Forgetting yourself.

Hey there! So it’s been quite a while huh? Funny how life starts to get in the way and all of a sudden blogging becomes a low priority behind keeping food on your table and a roof over your head, behind that date you got asked out on and accepted, behind trying to work out if your feelings for this guy (who claims he has feelings for you, and is looking like throwing his marriage, which is on the rocks already, away, to be with you) are truly LOVE, or just lust based on the fact that he’s the first guy to ever pay you attention and say the right things and make you feel special, beautuful etc etc etc.

 

It’s easy to get caught up in the moment, to forget yourself and your situation, to believe that maybe it (your situation) won’t matter when the time comes, that he really DOES have feelings for you, instead of understanding that the truth is just that he’s under duress and that you look like an easy and attractive way out for him.

 

You’ve got a better heart than most people will ever understand, and so you’ve showed him care and compassion, tried to help him when everyone else was siding with his wife, and he’s read more into that than you’d ever truly intended.

 

What they don’t tell you in the “how to transition from male to female successfully” handbook, is that your pre-conceived notions that life will be simple once you’ve “corrected” your issue, that life as you’ve always known it was meant to be for you, that life when you’re finally (physically) female, are totally incorrect!

 

Life for a girl is not in any way simple, especially for a girl like you who was a late entry to the party and as such 1. Is STARTING her life in a world where everyone else’s life is well and truly underway and 2. Hasn’t had the early life all other women her age have had during which, they’ve learned to understand their feelings, thoughts and emotions and how they can lead her astray, and then make informed decisions, knowing when to ignore her emotions, her heart, and rather listen to her head and NOT screw herself, her life and the life of others, up in the long term. (that said, some women, even natal born females, are stupid and NEVER learn this)

 

Where am I headed with this?

 Not entirely sure!

 

I needed to write, to get my thoughts out on what is and has been happening in my life currently and try and get myself to be ok with making decisions (about current events) that are right for me and everyone else, but that I desperately want to ignore.

 

So the situation?

 

For the first time ever, a guy says he loves me, says he finds me attractive, says he wants to be with me.

He spends time with me, makes me feel special. He does things for me (he washed my car for me the other day, without me asking him to or knowing he was doing it, just a surprise, his way, I think, of showing he likes me)

 

He’s married, he has two daughters (one eight years old to one woman, and a one year old with his wife, who is now pregnant again in an effort to save the marriage).

 

When I met him I found out that they’d recently separated, that he didn’t want to save it.

 

I’ve come to learn that the reality of the situation is that she chose to be a stay at home mom, and so he’s off working away from home 6 days a week (to earn ends-meat for them), and when he IS home, he wants to rest, spend time with his friends, have some leisure time etc, and she’s constantly mad because he’s not home more often and when he is, he’s not helping her as much as she expects, add to that she’s insecure and thinks he’s cheating on her, and he’s pretty simply “over” it all and wants out.

 

Along comes me, young, un-attached, tall, slim, blond, down to earth, direct about what I want and am looking for, independent, understanding of him and his life (we share a profession) and I show him compassion, I take him away for a weekend to relax, he meets my family (who seem awesome) and all of a sudden, he’s trying to work out how we might make a future together, how he might be able to make it work with me.

 

His friends all know me, all talk crap openly about competing to “bed” me all think I’m attractive.

 

His best friend is my boss, and he’s apparently told the guy how he feels (or thinks he feels) about me.

I won’t lie, it feels real.

 

For the first time EVER, it feels real.

 

*I* feel “real”.

 

But then there’s the truth.

 

The truth is that he’s in a bad situation right now, and the time he spends with me makes him feel ok, the truth is that he really knows pretty much nothing about me, aside from the fact that he’s seen (with my family) how much I care and try for the people I love.

 

The me he sees right now, is not the me I do/had planned on being in 5 years.

 

He doesn’t even know me.

 

And then there’s the wild card, the thing that potentially changes EVERYTHING!

 

My birth condition.

 

He doesn’t know that, no-one in my/our current life/environment seems aware of it, but if they dig, if they’re inclined to look further than the surface….. well, let’s just say my life hasn’t progressed far enough yet, that it would be difficult for them to find out about.

 

And there’s two ways I feel about that, 1. It makes me cautious, and 2. Part of me is of the opinion that I am who I am and what they think can’t change who I am, it can/will only change what THEY think of me, but if it does, and he’s been so open about how he feels for me, if things progress further, if he puts a relationship with me before saving his marriage, before his children, and then if someone DOES dig and spread things about me, where will that leave him?

 

I suspect it will leave him ready to beat me to death, feelings or not.

 

And all because I just wanted love.

 

Life is cruel. Know that before you start.

 

Read this blog (over and over if you have to, until you begin to understand what she’s trying to convey):  helping transsexuals

 

Especially this post

 

I wouldn't say it is, or that I AM in denial, I'm well aware of myself and my situation, but it's simply something I've been failing to consider as much as I should be.

 

It is relevant

Cold hard bitch

Two in two days!!!!

Wow! I’m on fire lately.

I often wonder how much of myself I should “let out” in this blog.

Part of me knows that most that read this blog are morons looking to live a fantasy, and totally disconnected with life and their real world.

They don’t view this place and people like me as real individual people, because when they come and read these things, the form THEY take on, it’s all in their imagination it’s all part of the fantasy for them, none of it is actually real (me and the things I write here included), and quite frankly, I’d rather not write things that are deeply emotionally seated for me and my life, if it’s just going to be trivialized.

But part of me needs an outlet.

Somewhere I can express myself and the things I find myself working through in life and part of me also feels that, although (as I said in my last post) I’ve NEVER found them, there has to be someone or others out there who are going through similar things to me and would be greatly helped to know someone else is too.

