Running as Fast as I Could

 

Photo from the Jessie 
Hart Collection

During my life I confess I have never been a fan of running. In fact, the only time I had to run to any extent was when I was in the Army and when I played football. At least that was the physical version of running and not the mental one. 

On the other hand, I became quite good at the mental part of running. It all started out in my cross dressing or transvestite years when I was struggling initially with my gender issues. To help my overall mental condition I would mentally run away to hopefully dress in my small wardrobe of feminine clothes and makeup. I would even try to comb my short hair in a girlish bob to see how I looked. At the time, I was lucky if the results of dressing in front of the mirror lasted more than two or three days. At that point, my boring, unwanted male life would enter back in and normally some sort of depression would set in. 

Fast forward to my time in the military and beyond when my running became more intense. In addition to the physical running in the Army, I used my recollections of fond moments when I was dressed in mini-skirts and heels to get me by mentally. I grew quite good at day dreaming of being a woman while I was in the middle of a very male activity. I wish now that I could reclaim just a small portion of the time I wasted.

When I was honorably discharged from the military, the real running started. To seemingly circumvent my transgender desire to be a woman, I started to move my small family to new jobs and locations around the country. Shortly after we were married, I picked up and moved my second wife and I to the suburbs of New York City from our native Ohio. Only to move back again several years later. By that time, I had honed my skills as a restaurant manager and found I was in some sort of a demand and was able to switch jobs often. Most were not lateral moves but I found the move and challenge of a new job opportunity temporarily put my gender dysphoria on the back burner. For a while at least, I was able to concentrate on living nearly full time as a male. Even though my job was nearly the only thing keeping me there. 

The problem was, everytime we moved and began to get settled, my running urge would set back in. I finally learned with the help of therapy, I was trying to out run my feminine desires. In the end run, the only thing that worked was  when I stopped moving around and faced my issues. Again I wish I had back all the energy I lost trying to live a life between the two main binary genders. Eventually I did settle and began to learn a life I found I needed to survive in this world. In essence I became "Man enough to be a Woman."  At that point my running stopped, my mental health improved and life became worth living again. 

Running with a Different Pack

 

Image from Omar Lopez
on UnSplash

Back when I was living as a faux macho male, I used to be a fan of the "Big Dog" stores and was fond of using certain terminology they used to harass other store managers who were in competition with me.  Such as "If you can't run with the Big Dogs, Don't jump off the Porch. Even my second wife made sure she had given me several of their shirts. 

Little did I know later on in life, my idea of running with the big dogs would radically change. Once I started to seriously undertake a male to female gender transition did I understand who the big dogs really were. The true alpha or "big dogs" were really women. Quite quickly I realized women had to carry the weight of society on their shoulders. Women led a multi-layered complex existence which often included the burdens of raising children and holding a full time job at the same time.

To survive, I needed to learn quickly how to be accepted and be invited into cis-women circles where I found how different communication was between the two primary binary genders. It was no wonder men and women didn't understand each other. On occasion I was even asked to explain my idea of why a couple wasn't getting along. I was flattered but was at the same time a little scared I would give the wrong advice and set their relationship back even further. At the same time, I am sure none of the other women in the circle realized how much I was learning from them. After all, I was being given an once in a lifetime chance to play in the girl's sandbox. All I had to battle then was an extreme case of "impostor's syndrome" which kept questioning my right to be there in the sandbox at all.

I was fortunate also in that the circle of women I was included with were very strong individuals. What better way to learn my way in an exciting yet scary new world was there. Being able to run with the new circle increased my gender transition timetable immensely and made the whole dream of living as a fulltime transgender woman a distinct reality. I had assembled the role models I needed to move forward when they all accepted me.

The final problem I needed to face was living up to all their expectations of me. Or, what was the new person I was just becoming turn out to be. Could I be the person they expected me to be when I was still learning so much. The professional football game I was invited to was a prime example. Here I was, with my ill fitting wig and all trying to enjoy such a different experience. I had been to many games as a man but never as my true authentic self. Thanks to Kim for the wonderful time!

The final chapter in "Running with a Different Pack" has yet to be written. I still will have the final chapter to write. Hopefully it will be another smooth one once as I face the very real possibility of assisted living later in life.

