Interruptions

 

Image from the
Jessie Hart archives. 

As I was seriously pursuing a life as a fulltime transgender woman the interruptions I went through made life very difficult.  

What happened was I was still attempting to live life as a man and a woman, I found I favored one gender over the other. The gender I favored of course was my feminine side. When I was out in the public's eye, I felt so natural and so alive. As I continued down my path, I became obsessed with improving my presentation as a woman. I had so far to go to try to perfect moving as a woman, not to mention any new communication skills I would need to get by. I was able to work on all of my gender issues approximately three days a week before I needed to revert to my old relatively macho male self. 

The problem immediately arose when I was forced to go back to my ingrained male ways or all the male type walking and talking guys do to survive. In order to be successful again as a guy, my path to femininity was interrupted and I felt as if sometimes I needed to begin all over again when I switched back to my newly preferred gender. When I did, I had to work harder to maintain what I had earned previously. Working harder allows me to explain more in depth a recent post I wrote here in Cyrsti's Condo called  "Trying too Hard." From the post I received several comments (thanks!) alluding to the fact I somehow mentioned working too hard to be a presentable transgender woman was not something we all go through as trans women. What I really believe is we have to work much harder than the average cisgender woman to earn our way in the world. Among other things, we trans women didn't benefit from growing up feminine. With no feedback on how we looked or how we acted. 

Of course too, all the interruptions I experienced on my gender journey just became worse the more I attempted to do to follow my path. It was so frustrating when I was mentally celebrating the evenings when I felt I looked and was able to act correctly as the person I increasingly wanted to be. Those were the evenings I felt my entire image worked. My makeup, hair, clothes all were on point and I was able to walk in my heels without falling or looking like a linebacker. Sadly, the next morning I would need to make sure I had removed all my makeup and had gone back to walking as a man. It was tough on my fragile mental health as I felt like a juggler trying to keep all my balls in the air. (No pun intended). 

Somehow, someway, I made it through this toxic time of my life. Ultimately, I used all the internal frustrations I was experiencing as motivation to move on. 

Moving on became a theme in my life for once I didn't use the theme to escape, I used it to move myself forward into a new gender world I had only dreamed of. Finally free of all interruptions.

Looking back...Again

Image from the 
Jessie Hart Archives

Rumor has it October is my birthday month and this year I am coming as close as I can  to being seventy five years old without actually being there.

As I am not really in the habit of celebrating anything but my milestone birthdays, so this year is not really in that category, yet. 

Even still this year for my birthday I find myself looking back at how I lived my life, good and bad. As I reminisce, the first thing I always encounter is how long I waited to let the world in to my true self. In other words was waiting until my early sixties until I came out to the world as a transgender woman. The time just felt right for me for several different reasons. The first being my life as a three days a week cross dresser just wasn't cutting it and I was becoming increasingly frustrated with attempting to live a life between two of the main binary genders. I felt as if I was being completely torn apart when I did it. 

I also felt as if I had taken my unwanted male existence and made the best of it for as long as I could and it was time to let it all go. During my male life I had achieved such milestones as fathering a child, completing an education, serving in the military and holding down a good job. And, maybe most importantly, my body had given me a healthy life to work with. To this day, the only operation I have undergone was having my tonsils removed. Most certainly, good health is the key to a good life. 

Perhaps, as I look back, I was a user when it came to my male life and a taker when I transitioned into a feminine world. When I made it into my sixties, I had used up most all of the male privilege life had to offer and it was time for a change. If you want to fault me for feeling this way, I plead guilty as I played the best I could the gender cards I was played. During my life, on occasion, I did gamble on moving and job changes to advance my male life, what I didn't gamble on was when I decided to complete my male to female gender transition. What I did do was explore every facet of the possibility I could live my dream and exist as my feminine self. I went out into many areas of the world to see how I was accepted and in most cases came back with a positive response.

Also, I know in some circles, waiting so long to trnasition makes me less transgender than others consider themselves to be.  I can only say, the past I lived and survived in was a different world than the one today.  Plus, I can care less what anybody says about me except my wife and daughter. With the outside world bringing all the pressure on the trans community politically, it is time to put petty differences behind us and go forward together. 

Perhaps the benefit of age can give us a better look around and not focus on the red hatted crazies who still support a former president.  But on a positive note, it is always good to put another year behind me and always hope for better in the year to come.