised when I attracted more attention from ciswomen than men and just thought they were curious about me and were welcoming me into their worlds, while men were just the opposite. Most resented the fact I was leaving all of the male privilege behind (along with the good old boys’ club) and moving to the other side of the gender border. I did not care because my need for companionship was being satisfied and I had always gotten along with women easier than men most of my life. Increasingly I found I never wanted to go back to the male life I was attached to by a spouse, family, friends and jobs. It seemed the longer I waited, the more male baggage I was building up when I really did not want to.

The next problem I ran into was the impostor syndrome I was feeling. Specifically on the girls’ nights outs I was invited to. It never failed that right in the middle of me enjoying the evening, I had suspicions sneaking up on me that I did not belong there at all. I was an impostor in a scene made up of women who had worked their entire life to get there. It took me awhile to come to the conclusion that I had worked my entire life also to make it to my own version of womanhood, and I deserved as much as the next woman to be attending. Fortunately, I received very little negative feedback from other women attending the get-together, so I did not have to face my impostor syndrome at all. I was doing something right for a change to even be invited to such special women only events.

I was able to take my experiences with girls’ nights out to my everyday life primarily because it built my confidence as a transfeminine person so much. With my newfound feelings, I worked even harder on my makeup, fashion and hair to appear more feminine than ever before. Primarily, I learned the power of contouring and colors on my face from professional makeup artists I met at the cross dresser-transgender social mixers I went to. One in particular, took the time to explain what he was doing in terms I could understand and repeat on my own. It was a powerful experience when I had to set my makeup ego aside and learn better results from a professional. From that point on I worked on taking weight off, so I had a better opportunity to find and buy more fashions that flattered my male figure at the many thrifts stores I frequented. When I arrived at that point, the problem then became getting out of the mirror and started putting my new improved feminine self into motion in the world. It proved to be the most difficult part of me doing something right.

Suddenly I had to consider how I was moving as I tried to mimic the unique way ciswomen move and put all my male linebacker moves behind me along with the scowl on my face I was used to wearing as my male defense mechanism. And the most difficult issue of all was learning to communicate one on one as a woman. I knew with certainty I would have issues with my communication, but not to the point that I did. I even went to the extent of taking vocal classes to improve my feminine basics and be able to talk easier in the world with women and men. It just made sense to do if I was continuing to do something right.

It turned out, the more I did right and received positive feedback, the more I wanted to do to refine my feminine approach as a transgender woman. Because I always had the belief, I needed to be better than the average ciswoman to just survive behind the gender curtain. When I was just trying to do something right, on occasion I paused to reflect on how far I had come along my gender path to arrive where I was. I did remember that scared little boy dressed in his mom’s clothes in front of the family’s hallway mirror, wondering what was next. For the most part, back in those days, there was very little to let the young boy know he was doing anything right.

Somehow, I survived all the negative feedback and impostor syndrome problems and continued forward to a better world. One I wanted to be in and dreamed of my entire life. As I love to say, as with any woman, I needed to socialize myself into the world. Being born female does not automatically make you a woman, you must learn to be one. The same was true for me. I just took a radically different path to earn my womanhood. I needed to do many things right to arrive at my dream.

 

 

 

 

My Gender Woes were Always Pending

 

Image by Samual Regan Asante
on Unsplash. 

From the earliest days of my life, my gender always seemed to be “pending” as the bank likes to call my most recent on-line deposit.

In my cross-dressing days, when I could afford it, I jumped daily into different wigs, clothes and makeup styles. I was desperate to find the next best thing which would help my feminine presentation along and I was always waiting for the public to acknowledge me. Positive or not, I was always pending their approval in my life.

Along the way, I did get better with my looks and became better at blending in with the ciswomen in the society around me. But I never lost my desire for approval. It became key to my survival as a novice transgender woman, long before I discovered there would be so much more if I ever wanted to slip behind the gender curtain and live my dream life. By then, I was lapsing back into my brainwashed family idea that nothing was ever good enough which carried over to my male to female femininization activities. My confidence was so low, and fragile that the smallest negative comment would send me back to my cross-dressing drawing board as I wondered if I would ever make it.

At that time, I survived in my world by listening to a little voice in my head which was telling me all this turmoil was pending if I just stayed on my path. To do so meant negotiating many blind curves, bumps, and stop signs along the way. Before I knew it, my path was littered with failed fashion choices, wigs and drag style makeup. I needed to choose wisely what I would need to keep before I attempted to move on.

One of the most dramatic pending issues I had was when I made the jump from gay to straight venues. When I did it, I had no idea if I could, so I had to gather the confidence to do it. I needed to be better at blending my style so I would fit in but not too flamboyant to attract unneeded attention as a single woman by herself in a bar. I became very good at using my cell phone as a prop to act like I was saving a seat in the venue for a friend. Among other things I was doing to present and blend in as a transgender woman. I was not concerned so much about being read as trans but was concerned about not being a distraction. Even though I became successful and was able to become a regular at a couple venues, my relaxation was always pending as I needed to stay on guard for any crazy reactions to my being there at all.

