Charlie Martin and Connie Malone

 All of a sudden more "Sports and the Transgender Girl" has emerged. The first of which comes from across the pond and involves Charlie Martin (below) a veteran trans endurance racer from the United Kingdom. She uses her platform to promote LGBTQ issues as well as someday racing in the 24 Hours of Le Mans. 

The second part of the post regards a comment from Connie and her experience with her wife and sports:

"My wife has become quite the sports fan over the years. We spend more (quality) time watching sports than most anything else. Years ago, when she had had enough of my not-so-secret girlish ways, she left to stay with her sister for the weekend. Although she knew what I was doing, she had never seen me dressed, and it had gotten to the point where I had to show her my real self. It was a Sunday afternoon in December, and there was an NFL playoff game on TV when she came home. I emerged from the basement, where I had been spending so much time away from her in order to "be myself" - by myself. This was a big deal, I was thinking to myself, but my wife seemed more interested in the game than she was in the "pretty-me." We just sat together and watched the game until halftime before we had any real discussion. I also made a pitcher of Margaritas before halftime, and that helped, too! Oh, I might add that, after that day, I could also admit to her that I enjoyed watching figure skating with her, as well. :-)"

My deceased wife was quite the sports fan. Just not with me being my authentic self. Liz is also quite the sports fan. Of course she also accepts my true self. It all makes life so much easier and fun. I always remember going to a woman's roller derby event with three lesbians drinking dollar beers as one of my highlights in sports. 

Sports and the Transgender Woman

 Years ago, as I started my Mtf gender transition, I was very concerned about how much baggage I could bring with me from my intense male past. No matter how painful it was, I hid my feminine self well from family and friends. In fact, one of the few cis female friends I told about being transgender said I was the most unlikely person she knew to attempt a gender change. 

Of course, back in my "formative" years, gender norms were more rigidly structured. In the conservative rural Midwest I grew up in, the only real "sports" girls could participate in were cheerleading. Because I could not make it on the sidelines of a football game, I had to participate. I was a very mediocre defensive end and ended my high school "career" prematurely due to a couple broken bones. But, no one suspected I really wanted to be a cheerleader.

Perhaps it was all worth it to hide my gender misgivings. These days though, I find my love of sports has been a lifelong pursuit for me, no matter what gender I was living as. As I did transition, I found three close cis women friends who shared my fondness for sports. All three could sit at a bar drinking beer and watching sports as well as any man. 

So you could guess how great I felt when last night my childhood favorite baseball team finally clinched a spot in the Major League Baseball playoffs. In fact I cried tears of joy... *damn hormones"! And of course I am overjoyed The Ohio State Buckeyes" are due to start playing in a couple weeks. 

Once I got past the worn out gender stereotypes of women and sports, I was able to carry forward a great portion of my previous life. I did find out the hard way to never talk to a man about sports.

Gender Bake

 Most of us if we like it or not, are born into strict gender rules. Those of us who are transgender just happen to not fit into those gender norms. Of course, that is where our problems begin. If we are very lucky, we have accepting parents and we are able to communicate what the situation is.  Unfortunately, the vast majority of us transgender women and trans men never had a chance for acceptance until we finally decided to seize the moment later in life. The internet and social media has helped to educate the population but of course serious transgender problems still exist on so many levels of society.  Specifically within the trans women of color community with their extremely high and tragic murder rate. Plus I won't even get into employment issues.

In our own lives, we all decide to choose the path best suited to our needs. Two prime examples would be not being allowed to pursue hormone replacement therapy due to health concerns or deciding not to live a fulltime feminine existence because of a spouse or family. 

Per norm, Connie came up with an expanded comment on the Cyrsti's Condo "Shake and Bake" post:

 "Shake and Bake can mean so many different things. I like to play with words, and I like to play with you, too (word-wise, that is).

Actually, what I meant by "shake" was the acquired male persona that I needed to shake off to reveal my feminine-self. If you're familiar with baking - say, a cake - you know that using the right ingredients in their proper proportions is critical. Then, there is the temperature of the oven and the baking time.

