Alone

Wow. It takes THIS to make me post more than once every ten years, huh?

The house feels horribly empty. I've been spending a lot more time sitting in the same room as my parents.. just watching whatever they are. I could have seen him and pet him any time I wanted. Just go one room over and pet him a bit. I can't do that ever gain. I'll never again hear his nails clack on the wood floor outside my room in the middle of the night. No getting up to let him out before he thinks he can't get out and decides to go on the floor instead(he learned what the bathroom was for.. at least..). No wondering why he randomly pokes his head in my room at random times in the day. I think about the spot he liked to lay in.. and know I'll never find him there.

Now everyone else is asleep. I'm tired.. but I know I won't be able to sleep for a while yet. I used to like having the house to myself at night. I'm a night owl. Now I hate it. I don't want to be here alone.



Oh, this is an old ruling. One that was made early last year even. Long before he even had his ear infection. Mom decided that these were our last two dogs. No more. After they were gone that was it. She'd told me. I kind of agreed. Dogs were expensive and money was getting tighter. What if a dog got ill.. and could be saved.. but we didn't have the money? Apparently she never told dad.

He kind of freaked out about it when she told him. I woke up when a door slammed. Sounded like someone fell so I checked.. she told me what happened. He's been acting like a gigantic butt in general since mom called him at work with the news... that only made him worse. He was a lot less upset after a nap today. He must be having a hard time. I haven't seen him cry over it yet.. and i hope I don't. It's entirely selfish.. but seeing him cry always makes me break down. I can't help it.

Everything feels off. Everything. I had no idea. I never knew. I'd thought about what I'd feel like if he died before. I always came to the conclusion I would be disappointed in my lack of emotion. I never gave him enough attention. I figured our connection wasn't that great. I never knew how much I just depended on him just being there. I never knew the connection was so strong. We didn't need to play together. He didn't do that kind of thing anyway. We just needed to be near each other. That was enough for both of us. That's all either of us wanted.

Now it's like I can feel the emptiness around me.

Dead

He's dead. My dog is dead. Only twenty minutes ago(as of the start of this post) he was put down. I stayed there the whole time. I wasn't going to leave him alone in a strange room with strange people. I'd never have forgiven myself.

He wasn't well for a while, but it wasn't this bad. He's had an ear infection that just wouldn't go away. He was fine and perky with medication, but going off it made his ears spew crud. We had to battle with fleas constantly, but it wasn't too big of a deal(just required a lot of attention to keep him comfortable). He's been more inactive in recent years. Hell, I got him when I was still in daycare. He was old, but he'd never been this bad. He changed what seemed like instantly over the course of the week.. or even less. I don't even know. I was all too glad to let him just lounge if that is what made him happy.

Looking back it should have been obvious something was seriously wrong. Ear problems aside, he was being unusually lethargic the past few days. Even for him(he was never a very active dog.. even as a puppy). He wouldn't eat his dog food(hard food.. he'd eat bits of meat). He was going outside less and less. He even had a pressure sore from laying in the same spot(with all his fur we only saw it after giving him a flea bath). It just happened so fast. One moment.. lazy but happy. The next we were having to drag him outside to wash him because he was too tired to want to walk on his own. He wanted to go outside after the bath. At the time I thought he was just standing around looking at stuff.. but in retrospect.. knowing what I know now.. he was probably trying to pee but couldn't.

Renal failure. He might have been fighting it off for a while. It just FINALLY got him now. His body couldn't compensate anymore. With all his fur you'd never know(he was just one big pile of it).. but he'd lost a lot of weight in a very short space of time. Even if we had all the money in the world.. our options were nothing more than a kind of life support. He'd be constantly going to the vet to get fluids to keep him on his feet. He'd need a special diet to make sure his kidneys didn't do much work. Even with all that he'd still be lethargic and in pain. It wouldn't have been fair to him. Not at all. I did the only thing I could for him. I stayed with him every moment at the end. I made sure he could see I was there. I wasn't going to abandon him in his final moments. My mom left the room.. and I don't blame her. He was mine. I was the one that needed to stay with him. He was so scared to be at the vet.. but he was too weak to do anything this time. I couldn't do that to him.

I'd been meaning to do a portrait of him for a while. Just take a big piece of paper and draw him. I'd put it off so many times. Why didn't I do it while I had the chance? Why didn't I pay more attention to him? I shouldn't have just let him lay in his favorite corner. He loved being pet and brushed. I should have taken more opportunities to do that. I should have done more to make him comfortable.

I remember the first time I saw him. It was December.. almost my birthday. I believe school was out, but my mom and dad worked full time so I had to stay at daycare. Suddenly, mom walked into the playground. She was carrying the most adorable white fluffy puppy. American Eskimo. He had this little santa like hat on. He looked completely worn out. Turns out mom had taken the whole day off instead of working. She'd gotten him from a breeder(not a pet store.. a real breeder) then spend the day getting him his shots and all that stuff. She'd showed up around lunch.. so I got to spend the rest of the day lavishing my love on this adorable creature. It was the most wonderful birthday gift I've ever received. He was kind and loving. He liked nothing more than to lay at your feet and keep you company. That was all he ever desired.

That was very close to fourteen years ago. I hadn't even started my transition yet(gotta mention the trans thing eventually.. this is a trans blog.. right? I think it still is). We let the vet dispose of the body. There is too much out here that would decide to dig up the body.

I don't know what to do from here. I knew his time was coming soon. He was slowing down, but he was gone like that. I barely even had time to say goodbye.

Proast! Hah Hah!

(I was making this a reply to the comments to the last post.. but it got so long.. and I need to update with SOMETHING..)

My AIM is String Games, for the record.