The whole process helped me to heighten my senses to where ciswomen normally operate on a daily basis. Since I was primarily dealing women in my new life, it was key that I was able to read my gender cues correctly because the cues were coming from a different angle than they ever were when I was a man. Women primarily were curious what I was doing in their world and was I projecting an honest view of myself. When I passed their tests, I was allowed in to play in their sandbox. There was room for me after all and my dreams of living in a feminine world suddenly became so much more feasible. Something which was always pending before I was able to get out into the world and experiment as a transfeminine person.

The problem became; I was forced to remain pending in my life at a time of extreme gender discovery from me. As the world of ciswomen were exploring me, I was exploring them and learning tons of information on what I would have to do if I ever chose the final male to female transition. In other words, I was able to turn their curiosity around to satisfy my own.

Finally, I arrived at the point of no return when I had done enough experimentation as a novice trans woman to know where I wanted to go to live my dream and I knew I could if I played my cards right. I knew in many ways, this final transition I was planning on making would be the most difficult to do. I would have to try to wrap my male life up the best I could. Which involved deciding what baggage I wanted to bring with me following nearly a half of century of living.  As far as family went, I was down to only two who were still living and I knew I really wanted my daughter to accept me, which she did and my brother who I figured would be a problem and he was. He rejected me and we ended up going our own separate ways over a decade ago.

I knew too, I would have to find another way to financially support myself because my employers never would. For once, age came to my rescue as I was close to being able to take an early social security retirement and augment it by selling the numerous amounts of collectables my second wife and I had collected over the years. With the two sources of income, I calculated I could not have to work another job as I transitioned.

With those two major potential problems behind me, I had very little pending to stop me from moving ahead to the hormonal world of HRT which proved to be immensely satisfying and something I should have done years before. Rather than making the process another pending idea I wanted to try.

By now, you probably know the rest of the story. I am seventy-six and the remainder of my life is shorter than what I have previously lived. Even though I am immobile, I am fortunate to still get around and have someone who loves me. I just hope good health is not pending and I can live peacefully with myself. Which at times during my life has been an issue, including my mental health. I am meeting with my new therapist this week and will have more to share later.

 

Everything Was Fine Until It Wasn't

 

Image from Danny
Messina on UnSplash

Many times, when I was sailing along thoroughly enjoying my feminine self out in the world, I would come to a rude awakening that something was not right. As I experimented as a novice cross-dresser fresh out of the mirror at home, I learned any number of things could be wrong. Including the cruel imposter syndrome which haunted me. A great topic for another blog post.

Or maybe my makeup was not on point, and I looked like a clown in drag, or I had that old male scowl on my face instead of a pleasant little smile which gave away the fact I was not enjoying myself the way I should. But something was wrong as I was doing what I wanted to do for a change, and I needed to show it. Not revert to my old male ways of trying to scare people off before they even started to interact with me. It is something I work on to this day as it is easy for me to fall back into old gender habits. I needed to work hard to put my entire new feminine image into play when I was out or no matter how good my makeup and fashion looked, I was not going anywhere in my development as a transgender woman.

A quick example of the problems I was facing with my face happened one day when I was out shopping in a woman’s clothing store. When I came around a rack of clothes, I was startled by a young girl staring up at me. Worse yet, I was prepared for the worst when she took off looking for her mother. I was semi-relieved when I heard her say, look at the BIG woman, and I thought she had that part right. Until she said, the BIG MEAN woman, and I immediately felt bad that she thought I was mean. From that point forward, I put a slight feminine smile on my face as my final touch of makeup. Everything was right with the world that day (including the little girl who thought I was a woman) until it wasn’t.  Lesson learned.

Changing the way, I looked at the world with my face was just the beginning of improving my overall presentation in the world of ciswomen, young and old. Early on, I paid quite a few brutal dues when it came to encountering groups of teen girls in the malls I went to. We all were in the process of discovering our femininity, and the girls took their humor out on me vocally and it hurt but the process helped me to develop myself to a point where I could better blend in with the new world I was trying to conquer. I just had to learn to conquer in a different way than I had ever had to before. I could not just hope to bluster my way through life as a man which I had gotten used to, I needed to finesse my way through until I began to feel the benefits of female privilege past the occasional man who opened a door for me.

Everything was fine, until I learned I was just getting started on my dream to live a transfeminine future. I had no idea how complex a woman’s life could be with a passive aggressive future in store for me. Plus, a future where for a change, to survive with other women I needed to completely listen to what they were saying and make sure I looked them straight into the eye, so I did not miss any nonverbal communication which was coming my way. Several times, I was helped out of potentially dangerous situations with toxic men by paying close attention to the nonverbal cues being given to me by concerned women with much more experience than me.

For the most part, this time of my life, in my thirties and forties , everything was fine with the gender juggling act I was attempting until I pushed myself too hard, challenged my mental health and continually got in trouble with my second wife who caught me trying to sneak back into the house after a night of living as my newly thriving feminine self. At that point, massive fights occurred which ended with me trying to promise I would never go out again. Which I knew would never happen. Once I had seen the world from my vantage point of a trans woman, deep down I knew I could never go back to a completely male life. I think my wife knew that too and that is why the fights we had became so vicious. Particularly when she told me I made a terrible woman because (in my words) my gender workbook was not filled out, and I had not paid my dues. Which was exactly what I was doing when I went out to live. I was sad I couldn't share my new knowledge with her but it was just not meant to be before she suddenly passed away.