Singing a Different Tune

During the search for my authentic gender over the years, I relied on music to lift me from my bouts of Bi-Polar based depression. 

Once I reached college age, I was drawn to music as a way of trying to support myself as a radio disc jockey. In fact, I was able to work my way partially through college working at a local small radio station. I made a small amount of money while at the same time furthered my love of music. Along the way I was fortunate in that even though I was a rock and roller at heart, I was also able to work in various other music formats such as free form (or progressive rock) as well as country music. Bottom line was I grew accustomed to appreciating music as a whole and just not a specific medium.  I can't tell you how many times I tried to mimic "Reba McIntire" the country singer. 

Along the way, early in my career I happened along certain songs such as Lola by the Kink's in 1970. It was interesting when I had to field call in's asking was the song really about a woman who was a man. I also discovered certain music which could soothe my blues temporarily. Which led me to an appreciation of the Jazz/Blues form of entertainment. So much so, with the help of a large music library which went back to the post WWII days, I was able to produce and program my own Blues Show on the American Forces Network station in Stuttgart, Germany. It was during this period of my life I was able to over enjoy the effects of powerful German Beer. Even though the extra alcohol was not good for my overall depression, it turned out to be a primary source of socialization for myself and friends I made along the way. This extreme alcoholic socialization finally led me to confessing my Halloween feminine "costume" was much more than an innocent past time as I was also a transvestite. It was the first time in my life I had told the truth to others that I was actually singing a different tune.

Destiny was behind me at the time because my admission could have been quite harmful to my military "career" which still had a year to go.  No one I told seemed to care and no one held it against me. As they could have. I was able to concentrate on my two main pleasures, playing music and reading "Dr. Strange" comic books in my spare time. I have said many times, I enjoyed my easy military time the best I could. Tough duty! Right?

After I was honorably discharged back to civilian life, I resumed my commercial radio career working for several small and medium sized radio stations in the Dayton, Ohio area. Music remained a huge part of my life even though my gender dysphoria ran a close second. I was very much mostly out of control until my daughter came along and I decided not to make the move I had planned to make to Texas to continue my career. In essence, I needed to take a more serious look at life. All along life was telling me two things. One of which I loved music and the second was I wasn't sure what gender I should be. Was I destined to be known as one of the newer terms of the time...was I transgender. 

As much as I loved my career, I was having a difficult time at making a living for my new family and decided to give it all up and try my hand at the rapidly expanding restaurant business. Sadly as I did well at running restaurants, my reliance on music to soothe my soul diminished.  I began to rely on my prescribed depression medications to control my Bi-Polar mood issues and my life stabilized. At the same time, my reliance on alcohol went away also. I need to stress, I followed my therapist's orders. 

I still remember how fondly I embraced my musical interests and look back at the time as the only job in my life  when I ever truly enjoyed my work. However, when I emerged singing a different tune, I was eventually able to live a happier more satisfying life.

Happy Mother's Day

At the least, Mother's Day is a bittersweet occasion for many transgender women. Tragically we have the many trans women who have been ostracized from their families for wanting to live a life reflecting our authentic selves.

On the other hand we have the rare example of those transgender women who were able to walk the gender path to the other side and be accepted as a Mother figure. The misconception continues to be females who give birth are automatically mothers in the strictest sense. Some females have the ability to be a Mother, other's don't. In fact I have a dear trans friend who is a prime example. 

Over the years of her life when her two sons were young, she ended up being the prime nurturer to her two boys. She fed them and healed them when they were sick as well as making sure they made it to all the extra curricular activities they needed to go to. In other words, she was the prime parent while the "womb donor" disappeared. Now it is obvious she raised two accepting young men who mostly accept her gender preferences. 