Also, to the person above cosma, I've found out my one key skill is.. well.. perception. Mostly from a conversation with a person with aspergers(no I don't have it.. at least I don't think). They said that all aspy suffers have ONE big area of expertise. After consideration.. mine would be perception.

It makes sense with how I learn and my natural art skill. I can pick up a great amount of detail and solve lots of problems with mental shape shuffling(ranging from math to word puzzles and such). It also allows me, as you said, learn even complex activities from simply watching people do things(handy skill, really). I knew precisely how to work a car before I was ten(no.. I never drove it). I'm the quiet perceptive type. Sitting back and soaking in everything around me. You'd be surprised how much you learn just by sitting back and paying attention. I find that is the biggest problem with kids in school. Other students wanted tips from me on why I was smart. I just said I actually payed attention in class rather than goofing off. I think a lot of them were a bit upset when I couldn't give them any super secret smart tips.

I am actually very capable. I just suffer from lots of confidence issues. If I don't get something right quick then I tend to give up(I expect myself to do it right on the first few tries..).

My biggest issue is actually RETENTION over the long term. I have a lot of issues with my memory. I mean a lot a lot. Basic daily life things as well as complicated stuff. I was having an emo spill in that post. The truth is I just don't remember specific names to be able to properly communicate what I know. So I end up coming off as stupid, and I can't back up any of my arguments despite knowing the other person is full of shit.

Also, yes, sometimes I have off periods. Times when I act a certain way for reasons I don't even know. Times when things start to make less and less sense. I get distressed.. then I lash out emotionally in some way.

Hm

It has become abundantly clear that I am a gigantic idiot.

Honestly, I don't know how I ever managed looking smart. In high school I was a B student. That is with the least amount of effort I could actually manage. I never did homework. I actually missed so much school that I got in trouble with the truancy officer. I still managed As and Bs with no effort. Any school I was in wanted to skip me or put me in some sort of advanced placement.

Yet I am not actually capable of doing ANYTHING competently. Actually trying to talk to anyone about anything makes this obvious. How I see and understand things doesn't jive with.. well.. anyone I've ever encountered. This has made the world incredibly confusing and frustrating. Each day that goes by it feels like things make less and less sense. Everything is just confusing now.

There is.. no subject I am so much as competent on. I'm not a writer.. an artist.. an athlete. I'm not even a thinker. I can't actually seem to do anything on my own. I need everything explained to me. I have to be walked through everything.

I guess there isn't any real point to this post except to whine and wonder what the hell is wrong with me.

Random News

Other than trying to decide if I should keep recounting the story of my life..

I've been yo yo ing(wait.. how should that be typed?) faster than.. some type of very fast yo yo. Not the emotional type, though that is equally annoying. It's weird. I keep running it over in my head. Do I want to keep my winky or to go all the way? One week.. one seems attractive.. then the next week I feel like..

Bleh. I feel like I might as well just flip a coin. I don't feel strongly one way or the other.

Aside from that, the job search isn't going well. I don't know what it is, but no one hires despite saying they are actively hiring. I seem to be having less luck than I used to.. despite having some sort of experience to put on my resume now(well.. more like stock forms everyone uses now instead of handing in resumes.. but it collects the same info). I'm wondering if it is because I can no longer say I'll work any day of the week. I have to leave Saturdays out.. which probably seems very selfish.. or uncommitted for someone with so little job experience.

I can't help it though. Here's the funny thing about it. Dad is the one breathing down my neck about trying to get a job in this hole we moved to.. and he insisted on forcing me into a group I wanted nothing to do with. Thanks to that I have experience to put on a resume(secretary), but until they get off the ground.. I can't say I will devote all my time to another job. They won't survive without me at this point, and it will be many months(even a year if things keep going at this rate) till I can stop helping them.

I guess I could quit.. but the whole thing would fold like a house of cards. Barely enough people come to make it work. Least I could do is take an hour each month to record the meeting(apparently I'm quite good and dedicated to it despite it being easy and only taking an hour a month to do.. silly people). So now I have to keep doing this or feel horrible guilt at letting it fail, and ONE hour of each month is what stops me from saying my Saturday's are free. An employer doesn't want to hear an explanation, and I doubt they want to hear me whine about how the meeting has been moved this month and blah blah blah. Who are they going to hire? Two people with next to no experience.. one will work Saturdays.. one won't.

Of course this is all just me ranting and my best guess. I just know no one is calling about employment. There aren't that many places to apply here.. and I've been rejected before. All I can keep doing is reapplying despite knowing they don't want me. If we still lived in a big city.. lots of places to apply.

Leo and Lilly

Just a little something I wrote. Pardon the dust, but I wrote it on the spur of the moment on a forum.. so I had to paste it a section at a time. It is grouped so I could easily paste it a bit at a time.

One thing, IT IS PORN. XXX. Don't look unless over 18!

YOU ARE WARNED.

http://rapidshare.com/files/110721226/Leo_and_Lilly.txt.html

Good for most people. Amazing for people with a transformation fetish.

As I said, spur of the moment. I had already done an outline, but I skimmed some stuff on purpose. At a later date I am going to go back and brush it up.. expand some ideas.

Calling all links!

I no good at intarnets.

Seriously, I suck at finding stuff. Almost everything I know of on the net.. I was linked to by someone else.

My request is somewhat specific. I'd like links handy for trans people to have. Particularly I'm interested in good places to socialize online. It's easy to stumble over any of the basic information people need, but finding good places for online support(person to person) is a bit harder. I used to be registered to a decent forum as Cats Cradle.. but I lost the dang link in a browser update.

I dislike when I can't point others I run across toward a good community to chat with.

Many things..

