Why Not Me?

 

JJ Hart at Club Diversity
Columbus, Ohio

When I was very young, I had the tendency to hide behind my skirts when I needed to deny any masculine pursuits at all. 

Any time I failed, I ran home to see if I could lock myself in the bathroom and apply makeup and try on any of mom's clothes which still fit. I had a dream of finally making it to my own transgender womanhood when I grew older, but I had no idea of how. Back then, little did I know, the journey would take me over fifty years to complete and the path would be so curvy and full of hurdles. If I did, I wonder if I would have ever attempted to try it.

Of course, I started out innocently enough as a cross dresser in a mirror. My reaction was a double-edged sword. One side of the sword told me I was not doing anything really wrong, while the other side wondered if I was the only one in the world doing it. If that was the case, being a transvestite just could not be good. Right? All I had to rely on was my instincts which told me I was on the right path. So, I persisted and stayed on it. Since the only real feedback I had was from the mirror, I needed to rely on it when it was telling me I had advanced on from the clownish drag makeup stage I was into a more acceptable feminine form. At the time, I equated it with painting model cars which I was never good at and I was so proud when I thought I had conquered the basics of makeup. Even to the point of purchasing my own from the newspaper route I had when I was a kid. When my friends were buying model cars, I was buying makeup and loving it. It was not until many years later, would I receive the instruction I needed to really understand the art of makeup, but I was getting by at the time.

Clothes and hair were a whole other problem I needed to try to conquer at the time. With the very limited budget I was on, there was no way I could afford a nice wig all the way to my college years, when I was working a better paying job. In order to buy a wig, I needed the help of my fiancé who bought it under the idea she would possibly wear it. The wig was long and blond and was my cross-dresser's dream and luckily, she hated it, so I inherited it. Even with the abuse I put it through, the wig lasted for years before I needed to finally retire it. Clothes were another problem because again I did not have much money, and these were the days before larger sized women's fashions became available in a younger style. It was not until years later, when thrift stores became abundant, did I finally become fashion independent. 

As my feminine life was coming together, slowly I began to realize transgender womanhood may not be such a reach for me after all. I was beginning to explore all facets of the world as a trans woman and it all felt so natural. The more I attempted and succeeded at in my new life, the less I wanted to go back to my old, boring male world. So, I did not.

I was on a slippery gender slope my path had led me to, and all of a sudden, I did not fear it anymore. Somehow, I knew there was a soft landing out there for me. The stop signs were gone, and I knew at the age of sixty, if I did not try to live my transgender dreams, I would never have the chance and would forever regret my decision. From there, I decided to follow my heart and seek medical help to begin gender affirming hormones or HRT. The hormones forever sealed my trans life, and I never looked back. I always felt my body was looking for the hormones the whole time. Again, a scary gender transitional moment felt so natural. 

Why not me, turned out to be why should not it be me? 

Gender House of Cards

 

Image from 
Nathan Dumlao
on UnSplash.

As I progressed along my gender path, I regularly built houses of cards.

I became used to showing my cards regularly when I was a novice cross dresser. Sadly, I was coming off too often as the joker. I can't mention enough how I was the victim of the beginning cross dressers' curse. I was trying to dress as a teen aged girl when I was a wide-bodied male just trying to survive in a new exciting yet scary new world. My life existed by taking a step forward and another two steps back. Gender euphoria was very rare in my life, so I needed to cherish it when it came about. 

In order to make up (no pun intended) from the long lapses of gender euphoria, I needed to step back and try to build my house of cards with a better, more solid foundation. Every time I was rejected, I had to resolve myself to go back to my cross-dressing board and work harder on something like I had never worked so hard on before. Finally, my efforts paid off and I began to blend in with the public with less effort. I was ecstatic and I readied myself to move forward play more cards. Did someone say success breeds success? If not, I will, and it happened to me. I gained the all-important confidence I needed and headed on up my gender path.  

I proceeded to keep building my house of cards against all odds, I realized who I truly was. Much more than a relatively innocent parttime cross dresser and much more of a transgender woman. It seems like such a small difference in thought pattern could make such a huge difference in my life. Suddenly, it seemed the world opened up for me and I thought I had found the missing card I had always been looking for.  

Having said all of that, I knew I would have to set out to build a whole different house of cards. No longer did I want to just look like the women around me, I wanted to be treated as an equal. Which seemed to be an impossible dream. When I was successful in hanging out with other women, I developed a whole new set of confidence and began to relax and enjoy the experience. I was at home with myself for the first time ever. Perhaps the best result was, my house of cards was being built so much stronger and more resilient to the outside world. 

From then on, the race was on to enable my inner feminine self to play her own cards. When she finally did, she was extremely successful and made the best of her situation. Plus, she was able to build upon the mistakes of her male counterpart and never having to play the joker. Then my wife Liz came along and re-enforced my new transgender womanhood, while at the same time rapidly building my house of cards. When I experienced a collapse, Liz was there to catch me. 

I am sure you agree, building your own gender house of cards is not an easy task to complete. You need to show an uncommon level of patience when your cards collapsed, and you needed to start all over. It shows how difficult a transgender life can be. Especially in these difficult times.  

Always Running

 

Image from JJ Hart

Much of my life was immersed in running from my gender problems. 

As fast as I could, I changed jobs and even places my wife and I lived so I thought would make a difference in my life. The prime example was when I picked up and moved my small family from our native southwestern Ohio to the huge bustling New York City metro area to operate a fast-food restaurant. By doing so, I thought deep down I would be closer to a population which would be more friendly to my cross-dressing desires.  I only made it a year before the culture shock pushed me back to our native Ohio.

In the meantime, I did have several moments when I was in New York which I will always fondly remember. One of which was the night I actually got out of the house by myself without my wife and drove myself out to Long Island for a transvestite mixer I had read about. Once I was out, I had two major surprises waiting for me. The first of which was I was happy I found the venue at all. The second one happened when I tried to get in. There were two women at the door monitoring who got in or not. I was flattered when they refused to believe I was a man at all and asked for an I.D. to prove who I was under all the hair, makeup, and fashion. 

The second most memorable night was again when I managed to be out alone in the world as my authentic self. Quite unexpectedly, I was invited to a Halloween party by one of my female assistant managers. Of course, I did not to think twice before I accepted her invitation and began to plan ahead on what I could wear that my wife would approve of. Finally, I learned she would never approve anything I wanted to wear, so I set out on my own to come up with a costume I would have fun with. It turned out my short tight dress and heels matched perfectly with what the other women in our little group were wearing. Plus, the women were all tall and I really blended in well in our heels.  