In my case, I often document the disagreements I suffered with my Mom. We were much the same as I resembled her in many ways as well as we both had the same fiery temperaments which resulted in never being satisfied with our state in the world. Then there was the infamous evening when I finally came out to her as her transgender daughter, only to be roundly rejected. Her response was paying for strict psychiatric care. From that moment forward, I did resent her for years until I did come to a personal understanding she was only a product of her generation and was doing the best she could in the middle of changing times. The end result was when I decided to change my legal name, I decided to use her first name as my middle one. I was honoring her for putting up with all the mis-carriages and even still births she endured before I finally came around. Even though it was difficult to forgive our differences on my gender disposition, I knew she loved me deeply in her own way. She has long since passed away. 

On this Mother's Day, I hope you have some sort of acceptance from your family. Being separated is a tragedy too many of us transgender women have to live through.        

I Made It

Liz on Left, Daughter on Right
from the Jessie Hart
Collection

Yesterday I received a special small box in the mail. Before I opened it, I truly had no idea what it could be except for the obvious...it came from my daughter in a relatively nearby suburb of Dayton, Ohio.

The only thing I thought the box could contain was something involved with the rapidly approaching Mothers Day celebration. It turned out my instincts or intuition was right and the box contained a really special coffee mug which said it was from my "favorite" child which was a standing joke between the two of us because she is my only child. Even though I only had one child, I could never have asked for a better one. 

Growing up, she had the benefit of having a village helping to raise her since her Mother and I divorced when she was quite young. She was accepted whole heartedly as part of our lives by my second wife as her strong willed Step-Mother so essentially my daughter had two accepting extended families. Plus when I moved around the country for new job opportunities, she was exposed to life in other places. I guess all of it worked to perfection because after my daughter graduated from college, she settled down with my Son-in-Law to raise my three grandkids. We enjoyed a good relationship until the potential problem of coming out as transgender raised it's potentially problematic head. 

I will forever remember the day I came out to her during a special breakfast we scheduled. Her reaction was? Why was she the last to know! From that point forward my child became my biggest supporter and she did things like schedule me an appointment at her beauty salon when my hair became long enough to style. Through it all, we worked together to get over my second wife's death, legally change my name to one which honored members of my family and other key moments in my life at that time.

The one thing which I never asked for was to be referred to as Mother in any way shape or form. So, in our case Mother's Day became "Parent's Day" and that was all good with me. Yesterday "Parent's Day" forever changed between us. Included with my coffee mug was a special hand written card. Unbelievably, the card said Happy Mother's Day in her hand writing. I immediately teared up. After all these years I had made it to a goal I never dreamed of achieving. Being called Mother by my daughter. I can only guess why the big change happened now. Perhaps it was because the last time I saw her we had a chance to sit down and just talk between ourselves, Liz and my transgender grand child.  Maybe my femininity showed through enough she decided it was time to do away with "parenthood" and move up to "motherhood".

All I can say is I am again beginning to cry tears of joy as I write this post. I am so fortunate to  have the family I have now. Especially since I have moved up to "Mom" . It took me nearly fifty years after I was present for the birth of my daughter to make it.  

Being the Transgender Woman you Desire

 

Image from the Jessie
Hart Collection

Recently I went with my wife Liz to her latest Doctor's appointment. As I waited I was able to see and judge several genetic or cis women.  It is a past- time I have developed over my many years studying all sorts of women as I transitioned. Along the way I so envied women for many different reasons.

Before I transitioned and began to live full time in a feminine world, I over simplified what I observed from other women. In other words, I was seeing the totality in what I observed in the woman's world. Not the overall layers which went on behind the scenes.  An example was when I noticed a younger woman this morning with a head of curly beautiful hair. Since now I have an idea of all the necessary steps a woman with long hair has to go through for maintenance, I immediately had more respect for the woman I noticed. 

Over the years of changing my gender presentation, hair was not the only part of a woman I noticed. Of course there were the individual parts of a body to consider. When they were all brought together I discovered a new found respect for classic beauty in a woman. On the other hand, I also learned of another very important fact. Even though most women aren't blessed with so called classic beauty traits, just as many have a few of the traits to concentrate on. A very important fact to consider if you are a novice transgender woman or a cross dresser. While it is an exceedingly difficult job to cover years of testosterone poisoning, it is possible to work with any positives you may possess. Legs are a good example. Many male type people are blessed with good strong feminine looking legs which are a good starting point to building the woman you desire. The problem of course is when those same legs are connected to a thick torso and broad shoulders. The real work begins when you have to start hiding the upper part of your body. Before I lost many pounds, I resorted to loose flowing tops and I was still able to show off my legs in shorter jeans skirts. In essence what I was trying to do was direct the eyes down to my legs and away from my torso when anyone noticed me. 