Hm, only a week since my last post. Not bad considering I am recovering from what I can only describe as a nervous breakdown. In a way I am glad I still live with my parents. I can freak out in my room an no one has to be the wiser. No employer to get on my case for missing work or anything like that.

I'll just cover a few things buzzing around in my head at the moment. Hopefully I'll get back into the swing of things and keep bringing more than one post a week.




Hair hair hair. I love my hair. I've said that before right? I know I have. I'll spare the whole speech and say my hair is cut short at the moment. Horror of horrors. I remember once I nearly lost it when I found out a stylist cut it short(this was years ago) despite my instructions. Now.. it doesn't bother me so much. I collect pictures. I am a picture pack rat. At LEAST 50% of the data on my hard drive is jpeg. I do it because I am an artist. I save anything that strikes me in a certain way.. or a hairstyle I like.. or an outfit.

After a while.. I started seeing all these neat pictures of women with short hair. They looked good with it. They looked sexy. It slowly separated me from my long hair obsession. I thought about cutting it.. but getting as long as I had it took a while(even with as fast as my hair grows). I also still liked it that way.

Well, seems odd little opportunities just drop in my lap constantly. It's weird. Do I have this odd aura of luck that presents opportunities just after I consider something? My grandmother wanted me to donate my hair to cancer patients.. you know.. for wigs. I had great hair, and it would really help some people out that lost their hair to kemo. I considered it.. and.. why the hell not?

I got it shaped up after the hair was collected. Long in front.. very short in back. A style I had seen that I liked. I'm not sure if I like it or not. I'm torn(and with how fast my hair grows it's time to decide if I want to grow it out again). On the one hand it seems to emphasize the fact I look horribly young and adorable. On the other hand.. I do look good with this style. I wouldn't mind looking a bit more mature. I guess it is a grass is always greener thing. Like perhaps it wouldn't have been quite so bad to wait a bit longer to transition. Then again, it seems more like my genetics than when I transitioned. Either way, I hope whoever has my hair is happy and cancer free.




What if I was born a girl. How different would I be as a person? It's not something I can deny.. or anyone in my position can rightly deny. I'm a different woman than I would have been had I the privilege of being treated as a girl my whole life. What kind of girl would I be?

It's hard to say. I can see some possible paths that are quite likely based on real events in my life. I got involved in gymnastics fairly heavily for a time. I never really did anything except as something fun in my spare time. My parents could tell I needed some sort of outlet. A certain program fell into our laps. Gymnastics! They asked rather hesitantly if I wanted to try. They must have been surprised when I responded so enthusiastically. I liked it. I did. I stopped going to the professional gym at some point.. but I still keep in shape and limber. I could see myself diving head first if aloud to freely pick any path I desired. Miss Kitty.. gold medalist! Ok.. so not that.. but I could see myself trying to compete on a small level if my parents were willing to pay.

Though, perhaps more likely, is Miss Kitty the tomboyish geeky type. It seems like such an utterly odd twist of fate, doesn't it? A complete 180. Not a rejection of femininity, mind you. Just settling in where I'd be comfortable. Nothing filling my head over what I should or shouldn't be doing. My secret shame.. I am a huge dork. Not just because I hang out on the internet. If you've ever ran into the geek hierarchy chart.. I fit into quite a few places on there. Also, much to my shame, I enjoyed DBZ as much as I did Sailor Moon. Both dragged me into the world of anime.. both kept me glued to the TV back in the day when I had no idea what anime was. Hell, I still enjoy watching DBZ(favorite part ever is when Gohan goes nuts over android 16's death). I have a box set of uncut dubbed sailor moon sitting behind me. I just wish they'd redub Sailor Moon and give it a non suck dub. Reading is fine, but I just want to sit back and enjoy. Then there is the fact I would still be doing martial arts. Then a number of other things I can thank to my specific experiences on either side of the boy girl line. I'm also a slob by nature(though nature can be overcome).

Strange how drastically different the same person can be when you change one little thing, huh? Just that spot between the legs. Change that and suddenly my life isn't recognizable. Ok, I'd still be a geek either way(a geek in the closet is still a geek!), but my attitude toward my gender and my role and what I want to be.. I can imagine myself being drastically different. Some things are only so important because I wasn't aloud to have them once upon a time.

Then again, maybe not so different. Maybe there is an off beat, brave, loud, and openly geeky slob of a girl in me waiting to get out? Maybe things haven't improved as much as I thought. Maybe I escaped one set of expectations only to let myself fall into another? I think I'm going to make a list as soon as this post is finished. What I truly enjoy. What I only enjoy because of my struggles. What I do because I am expected to.

It's time to stop just bitching about it and examine myself in full detail. It's time for another change. Time to redefine who I am. I know I am a girl, but what else? I can't make just one jump and expect everything to work out.





One final parting thought. There is no such thing as normal. Nobody in the world can claim to be normal. The world has some strange idea that there should be some baseline everyone matches, but no matter where this line falls.. no one is on it perfectly. Everybody has some weird quirk they have to live with. Everyone has some oddity. Everyone has a little bit of crazy. Everyone has something they have to deal with.

Never think you are alone. I know it can be hard.. even impossible to get yourself to realize it.. but you aren't alone. Even if it isn't exactly the same, everyone else is going through something similar. There are parts of themselves they can't or won't deal with. Things they wish they could change. Things they think are unnatural. Things society tells them is wrong. Things they are made to feel ashamed of. Things that are part of the human condition.

There is no normal. Only a foolish and undefined ideal that makes everyone feel bad about themselves. Trying to match it is foolish... and trust me on this one.. will only leave you exhausted in the pursuit. Change what you can. Realize it is pointless to worry about what you can't change. Decide if you are happy before trying to make anyone else happy.

