Old Friends Are Hard to Find!

As with so many other transgender women and trans men, when I transitioned I gave up contact with several old friends who I thought refused to accept me. One it turns out was too quick.

I came out to her and her comment was she was shocked, "I was the most macho man she had ever known." Guess I played the part well. At any rate we went our separate ways in separate cities. She craves very rural areas with no neighbors while I have always liked medium sized big cities such as Cincinnati or Columbus.

As days stretched into weeks, months and years, I just figured she had refused to accept me and moved on like a few of my other friends.

I was wrong. Saturday night out of the clear blue sky I received a text which merely asked was this (my old male name.) Understandably I proceeded slowly since I didn't recognize the number. We exchanged a few more texts before she finally gave herself away and told me who it was and...

Told me she didn't abandon me, she lost me. 

It turns out all this time, she did accept my Mtf gender transition and had lost my phone number information. Plus, I didn't have hers so there was no way we could connect. Plus, ironically, it turns out she is originally from the area of Cincinnati Liz is from and they knew some of the same people growing up. It is truly a small world!

We ended up calling each other and chatting for over an hour when she told me she had even talked to my daughter about my transition and I was obviously the last to know.

She lives about a hour or so east of us near the Ohio River, so getting together in person is very feasible.

I can't wait and it does my heart good to know and old dear friend didn't desert me!

"Transer Than Thou?"

in response to my post on "Hell" Connie wrote:" I never hear you say the phrase that you used to use anymore, and, out of respect, I will modify it to "Transer than thou". It seems that many trans women fall back on their male need for competition to find validation. Whether one spends 5 minutes or 5 hours on her makeup is like bragging about the length of ones penis. The only difference is that it varies from person to person whether longer is better or worse. Let's face it (pun wasn't intended, but now that I've written it....), most of us need the makeup for the purpose of femininization, as we don't have a chance of presenting well without it. 

Dolly Parton has admitted to patterning her look after the harlots she would see in her youth, and compares her presentation to that of drag queens. She is also intent on maintaining her made-up look, even as she sleeps, so that only she would see herself without it in her private mirror. Still, we know that she sees a feminine face there, and, after she has spent whatever time it takes to reapply her makeup, is she any more or less a woman because of it? Some may argue that she's putting herself through hell in the process, though. If she is (and I don't believe she thinks she is), then it's for her, alone, to decide. I think it's the need to compete, with which the Devil uses, that leads us to our own hell."

Thanks!

Going Through Hell to Get to Heaven?

It seems the more I am around younger LGBT (more specifically the transgender groups) the better their attitude is compared to the "more mature" trans folks.

With all due respect to the Steve Miller Band song, is it because we had to go through hell to get to heaven? With all due respects to the "youngsters" the world is changing quickly in regards to the transgender community, so maybe they should have a better attitude. OR, do we "more mature" trans folk just harbor some grumpy resentment?

After all most of us were trapped in very small dark closets without even a glimmer of hope from a computer screen. Also, by the time we were able to attempt a transition, our bodies were wrecked by the ravages of years of testosterone, unless we were very fortunate.

Or it could be just a basic change of attitude. Some waited so long to get to where they wanted to go in a feminine world, when they got there, it proved to not be what they thought. After all, it wasn't for me.

Nearly nothing was bad for me, it was just facing the 24/7 world as a trans woman was just different. I had to reach some magical point of blending versus of looking like I wasn't trying, which has seemed to be a recent point of emphasis here in Cyrsti's Condo. Probably because of two post opt transgender women I have seen recently. At one of the meetings, another member said she spent about a half hour on her makeup and one of the post opts said "I only spend a couple minutes.'' Being the smart arse I am, I almost said "It looks like it." But I didn't. No matter how snarky she is, there should be no need to jump into the snake pit with her.

Maybe too, it's an idea Connie and I used to discuss years ago. What if you went through all the pain and suffering only to find you were in an irreversible miserable lonely place? An ugly new closet indeed.

I wish I could share a lengthy FB post I read recently from a much younger trans woman friend of mine who just had a boob job, FFS and other work done. She looks good but now is facing
the prospect of dating crazies from both sides of the gender aisle.

I guess so many people can go thru hell and never get to heaven. Sorry Steve.