Monday 7 December 2015

Who? What?

The presentations and seminars I have done or been involved with have had the side effect of helping me learn more about myself and what it means to be trans. That's the great thing about working with many different people, you can't help but learn something new.

One thing I have learned has really resonated with me. The idea that many trans people have a difficulty developing a sense of self. When I first stumbled across that I raised an eyebrow and thought "oh yeah? Hmm, that makes sense" and carried on. Since then though it has filled in the gap for, what seems to be as of now, an endless stream of confused feelings. A hole in understanding that has become a part of me just as much as the feelings of confusion.

I first started wondering if that was anything to do with why people made so little sense to me. I would wonder why or how people could feel so attached to things, or so willing to put all their eggs in one basket, so to speak. I don't mean that negatively, I mean how people decide, "yep, I'm a veterinarian" or "I'm a cat-lady" or whatever.

Then I realized, I think, that's not it at all. People don't "decide" these things, they just are. They just simply know who they are, what they like, what they want.... they know themselves. A feeling that is utterly foreign to me.

Living that way, not knowing who you are and not knowing that you don't know yourself or why you don't know yourself, is draining. People tend to get aggressively defensive when their lack of self awareness gets challenged, teenagers in particular and I imagine I was no different back then. What eventually happened to me though is I became a passive observer of my own life. Fighting only gets you so far when your opponent is a shadow in a lightless room, when the path out feels more like a bottomless pit down. I didn't know the person living the life I was fastened to any more than I know any of you.

But here's the thing, I didn't realize any of that until recently when I came across that tidbit of information. For the entire time I thought I did know myself, I hated myself but I knew who I was. I guess the truth is I knew who I wasn't, I wasn't someone I cared for much at all.

It has been difficult parsing this out from the other feelings that trans people have to deal with. Being a developing teen/person we are all searching for some sense of self, and it's a struggle, for everyone. It's a part of life that is unavoidable and can often turn ugly, for anyone. Take a moment to thing of the trans person though. When people are discovering things about themselves like, where they want to go in life, what drives their passions, progressive or conservative, and some deal with liking boys or girls, the trans person is starting at "Am *I* a boy or girl?". A six word question to yourself that shatters the world around you like few other questions will. For me, it led me down a path of questioning everything about life. How can people know what they are talking about when it seems none of them are capable of taking the most basic question one can ask oneself, seriously?  But I suppose that's another story.

So it seems what I am left with now is the task of making sense of my feelings compared to my fears. I guess as a way of keeping myself sane I passed off most of my unanswered questions as unanswerable questions or I went with the assumption that everyone has these questions and I'm simply the idiot who hasn't figured them out yet, like I was 10 years late hitting puberty. I also get a minor (an these days welcome) hit to my ego. Every now and then I'll pause and think "Wait, I actually don't know what I'm feeling here.". It makes me a little sad, sad that I've gone so long ignoring me, but then I pick my head up and remember this is part of the process.

I'm not quite sure what my point is to this post. I think I mainly want to say, to trans people, the fog of confusion is not your fault. When the rules everyone else seems to agree on just do not apply to you, there is little you can do to avoid having the world around you make little sense. To cis people, this is why trans health care and training is so important. When you give people the power of knowledge, it can be transformative.

Sunday 8 November 2015

Solidarity

Alright, one thing that has been keeping me from writing is I find myself wanting to talk off topic from what this blog has been about. That being said, many of the opinions or topics I want to write about come directly from being transgender in one way or another. I'm also not sure what my point is, I just wanna put this out there I guess.

As I just suggested, and have said before, being transgender has shaped much of who I am. I think it is impossible to imagine it otherwise. It has brought me a lot of depression, half of a life time of survival mentality, lost opportunities, friendships, etc. Most of which I have written about.

 I have mentioned some of the good things it has brought me, confidence and a better understanding of myself (or at least a heightened desire to understand myself).

Those things are more personal, more about me, and things that I can say with some certainty because I am the only master of that topic. There are things though that are not so personal. Being transgender has heavily influenced how I see the world, how could it not? The fact that I'm a hermit is pretty much entirely to do with being transgender.

It has brought me a point of view that I feel like is worth sharing, especially with the world being as crazy as it currently is. The one sentence description is; It has made me see how we are all the same.

Being transgender made me feel like I was outside of everyone else. The world was divided into two groups, everyone that wasn't me, and me. They all felt, thought, acted, believed, one way, and I did mine. At first, it made me arrogant, then it made me sad, and then it made me detach myself from the world and recoil into my mind. One thing it did along the way was let me start to observe people in a less critical way. Don't ask how my mind came up with these conclusions but let me try to explain the steps.

 After getting over my depression, and one of the ways how I did get over it, I started to see how I may feel very different from everyone else, but I'm still a good person. I had evidence of this, I may have had the desires and feelings I did but I also didn't want to hurt people. I didn't think people should hurt others, I was empathic and sympathetic, and the way I felt when I seen wrong happening seemed to resonate with how others around me felt about it. This is the part that I'm not sure how my brain went there, I flipped this around and started to assume others felt the same way. Everyone had their problems, worries, etc and that may make them seem one way but ultimately they are only doing the best they can as they know how.

Armed with that hypothesis, for lack of better terms, I started to watch people and get to know their true selves. It turned me into, what I think anyway, a great communicator, especially in person. I think the people that like me, actually like this part of me when you boil it down. I only have "real" conversations. When I get into your car you know I won't be talking to you about whatever is going on on "Jersey Shore" (that is a tv show right?). More importantly what people feel is a total lack of judgement. And if I express a judgement it almost always come with a litany of how I may be wrong.

Honestly I felt like someone stepping away from a particularly oppressive religion and into the real world. Sure you're amazed at all the new amazing things at first but eventually you look back, and you can't help but feel sorry about just how much everyone is missing. In much the same way I feel like I am seeing what everyone is missing. What that is, is we are all the same.

Let me tell you something about us, humans. Every one of us is scared, and so we should be. Everyone's life is a constant struggle, that is what life is. At any given moment, something could happen that either totally changes your life or at worst, ends it. It's a scary world out there, and it's not that forgiving. Everything from going to work to picking up groceries to politics is an attempt to lessen the harshness of that world.

People don't see it that way though, and it's sad. It is the thing they are missing, they see others attempts at getting through life as somehow an attempt at limiting theirs. It doesn't matter if it is a young woman doing porn for money or Isis fighting for what they believe in, we are all fundamentally doing the same thing. If people could only realize that everyone is in the same situation, and have some sympathy that no one has any answers, I think the world could possibly start to stop killing each other.

And not just killing each other, but what about the pointless bickering we all do? Or these stupid fights we have about if a certain group of people can do a certain thing be them legal fights, like gay marriage or social stigma like the bdsm community. The people against the things others do, in my experience, all believe that these people are causing great harm to some "fabric of humanity". What they don't realized is the fabric of humanity is woven with the threads from all walks of life. All experiences are equally valid.

We even bring this to our homes. I have heard from countless men and women who are in a relationship complaining about their partners. Why? They may never break up, or take way too long to do so but all the while they are judging their partner for what they do to get through their life. Which almost always leads to arguments. Co-workers, other drivers on the road, the stranger that uses drugs... you all know what I'm talking about.

Ultimately it comes to an understanding that we would be a better world if we could all either help others with their struggles, or at the very least not impose your idea of the world on those who don't feel the same way. No one has a magic key to life, and even if they did, no one knows where the keyhole is anyway and we'll never find it until we stop yelling and screaming at each other.

So maybe I'm not alone in feeling this way. I'm thinking maybe it's something forced upon all or most transgender people, if you can take the time to think about. Maybe I'm wrong, but if I'm right this is a part of life that the trans community has to offer the rest of the world. Coming from one of the most fringe and stigmatized parts of society it is a powerful thing to look at the world and say "I forgive you. I forgive you because I know you're struggling, so am I." and to teach them this understanding that ironically, society has it's fair share in creating.