So what is it today? What’s got me writing again today?

It’s something I’ve been laying here thinking about that honestly has me concerned.

I’ve had to become 100% self-reliant over that past three or four years.

When I made it clear to my parents that I needed to change sex, they simply stopped making any effort for me at all. Even before that I really had no friends I felt I could truly rely on if I needed help with anything, my parents were the only ones who ever did anything for me if I needed help, but couple that with a move to a totally new city, where I didn’t know a single person, and throw in the fact that I didn’t want to make friends with anyone (as my out-going identity) because they’d have become a liability, and the result was, anything at all in life that I needed to achieve, was solely up to me and me alone.

An example:

I’ve moved house 5 times in the last 3 years. Every time I got a trailer from somewhere and had to find a way to shift the biggest and heaviest furniture , refrigerators things like that, all on my own.

Often crying a little at the fact that my family knew what I was doing, it would’ve been reasonable for them to assume that I’d need help, but they didn’t seem to care enough to make an effort to help me. That’s just one example, there’s a million things I’ve been alone for and not just wanted but NEEDED someone to be there for and they haven’t, and each and every time I’ve died a little more inside.

Each time my heart has grown a little colder.

I didn’t matter.

It’s hardened me.

Soon I learned to stop wanting.

Stop needing.

Anything!

From anyone.

I’m not worth it to them and the last thing I wanted was to drive them further away by being a burden.

If I couldn’t find a way to do it myself and (as was the case more often than not;) I couldn’t afford to pay to get it done, then I just learned to find a way to go without.

So what is my concern here?

Girls aren’t like that.

Girls aren’t like me.

Cold.

Hardened.

Girls get looked after, they never learn to be as I have.

It’s not often they’re made to learn not to want or need anything or that it's a burden for people to love them and make effort for them, to be weary/cautious of anyone who might show signs of doing that (and on in the rare occasion they are, at least not at the point in life I was made to learn it)

It scares me. Terrifies me in fact.

I’m terrified I’ll never find a man who’s prepared to take the time to break down the wall I’ve built and look for what’s on the other side.

From the outside, I can’t say there’d appear to be many/any incentives for him doing so.

If you’re out there somewhere? I promise you if you do, I’ll do my very best to make it worth your while.

The quiet girl.... Loneliness.

It is a very natural human need to desire understanding and to want for someone who can relate to and empathise with you.

Being able to understand someone and being able to relate to them are different things entirely but both are reliant upon each other.

In order to understand someone on any level, you must first be able to relate to them through (at least SOME) common life experience, something about your life and their own that has been similar, even if you’ve not ever met each other, you must both share a common perspective on some aspectof life as you have each lived it, if you are to understand each other on some level and both get “on the same page” as it were.

Once you’ve found one way in which you can relate to someone, if you can then think outside your own personal “sphere” if you canl ook past your own experiences and contemplate different circumstances to those you’ve experienced personally and contemplate how those other circumstances may have affected you differently, shaped your personality, your perspective; differently, then soon your ability to understand others starts to grow.

There is one reason alone in this world; why one person can’t relate to someone else, one reason why there is “conflict”. It is that ONE factor, that causes most of humanity’s problems.

Ego.

Over estimation of one’s personal opinions, the value of their own personal life experiences, the importance of their own needs or any other factor they might consider personally important.

What is this post about?

This post is about a perpetual cycle I find myself in in my life.

The reason I’m still here on the internet in this arena.

The two reasons in fact.

The first is the basic human need I wrote about above. Like all humans, part of me needs someone to relate to, who can understand me, understand who I AM in essence, my nature, and (possibly) the factors of my life that have seen me become that person.

The other reason?

I try to help people.

In my own ways and ways that aren’t necessarily apparent to the people who only know and see me for what I write under the handle “Van Buren”. I do my best to help people and their families so they DON’T have to know (from personal experience) what I’ve experienced in my life.

Stupid huh?

I’m here to try and find someone who understands, but at the same, time I work towards helping people NOT have to understand.

The only people who MIGHT someday have a CHANCE at understanding me and my perspective, and I work to make it so they NEVER have to have that.

I badly need to find someone “like” me but I also don’t want anyone to ever have to end up “like” me, and that’s strange and sad to me, because I personally feel I’m a beautiful person, a person who would give just about anything for just about anyone if she thought they needed it and that it might help. A person more worthy of trust than your mother, than your father, than the person you consider to be closest to you in your life.

I guess it’s MORE important to me that people DON’T have to know what my life has been like, and the hurt from that (that has made me who Iam), than it is to find someone who DOES understand (fully) that hurt personally and can relate.

There are some people who I correspond with (and some I don’t) who I sense share SOME common experiences in relation to my motivations for having changed sex, and some of them, I sense, can relate in many ways to the struggle I endured in order to do that. But not yet have I found or corresponded with a single person who I feel truly understands the full impact my/our shared birth condition has truly had on me and my life.

Why?

In even those who come the closest, I sense a level of ego. I understand much about them and how (and) the factors of their lives (from what they recount of them) that have likely lead to them having their perspective, and I don’t judge them for that, BUT! I (personally), I have NO ego.

None at all.

I don’t truly think myself or my life story to be better or more valid than anyone else’s, however I also cannot agree that others (so far) could truly be deemed the same as mine. Their choices and actions were different to mine and part of me has to believe that is due mostly to different personal motivations for their actions.

So I face a personal dilemma.

You see, I consider myself to have been born female but transsexual, and the fact that I was born and experienced early life under those circumstances, HEAVILY influenced the decisions I made in life and the actions I was able and required to undertake.

Yet everywhere I look, I see people who also claim/consider themselves to be (born) transsexual, and the decisions they have made and the actions they were able to undertake in life, were the very same things that being born transsexual PREVENTED me from.

