Interview with Nicole Maines

From Queerty:

"Nicole Maines once offered lessons in becoming herself. Now, she becomes someone else for a living.

The Maine native first made headlines as an anonymous student who sued her school district in 2013 over bathroom discrimination. School officials had barred Maines, who is transgender, from using the women’s bathrooms. She won her case, and eventually went public to describe the experience in the family memoir Becoming Nicole: The Transformation of an American Family.

Maines’ activism also led to on-camera appearances in television and film discussing her experience as a transgender American. Her natural charisma also led to acting opportunities, including appearing as the first transgender superhero on American television with her role as Dreamer/Nia Nal on The CW series Supergirl, produced by Greg Berlanti. Last year, she also earned acclaim (and a Queerty Nomination) for her work as a vampire in the indie horror film Bit.

With her star on the rise, Queerty snagged some time to chat with Maines about the unusual trajectory of her life, her newfound acting career, and her survival lessons for the COVID-19 lockdown. Supergirl airs Sundays on The CW."

To read the interview, go here.

Rest Room Review

I have been spending quite a bit of my time these days working on my new book. Yesterday, I spent my Sunday afternoon working on a chapter about restroom manners and the average transgender woman. Fortunately, over the years I believe times have changed as far as the simple act of using the women's restroom. Unfortunately, we still hear on occasion, times when trans women have been harassed or even worse injured attempting to use a women's room. 

The basic problem still exists, many continue to struggle to present properly as a feminine woman. It is so difficult to fight years of testosterone poisoning. It is similar to so many other aspects of being a trans woman (or a cross dresser). We simply don't have the upbringing cis girls and women are able to take advantage of. We have to catch up quickly and even be better just to survive in the world. 

In order to get to a rest room survival place, it is essential to develop and follow a common sense approach to your "Girl Code". One of the most basic rules is to always sit down to pee. I mention this because years ago I encountered a couple cross dressers who didn't. When I first started to use the women's bathroom, I even listened closely to mimic as close as I could my flow into the bowl similar to the women next to me in a stall. Another point is to always check to see if you have enough toilet paper for you to use and to help out another woman in the next stall who needs it. I even carried a feminine hygiene product in my purse in case I was challenged by another woman who just wanted to find out what I would say.

Another a couple of small hints are, make sure you use a stall which locks and if at all possible has a hook to hang your purse from so you don't have to sit it on a potentially nasty floor. Speaking of nasty always check the toilet seat before you sit down!

On several other levels, learn to be efficient. Always wash your hands, adjust your hair and makeup and keep moving. It is always possible you could be waiting in line for your turn, so depending on the other women, you may be required to acknowledge them with a knowing smile, If you are afraid of outing yourself with your voice, use your cell phone as a prop.  Similar to so many people these days, you won't have to communicate with anyone and you will discover most other women won't notice you either.

Finally, if you run into any problems, ask to speak to the management. Unless you live in a very rural redneck region, more companies are coming around to supporting the transgender part of the LGBT population. And, the way it is looking, when/if the world ever returns to a new normal. Companies may need your business more than ever. 

It's been years since I have had any restroom problems but decades ago I was kicked out of one venue and had the police called on me in another. I still carry the scars with me and seek out an unisex bathroom where ever I can. After all if I wait too long, the results could be ugly!

 

It's a Waiting Game

This morning as I was thinking about what I was going to wear to the grocery store, I wondered if I should pick a quick outfit which would match the mask Liz made me. Then I wondered why bother? On the other hand I figured I could be a proper transgender woman and at the least focus on my making up my eyes. So I did. Leggings, cowl neck hip hugging sweater and tennis shoes completed my fancy once a week time to go shopping outfit. Predictably, the early Easter Sunday morning market was sparsely populated. Surprisingly, the shelves were still fairly well stocked so we found everything we went shopping for.  

As we returned home, I said a silent prayer to the Goddess asking for protection from the nasty virus. Then I began to think I need to be patient once again and stay in as much as possible, Looking back on my life, I should be used to it.

Aren't all trans women and men involved in a waiting game? From our earliest moments exploring the fantastic feminine clothing and makeup we found to the time we had to wait before we could find a safe time to explore again. Then, as our lives fast forwarded, many of us had to wait a year at a time for Halloween to cross dress, often for the first time in the public's eyes. For many of us too, the waiting was just beginning.

Perhaps the longest, most intense, waiting game of all involves beginning hormone replacement therapy. I remember vividly how quickly I wanted to progress with all the promised feminine changes. It seemed the stronger the desire for progress, the longer the process took. In other words, "a watched pot never boils." Well finally, the boiling began and I did begin to develop the feminine characteristics I so craved. Before I knew it, I was carefully trying to wear very loose fitting shirts to hide my budding breasts. Following seven years of being on the HRT regimen I can safely look back on it and realize nothing came easily or quickly.  