Friday 6 November 2015

Stretching

Things have really changed since I last wrote something. So much so that I don't know where to start, and has been one of the reasons I have been away. Let's start there then. What I have been doing lately is living life more, that's probably my biggest change. I still think all the time but I don't dwell like I used too. As a result, I feel grounded, I feel more like I know where I should be.

All of that together, feeling grounded and more calm while I experience life has.... humbled me, for a lack of a better phrase. I feel now like what I have to say should be left to myself, otherwise I ruffle feathers and I'm also not into that so much anymore either. I've stepped away from the soap-box it seems.

I have even stepped away from the activism. Not only did I stop for ultimately selfish reasons, I did it to be selfish. I'm not sure how I got there, perhaps after enough therapy, but one day it just hit me, I had to drop all of the activism and take care of me. I was in a bit of a hard spot, mostly financially but very much so emotionally. As I did my rounds I got the most unexpected response from each person I apologetically bowed out of mutual plans with. Each one said something of the sort of "Good, I'm glad you're taking care of yourself" calling me either strong or brave for doing as such.

It didn't feel like it then, but now it is on my top 10 list of best things I've done in my life. I have discovered where "base Rebecca" is. By that I mean, reasons aside, I have found what makes me comfortable, what makes me happy or depressed, what it is that makes me pleased with life in general. Also, I have come to terms with some of my limitations, or at least the ones I've noticed.

It is something I never thought I'd find. Peace of mind of who I am. It even feels strange typing that sentence. That is the way to describe it though. Far more often I find myself thinking of ways, or currently in the middle of, just plain ol' enjoying the fuck out of my newly acquainted femininity than I do wallowing in turmoil over who I am, or what I am. I feel like celebrating on a regular basis who I have become.

and I do often ;)

Now for a little humility, who I have become is roughly the equivalent of a well thought teenager. I still don't know shit about shit but at least I'm wise enough to pay attention to what's going on. That being said, that excites me. I have the chance to learn myself again, but this time I get to listen to the real me. It's the part of me that yearns for my teen years to actually be back, in order to live life as a young girl. This is not that, and it's not better than that, but after finding my peace of mind I'm now able to see just how much potential for joy and excitement there is in my time ahead.

I find myself oddly feeling like I have no business writing these posts now though. That is not to say I am finished. It is just that after finding out how little I really know about myself I don't feel like it's my place to throw my opinion at people. Which is why this is going to be so short. I will write more, it's an outlet that I enjoy, I guess I've been attacked by an ebola-like version of writers block.

What has prompted this post is an opportunity I was given. I've been asked to join 3 others in a presentation to what seems likely to be several members of my local government. It started me thinking about things I haven't thought about for quite some time now and that led me here. What I've been thinking about is what to say. If you were given some time to promote the acceptance and wellbeing of transgender people, what would you say? There seems too much that they should hear, but what is it that they got to hear that will finally make this all make sense to them? As of right now, I'm at a loss. I'm afraid our presentation will degenerate to a listing of things trans people legitimately need but will sound like nothing more than another group making demands.

If I figure anything out, I'll let you know.

Well, a short one, getting my typing fingers back.



Saturday 2 May 2015

School's in

So, over the last month I have been doing a lot of presentations with our local "Trans Needs Committee" of which I am a member. The odd thing about this month is that the majority of the presentations I have given were to students, ranging from high school students to first and second year medical students and soon-to-be doctors finishing up their last year. The opportunity given to us to talk to these three groups of people is amazing, imagine these things happening even just 5 years go? Well here anyway, all but impossible.

Two years ago, when I started my transition, the general consensus was that as a trans patient you had to go to your doctor with information about you and what it means to be transgender because your doctor, most likely, had no idea. It seems to me that the transgender "movement" has taken Newfoundland, particularly the medical field, by storm and surprise and frankly they were not prepared. It is an odd feeling to go to a doctor and see how completely lost they are on the topic and suddenly become their source of information. On a whole, trans patients were going to doctors for help and ended up being the one doing the helping.

It has changed a fair bit, though it is still somewhat like this. Doctors here now, many of the good ones anyway, have taken it upon themselves to learn more about trans patients. The committee I am on has managed to get several research/practicing doctors to travel here and give seminars, presentations, etc. And I am proud to say all of my personal health care professionals seem to be right on top of learning more and making it to these meetings. The presentations we do on the Trans Needs Committee are still necessary though, we bring the personal needs to the doctors, we are still the voice they come to for information or confirmation of information.

For example, one of the biggest parts of our presentation to any audience is terms, We have two slides that I love watching the reaction in the audience. The first is current conceptions about gender, it shows an umbrella with Male on one side of the handle, an Female on the other. Then, *click* we go to the next slide, the same umbrella and a screen full of terms and you can watch the reaction of the crowd ranging from "OMG!" to "How the hell will I remember all of this?" For perhaps the same effect, here they are:

Femme, Butch, Stud, Drag Queen, Drag King, Cross dresser, Trans, Transgender, Transsexual, Two-spirit, Gender Queer, Gender fluid, Androgynous, Trans woman (male to female), Trans Man (female to male), Intersex, (Kids) Gender Creative, (Kids) Gender Non-conforming, (Kids) Gender Variant.

Oh, and Male and Female.

I must admit, I take a little evil pleasure dumping all of this information with the statement of, "there's a lot more that we just couldn't fit into the time allotted" in the doctors lap and watching them flounder. It's the anti-authority part of me that gives a little squeal of glee.

However, it has a very different effect on younger people. Instead of being concerned they will mess up what they just learned, younger people tend to just absorb it. To them it's a stream of information that does little else then give them the language to have something to think about. That may not sound important but it seems to be a trick of the mind that you can't properly think of something until you have a word for that something. So simply giving them the language to use is actually a powerful step. Particularly to any young person that is also transgender. Take it from me, just having a word to make sense of your feelings is incredibly liberating.

To be honest though, these presentations have been just as enlightening to me as my audience. Some of these presentations I go to kinda as an "extra". The presentation was done by someone who has a little more experience in it and I am there for the "realness/lived experience" of it. For example, the last three I did was about trans kids, specifically. I, do not have a trans kid, but I was one.

So these presentations, the audience themselves and other trans people, have started to teach me more about me. I have come to realize I have a serious "black hole" in my memory about my gender experience as a child. Perhaps a black hole isn't the correct description because all of it lingers just under the surface and I can see shimmering visions of what they are but unable to grasp them. What happens is a story is told, or a question asked, or information given that makes me think "holy fuck, that was ME". Sometimes that gives me courage, affirmation, and new knowledge about myself. Other times is turns me into a heap of tears on the floor.

For example, I was talking to another trans person about their past, a trans-man. One of the things they said was that before they transitioned many people would, innocently, call him a man. (just so you aren't confused, at the time he would have been presenting female). He realized that this was people just picking up on the little things that make you think "man" or "woman" without really thinking about it, not them trying to be offensive. This blew my mind when I heard it. I have often spoken of how I used to have long hair, and that people used to call me a girl. I never once saw that as a "precursor" of who I was. At the time, I assumed it was for no other reason than my hair. But reflecting back on it, I can't even count the number of times I was "mistaken" as a girl to only be profusely apologized to by the other person, especially store clerks, waiters, service staff, etc. They were not being intentionally provocative or insulting, they made an honest mistake. They were seeing the many subtle things about me that gave off "girl" that even I had no idea about at the time or rather, that I was repressing. What makes this worse is why I assumed these strangers were intentionally insulting me. I assumed that because all of my friends and family insulted me in the same way. I just figured these strangers were getting in on the joke.

I have come face to face with the emotional and social pretzeling I have done to myself. The amount of mental energy I poured into making this all make comfortable sense to me is staggering. I have always remembered explaining away my desires by telling myself that gender is obviously a failed social construct and it was ok to be like I was even though I was a "boy". I remember doing that because I did it all my life, up until about 2.5 years ago. Again, I never once seen what I was doing for what it truly was. I was trying to make my painfully difficult "female side" some how fit with this pervasive idea that I was a boy. The truth being, I was transgender and didn't believe it, didn't accept it, and told myself all of my life that there is something wrong with me that I need to correct.

