Being the somewhat paranoiac person I am, often I wonder if I was in the acting business, would I be forever wondering where my next job would be coming from. I wonder also if transgender actress Nicole Maines can land another starring role after her current gig as "Supergirl" comes to a close.
Seemingly, like a bunch of screaming spoiled children, the state of Ohio has given up and will not fight the court case which allows transgender women and men to change their birth certificates.
This comes from Cincinnati.Com :
"The Ohio Department of Health will not appeal a December court decision requiring the agency to accept requests from transgender people to reflect a gender different from the one assigned at birth, according to a Thursday court filing. The department is working on a process for people to request the change and expects to have it in place by June 1."
Not surprisingly plaintiffs in the case said they ran into legal and professional problems because the gender on their birth certificate didn’t match their driver's license and other government documents. One was physically threatened after her mismatched birth certificate outed her as transgender at work.
Ohio and Tennessee were the last two states to deny transgender citizens the right to change their birth certificates to reflect their authentic gender.
Also, since Ohio uses the gender on your birth certificate to determine the gender on your death certificate, this is a big deal.
Out of all the Mtf gender transitions I have encountered over the years, one of the nicest and most successful transgender women I have known (through Facebook) has to be Wisconsin's Melonee Malone. I have featured her before here in Cyrsti's Condo and after her most recent picture, I thought I would do it again.
After my shower yesterday, I wiped the fog off the mirror and had the courage to look at myself. In the past even looking at myself has set off waves of worsening gender dysphoria which I will explain later.
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| Pre Covid Summer Picture |
As always, my mass of hair was it's ultra wavy, curly post washed self. No surprise, I have never had a problem looking at my hair. Along the way too, I glanced at my face. I saw a curiously androgynous face staring back at me. No real surprise there either. I have decided it is mine for better or for worse to live with for the remainder of my life.
For the first time yesterday, I was brave enough to look down from my face to my breasts. Since my maternal grandmother passed away from breast cancer years ago, I am considered to be at risk for the disease and have been told to self examine for any strange soreness or lumps. Which I have done.
As I had the courage to do a chest scan of my own, it occurred to me how rare it has been for me to do one. In the past, the process has caused my gender dysphoria to flare up when I focused on a relatively small set of breasts overcome by a large set of shoulders. Finally yesterday, my slightly expansive breasts were able to hold their own with my undeveloped old male shoulders and torso. I even discovered one of my breasts was larger than the other which is common in many cis women.
To make a long story short, my recent discovery process has led me to look ahead even more to when the weather warms up (and stays) and I can wear my summer fashions.
Unfortunately, too many transgender women are very lonely and can't find any stable social contacts. Either with women or men. Back in the day, I went through the same dilemma. At the same time I was going out to venues to seemingly entertain myself, I searched many on line dating sites at the same time. Needless to say, I sifted through a lot of trash until my partner Liz found me. What I mean is, she answered my ad on the Zoosk dating site. That was nearly nine years ago and we have been together ever since. Perhaps I was fortunate in that I was fairly unsure about where my sexuality would take me, so I could double my search to both men and women.
Back then, there weren't any real dating sites which dealt with transgender women and men. Most all were fetish sites mostly populated by male admirers of trans women. I had the misfortune in my dealings with admirers. One corned me in a hallway once during a party and one wanted to just wear my panties. I won't even mention the number of times I was stood up or "ghosted" by men.
Today though, a new transgender dating site has been announced which promises to be different. I don't like the name but here is the info:
TransFable, a brand-new dating app for men and transgender women, is set to take over the digital world of transgender dating this year. The first transgender dating app of its kind, TransFable offers users a safe and secure platform to meet their match, where transgender women can connect with genuine men for free.
TransFable stands apart from its competitors as a transgender dating app specifically designed for those seeking serious and genuine relationships. It can be a challenge for both men and transgender women to meaningfully connect with one another and TransFable offers the perfect place to do so. Indeed, if you are looking for a hook-up, this is probably not the transgender dating app for you. However, if you are serious about finding a genuine match, then TransFable is the transgender dating app to be on in 2021.
