A Holiday Reminder

 I am sharing this post I found on the "Kira Moore" WordPress  blog which spotlights the problems and loneliness many transgender women and men feel. Especially during the holidays when they have been ostracized by their families:

  

Giving Thanks

For many in the United States Thanksgiving is a bittersweet holiday. Especially in the transgender community. I am an example.

Over the years my deceased wife hosted the family for a Thanksgiving feast. Our door was open also to my employees who may not have a family to celebrate with. To put it all in perspective, one big turkey was never enough. Through it all, after my parents passed away, my extended family was my brother, his two sons and the kids of theirs (and mine) who followed. We had a big house I was restoring so we had a large space to set up in and all were still welcome.

For the most part these were fond memories until I transitioned. By this time my wife had passed away and the dinner had moved to my brother's house. Before I showed up as my authentic self for Thanksgiving, I called and talked to my brother. He said in essence he would always refer to me as my old self and he would get back with me concerning having an invitation at all. He never did and I never looked back. After all his in-laws were all right wing Southern Baptists. I guess he didn't want to stand up for me.

As I said, I never looked back. I found myself firmly entrenched in my partner Liz's family plus I was welcome in my accepting daughter's extended family. 

I know so  many in the LGBTQ community aren't so fortunate. Too  many are ostracized from their families and previous friends. Now it's not uncommon to refer to other "non-blood" folks as new family.

Whatever it takes, I hope you all are able to take a moment and celebrate your blessings.

Happy Thanksgiving and thanks for stopping by Cyrsti's Condo! I truly appreciate it.

The A List

 As I was writing this post I considered calling it the "Alpha Female" At any rate, the whole post goes back to my earliest remembrances of coming out and interacting with like minded cross dressers. Or at least I thought they were. 

What I naively thought was all sp called hetero cross dressers would be one big happy family, happy to mingle with others in their feminine finery. I was in for a rude awakening. 

First of all, there were what I call now the "deniers" . I saw guys in dresses and heels topped off with a cigar (before it was cool) and a cowboy hat. They were doing their best to dissuade anyone they were fond of their feminine selves. I learned quickly I didn't fit in with their group. I was serious in putting my best foot forward. Normally in heels back in those days. More on that later.

In the meantime, I was fascinated with the other attendees to the "mixer". The group ranged from the cowboy hats (not Urban Cowboy) types all the way to impossibly feminine types who I didn't detect any masculinity in at all. Ironically, even though I am impossibly shy around people I don't know, I didn't feel I really fit in with any of the small groups I was observing. Except for possibly one.

The group I didn't mention was who I call the "A Listers". Or they considered themselves to be the best in looks and the best in social activities in the group. While the majority of the group stayed huddled in the hotel, the "A's" went out to gay venues to entertain themselves. Even though I didn't perceive myself to be their equal in appearance, I certainly wanted to tag along when they went out. I was determined even back in those days to allow my feminine self to sample the world whenever I could. So I did.

For the most part, excuse the term, they were bitches and didn't accept me much but I didn't care. I was there for me, not them.

Ironically all of my tagging along worked one night. Earlier in the evening the main group brought in makeup experts for advice to anyone who wanted it. I through my makeup to the wind, pulled up my big girl panties and volunteered. The guy who worked on my looks performed wonders! Easily he did much better than I could have ever imagined. I thought now, bring on the "A's".

It turned out I tagged along per norm to the first gay venue we always went to then, even went to a second. The second place was more subdued and was more like the neighborhood taverns I was used to. As the "A's" positioned themselves at the bar, I headed for the pinball machines. As luck would have it, It was time for Cinderella to turn in her heels and head back to the hotel. 

Before we left though, a guy approached me at the pin ball game and asked if he could buy me a drink. I ended up telling him no but the "A's" noticed and that was important too. I was accepted by at least one of them for the very few times I could attend another mixer in the future. I ended up attending several parties at her house in Columbus, Ohio. Most of which with my wife so she kept track of me. All material for another blog post.