After she died, nothing was fine as I was intensely lonely and needed a shoulder to grieve on. I found that shoulder in a predictable place and she was there all the time, my transgender self. When failure was not an option in my life, all the lonely nights I spent exploring the world around me with other women proved to be an invaluable experience when I learned I did not “make” a terrible woman after all. It turned out, I did not “make” anything at all, I just found my way to a place I always should have been, and everything turned out of be fine and I could take the wasn’t away from it.

I was even happy for the first time in my life as the heavy expectations of a male life I wanted no part of were removed for good. Being free to be the true me was the best move I ever made and my only problem was I did not do it sooner. Everything was fine, it was just hidden from me by myself. When revealed, I was free to never look back.

 

 

Facing my Deepest Fears

 

Image from Tonik on Unsplash. 

Over the decades I have found that my gender desires have produced the biggest fears and anxiety I have ever felt.

Prime examples came from the times I was first testing the world as a transgender woman. The number of occasions I needed to sit in my car making endless tries at adjusting my hair and makeup until I felt everything was right to attempt going into whatever venue I was going to. You would think from the number of times I had to face my fears; I would have at least become used to it. But I never did. In fact, I developed my own form of trans PTSD from the number of times I was rudely rejected by the public. I could not get it out of my mind that if I was laughed at once, I could be laughed at again. Which I discovered just was not true after I learned to dress for the public of ciswomen around me.

Finally, a little confidence began to creep in, and I did better for the most part, but it seemed the fear of being myself just would not go away. Maybe I can blame my old male self who in his own way was as strong willed as my feminine self and did not want to give up all the male privilege he worked so hard to earn. His reluctance to give up pointed to a deeper problem I had. The fear of facing myself. At the same time, my dreams of even trying to become a fulltime transgender woman in the world seemed to be a far-off dream.

What I decided to do then, even though I still was experiencing deep fears about my future, was experiment by going out into the world a little at a time. I started in what I perceived as safer spaces such as shopping malls and gay venues. If and when I was successful (or grew tired of) in those places, I would try more challenging places. Lessons I learned included money overcame gender problems in the malls and I was just considered another drag queen in the gay bars and made to feel completely out of place. I discovered to enjoy myself more I would need to try to frequent the same sports bar venues I went to as a man. Where I could drink draft beer and watch my favorite team on the big screen televisions. Sure, I was scared to do it as I knew how single women were viewed in sports bars, but I had to try.

Desire overcame fear and I was successful as long as I followed my three basics of smiling, never causing problems, and tipping well. Before I knew it, I was a regular and gained the backing of the bartenders who even saw to it that I had restroom privileges. Before  I knew it, I had built a small circle of lesbian friends who shared my love of sports, as well as another transwoman. Loneliness became a thing of the past for me, and my fear of being seen as a woman was going away too.

Just when my trans confidence was at an all time high, obstacles such as drunk guys would come along and ruin my evening. The night I remember the most was when a bunch of drunks noticed my trans friend and I at the bar and started playing “Dude Looks Like a Lady” time and time again until the manager asked us to leave. We did, temporarily, because a month later when I was in a nearby competing venue, I was surprised to see one of the bartenders who was there when I was asked to leave approaching me. I was astounded to learn the manager who had kicked me out had been fired for drug use and I was invited to come back. So much for the drunks who had played that song over and over and I had put my fears to rest. To this day though, when I hear that song, I cringe.

Sadly, even though I have been in the public’s eye as a transgender woman, I still look over my shoulder when I do things like use the restroom. Fortunately, I have Liz to help me out when I have to go and mainly these days, I don’t present as trans as much as I do as old and partially immobile. I am happy these days when I can find a restroom with a handicapped stall to take my fears away.

My deepest fears now revolve around the number of ridiculous restrictive anti-transgender bills currently in the Ohio legislature. One bill would make it illegal for anyone to wear makeup different than their birth gender. Which I guess would mean the orange felon or his sidekick Vance would be arrested if they come to Ohio. I am lucky that age and years of HRT have softened my facial lines to a point of where I don’t wear much makeup at all but what about the younger transgender population. Hopefully, none of this will actually happen or the courts will strike it down.

These days, I have managed at least to calm down my fears of what will happen to me if I have to go into assisted living or if I develop dementia like my dad had. I finally came to the conclusion not to worry about something I have no control over.

I don’t know why I waited so long to be paranoid over what has made my life worth living over the years and decades. I used to be a go with the flow type of person and if I got myself into some sort of a mess, I could get myself out of it. Probably now it is because I have to depend on my wife Liz for so much. Fortunately, most of my deepest fears came from pursuing my gender truth and when I came out to myself, I proved that I was the most important person of all to be truthful with. It was not until then did my life began to change for the better and I could live without all the fear I was experiencing.

 

 

 

 

Was I being Selfish?

 

Image from UnSplash and
Brooke Balentine.

When I was a maturing cross-dresser, one of my wives made it a prime point of her argument against my cross-dressing at the time saying that I was just being selfish. The problem I had with her saying that was deep down, I knew it was true. Mainly because I was spending all my spare time thinking about or doing my cross-dressing activities. I felt guilty, but there was little I could do about it as I wanted to be feminine so bad. So, I went on with my daily activities ignoring the best I could what she said.