As I said, the culture shock of NYC over Ohio wore me down and we ended up moving back. When I did, I immediately fell back into the whole cross-dressing culture I was in before. I was unhappy and hidden away from the world, so I found another place to move to and uproot our lives. The job I was working offered me an opportunity opening restaurants along the Ohio River in southern Ohio. A very conservative area to be sure so I needed to up my cross-dressing outings. Somehow, throughout the whole adventure I grew tired of having limited places to go and wanted another move to improve myself. 

This time, I tried to move back to the Columbus, Ohio area where I knew several very diverse friends in the LGBTQ community, specifically the transgender crowd. Following a lot of work, I finally landed the job I wanted, and we moved again.

Finally, I grew tired of all the running I was doing, and I needed to settle down and face my gender issues head on. It took me until I was sixty to realize I needed to make a change to a full-time transgender lifestyle. When I did, a giant weight was lifted off my shoulders and I went on to start gender affirming hormones or HRT. It was a wonderful way to live. 

All Hands on Deck

 

Image from UnSplash

As I progressed farther along my long and difficult gender journey, there were many times where I wished I had company to aid my path.

Even though I often whine and cry concerning the lack of assistance novice cross dressers or transgender women have early on in their progression, the fact remains we need to work our way through it and do the best we can with our fashion and makeup. Until I began to see positive results, I am sure I looked like a clown in drag. Still, I was alone with my thoughts. I am old enough to remember with "Virginia Prince" and her Transvestia publication first came to my attention. It provided me with the first real look at others who shared the same interest in being femininized and looking like a girl. I was mesmerized with more than a few of the cross dressers I saw in the publication. I so badly wanted to be like them.

For years as I worked alone to look more realistic as a cross dresser, I still yearned for feminine help. I thought any cis woman could help me because of their years of practice and interaction with their peers. When I was engaged in college, the opportunity to be dressed from head to toe as a woman by another woman finally came my way. Somehow, I begged my fiancé to do it even though I don't remember now how I did it or was so persuasive. I went all the way by even renting a motel room for all the pre-prep work such as shaving my body I would have to do. 

Once I shaved and dressed, I was excited to undergo the long-awaited makeup process. Since she wore quite a lot of makeup, I was confident she could do a great job. It was finally time for all hands-on deck in my young cross-dressing life. Back in those days, mini skirts and dresses were in vogue so I brought one I found and purchased along with panty hose, heels, and a long blond wig and started the transformation process. To say I was excited would be an understatement. Time flew by as she finished my makeup, and I headed for the mirror. Instead of the beautiful blond I thought I was going to see, I was actually disappointed. I could not see much difference in her efforts from my own. Even still, I acted as if I was really impressed with her expertise when in fact, I was impressed with how much I had learned on my own over the years. 

It took me a long time working with makeup to learn each of us has a blank face to work with and we need to learn the best way to work with it. My fiancé was doing the best she could with the knowledge she learned from her own face, not mine. She was far from being a professional such as the help I finally received from a true makeup pro at a transvestite, transgender mixer I attended years later after I was discharged from the Army. He taught me lessons about my face I had never even considered such as which features to play down and which ones to build up. To this day, I owe him a huge vote of confidence and thanks.

It turned out the opposite happened with my fiancé. Due to knowing my deepest, darkest secret about being a cross dresser, she said I should use it to dodge the draft and stay out of the Vietnam war. There was no way I was going to do that, so we split up shortly before I was to leave for basic training. Actually, it was the best thing which has ever happened to me in my life. The pain it caused immediately would have been nothing like the suffering we would have gone through if we had stayed together.  

Looking back, at my life's work as a transgender woman, for the most part, it has been a solitary experience. Not having a female peer group to interact with and learn from was a problem to be sure but one I learned to work around. The end result was, I needed to be better than the next woman to make it. 

Transgender Procrastination

 

Image from JJ Hart

During my life, I have developed with an excessive amount of procrastination. Who knows, maybe it started when I put off doing my homework until the last minute. Later on, I began to connect the dots to me pursuing a life as a transgender woman. In other words, why did it take me over a half century to finally decide to leave my male life behind and the confines of my dark gender closet.

The easy answer is I kept putting off what I did not understand or want to face about myself by cross dressing my life away. To be certain, it was a series of stop-gap measures designed to help me survive life at all. When I was able to cross dress in front of the mirror or later at transvestite mixers I attended to see for the first time, others who perhaps shared the same gender views as I did. Ironically, I found I was wrong as I found most of the others at the parties were still a bit (or a lot) different than me. I did not quite fit in with the transsexuals or the cross dressers who were seemingly still stuck with their male selves which they were still attempting to deny. 

Still, I survived and slowly began to carve out my own life on my own terms as a transgender woman. Of course, even then, I still was the mistress of procrastination. Increasingly as I began too seriously explore the world as a transgender woman, I could not procrastinate any further. The result was I needed to merge my conflicting genders the best I could. The holidays proved to be the best time for me to try to do it. 

I have already written about my adventures shopping for my second wife when it came to buying her a matching oak bookcase and my time shopping for the perfect garden accessory. As I have promised in the past, I have not written yet about my times searching the antique malls for the perfect vintage gift for my wife. The added benefit was I could complete my Christmas shopping as a woman.

It just so happens, one of the largest antiques malls in the Midwest where I lived was located in my hometown. It gave me extra time to shop since I did not have to drive far to get there to the mall. I had several favorite things to do once I arrived and made a last second check of my hair and makeup in the car mirror and went on in. The benefit of vintage shopping for my wife was at the same time I could admire myself in one of the many available mirrors of the vintage furniture for sale. 

The furniture was not in my budget but items such as vintage seed boxes were. In fact, during those days, the seed boxes were a hot item for gardeners everywhere, so they were pricey. Still, I persisted until I was lucky to find one from another company, she did not have in my price range. The other benefit of shopping in the antique malls was I could really relax and enjoy the experience. Back then, the feeling of my feminine clothes and the interaction I was having with the public was so new and exciting. Plus, I could not wait to see the look on my wife's face when she opened the gifts I found for her. Back in those days, we had three Christmas gift celebrations. Two with each of our families and one just between ourselves. The giving of gifts between us always came last and always included the gift or gifts she reserved for my feminine self. 