It’s not uncommon for people to think of or say that those who write the things I write and take the stance I take on most issues are “separatists”or think ourselves to be better "purer" or more valid than others.

Personally, it is NOT my INTENT to appear/be that way, but by life circumstance/experience and how it has shaped my perspective differently to most, it simply happens as a matter of natural progression, it is THEIR interpretation based on THEIR own insecurities, not MY intention.

So my dilemma is how and who to apply the word “Transsexual” to accurately.

To me personally, it can’t be both ways, transsexual cannot simultaneously describe two different life experiences.

IE the life experiences I have, and at the same time, the experiences of those who WERE able to do those things that I consider Transsexualism to have prevented me from doing.

It can’t possibly be both ways in my opinion.

And so that leads us back to who's experience is accurately described by that word.

If I were to say mine is and the other experience is not, I would be called a separatist, possibly an “elitist” the implication being that I think I’m better or more valid than those who DON’T share my life experiences.

So what happens then when all that is left for me to do is surrender that term so that others can use it for themselves to describe THEIR (different) life experience? Where then does that leave me? What can I use to describe my life experience to others if not that word?

The only words left that truly fit in any way and that do not conflict with the claims of others are simply woman and female.

YET! If I claim those things, if I use those to describe myself, even though they are my only remaining option, all that I have left without having to surrender and lie about my own history, then I’m told I’m in denial of who and what I REALLY am, and again, told I think I’m better or more valid than others and “elitist”.

What would people have me do?

The minute I question THEIR lived experiences, I’m disparaged and shouted down, yet they deny me the right to my own on ANY possible level and again; disparage me if I refuse to do what they themselves refuse to do (and get so up in arms about at merely the suggestion they do) and relinquish my own history/validity.

I am prepared to accept their history and still see them (mostly) as valid for/as who and what they say they are, provided they are living their life right for who and what the world and society considers what they claim they are to be , yet it is impossible for them to accept that my stated history might be the exact truth of my lived experience.

Their ego prevents them from looking outside their own square long and far enough to consider my life a possibility.

So who am I?

Who is this person no-one (it seems) can or WANTS to understand?

I don’t think myself better or more worthy of anything than any other human being on the planet, be they gay, straight, Transsexual, Transgender, "cis" or whatever else you can come up with, but I also don’t think myself to be THE SAME as all (or any) others.

I was finally forced to seek treatment for my condition in my 20’s, 100% alone and without ANY support what-so-ever.

You want to know how much better I think I am than others? How much more a woman or a female than anyone else I think I am (personally)?

I paid for my treatment by driving a truck. I worked 14 hours a day, much of it dirty hard and physical.

Hardly the epitome of what most people would consider to be a woman or female, but I needed the money and as all women would do, I did what I had to.

I was 5’11”, balding and 280lbs with the build of a brick shit-house when I started.

Better than others? You’d have to think I think so wouldn’t you?

I lived in solitude, socially isolated in life in just about every respect except my employment, for three years, not by choice but by circumstantial neccessity.

I sold everything I owned except my car in order to pay to do what I needed to do.

I’ve rebuilt my life completely from scratch, the only things that remain of old now, are my car and my job, and soon enough they will be gone too.

Better?

Do you think so?

I don't!

But who has done the same that you know of?

Different?

Can you honestly say NO(?) and believe yourself to be being honest (in every respect) about the life YOU have lived?

What can be said (acurately) about me now?

I am a twenty something year old woman, who would consider it acurate to state I was born transsexual, IF (that is) it weren’t for the fact that my life (due to that fact), has been so different to everyone else who also claims to have been born that way.

I’m a twenty something year old woman who hopes to soon find a boyfriend, love, to someday be married and a mother (somehow).

I’m a twenty something year old woman, who’s contemplating doing a degree in high school teaching because she wants badly to help kids and offer them the understanding, compassion and assistance that they each need in order to become well-adjusted young human beings (whatever form they may finally take) that never had to know the hurt she has known personally.

A young woman who desperately hopes she offers those she considers friends, that most basic of human needs that this post talks about; understanding (free of consequence).

AND! I'm a young woman who; regardless of what people might know or sense of my history or origins, refuses to explain or feel responsible for explaining to others that I AM female, that I AM a woman and/or why (no other girl has to, and niether do/should I).

My history and how I got to be who I am (although I'm in no way proud OR ashamed of any of it) is NO-ONES business but my own, what they get to have, is me at face value, and most have no problem with that at all.

In fact; many go out of their way to make an effort and help me because of who they get at face value. They see a kind, intuitive, humble and hard working young woman and recognise the rarity of that in this day and age.

Who would some people SAY (or think) I am?

Some would say I’m one of a group of “bullies”, a separatist, an “elitist”, some would say due to the perspective my life experience has given me and the opinions I express because of that, that I (and those they think are like me) would be a “classic tranny skank”. (for example)

I often wonder how many people truly assess the motives and personal issues behind their own perspectives? (before opening their mouth and voicing their opinions, even though I realize the example I've given is a response to a post from another blogger that becomes a pretty generalized attack on what the author views, perhaps incorrectly, as a certain "group")

I know that now-a-days the only affinity I have for the term “transsexual” is due to my desire for those born into (what I deem as) the same condition I was, NOT to have to suffer and be mistreated, and I see and have seen first hand the irreperable damage conflating and co-opting different motivations with that word can and DOES cause, and my experiences are NOT from 40 years ago, they are from NOW!

I also know that the more/longer I’m involved here, there more I realise that the only people I can seem to find are the egotistical ones trying to compensate for their insecurities instead of truly assessing and facing up to and working to resolve their own history and personal issues.