All users on TransFable are manually verified by a human so you can be rest assured that you will not match with any bots or fake profiles.
Perhaps you have heard (no pun intended) musician Ezra Furman has announced she is a transgender woman and Mom.
More from "Page Six":
“I wanted to share with everyone that I am a trans woman, and also that I am a mom and have been for a while now (like 2+ years),” she wrote. “About being a trans woman: for my own reasons I have been hesitant to use these words, especially the ‘woman’ word. I have often described myself as non-binary, which maybe is still true (I’m just gonna sit with that question for the moment).”
Furman, 34, explained that coming to terms with her identity was “complex” but added it’s “complex to be any sort of woman.”
Being Bi-Polar myself, I have become used to the ups and downs of my mood reactions to life. Quite possibly, before I was diagnosed with my own version of being "Bi" I did my share of hiding behind a dress to take my mind off the daily stresses of life.
Of course, I could argue the simplest stresses came from trying my best to live up to male standards as I lived my life.
The older I got and after I was honorably discharged from the Army, the worse my mental issues became. On occasion it was a struggle to just to get out of bed on certain days. Along the way, I finally resorted to therapy. The first guy I went to was a total waste of time as he didn't seem to want to discuss my fondness for cross dressing at all. I solved the problem by going to one of the very few therapists in Ohio at the time who had any knowledge at all of cross dressers as this was way before the transgender idea was even discussed.
Ironically, it was her who diagnosed me being bi-polar and was able to separate it from my gender dysphoria. She was blunt (and truthful) when she said my desire to be a girl would never go away. For the first time in my life I felt a glimmer of hope.
Even still, it was difficult for me to separate my two main issues and continue to live a reasonably successful life as a cross dresser. Meaning I was a woman cross dressing as a man. Years later when I needed to take advantage of the Veterans Administration health care, I was paranoid if I would find a therapist who would understand my complex problem. Fortunately I did and amazingly nearly ten years later she still is my VA therapist.
She was the "gold standard" for me as she signed off on helping me begin my hormone replacement therapy all the way to providing me documentation to facilitate changing my legal gender markers in the civilian world plus within the VA itself. I consider her as one of my top three people who assisted in my early Mtf gender transition.
These days, while I still have the occasional valleys in my life to climb out of, my medications keep my moods relatively stable and I am able to understand when gender dysphoria enters my life. More so than my Bi-Polar condition.
Most importantly, I have done away with my self harm issues. It took a while to separate all of this out but thanks to a ton of help I have learned to live the peaks and valleys.
This quote from an unknown person definitely could have come from a transgender person:
"Your perception of me, is a reflection of you. My reaction to you is an awareness of me.”
I found it on a blog called "Pointless Overthinking"
It occurred to me recently, after my posts on going to the dentist, just what did all of that really have to do with a blog supposedly dedicated to a transgender lifestyle.
Then I thought perhaps I was approaching it all wrong. Here is one example. As bad as the anticipated discomfort and suffering associated with a long put off dental appointment was, the bigger fear came when I thought of the amount of gender confusion I had absorbed in the past. Would I have have to put up with being mis-gendered?
Because, as many transgender women and men know, a visit to a medical facility can bring on embarrassing mis-gendering situations. Even to the point of your "dead name" being screamed out in a crowded waiting room.
Many times too, transgender people are forced to educate their medical care givers who have never encountered another trans person. All the way to being refused treatment altogether.
Depending upon where you live, the situation is getting somewhat better, even in Ohio a few major hospitals and other organizations are stepping up their game as they offer and interact with transgender individuals.
Plus, even webinars are popping up here and there focusing on LGBT elderly adults. In fact, I am attending one in May.
Now if I could go back and erase all my unpleasant medical experiences from my past, I would experience less anticipatory problems.
Summer Image Dining Out by JJ Hart. Last night, my wife Liz and I went out to eat with her son as an early Christmas gift to him. We went...
