Always a Surprise

 This  happens to me very rarely, in fact about once every  two years and a half. Yesterday I received a friend request on Facebook from a person I ultimately decided I knew from my old male cross dressing days.  Recently I have been accepting requests from those acquaintances I have met or people who live close to me.  This person actually lives in a town I used to run a restaurant in just before I retired. So I accepted.

Almost immediately she messaged me about how much I had changed for the better. Which of course was nice. From there we exchanged niceties and remembrances concerning the places we happened to hang out  together with mutual friends. Ironically one of the friends was one I was thinking of fondly a couple days ago. He ran a neighborhood tavern I used to go to quite frequently. From his clientele which ranged into a few gay and lesbian types, I often wondered how I would have been accepted as my authentic self. Sadly I was never able to find out because I never had enough courage to try and he ended up passing away shortly after all of that. I fondly remember him as a kind man who accepted most all types in his tavern as long as they weren't trouble makers.

It only makes three people (all cis women) who I "imprinted" as my false male self now who have tracked me down over the past decade. On occasion it is fun to ponder the "what if's". What if I had thrown caution to the wind and transitioned? Even though the three women who accept me now  gladly do it, would they have done it then when the world was different as far as transgender women and men were concerned. Actually, even back in those days, I was exploring the feminine world in my own way to answer my questions about transitioning. I have written before how I had very few male friends to start with and they all died.

Even though I still knew several cis women, more importantly I was forming new friend bonds with other women so my transition was made so much easier. The photo is me with Nikki and Kim to the right. They quite possibly helped me to save my life and made my Mtf gender transition so much easier. 

Along with Kathy and Mim who invited to my first girls night outs, my gender confidence soared.

All of them including my partner Liz of course helped me to pry the transgender closet door open and allow me to finally escape. 

So. it is always a surprise when I happen upon a person who knew the "before me:" Almost to a person, no one ever guessed my "secret." Which only meant I was very successful at hiding my authentic feminine self. 

The biggest surprise was on me when I discovered how natural it all felt after I transitioned.   

 A friend of mine is working to complete his doctorial thesis and is looking for survey participants who can answer yes to the following  questions: 

1.- Do you identify as LGBTQ or Ally?

2.-Have experienced self identified spiritual religious or spiritual trauma. 

3,- Have experienced self identified growth after said trauma.

4.-Do you currently live in Ohio, Indiana, Kentucky or Tennessee

5.- Are you 18 years or older.

The 15 minute anonymous survey is being conducted by Ryan Joseph Allen  at Xavier University.

The hope is the study will yield understanding and spotlight areas of future research and service to those who have experienced religious trauma and PTSD spiritual growth within the LGBTQ Plus Community.

The survey can be accessed directly from this link:

https://xavier.co1.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_6QHkickaCjCQOtw

Thanks! For further info, feel free to contact me.

Parental Guidance?

 A couple days ago I wrote a post which spotlighted parental fixation from transgender women and men. Or the how's or whys  of our lives as we grow into our adult selves. 

Connie responded with this comment:

Photo Source: Connie
Malone

"The last words my mother uttered, as she lay in her hospice bed, were, “It’s nobody’s fault.” I think that was her way of making a final confession in general, but I’ve chosen to embrace it as a sign of forgiveness for me, her oldest son, even though I longed so to be seen as her only daughter. I doubt, though, that she would have been any less critical of me, but I still know that I’d have been a much happier daughter than the son I was forced to be. There was no need for me to come out to her, as I’d been caught more than once in my trans expressions. Although we never discussed the subject, I was chastised and humiliated on a number of occasions – even beaten with a stick – during my childhood for being (unacceptably) different.

The beating incident took place when I was 13, after I’d put a small dent in her car during one of my middle-of-the-night jaunts out as my feminine-self. Despite the beating, though, I remember the whole thing with some humor. Her main concern was not that I’d dented the car, nor was it that I’d snuck the car out – never mind that I was only 13. No, it was her fear that someone might have identified me as her, being out at 3:00 AM! The optimistic way for me to remember this is that she thought I looked convincing enough for people to mistake me for my mother, and that it was a back-handed compliment for my ability to pass. Back-handed compliments were the only kind she ever gave me, anyway, but I was driving her car, wearing her clothes and wig, and I have always resembled her facially. Unfortunately, I also resembled her in temperament and sarcastic wit. I have learned to forgive myself for that, though, and I’m a much nicer person than I used to be; she never really got there.

Gender identity is not a fault, but much fault can be attributed to how one deals with it – whether that be the person dealing with the dysphoria directly or others that are affected by it. So much more is known about it now than was known 60 years ago. I don’t blame my mother for how she handled who she thought was a sick and disgusting son. I do place some blame on both of us for never having had a frank discussion about my gender identity, however. Sorry, Mom, you were wrong to say that there was no fault. There was, but it was for what we didn’t do, and not anything that was done.

“IN THE END… We only regret the chances we didn’t take, the relationships we were afraid to have, and the decisions we waited too long to make.” ― Lewis Carroll"

Thank you so much for the in-depth look at your life!