Can any of you imagine what it is like to police your own thoughts? It came to the point that nothing was more valuable to me then time to think. Friends, family, hobbies, work, money, life in general were all very distant seconds to thinking, trying to sort out my own thoughts. You can guess what problems that has caused, not the least of which is ruined relationships, be them romantic or platonic.

Of course, learning these things about me and my past has hit me in many ways, and I think it's clear to see it hasn't all been roses, but I do see the silver lining in this cloud. I'm trying let these things show me how strong I must have been while being so confused. How resilient I was while being a victim of stigma. And how I can look at myself now as rising from the ruins of the past war in my head. I look back on my past, emotionally and intellectually and that is what I see. I see the remnants of a war with all of the associated feelings that go with it. The obvious lack of understanding, the unnecessary use of force, and ultimately the utter destruction of most of what is good while what is evil seems to run rampant. I look back on it with a mix of feelings. Like any conflict I can't help but think of how senseless it really was. How if I had even an ounce of understanding that war could have been prevented. And how that being on the "beaten" side, I did everything I could to save myself, not all of it makes as much sense on reflection as it did at the time.

The other side to this that I am now grateful for is the tools and the drive it gives me to make sure this happens to as few trans kids/teen as possible, hopefully none. My first presentation to a high school made my mind explode with things I wanted to say, barely any of it to the audience, I wanted to pull the trans kids aside and tell them everything will be ok and just how far along they already are simply for living in this year rather than a year 20-30+ years ago.

So to any younger trans peeps out there that may read this: "You got this."

Wednesday 1 April 2015

Invisibility

Yesterday was "International Transgender Day of Visibility". I attended a presentation/discussion at the university here, and it was nice to see the turn out for a part of it. However, it brought to light something the trans community, here at least, is lacking and it also brought to light an emotion I have had all of my life. One I knew was there but was too depressed to think about it reasonably because as is, it brings me down all on it's own. So, for a little warning, this won't be a happy post.

When I was a kid, when we all are kids, what is one of the main things we do socially? We look around for like minded people and we attach ourselves to them, or I guess you attach yourselves to each other. It's more or less the bases of friendship. We don't even realize what we are doing, we just gravitate toward each other. For me it was DnD, Dungeons and Dragons that brought myself and my friends together.

I vaguely remember how it happened. I was always into those sort of games, I would play rpg games on my computer or whatever console I had at the time, when I was even younger still I used to enjoy pretending I was a superhero or something with my friends who were also pretending to be superheroes and we'd beat of the invisible bad guys together.

I spent grade 8 being quite popular in school but when the summer came around and we weren't going to school all of my friends vanished, mainly because of geography, so no I'm not placing blame or accusations on them or me. But when I got to grade 9 my popularity of the previous year was gone, something I didn't really take conscious notice of. But for the most part, it was easy to tell from an outside observer that I had little to no friends. I spent my lunch times sitting in my classroom and looking outside at all the people doing whatever they do at lunch. I was always lost in my thoughts, even back then. In fact being lost in my thoughts back then was one of the main contributors of my depression that I was rapidly slipping into as grade 9 went on.

So one day two boys approached me, I have no idea what brought them over to me at all. Pity, interest, the logistical need for another player, I just don't know. But they asked me if I would like to play DnD with them and I quickly accepted. What that led to was a long relationship with the two of them and others that I still have today, as tenuous as they may be.

Not that I wanted to, but I was powerless to turn away their offer. I had just started to get a vague idea of how "messed up" I was, I had no friends and suddenly here were two people asking me to being their friend, more or less. How could I have said no? They made me feel like maybe I wasn't so messed up, of course until my depression completely took over. I lived two lives back then. The one that was a friend to these other kids, I laughed and joked with them, occasionally fought even but our friendships became so strong that even fights wouldn't ruin it. And the other life that had desires, feelings and emotions that conflicted directly with the person I presented to everyone else. That split is what ultimately led to my completely insane depression. I would come home from school, go straight to my room and cry until supper time and then I'd go back to my room and cry until bed time. I did this literally every day for 7 or 8 months. I unconsciously realized that being around my friends kept this level of depression more or less at bay. I put more mental energy into them than myself while they were around, so I spent as much time with them as I could.

Even with such good friends as these, ultimately I felt alone. My main "hate myself" thought was that I was messed up and no one liked me, the real me. The dance I did every moment of my life was exhausting, and dancing with yourself is as sad in reality as the imagery suggests. I had plenty of people to explain how I wanted to make my next DnD character to, but not a single person in my life that I could explain how I was feeling to. Someone else who also had my feelings seemed impossible. I was the only one who felt like me, I was the only one on the planet that wanted to do the things to my body that I did.

Fast forward to yesterday, it was during a talk among 16-20 people that I realized the same is true for me now, and I can't help but feel it is true for many older trans people. As I mentioned I was at the university here, and of course all of the people there were university students, of which I am not one and was the oldest person there by 10 years or more. I went there with the intentions of offering support to what I knew was going to be a young group. While sitting there though, I couldn't help but notice how there is plenty of support for young trans people. These peer support groups, a trans-friendly/lgbt oriented summer camp, housing and support for homeless trans under 25 etc. The two biggest hurdles a young trans person has now is themselves, and simply locating these services. It is fantastic for them, I can't imagine how my life would have changed were these things around when I was young and totally lost.

But...

There is nothing, absolutely nothing, for trans adults. If you are over 25, you're fucked, time to fend for yourself. I guess the mentality is after 25 you're a "real" adult and should be able to take care of yourself. Well, this may come as a shock, but being alone is no good at any age. I know exactly zero trans people my age, and not for lack of looking, trust me. everywhere I go, no matter how trans-friendly they are, I am the transgender flag bearer. I represent the transgender world to them because none of them are trans themselves and if I do end up in a situation like yesterday when I'm surrounded by transgender people, I am still a transgender flag bearer, I'm the future that these young men and women are looking at.

Just once I'd like to sit down with someone who is my age, roughly my intellect, conversation ability and just let go of everything to them. To someone that isn't going to be surprised or deflated with how hard my life still is. Someone who knows, because they have felt it, how being transgender paints and accentuates every decision you make and thought in your mind, or how inhibiting it can be, even on good days. How I feel years behind everyone else, years behind where I should be at my age.

Similar interests and values are great between friends. They can even make strong friendships. Having no one in your life you can truly connect to will always weigh in on the side of loneliness however. Imagine being the only women you've ever met. The only other females you've met are kids. Sure you have plenty of attention from all of the men around, and are probably looked up to by these kids, but there is no one you can turn too that doesn't make you feel like you're fencing with them. Everyone you speak to has no idea at all of where you are coming from, by design rather than fault, and their expressions of sympathy or encouragement are more or less useless to you because they cannot take into account you or your experiences/values/morals.

I can't really end off with a point because I don't have one. I just needed to get this out somehow.

Monday 30 March 2015

Becoming

It has been a while now since I've posted any sort of developmental progress in my transition. There really hasn't been much of a reason other than not having a good way to get them down on paper or having something else to talk about. While the changes I'm going through now are, at base, the same as I have always been going through they feel different. I am still having physical changes from the hormone replacement and I'm still having emotional changes due to being myself and learning who I am.

Looking back over the last, almost, two years it feels like I had just gone through the entirety of puberty in a matter of a year and now I'm starting to flesh out, to define, the woman I will become. I feel like my developmental age has almost caught up with my actual age. I'm starting to feel more confident and comfortable in my body and I've fallen back in love with my hair which is now past my shoulders. Honestly, I have changed more physically than I thought possibly, especially for someone who had gone through puberty such a long time ago. Even since last writing about any changes what has happened now is on top of that. I've mentioned before how my skin has gotten so much softer, well recently it has gotten softer again, and smoother. I notice different areas around my body that just feel totally different when I touch them. The odd muscle memory that you don't think of, like reaching up to scratch my cheek, is how I notice many of these changes. I touch my face and my muscle memory says "No, this should be more solid and back a few millimeters.".