There are plenty of waiting games to consider too. Take for example the time it takes a transgender person to realize they were living a lie and desperately needs to come out. Or the time it takes many cross dressers to decide they may be more than a lover of feminine clothes and more of a woman. And, let's not forget the time it takes to either unravel old relationships and begin new ones. 

After all this waiting, what's another couple months (I hope) before life returns to a new normal. 

  

Boredom

Indirectly I have found an outlet to relieve some of my boredom. I decided for a change to respond (and accept) more friend requests from my Facebook Messenger app. 

In the past, I only basically accepted women (trans or cis) or someone who lived close geographically to me. Recently though, I have opened up my friends list a little. Even still, I have only 840 "friends" compared to the thousand plus others I know have. 

Results have been predictable. Several of my new "acquaintances" have massaged my vanity by telling me how good I looked and how much they liked transgender women. One in particular wondered how often I made it to New York City. I told her I worked for a couple years in the NYC metro area but hadn't been back for decades, Plus, right now with all the virus happening around there, I don't think it would be my fave place to visit anyhow. I found out too my attachment to younger lesbians continues. Or their fascination with me. I had one supposed 24 year old in Quebec wanting to send me sun bathing pictures. And another in Florida who wanted to see sexual pictures of my partner and I. I just immediately blocked her and laughingly mentioned it to my partner Liz. 

Then I have the ones who busily want to chat, start then rudely disappear without saying anything. I suppose they realized quickly how boring I really am. And, there was a guy named Joe who is my age who would try to chat later in the evening and then (I think) fall asleep in his chair. 

Probably the most interesting chats I have had came from a couple different sources.  One of which was a trans woman who supposedly lives only about 20 miles away. She started an active chat then abruptly ended it, never to be heard from again when I asked her if she had ever heard of the cross dresser-transgender support group I am part of. Maybe she was and that is why she ended the chat :). Then there was the 27 year old medical student in relatively close Lexington, Kentucky. She was attracted mainly to older lesbians. 

Finally, there was the middle aged bitter transgender woman from Ontario, Canada. She has suffered through many genitalia related problems through her life and I suppose if I had gone through it all, I would be bitter too. 

All in all, Messenger has shown me the world is indeed an interesting place, especially if you are like me and take nearly nothing I read with a grain of salt. Excuse me now, I have to go. My messenger just dinged on my phone. :)  

Southern Style

Susan Lee was kind enough to send in this You Tube video on Girl Code "Southern Style." Thanks!!!!

More Such a Girl

In a recent Cyrsti's Condo post, we took a quick and all too simplistic look into what happens when a husband comes out to her spouse and family. Of course the path is a rocky one paved with all sorts of misplaced good intentions. Lets' check in with Connie concerning her long term relationship with her wife:

"While all relationships differ in an infinite number of ways, so do those in which one person is trans. Any combination of when, why, where, what, with, whom, and how will make a relationship unique. Also, no relationship is really perfect, and I have to imagine that a gender change by one party would not go toward making things closer to perfection.

In my case, I need to add coulda-woulda-shoulda to the list of variables. I met my wife at seventeen, just four months into a concerted effort to suppress my gender dysphoria. There was no need, I thought, to tell her of my perversity (what I believed it to be back then), because I thought it to be completely under control. I didn't tell her nearly four years later, when we married (still under control). I didn't tell her even after the births of our two daughters (Dad's in control!). When I did finally lose control, it was the end of a seventeen year suppression - but I still tried to keep control through compartmentalization - so, still no need to tell. Of course, the activity of cross dressing in secret eventually becomes no secret at all - even if not talked about. Our relationship had to hit rock-bottom before we could start to really deal with my gender identity together, which - keeping with a theme - occurred another seventeen years later. As I write this, another seventeen years have passed, and our forty-eighth anniversary is coming soon. Our marriage looks nothing like what it started out as (few marriages do, even without a gender conflict). I'm sure that it wouldn't have started at all, had I come out when we met 50+ years ago, nor would it have survived, had I come out to her at the same time I sort-of came out to myself, returning to the "shameful" behavior of my youth.

I could write a booklet on "How Not to Be a Happily Married Trans Woman." I was a husband who was this such a girl, then that such a girl, and many such iterations in-between. Consequently, my wife has had to make her own transitions throughout this whole process - to the point where she has given up having a husband at all, but she still has "such a girl."

Thanks for the comment! 

With my deceased wife, I became a woman she didn't like so well. She was a very natural woman, she rarely wore makeup and dresses. All of a sudden she had to put up with me being the "Pretty. pretty Princess." Back in those days, I was really into being a beginning fashionista...everything she wasn't. Plus, as she wasn't shy about telling me, I really knew nothing about being a woman. Of course with my male ego, I didn't believe her and was destined to never really understand until years later after her passing. I had to live full-time in a feminine world to understand. 

Finally, I came to understand I wasn't kidding myself all those years. I really was such a girl. Unfortunately when I interacted with my late wife, neither one of us knew the real me.  