Sadly, my selfish problem only became worse the farther along I traveled up my gender path. I simply wanted more from my life than what I was getting and I was pursuing it. I thought to hell with the risk I was doing to my male world and life as I knew it if my secret was discovered as it almost was several times. Like when I almost ran head on into my wife’s boss going to a big box store in a small Ohio town we lived in at the time. I did not think he recognized me, but he did bring up seeing a a particularly “big” woman the other day when he left work to pick up supplies at a party we were attending at his house one weekend. Of course, I could not let on it was me he was talking about, but my wife knew and questioned me about it later. I don’t think she ever believed my denials, but life went on until I made it to the next level of being selfish.

When I was out in the world as a successful transfeminine person, just doing it a little bit was just not enough. Success bred success, and if I could not for some reason make it out into the world again, I grew angry and bitter with life and tried to take it out on the world around me. By doing so, I even almost lost jobs because of my attitude. Having a sullen selfish attitude got to be so bad, I even sought out gender therapy to help me from one of the few therapists in Ohio at the time who dealt with it. It turned out to be that she could not work miracles with my gender issues, but she did with my attitude which was influenced by being diagnosed with a Bi-Polar depression disorder. Following a few experiments with medication, I found one that worked and my life became better. Except for I did not magically quit my feminine ideas and remained on my selfish path to see if I could ever live my dream of going full-time in life.

What made matters even more frustrating was, even with all the mental energy which was going into my transgender issues my male self was still able to advance in his life too. Making it harder for me to think about moving along with my plans and even being selfish about them at all. Through it all, my guilt was building about why I was even cursed with being transgender at all. This was before I finally began to understand my gender problems were not a curse at all.

In the meantime, my wife and I were clashing every time she caught me being selfish and leaving the house as my feminine trans woman self. One time she was even mad enough to tell me why I wasn’t man enough to be a woman. If I was smart at the time, I would have listened to her advice. I should have faced my true self and started making plans for my ultimate male to female femininization project. I just was not ready for several reasons such I loved my wife very much and the life we had built together.

By now, you have probably noticed a theme here. I kept shooting myself in the foot by being supremely selfish when I set out to build a new life when I already had a perfectly good one with a loyal wife, good job and loving family. All of which helped to describe why I felt so much stress and tension during this portion of my life. All the therapy and medications in the world could not help me until I had the courage to face up to my true self as she looked at me in the mirror. She had been there all along, and I thought I needed to apply makeup to bring her out (which I did for the public) but one on one, she was very real to me. She appreciated all the outwardly things any ciswoman needs to survive but inwardly, she just needed to be recognized for the person she had the potential to become.

Ultimately, I outlived my second wife (and many family members and friends) which freed me up to not feel any selfishness at all about what I was doing with my femininization. I was just busy preparing my world for the truth I had so deeply known. I should have never been a male at all and was just a woman cross dressing as a man. Needless to say, it was an enlightening experience coming out of my gender shell and having the opportunity to live my feminine truth. Just having the chance to compete in a world of ciswomen on their level was an intimidating yet exciting experience which my true self was up to. After living life hidden away all so many years against her will. As with most all transgender women and transgender men, it is a major project to bring ourselves into the world and unfortunately, we must be selfish to do it. The good thing is, once we go through the selfish part of our lives, we have the potential to be good, loving partners. If we are destined to find that special someone to love.

Life dictates it is nothing but a circle, and we have to take the good with the bad. Selfish or not.

 

 

 

 

 

Wishing and Hoping never Made it For Me.

 

Image from Abbot
on UnSplash.

Sadly, just wishing and hoping that we can make it to our feminine dreams just won’t get us there.

Since most of us started our gender journeys with very little natural external characteristics of the gender we want to become, it makes our struggle even more difficult. Even more so when you consider how far trans women like me had to go to hide my true self so I would not be bullied by the men around me. I played sports such as football and worked on cars to hide the fact I did not really want to follow a male path.

In the deep, dark recesses of my closet I spent my time wishing and hoping time would come along to magically change me. We all know how that worked. It did not and I grew more frustrated as I spent my meager leisure time wistfully cross-dressing in front of the mirror at home in the long hallway we had. After the initial success I felt from looking at my imagined self as a pretty girl, I knew it was just not enough. Looking back, I was going through the early stages of being transgender without having any of the terminology to go with it. In the meantime, I needed to keep my public charade alive of making the world think I was male.

Then, along came the shock of puberty with all its unwanted physical changes such as size of body and bone structure. I was helpless as all the changes took place and I was depressed that I was moving farther away from the feminine person I always wanted to be. All I could do was wish and dream for change which never worked. I finally had to do something about it, the pressure on me was intense. The little trips to the mailbox when I was dressed as a girl just were not enough anymore, I could no longer just exist on that little interaction with the world as I introduced my true self.

Early on, once I grew older and found a place of my own, I did venture out into shopping malls and often the experience was brutal. No matter how good the mirror at home was telling me I looked, the public quickly told me something else. Too many times I had to come home early crying because of being laughed at by groups of teenagers I attempted to dodge but couldn't. Fortunately, something deep down inside me kept telling me to keep trying to get better with my make-up and fashion and maybe then I could present well enough to get by in front of the mirror and the public both. The brief moments of gender euphoria I experienced were the indication I needed to know there was indeed more and I was on the right path after all.