My procrastination always extended to shopping at the last minute. As a trans woman or not. Perhaps I was addicted to the excitement of waiting until the last minute to find and give the perfect gift. All tempered by the fact I was shopping as my true self.

All of the experience added to me not waiting any longer and finally deciding to take a huge weight off my shoulders and do the right thing. Quit trying to live a lie as a man and begin a new life as a transgender woman. Facing my truth led to the end of my gender procrastination. 

NOT for Entertainment Only

 

Image from Alice Alinari
on UnSplash

As I went along my path to transgender womanhood, I found the journey was never a choice and was not for entertainment only.

My journey did not begin that way. Similar to many of you, I started by exploring my mom's underwear drawer and wearing what would fit. All of that was seemingly innocent enough unless I was caught. Then there would undoubtedly be hell to pay, along with a trip to a psychiatrist. Later I would wonder if my mom ever knew because her underwear was stretched out, but she never approached me at all. 

It was all fun and games until it wasn't. Slowly, I learned wearing girls/women's clothes was not for entertainment only. I was becoming increasingly serious about it. For the first time in my life, I was obsessing over how I looked. How was my makeup and very limited access to a wardrobe appearing in the mirror. I even went as far as shaving my legs when I thought I could get away with it. In addition, I did my best to study the other girls around me. I did not know it then, but I probably was wearing makeup before a few of the girls I knew were allowed to do it. At the time when I could not seem to muster the same passion for building the model cars I had and painting them well, makeup was an entirely different challenge and one I could not resist doing my absolute best at doing well. With no help whatsoever. 

I found, for the first time in my life, I was completely serious about doing one thing and it was being a girl. Not just looking like one. It took me years to learn just gazing at my reflection cross dressed as a feminine person was just not enough. I needed more. My problem was early on was having the budget to do anything such as being able to afford having a nice wig. It was not until my college days until I could buy a long blond wig I cherished for years. Spending all the money on one specific fashion accessory proved my passion to look good was not for entertainment only. I was really serious.

Of course, then I really started to step up my gender game. When I was released from my military service, I began to seriously explore the world as the feminine trans woman I was destined to become. As I write about often, my journey was filled with ups and downs and my mental health suffered. Definitely not the way I thought it would be when I looked at myself dressed as a girl in the mirror early in my life. What I never had a chance to consider was I was not a transvestite or cross dresser at all. In fact, I was a transgender woman and needed to accept it. I was never in it for the entertainment and my life depended on a successful outcome. 

What I mean is, I needed to stop all the self-destructive behavior I was exhibiting as I sought to destroy everything successful, I had ever done. Along the way, I had tried to lose jobs, drink too much all the way to trying to kill myself with pills. Never realizing how much I had to live for if only I followed my transgender path far enough. 

I wonder now, if I had realized how difficult my journey would be and not be entertaining would I have ever undertaken it at all. I also realize now, I never had a choice, and my life would have been better had I realized it sooner. I would love to get back just a tiny portion of the stress and tension I lost during my life as I worried about my gender. Outside of a few therapists who tried to help me by telling me the truth about myself, I was on my own. My life was never for entertainment only as I followed a gender path full of turns and dead ends before I discovered my truth in my transgender womanhood. 

Answering the Call

 

Image from Alexey Elfimov on UnSplash.

On occasion I am sorry to say it took me over a half a century to answer my gender call. But thankfully, I finally did take the call and listen to the urgent message. 

Please keep in mind I don't count all the years I attempted to cross dress my gender issues away. As I often write about, all cross dressing did was provide me with a quick fix. After I dressed as a girl, I felt better for a while before the same old tensions of life with gender dysphoria set in. The problem was, deep down I knew I wanted to do so much more than look feminine, I wanted to be feminine. 

One of the few good things which came from my gender struggles was practice made perfect. Even though I knew I was the only one who could see my progress with makeup and clothes, I stuck with trying to improve every time I cross dressed. It was so difficult for me since I only had the mirror to answer to when checking out my progress. The problem was the mirror was so good in telling me everything, but the truth and I tried to keep in mind I might look good, for a boy in drag. Not as an actual girl. In other words, I learned I needed to hold myself to a higher level than other cis women I observed if I was to survive among them. 

The entire process was so difficult for me since I had never been detailed orientated in my life. Just getting by was not going to be the way to go. I was fortunate when I encountered professionals in the makeup world who helped me along. One in particular came following a transvestite-transgender party mixer I attended near Cleveland, Ohio years ago. After the mixer slowed down, the organizers provided several makeup professionals to provide free tips to whoever had the nerve to ask. On that evening, I am happy I put my ego behind me and answered the call for much needed makeup assistance. The catch was I needed to remove all my makeup and wig and let the professional start over. His work and results were amazing, and I even understood all the tips he was trying to tell me. The end result was I was flooded with compliments and my gender euphoria soared to an all-time high. Furthermore, later on that evening, I was even hit on by a guy in a straight venue I went to with other transwomen from the mixer. 

That night, I did not answer the call to stay with the guy who showed interest in me. My reason was, I was in a strange town with a person I did not know, and I did not know if he realized I was transgender. Not a good place to be at two in the morning. On the other hand, I loved it when the other "A-listers" from the mixer were jealous of me for once.

Along the way, I ended up answering enough calls to barely keep myself going. There were plenty of times when I did not know if my mental health could take it, and I could keep going. It was then when I took the all-important call to begin gender affirming hormones and change my life forever. I was sixty by then and knew there would be no turning back. After I did, I learned taking the most important call of my life turned out to be a life survivor for me. I remember the evening when I decided to answer my phone for the last time. All of the sudden the voice told me I was free to live as my authentic self and the relief I felt was tremendous. All my previous misgivings were swept away. 

Fall Leaves

Image from Alisa Anton
on UnSplash. 

I write substantially how fall is my favorite season of the year. I love the cooler temperatures, wardrobe changes and how the trees change into their brilliant colors. All before the colors go away and drab winter sets in.

Long ago, I felt all the seasonal changes deep down to my inner soul. Of course as a novice transgender woman the wardrobe fashion changes were challenging and fun. I learned I needed to look ahead for the best clothing bargains if I was to be successful in locating all the fashion firsts in sizes that fit me. After a few seasonal changes, I began to feel so natural, I automatically felt the changes coming on. Fall was especially fun when it was time to go through all of my leggings, boots and sweaters to see what I would have to add or subtract to make it through another season.