I'm Alright.. and Not

That is to say, I'm unhurt. I didn't do anything drastic. I've been feeling alright for the past week. I've just been relaxing and trying to sort through some things mentally. Examining my behavior.. my beliefs.. examining where my life is headed. What should I change about myself.

As usual I'm right back where I started.

Not to mention it's only a matter of time till I lose control again. No matter what I personally decide to do.. that won't change. There is no amount of willpower and chanting "I will change" that can stop that. I suppose I should explain the last post a bit. I didn't want to come right out and say it. I don't want to be one of the many people on the net self diagnosing mental illnesses and using it as an excuse to be a huge 'tard.

I've known I wasn't all there for a while now, but I don't know quite what was wrong. Doctors didn't either. The ever changing diagnoses dance got tiring so I stopped bothering. They couldn't give me anything that did help so what was the harm in saying I didn't need help anymore? Waste of money. I've been anxious about it since then though. What DO I have? I've read stuff.. medical sites.. that sort of thing. If I did come across something I could always go back and ask to be checked, right?

Well, there is an uncomfortably good chance I am bipolar. Till recently I've taken my mother's stance on the subject.

Mom> *Looking over her glasses at me.. and in the most deadly serious tone..* You are not bipolar.

It was silly, right? No way. Well, I traded stories with friends that are confirmed bipolar. Aside from the boy to girl thing.. our childhoods match up way to well. It's actually kind of creepy how similar the stories are. Practically word for word. It makes me.. uncomfortable. It isn't just the mood swings. There are other facets. I never considered myself paranoid.. or at least not delusional. Though comparing stories.. and looking back on my childhood..

Ugh. Not that I can do anything now. Money is tight. Doctors and medication are expensive as hell, and I don't want to look like a fool and say "hey I need to be checked for bipolar" and ends up I'm just being a hypochondriac.

Who am I kidding? Money IS tight, but that is just a convenient excuse. Truth is I'm scared. What if I go in and I'm right? It seems I am only right when I don't want to be right. It scares me more than I can admit.. even to myself. I try not to think about it.





So, what have I been doing all this time? Not much. Still searching for a job. Plenty of places hiring but none of them ever actually hire anyone. A gas station has had a sign out for months now. Walmart? I actually managed to get an interview once but never got a call back. I need money to continue college, dang it. Not even that. I need to get various doctor visits. Then I need to pay off my credit card(it's sort of the family work horse. We are in a situation where we can pay as much as we are spending.. with a little left over.. but not enough to pay off my parent's collected debts.. at least it's getting me one hell of a credit rating). Usually I just never get a call back. At least I have something new to put on my resume.. so that might help from here on out. Time to reapply everywhere.

Off the subject of jobs though.. if only to prevent myself from going into my usual "what is the value of going to college for an art degree? why don't I just skip the expense and get a day job like i'd have to anyway?" debate.

I did a TOTAL spazz thing. I got milk all over my PS2, and I hadn't finished God of War 1(hey.. I never got a PS2.. why not cash in on the massive library of games that are now going dirt cheap?) or even played some other games I had. I hit the glass.. and it went EVERYWHERE. I'm surprised my room doesn't smell like sour milk now. By the time I realized it was on the PS2.. it was too late to save it. The power button would go green when I pressed it.. then go red again immediately. Then I dropped it. Now something rattles inside it. I cried.

*Hangs head in shame*

Yeah. I'm a complete spazz. I don't know how I can be so graceful AND clumsy at the same time. I sneakily got another PS2. I have a 3k+ credit limit and wasn't using half.. plus plenty in my savings to cover another one. I told my mom.. AFTER I bought it. She agreed that I had too many new games to let go to waste, but the look of sheer HORROR on her face when I told her was classic. It was.. hilarious.. I almost laughed. Oh dear Lord I would pay to see that again. I think she thought it was more expensive than it was. She was relieved when I told her the price. A week's groceries. Still plenty of money, but it won't break the bank.

What else? I've been obsessing over the status of that little thing between my legs. As the result of my little episode I've been wondering if I am just fooling myself into believing I can live like this. I know some will find this offensive.. but I've been doubting my status as a girl because of it's presence. Like I used to a decade ago.. I go to bed hoping for some kind of miracle. I'll wake up and be a real girl. Pray.. despite every part of my mind saying it isn't rational to expect anything to come of it.

I had settled down. I was content to be a girl with a little something extra. It was no big deal. Then suddenly boom.. it wasn't alright. For no reason at all it was no longer alright. The trigger for the freak out had nothing to do with it, but I was suddenly wondering why I wasn't born the right way. Did I do something to deserve a punishment? Did God just hate me? Was I doing something wrong or evil in my life to deserve it? Hopefully anyone reading this now understands what I mean by my mind ripping itself apart. It was a self destructive thought process that was tearing me down from the inside out.

I still wonder if there is anything at all I can do. Is there any way I can change..? I know it's silly. I know it's stupid. No power on this earth can help me, and there is no miracle coming down(hard for me to even type that.. It's giving up all hope). Still, I won't be getting SRS. Having a penis, in and of itself, doesn't bother me. No no.. it's what I'm incapable of that gets me. No surgery.. nothing that can be done will give me what I want. Not what I really want. Yeah, having an actual vagina wouldn't be all it's cracked up to be(GG> What do you mean you WANT cramps?!), but I don't care. I want the whole experience.. even the not so fun parts. I'd suffer a lot to get it.

I wish the universe would just speak up and name its price. As irrational as it is.. I still can't give up hope that there is something out there that can help. I just don't know how to reach it. Sometimes it feels like that is the only reason I keep going.. that maybe.. one day.. the impossible won't be so impossible.