And the more I constantly see that, and see it conflated with me, the more hurt I feel and the less I am inclined to come here in search of fulfilling that basic human need.

Someday I’ll get smart. I’ll work out that it is simply NOThere and I’ll do myself a favour and stop coming back.

Women's Issues

I don’t feel I’m very successful at blogging anymore.

It’s been what?.... over a month since my last post, one could hardly suggest I’m consistent or regular.

I used to be….. once upon a time.

 I’ve had a few different blogs throughout my blogging “career” and all of them have come about from my desire to address individual facets of a certain topic  and how it was effecting me and my life or ways in which I’d hoped my experiences and what I’d learned, or was learning, might help or benefit others.

Some of those previous blogs managed 100-120 page views per day, which is not much by any means, but considering the stat’s I see for this blog, I think is rather remarkable.

So what has changed?

My issues in life have; my motivations and so the perspective I have on many things lately (and in life in general) has.

My blogs until now, have been focused on Transsexualism mainly.

I personally view (male to female) Transsexualism as a women’s health issue, despite what transgender (IE transvestite) men do to influence public opinion on it in an effort to exploit the treatment designed for us to the benefit of their fetish.

At my core I am and always have been female. My life history reflects that of a female minded person who has been restricted from having the things in life that the balance of the world’s female  population desire/need/seek and typically attain in/from life. What caused that/those restriction/s was not a psychological issue, but a physical one, one that I treated the best and only way I possibly could have, with medical science.

Despite what people may think due to the influences of transgender men (IE transvestites), what is in my mind is not, has not, and never will change. In essence I am female and that makes the issue I faced until now, transsexualism, a female/women’s medical issue.

So up until recently, that was the BIGGEST issue in my life and hence my main subject and the thing that influenced my perspective and everything I wrote.

 Now however, I’ve largely resolved that issue and so it bears little importance on me and my life and the woman I am, and so my issues have become relatively few and hance my posting has reduced.

That is; until I see something that inspires me, something that has the potential to benefit some women’s (including possibly my own) life.

Something like this which I saw on morning television today.

Back to needs and desires.

Something that sets (most) women apart from men (including transvestites) is the instinctive desire to bear and give birth to children.

For me it’s a very sore, complicated, and emotional subject, because I was born with a medical condition that should exclude me forever from being able to do that.

That resonates with me through so many aspects of my life. Not only is there the personal disappointment of knowing it will likely not ever happen for me EVER! and the indescribable hurt I feel at that whenever I’m made to think about it, but there is (for me and I suspect many women who face the same life circumstances due to other issues) a personal sense of guilt, (maybe) shame, of worthlessness.

It reaches far throughout my life, I question what man could love me/would want me? I’m obviously “broken”…. less than. How much good, how desirable; is a woman who can’t fulfil a major aspect of a female’s purpose in the species/world?

I feel sadness that I’ll never share the lifelong connection with the man I love that having children represents, that I’ll never give him the joy of being a biological father.

 That’s my job, my responsibility.

Or at least that’s kinda how I feel.

These things and feelings are largely self-imposed, I’m NOT complaining about society’s views here, just speaking of my own personal feelings and expectations.

I know of other girls born with the same condition I was, who also insisted on not cutting corners and who insisted on addressing functionality (during treatment) as well as “aesthetics”.

What do I mean?

Not all of the female hormones are required for the female form to develop, but some are most certainly required for things to “work” correctly. Progesterone for instance, is important for breast development and ESSENTIAL to function. The theory being that if one day it became possible for us to bear our own children, we’d need our breasts to function correctly. Progesterone however, is NOT a necessity and can have some pretty serious Side effects (Tell me that doesn’t speak of personal motivation).

So like (I think) many women, I have a hard time with the fact that I’ll likely never carry my own children, and like most of those women (I suspect), I’ve had to find a way of dealing with that.

Call it justification or a coping mechanism, whatever, it doesn’t matter, it’s not for you; it’s for my own sense of self-worth and wellbeing and how I’ve done that, is to simply decide that I was put here for a different reason to most women, that there are so many children out there in the world who, for whatever reason, need a mother to love them and look after them and I’m the woman put here to fulfil part of that need, I’m the woman who needs a child to love.

And that’s been ok, it doesn’t totally mitigate the hurt, but whilst I’ve been able to believe that, it’s been ok, bearable.

But then go and introduce that concept in the article listed and the game changes. I get to ask new questions of myself.

Part of me has to think that if successful, then combine that with future/the right advancements in mitochondrial replacement and there aren’t too many reasons I can see why I and other girls born like me might not be able to bear our own biolgiocal children soon enough.

Would I do that?

I’d want to, certainly! (very badly!)

But when I think about it, I have to think that given my current place in the world, the decision I’ve made as to my purpose, that my motivations would be very selfish.

As sad as it makes me, I don’t think I could in good conscience; for multiple reasons.

The children I talk about above being one, and another being that I honestly don’t think I could ask any other woman to give up that part of herself, regardless of whether she might be “done” with it or not.

Further, if that much science has to go into it, is it natural anyway? Is it ME? I could kid myself that maybe it is and I could just try and enjoy it for what it was and be grateful for what I was given, but that comes down to what I’d be prepared to justify to myself and what my motivations would be for doing that.

I think I’d prefer to someday have the science needed to grow my own and be more naturally capable. Then! maybe I’d feel more like it was meant for me, like it was what the world and life intended for/of me.

So as surprising and silly as it may sound, I think I’d sooner continue to live with the hurt for now and know that good can come from me somewhere else.

One thing I do know for certain; is that no matter how it is I come to be a mother, I will be the kind of mother that only a woman who has a true respect and appreciation of the role can truly be.

 

God's gifts to women

You may think this blog is about being born Transsexual.