Speaking of my face, crying has taken on a new feeling. As a tear goes down my face it takes a completely different path than it used to and it feels different on my skin in general. Then when it falls it lands between my breasts and keeps going. That is a completely foreign feeling to me, normally the forest of chest hair would have sucked that up like a towel.

As I have mentioned I am back in love with my hair. Not only has it gotten longer but it is fuller, stronger, shinier, in general more healthy. I guess it could be, and probably partially is, because I am taking care of it better but it was a change that seemed to happen practically overnight. One day after getting a shower and drying my hair I couldn't help but think it felt totally different to me all of a sudden.

With all of these physical changes I think it would have been impossible for them to not affect me emotionally. I feel beautiful. I look at myself in the mirror, or I touch my hair or skin and it brings a smile on my face, a smile of contentment. It's a strangely familiar feeling to me, one I can't place a finger on but it seems to call from my much younger years. I'm not sure if I can sufficiently put into words the feeling that overwhelms you into wrapping your arms around yourself, tilting your head to your shoulder and feeling your own body just to enjoy it, just to bring to memory how wonderful you feel right now both physically and emotionally. It is powerful, and my solitary regret is not having someone around to appreciate it with me. A regret I feel because for whatever reason, the next feeling that comes up with how wonderful I feel now is how much I'd like to share it with someone. That in itself is a feeling I'm not used to having.

Feelings I'm not used to having is something that has become some of a theme for me now. For the majority of my transition so far I have been in situations I have been in many times before. It is good it went that way, and I'm not sure if it wasn't subconsciously on purpose. What it did was allow me to get used to feeling, for the most part, emotions I have had before in situations I have been in before but now through this new lens. As I have mentioned, dealing with the emotional changes is one of, if not the most, tumultuous parts of my, and I would hazard to guess any, transition. The sorting out of base emotions like anger, sadness, happiness, attraction, etc had to be done, no differently than a teen having to sort out there emotions through a tsunami of hormones. I am more comfortable with them now, I can identify which emotion I'm settling on and can deal with it as needs be. Now that I have done this, I'm more capable of taking on more complex emotions. I find myself now defining myself as a woman. I'm collecting emotions and feelings and deciding how I will let them shape me as the person I want to be.

And now it's story time, and I'll describe a host of emotions new to me.

Well, first of all I should say this. As usual, I am about to write about a few people I just gave this website address to. I'm not sure if they actually read this or not, but apparently this is a thing I do. So without further adieu, I'll introduce these people and in the meantime, hope I cause an emotional tear or two to be shed ;)

In a good way. :)

So recently I have been volunteering at our local women's center on a couple of projects. I've met some fantastic women through the center, strong women that anyone could look up to. I certainly do.

Two women in particular, the two I deal with the most, are women I have no other way to describe and have to others in the past, other than super heroes. The amount of work, time, effort and emotional investment these two women put into their day is just staggering. Dwarfed only by the number of people they help and the degree in which they help them.

One of the two is a little older than me. She seems very much like I could picture myself after a few years. Intelligent, thoughtful, wise, patient... and with a seething feistiness you can't help but feel you don't want to see unleashed.

The other is a few years younger than me. She seems very much like the woman I could have been had I only been a woman at her age. Also intelligent, patient, kind-hearted, getting wiser and while she doesn't have a feistiness that is almost palatable you can tell that being on her bad side is analogous to bringing a knife to a gun fight.

Both of these women seem to be doing exactly what they were built for. The amount of advancement and sheer work that needs to be done around women's rights, health and safety requires women just like these two. It was after sitting and talking with them for three hours about what needs to be done, their plans for the future and how I can help that I came across a new set of emotions I hadn't had before.

I was so struck my these two women that they were on my mind for the rest of that day and I thought about them often after that day. What I noticed was how much I admired them, and that made me realize two things. First, it was the first time I could recall truly admiring someone and not having it turn somehow sexual, and second, how I have never had a role model.

Having no role model was something I have had on my mind off and on after my therapist asked me one day if I had any female role models when I was young. My answer was no, not only did I not have a female one, I never once had any sort of role model. I think I could take up an entire post just on the causes of that, but mainly, I never let myself. Honestly, I had no idea what I was denying myself, but at the same time, what choice did I have? How could I have sculpted myself as a woman I admired when I wasn't allowing myself to feel that way, when I was running away from feeling that way?

It may not seem like much, but to me it was a powerful revelation when I realized both of these women could fill that role for me. It was powerful because for the first time I was seeing myself as a real developing woman, I felt like a young girl looking up to these two women in complete awe at who they are. It was a feeling I couldn't help but hold on to and cultivate. It was too new, and felt too natural to let it go. It felt like exactly what I should feel like at this point in my emotional development. It has brought to mind questions and answers (not necessarily linked to each other) about myself that I had never come up with before. To see two women that seem, to me anyway, to be so much like me, or like who I could be, made me feel like a woman, period. It validated my existence as the woman at heart I always thought I was, the same woman that I hid for so many years I forgot who she was.

It is also a powerful thing to see your path laid before you. What has come from knowing these women is seeing that I am on the right path, or at least a good one for me. I no longer feel like I'm screwing up my chance at being the woman I have always wanted to be, for two reasons. One is that my goal seems attainable now, it seems attainable now because I see how I am the emotional "child"  growing into the adult woman who seemed like an unreachable specter in the dark. The other reason is now I know I don't have as far to go as I thought and the road isn't as perilous and impossible as I was certain it was.

I think, if you were to go back to some of my older posts and compare it to this one you would see the difference in levels of emotions I'm talking about. It is strange going through teenage-like development at 36 years old. Strange, and it sucks too for the reason I would have preferred to go through it when I was a teen. With that impossible notion to square though, it is good to have the maturity of an adult to go through my younger years with. I find I have the ability to section out each new feeling and emotion and nurture it as I see fit. And while I don't have the unknown pleasure of having this happen naturally and mostly without my knowledge, like what happens to teens, I do get to watch it happen. Being able to watch it happen, for me as a trans woman, gives me the encouragement to go on. Self encouragement, the hardest but most useful kind to find. I see myself, wading through a new emotion, or new part of myself and I can see the progress. More importantly I can see myself becoming the woman I always wanted to be.

Sunday 15 March 2015

Gay? Right(s)!

Look at me going, two posts in two days.

I'm not sure if everyone has picked this up yet or not, but I live in Canada. And even though her news reporting has little to do with the country I live in I have been watching a fair bit of Rachel Maddow clips on Youtube lately. I guess it's the combination of her delivery and the fact that the USA seems to be totally insane that has me glued to my computer screen. I find her funny, articulate and interested in the same things I am. Thankfully she is a self proclaimed lesbian, (for the love of fuck I hope I didn't make that up) and perhaps because of that she covers a lot of LGBT rights, well I guess mostly LG rights, but I'm not sure how much Trans rights pop up in the US separately from LG rights.

Through her show however, I have seen a lot of the anti-gay garbage that others get on with. As I've said, I live in Canada but as I watch these people go on with their anti-gay rhetoric I can't help but wonder how much longer until government officials in Canada start working anti-gay policies in their agenda. It worries me because I feel like I am watching Canada step backwards in human rights and I'm not utterly convinced that our neighbours to the south aren't influencing some of the..... less cognizant members of Canadian government.

Now I'm not a political science major so I'm not going to try and explain all the details but for my American readers out there, laws in Canada get passed more-or-less like they do in the states. Very basically, a bunch of people have to vote on a bill, it can be amended before passing, etc etc. (holy watered down version...) though our passed federal laws seem to have more direct impact on the entire country then they do in the US, but maybe not... like I said I'm no expert.