That's pretty much how my time since my last post has been. A flood of confusion and doubt when I had just become certain of my path in life.. only to feel like I've gone nowhere due to my inability to change what I feel is wrong.

Random thought: The episode of Camp Lazlo where they try to catch a snipe was on while I wrote the last part of this. I remember that gag in scouts. The more experienced scouts and leaders tried to play that trick on us. I caught on immediately(Too smart for my own good sometimes.. sometimes), but I decided to play along anyway. Those in on the gag were grateful I decided to keep my mouth shut.

*Point*

Look! There it is! A snipe!

*Contains laughter as friends rush to find it*

Losing My Grip

It's getting worse.

No, that isn't right. The freak outs and breakdowns aren't getting worse. I'm losing my ability to deal with it. I'm already over the cliff's edge. I'm hanging on by my finger tips, and my fingers are worn out. I look down.. and can't seem to see the bottom.

It's wearing me out. The ups and downs. Even the ultra happy highs are wearing on me because the rush of uncontrollable energy will inevitably leave me wasted just in time to do something constructive. Then there is the fact that the ultra highs come with the ultra lows. The bizarre freak outs and breakdowns. When they actually come, there is nothing I can do. It has to run it's course. Nothing anyone has done has ever changed this. That is just the way my life is. Either irritatingly happy and full of energy.. nothing able to keep me down.. or an inconsolable wreck of a human being.

This time it was bad. After a brief flash of blinding anger.. I lost it. With nothing to take out my rage on I broke down. My mind tore itself apart as I paced about. Then I was an unmoving heap on the floor.

I don't know. I don't know. This was my chant. I had no idea what I was doing anymore. What I should do. What I should think.

Logically.. I knew I could move.. but I was unable to summon the willpower to do more than twitch a little. I'm not sure how long I stayed like that, but I eventually lifted myself into bed(luckily I "chose" to shut down right there) and curled in a ball. I cleared my head and batted away any thought before it was finished forming.. trying to save myself from my own mind.

Nothing.. nothing.. just think about nothing. That is how I saved myself. I imagine myself in a little bubble all curled up. Nothing in it but me. Just me. Nothing else. No thought. No sound. Just me.

It's the first time I took such strange steps to keep myself under control. I've had episodes before, but that was the first time I ever felt like my mind was just.. unraveling. I think the roller coaster has just worn me out. What I wouldn't give to be calm. Not happy.. not sad.. just calm. Mellow. Not a zombie, mind you. Just.. calm.

Just a normal calm girl. What wouldn't I give? Nothing. I'd do damn near anything for it.

Fashion Sense.. or lack thereof.

I have a bit of a confession to make..

Despite how utterly awesome I may appear to be, I am not hip. I am not with it. I'm not a cool cat. I'm not the paragon of.. uh..

Damn, I ran out of phrases.

I know! Seems impossible right? I am utterly perfect in every way.. how can it be true? Calm down, loyal subjects, for I will tell you what is going on. As you should all know by now, I started to transition in middle school. We've also established I wasn't aloud to just show up as a girl one day. That was asking for trouble. I (unhappily) agreed with my mother on that point.

I guess you could say I just got used to it. Initially, my choice in clothing was influenced by pure necessity. At first it was no big deal. Aside from wearing anything that screamed, "only girls wear this!" I was OK. In what seemed like no time at all, I was having to be careful about what I wore. I couldn't wear this shirt or that shirt unless I wanted to be known as the boy with breasts(and the figure to match). Loose tops.. or tops too big for me. Pants and shorts were less of an issue.. at least in what I could get away with wearing. I had to be more careful about what I bought to make sure I got something that would go over my fat butt. So tops that didn't fit and pants that did.

Probably.. yeah.. probably a bit of an 80s look going on.

I got used to it. By the time I could go full on I ended up not changing it. I added more items I wasn't aloud(skirts, hose, so on), but I stuck to the overall look. I developed a fondness for it. I used to want so badly to dress in the typical outfits for girls my age. By the time I was aloud I didn't think of switching. Sure I changed it up now and then, but I liked the look I had accidentally developed.

THE SHAME.

Though I hear the 80's look is coming back...

Though perhaps my efforts were for naught. It was pretty damn obvious by the end of middle school. My face, in particular, probably gave me away all too easily. Aside from normal effects of hormones, I have naturally full lips. My cheeks are pretty muscular.. making them fuller(I found out I wasn't normal in that regard when a dentist remarked how hard it was to work on me because of my cheek muscle). Overall I have a young face. I got comments on it plenty of times. Also..

"..Are you a girl..?"

That got asked plenty before I was done with middle school. The first time this got asked I stared at the person for a long moment(I must have looked absolutely startled).. then answered, "What do you think?" People around me would confirm my boy name and friends would confirm the identity.

Though perhaps it wasn't pointless. At least that way there was enough confusion over what was going on for me to be left unmolested.

At least I can pull the look off. I'm damn cute..

New Scouts For A New Age

I was in boys scouts since the 1st grade. If I recall correctly, you are called a Tiger Scout then. Only a wee cub scout. It was a good source of companionship for me. I think that is the only reason my mother kept me in it for as long as she did. It was fun at first.. but it turned creepy new age after a while. Not to mention a bunch of administrative BS sucked out all the life from it.

It was useful while it lasted though. Some of my only friends came from there. As scouts we were all on the same team. None of the typical childhood crap where kids single people out for random stupid things. If I had to do it all again.. I would enroll in scouts again for this simple fact. All things said and done, I had friends if nothing else. It was a necessary lifeline.. even if I never did learn anything useful(seriously.. the whole thing is a bit of a joke).