Even though fashion changes were exciting and fun, other aspects of the season just brought about melancholy depression. I vividly remember the nights when I went out and just drove around in my car watching all the leaves blow around in the headlights. Here I was still stuck in a gender I did not want to have anything to do with and not seeing a way out. Very soon, the fun of fall would turn into the depression of winter for me. My final fall before leaving for Army basic training was especially bad because I knew for a fact I would not be able to do anything about my transgender desires for a very long three years of my life. It seemed so unfair my new life into transgender womanhood would have to be put on hold through no fault of my own. I was bitter. 

Little did I know, after waiting over two years out of three in the Army, karma would come back to help me. During my last year I learned of a Halloween party which was being planned by a hospital group which my friends and I were invited to. Immediately my mind jumped to the possibility of me dressing up as a woman and going. Of course the problem arose how was I going to do it because I did not want to go halfway. I wanted to be the sexiest dressed woman at the party. Fortunately, I had access to an apartment where I could finally shave my legs and put on makeup with a wig I managed to buy at a downtown Stuttgart, Germany shop where I was stationed. Through it all, I knew I was risking harassment or worse by my superiors in the Army if the word got out about my so called "costume" which may have been a little too good. But nothing ever happened.

In fact, because of the Halloween party, my life changed nearly full circle that fall. A couple of days after the party, when my closest friends gathered once again over potent, tasty German beer I blurted out the costume I wore was more than a casual fun idea I came up with on the spur of the moment. I was a transvestite as we were known back in those days and I enjoyed wearing women's clothes, makeup and wigs. I knew at the time, again I would be risking what was left of the time I had left in the Army if what I said found it's way into the wrong hands. It did not matter at the time as the first time I left my gender closet felt so good. So good, I tried to come out to my Mom who promptly slammed me back into my closet. 

All of this happened during the fall which still remains my favorite season of the year. As a  transgender woman, I appreciate the re-birth of spring but summer is too hot and winter is too long and drab. It's why fall leaves are so important to me.  

Running but not Hiding

 

Inage from JJ Hart
at the Cincinnati Witches Ball.

Over the years I considered myself the complete procrastinator. If I could put off anything, I did. 

My running and hiding continued unabated when I began to express myself as a girl. In fact, it got worse. Once I had the opportunity to cross dress and jump in front of the mirror, I could not wait to get back. I wanted to so bad, I tried my best to put my male life on hold until I could. I was running as hard as I could but was making no real headway. The real problem of course was because I was attempting to run my gender life backwards. I was a girl all along who was forced into being a boy and I needed to be increasingly careful to hide it.

The older I became, the more running I needed to do to hide my true gender. Even though I needed to take a break from my running when I was in the military, when I returned to society, I picked up where I left off. This time, I tried changing jobs and geographical locations to hide my true nature which was increasingly leading me to accepting me into transgender womanhood. I picked up and moved my small family from more conservative Ohio to liberal leaning New York City as an example. Deep down I felt I could express my gender desires there more effectively. Within two years, I more or less discovered I was wrong and decided to move back to my native Ohio. 

My moves continued around Ohio as I sought out the ideal job when in fact I was running from myself. I finally discovered no matter where I was, my gender issues would be there also. I was good at running but bad at hiding as I slowly added others into my secret world. For example, both my first and second wives knew I was a cross dresser and/or transvestite before we were married. The problem was I was so much more than a person who wanted to wear the clothes of the opposite gender, I wanted to be the opposite gender. Which was the deal breaker for my second wife.

It took me years to grow into my authentic feminine self as I slowly experimented in the public's eye.. All of a sudden the only people I was hiding from were the most important ones in my life. Which certainly did not make life any easier. I am referring to my family, friends and bosses. By far the three most important people I needed to come out to if I was going to ever live my dream as a transgender woman. At the same time, I was successfully building up a new life as a trans person so once again I was somewhere in the gray area of running but for once not hiding. The entire process, caused me tremendous mental health problems. Running head on into my old unwanted male life when I was trying my best to learn a new femininized existence was no fun.

Essentially what I did was keep running until my second wife as well as many of my close male friends had passed away. Leaving me fewer and fewer people to let into my gender reality. I would not recommend doing a transition the way I did but we are all different and it worked for me.

I ran until I could not anymore and finally was mentally exhausted enough to put my male life behind me and live my truth. All hiding was behind me.   

When Every Night is Girls Night

Grae Phillips is still active
on Facebook if you want to 
see more. Or just keep up. 

I know I make a big deal out of my second huge transition, when I mentally moved from being a serious part-time cross dresser into being a novice transgender woman.

Sometimes I feel as if I am putting myself on some sort of a gender pedestal when I write about not considering myself a cross dresser anymore. If it comes off that way, I don't mean it to. On occasion, the written word gets in my way. Getting back to the cross dresser versus transgender statement I made, I think in my case, it was a matter of me judging my own life. Originally, as I was working my way through my early years of admiring my girl self in the mirror, I knew it could never be enough. There had to be more. I was so tired of cross dressing for one day and then two or three days later wanting to do it again. 

As I always mention, all of this occurred back in the pre-internet information era when any news and contact with like minded gender individuals, be they transvestites or transsexuals, was very difficult and rare to come by. This was even before the barrage of talk shows led by the late Phil Donohue who interviewed female impersonators such as "Grae Phillips", all the way to transvestites seeking approval from a doubting world. It was quite a bit for me to sort out. But I did. I knew I could never be as beautiful and talented as Grae but I could reach the standards of most of the transvestites I saw on my television. There was hope for my future after all.

As I progressed into meeting more and more diverse cross dressers or the women known as the new transgender group I began to think what it would mean if I went all the way and every night became girls night. In other words, a time when I would never have to go back to my old male self and live. Deep down I knew there would have to be some sort of line drawn in the sand if I did. As much as I loved all the fun of the newness of applying makeup and picking out clothes, I wondered what would happen when the newness wore off and I needed to settle into the daily routine of the transgender womanhood.

It turned out, I had nothing to worry about. I settled into my new feminine routine as if I had always should have been living this way. I found I didn't have to do much special on many days such as most cis-women do and then again still have the fun of dressing up for special occasions. It was true, once I jumped the gender border from cross dresser to transgender, I could experience what life could be like if every night was girls night.  

The Rock and the Hard Place

 

Image from
the JJ Hart
Archives

Recently, I received a comment from a reader who said in essence, I was too hard on my second wife when I mentioned her.