Anyway, there has been a bill (law) recently try to get passed here in Canada that was meant to give transgender people more rights, it was going to be a good thing for us, non-discrimination laws and the like. It didn't pass however. It had the full support of one side of our government but a member of the other side added an amendment that basically said that trans-men and women need to use the public bathroom of their assigned sex at birth. Getting the bill labeled "the bathroom bill" and forced supports of the bill to vote against it because they didn't want this in what was going to be a ground breaking bill. I believe something similar has passed, or perhaps is trying to be passed in a few states in the US, or something similar to it. I know this only because I have been considering going to our local mall (yes, yes, I live in a small city) and go hang out in the men's washroom in protest and before I had the chance I was getting plenty of articles of trans men and women doing this exact thing in the US over a similar law.

And just like that, something clicked and my world started to get smaller. Canada has always been looked at as being heavily influenced by America. I have spoken with a few patriots here that would argue differently but the truth is our cultures are very similar and most of our media comes from the US. Most of our TV channels here are US based and therefore carry US news, I have no numbers but I would have to say the vast majority of TV shows in general are US based. And when you influence a people, you influence their government.

For example, apparently the Canadian government has found it prudent to give tax breaks plus direct funding to an anti-gay group here in Canada called "Crossroads Christian Communications Inc." Thankfully Canada does have fairly solid discrimination laws and after it was found out that Canada was supporting this group the government had to investigate. But therein lies a problem. Yes they stopped funding for the investigation (I cannot find any updates) but the problem is they would have never stopped if the public didn't stumble upon what was happening. Just to be clear, this group had on their website statements like homosexuality and transvestism are sins equivalent to pedophilia and bestiality and are sinners that need to repent. They were taken down when they realized the public's eyes were starting to focus on them. Their views weren't a secret beforehand and the government still thought it a good idea to fund them.

Thanks to shows like Rachel Maddow and you know, being alive, I have heard every possible explanation of why someone is anti-gay. Everything from homosexuals being pedophiles to ruining the fabric of our society to abominations that are against gods will. These people face pro-gay rights with the certainty and smugness of moral superiority. They are firmly in the position that they are correct and you are somehow blind to the truth and you need to change to fit their description of the world.

That is really all it comes down to, they want to shape the world to fit what they are comfortable enough with to let go of their security blankets. When I started this post I had planned on inserting a couple of statistics I could find, like how the divorce rate is a full percentage lower for homosexuals then for heterosexuals, or how that there is zero evidence that suggests that pedophilia and homosexuality are linked at all. I heard the opposite spewed from bigot mouths on many occasions and I thought it would be useful to have those stats here as "proof". The problem is, these people are immune to logic. No one has ever convinced one of these sort of people by trying to talk sensibly to them. So unfortunately there seems to be little left to say to them. They have removed themselves from the conversation by essentially putting thing fingers in their ears and screaming "la la la" over and over.

Do you know what is a powerful deterrent though? Something everyone in the LGBT community is all too familiar with? Public ridicule. Now I know, it feels like we would be sinking to their level by doing this, and I would caution against it but I think it is time. It is time we stop fulfilling the victim role exactly how they want us to, constantly defensive and emotional, because it is so personal to us. We need to climb on top of our moral high ground and start glaring back. Their arguments center around violence, trying to change people, trying to impose your will on someone is violence. Our argument centers on peace, allow us to live our lives without persecution. Instead of getting defensive or hurt when someone says these anti-gay things to you, instead of that, laugh at them. Laugh at them like they are trying to have a serious discussion about Elvis still being alive and well and having margaritas with Jimmy Hoffa in Argentina.

We give them ammunition when we play their silly game. The constant back and forth they want to get everything tied up and clouded in until no one is sure what we're talking about any more. Think about it, when someone approaches you with anti-gay speech you feel compelled to give in to their trolling and get into the fight they just picked. Now if someone were to seriously say, "You know, people who drive red sports cars have huge penis's" you'd look at them with an ill-concealed look of "wtf?" on your face. That's exactly how we should treat these anti-gay children. Give them no ground for purchase, blow them off like the obscurity in history they are destined to be.

Saturday 14 March 2015

My World

I've been thinking about this post for a long time now, a month or more I would say. I feel like I have come to a point where I'm not sure what else to say. I feel like I have been saying more or less the same things over and over just in a different way and quite honestly, I have gotten somewhat bored of it.

What I never get bored of is thinking. I get frustrated with it, I get angry or depressed with it even but I never stop. This is something I have been thinking about in relation to me and nothing else for several months, it is only the last few months that I have been thinking about how to make this a post.

It started when talking to a friend, the conversation was about me specifically and how I was feeling. It was all in good intentions and went something like this.

Friend: "Yadda yadda"
Me: "blah blah"
Friend: "As long as you feel like a woman then it'll be ok."

Now without getting into where that came from, and through no reason of it being said by this person, I couldn't help but think about that statement non-stop. And the question I kept asking myself was a simple one, in form if nothing else. "What do you mean 'feel like a woman'?"

That question has been the focal point of my journey as a trans-woman ever since I knew I wanted to be a woman. I would think to myself constantly that if I were meant to be a woman, or later when I knew the label for it, if I am transgender then there should be something intrinsic about me that is definitively female. I searched my inner self high and low, and over two decades and have only found the question to be a non-starter. The test that every seemingly good answer always failed to pass was, "Is this feeling I have ONLY able to be had by a woman."

The answer to that is of course, "No.". To be the person I am, to be real followers of the values the majority of the LGBTQ2 world seems to profess and I certainly do, I simply cannot believe there is a single one thing that either gender exclusively feels. How sexist to suggest otherwise, wouldn't you agree?

But I've come to see how I live in a perfect world, largely because I spend 90% of my time alone. Not because I'm perfect (lol) but because everything in a world that consists of 90% me is something I clearly mostly agree with. The real world doesn't seem to fully accept this spectrum. Now I'm sure these people have their hearts in the right place, the problem tends to come when the spectrum doesn't work for them. I'll try to explain...

An increasingly large amount of the population is started to see gender and sexuality as a spectrum. I think one could argue a circle, but I'm not going to try that here. Essentially you have male and hetero on one side female and hetero on the other and people fall somewhere in between that. Now in my world people don't care where other people fall in that spectrum. In my world anyone can be who they want to be, love who they want to love, use which bathroom they want to use. Sorry, not "don't care" that's too harsh for my world, people love the fact that you are being you in my world.

In the real world however, a lot of people do get upset if you are something they don't agree with, you can only love certain people and who goes to which bathroom is up for debate. The problem, as I see it, is people lump all of these things together when it comes to fighting for rights. Where people get very emotional and defensive when you try to tell them how they can dress or look or who they are allowed to love, and with understanding. These are the sort of things that are absolutely not up for debate. These are the sort of things that is no one else's business like who or how you fuck. With these, case closed, move along, nothing to see here as far as I'm concerned. Because in my world gender and sexuality isn't something you try to hide from the world, it is something you try to bring to the world, something every human being needs to cherish about themselves.

The other questions though, like who can go where, I'm far more uncertain. The public washroom question is one that seems like I can't think about fairly because I always simply fall on "who really cares"? Clearly some people do but I can't think of a sensible argument that they may be correct so I can't come up with sensible reasoning that could convince these people.

Honestly, that is a problem I have for most of these questions, the Wiccan Rede is the perfect answer, "Harm none, do what ye will." But let me talk about a problem that I had to try to solve in the real world and honestly, didn't. Now honestly my answer would have affected nothing, I'm not in that sort of position, but there was a point that it came to me to figure out.