Maybe you think it’s about establishing you are, and the how to proceed in/with treatment.

Maybe you think I’m here to help girls born with the transsexual medical condition? (To a degree yes, but)

You’d be wrong.

This blog is about living life as a woman and how I experience life as one. The things I do and have learned, in my relatively short time on this earth living the life I live.

If there is mention in my posts about Transsexualism and issues relevant to that condition (and there will likely often be) that is simply because I was born with that condition and it has shaped my outlook/perspective on life in some ways.

Some women WERE born with that condition, I am one of them. However, that is just one factor that has influenced me and how I experience life.

Many of the things in this blog are relevant to women on the whole. The blog is about WOMANHOOD (see title) not TRANSSEXUAL-HOOD, or TRANSSEXUAL BORN WOMAN-hood.

Just womanhood.

OK, So having said that; I’d like to share an aspect of life that has developed in me as I’ve grown from a girl to a young woman.

Most females are born destined to grow into and be women. They are NOT born already women, they are born girls and mature into women as they age and gain the level of life experience that their culture or society requires of them, before it considers them to be no longer a girl, but from then on, a woman.

There is no celebration, no official ceremony, womanhood just becomes apparent to the individual and those around her, as her life progresses and she matures and the title becomes relevant to her.

Society and human instinct are a wondrous, fascinating and truly magnificent machine; that for all intents and purposes, is totally invisible to 99% of the world’s (willingly oblivious) population.

"Get to the point" you say!

Ok.

There is much more that separates males and females, men and women, then simply the physical traits that make up their body. More than Chromosomes, more than genetics, more than reproductive capabilities.

Certainly, those things are all factors, however, there is an even bigger factor that is more often that not completely overlooked and/or not even recognized or understood by the bulk of society.

Sex Identity....

That which is innate in a person’s brain.

Although it is not understood by common people or even considered, every human has the instinctive ability to sense it in another person.

We don’t have to check a person’s “draws” to know where they fit in the world relative to sex, and how that aspect of them could potentially relate to us.

There are things that separate a male and a female (innate) sex identity that go further than just what genitals they are each supposed to have, and those other aspects also help us identify who is what, as they are displayed visibly to others through our actions and emotions.

If you are someone with a male (innate) sex identity; you KNOW subconsciously (and possibly also consciously), that you are, and so does everyone else. There are aspects of a female sex identity that you will never poses or attain, things that are required fundamentally, in order for others to identify you as female, and the same but opposite goes for females.

Basically, you ARE what you ARE (in the brain) and always have been, regardless of whether people have always recognised you correctly or not.

Anyway, so I want to talk about an aspect of a female sex identity that has developed in me over time, and that I think is relevant to all women and girls developing into women.

What is it?

I have come to think this thing, these “abilities” are what society uses to draw the line between girl and woman.

Each girl must learn and develop these traits in herself if she is to mature into a woman.

What are they?

Just like there are traits that men have, abilities unique to their sex (things like physical strength etc), that give them capabilities and advantages in certain aspects of life over women. Women also have their own set of abilities that are unique to THEIR sex, and that give THEM certain advantages over men in certain aspects of life.

This is often not known about, because in women, the additional abilities aren’t often as outwardly visible as they are in men.

Women have heightened senses in comparison to men.

Humans see with their eyes, hear with their ears, smell with their nose, taste with their tongue etc etc.

That is commonly understood by most, but what isn’t understood, is that as a girl develops into a woman (and in order FOR her to), she hones and increases her sensory abilities.

To grow from a girl to a woman, she must develop the ability to see not just with her eyes, but also with her ears and to hear; not just with her ears but also with her eyes.

She learns to speak and communicate not just through her voice, but also through her thoughts, her decisions and her actions.

These traits or abilities combined, are commonly referred to by some as; "female (or woman’s) intuition". They are unique to female minded people, and are an understood and subconsciously expected fundamental used by humans to Identify the female sex identity.

Often their development in a girl, corresponds with aging and fading beauty. Developing these traits becomes necessary for her in order to maintain validity and a perception in her society of worth.

IE: the beauty of youth that society once valued her for, has faded (or is fading), and if she is to maintain value to society and to a mate, (and therefore not end up alone and unloved) she needs to develop in herself other ways to be seen as valuable and purposeful

To be a girl is special, it is a gift.

To be a woman is also special, but it is not a gift, it is a responsibility.

No doubt it is Special and unique in its own ways to be a boy and then a man as well

However, I cannot talk to that subject as that is not who or what I AM, what I am becoming, or what am destined to be, just as someone with a male (innate) sex identity, might pontificate were he to attempt the same with regards to womanhood.

Sex and preference.

(please ensure you have read the previous post first)

So could you do it?.....

Did you manage to answer the question?.....

Where do you hope to be in ten years?....

How did you answer, was it something like?:

“I hope I’ll have come out, and that I’ll have started HRT?”….

Maybe you’re a little more ambitious?

Maybe you said:

“I hope I’ll have come out, I’ll have started HRT (maybe had some FFS or a “boob job”), and that I’ll be living fulltime as a woman”.

So you’ve decided you fit into the first group or category I wrote about and you want mainly social transition, and you’re Transgender?

That’s ok, if that is what you feel you need for your life to be better, then I’m all for that. You have my very best wishes and I hope for your sake that you have an easy time achieving your goal. I would just ask that you please be careful of/with yourself and considerate of others.

We all have to share the world and try and find as much happiness in life as we can and it wouldn’t be fair of you to expect others to give up their personal comfort, security, personal principles (and therefore probably their own happiness) so you can have yours and feel better about yourself. They don’t EXPECT you to sacrifice all of those things for them do they? They don’t DEMAND you BE or FEEL or BELIEVE something that you were upfront and HONEST (as in: telling the ACTUAL truth, rather than what you HOPED or WISHED was the truth) about NOT being do they? (most people I know aren’t that unreasonable, they generally only expect from you the same things you’d expect from them as aperson and in a relationship).

