A-Ha Gender Moments

 

Image from the Jessie
Hart Archives

Since I have been fortunate enough to live a fairly long life, I have experienced several a-ha moments when it came to my all important gender needs. 

When I started my gender journey as a youth, even though for the most part I considered my desire to cross dress my boy self as a girl to be a fairly innocent hobby...unless I was caught. Looking back, I don't know how I managed to hide what I was doing. 

Perhaps my first a-ha moment came when I was able to save up enough of my own meager funds to buy my own makeup and pantyhose. Sure I was petrified but somehow I made it through and was emboldened to do more. The whole process was to set the stage for more gender adventures and a-ha moments or being scared to death but loving the feeling of success.  

A few of the biggest moments I mention quite often and I am sure I will remember them when if and when my life flashes in front of my eyes when I pass on to the other side. One was the night I decided I would make the effort to go out as a transgender woman and quit thinking of myself as a cross dresser. Knowing full well, there was nothing wrong with being a cross dresser, I just needed more since I was increasing how many times I was going out and the venues I was attempting to go to. On the night in question, I ended up in the parking lot of a nearby "Fridays" venue gathering my courage to go in. The end result was predictable as I was to discover later. I lived and was treated with respect. I had done so much more than just interacting with store clerks in the mall. 

The more a-ha moments I had, the more emboldened I was to try more. For the most part I was successful except when I tried a couple redneck venues where I was roundly rejected. I guess you could say I had different a-ha moments when I had the cops called on me. I learned the hard way and kept on trying. When I tried, I was able to find more success in my quest to see if I could live fulltime as a transgender woman. As I progressed, on occasion I was elated and couldn't stop thinking how I could fit in to the feminine world but other times when I thought of the enormity of what I was thinking of doing. My male self and wife were fighting me at every turn so life was not pleasant. 

As it turned out I out-lasted both of them and finally came to the conclusion I needed to transition fulltime into a world I had only had ever dreamed of. It was a huge a-ha moment and took a ton of pressure off of me. From there, it was a short jump to deciding if I should undertake hormone replacement therapy or HRT. HRT was yet another major moment of success. My body took to the new hormones as if I should have always been on them. 

The only problem I faced at that point in time was my feminine inner soul taking over my life. She had waited so long and proved time and time again she knew what to do if I would just trust her. 

As I near the age of seventy five, I am sure the a-ha moments maybe will be less numerous but more dramatic as I face the final hurdles of life. 

Virtual Outreach

Image from the Jessie Hart
Archives.
Ohio River in background...

 Recently I experienced a busy day virtually on the old laptop.

First of all, I needed to go through the pre screening process for another colonoscopy. I just had one a year ago but the doctors removed a sizable polyp which fortunately turned out to be non cancerous. Even so, instead of waiting the usual three years between check ups I was scheduled for to come back in a year. If you are not familiar, colonoscopies are not the most pleasant procedures to go through but on the other hand, having intestinal cancer is a terrible alternative. 

I don't know how many of these procedures the Cincinnati Veteran's Administration hospital does a year but the woman doing the intake on the phone almost immediately said, I remember you. Being transgender I am used to being remembered. However, this is one of the times I would have preferred not to be remembered. The woman I was talking to on the phone possibly reacted at my often poor attempt to sound feminine on the phone. Part of my transition I am always working on. Hopefully this time, I won't be miss-gendered when I go in early January for the procedure as I was last time.

The second part of my virtual day occurred later on when I attended the monthly meeting of the Greater Cincinnati Alzheimer's diversity committee. As always the meeting was very gender affirming as the other four participants were all women. It's almost as if I was in another mini girls night out. Plus, I am a big believer in helping anyway I can with the association because years ago, my Dad passed from having Alzheimer's. When I approached them to do more, I was pleasantly surprised to learn the association already had some guidelines in place to deal with LGBTQ patients. However as we all know, being transgender presents more unique opportunities we have to encounter than the rest of the gay or lesbian community. 

One thing I have had to do (which I have been putting off), is write a short post for the Association's Facebook page. It should be noted several of the members have made it a point to go to several of the regional Prides this summer to help publicize what programs are offered to help those in need. So hopefully I will be just aiding in the process. 

I also write for the local transgender - cross dresser monthly newsletter and each time I encourage anyone else to wants to become involved a path to do it. So far, no one has come forward to volunteer which is no real surprise because so many members are still deep in their closets. On a wider scale, if you have ever been touched by Alzheimer's and have time to spare, seek out your local association and see if they have a diversity committee to volunteer with.

One thing with a virtual day is, I need to apply makeup and fix my hair which is always good. In addition to my virtual appointments recently, I also had another one a couple days ago when it was time for the Dayton, Ohio VA LGBTQ support group. I learned then my long time (ten years) therapist is leaving for another job. I was very sad because I have always looked up to her as one of the top three influencers in my life. It will be interesting to learn if anyone else will run the group. 

Now, for awhile, life will settle back down as Thanksgiving has now passed us by and it has occurred to me I have not written about my family experiences yet. Where does time go?

Stuck in the Middle with Me

 

Image from Rene Ranisch 
On UnSplash

Once upon a time and probably more than once, my second wife told me my cross dressing existence wasn't all about me. 

We were usually fighting about my feminine existence when she came up with the same comment. The unfortunate truth was it was all about me. I had a singular desire to look better as a woman and I knew deep down the whole femininization process would not be accepted by my wife and if I was to succeed at all, I would have to do it myself. Since she was unable to help, it meant I was on my own to discover my own fashion, makeup etc. So, for the most part, we never saw eye to eye on anything when it came to my cross dressing. Over the years, it became obvious she didn't like my inner woman at all.

Even though I knew it was and had to be all about me, life went on and we were able to stay together for over twenty five years until her untimely death. Until the end, she resisted any idea of mine I would ever want to begin down the road to trying a transgender lifestyle by starting hormone replacement therapy. When she always stated she didn't sign up with me to be with another woman again I had to agree with her.

Since she did not accept me, I started to sneak around behind her back and found out it was possible I could follow my ultimate dream. In the world I was beginning to discover, I was able to begin to carve out a new life as a transgender woman. When I did I became stuck between the two binary genders. I was trying to live as my old male self a couple days of the week and my female self the remainder of the time. Of course my life became unbearable and I sustained dark days when it came to my mental health. Being stuck in the middle with myself was not a fun place to be. I would come to learn in her own way, my inner woman who was doing battle with my wife was just as strong willed. 

I quickly figured out my old male person was going to be the first person to go away when my wife passed. I'm sure in the next life, my wife wasn't surprised to see I quickly transitioned totally into a feminine world. She always said my dog would never miss her if anything ever happened and she could have added my inner woman would not have missed her either. To make matters worse with my overall mental health, my male self desperately missed her. Possibly knowing my wife was his last chance at maintaining any sort of life.

 Even though the times I was out exploring the world as a novice transgender woman on occasion I was terrified, I pushed on to experience the excitement of exploring a life I had always dreamed of. When I did, often I was surprised at the outcome. I never expected many of the results I had when my inner feminine self took over. Quite a few times I couldn't believe how easy and natural life turned out to be.

Being stuck in the middle with me turned out to be worth all the hassles I went through to arrive there.