I was talking with two friends of mine, we were getting together to talk about a workshop we were going to do with the women's center in my city. We ended up talking about inclusion, who would/is accepted in a woman's center? We didn't know the answer, and sadly I didn't find out through no fault but my own from not asking yet. (something I will have to do)  But we had a little brainstorming session. I won't get into our talk but I will explain my thinking on the whole situation.
I looked at it this way. Let's go down the list of who is and isn't included, so we start with women, obviously women are welcome in a women's center. Next is trans-women, which as far as we knew were also welcome. I guess we skipped over gender neutral (sorry) and next was trans-men, we honestly had no answer for this, were they already welcome, should they be and should we convince a center to? And then there is men who aren't welcome. My inner question is, where is the dividing line between trans-men and men? I sort of defaulted to how the trans-men feel about it because I have no idea, really. This is where the spectrum gets complicated and sometimes works against us. And by work against us, I mean it doesn't work in our immediate favour. Nothing but good can come from getting the entire population to accept and fully understand this spectrum.

Why should trans-men be welcome? I couldn't help but think about being in the opposite situation. If there were such a thing as a "Men's center" and they were to say they welcome trans-women I would actually be insulted, profoundly insulted. Honestly, asking myself where the dividing line between trans-men and men felt insulting. Imagine if someone were to ask me, "Where do you think the dividing line between women and trans-women is?" I'd probably go ballistic. If a Men's center was welcoming trans-women I would think they should be welcoming cis-women. Therefore, the opposite seems to make sense to me as well. If you allow trans-men in a women's center, then you should allow men. To say other wise feels to me to be insulting to the trans community as a whole. You are basically saying, while trying to be helpful, you aren't entirely a man and you're close enough to a woman to be allowed. I would chew on a cinderblock if someone said the opposite to me.

I guess I could come up with a working decision if I ran such a place and had to make it myself, but since I don't I have yet to answer this question in any sort of meaningful existential way. I can't answer this question for the same reason I can't answer the question I started with. Where is this line that everyone wants to draw? What are these feelings that are absolutely male or female? I feel like the world is locked in the binary frame of mind simply by giving weight to those questions because I think a lot of people think they have answers. People seem to think too small, they think of one or two hyper examples and assume the rest falls into place. We know the real world isn't like that at all. The real world consists of every option you can think of and they are ALL valid.

I feel like I am example of how much harm these absolute questions with no answers caused. When I was trying to figure myself out in my young years I knew nothing about the world, all I knew was what was around me. What was around me, especially back then, was a constant barrage of binary gender and sexual do's and don'ts. This works for most people because most people are cis-hetero but when you aren't one of those people, the pressure of this imposed binary becomes your cage. When your gender becomes a question, because for most it never is questioned, you have nothing to look at for answers but the ocean of possibilities within your own heart and mind. All I had was this whimsical desire to shed the body I was in and don a new one. I couldn't place my feelings in boxes labelled "male" and "female"

And that's it, that's all I can come up with. The only thing I can equate "feeling like a woman" to is how I feel about how people view me. I can't say "I'm a woman because I feel pretty.". "Pretty" has no gender, it's just a word, but I can say I love how I feel when someone tells me I look pretty. (female being implied) It is the person who I present to others that makes me feel like a woman everything else is just "me".

I guess I spend a lot of time thinking about how the world around a trans-person affects them because I feel deeply affected by it myself particularly when I was young. That's why I have invented my world. In my world there is no gender or sexual pressure on kids, or anyone really. I feel no need to keep sex away from children, in fact I have always found it suspect when people say we can't show kids sexual material but encourage them to violence. (and then wonder why violence is sexualized, sigh) The more comfortable our entire culture becomes with gender and sexuality the easier these young people will find it do discover themselves. Imagine a world where 100% of the children grow up not just being ok with, but being confident in their sexuality and knowledgeable of the sexuality of others. Once that generation grows up we will have law makers, civil servants, volunteers, doctors and their patients, etc etc that would have no need for questions like "what bathroom should a certain group use?". Gendered bathrooms, change rooms, clothing, toys would become a thing of the past, a relic of the "old way we used to think."

Then maybe, just maybe, I could welcome you all to my world.

Sunday 1 February 2015

Hopefully

I've been toying with how to write this next post for a few days now. It started as a result of something my friend asked me, someone who knows a fair number of transgender people. It was something like, "Why don't we hear about positive transgender experience, or why don't people want to talk about positive transgender experience?"

Now out of context of the entire conversation that may sound a little short-sighted or insulting in some way, but I assure you it wasn't as such, but she brought up a good point. Personally, during pride week in this city last summer, I contacted several news organizations with the story of a transgender woman with a positive experience in our city, working, my own apartment, and a drastic change as a result of transition. I got no bites.

Anyway, there is of course plenty of reasons we don't hear many positive stories. For one, news is rarely positive, period. There are lots I can get into, but I'm going to write about the one I can relate to. That is, why wouldn't those of us with positive experiences talk about it?

Why I am hesitant about it is I feel bad. I know of so many transgender people that have had to deal with so much more than I have, and have had less luck in general then I have had when it comes to transitioning. I mean there are a host of things that can go wrong in a transition. Anything from your parents rejecting you to your hormone replacement not working. I have had little trouble in any aspect of my transition, so I can't really relate to how it would feel like to face some like others have. I have felt the complete fear of them though.

I have posted a mix of emotions on this blog so far, and that is for a reason. I think people need to see the "realness" behind transgender life. Not necessarily how "shockingly real" it is, though it certainly can be, but how there are also plenty of transgender people you never hear about that are quietly, happily transitioning, and they have lives like everyone else.

I feel like we need to hear more stories like these. Yes, the stories of Lavern Cox and Janet Mock are just fantastic to hear, but I think it says more for us to see the "Jack and Janes" of the transgender world. For one, the cis-folk out there need to see that we are everywhere. No different than the homosexual movement eventually did, the more that come out the more people see how "normal" we really are and the more comfortable people become.

The more important side, in my opinion, is what it can say to those that still haven't been able to start transitioning because they are too afraid to. I think every one of us goes through this, I know I did. Besides all of the many other questions, doubts and fears you have you also worry about what if transitioning doesn't "work". All I ever heard about was bad stories, ever. As far as I knew not a single transition ended well. I could find only two types of literature. Either people talking about how their lives have fallen apart or people who said nothing about their personal lives other than a hint of "I don't go there anymore." tucked in between the lines.

I'd like to start a trend. There are a lot of trans people that do little but talk about the negative, and I guess that plays it's part. People do need to see how society treats us so we can open their eyes. What I'd like to do is start people talking about how their transition makes them happy. I have already said quite a bit of positive things about my transition and honestly, it has only gotten better. We need more of it.

I have gotten so many messages from people telling me how they wish they could be as brave as me, or wish their life circumstances could allow a transition and it breaks my heart. The fear (and possibly reality) of being another statistic is great enough to keep many people from being themselves. Maybe if they could read more blogs and stories like mine they would have the courage to face their fears. Maybe instead of being afraid of losing someone, perhaps they would hope that person would understand and help them. I'm hard pressed to think of someone with more doubt and uncertainty than a transgender person starting their path into transition, every little bit of hope helps.

Monday 19 January 2015

Picture This

I often find myself reflecting on my personality and asking myself what parts of me are there because I am transgender. I guess in a way I try to think how the rest of the world must feel about something then compare it to how I feel about it and then decide if growing up unsure of my gender had anything to do with it. Well partially. A lot of the times I think back on things I have thought about myself or have done in the past and I see how being transgender directly affected that.I feel like I can't stop myself from doing this. It feels to me as something that is just intrinsic of who I am. Ironically, it is something that is a result of being transgender, I think.

I struggled with being transgender for years, that is true, but I always kinda knew how different I was. While lack of information was the real culprit, that combination of being transgender and not knowing it was even a valid life option lead to me dealing with who I was, affected who I was, in many ways.

The thing that made it difficult for me to see the truth about myself was that to me, I was "just me". I don't mean that in some cute way, I mean I was just a kid being a kid, like all kids. When I became a teenager and started to become self conscious, like all teenagers do, I realized I had this part about me that didn't fit what was "ok" for a boy to feel like.