But maybe that isn’t your goal? Maybe that isn’t all you need?

Maybe after reading what little is here so far and all the other stuff you can find out there on the internet and everywhere else (heck! maybe you’ve even already made it that far already?), you’ve decided that those things won’t be enough and that you need to go “all the way”?

Maybe you’ve decided like many that you fit into the second group that I talk about, and that you NEED SRS, and that you know and have finally accepted the horror that IS, and that you were born; transsexual?

You have my most heart felt condolences. YOU have what (for most) is a VERY hard road ahead of you.

Most people end up losing all their money, many lose theirhouse, often people lose their job and have a great deal of difficulty finding new work that pays anywhere near what they once could have earned.

If you happen to have been one of the less fortunate (relatively speaking) who ended up married and possibly even fathered a child or a few children, then it’s probably going to hurt you terribly. I probably don’t have to tell you that most relationships don’t survive a transition. Many end in divorce with the trans person losing a great deal of assets, and ending up responsible for child support for their children, who they love beyond belief but if they’re lucky; will only get limited visitation rights too see.

If they’re unlucky, and their (former) spouse gets angry and (or) the law is strict where they reside, then there’s a very good chance those visitation rights will be supervised. If they’re VERY unlucky and the spouse gets really angry, and has evidence they’re prepared to provide to the courts that might skew things and about how they’ve managed to deal with their issues over the years of being married to make things look like they have some kind of kink or sexual fetish, then they MAY end up paying a great deal of child support for children that they love and would probably never dream of hurting but will also probably NEVER SEE AGIAIN (maybe EVER! if by the time their children are old enough to legally make their own decisions, the spouse has turned them far enough against them).

That is a truly terrible outcome for anyone to ever have to face in order to feel good or comfortable about themselves and their body.

It’s NOT unheard of though, it does happen, and as most trans people are considered by the law and (generally) society to be male until after they’ve had SRS (and in some cases even AFTER they’ve had it) the law and society generally takes a dim view of them.

The law is never on a MANS “side” is it?

How often do you hear about a husband and provider getting custardy of the children and cleaning his wife out?

Why?

Because mostly the wife is viewed as the innocent party and secondly, the wife rarely has any money or assets TO take, she’s not often the head bread winner of the household and more often than not, that is because she spends the bulk of her time looking after and raising the children (which her proven history of being able to do responsibly, will likely be used to help win the custardy battle).

I honestly don’t know what to tell you or how to advise you.There is no RIGHT or best way that will help you, sadly all I can offer is whatI’ve written for the group above that I described as transgender.

Try to be careful and take your time and think EVERYTHING through and if there’s ANY better, easier or POSSIBLE way to avoid all of this; then certainly it would be advisable to give it the best try possible wouldn’t it? Even if that means not having SRS, staying a male and just seeking the treatments set out above to try and make life bearable, or maybe even enjoyable.

If you do things that way, and are careful about how you handle things, you still find a way to take care of the responsibilities you always did before and you are discrete about things, your wife might stay with you. She might find a way (eventually) to understand who you are and she might even be able to go back to loving that person on some level or in some ways. I can’t promise she will, but if you take things slow and try to be considerate, then maybe the worst that might happen is that she doesn’t get angry and you get to see your kids and surely that would make it worth trying wouldn’t it?

Again though; you have the most heartfelt best wishes I can offer, try to remember always that we are ALL people, that we ALL need to live and breathe, that we ALL need to find a way to pay our bills and to take care of the things we are responsible for. (That’s EVERYONE not just you)

Ok, so which was it? Transsexual or Transgender?

It was transsexual right?

Well before you answer, I’d like to talk about transsexualsa little more.

I was born Transsexual.

I was raised the middle son of three children, in a very small and remote community in a part of the world where anything or anyone not considered to fit heteronormative ideals was either treated VERY poorly (regardless of age, sex or any other factors) or if the person that didn’t fit the ideals HAD come of age (as it were) they were often beaten or killed (or at least that’s what most assumed, it’s likely they were just not ever heard from or ABOUT ever again. Not even for a court proceeding).

Put simply, no matter WHAT you were, you were straight and you were the sex you were given at birth if you knew what was good for you and you wanted to survive.

I first realised I wasn’t normal (relative to what I felt was normal for me) when I was 4 years old, at a pre-school day care centre, when I watched my carer take my mother aside when she came to pick me up in the afternoon. I’d been playing with the other girls in a pile of toys and clothes heaped in the corner of the room.

From what I can remember, I didn’t go to day care very often, only every once in a while ( at that time, early on) and that was only when my mother had reason to bring me into our small community for the day. At that time, I guess she had things she needed to get done and she only had so much time around the town to do them, so it was probably easier for her to leave me with someone for the day and collect me on the way home.

Until that day I’d never really worried much about it. I only had my two siblings at home to play with (one was still only a baby so I didn’t play much with it yet and the other was older than me but kinda didn’t seem to fit) and there were heaps of kids at this place, even kids I thought were like me.

I don’t remember earlier in that day, just the afternoon, and that something bad was happening/had happened.

The carer and my mother looked pretty serious in their talk and they were watching me play, it made me worried. I knew from that day that something was wrong, but I didn’t know exactly what was wrong with me and what my problem was until a little later on (and even then I was too young to fully understand).

I remember not long later, my mother bathed us three children together, and that my baby sister had a difference I could SEE, too me and my older brother.