Things became particularly difficult when I started to transition. At first I didn't say anything. I knew it wouldn't be a wise idea sooner or later, and I didn't particularly like scouts. None of the activities appealed to me. At the time, scouts was nothing more than an annoyance I had to put up with from time to time. Something I was forced to waste my valuable free time on. As much as I disliked playing baseball.. I would have preferred to start doing that again than be in scouts.

What would I rather have done? Martial arts lessons. I wanted to do that for as long as I could remember, but the answer was always no. I'd have loved to start gymnastics again. I liked it a lot, and I was SO jealous of the leotards of the girls. I wanted so badly to wear one during classes. I was even good at gymnastics.

The last trip was absolutely awful. Camping.. for the better part of a week. It was near the end of my time in middle school. By then I was developing noticeably. A uniform too big for me took care of most of it, but you could still tell(especially since I hadn't grown into a big strapping lad like everyone else..). The ultimate test for passing is being able to go out in a sack and still passing. Blessing and a curse at that point in my life. Not like I had a choice. For some reason my mother wouldn't take me out of scouts.

Bad. Any kid not in my troop treated me like shit. The scout leaders.. anyone in a position of authority.. and kids not in my troop. This is very bad because... who do you turn to? No one in charge did anything to stop shit from happening. Worse. I got pushed relentlessly. No pity. If I fell behind? I got left behind(the only person this happened for..). The only thing that made this bearable was this one really cool guy there. Very tall, and he would sometimes stop and wait for me to catch up. He'd chat for a bit.. then speed on ahead. He was the most physically capable of anyone there, but he didn't care about staying ahead or impressing anyone. He was the only one I didn't already know that was nice to me. He was cute too.

*Dreamy sigh*

..Uh.. anyway.. Worst. Showers each night were.. open. There were stalls, but no doors. You had to take a shower. No choice. Everyone showered at the same time. I got around this by going to the bathroom with my stuff.. then hiding in the woods for a long time. Lots of deodorant. I didn't get caught either.. thank goodness. That would have been a disaster of epic proportions. I thought about huddling as far in the stall as I could and never facing the other way even a moment.. but. that idea was cast out the moment I stared at the array of weenies. I got out of there FAST.

I didn't have a single fun moment. There was even a ceremony for those going to the next level. Guess what? An "administrative error" that my leader outright refused to correct lead to me being a badge short of it. I got to sit in the dirt next to the bleachers the audience(parents) were in.

Goody goody gumdrops!

It was freezing that night too, but I am kind of glad I wasn't in it. The ceremony was.. utterly creepy and new age. The experiences on this trip were the last straw. Only one person in my whole group of friends continued scouts. Apparently we had all been treated like garbage. We didn't stay the whole time even. We left half way through. Everyone agreed.. NEVER AGAIN.

Honestly, I think they picked it up.. even if they didn't fully understand what was going on. I had overstayed my welcome by a long shot. I don't think the boy scouts approved of their scouts having long hair and tits.

Do Re Mi

I was such a big girl. Had it all figured out. No more confusion for me!

Right.

I do miss one thing from Middle School. Choir. I was good at it. Very good. Of course the teacher was amazing as well. She single handedly revived the school's boy's choir and got us awards.

Yeah, boys choir.

It was fun.. lots of work.. but I honestly had fun. I was good at it, but I couldn't solo for crap because of confidence issues. We had to work on a song in our own time for a big test. I think it was a midterm.. I forget. Well, on the day, staring at the camera and the teacher, I froze. My mouth opened and a little squeak came out. I promptly walked out of the room we were recording in and went back to my place. I could see the disappointment on her face. She knew I was good. I knew I was good. I just couldn't.. I panicked.

That one regret aside, I had fun. I was horribly shy about every performance, but I still enjoyed every moment somewhere deeeep inside. It was actually a blessing in disguise that I was in boys choir. The girl's was JAM PACKED. We barely had enough kids for a choir for the boys, but the girls had many more kids than one teacher is normally aloud. We got lots of individual attention. I could go on and on. Some of my more favorite performances. Just how AWESOME of a teacher we had(and a well known one at that), but I guess it is time to get to the point. I had to stand next to these other guys day after day. All of us slowly growing. Perfect chance to constantly compare myself to the others. They all changed so.. fast. It was irritating!

Yeah, I was jealous. For some odd reason I was jealous.

I felt like I was stuck in slow mo. Then there came the time that we(or rather, everyone else) was growing up enough to warrant splitting us into tenors and baritones. After lots of voice cracking (to the great frustration of our teacher) she got a voice range on us. Now, she had done this before when we first started to get an idea of what we were capable of, but it had to be done again. One by one we sung a simple song and got put on one side or the other. Then it came to me.

Tenor.

It was a strange feeling of disappointment. Like I didn't live up to some expectation of every boy. My voice was girly! Then I had a strange revelation. This was a good thing. I was on hormones. I didn't WANT my voice to get deeper. I should have been proud to be a tenor. The duality continued to kick my butt for a while though. I didn't want a deep voice, but all the guys around me got bigger.. got deeper voices. It was intimidating. At first it was only three on the baritone side. Then four. Then the tenor side was almost gone. At least we had much more people the next year.. so both sides had enough.

I do have one interesting story I got out of this. Eventually we participated in a performance where we had to sing with the girls at the same time. Same song. We prepared and prepared. This is how it would be if we went on to high school. Our teacher wanted us used to performing with the girls. I was having.. trouble. With only a few more practice sessions left, I was instructed to do something I'd never have expected. My teacher took me aside and told me I wasn't hitting the lower notes in the tenor range. I'd have to sing the girl parts(which were the same as the tenors except for a few parts where tenors went low). So yeah.. that was fun. I liked that. I couldn't make it as a baritone.. much less a tenor. Even THAT was too low for me. I was dragged aside.. probably because she didn't want to embarrass me in front of the guys. It WAS my last year in middle school though.. so maybe she caught on. By then it was.. how shall I say.. painfully obvious?