Because we we all taught that as young as possible, aren't we? What makes a "good" and "bad" boy/girl/person? From the fire fighter who's a hero and helps people to the kid who's a bully and teases people. I can't say I remember how, but somewhere in my life I learned that boys were not allowed to be like girls. That boys that liked feminine things were perverts and men that liked feminine things were either gay or disgusting (those two words at the time only just starting to not be synonymous).

So what was I?

I know one thing I was, I was lucky. I was lucky that I was born stubborn and confident. For the majority of my teen years I struggled daily with this idea, "I'm a good person, why do I have all of these "bad" feelings, wants and desires?"

I remember being in a girlfriends bedroom, or any females room for whatever reason and I would feel like my world was closing in on me. I wanted to look at everything, I wanted to get some sense of what it felt like to live as a girl at the same time I would be inches away from my horrible secret that it would kill me if anyone found out. I didn't really realize what I was doing, to be honest. There was just something that drew me to these things and living like it that made me feel comfortable. I was just "being me" as before, but now that "me" had a label on it, one that made me hate myself.

In bed after days like these, or similar ones, more often than not I would cry myself to sleep. I'd be asking myself that question, "Why do I feel like this? Only 'bad' people feel like this." I would hate myself for feeling that way, and I mean hate. Hate that manifested itself in everything from cutting myself to year long depression. I would see a girl and think she was beautiful, and instead of imagining feeling her body against mine, I'd imagine what it would feel like to have that body. After realizing what I was feeling, and not being able to deal with it internally, I didn't know what else to do. I wasn't a bad kid, I didn't get into trouble, I didn't drink or be out late or whatever. I think cutting myself with something was the best thing I could come up with that wasn't hurting anyone else and besides, it was to this body that didn't really feel like mine anyway.

That is something else that is a result of being transgender for me. I was never really attached to my body... I'm not sure how else to say it. All of my life the idea of something happening to my genitals didn't really bother me. My body just felt like a box carrying "me" around. This happened later in my life than my teen years, maybe it started in my late teens. I started to gain weight in my early twenties. I was a very healthy and in shape teen, athletic. What happened was I started to gain weight almost at the same time I started to find language to put my feelings into terms that were real. I distinctly remember looking at myself in the mirror after gaining weight and thinking "hey, now I look like I have a hips like a woman." I was pretty pleased with myself. I was wrong, I looked awful, but I saw what I wanted to.

Later in life after allowing myself to buy and wear some female clothing again I realized women's lingerie was not meant to go on a man my size. I told everyone my motivation was seeing the built men on "300" but the truth is it was because I wanted to look good in lingerie. What happened at the same time however was a crushing quasi-relationship that had me hating myself even more and blaming it on this "sick person" I am. So I decided to never go there again, and kept up with the exercising and losing weight until I was too thin. I think I could have been anorexic for a while. Another trait passed on to me from being transgender is listening to what others say about me, and after hearing several people give me the "Uh, you aren't fat at all. In fact you're too thin." talk I started to be sensible about it.

The point I'm trying to make here is being transgender has been hard on my body.

The part that really gets to me when I stop to think about it is how being transgender has affected my mind. Not just my thoughts, and feelings, but my very essence, my beliefs, my desires, my self image. I have lived my life questioning everything about me, a self-doubt that is pervasive throughout everything in my life, everything that makes up me. Questions that the outside world will happily, quickly, and with zero conscious and empathy give you their answers to. I'm not sure if it is fair to say this is true about all trans people, but for me growing up as a transwoman was traumatic. Something that only recent talks with my therapist has me thinking about. Again, to me I was just "being me" going through life, taking and dealing with things like I assumed we all do.

However, like any trauma victim it has left deep scars on who I am that are so much a part of me that I have no idea when they are influencing my life and decisions now. Feeling like no one could ever love me, which is progress from no one SHOULD love me, or feeling like I am my own best company which works out because I also feel like no one wants my company. Having no sense of "self" or who you are because I, until relatively recently never was who I am.

There are other things that being transgender has created in me that are neither horrible, or joyous. Being self reflective was something that was forced on to me. It started from what I mentioned earlier, how I had that one question always in my mind, "I'm a good person, why do I feel "bad" things?". I picked apart everything I did. Every. Little. Thing. Especially anything that had to do with a moral or ethical choice. I had to make sure I was correct, that I wasn't a bad person. It was possible I thought I was good but I actually wasn't. I had read enough to know of the villain who believes he is right in his doings. The time up until reaching the conclusion that I am indeed a rather "good" person was very hard. This was my massive depressive stage. After my depression I started to realize that regardless of what people may think of the OTHER stuff going on in my head, I'm still a good person.

This lead me to another frame of mind that is intrinsic in me now as well. How open minded I am, particularly sexually, or sexuality. After realizing I was a good person even though I felt the way some of the "worst" (read perverted, really) people in the world felt I couldn't help but think that I must not be the only one. I started seeing people in a very different light. I started to see individual struggles. How the people with the worst ones tend to be the most quiet, and how, like me, they have a hard time accepting help. I developed an empathy or these sort of people, something I think my friends picked up on, as I have mentioned before. A part of me wishes I choose a career path that would have lead to me helping those people but I had other things on my mind.

There is a point to this whole post. Yesterday I took a picture of myself. (wtf does all of this have to do with a picture, I know.) This picture is of me with no makeup. I took this picture and posted it to facebook and immediately contacted the few friends I have to take a look, even called my parents. People don't seem to understand what this picture means to me. For the first time in my life, I didn't feel like I was faking being a woman. Right or wrong there is a part of me that gets utterly disgusted when I try to look feminine and when I look in the mirror all I see is a crossdresser, basically. (No offense CD's out there). This time though, I came out of the bathroom and walked in front of my full length mirror and had to stop and go back to it to look some more. I couldn't get over how feminine I looked while totally naked, makeup and all.

That changed my entire outlook instantly. It has been so powerful that I could feel my state of mind, emotions, self awareness, sexuality, and more starting to shift all day yesterday. To see a genuine woman looking back at me in the mirror is finally allowing me to feel like a genuine woman in general. My body is beginning to feel like mine now, like it never did before. I'll admit to being a little "catch phrase-y" in the past when describing how significant things have been but this time I'm not sure what to say. I feel like my whole being has started to change. It's hard to imagine such an impact coming from such a simple thing. A picture that, admittedly, doesn't make me look gorgeous, but does make me look decidedly female, and with no make up, no "faking it".

The change is real though, I actually feel like a woman, I am now able to picture myself doing things, like typing on this computer, and see the woman I always felt I was. What is changing is many of the things I started talking about on this post. My self worth especially. I'm starting to feel attractive, desirable even. I'm starting to feel power in my femininity.... power. Imagine?

I feel like I'm running out of ways to articulate myself now so what I will do is leave you with said picture. I barely stop looking at it, I can't believe that is me in the picture. Anyway, take care everyone.


Friday 2 January 2015

Number One

Well everyone guess what. I have finally had sex with a man. And holy god damn was it ever fun.

I met him over the internet. Of course right? Who actually meets people in person anymore? We talked a bit over a few days and I invited him over. This isn't the first time I have met someone from the internet and every other time was kinda lame. Honestly, the main reason I had him over was I was getting to the point that I had to do this.

Not to long before this actually happened something changed in me. I mentioned a while ago the changes that had happened in my breast, we those changes happened everywhere. My body has gone under some major changes in the last few months, and still is. (more on that later). Along with the physical changes I started to become more comfortable with my body emotionally. It feels so much more like a woman's body, a difference I notice regularly.

Ok, off topic, but I want to say this. Over the course of the last year and a half of being on hormones there have been times that I have felt like I am actually supposed to be a man, not a woman, and I'm screwing up here. 90% of the time that feeling comes from seeing or picturing my body or how I move or how I emotionally react to my body. Essentially it is what is left of my dysphoria now. To use my therapists favorite word, the "incongruence" triggers my dysphoria.