I gradually put things together after that and by the age of about 6 or 7 (best I can place it) I’d asked my mother if there was a way a boy could be turned into a girl. She denies (even to this day) remembering the conversation (and for a long time I was mad at her for that and for not helping me when I was a child) but that’s ok, I understand now the pressures she was under and what she’d have had to do in order to help me and in reality, she did the very best thing she could for me and my siblings.

HOWEVER, she DID give me the RIGHT answer to the question I was asking her, that; (with a different wording that I still remember)essentially yes, they could, and that surgery was involved.

From that day forward, that was what I clung to for hope and survival. In the back of my mind was a plan to fix the problem as soon as I REALLY knew how. I did my very best to get by until that time and not get hurt or killed, I basically tried mostly to make myself pretty invisible to most people in my daily life.

Oh sure, I did things as a boy to get by and to try and cope but that only ever went so far and I never really allowed myself to develop relationships ona personal level with anyone but my family. Everyone has to have a family and at least some form of love, but what is the point in developing friendships and romantic relationships when you can’t base them initially on truth and when you know that the you you’d have to maintain to keep that relationship is only a temporary person/thing anyway?

So when the time came for me to transition, I really had no friends (or very few that I knew on a meaningful level) to worry about losing.

My family on the other hand? They’d been my everything my entire human interaction was based pretty solely on them and even though I’dalways tried to be honest with them, it seems they’d never understood or could see what I was trying to show them, and so they’d grown very attached to the person I’d had to be over the years, to the point where they loved that person and what he represented to them and their own lives VERY much.

Taking him away from them hurt them VERY much, to the point where they rejected me completely and largely refused to have anything to do with me, and FLATOUT refused to help me.

By this time I’m in my early twenties and I have a formal qualification to do a (commonly low paid) menial job in a very male dominated environment in my already narrow minded town.

By my late twenties I was a post-operative transsexual born female, but if you’d asked me; the only part of that description that made adifference to me in my opinion was the FEMALE part, the rest just described my early life and circumstances.

How did I do it?

The most I will tell you is it took me four very long and hard (mentally, emotionally, spiritually, financially and lastly physically) years to finish what I would personally think of as transition.

And now we have FINALLY reached the point!

Like ALL transsexuals I’ve ever known, for me there always was A POINT there always was A GOAL to achieve, by which we defined the end of the “transition” phase of our life. HOWEVER, that goal was never the END goal of our lives or solely what we focused on.

If you ask a TRANSSEXUAL person where THEY hope they will bein ten years? I’d lay money on (almost) EVERY SINGLE ONE of them being able to give you an answer that DOESN’T involve “transition” but rather, the life they hope to have AFTER transition.

Most should be able to tell you all about their hopes and dreams becausethey’ve had their entire lifetime up until the point (at which you are asking them), to work out EXACTLY what it is they DO hope and dream for and those hopes and dreams for their life are and always have been what get them through the trauma of life up until they can start it.(in my opinion/experience)

From the moment that they become aware of what their issueis early in childhood, they learn how to handle life and the people in it. They watch and prepare for their new life from that early point and they never (or rarely) develop enough of a life as a male to give them something substantial to lose when they transition.

That’s good and bad for them. Good in the sense that nothing or little to lose means hard decisions aren’t as hard as there is mostly very little personal or emotional investment (however that has the consequence that the few things they ARE invested in, they are HEAVILY invested in and so, are harder to deal with). BAD in the sense that it is hard to verging on impossible to make something or achieve a goal when you have no real means to do so.

What that means is that very often, the price TRANSSEXUAL born women MUST pay to do what they absolutely NEED to do (in order to have ANY life at all that is worth them living) is, one of self-respect and self-degradation, as (most often) the only things of any useable value that they have are their body and the traits about it that personally sicken and disgust them.

Can you imagine that?

Four years exploiting that about yourself which you loath in order to achieve a life that is probably going to be less than what you NEED or had hoped for?

How many “Trans” blogs and people do you read about, who are prepared to do that? Who are prepared to take degradation in order to achieve what they need to?

I laugh when I hear most so called transsexuals complain about being “misgendered”

Most people think that a large part of transition is shedding “male" privilege and to that I would say, although it IS in different ways, most transsexual born women know as much degradation and misogyny as most natal born women (again, although we experience it in different ways), however, unlike natal born women, other women often don’t recognize the ways in which we do, and so we are additionally subjected to misandry to counteract any privilege (benefit) it may be perceived we have. (which is what truly DOES hurt us)

Most transsexuals I know can tell you no matter what point in “transition” that they happen to be at; what they hope for from life in a fair amount of detail and there is a VERY significant thing that almost ALL can ALSO tell you and that is; WHO they hope they will be with in the end.

I read all this crap about sex and sexual preference not being related from transgender people (and I to an extent I agree, for “trans”people), but for a transsexual (as I experience/d it), those things are a large part of what again is THE POINT of transition to them.

For a TRANSSEXUAL (the POINT of transition) is NOT solely changing their body but more importantly; the life they need to live and will be able to live (and the capabilties they need to have) AFTER they have become female (to the most extent possible forthem).

Almost ALL transsexuals I know, know about and understand and have experience many or MOST of the things I’ve written about my life here (unless they happened to be recognised and supported by family early on or when they first exposed themselves).

The first two groups I described would in my opinion BOTH be typically labelled transgender (and NOT transsexual. I never said the the second group WAS just that MOST people think it is) although their motives may seem different, they are just variations of the same thing.

I have NO advice for the last group, aside from: try to be careful and be SMART about how you do what you are going to do, and importantly, be as quiet about it as you can. (but most of them don't need my advice anyway, they will simply do whatever they can and need too)

So let me ask you again:

Which are you?

Where do you fit?

In ten years…..