Shaking the male facade was the difficult part for me. I had worked so hard to construct it: athlete, rock drummer, husband, father, grandfather. Over time, the athletic and rock drummer parts became less masculine-identified (although, both require a lot of sweating, which I'm not so fond of anymore). Changing from husband to spouse, and father and grandfather to parent and grandparent was still not without its own sweat.

I always possessed ingredients for a transition to womanhood. I can't say they were all "sugar and spice, and everything nice," but they have always been there. There was some experimentation necessary, in order to come up with the right recipe for me, but trial and error is how any of us must find ourselves. With the climate (temperature) just right, I was able to rise and "bake" into the woman I am today."

Although there are still some physical changes I'd like to see for myself, they would be but icing on the cake at this point. 

Thanks for the comment! In our house though, "Shake and Bake" normally meant chicken. Not a cake. To add insult to injury, my Mom was a high school home economics teacher and she rarely baked.

Shake and Bake

 Connie referred to the previous post here in Cyrsti's Condo called "Faking it till you make it." as "Shake and bake." 

The reference aptly describes many of my early attempts into the feminine world which were mostly unsuccessful. My wife was convinced I dressed too slutty and she was right. I was stuck in the concept that revealing clothes validated my femininity when truthfully my choice of outfits was doing exactly the opposite. 

In essence my skirts were too short or tight and I was having a difficult time adjusting to what my feminine image should be. Looking back now, I feel as if I could come up with a reasonable fashion statement if I stayed in the professional fashion image. I owned a black jump suit I loved and wore repeatedly to upscale shopping malls in the area complete with my black heels and long honey blond wig. The problem I began to run into was when I began to encounter the same people over and over again, I needed other outfits to wear. I remember vividly several outfits I managed to come up despite rigid budget constraints which fit the late 1980's and 1990's fashion scene. Since for the most part, big hair was in, my wigs fit right in as did my shorter skirts if I wore them with flats or low heels. Also there was quite a bit of Demin and Boho influence in the 1990's which I loved. Check out the picture below.

With all of that, I still couldn't fulfill my wife's standards of how she thought I should look. In my defense, she was a very natural person and didn't wear much make up at all. Every now and then though she would still consent to going to a nearby town to go out and eat. To dress to her standards would have been difficult for me. So being the determined person I was (and am) I did the best I could to wear what I wanted. So in her eye's I was still a "shake and bake" person.

As with any transgender woman or man and/or cross dresser, we are all survivors. So if we are faking it or baking it, we find a way to get by.

  

Fake It till You Make It

 I saw this quote on a another blog I follow and it started my thought processes on my gender transition. The other blog is written by a cis woman who was detailing how to feel better concerning her/your appearance. 

The post brought back to me in a much clearer sense how all women (transgender or not) carry the social stigmas of how they look. A good example is my partner Liz who lost nearly one hundred pounds and still has a hard time escaping ideas of how she appears to the public. There have been several times when other people may be staring at me and she never notices and I am astounded. 

I think much of my remaining paranoia with the public goes back decades ago when I was faking it to making it as a woman. Or, my old cross dressing days before I finally admitted to myself I felt so much more natural in a feminine world. I have detailed several times here in Cyrsti's Condo the first night I decided to go out and try to exist as a woman and not someone who was dressing up to fool the world. There was a huge difference for me and I was terrified yet excited. 

This is the point I always have to add my disclaimer...being a cross dresser is quite fine. It just wasn't good enough for me. It was immensely difficult to do but I found myself more and more faking being a man in my life.  

Then again, you have to do what you need to get by. Faking it or not.

Twizzler Candy Commercial

 Twizzler is a candy which as far as I know comes in licorice and strawberry flavors. Recently, where I live here in Cincinnati, Ohio Twizzler has been re-running a 2019 commercial which really hits home for me. In the commercial the spouse is driving and the guy is off deep in thought. Finally she asks him what is he thinking about. As he eats a Twizzler, he wonders if it is all right at his age to start skate boarding.