It is important to say I never felt a part of the "A's" and as time progressed I learned why. The so called LGBTQ community doesn't have much to do with the transgender part of group. In fact I learned the hard way how many of the trans group have a hard time dealing with each other.  Indeed we are a multi faceted group.

One thing is for sure all these years later, I just couldn't fit in with the "A's" and it's one of the reasons I try to be accepting of both cross dressers as well as trans women.

Stairsteps

 Over the years I have thought about my transgender transition as climbing a hill. then sliding down. Recently though, I have began to consider it as more of a trip up  a gender stairwell.

My first steps could have been the hardest. I had to live through the unmistakable urge to try on any or all of my Mom's clothes I could squeeze into. This step produced many feelings including confusion, fear and elation. This step was destined to last many years as I desperately tried to understand ad hide my inner feelings'

The next step brought with it the realization I wanted to be so much more than look like that girl I was seeing in the mirror. I didn't understand it fully at the time but I wanted to be the girl  staring back at me. All of a sudden, the feeling of wearing the clothes and the makeup faded away and a new deep longing settled in. 

Ironically the next several steps became steeper and blended in. As I became more experienced in the makeup arts and was able to build my own small collection of women's clothing, I am of the opinion I paused on these steps to look around and see where I was located. I did know, as far as my gender issues were concerned, not one thing had improved. I still would wake up in the morning wondering if
I wanted to spend the day cross dressed as a male or enter m more natural gender (feminine). Unfortunately, there was little I could do about it.

Years later, I was able to take giant steps and actually climb up and see if living a more natural life for me in a women's world was possible at all. It was around this time the internet was taking hold and I discovered new exciting terms such as transgender. It was on this step also when I began to attend "transvestite" mixers and actually learn from people who were close to being just like me. I remember awaiting my new copy of "Transvestia" magazine. What turned out from this step was a deep encouragement to take another. 

The next steps were the Halloween parties I attended. They all taught me yes I could present well enough as a woman to possibly get by in society. I have written in depth about them here in the past but briefly I can write all these steps were doing were creating more doubts about my ability to continue living a false life as a guy at all.

As I continued up my stairs, the newest landing, found me increasingly exploring the feminine world. I was leaving behind any ideas of being "just" a cross dresser and began exploring again the wild wonderful world of living as my authentic self. Although there is nothing at all wrong with being a cross dresser. At this point,  new steps brought me into a new feminine world of communication as well as losing my male privileges. As I reached these lofty gender heights, I had many fears of losing what remained of my life. Through it all, it seemed I had built a back stairway to use as a gender escape back to my old male life. Which made things worse and life unlivable at times. 

This all brings me to my final step which happened nearly seven years ago. I decided to give up my partial male cross dressing and live my life full time as my authentic self...a transgender woman. It was around this time too I started hormone replacement therapy to transform my body.

Finally after years of severe gender dysphoria I was able to tear down my back stairway and never looked back.  

And the Winner is Transgender

 

Amy Schneider, a trans woman from Oakland, will make her fourth “Jeopardy!” appearance Monday after winning three games last week during Trans Awareness Week

.After her victory on Friday’s show, she told Newsweek that she had been trying to get on the show for over a decade. 

“I’m not sure quite how long [ago I first applied], but I remember trying out when I still lived in Ohio, and I’ve lived in Oakland since 2009, so it has to have been at least that amount of time,” she said. 

Schneider also explained how her transition in 2017 might have helped her finally get a spot on the show. 

“The reality is that for the first few years of that, when I was trying out, I was, as far as any of us knew, a standard white guy,” she told the magazine. “And there’s just more competition for those slots on Jeopardy! They’re making a TV show, they don’t want everybody to look the same, and I looked a lot like many of the other contestants, and I think that definitely made it a little tougher for me at that time. I would have got on eventually — I was never gonna stop trying!”

