Climbing the Gender Mountain

 

Image from David Billings
on UnSplash

As we transform ourselves over the years to live as our authentic gender selves many changes take place. Recently I came to the conclusion the whole process is similar to climbing a gender mountain. Initially we start in a huge valley and attempt to make our way out. 

Similar to so many of you, I started my journey exploring the wonderful world of my Mom's clothes and then working my way to the mirror. On a good day I was able to gather enough courage to walk down our long driveway to the mailbox when I was dressed. We lived on a rural road so cars were rare and discovery was nearly non existent.  Even so, I felt I had reached the first pinnacle of my climb and I rested then wanted more. If I had more guidance back then, I am sure I wouldn't have to have waited all those years to understand I was much more than a casual cross dresser who was attracted to wearing feminine clothes. 

Perhaps the next step I took up the mountain was when I started to go to Halloween parties as the most attractive woman I could be. Each year I improved the process so much on occasion I was mistaken for a cis woman. I loved it when it happened and was so sad when I had to wait another long year before another Halloween rolled around. Another year of just me and my mirror. The one thing I knew for sure was once I had reached a certain point of acceptance in my preferred gender, I could never go back to my unwanted, mundane male life. From Halloween interactions forward in my life, times were due to become more complex as the climb became steeper. Once I started to break out of my gender closet and explore, the more I saw of the mountain, the more I wanted.

Those were the days of escaping the endless clothing stores and malls searching for acceptance and doing my best to climb even higher to my goal of existing as a transgender woman in the public's eye. This step was radical for me and required years of work and years of learning on what I needed to do to achieve the new goals I had set up for myself. In fact, for the longest time back then I wasn't even aware I needed any gender goals. What I did know was the more I was able to look out and experience this new wonderful world I was in, the more I loved it. I certainly wanted to attempt to keep climbing. The problem was I was becoming increasingly engaged in a fight with my male self over my actual life as I knew it. In other words I was becoming more stressed on how I spent my time in each of my competing genders. Not to mention a marriage I was trying to protect . I can compare it to climbing to a certain point and then looking up to see how far I still needed to go.

At this point, the stress of the climb became too much and I became very self destructive. All the way down to falling into the valley of a suicide attempt. Of course it took me time to restart my climb after dealing with that massive set back but somehow I was able. Perhaps the biggest reason why was deep down I knew I was on the right path. I knew somehow I needed to climb higher and see what life offered. The next step I took was a major one when I started hormone replacement therapy which helped to further feminize my exterior self to sync with  my interior self. Once I did the HRT, new wonderful opportunities to climb opened up to me. Even still since I am afraid of heights, the fear of going higher often scared me.

Finally, with the help of several very supportive friends and family I was able to undertake a major step upward and decided to live my dream of being a fulltime transgender woman. By the time I did, I wondered why it took me so long because I felt so natural. I was just afraid to climb.

Impostor Symdrome

 

Photo from the Jessie Hart
Collection on a dinner date.

To me, impostor syndrome means once you are out and about as your authentic self  in public and all of a sudden you suffer from sneaking suspicions all is not right begins to influence you. It's similar to completing all the hard work it takes to prepare yourself for meeting the public. I vividly remember stressing out over the smallest details of my hair, makeup and clothing. When I did, the most amazing thing happened, I began to make it in the world as a transgender woman. For the most part, I was walking on cloud nine in my heels I wore all the time back in the day. 

Perhaps I was just waiting for the other shoe to fall when it came to dealing with the public. Normally, all the problems came about when I was engaging with other women, As I remember, the conversation started quite normally and as I tried my best to modulate my voice and sound feminine, I could see in the person's eyes they were thinking something was wrong. Somehow, someway I couldn't seem to close the deal I was a woman. As I considered again what I was doing wrong, I thought I had (or was) covering all the bases of why I couldn't feel entirely comfortable.