I was also fortunate  in that I had always admired a more statuesque woman so I wasn't (and not)  impressed with the overly thin predominance of thin female models. So I didn't have that to worry about as I went about becoming a semblance of the woman I wanted to be. 

It turned out I was putting way too much worry and thought into the woman I was becoming. My inner girl already had the process worked out for me. Now I see other women for what they are and not what I want to be. I have learned to do the best I could with the cards which were dealt to me. Being the woman you are is a matter of letting her live. I know the process is so difficult for so many of us and I am far from putting myself up on any sort of pedestal. I have learned my lesson when my fall from feminine grace hurt me deeply. All I am trying to say is when anyone asks me when did I know I was transgender, I have always been. She was just waiting to be let out and be the woman she always desired.  

Tennis Anyone?

Image Courtesy Renith R
on UnSplash

 Years ago I felt the need to attempt to copy many of the most popular feminine mannerisms and/or activities I could find. This is a fun post describing one of those activities I was able to indirectly join in on. 

At the restaurant I was managing at the time during lunch we had several women come in for a late lunch and a cocktail (or two). During the warmer times of the year they were avid tennis fans and came in with their very sexy short tennis outfits. Of course, at the time, I wanted my own tennis outfit and be able to go out and show off my legs. 

What happened was, by total accident, I was able to piece together a passable (I thought) tennis outfit with everything in white excluding a tennis racket I didn't have or want. Since I had never really tried to play tennis at all. What happened was I found an all white, lite weight mini dress as a starter point. With it I was able to find all white tennis shoes which were very inexpensive in my size as well as a tunic of sorts (all white) to cover my arms which had tons of black hair I couldn't shave off back in those days because on certain days I needed to wear short sleeves for the kitchen work I had to do.  Hairy arms would not just work with the image I wanted to portray.  I even had to rely on trying to camouflage my hairy legs by wearing two pairs of panty hose as well as adding my own guilty pleasure, a pair of white thigh high stockings.  Because during this time I had agreed with my wife not to shave my legs during the summer. 

Of course, once I had my outfit together, I needed to find a venue to test it out. I finally decided on a nearby mall where I could test my new tennis look with my shoulder length blond wig. Once I got dressed and put my makeup on, naturally the mirror told me I was ready to go and I snuck out the back door while my wife was at work. When I was in the car and out of my hometown,  I began to breathe and enjoy the air on my legs and the drive to a faux tennis match. 

In no time I arrived at the mall, my anxiety over being "discovered" or even laughed at grew stronger as I wondered how I would be accepted. Little did I know during the time I was at the mall, it was nearly deserted. So I was stuck with "presenting" my new tennis look to a few old men who were there to walk around and get some exercise. Naturally, I was noticed and I tried to make it seem I was just in a hurry to pick something up and get back to my tennis. All in all the strategy seemed to work because outside of being stared at (as any woman would) nothing out of the ordinary happened. In no time at all I was back in my car heading home, loving my tennis experience.

These days with all the advanced conditioning available to athletic women, many appear to have developed more muscles with an resultant androgynous look, so a tennis outfit may not be as much fun. One way or another back then, I was able to check the whole experience off my bucket list of womanly things to do as a transgender woman. 

I Failed my Gender Assignment

Vintage Edition of
Transvestia Magazine

 My initial gender assignment was very simple. I was born a boy, now be one. The problem quickly became I was failing the assignment and I just didn't want to be the gender which was assigned to me. 

Instead of following all of the basic rules I was given about being male, sooner more than later I began to realize something was wrong and essentially I had no choice but to follow the rules. As they were presented to me. My parents were members of the "greatest generation" who survived a great economic depression and a world war.  They were well versed in taking what was presented to them and making the best of it. The same was expected from me. I had no way out when it came to my gender issues. I was alone with my problems. 