 

During a vacation my wife and I took one year, the same thing happened to me. The only difference was I had a much more serious problem to ponder. Could I ever become a transgender woman. My life at the time was in very good shape. My wife and I loved each other deeply and my job was riding a pinnacle of success. Yet, here I was lost in thought pondering my future. 

Perhaps the worst part about the whole thing was I don't remember telling my wife what was really bothering me. I was still trying to out run my gender dysphoria which was slowly but surely tearing me apart. 

Sadly, my thoughts ruined much of the fun of the vacation. Maybe a Twizzler would have helped?

Another Summer

 Another summer has come and gone, way too quickly. Even though summer is not my favorite season, it's almost time to consider putting all my seasonal sleeveless tank tops away and taking stock of my sweaters which are still wearable from my wardrobe. I say "about" time because here in Ohio we always have what we call an Indian summer when temperatures hit normally summer like temperatures. In the meantime, we have been enjoying rare wonderful fall weather away from all the fires and hurricanes plaquing the country. Where ever you are, I hope you are staying safe. Of course too, we have the continuing tragic problems with the Covid virus.

I keep thinking as bad as the year 2020 has been, I ought to try to slow down the march of time as much as I can, because as I near 71 years of age, realistically, I don't know how many summers I have left. But that is a whole other subject. On a lighter note, I did take advantage of the good weekend weather to finally start to clean out my old car which is probably heading for the junk yard. Being the procrastinator that I am, I still have a couple weeks before the license tags expire and I have to get it off the street. Interestingly, none of the neighborhood kids I encountered yesterday paid me any mind whatsoever. 

On another level, the car represents one of the few remaining ties I have with my old pre transition self. Cutting ties all the way with it would provide me yet another way to cut ties with the past. 

Later on today, I hope to take advantage of the weather and do a little more work on the car. When the rains come later on in the week, I plan on going through all my clothes. I did find a The Ohio State hoodie in the back of the car I can wear on my walks when the weather cools off again. And I'm excited the Buckeyes (OSU) are going to start playing football again in about a month. 

Go Bucks!

Hot Flash?

 If you have never experienced a hormonal hot flash, it's quite the experience. 

I remember vividly my first real "flash" as I was sitting at a favorite sports bar (of course) of mine enjoying a drink and watching the big screen television. All of the sudden, I felt like I was internally combusting. I wondered if the whole world would notice. They didn't seem to and fairly quickly I returned to normal (?) and began to realize I had just experienced my first hot flash. No wonder all the cis woman of middle age I knew talked about their overheating. 

All of a sudden, this morning, I experienced another hot flash and I am not completely sure why. I have not changed any of my HRT meds I have been on for many months now, so meds should not be an issue. Similar to my first case of heat, the whole episode probably only lasted an hour or so. 

I will have to see if it happens again as I have another visit coming up in October with my endocrinologist so I am sure she will check my hormonal levels again anyway. 

As with mammograms, I see hot flashes as a rite of passage into being a more physical transgender woman. I say physical because I feel mentally I have always been trans. Plus, all of this temperature issue leads me to point out the changes I went through in relating to the weather as I hormonally transitioned. I found I became colder quicker and stayed that way.

I also recognize though that hot flashes could be an issue with my HRT meds. An issue I will have to discuss with my Doc if it happens again.

A Real Loss

 The passing of "Ruth Bader Ginsburg" creates a massive hole in the US Supreme Court. One I fear will be impossible to fill with a qualified candidate. Here was one of the news releases: "Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, the demure firebrand who in her 80s became a legal, cultural and feminist icon, died Friday. The Supreme Court announced her death, saying the cause was complications from metastatic cancer of the pancreas."

Seemingly, before the body even had a chance to cool off, "Moscow Mitch" McConnell in the Senate was starting the fight to replace Justice Ginsburg who had also voted to help gender causes. 

For all of you who didn't vote for Hillary and identify as transgender and/or crossdresser, your desire to have all of your gender rights taken away could become a reality.

In the meantime, Rest in Power Justice Ginsburg. You will be missed.