So many blogs I read, so many forum posts, people write about “gender dysphoria” about “the Trans” (a new one I’ve found the young people use now, that makes it almost sound “cool” huh, like something you name in order to refer to it, a car for instance? “The STANG” or “the VETTE”, or if you’ve got high tastes “the ROLLS’”…. a sign of status, where people can understand a common abbreviation maybe?....)  and how it consumes them, how they desperately NEED F.F.S. how their body is making them “dysphoric”…. Or many other aspects; how their family won’t use the right pronouns etc. (and on it often goes without abate)

I dunno, it comes across to me as though changing their sex (however they each individually define that) is their ONLY goal in life.

You never read much about people talking about THE END of transition….. that’s something they never really talk about.

Does transition have an end?....

What is “transition” exactly?

What do YOU think it is?

Do YOU think there is an end for it?

If so, what would YOU say is the end?

I read a lot of people say they “transitioned” (insert number here) many years ago, and now they are working towards SRS. So I guess some people must define its completion as when you stop living life as your old “societally recognised” sex (which MOST people incorrectly refer to as “gender”) and start to try living your life as your new/preferred or correct (hopefully) “societally recognized” sex (IE the opposite one to which you were before and in these peoples case; still physically ARE).

Some people then; (I guess) see transition as changing how society (and in most cases, they include however many legal aspects that might be convenient to them personally, be that their legal name, and for some; they include how their sex is recognized by the legal system that is applicable to them) is technically supposed to recognise and handle them as individuals.

You see; society (the world and the people in it that we are included in as humans on a whole) has different rules for how to treat Males and females and men and women.

Those rules are there not only for convenience, but (some) are for specific reasons.

An example of a social rule based on sex that is designed for convenience, would be the pronouns we use to refer to someone. It’s easier to relay a person’s physical sex or refer to them by that sex when conversing with a third party (IE to use “him” for males and “her” for females), than it is to have to go into detail every time (and say: “the female person called Renee” or “Bob, the male person”) that just makes sense and makes language and communication easier and less confusing for everyone on whole, it’s a convenience thing.

And then there are rules that are in place for a specific reason.

Rules like those for which bathroom each sex is supposed to use.

Women are typically the female sex , they are smaller and weaker and potentially could be vulnerable to sexual attack when (necessarily) exposing themselves and confining themselves in a small space with (typically) only one escape path. Sexual (or any) attack is a serious concern for females(on a personal level AND as a group) , it can impact on them and their future, their happiness, their success and even their long term survival in life. Males aren’t typically susceptible to quite those same risks and repercussions.

So something society does as a necessity to (hopefully) ensure safety and longevity of individuals and us humans as a species is to simply separate the areas in which, each sex does their “business”. It’s an example of a rule that separates two sexes for a specific MEANINGFUL reason. (even if some people DO try to interpret alternative (fraudulent) meanings into its application to them and how they relate to the rest of society for whatever motive they may personally have).

So SOME people will say that the end of transition is when they stop using one set of social rules and start using the other set (and maybe even get away with it without backlash), and that THAT is what defines their SEX (IE that how they are supposedly societally recognised is what they would have you believe defines their innate sexual identity and that they have changed from one to the opposite).

Typically, the timing at which they make this change also correlates to the degree to which they have managed to change the external appearance of their physical body (and often also the timing of certain methods they undertake to do so). It’s common to hear that people go “fulltime” (living socially) after they have achieved what they feel are sufficient changes as a result of counter sexed hormone therapy, or after they’ve made surgical alterations to their body with breast augmentation of facial feminisation surgery.

In truth, I can claim these very things myself (relatively speaking) but I did not personally consider myself “transitioned” or that my transition was complete.

There’s another group who it seems think differently about the end of transition.

I read some places (and you might also) that people consider the end of their transition to be marked by (most often) the last thing on their list of things they need to complete (which generally includes all of the above, and the final and additional thing to this select/outlined group of people is apparently) Sex Reassignment Surgery (or SRS; just one of many names for what essentially is supposed yield the result of re-arranging the primary sex characteristics to match/resemble/mimic and function as much as possible, the opposite sex).

I guess these are the people you could say view “transition” primarily as a physical exercise, in an effort to be recognised as the opposite sex to that which they were born.

Most people would call this second group transsexual, and would say the first group is not REALLY transsexual, but rather, a group that people commonly refer to as transgender.

What I see from what I read of both groups is generally that there are two different epitaphs, generally two different ultimate goals for the groups, and generally what I also see is that the goal of each group tends to consume each individual’s (relative to which way they are inclined) life.

That end goal is what their life is about when you talk to them. It consumes everything they have. Often their money, their home, their families, even all of their worldly possessions.

Both goals take a varying amount of time and resources to achieve dependant on each individual and how they approach and attempt their goal, and what kind of means they have at the beginning, relative to possessions, education, earning power, personal attitude and a multitude of other factors.

No-one can predict their outcome and how long it will take them to achieve their goal, which is why I’ve titled this post the way I have.

It seems to me that Trans people are always living in and thinking about the here and now. Their focus is always solely on one of these two goals with a little left over to contemplate where they will get money to pay for food, or rent, or the mortgage payment, or their next dose of hormones, or whatever else it is, outside of their primary goal in life (and how they can achieve it), that demands the most of what little attention they can spare at that very moment.

You never seem to hear “trans” people talk about where they will or hope to be in ten years from now….

And from what I can tell, there seems to be two reasons for that.

1.       They don’t know if they’ll have finished their transition.

And

2.      Transition is their only goal, they don’t contemplate what life will be like after they’ve achieved what they’re trying to achieve.

So how could they possibly answer that question? And when you think about it; why would they want too? They might not like whatever answer they come up with.

So now, tell me (or don’t, just think about it for yourself maybe); where do YOU hope to be in ten years from now?