Either way.. fun stuff.

We interupt this broadcast...

Before I bring you more story on Monday(I have the next two already written... thinking of mon through fri and taking weekends off), I thought I'd share some random stories of trauma.

Still middle school for all these.

I have no clue what was going through my head at the time. My thoughts were just wandering through home room one day. Sitting at my desk.. staring nothing in particular. Suddenly.. tears. A flood of them. No reason at all. Suddenly everyone in the ENTIRE class was staring at me. The weird kid was crying again.. and this time no one even did anything. The teacher asked what was wrong.. did I want to go to the nurse? In my haste I grabbed onto the most recent(but still years old) big tragedy in my life. My grandfather died. Yeah, I had already processed and gotten over it, but who was I to not take advantage of my quick thinking and devious mind(I'm a better liar and fiend than I'd like to be.. much better)?

Sigh.. humiliating. I got called a crybaby enough before my transition. I cried at the drop of a hat. I didn't need that.

Then there was the time I got a bloody nose for sticking up for myself. I got routinely shoved around as if I wasn't present. I didn't matter.. I wasn't there. Well, one time I decided I had enough and said something. Rather, I shoved the jerk back then said something. POP.. bloody nose.

At least it stopped after busting some heads(ok.. so I lost it.. can you blame me?).. though most noticeably after chasing some squirt(smaller than ME.. seriously!) down the entire length of the school.. screaming for his head. The main hall was longer than a football field too.

I should have totally tried out for track..

In the Beginning

There was naught but darkness. Then God put up a disco ball and had a wild drunken party.

So here is where we start to slow down. We leave childhood behind. I'm officially a teenager. One with veins pumped full of estrogen no less. The estrogen was quite a good feeling at that. Calming.. like it belonged. Delicious, delicious estrogen. I'm not sure I would be sane without it. Ok, so I'm not sane, but I would be even less sane.

Of course it wasn't just happily ever after. There was a whole mountain of things I hadn't considered. I was very anxious to dive head first.. damn the torpedoes. I could have easily passed as an underdeveloped girl with my hair grown out. Luckily my mom had her head on her shoulders. She wouldn't buy me anything unless more time had passed. When I was ready to go full on girl. I'd be going gender neutral as much as possible.. wither I liked it or not.

I was heart broken. So close yet so far. To come all that way only to face setback. I knew just showing up at school as a girl was a bad idea, but I was still upset. Only a matter of time though. Only a matter of time. Still, it wasn't all bad. I was aloud to start growing my hair out, and I was never going to have to suffer a regular male puberty.

Still, it was only delaying the inevitable. D-day would come no matter what I did. I'd reach the point where I couldn't hide behind anything clothing choice. Questions would be asked, and the immaturity of the average middle schooler would kick in. I could only fly under the radar for so long. Though the further away that was the better. Eventually I came to terms with this. As much as I wanted it.. I didn't need to put myself in front of the firing squad. School wasn't going to last my whole life. The longer I could hold out the less I had to suffer.

I didn't have to go totally without though. I was able to get away with not getting a haircut. My hair grew like a WEED too. It always has. In no time I was deflecting questions about my hair. I was letting it grow? Why? No one teased me over it, thankfully. I simply said it was something I wanted to try. No one pushed me more than that. Though, I was getting a little annoyed after the millionth time of asking. No one teased me, but EVERYONE asked sooner or later. The few compliments I got were nice though. I don't think they realized how good that felt either. People liked my hair long. It looked good.. it suited me.

Stimpy> JOOOOOY!
Ren> *Whap* Quiet you fool!

At times I could tell myself I already looked like a girl.. or could pass for one easily if everyone didn't already know me as a boy. That helped me a lot, and I fantasized just that all the time. I was already there.. I just wasn't the type of girl to go super girly. I did enjoy the simple act of pretending I was just another girl in class. One would be amazed at how much expectation goes into the perception of how you look. It's easier to fool people into thinking you are another gender if no one knows better. They'll take it at face value. They'll unknowingly overlook the proof staring them in the face. It's actually kind of strange how much overlap their can be in the genders in this respect. I notice it all the time(I unknowingly trained myself in this while obsessing over my own looks.. if you look up Vanity my picture should be right there). Real men with less than manly features that no one notices. Beautiful women that, if you focus on the right features, could be men in drag!

What you expect alters what you see. I probably could have pulled it off, but it would have been a nightmare. The reactions. The paperwork. The paperwork. Did I mention the paperwork?

Coming out..

Angst angst angst.

Yeah, we are skipping ahead a lot for now, but again there isn't much to say. I did a lot of worrying about coming out. I was on the verge of telling my mom so many times. I mean I could feel the words forming in my mouth, but I could never do it under my own power. I knew how my parents would feel. My mother's feelings came out on the subject because of a day time talk show. Yeah, my teen is a transsexual or something like that. She.. didn't approve.. to put it mildly.

So how did it happen? I'm only 22 now, and I am already as feminine as I'm getting.

Well, somehow or another I landed in the one place I needed to be for this. My regular doctor made me take a survey, and I showed some clear signs of depression. So off to the crazy person's doctor to get my head checked. It was your ordinary first appointment. Just go in and give a basic rundown of what was happening and how I thought. The guy had probably done it a million times. He just had to ask that question though.

"Have you ever contemplated suicide?"