Monday Inspiration

 This is especially directed to you cross dressers or novice transgender women struggling to find your way out of your closet.

Tennis Anyone?

This is another of my continuing series of posts revolving around chances I took cross dressing my way into becoming a transgender woman and living fulltime in a feminine world. 

In the restaurant/bar I used to manage, two cis women who I presumed were in their fifties, came in several days a week to enjoy a cocktail or two. During the warmer months they used to stop by after their tennis matches in their tennis outfits. Of course I was jealous of the fact I didn't have an outfit to match theirs.

Around the point in time I am writing about, the stores I loved to shop in started to carry short thin ribbed flared dresses in larger sizes. Perfect to put together a tennis outfit. All I needed to do was find a white one. As luck would have it, I found one in my size. I then set out to complete my "outfit". The problem I had was finding items and then hiding them from my wife. As luck would have it, we had a rarely visited other closet where I could hide an item. Often in plain sight. 

Now, back to the outfit. Finding a pair of white tennis shoes in my size actually proved to be fairly easy too. Now I had to figure out what to do about my legs. Even though I was able to shave my legs back then I added a pair of Leggs pantyhose and even added a pair of white thigh highs which didn't exactly fit the idea of what a cis woman would wear with a tennis outfit but still added some pizzaz to the whole image. After all, I was reliving my non existent teen girl years I missed. 

I finished off the whole tennis image with my long straight blonde wig.

Let me add in here, I had rarely even touched a tennis racket in my life so I would be without one when I went out.  Once I was secure (the best I could) in my tennis woman outfit, I headed out to one of my favorite up scale malls. My wife was working that day so I had free time on my hands. Once I arrived at the mall, I was able to semi relax and feel the air on my legs and I found also I attracted quite a bit of attention from the older men who seemingly were there to supposedly walk but probably to look at women too. 

The whole situation was I equated being stared at as validation as a woman. I was  to learn later in life it was so wrong. There is a thin line between being classy and trashy when you are first cross dressing in public. I'm afraid I crossed the line into trashy in my early days of journeying into a feminine world. If my tennis outfit crossed into trashy I can't tell you. It was so long ago.

My story is I was doing nothing different  than other cis women I had mentioned above. It was only another attempt to be just like them. 

Tennis was just an excuse.

As My Blog Gently Weeps...Again

Sadly, it's time for remembering all our transgender sisters and brothers who have perished. For those of you who don't know:

 Transgender Day of Remembrance (TDOR) is an annual observance on November 20 that honors the memory of the transgender people whose lives were lost in acts of anti-transgender violence.

"Transgender Day of Remembrance seeks to highlight the losses we face due to anti-transgender bigotry and violence. I am no stranger to the need to fight for our rights, and the right to simply exist is first and foremost. With so many seeking to erase transgender people -- sometimes in the most brutal ways possible -- it is vitally important that those we lose are remembered, and that we continue to fight for justice."

- Transgender Day of Remembrance founder Gwendolyn Ann Smith

46 trans & gender non-conforming have been killed this year making it the deadliest since this started being tracked back in 2013. These are their names...Tyianna Alexander, Samuel Edmund Damián Valentín, Bianca "Muffin" Bankz, Dominique Jackson, Fifty Bandz, Alexus Braxton, Chyna Carrillo, Jeffrey "JJ" Bright, Jasmine Cannady, Jenna Franks, Diamond Kyree Sanders, Rayanna Pardo, Jaida Peterson, Dominique Lucious, Remy Fennell, Tiara Banks, Natalia Smut, Iris Santos, Tiffany Thomas, Keri Washington, Whispering Wind Bear Spirit, Sophie Vásquez, Danika "Danny" Henson, Serenity Hollis, Oliver "Ollie" Taylor, Thomas Hardin, Poe Black, EJ Boykin, Aidelen Evans, Taya Ashton, Shai Vanderpump, Tierramarie Lewis, Miss CoCo, Pooh Johnson, Disaya Monaee, Brianna Hamilton, Kiér Laprí Kartier, Mel Groves, Royal Poetical Starz, Zoella "Zoey" Rose Martinez, Jo Acker, Jessi Hart, Rikkey Outumuro, Marquiisha Lawrence, Jenny De Leon, Jahaira DeAlto.

