Doing It Right in the UK!

From the "Pink News":

"Transgender newsreader India Willoughby is joining an all-female Celebrity Big Brother house – alongside ultra-conservative Ann Widdecombe.

Before and after "India Willoughby"

The pair are both signed up to appear on the Channel 5 reality show, which launches tonight. "

She (India) made a return to the airwaves in 2016 as a woman – and has since become a prominent columnist, as well as a panellist on Loose Women.

The transgender journalist and presenter will be walking on eggshells in the house, as joining her will be former Tory MP Ann Widdecombe.

Widdecombe is a lifelong critic of LGBT rights, who recently spoke out against Prime Minister Theresa May for vowing to support transgender rights at the PinkNews Awards.

Responding to the PM’s speech, Widdecombe said: “I think this is very very bad news for a lot of confused young people and if I were the Prime Minister I would think rather long and hard about this.”

To my knowledge, the American version of the show has ever only accepted one openly transgender woman onto their show.

Should be interesting! I am sure Paula Goodwin (from the UK) may tune in!

Nothing Happens in a Vacuum

2017 marked a huge year for transgender candidate's nationwide. Most of those victories just didn't happen in a vacuum.

Here is more from The Advocate:

"In the wake of the 2016 elections — and subsequent attacks on transgender rights — a group of pioneering trans activists decided that getting more trans candidates on the ballot would be more impactful than checking one off. Together they formed the Trans United Fund, the first and only national political advocacy group focused on empowering trans and gender expansive people. Its Breakthrough Fund is the first bipartisan transgender political action committee (PAC) and was designed to help a handful of key political candidates by providing funding or other resources — sometimes both.

In the 2017 elections, TUF won big: Virginia’s Danica Roem became the first transgender woman in the United States to win a seat in a state legislature, and two trans candidates were elected to the Minneapolis City Council. Andrea Jenkins became the first out trans black woman, and Phillipe Cunningham became the first out trans black man elected to public office.

If it weren’t for the money TUF raised, the connections and resources it provided, or the voter mobilization it spearheaded, it’s quite likely these trans candidates would not have won"

For more, go here.

And So We Meet Again

For some reason, my schizophrenic cat wants to help me write this post. After biting me last night she can't seem to get enough of me. Not unlike a few of the friends I have had in my life. Not the ones I am referring to in this post.

I didn't have much choice in coming out to my close friends. I never had many, what I considered close friends but what I did have up and died on me in a two year span. It took that aspect out of my Mtf transgender transition reality.

To this day, I only have one friend who knows of my trans life and supports me. She just happens to live some distance away and we don't see each other much. The last time I met her and a couple of her grand-kids, they were all really nice. I could have been meeting them as my old male self other than the person I am today.

Plus, with kids, they always seem to be more accepting.

So, as 2018 begins I count my long time friend as one of my transgender blessings.

I have always wondered how it would have been to have been able to come out to my deceased male friends. Of course, it's nice to think they would have accepted me, but then again, I will never know. I do think the process would have been way more uncomfortable for me, than them. Maybe then though, they would have understood why I "disappeared" on occasion as I secretly was learning to live life as a transgender woman.

I am sure too, as I started HRT, there would have been very little chance they wouldn't have noticed the obvious and subtle changes going on with me.

Like so many things in my lives, I will never really know the answer.

New Years' "Stuff"

It should be fairly quiet in the LGBT-transgender world early in the year, unless the Cheeto (IQ-45) decides to try to single the trans community out for no specific reason except to cover his own problems.

After all, his ban on transgender troops in the military was summarily dismissed in the courts. What a great way to end the year!

Other than that, Caitlyn Jenner is heard/read, released her book. As you Cyrsti's Condo regulars know, I'm not one of her fans and even after reading reviews of her book, I don't plan on jumping on the Jenner bandwagon anytime soon. Plus, not all have resolved Jenner from her alleged continue support of tRump, like:

Ashlee Marie Preston, who became the first trans magazine editor-in-chief earlier this year, ripped into Jenner for her allegedly ongoing backing of Trump despite his decision to ban trans people from the military.  Now  following the sudden resignation of California assemblyman Sebastian Ridley-Thomas, Preston has said she will run for the District 54 seat.

Preston (left) and Jenner

I'm sure my views won't hurt her (Jenner's) feelings one way or another but I am not so sure how easy it is for a tiger to change her Republican stripes.






Personally, my goals for 2018 mainly revolve around exercise and eating healthier. Some of us aren't getting any younger :).

2018!

May 2018 be a safe and prosperous year for you all!

Thanks for visiting Cyrsti's Condo!

Happy New Years!