After thinking the comment over, I can see why it was made. First, some quick history. My second wife and I were married for nearly twenty five years until her sudden and untimely death at the age of fifty. She knew I was a transvestite or cross dresser when we were married and accepted it up to a point. The demarcation line was always HRT or me pursuing  a life as a transgender woman. For years it was fine with me as she approved me going to a motel to cross dress and go out into the world. We had an uneasy gender truce and I ended up abusing it.

The problem was, I always blamed myself for our gender problems because naturally, they all originated with me. Primarily when I began to break the promise I made to never leave the house dressed as my feminine self. Of course, I eventually was caught and all hell broke lose. She was a strong woman and knew how to emotionally battle me. She was the rock keeping me from my increasingly obtainable goal of trans-womanhood and I was in the hard place of knowing deep down it was where my life was headed.

Along the way, my second wife imparted good information about being a woman but withheld other very important facts. She would just tell me I made a terrible woman and then adding in she was not implying anything about my appearance. Leaving me to wonder for years what she meant. Mainly I found my old male ego was still in the way of my gender progress to the future. It wasn't until she had passed on and I took the opportunity to really explore the world as a transgender woman, did I understand what she meant. I finally had to walk the walk and talk the talk to move my hard place along. Femininization was difficult yet exciting for me on many occasions.

My second wife also tried to tell me to follow my dreams and give up our relationship but I still tried to have it both ways which just made things worse. She knew me better than I knew myself. 

So, as you can tell, I owe her quite a bit and wonder if we could have at least arrive to a point where we could have been woman friends. I obviously don't say it enough if I am receiving comments to the contrary. I also don't praise the cis-women who stay in marriages with their transgender spouses. I know if the shoe was on the other foot, I would have an incredibly difficult time accepting a trans spouse. As my wife said, living with another woman  was something she never signed up for. 

The rock and the hard place cost me dearly over the years. The pressure of attempting to maintain a relationship and a male life with the increasing knowledge it was all a lie built up an enormous amount of pressure and all but ruined my fragile mental health. I resorted to trying to drink away my problems to no avail and just became more depressed. I was not freed until I basically had nothing else to lose after her death. Once I was freed, I could look back on our relationship for what it was and all the good times we had and how I basically hurt it all.

What Would Mom Say

Image from Jenna Norman
on UnSplash

This week my question to answer on the year long bio I am writing for my daughter and family as well as my wife Liz involved what parent I learned the most from.  

As I compared my Mom and Dad, easily I learned the most from Mom. Outside of the usual circumstances, I found I could find many more opportunities to spotlight Mom's influence on me. For example, I remember at a very early age watching Mom put on her makeup. Being a product of the "greatest generation" she was not shy about dressing up. However, I don't think watching makeup being applied led me to being a transvestite or even a transgender woman really mattered. Somehow the gender issues I faced went much deeper. Perhaps as deep as the medication Mom took during her pregnancy (DES) which was offered to women at the time to prevent problem births.

It turned out, I was successfully delivered just before my parents had decided to give up after three still births and adopt a child. I think because of all of that, my Mom put an extra emphasis on raising me and my brother who came along two years later. So much so, I wonder now what would have happened if Mom would have realized she had a daughter rather than a son. In all fairness to her, the fifties during my youth had very little information on gender issues. When it was available, gender issues were known as mental illness. 

Throughout the years, I always mistakenly thought girls had all the benefits in life I always wanted. Girls were able to wear the pretty clothes I wanted, be gifted the dolls I wanted and even never had to worry about being drafted and serving in the military. Male privileges were not known to me in those days because I had not yet earned any. As a side note, once I did earn the benefits of being male, I learned some of them were automatic and I did not want them anyhow.

I have forever wondered what my life would have been with Mom had I been born a biological female. Being as similar personality wise as we were, we fought quite a bit as mother/pseudo son and I have to think it would have been worse as a daughter. Mom was very headstrong and I am sure we would have had battles over fashion styles in the 1960's as well as when I could begin using makeup. In fact, when I was sneaking around using her makeup, I was probably younger than I would have been had I been her actual daughter.  I am sure too, Mom would have tried to influence me into going to her college and joining her sorority. She would have done her best to push me down a certain path which was certainly going against my generation's rules at that time in history during the upheaval in the later 1960's.

By this time, you may be asking where was Dad during all of this. It was not like he was not an influence in my life but he was not as hands on as Mom was. He was long on providing and short on emotions which I struggled with for most of my life. One thing I remember most about him was how desperate I was to never disappoint him and since I rarely if ever heard a positive from him, I never knew what he really thought of my life. He was blessed with excellent health and outlived my Mom by ten years and I never came out to him before his death from Dementia.

I did try to come out to Mom but it was a dismal failure for both of us. Predictably, when I told her I wanted to be a woman, she offered up mental health counseling. The conversation took place just after I was finished with my military duty and was never mentioned again until her death fifty years later. I used to hold her thoughts against her and was quite bitter but I gradually mellowed with age and came to realize she was just a product of her generation. 

To honor all her sacrifices, I used her first name as my middle name when I legally changed my gender markers nearly ten years ago. Had I had the opportunity to be accepted as her daughter from the beginning, it would have been interesting how our lives would have intersected. Way past the pushback I would have received for wearing my skirts too short and wearing too much makeup when I was a teenager. I know what Mom would have said. You aren't leaving the house looking like that. Maybe I should have thought of that when I tried and failed to dress that way later in life.  

 

A Spectator in my Own Life

 

Image from Author JJ Hart

There were many times in my life when I felt as if I was a spectator in my own life.

From the first glimpse in a mirror when I cross dressed as a girl, all the way to when I first went out determined to be a woman rather than just look like one, often I was on the outside looking in. Being on the outside was certainly not a great place to be. I literally spent decades of my life worrying about where I actually stood with my gender issues.

Along the way, I grew tired of being the spectator and wanted more inside information on how the feminine system I so admired worked. I discovered the hard way, I was not going to be allowed to learn more until I made the drastic step of increasing my transitioning efforts. Naturally, it was very difficult to do when I was totally immersed in leading a male life which I had become quite successful at doing. Overall, I was becoming the victim when it came to my life as a whole. I kept wondering why me when it came to my desire to live as a transgender woman. I finally had to shake it off and move forward with my gender transition before I lost everything I knew in life. 