Each and every name read and recognized on the Trans Day of Remembrance represented a full, rich life that did not deserve to be cut short. The rhetoric and stigma aimed by anti-equality political leaders and public figures at transgender and non-binary people have led to an unprecedented level of horrific violence against our transgender community. We must fight for change. We must dismantle this stigma. We must bring this epidemic of violence to an end.

#TransDayofRemembrance

Well, It was a Good Idea

 As I previously wrote about, yesterday was the day of the college class I was supposed to attend with several other LGBTQ board members of the group I am part of. 

As it turned out, I drove an hour and fifteen minutes one way to not ever locate the classroom I was looking for. 

Needless to say, I was deeply disappointed. 

Better luck next time.

Inspiration

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

Here is a bit of inspiration in the meantime:

 

When Life Gives You Lipstick

 

When life gives you lipstick, wear it!

Anyway you cut it, life is never fair for everyone. I'm biased but I think transgender women are dealt the most difficult hands in life. First of all, we have to do the difficult work of  figuring out who we are. Looking back I have written numerous times about all the mornings I woke up and immediately tried to figure out if I was a boy or a girl. What made matters worse was the fact this all happened before the internet and social media eras. Loneliness was extreme. I wasn't old enough to understand all that was happening to me and there was no one to explain the meaning of being gender fluid.

In the meantime I did the best I could to survive. I even tried to "come out" to a friend in high school (a guy) and was roundly rejected. Looking back, I had a total girl crush on another friend which I never let on to. It seemed life had dealt me a hand I couldn't win. 

Once I turned driving age though, I did get a small break.  On a couple occasions I was able to cross dress and sneak out of the house when my parents were away. I remember the trepidation I felt when I saw my reflection for the first time in a store's shopping center window. On the other hand, I felt a bigger sense of accomplishment. Other than those extremely rare occasions, high school wasa continuation of my gender frustration. The only relief I felt were a couple of school events I went to which featured a couple of very presentable boys in drag. Needless to say I was very jealous. 

The biggest setback I thought was coming was being drafted into the military. Along with the obvious reasons to dislike my upcoming service was the fact that women didn't have to worry at all about the military. Ironically this all turned out to be the time when life gave me a potential set back and I was able to turn it all around for the better. First of all I was given very little chance of  continuing my career as a radio disc jockey in the Army and I did just that in the American Forces Radio and Television Service. Then perhaps more importantly, I was able to finally come out of the closet toa few of my closest friends as a transvestite. Finally, the gift which kept on giving was meeting the woman who would turn out to be my first wife and birthed my beloved accepting daughter. 

Even with all those successes, I was still missing a huge gap in my life. Something was still wrong. Around this time life gave me the transgender term and the internet to research it. .All of a sudden I knew who I was. All those times I went to the transvestite mixers and didn't quite fit in made sense.

It all left me with the huge "what if" questions. Life had given me the answer to my gender issues but also left me the choices to settle my problems. Was I going to take the chances to give up all my male privileges and live full time as a transgender woman. After years of experimentation and soul searching the answer became clear and I took the gender plunge. 

At this point life gave me options. When my wife passed away, she was my biggest naysayer, so tragedy turned to a bittersweet triumph. Around this time also, the Veterans Administration began offering Hormone Replacement Therapy which I could take advantage of at a very low cost and I was old enough I could take advantage of early Social Security retirement and not have to worry about coming out at work.

It turned out life was repaying me for all the years of  turmoil and stress it put me through.