Well, by now around here at least, 2018 has arrived and it's a cold one! Well below zero (Fahrenheit) with wind chills factored in.

Due to the brutal cold, my partner Liz and I decided to spend New Years Eve together at home.

So, our special night out together will have to wait until a later date.

That's OK since we already have several other get together s to go to in January. One of which is a dress up affair I understand.

I hope where ever this post finds you, you were able to reflect back on 2017 and ahead to 2018.

Have a great New Years!

Survival and the Trans Girl

Here in Cyrsti's Condo recently, we have been exploring the relationship between cross dressers and LGBT transgender women.

As happens so many times around here, a couple of you regulars bring another sense of clarity to the subject. As in this comment from Connie"

"For me, being a transgender woman involved cross dressing as a means of survival until I could finally express and present myself completely. It was a combination of luck and a lot of hard work. The middle-ground became less and less an option, although I remained there for many years. I could no longer be disingenuous, however, and I believe that those close to me could sense that, as well. Had I been satisfied with occasional cross dressing, I would not have felt myself to be disingenuous.

As I am a musician and performer, I could easily have been a drag performer, but I never saw myself as one. My wife, in our early conversations, thought it to be acceptable for me to combine my "passion" for cross dressing and my passion for performing as an outlet for my gender expression. While music is a passion of mine, however, cross dressing was (and is) not. I was lucky that she came to understand that, but it took some work on my part to convince her. If someone who may have thought I were a drag performer sat through just one set of one of my shows, I think they would recognize that, too. Having the ability and permission to just be myself is all I ever wanted, and I can accept the accolades, as well as the rejection, because of it."

It's important to note she mentioned "rejection". Often the setbacks we encounter in the newly feminine world, are the best teachers.

I can't tell you how many times I was almost reduced to tears from cruel stares, comments, or giggles. Plus I wasn't even on HRT yet, which has driven me to tears for bad and good reasons.

Somehow though, I always found the fortitude to hitch up my "big girl panties" and get back in the game. Finally, I became skilled enough to exist in the world...on my terms.

I also was intriqued by Connie's reference to not being a "Drag Performer." The path was also indirectly open to me and it didn't seem to fit either. Plus, I have no performing talent at all!

Transgender survival in it's truest form. Thanks Connie!

Climbing Walls

As 2017 comes to an end, it's time to reassess the year and look ahead to 2018.

As I look at my life, I consider my Mtf transgender transition not unlike climbing a series of walls. Of course, some, like HRT or having legal gender markers changed are more serious than others.

2017 was fairly quiet for me. I look back at the year as one of stabilization. I was able to continue living day to day as a woman and learned from it...although not as dramatically as earlier in my transgender life.

Since I have been on HRT steadily now for three plus years and have even completed all my legal gender markers changes which are possible, what is next?

I still would love to have breast augmentation surgery someday to compliment my hip developement, but finances continue to be a issue in the near future.

Other than that, I still need to work on projecting an "aura" of femininity. I feel the need to out do cis women in this area, as they take their femininity for granted. Some, not so well.

Looking further back, I remember the excitement of someone like Cyrsti's Condo reader Marcia who is looking ahead to 2018.  Having the chance to finally achieving her dream of transitioning fully! How scary/exciting it was for me.

Either way, looking ahead at a new year is always exciting for me. A chance to find other walls and climb them.

In fact, I am thinking of adding "Walls" into my proposed Trans Ohio Symposium workshop in the spring.

It's OK!

As I wrote in the last Cyrsti's Condo post, there is plenty of room to differentiate cross dressers and transgender women.

An example is one of the professed cross dressers who comes to one of my transgender support group meetings. She is quite attractive and seems to be quite secure in who she is. She says she is satisfied with a life that has her looking like a cis woman part time and living like a guy the rest. Yes, she is married.

Granted, to be able to live like she does, one has to have an understanding spouse.

I wonder too, if the number of trans nazi's who drift through the group, influence her too. Several just aren't pleasant people and don't seem to be secure in their Mtf transition. One is even a total "IQ-45"(Rump) fan, which I can't come close to understanding. She went through SRS several years ago and just has a level of meanness which doesn't lurk so far beneath the surface.

Of course, being trans is not just a trait you somehow acquire, I believe you are born into it...or not.

The cross dressers in the group profess having the freedom to dress or not, but a transgender person doesn't. The difference being, a cross dresser wants to look like a cis woman, while a trans person wants to be a cis woman. Or live the life of one.

Some, like the person at the meeting, are fortunate to have been able to transition well enough to step between the genders. Most just aren't.

Either way, it's OK to exist together. Cross Dressers and transgender women are just as different as drag queens are to us.