It turns out the real culprit was myself.  I was afraid to face my truth and it cost me. I even tried to out run my desire to live as a woman by moving and switching jobs. Once I talked my wife into moving from our native Ohio to the New York City metro area. Then back again a couple years later. Living in different parts of the country was certainly an eye opening experience but did very little to help my gender issues. On the rare occasions it did like the night on Long Island when I went to a transvestite mixer and the hosts thought I was a cis-woman was flattering but did me no good the next morning when I crashed back into my male life. Then my poor wife had to put up with my mood swings.

Still I was a spectator in my own life when I walked down the long hallway in heels to get carded for my true gender to the times I did the family grocery shopping in sweaters, mini skirts and flats, I wondered who was that? It took me years to come to the conclusion the other feminine person was me and she had a right to be here in my life. Slowly but surely, I was building the life experiences needed to cross the gender border but it kept taking me so much time. I kept running into so many road blocks, I thought I was some sort of a gender construction engineer. 

Regardless as time flew by, it was time to put my gender cards on the table to finally determine which gender was going to be the primary provider in my life. What I attempted to do was live as much as I could as a novice transgender woman to see if the lifestyle was for me. Even though initially I did not attempt to do it, the trans life rapidly snuck up on me. Before I knew it and maybe before I was ready, I began to carve out a brand new life as a woman. Quickly I needed to develop feminine communication skills which was difficult for me to do since I was overwhelmingly dealing with other women in my life.

Through it all, slowly I grabbed total control of my life and became a spectator any time I was forced back into my old unwanted male life. In other words, I finally faced my own truth and flipped the ultimate gender script in my life.    

It Was Never Easy

I am amused when anyone thinks my gender journey has ever been an easy one. 

To begin with, I was born into a very male dominated family. Being the oldest son of two, I had heavy male expectations forced on me. Very early on, I learned I was in the wrong place at the wrong time. I did not belong in the male world at all. The problem was coming to the knowledge I did not belong as I was sneaking around my family's back to cross dress as a girl. As I remember, I had two hiding places for my small collection of feminine wardrobe and makeup. 

The first place was up in the attic of our family garage and the second was more creative when I discovered a hallowed out tree trunk in a woods next door to my house. What I did was use plastic trash bags to protect my precious belongings from the elements and it provided an extra way I could be alone and dress which relieved (for a day or two) my gender tension. So none of my drastic measures were easy but I survived without anyone detecting my secret, to my knowledge. 

As years went by and my life as a girl began to be more complex, I was pressured to do more and more to protect my life. Sneaking around became more intense as my wardrobe increased, along with my knowledge of the makeup arts. In all fairness to me, I attempted to ease my gender pain, I told my first and second wives ahead of our marriage I was a transvestite or cross dresser which I thought would help my world. My idea worked for awhile, until I essentially out grew the idea I simply wanted to wear women's clothes and makeup. More and more I wanted to be a woman.

Making the jump from cross dresser to transgender woman often was brutal. Partially because I still had my male life to contend with. It probably would have been easier on me if I was not involved in such a male intensive job which automatically would completely throw me totally and publicly back into a world I never wanted. Ironically, my life as a man I worked so hard to build was now in direct competition with a feminized life I was growing into. 

At the same time, my biggest challenge became was deciding if I was transgender at all, Could I continue a life where I lived in both binary genders temporarily or would I need to choose between being a man or a woman. I ran from the decision for years before I grew so tired of running I could go no farther. Making a decision was never an easy one but one I needed to make. Finally, one night I had yet another soul searching discussion with myself and decided to live a life as a transgender woman. The world as I knew it was showing me the way. For the first time in my life I was single and did not have to worry about a spouse to deal with when I changed.

I went even further and decided to go to a doctor to see if I was healthy enough to begin gender affirming hormones. I was and my body took to them very rapidly, making my decision to give away what was left of my male wardrobe to charity and add to my feminine wardrobe. It was not easy to make the decision but it was easy to live with the results. I only knew my new feminine life would never be easy but still would so much better than the life I had lived,

It was never an easy life and my gender dysphoria certainly did not make it any easier. Waking up in the morning after dreaming if I was a boy or a girl never got my day started on a good foot. All of it became some sort of a daily routine I never wanted. With all the highs and lows, somehow I learned to live with it all. 

Options or Paradise

 

Liz on Left, out to eat! 

During our gender transitions, many times we have the choice of options or paradise. 

Often, options come about as not being a choice. Examples include all the days we had to rush around and hide our feminizations from our family and friends. We had no option but to hide our truths. For some if us also, our cross dressing options never became any better when we had to pursue stints in the military. Certainly, the military provided every roadblock in the world for pursuing any route to paradise for gender conflicted individuals. 

As a whole, back then, paradise was very difficult to achieve. In fact I can now refer rare paradise as gender euphoria. For many years and even decades my gender balance never changed. I was still sneaking around risking life as I knew it to momentarily express my true inner gender. Fortunately, I had the time to work on perfecting my femininized presentation. When I finally was able to pursue paradise by going out in public, I was closer than before to achieving success. In fact, once I learned to blend in with  other women in the world, I was more likely to find a fleeting sense of paradise. 

Usually, my paradise did not last long because I needed to quickly return to my male world which I was increasingly feeling uncomfortable in. I was desperately seeking other options to find more gender euphoria other than the annual Halloween parties I was going to as a woman. The parties and the transvestite/ transsexual mixers I started to go to helped me to understand the gap I was facing when I considered the ultimate outcome of where I wanted to go with my life. Instead of just embracing the usual male attributes in life, I needed to include the very real possibility I would have the option to live life out as a transgender woman. The reason I thought this way was I encountered paradise when I was experiencing the world as my true authentic self. I felt so natural and wondered why I had waited so long to do it.

What if I had experienced paradise a decade earlier than I did when I went to a TGIF restaurant and bar determined to mix with other single women. Maybe I was just waiting for the world to catch up to me but more than likely the opposite was happening. I had the options to catch up to the world and I took the chance. By the time I ventured out into the world, I had certainly paid my dues and was  ready to reap the benefits. 

Still I was frustrated when the benefits of my new life were just out of reach. Such as the times when I was so comfortable in my new feminine world I actually forgot where I was and caught myself slipping back into a male mode. I still did not have the full closure from my old male self I so desperately needed. I kept running into unexpected roadblocks and stop signs on my gender path such as a spouse's death which changed my ideas of where I was headed but not for long. Soon with fewer and fewer options to consider as well as a solid new life I was building, paradise was closer than ever before. 

As transgender women or trans men, we often experience periods of options or paradise as we follow our difficult, unique gender paths which separate us from other humans. The whole journey hopefully makes paradise worth it.  