Once I did discover I was on the right path, then I needed to stay on it and try to navigate all the blind curves, potholes, and stop signs I encountered. Initially, I was naïve and was not prepared for everything I was about to face. I thought I had a fairly good idea of what was behind the gender curtain with the ciswomen I would have to coexist with, but I did not. All of what I was seeing was the pretty clothes and passive aggressive nature without seeing all of what went into it later as I actually made my way into the world. I really misjudged how complex and layered a woman’s life could be if I decided to follow along.

At first, I thought I needed some woman to show me the way but again was so wrong when I tried. By the time I did, I actually had a better knowledge of makeup than she did, so basically, the whole experience was wasted, and I knew I would have to go up my path on my own if I was going to be successful as a transgender woman. Then, I had to figure out what being a trans woman meant to me. As in my earliest days in front of the cross-dressing mirror, I knew I wanted so much more, and I knew it would involve my evolution into a unique woman of my own. As with any other human born female, I knew they needed to be socialized into being a woman and so did I. It just was because my path to womanhood came from a different way than most women but that should not exclude me. Once I felt secure with feeling this way, I freed myself to more completely live my truth in the world with people who accepted me

Surprisingly, I had fewer problems than I anticipated when my trans friend Raquel told me I passed out of sheer will power, that became the story of my life. I was not trying to “fool” anyone into thinking I was the most attractive woman in the room. I was simply announcing my truth to the world, and they could take it or leave it. No more wishing and hoping for me, if someone did not like or approve of me, that was their problem not mine as I paid my dues to be where I was.

As I look back at all the wishes and dreams I had when I hoped to somehow live my dream as a transfeminine person, I know I wasted a lot of my time which I could never get back. Once I did get my late start and began to make up for lost time, I did begin to learn what I needed to survive in the girls’ sandbox once I was allowed in it to play. Once I did, I resolved to never look back and enjoy what I helped to create. A woman with an unique background allowing her to arrive at where she wanted to be.

Before I wrap this post up, I would like to thank Sara E for writing in and commenting. She is in a similar position as most of us went through. A married man, working through her feminine side.

Thanks to all of you who take the time to read my writings and comment!

 

 

Pulling Your Gender Band-Aid Off

 

Image from Possessed Photography
on UnSplash. 

I am sure you have encountered a time when you just had to pull a band-aid off quickly from a tender area of your body. Even worse, maybe the band-aid was in a spot where your unwanted male hair was thick, and it hurt.

After I began to realize what was going on in
my life with my gender issues, my time to remove my lifetime band-aid was coming closer to being done. I could put it off no longer once I started to get out into the world as a transgender woman and begin to live. Sure, I was scared, but my whole new life felt so real and natural to me that I just had to keep moving forward.

What helped me gather the courage to finally rip the band-aide off was that I was becoming quite successful in carving out a new feminine life were no one knew or cared about the old male me. Even with the protests of my second wife and my male self, it just seemed possible that someday I could live my dream of being a fulltime transfeminine person. On the negative side, I knew I had a lot of work to do to be able to even think I could ever rip the band-aid off and move on with my life the way I always thought it should be. Courage was always my problem, along with the possibility of causing loved ones around me pain if I made such a perceived selfish move.

Until I arrived at the point of self-preservation, I did think it was selfish the way I was living. After all, I was spending every spare moment when I was not working either living as a woman or planning the next time I was going to do it. I was completely obsessed with making the next move up my gender path and could not wait to fill out the next chapter of my gender workbook. The problem was, ignoring my path was causing me damage to my mental health all the way to me trying self-harm to myself with a suicide attempt when I thought all was lost. Until I finally regained control of myself before I did more harm. When I did, my life began to go  full circle and the future seemed brighter. If you find yourself looking down at that dark tunnel of self-harm, please remember what might be true today, may not be true tomorrow and there might are people to help you on various hotlines. Especially if you are a veteran and have Veterans Administration health care.

I am sorry I digressed from my original topic of pulling off your band-aid into suicide, but it just so happened to me that suicide helped me to make the final decision to take the gender jump from a male to female life. Was there room for me after all behind the gender curtain I so desperately wanted to explore because I felt I belonged there. If I did not make the jump (or attempt to), what reason did I have to keep living, kept sneaking into my subconscious thoughts. At the same time, I wondered what was going on under the wound I was carrying around as I tried to live a successful male life. My habit of living half and half in both genders was just not working for me. I had always heard that if takes three repetitions in a row to form a habit, so what I was doing was completely wrong when I needed to go back to my unwanted male gender after spending three days as a trans woman leading my best life.

My life finally got to the point that even I could not ignore the ignorance of how I was choosing to live. I needed to face the truth of living the male life I had since birth was false and I needed to move on to a brighter future away from all the male influences I lived under. The band-aide which had become such an integral part of my life had to go away. No matter how much pain it might cause. I was fortunate in a way because I had most of the people in my life who had mattered to me, including most of my family. When I came out to my remaining blood family, my daughter wholeheartedly accepted me and my only brother rejected me. So, I earned a fifty-fifty split when the band-aid came off.