Looking back, I don't think I considered the most important parts of what was causing my impostor syndrome. I know I was very impatient and on occasion expected miracles when I went public for the first times. I didn't take into consideration how long it takes a cis woman to grow from being a female into living as a woman. It is not an easy task or even a given for either binary gender to grow up and be a responsible human being. Plus, even through I had been cross dressing as a transvestite in front of the mirror for years before I went into the world, I missed many of the basics I would need to survive and hopefully prosper. I never faced the fact I never had any of the peer or Mom influence on my fashion and public appearance. To put it mildly, there was quite a bit of catching up to do.

I also had to overcome the initial bad experiences I went through when I first escaped my dark lonely closet. I needed to try to forget all the times I was laughed at or stared at in public as well as bad restroom experiences when I had the cops called on me. Even though I have used the women's room  with no problems for years now, I still have the slightest fear of push back when all I am doing is going to the bathroom. Impostor syndrome at it's worst even though I have been in so many different restroom situations over the years, Again with no problems. 

Since I was able to live an unwanted but fairly successful male life for so many years, I am asking too much for my impostor syndrome to just go away in my feminine life. I have every bit of a right to occupy a spot in a woman's circle as any other cis woman. I just earned my rights in a different way. The problem I often have is the only person I have to convince about my femininity is myself. Impostor syndrome is hard to shake after all. After all these years of letting my feminine person out of her closet she should be allowed to totally rule my world without all these distractions. 

Staying in Your Gender Lane

Image from Robert V, Roggiero on
UnSplash

Seemingly, gender differences are one of the earliest things we learn in life. By learn I mean we come to realize there are differences in gender. To simplify the matter, I should use the differences between boys and girls. For the fortunate ones, they never question their biological sex matching up with their mental gender. At that point, if we have questions, staying in our gender lane becomes a huge issue which can linger for life. 

I mention often I grew up around very few girls and I was in a boy's world. There was only one time I can remember an incident which could be called I will show you mine if you show me yours. It came up innocently enough between the only girl and the boys. All it did was reinforce the differences we had as separate genders. Years later all I really remember about the encounter is that it happened. There was no blinding realization I wanted what the girl had between her legs. To this day, I have had no strong desire to undergo any gender realignment surgeries of any kind as I feel my gender has already been aligned by the way I live. Finding a spot in my gender lane was far from easy and took me years of learning. 

Sometimes I believe children are born gender free and early in life are forced into stereotypical boys and girls roles. In my case, I never was afforded the chance to look around the world and determine which gender I wanted to be because my sex was biologically set at birth. I am often asked when I knew something was different about me and now I reply I always knew I was different. I just didn't know how. It took me years to define my gender was different than my assigned sex and I would have a lifetime of issues because of it. Perhaps my gender issues began in my Mother's womb when she was prescribed a hormonal drug to prevent miscarriages but of course I have no way of really knowing. Plus, blaming the medication (D.E.S) would just be an unnecessary crutch anyhow. 

The older I became and the more proficient I became in expressing my feminine side, the more difficult it was for me to stay in my original male gender lane. Especially when it came to the time when I began to understand my gender was completely between my ears and my sex was between my legs and my problems stemmed from syncing up my life. It all added up to severe issues when I at first attempted to change lanes from the male to the female side of the road. As "Stana" from the Femulate blog always says, she turned on her turn signals and used her horn when she entered the passing lane. If you are familiar with her blog, you know she does well in the passing lane.  For the majority of novice transgender women, men or cross dressers we are not naturals and using a new gender lane takes a lot of effort. 

One of the main problems is the gender lanes are crowded and have very different rules to obey. It often takes years of practice to learn the new basics of gender life you are trying to live, Then you have to face the potentially other hostile inhabitants in your lane. Anymore with the number of new anti-transgender bills in quite a few states, our gender lane as trans people seems to be tilted against us. It's bad enough if you have to face an insecure hostile man  but sometimes it is just as bad when a hostile cis woman or TERF does not want you in her lane. 

The good part is, once you make it into the new gender lane you are seeking, no one can force you back,  You have passed into your authentic life and have every right to  enjoy the respect you  deserve.