It is NOT a Choice

Image from Alexander Grey 
on UnSplash

I still get aggravated when someone says being transgender is a choice.

Realistically, why would I have ever chosen to live the life I am living. Would I have made the choice to give up everything I worked so hard to achieve just to put on a dress, makeup and heels and attempt to live a feminine life. All the material benefits I had acquired as part of my life as a white male privileges disappeared for good, if I wanted them to to or not.

Suddenly, I learned the hard way what it was like to have my personal security threatened as well as being mansplained when I attempted to insert my feelings on a topic I knew quite a bit about. Quickly I discovered many examples. I nearly found out the hard way, if I dressed too provocatively at a mixer, I would be cornered and harassed by an over bearing transvestite admirer. In an instant, I learned how it would be to be a helpless woman being overwhelmed by a much larger man. Not a pleasant experience and it was not all of my lessons. One night when I was blissfully minding my own business on a dark city sidewalk, I was approached by two sketchy men wanting a handout. Fortunately, I still had a lone five dollar bill for them and they went on their way. From then on my new feminine common sense began to grow and I started to develop the gender protective sense all women acquire as part of their life experiences.

None of what I was experiencing was a choice and not part of me being validating  myself as a woman. All I needed to know was I had no choice but to follow my path if I was able to look myself in the mirror and know I was doing the right thing. Coupled with the natural feelings I was experiencing, my supposed choice was made. 

I knew over a span of time, I would learn to deal with being mansplained was something I just had to deal with as a transgender woman. I will never forget the day I had to sit in a tow truck and be subjected to being bored when the driver was telling me how the truck worked. Finally, I gave him my best blond act until he finished all his rock bottom explanations. On one of my few dates with men, quickly I found I knew nothing about subjects such as sports and politics.

Why would I choose to be something as difficult as being a woman? My entire life became dedicated to proving the world wrong. I could carve out and experience a new life as a transgender woman and thrive. But again, I needed to prove all the naysayers wrong. The only natural feminine attribute I started with was my brain. Which for some reason, kept telling me I was doing life completely wrong because I was living it as a male instead of my more natural female. Finally, all the pressure to change and all the stress to explore the world as a trans woman. I was living in a world of alternate facts which was increasingly too complex to handle. I came to the point where I felt as an impostor when I went out of the house as a man. Can you imagine that? Feeling as an impostor when you attempt to live as your birth gender. It happened to me.

All the process proved to an outsider is gender issues are not a choice. During the process none of us understands, we are born into system we never asked for. The path is often a bumpy one with plenty of curves and stop signs. We have to wait our turn before we move on. 

For any number of reasons, the true number of transgender women and trans men may never be known. One thing is for sure, there are many more hidden transgender individuals waiting to take their turn and enter the world. Regardless of all the negative publicity we receive, transgender people have been around forever and will remain a part of the human experience. After all, we don't have a choice.

Building from the Inside Out

 

Image from Brooke Cagle
on UnSplash

Years ago I began to understand I was building a new human being from the inside out.

I began to realize it when a person very close to me told me how fortunate I was to be able to start over in the world as a transgender woman. At first I was scared, could I really re-create myself as a woman and at the same time achieve my ultimate feminine dream. Following years of living and training, I found I could indeed live a life as a trans woman.

Before I did, I needed to decide what old male baggage I would have to discard or adjust to the fact I would have to bring it with me. It was difficult since I decided to seriously began my gender transition at the age of sixty, I had years to consider what to do with my baggage. Initially, I was part of the old transsexual school which believed you had to totally uproot your life and move when you transitioned and start all over. The problem I had was, there was some baggage from my old life I wanted to bring with me. For example, I wanted to try to preserve contact with my family and wondered if my wife (who I loved completely) would ever accept me. Not to mention other key points of my life including my passion for watching sports. 

Fairly quickly, as I transitioned, I was able to indirectly control all I was building from the inside out. By this time, I had worked out most of the appearance or fashion challenges I faced, allowing me to work on expressing my internal self. First of all, I learned my only child accepted me totally and my only sibling (a brother) did not. Sadly, we have not communicated in over a decade now. I know I have survived and I have assumed he has also and we moved on. Since I was now a different person now and he is entrenched in his ways, I am sure it has all been for the best although it hurt me how he handled it by rejecting my invitation to the family's annual Thanksgiving feast.

In many ways, having the opportunity to rebuild myself was terrifying yet exciting. Along the way, I found I needed to transition again. Mainly when I finally decided to make the mental move from cross dresser to transgender woman. I say mental move because I wasn't doing anything outwardly any different as I was doing my best to put my best appearance foot forward as a woman. I knew if I was successful, there would be no turning back on my gender path. It was a huge continuing beginning in the process of leaving my male world behind.

By this time, I was well on my way of deciding what baggage I could bring with me and what I could leave behind. I was preparing to give what was left of my male clothes to a charity and I had fairly quickly established myself as a regular in a couple of the big sports bars I had frequented as a guy. By doing so, I could meet my small group of new women friends I had met and watch the games we all enjoyed. My new life was coming together from the inside out and I was loving it. 

Even still, it sometimes took all the concentration I had to remember I was living a new life and I needed to rely on my inner female to carry it out. By doing so, I was able to say what I was thinking and not screw it up by injecting any of my old toxic male self. The only thing I could rely on was my new friends and their reaction to me since they had no clue of the old me. It was very liberating to say the least. 

Overall, I have to say, building the interior person was more intense when compared to the exterior woman the world saw. Especially when I needed to communicate more and more with the public as my new self. When I did build from the inside out, I learned to live my truth and empower my life as a transgender woman.

  

A Want or a Need?

 

Summer image from
the Archives. 

Are gender issues a want or a need. 

Initially I know I thought being a girl was a want, rather than a dream. During one of my classic if I had known then what I know now phases, all I knew was I loved my cross dressed image in the mirror and could not wait to see her again and again. The worst part is I could find no outside information on my gender issues. Mainly because deep down I knew I wanted to do more than look like a girl, I wanted to be a girl. Those were the pre-internet dark ages, well before the transgender label was even used. Perhaps, had I had access to gender information I would have known the way I felt went way past being a cross dresser or a transvestite, as we were known in those days.