The next big problem was averted when I was able to take an early retirement, so I would not have to worry about working a new job as my trans woman self. I supported myself by selling collectables and with my Social Security.

I guess you can say, taking the hard way out and waiting as long as I did transition worked for me. Even though I had to go through enough anguish along the way to wonder why I did it. I was doomed to life of opposites. Gender being the main one, and honesty being the second one. If I had dealt with the second one first, maybe I would have saved myself a portion of the problems which were presented to me. Certainly, emerging into the world at an early stage would have not necessarily been ideal either, but if I had just pulled the band-aid off and did it, I would have had the opportunity to build a new life earlier. Probably in a new job and with a new family because my blood family would not have accepted me.

At least, if I had done it then, I would have had more years to adjust to the radical changes I would have to go through and figure out away to do it. One way or another, we can not go back in life, so we have to live with the consequences of what we have done or haven’t. Who can say which time would have been easier to join the public as a transgender woman, twenty years ago when I was seriously exploring ways to do it, or now with all the anti-transgender rhetoric which is going on as politicians use us as a scapegoat.

I guess we are doomed as transgender women and transgender men to have a giant band-aid to pull off one way or another. In my case, I should have just pulled it off and got on with my life.

 

 

It was Always in my Way

JJ Hart on Left, wife Liz on Right.

Every time I turned around, my gender issues were always in my way. When I was younger and my life was simpler, the issues manifested themselves mainly around the sports I was trying to play. Since I was never good enough to win consistently, I usually had to head home to my makeup, mirror and skirts to feel better. One way or another, I always was soothed by looking at my feminine self in the mirror.

Of course, with age came complexity in life which included a military disruption of three years during the Vietnam War. My Army training very much was in the way of expressing any of my feminine qualities. Drill sergeants frowned upon any miniskirts or lipstick during basic training. So, I needed to resort to deeply hiding my secrets away, not unlike what I had done my entire life. I kept thinking against hope that someday I would be the pretty girl in the new car I was saving up for. I did get the new car, but being the pretty girl was very much up for debate and something I was always trying to achieve.

To remove the obstacles, I faced to living the transgender dreams I had, I needed to do a lot of living I discovered. Life was never going to be as easy as just looking the part of a ciswoman. If I truly wanted to go through all the living to earn the title, I needed to get out of my shell and into the world as a novice trans woman. Sadly, as I followed my gender path, there was always something emerging to get in my way. Such as a wife, family, friends and job which I did not want to risk losing. It seemed the better I did as a man, the more I had to lose.

All along, I thought the gender curtain would be more of a gentle barrier to cross to see how the feminine half of the population lived without men. I was not prepared for all I needed to go through to earn my way to having female privileges to replace the male ones I was losing. To begin with, I was painfully shy and insecure about talking to any other woman at all. Plus, as I learned all the different forms of communication women use, adding them into my world was a challenge. Such as having to stay in the present when someone talked to me and not try to anticipate what they were going to say. I discovered it was much easier to anticipate what a man was going to say from all my years as living as one, than a woman with non-verbal (eye to eye) communication skills. Not to mention, a ciswoman’s passive aggressive behavior which I misjudged several times before I adjusted to the new world I was in.

When I was able to get communication out of my way, I could move on to other obstacles in my way. I was still having problems with putting together a complete convincing picture as a transfeminine person. I had not practiced enough to feel natural in my world of makeup and high heels to feel natural and relax. Every time I was able to relax and enjoy myself as a transgender woman, I would do something to give myself away. It was not until I quit thinking I was fooling anyone into thinking I was a ciswoman did I do better. Mainly because I was just being me. At this point, I needed to overcome another major hurdle I had when I was a man. I never thought, or was raised to think, I was ever good enough to excel in the world and if I could never make it as a man how could I ever make it as a trans woman. It was a major boulder to move from my path.

It took a while, but I did build the self-esteem as a woman that I never had as a man. I did it slowly with the explorations I took into the world. I was able to build the all-important confidence I needed slowly but surely with the help of a totally new set of friends and acquaintances I built up who had no knowledge at all of my former life as a man. As my wife Liz told me, very few people ever have the chance to start over again, so make the best of it and I was able to. Soon enough, I was as comfortable in my tennis shoes as I was in my high heeled boots, and I was able to build upon nothing being in my way as I built my female privilege.

I knew then, I had made the right choice to follow my dreams into a trans woman world because I felt so natural. The light at the end of the tunnel was not the train as it beckoned me into a new world. It turned out, the main thing that was in my way all along was myself. Once I got me out of the way and for once was truthful with myself, I was able to move forward with a mental clarity I had never known before.

It was certainly worth the struggle to make sure my second chance in life was worth it. Sure, my gender issues were a major hurdle to move but it was no big surprise when I considered how deep gender runs in all humans. In many senses, discovering the true nature of me made life that much more interesting.

 

 

 

 

In Touch with Nature

 

Image from Brice Cooper
on UnSplash.

The “Ostara” ritual came off yesterday as expected with the usual suspects attending.

