No Body Liked You Anyhow.

This happened to me several times after I transitioned and came out to several people. They told me they could see a friendlier more comfortable me. (Even though my insides were twisted in knots.)

It was like the weight of the world was taken from my shoulders. So I could relax into a life I was evidently supposed to have lived from the beginning.

Of course I had all this paranoia about how I looked when it seemed most everyone else was concerned with how I felt.

Then, I began to wonder how different my life would have been as a transgender woman if I had started to live it earlier? How different would my life had been if I had not been under the early cross dressing pressures or just worrying later about the ramifications of being transgender itself?

Night and day to be sure because I had this mean streak to me, along with a touch of crazy. Out running trans is tough. Looking for each and every macho way to prove a non existent masculinity.

So it's no wonder I didn't have many close friends ever, because I didn't allow myself any. Non one was allowed inside "the rock" that was me.

What a shame the cup was half empty during the years of my life I spent in hiding or half full that I finally learned the truth and turned my life around.

So I am proof a life can turn on a dime, sometimes you just have to stay on top of the dime for decades.

Jeepers Creeps II

Received plenty of response to my Jeepers Creepers post yesterday in Cyrsti's Condo. To refresh your memory the post was about a guy who was making me feel very uneasy at a restaurant the other night.

The first from Jeni: "I'm coming up with a different scenario.
The guy hates trans, and was staring at you, not sure if you were trans or not.
If he had made up his mind that you were trans, then trans hate crime murder jumps to the top of the list for outcomes."

Geeze I hope not!

The second from Mandy: "I hope the creep didn't follow you...I suspect I might have driven to the nearest police station."

Mandy, even though Liz wasn't watching to see if he followed, I was!!!!

The third from Connie: "I was shopping in a Wallgreen's one night, and a guy (unsuccessfully) tried to be discreet as he followed me around the store. I, of course, carefully ignored him. I wasn't about to leave the store until he was long gone, but he remained long after I had gathered my products for purchase. I decided to stop in front of the "incontinence" display (surely, that would make me appear to be unattractive, so I thought). He showed himself at the end of the isle, though, stared at me for a half-a-minute, and then approached me.

"You're so beautiful, blah blah blah," he said. With a half-smile, I thanked him and then picked up a package of Depends, pretend to examine it. "I don't usually do this kind of thing, but I was wondering if I could buy you a drink," I heard from behind me. Without looking at him, I politely said "No, thank you," and moved down the aisle away from him. He followed me, keeping some distance, and I could tell he wasn't ready to take "No" for an answer. Before he could say any more, I turned around - still with the Depends in my hand - and said, "I've really got to get home now!" I don't know if he understood that maybe I was having a crisis situation, but he did stop following me. 

Then, I began stalking him, just to make sure he was leaving the store. I watched him as he went to the check-out counter to ask for a bottle of cheap whiskey. Was that what he meant by buying me a drink, I thought. Did he expect me to go out in the alley and share swigs with him before he got me drunk enough to give in to him? He was creepy enough that I thought he might have even been turned on by my expressed incontinence, and maybe he'd even like to be peed on. Anyway, the threat was over when I watched him leave with his bottle, crossing the busy street to a safe-enough distance so that I could get to my car parked in the lot. During my drive home, I came up with a better answer to his advances. I should have said that my husband was waiting for me in the car, and that he was probably already getting his temper up because I had been so long in the store. That's what I'll say next time, and it's a matter of "when", not "if", that it will.

BTW, I left the Depends on the counter; they were only a prop! The whole experience was worthy of peeing my pants, though - both out of fear and anger."

That's scary!

I always operate out of the possibility most guys know I am transgender and go from there. Plus, I am really fortunate these days to nearly never be alone much which gives me strength in numbers of course.

In a future post, I will have to pass along a few stories from the Witch's Balls I attended here in Cincinnati. Nothing dangerous because most witches don't have balls :) just fun interaction with a couple men.

Building Walls?

At the risk of erroneously lumping topics into one of interest. I have mentioned over the past week or so of being found by an accepting old friend. Obviously, all of that was good until I covered the subject again of not going to my 50th high school class reunion this year. My feelings have always been if they (classmates) didn't particularly want to see me then-why now? And, their are damn few I still want to see, let alone be some sort of center of attraction. For the wrong reasons.

As far as building walls, Connie wrote: "I understand the idea of distancing, and taking advantage of making a clean break. I had to move to another city just at the end of my junior year in high school. My plan was to not only leave everything and everybody behind, but also to be careful not to develop any close relationships in my new environment. It was my one and only purge, as I had also decided to break off with myself - insofar as my gender identity was concerned. 

Although my suppression of self lasted for seventeen years, my vow to avoid close relationships ended only four months later, on September 23, 1968 (I can still remember the exact place and situation, too), the day I met the girl to whom I would later be married. As it relates to my internal battle of suppression, it was the power of testosterone and social convention over my female brain to which I caved. Also, I just wanted to be loved by someone, and I could not see that happening had I been whatever I was trying so hard not to be.

I sometimes wonder where I'd be had I stuck with my original plan, but as badly as I've messed up lives of those I love over the past three decades, at least there is still some kind of love that has survived. As for the rest of the people from my past, the ones I managed to keep a safe distance from, I really don't care too much who they might think me to be today. For them, and with them, there was little investment in the first place."

Thanks again Connie for your insight!