In response I did the best I could. I participated in sports and did my best to present myself as a so called "normal" boy. While I was doing it, I also was doing my best to use my limited funds to accumulate a small collection of makeup and feminine clothes which freed me up from helping myself to my Mom's belongings. Of course at the time I was outgrowing my Mom in all the size categories, so it was good to finally go out on my own when I could. I guess you could say, this was the first time I actually passed my gender assignment, in my chosen dream world of being feminine. 

At the same time, I learned the male so called attributes of being emotionally distant and keeping my feelings bottled up. I would carry those with me until I was able to more completely transition my gender.  I was able to not fail this part of my gender exam. In many ways, in order to receive a pass or fail grade in either gender, I needed to wait for the world to catch up to me. Since I was a part of the pre-internet generation, information of any kind was very limited. In fact, I was completely isolated in my closet until I learned of "Virginia Prince" and her "Transvestia" publication. I was so relieved when I found I wasn't alone in the world and there were other so called transvestites in the world and some even met for mixers in cities close enough for me to attend. 

Once I did attend, my path to a different gender assignment became clearer. I was able to interact with others dealing with the same gender issues I was dealing with  and come up with a new plan for my life. It was about this time the transgender word became popular and I strongly believed it fit me. It was becoming increasingly evident I needed to take another gender exam. I was failing my initial male assignment and wanted so badly to attempt taking the new exciting feminine assignment or exam. Before I was able to, it turned out I had a lot more studying to do. Being a woman was a lot more than just looking like one. I can compare the process to higher education. Just being able to blend and mix in with the public as a transgender woman was similar to having an undergraduate degree. Then being able to communicate with other women one on one was the equivalent to obtaining a masters degree and so on.

Finally I accepted the fact I had failed my male assignment completely. No matter how hard I tried to succeed as a man, the whole process seemed to be an empty pursuit. Even though I was relatively successful in obtaining male privilege, I found I didn't want it. On the other hand, attempting to go as far as I could with a feminine gender assignment proved to be the answer to all my gender issues. Why? Primarily because the whole process felt so natural to me.

   

A Need or a Want

 

Image Courtesy Alexis Fauvet
on UnSplash

Beware, this post deals with semantics. Perhaps I should have put a "TW" or trigger warning in first. Semantics are difficult to deal with due to tendencies to paint problems or solutions with a broad stroke of a brush.

What I am getting to, is the question of being transgender  more of a need or a want. I have a tendency to think it is a need more than a want. Why? Because to me a want is more of a choice which anti transgender bigots who are trying to take our rights away often try to condemn us with. Down deep we transgender women and trans men know we never had a choice. Our lives were always destined to go down an often long and bumpy gender path to freedom. In other words, destiny equaled more of a need than a want.

As I look at the process, I can compare it also to the need to eat. Naturally we all have to eat to survive and that is exactly how I feel about my gender journey. The more I progressed down the path, the more I needed to keep going. Long ago in my journey did I stop thinking I was cross dressing simply because I wanted to. I learned the hard way I was so much more than a man who had an extra "hobby" which wasn't golf. Instead I was obsessed with the latest women's fashions and imagining how I would look in them. More and more, even though my wife knew I was a transvestite, I snuck away in our marriage. Essentially I was cheating on her with another woman who happened to be me. I always tried to live an honest life so lying to the one person I loved the most tore me up.

Through all the cheating I was doing, I never gave much thought to what was going on. Most certainly the whole gender process I was in was more of a need than a want. I needed to keep pursuing a feminine lifestyle which I had seen other transgender women around me try to do and were successful at doing. Watching and learning from them helped me to live a new life which was slowly but surely taking over my old unwanted male existence. No matter how I tried to tell myself I didn't want to be a fulltime woman and even with all the purges I went through, I kept coming back to the same place. I needed to live a feminine lifestyle.   

The rest of the story I write about often. My second wife tragically passed away from a major heart attack, leaving me so alone in the world. I was able to fall back to the other woman in my life who I needed also. My feminine strong soul took over and with the key help of several dear friends, I was able to undertake my key transition into a lifestyle I had only dreamed of. From there I never looked back. Secure in the fact my gender desires were more of a need than a want.