This new change has started to keep those feelings at bay. I found that at first the HRT made me feel better for a few reasons. I knew I was doing something to start my transition, the hormones in my body started to level out to where they should have been, and I would see changes being made, like my skin softening. What is happened now though makes those earlier changes seem almost superficial. At almost 2 years, my body is now beginning to really fill out as a woman's. Honestly, my figure has changed more then I had expected it to when I started and I easily see more changes coming. Right now, there would be no way for me to pass as a man. Not shave for a month I guess. But clean shaven, and maybe foundation and I could stand in front of you in my panties and you would not tell I was a man without looking quite closely.

Almost done with my tangent. what I want to say about this, is this. Over the years the dysphoria we face as transgender people is oppressive.... smothering, it can leave you doubting everything about yourself and it can leave you feeling like it will never end. I'm here to tell you it can, and it will. Those of you out there finding it hard to carry on, like I have so many times before, keep on pushing. Transitioning is the hardest thing someone can do, in my opinion, but I promise, it will be worth it in the end. It will be worth it as you go along, I am finding out.

Ok, so, where was I? Right, this guy. One of the side effects of the changes to my body was my confidence started to grow. As my confidence and appreciation of my body grew, the more sexual I found myself getting until finally I got to the point that I thought "Ok! Time to share this with someone!" I felt like a teen again, just wanting to have someone touch my body. I have to say, seeing that from a more mature age made it feel more passionate for me.

And speaking of passion.... this guy... damn. I can't say he was cut from marble or anything, but he had a wonderful body, nice smile, cute/shy-ish way of talking. However, he wasn't shy when we started to get naked... nope. Being on this end of things was amazing. Having someone pick me up, move me around, position me *cough* was different. That plus his touching me, enjoying my body, running his hands and lips... wherever. God it was different..

ok, I need to take a breather, lmao.

The experience was all together amazing. No offense to her, but it was far more passionate, and intense then my first woman. Being sexual as a woman, letting myself feel how I want to feel... or simply letting myself feel, is part of me like having sex before never was. Instead of being a locksmith I ride a wave of pleasure. It is exquisite.

Thursday 1 January 2015

Poof

Sorry about the long hiatus, between work, my computer not working and my internet connection not working it became quite difficult. Now I have another problem, I have no idea what to write about or how to write, I've kinda lost it a little after not using it for a while. So I'm just going to dive right in, in typical Rebecca fashion.

There has been something on my mind for a good while now, even before last writing here. I think I may have briefly mentioned it before, but it's something that is seriously on my mind and I just may go through with it.

What that is, is moving off, starting a new life. I don't just mean going to another city and trying life there. I mean doing all but faking my own death and disappearing away from everyone I know and starting my life completely new in a completely new city. From my understanding many transgender people feel this way at some point. Honestly, I'm surprised I don't personally know of any. I guess then that it would only make statistical sense that I be the trans person I know that has done this.

I feel this way for a lot of reasons. It seems to be another one of those decisions I've wanted to make in a long time but haven't yet. What I have learned about myself is those are the things I always eventually do and after I do them I always find it was the right thing for me. I'm actually getting to the point that I let that feeling I get for these sort of decisions to make the decisions for me, if I find I can't come to one without it.

So why do I want to do this? Well I want to move for several reasons. I guess some of it is a "grass is greener" sort of view, but I live in a small city, a city I have always said was too small for me, and I think I would have more opportunities in a different/bigger one. This may be some what redundant but I'm also kinda done with this place. The available work, the weather, and to some extent even the people. The people for two reasons, one is the close-mindedness of too many people here, the other I'll get into in a moment.

That's just why I want to move. Why I want to disappear obviously has to do with people. I have to say the single biggest reason I want to disappear is to completely shed my past. Nothing reminds me more than people.

Here's the thing. I often reflect on my past, the "boy" I used to be. I really have become to see her as the young very confused and lost trans-teen. These reflections however, are mostly me sorting out where being transgender came from. Something I often say you shouldn't try to do I know, but it's impossible not to. I pass by places in this small city that remind me of past relationships, or stages of my life and some of them make me think "meh" some of them make me wish in the worst way I was a woman at the time, and those are the ones that get to me.

What people do is not let me let go of the emotional baggage of being transgender and they also trigger just about everything that makes being transgender difficult in your own mind.

For example, people who knew me in the past and either refuse to call me "Rebecca" or forget to so much that I just as well not have changed my name. The holidays were more or less the last straw for me. I seen a good bit of family and the majority of them got my name wrong most of the time. Yes yes, I know, I should be patient, they have been calling me that for 30ish years... blah blah blah. However, I am sick of it. It has been almost two years, my name is Rebecca. It has gotten to the point that it has become a major reason to move and disappear. If I never hear that name again, or be called "him" once more it would be worth it.

I also met an old co-worker that flat out refused to call me Rebecca because she "knew me as <insert name here>." If I wasn't in a nice restaurant at the time I would have completely lost it but I managed to keep my cool and just eat my app without any bloodshed.

I guess to these people, it's simply a matter of it being "no big deal" to them. I can even sit here and admit that that is a reasonably good way for them to be, it's kinda nice that they don't see the difference.

However.

I forget where exactly I read this, it was something that I scrolled by on facebook. It was someone talking about, and to, our transgender allies. Or actually now that I think about it, it may have been a lesbian who wrote it. Either way, it is the perfect message to our allies and it sums up nicely how I feel and that "no big deal" isn't as nice as you may think. Essentially what this person said is that that isn't enough. We don't want you to just be blind about it, we want you to see us. I may want the general public to just look at me and think "she" because that's how I look and act, etc and that's how I want to be. My family and close friends and allies though, I want them to call me by my correct name (because it is legally changed) and use proper pronouns because they know who I am. They know I am transgender, they see it, they fully accept it and they call me the correct things out of respect for who it is that I am.

Knowing I'm transgender and continuously calling me my old name and pronoun hurts far more than some random person. If a store clerk looks at me and thinks I warrant a "sir" then that's "my fault" for not looking feminine enough (oh please oh please, let's just leave this as is for now and not kill the poor clerk or get into how that's an awful frame of mind on my part.) But if my family, or friends call me sir, they know. They know that hurts me, they know that reminds me of a time of my life that was nightmarish. They know better.

Besides that, I find myself still catering to the people of my past a bit when it comes to my personality, interests, lifestyle and life choices. Many of which, I feel, are more suited for a larger city anyway. There are still some people I spend time with and ever so subtly start feeling like that old person and it makes me want to jump in a shower...

...of fire ants

Which brings me to another point. If I move to a place full of strangers, at this point in my transition, I would simply be "she". Everyone would treat me as a cis woman and I LONG to know what that feels like. Right now I live two lives, the people that think I am a cis woman and the people that know I am not. I am a different person around both groups of people and I like everything involved in everyone thinking I'm a cis woman a lot more. Imagine never talking on the phone to someone that might accidentally call me "him" from memory. Or not being on the outside of the social dynamic because people don't know where you "fit" anymore.

As I said, I have been thinking about this for quite some time. During that time I have slowly eliminated the various things that were keeping me from this decision. One of those that is gone is giving people time to "get used to it." whatever that was about. People expect you to change your language instantly on a regularly basis, some people in my life can't be bothered with it for my sake. Another that is slowly going away is my fear of doing it. In fact, I'd say that is gone now too. And honestly, that is usually the last step for me in these big decisions.

Also, there are a handful of people that I wouldn't want to leave behind, people that I would tell where I was going and talk to while I was there. I used to feel like that was half assing it, honestly. If I'm going to vanish, then vanish 100%. This is something else I have gotten over.

The main thing currently holding me back is money and knowledge. I need to pick a spot, I need to find out costs, living arrangements, etc. It is possible I will overcome the financial situation in a reasonably short amount of time.

All of this being said, dear reader, I will keep everyone here filled in and probably won't be giving it up as part of my disappearing act.

Well, a short one today, I had to get back into the mindset, sorry if this one isn't up to par.