The weather cooperated with all the other plans, and it was a beautiful spring day here in southwestern Ohio. The only gender drawback did not even come because of me because there was a young very androgynous child there too. I could not tell the gender of the child and of course I did not pry. All went well until one of the other older women in the circle just could not leave the matter alone and said something to the child which elicited a loud response. Suddenly I heard “I’m a girl!”, and I thought the woman just could not leave it alone and had to go where she should not have been. Other than that, the woman sat next to Liz and I when we ate lunch and persisted on lighting up some sort of a cigarette after she ate which did not go over well with Liz and I who are confirmed non-smokers. The only good thing was after she smoked if was time for us to leave the ritual.

What I don’t think I realized was until after I received a comment from “Alex” who is transitioning from female to male was how much the opposite path of my gender male to female gender transition has meant to me. Now I can really feel the power of nature is a small example of how much more the Ostara ritual meant to me than I ever thought it could be when I was a man and too busy thinking about guy stuff such as work and sports to be overly concerned about my inner connections with Mother Nature. I credit the power of HRT or gender affirming hormones with unleashing a new appreciation for the world around me as I progressed with the hormones. All of a sudden, I was more in touch with the world around me with senses such as temperature and smell. I was very appreciative of permission I was given by the doctors I saw to go down the gender path I did, and I worry that the orange pedo in Washington and his followers will take it all away from transgender people of all ages today. Already it is happening here in Ohio, and I fear for my next estradiol prescription which is due to be renewed early in May.

It comes through the Veteran’s Administration health care system for me, and hopefully I still will be protected from outside political influence since I have been taking the hormones for nearly a decade now. Maybe I can fly under the radar at the VA and tie it all into my mental health (which is true) and something the VA is ultra-sensitive about. Fortunately, I have an appointment set up soon for a new psychiatrist who I hope will be sensitive to my entire situation. With that, maybe I can explain the power of the ritual I just went through on my overall mental well being and he will be behind me.

I think in many ways, getting back in touch with nature during “Ostara” takes me back to the innocent days of my rural childhood when my brother, friends and I had our run of the fields and woods around us. Growing up that way, with the freedoms we had, set in motion a lifetime of appreciation of nature that somehow got away from me as I grew into a false sense of manhood. Where “camping” out during Army basic training in Kentucky was as far as I got into nature. What a relief it was for me to make all the positive contact I had missed at least for a hour or so during the intense ritual experience.

I had no idea that my sense of gender was so intertwined with the world until I began to reach out to others and live it. And I am sad that mankind has managed to abuse the only world we have to call home, but that is another subject altogether. It all came back to me yesterday as I remembered the love I had for the woods which surrounded our house when I was growing up. I guess it took a jolt to my system which included a male to female gender transition, to bring myself back to a full circle experience with the world and back in touch with nature.

 

 

 

 

All Along, I was just Becoming Me

 

Image from Pea on UnSplash. 

As I always point out, becoming me was a very difficult concept to adjust to.

First of all, I needed to understand who the true me really was and work my way to the light out of my dark closet. Sadly, it took me decades to face the truth about who I really was. I was never the male I was seemingly born to be. I was born to be a feminine person, no matter what it took to get there. Which turned out to be the key term over the years, as I risked everything to discover who I truly was. As my male self was busy building a wall to his world by becoming successful in his job, my novice transgender self-needed to take a back seat and watch the clown show.

The problem was that often the clowns were not funny and just needed to stop before they caused complete damage to my life as I knew it. I was living the male dream in many ways with a good job, small family and a close knit group of friends and it was difficult to even thinking about giving it all up, but I did. Male privilege was very real to me and preparing to give it up was intimidating to say the least. Somehow, I needed to find the true me and quit being so self-destructive when my gender dysphoria hit me. In most cases, my morning mirror was to blame when I looked in it for the first time everyday and saw a woman lurking behind my male self-shaving.

I did not really begin to understand who I truly was, until I put my cross-dressing world behind me and started to explore the world as a transgender woman. Before I did though, I needed to draw an invisible line in the sand when I went out and see if I could cross it. When I did, I felt a deep sense of gender euphoria and wellness. When I did not I had to force myself to go back home, return to my cross-dresser drawing board and try again. Which I needed to do many times before I started to get it right. The important part is that no matter how down I felt on the days I was abused in public, there always seemed to be the slightest spark of hope which came from feeling good and natural as my feminine self. Suddenly, finding my true self did not seem to be so far away, if I could find the time out of my busy life to do it.

That is when I started to use every moment of my spare time in my transfeminine explorations of a terrifying yet exciting new world of cis women. Plus, if I was not exploring, I was busy thinking about it when I was working as a man. I wish I had back all the excess time I wasted in those days when I could have put the energy into my family, spouse or work. It would have made such a difference in my life. As it was, my life consisted of slowly sliding down a gender cliff. Not knowing what awaited me when I finally let go of my male self and headed towards a feminine world for once and for all. At that time, I did not realize I would have a team of gentle womanly hands to soften my fall. I still had a lot to learn about going behind the gender curtain.

Even though I was becoming accomplished as my authentic me, I found I still had many years ahead of me to continue my journey. I still had to round myself out as a new person very much from scratch. It was difficult to not automatically out my male self when I was talking to a new woman who turned out did not care about him anyhow. It was time to put him in the background and pick and choose the highlights of what benefitted me as a trans woman creating a new life. It was a different way to live and took a lot of getting adjusted to. Far beyond just worrying about my appearance and if I could use the right rest room. I needed to be on my toes all the time because just the wrong response about my past could give my whole male life away.