In my mind, the separation between a gender want or need was I could enjoy cross dressing for awhile when I wanted to but wanted to be feminine because I needed to. Sadly, it took me years to figure out what was going on. I went ahead playing the same old male role I disliked so much as I tried to be accepted into a macho male world without becoming a toxic man. Naturally, it was a difficult game to play and wrecked havoc with how I treated the world. My gender issues and how I dealt with them made me so frustrated and mean, I even lost jobs because of them. 

As the information age caught up to me, I began to understand I was not alone in the world any longer and there was even a label for my gender questioning. It was called transgender and it explained why I had never quite felt at home when I started to explore the cross dresser mixers I went to. Most certainly I knew I met a diverse mix of people. Including some of whom were headed for gender realignment surgery. To go that extent went way past being a want and into being a need. Especially if you were going to all the pain and expense to solve the gender problem they may have had. Even though I was intrigued by the transsexuals as they were called then, I knew somehow I quite did not fit it into their world. The same as I felt for the majority of the cross dressers attempting to express their femininity the best they could. I was stuck in the middle again.

I made the best of it by trying my best to research both sides of the spectrum I was observing. At the same time, I was doing my best to improve my femininization presentation so I could observe closer the transsexuals to see if their path could be mine. My biggest deterrents to following the TS route was my second wife who I loved very much and not having the insurance coverage to complete all the expensive surgeries. What I did have was the need to make a gender change. It had long since gone way past being a simple want. By doing so, I put myself into a gender pressure cooker which took me many years to release the pressure and escape.

Even still, the pressure release was not immediate and took me many years of exploration to accomplish. So many days and nights of being lonely and searching for my identity as a transgender woman finally came around to help me. 

I was able to learn my gender issues were so much more than a want because I never had a choice. They were a need I had to survive.      

Tomorrow is Here

Labor Day 2024.

 Throughout my life, I was the best at putting everything off. From homework to attacking a gender issue, I kept putting it off, hoping it would go away. 

Of course it never did and I was stuck until the last moment trying to do something about it. My best laid plans for escape never did work. Especially when it came to my gender issues. When I was young, the whole plan seemed simple enough. Cross dress as a girl as much as I could get away with and then escape back into my male world. No matter how painful that was. 

It was a good plan until life became more and more complex and I wanted more and more from my cross dressing activities. In other words, I wanted out of the mirror and into the world. I started innocently enough with quick trips to the mail box during the day when I was the only one home. Of course I had to wear my shortest skirt and feel the cool air on my freshly shaven legs and I was hooked for life. 

The problem was, tomorrow was never quite here. Once I cross dressed for a quick day, I needed to go back and try to exist in a male world I never really wanted and I deeply resented it. Repeating the entire routine over and over again made me moody, grumpy and overall difficult to live with. Perhaps the worst part was, I had no one to talk to concerning my gender issues. So a full fledged gender tomorrow never came for me. I was just digging myself a deeper hole, thinking someday my life would change. Then, I didn't know it would but I didn't consider how much work it would take me to do it. 

Days, years and even decades went by and still I hid from myself all my gender truths. Most of the time I did not live in the present while I kept in the back of my mind the next time I could cross dress and enjoy my small but growing feminine wardrobe. All of the waiting created it's own set of issues. During that time, my male self was doing his best to survive and prosper in the world. Which at the same time, made the idea of transitioning into a transgender woman more complex and intimidating. It was easy to keep putting off what I knew deep down was true, I was always meant to be a girl. I just had to be in the position to reach out and grab her. 

During that portion of my life, it seemed my gender tomorrow would never be here and massive roadblocks stood up and blocked my way. Navigating them in my newly acquired heels would be a challenge I would have to accept as I crossed the gender border to play in the girl's sandbox. I found myself to be way past the tomorrow mode and started to believe my dream of living as a full time transgender woman was very achievable. 

Very quickly tomorrow became today and with the help of others, I seized the opportunity before I became too old to enjoy it. I am not shy of saying I waited until I was sixty to transition and begin HRT for what ever reason. I ended up feeling so natural, I wondered why I waited so long. 

Gender Prison

Image from Denis Oliveria
om UbSplsh

Many transgender women and trans men have spent numerous years in their own gender prisons. Sometimes referred to as closets. 

Unless you have had to spend time in your own prison with the walls closing in all the time, you have no idea of how bad it is. Just another proof being transgender is some sort if a choice. Why would we ever choose to possibly destroy ourselves with our gender issues. It all got to the point with me, I was doing all I could to manifest myself being as feminine as I could. When all along my male self was telling me I couldn't. 

I finally arrived at the point where I was given free time from my gender prison to explore the world as my new self. When I did, most certainly I discovered I wanted more and more free time. I discovered also, I needed a ton of work to prepare myself for freedom. I was not prepared for all the challenges I would have to face as a novice transgender woman. Since I had spent so much time cross dressing in my life, I thought how much harder could it be. I never factored in what my second wife was always trying to tell me, I did not really know much about being a woman and she was not going to do much to help me out of my gender prison. 

When she told me that, I reverted back to working ever harder to understand what she meant. Since I had studied women closely my entire life, I resolved myself to trying to get behind the feminine curtain to learn more. It would take me years to get there since it seemed I was living a life time sentence in my gender prison. Outside of a few varied chances to thrive, my prison seemed to be escape proof. How was I ever able to leave my prison without jeopardizing all the white male privileges I had worked so hard for such as family, friends and employment. It seemed the more I tried to escape, the more the walls closed in on me.

Once I staged my big gender prison break, there was no turning back. I discovered that even though my wife would not help me pull back the feminine gender curtain, other women would and I took advantage of their kindness. Even when I was able to, I found I was still looking over my shoulder for any male prison guards who were chasing me. It turned out, even in heels, I was faster than they were and I managed to outrun my naysayers which mainly was myself. 

With practice in the world, I finally put my prison time behind me and I set out to live my dream life as a fulltime transgender woman. One way or another, I had paid my gender dues for nearly half a century before I had the courage to fully transition. It felt so good to be let out of my gender prison and not have to go back. 

My parole officers turned out to be the women friends I found and cherished as I learned so much from them about living in a feminine world. When I used their input and included it with what my own inner woman was telling me, I was able to make a smooth transition even smoother. Plus, I was able to use my prison time as a powerful motivator of what not to do in the world. Even as a man, I tried to treat women differently than the other men around me. Mainly because I wanted so badly to be one of them. 

In the end, spending all the time in my gender prison did not do much for my life. I spent so much mental energy rebelling against my male world, I often wonder how much farther I could have gone if I had used all my resources. It wasn't to be because I was in my own gender prison and could not find the key.