Girl Code

One of the first things I learned as I attempted to assume a feminine life was communication. I refer to it "Girl Code  The Art of Feminine Communication." As I learned the hard way with men, my intelligence level had decreased along with my opinions on current affairs, women played on a whole different field. 

For example, women operate on many more communication "channels" than men. Many of which are non verbal. Also it is no secret women are more passive aggressive than men. There were more than a few times when I discovered way too late I had a knife sticking out of my back after interacting with a woman I considered an ally. One of my favorite examples was all was good with socializing with several women until it was time to use the restroom. Or the well known "You make a good looking woman...for a man in a dress." 

I remember vividly the bartenders in the pubs I went to (all women) who would steer possible problems with men away from me, simply by giving me a look. 

I discovered girl code worked in wonderful ways too. Any number of small selected appearance compliments could open up a whole excellent 

 conversation with a stranger. I think, it was because they knew I was transgender and had some sort of "fashion sense." Also I was very lonely in those days and was seeking out any companionship I could. 

Girl Code to me also dictated I grow a thicker skin. Much more than the softer one I was developing with my Hormone Replacement Therapy regimen.  I became able to smile sweetly and pull the knives out of my back. 

These days I do believe in many areas. life is becoming somewhat easier for those of us transgender women who take the time to learn Girl Code.You just can't throw on a dress and make up and expect to cross the gender frontier. If you need to work on your skin, figure out how to do it. If you need to take off a few pounds do it. After all, Girl Code dictates you do it. And while I am on the subject, May's issue of Cosmopolitan, one of the ultimate Girl Code's publications features Madalynn a trans woman on page 62. She is part of a creative collaboration between  Dove and Cosmo. Unfortunately I have not been able to come up with a picture for you yet. I am sure one will surface sooner more than later. 

Finally, consider immersing yourself in Girl Code. It can be a very pleasurable part of your Mtf gender transition. 

Historical Moment

I have been binging on the cable television show "Dispatches from Elsewhere" for quite some time now as many of you Cyrsti's Condo regulars know. It stars a real live transgender woman playing a very understated trans character. Meaning, the show itself never makes any sort of a big deal at all over her past. She is merely there playing a very real character. The actress playing the role is Eve Lindley. 

I don't normally write a post upon nearly the same subject and/or give up a spoiler alert here in the blog but this time I can't help it. 

On this weeks' show, the simmering sexuality between "Simone" (Lindley) and "Peter" (Jason Segal) finally boils over into a passionate long series of kisses. It's the first time I can remember a cis man has kissed a transgender woman so completely on national television. Even though it wasn't on one of the so-called major networks. 

Liz and I watch the show on Monday nights at 10:00PM on the AMC Network. We are on the Spectrum cable system. I heard from one reader she couldn't get it on her television provider but did on a Firestick. Or you could possibly try to stream it on the link to AMC provided above.

Finally, one last spoiler alert. Be prepared, it is a truly strange show! 

My Husband is Such a Girl

The inspiration for this post comes from a new participant in my cross dresser- transgender support group. She recently posted for the first time of her experiences of going out with a very understanding wife. I am including the picture she shared on Facebook. I thought she looked very feminine and real. 

Then I began to wonder what her wife thought when she saw the transformation. Or what any woman thinks. 

When I have ever began to discuss this topic I always seem to get bogged down into my own version of being biased one way of another. The problem being, I know this whole transgender thing is NOT a choice or a fad. Normally, once you have had a chance to glimpse your true self, there is no going back. The process  leaves many relationships in the dust. Wrecked and broken. Also relationships will go through transitions too. 

Take the far from average accepting wife/spouse for example. Just how accepting will she continue to be as her husband/spouse begins more and more to accept and embrace her new wonderful self. What if she wants to begin a hormone replacement therapy regimen which will in most cases end a traditional sex life. The "what if's" go on and on to wanting to dress and become her feminine self full time. 

As much as people want to talk and write about loving the person on the inside not the out is the important piece of any relationship, changing your gender can strain a marriage to the core. After all, changes such as gender are not what the average woman signs up for when she marries the man of her dreams. Plus dressing him up and helping with his makeup is all kicks and giggles until the finished product looks very presentable and she can she the true self too. 

Again, there is s HUGE jump from a cross dressing husband wanting all of a sudden to take his new found femininity into the world to a full time HRT charged transgender woman. A jump many wives don't want to make and I don't blame them. I do blame them them though when they use the situation as a club to bang away at a trans woman's extended family. Betrayal is a powerful emotion but also is the drive to discover and live as your true self.

I just hope "Jayde" the person in the picture and her wife can make the transition as smooth as possible. She has daughters too which are also involved which is an idea for another post altogether. 

Finally, it is no secret cis women are multi layered humans. Much more than men. Sometimes it takes more than patience to see if they will ever accept a trans woman as a spouse. Sadly in many cases it is a no win situation...for both sides.