Once I separated the forest for the trees, I was allowed behind the gender curtain or rather followed my woman friends back there. For once, I was on the gender ride of my life. The same one I had paid so many dues over the years to be on, and once I got there, there was no way I wanted to give it up. So, as you can tell, I had a lot of help finding the real me. Women like Liz, Kim and Nikki showed me the way with their knowledge of playing in the girl’s sandbox. They all helped to bring out the true me in ways they never knew as my male past faded into my rearview mirror for good. It was the only time in my life that a mirror made the right call for me.

Needless to say, finding my true self after all those decades really opened the world up for me and made life so much more pleasant. Since I was not suffering from all the gender in-fighting I was going through, my mental health improved along with everything else. It did not hurt that the HRT gender affirming hormones I was on were making serious in-roads on how I felt internally as a trans woman and how I was viewed by the public. I felt better all around.

The only problem that I see now is how long it took me to come up with my own gender truth. If I had faced the facts long ago, I could have saved myself and the people I loved around me all the emotional stress I caused. Finding the true me cost me the most precious commodity I had. My time.

 

How Much Discipline do you Need

 

Image from Brett Jordan
on UnSplash.

One thing I learned the hard way in my transgender travels from male to female was that it took an intense level of discipline to do it. In fact, cross-dressing as a girl was the first thing I ever did in my life which took a large amount of discipline. School was easy enough and sports were something I always tried at but never excelled at.

Growing up, I was always under pressure from my parents to finish any projects that I started and do them right. That is when the struggle began. I have written fairly extensively about how I struggled with the makeup arts when I first discovered all the makeup samples my mom had stashed in a drawer beside her sink in the bathroom. Using the samples meant I would have less chance of discovery when and if she discovered someone was in her makeup.

The only parallel I always use was how I tried miserably to paint all the plastic model cars I put together. My cars never seemed to come out as well as my friends and I really did not want my makeup to be the same failure as my attempt at modeling cars was. For the first time in my life, I developed the discipline to do something about wearing makeup and I set out to become better at it. Which included being able to purchase the right supplies with the meager amount of money I had to work with. I was under a lot of pressure when I did my own shopping for feminine accessories, so I needed to make sure I did not make a mistake and buy something which made me look like a clown in drag going to the circus.

Little did I know, developing discipline in my feminine pursuits was just the beginning of a lifetime search for a transgender future. Every time I turned around, I faced a new challenge, it seemed like I first went out in the world of ciswomen. Where I needed to be better to just survive. A prime example was early in my life as a novice transgender woman, I had a difficult time of getting out of the mirror and putting a complete feminine image together for the world to see. It seemed as if every time I thought my makeup and fashion looked good, my movements and voice were totally off, and I would ruin the whole image. I just had to develop the discipline to do it all and complete myself as a transfeminine person.

Experience was the only way it happened. The more I went out into the world, the more I learned about if I could ever achieve my trans woman dreams. It was very important to me to explore all my options before I made such a huge and important decision in my life. Before long, I was sneaking out of the house every spare moment I had to live the new life I was carving out as a transgender woman. The problem was, the whole experience was terrifying while at the same time, it felt so natural. Further confusing me on which way I should go with my gender issues.

One way or another, I was developing the discipline to conduct myself in the world of women with my own set of standards. I learned to dress and makeup myself to blend in where I was going and more importantly how to communicate with others around me when I got there. It took tons of discipline to do it. Especially when I was making the mistake of trying to live in both binary genders at once. I needed to force myself to make sure I was projecting the right gender at the right time mainly when I was at my job as a successful man. I can’t tell you how many times customers tripped up and called me “mam” when I was going about my male business. Secretly I was pleased but could not show it. The bigger problem I always mentioned was that the gender ping-pong I was playing took a tremendous toll on my mental health. Switching back and forth was terrible.

The only positive was that I developed more discipline than I had ever had before. When I was a man, I knew I was temporarily holding on to a lifestyle I no longer cared about and when I was a woman, I totally had bought into where I wanted to go with the rest of my life. The only thing left to do was to seal the deal and do it. And learn the fine little nuances ciswomen know how to exist in their world. Like figuring out who the alpha female is and going after her approval. Through it all, I was building layer upon layer of confidence in myself. Which I would need later when the dark period of being extremely lonely set in. The intimidating thought of finding anyone remotely able to partner with again looked very dim until all of a sudden it was not. That is when I found my current wife Liz over a decade ago and she made a believer out of my self again and I could drop all my personal defenses to ever loving someone again.

It turned out that all the work I put into disciplining myself into being a totally different person worked out for the best. I emerged from my work with a newfound lease on life as the transgender woman I had always dreamed of becoming. I proved my parents wrong. I could take on a project and see it through successfully. Just not the one they had chosen for me. I tried once to come out to my mom and was rejected and never to my dad, so I doubt they would have ever approved of what I did. Even though what I did was save my own life by shattering my gender shell.

It took a lifetime worth of work to improve my feminine discipline. Mainly because I was blindly entering a world of ciswomen I knew nothing about as my gender workbook was blank when I started. After making up for lost time, I fairly quickly caught up and entered the world as myself.