Creating a Tangled Gender Web

Image from Robert 
Anasch on UnSplash

When I look back at my life, I wonder if I knew all it would entail would I do it all again.

The only change I would make would be to have have the courage sooner to go ahead and transition from male to female. Even though it sounds like a good idea to have jumped off my gender cliff earlier, the problem became the world around me. I am seventy four and the world at large has gone through several different realities when it comes to the transgender world. Back in the day, there was very little feedback when it came to being transgender at all. Basically, there were only two categories, transvestite (or cross dresser) and/or transsexual. Neither of which felt very natural to me, Plus if you went the transsexual route, you were expected to move and leave your old life completely behind. I never thought I could do it either. I still had a daughter I loved plus enjoyed small parts of my male life.

In other words, I was stubborn to the point I thought I could still transition my own way. If indeed I ever came to the conclusion I was trans. As I procrastinated through life, I created an increasingly tangled gender web. I was trying to balance what was left of my male life along with a long term marriage with a woman I loved very much. At that point, I was trying my best to try to discover my true gender self. My web grew ever tangled the more I tried to either escape or relax and enjoy the ride. The ride included taking my transition one step at a time. I found as I struggled in my tangled web I needed more than one transition to move forward. It took the evening when I finally decided to go out to be a transgender woman rather than as a very serious cross dresser just out to escape my male world. to change my mind The difference was major in that I was striving to discover who I really was rather than just playing some sort of game I had indulged in for most of my life. Much of it was in front of a mirror. Naturally the world was much more brutal and I needed to be better.

As it turned out, I was increasingly successful in both of my lives in the main two binary genders which caused my web to be even bigger and more tangled. I ended up sneaking out behind my wife's back, which caused severe problems with my marriage. It was increasingly evident I was stuck in a battle between two women. My wife and my inner woman were both strong feminine people and the war weighed heavily on my overall mental health. Before it killed me, I needed to finally escape the tangled web I was in and begin to live as a woman. Or, as my wife told me, be man enough to be a woman. 

Once I escaped, and with the help of several key friends, I was able to start all over in a new feminine  life. Although, once I began the life, I understood the fact my new life wasn't so new after all. My inner self had been waiting and observing my life just waiting to take over. Of course after I escaped the web, she had her chance and I was living my dream life.  At the least I never led a boring life. 

   

Testosterone Challenged

Image from the Jessie
Hart Archives

Recently it was time to take our car into the shop for an oil change. When I learned I needed to accomplish such a simple task on my own (with no help from my wife Liz), my anxiety level began to rise up. 

All my anxiety stems from my early upbringing when I was struggling to find my footing at all as a male type person. On a fairly regular basis, my brother and I would accompany my Dad when he visited his best friend who happened to own and operate a auto salvage yard. For better or worse, my brother and I got to see so-called pet alligators all the way to dynamiting ponds and salvaging the fish which floated to the top. to eat.

On occasion, the experiences were fun but at other times I was wondering how I could ever break out of my well hidden feminine tendencies and be a man in the mold of my Dad who was in many ways a man who fit the stereotype of a self made man. He rose from struggling through the depression to become vice president of a bank and building his own house. I never came out to him during his life. I forever grew up in his shadow and always experienced huge doses of anxiety when I needed to participate in any male-centric activities. Which included going to any sort of auto parts stores. 

Which brings me back to my oil change experience. My basic problem was I thought I could have been taken advantage of since I am a transgender woman. 

The staff at the place was predictably all male and the testosterone level was very high and yes I was intimidated but I survived. It turned out the only major questions I needed to answer or respond to were how to open the hood, turn on the lights and operate the turn signals. Outside of not knowing where the hood opener was, I didn't have any major problems. Very soon, they were finished and I was on my way. No worse for wear from the extra testosterone I had to experience.  As with anything else, the build up to the event itself was much worse than going through it. I have a colonoscopy coming up in approximately one week and I know the build up would be much worse than the procedure itself. The biggest problem I had the last time I went through it was being miss-gendered by the staff. Hopefully by this time the staff will be more progressive and I won't have to put up with that this time.

Since the staff who dealt with me last time was all female, I hope they recognize my testosterone level is as low as theirs and my appearance is only damaged by an unwanted male puberty I went through.  Plus as I look at it now, the biggest problem I may face is having another sizeable polyp which would have to be removed and I receive a clean bill of health. Health, after all is everything and miss-gendering is ignorance. 

Through it all, I am sure my testosterone didn't increase and I survived my anxiety level went back to normal so I am satisfied.   

Arrival

Image from the Jessie Hart
Archives circa 2010

The beginning of 2024 has given me the opportunity to look back at the years of my life when I became very serious about the reality of entering the feminine world and living as a transgender woman fulltime. This post my give you some sort of an idea of the time sequence I went through in my lengthy gender transition. 

The year was 2010 and three years had passed after my second wife had died. In those three years, I had a brief fling with another single woman as my old male self. Predictably the relationship didn't last and we both moved on. Not before she stood me up on a summer in the park outdoor concert I invited her to. Not to worry, I dressed in my best concert clothes and took my inner female instead. I ended up learning quite a bit and enjoyed myself immensely. Until my wife Liz came along, I was certainly my own best friend. 

As it turned out, 2010 also was the year I decided to go down the road of gender affirming hormones as I sought to change my outward appearance as much as possible. Little did I know, how much the hormones would change my internal life also. It seemed as much as my emotional outlook changed, my entire view of the world softened as my testosterone "edge" disappeared. To highlight my trip down the new road in my life, my first dosage of the new hormones came that year when Liz joined me for a special evening as we were out celebrating New Years Eve.

Even though I had officially started this new path in my life, I found I still had a long way to go. Arriving meant I needed to do more than take gender affirming hormones and feel the part. Then, more than ever, I needed to walk the walk and talk the talk of being a full fledged transgender woman. Meeting the world one on one proved to be both exciting and terrifying as I needed to give up all the male privileges I had fought so long to earn over the years. I learned quickly how I would be barred from any future benefits of being in the men's club. Plus, at the same time. I needed to quickly understand all the responsibilities of being allowed in the women's club. Early on, it took me awhile to see any real benefits from being a trans woman except for the occasional man who would open a door for me.

In the meantime, arrival also meant having to learn things such as a whole new way of just using the restroom. No longer was just peeing taken to such a high level of etiquette. I needed to train myself to look other women in the eye and smile when I used the woman's room and be certain to always stop and check my makeup plus wash my hands no matter how threatened I felt. All of this was just a start.

In essence, arriving also meant being able to relax and enjoy myself in public as my authentic self for the first time in my life. So 2010 was a landmark year for me but at the same time was just the beginning. 

When I was stuck so many years as a closeted cross dresser, little did I know how bright and exciting the world would become as I started to arrive.