It broke my brain. Up until that moment I was calmly, if very timidly, giving my answers. I became absolutely hysterical. The tears wouldn't stop. I said yes, I had, as coherently as I could manage while bawling my eyes out. I didn't stop there. I told him everything.

Everything.

My mouth was running itself. I couldn't stop. My mom had been sitting in(me not even being a teenager yet.. I was nervous about seeing him alone). Imagine her shock when it all came out. I not only hated being a boy as intensely as I was capable of, it contributed to an attempt to take my own life that she had never been aware of. I don't really remember what she was doing. I wasn't able to pay attention to much that was around me. I imagine she was absolutely terrified. I'm my parent's only child.. and a miracle of science at that. They shouldn't have had me, and they could have lost me without ever knowing something was wrong. Sure, I was naturally a shy little thing, but that? I can say now I am genuinely sorry I did that to her. I'm starting to cry just thinking about putting her through that kind of thing.

So, yeah, I was an absolute mess. I had to be brought in again for more evaluation. They had to be doubly sure what this was. Most people came out when they are already living alone. A child that knew this about them self.. and one that was that mature and self-aware.. was unusual. It was more than slightly nerve wracking. I had no idea what I would do if the hammer came down and they said no.. I didn't really want to be a girl. That I could never have my dream.

My parents handled it marvelously. I'd guess the prospect of losing your only child was scary. I know parents of trans children feel like they are losing a child and gaining another, but my parents faced the possibility I could kill myself. They weren't losing a child. They were saving one. My mother felt like that at least. My father I don't know quite so well, but I imagine mother put her foot down with him while I wasn't around(yeah, who wore the pants in the family?). I just know they never rejected my decision in the open. Now that the rush is over.. I have the strong desire to ask them what was going through their minds. I know they love and accept me. I don't need to know that. I just want to know what went unsaid. I know they must have bit their tongues hard.. for my sake.

Now, it wasn't quite that easy. I did have to do a lot of hoop jumping before I got any sort of treatment(namely visit after visit to talk about stuff), and even then they didn't just hand me a bottle of estrogen. I was still fairly young. However, I did manage to get a medication to hold back the puberty beast. I'd prevent me from feeling any effects from testosterone should it decide to go to town on my body. It gave me more time to be sure of what I was doing.. and let me get into a more safe range for beginning treatment.

I was going to make this my next post, but it would have been too short for me to be satisfied with. I didn't have to wait long to start more. Every day waiting felt like an eternity at the time, but in retrospect I was on the real deal pretty quickly. I was always worried they'd say no.. or I suddenly wouldn't be aloud. Any thing that I could think of to come between me and being a girl.

By now I was in Junior High.. or Middle school. The name got changed from Junior to Middle in 8th grade. I was overjoyed when I finally got to start. I was giddy with excitement from the moment I got the ok. Containing myself in school was a chore. I was doing it.. I was going to be a girl! It was very odd because it was near my birthday. It was like a birthday present. I went in a child.. and came out a teenage girl... well almost. It was a very good birthday gift at any rate.

Now, obviously I am a standout case in many respects. I got help very early, but it doesn't end there. I hit the genetic jackpot. I'm naturally short and shrimpy. I think 5'3'' is even short for a girl these days. I'm not sure it stops there though. Kids here bloom early.. boys and girls(something's in the water! AHH!). Certain.. uh.. goings on downstairs make me think I was already being clawed at by puberty. I was getting signs before I was ten, actually(though barely before then). I probably should have been further along than I was. Girls were already looking like girls and boys like boys pretty quick. I was behind.. maybe even a little girly already.

Now.. I could have been a late bloomer.. but the specifics make me suspicious of a condition I have heard of recently. A friend of mine actually has it. It's an insensitivity to male hormones and an overproduction of female ones. I honestly wouldn't be surprised. I'm already a pile of various medical conditions.. mental and physical. What is one more? At least that one helped me. Not that it matters anymore, but I do have a natural curiosity.

It's all pretty unbelievable. Even to me. Not to mention downright unfair. It's like the perfect storm... or something. No one should have to put up with two puberties.

A Godsend

AOL 3.0. That was my first internet experience. I don't remember quite how I convinced my mother to get the internet, but one of friends was on it. That meant I had to have it too. He helped me set up my account and helped me set up my first name. In no time at all I was exposed to the wonders of the internet.

I experienced many things.. including all too easy to obtain porn.. and role playing. Both of which I still enjoy.

*Cough*

I don't remember how it happened. I think I was searching for porn.. or maybe not. Though that is the most likely scenario. I had become interested in the phenomenon of "chicks with dicks" and "shemales". I honestly don't remember. I just remember seeing the link that would change my life. It was an online diary. One now famous in the trans community. It was the story of a man that had become a woman. It recounted every detail of his childhood right up to the day. He was more than twice my age when he started transition. I was enthralled by this person's story. I remember exactly how my heart felt like it was going to pop out of my chest. The way my jaw was slightly slack while I read it. How I felt short of breath no matter how much I breathed. The amazing revelation that washed over my being.

This was me.

Every feeling described. Every desire expressed. Every hope, every dream, and every sorrow. I shared them all. I suddenly knew what I was. I knew what could be done. I knew there was hope. It was like part of me was suddenly complete. I was a transsexual. That was the name for it, and I could be a girl. It was almost like a guide of how to go about getting what I wanted. I was stuck to my computer screen. My every free moment from then on was spent reading this diary. Finding out about this person that was so like me and had achieved everything I had ever wanted.

Pure joy. That's what it was. At least for a short time. I remember the pictures. One was of her in a swimsuit. It was an amazing picture. You never would have known. This person was a woman in every way. A pretty face.. curves.. even hips. If this person achieved so much so late in life.. there was certainly hope for me while I was still so young.

My life would never be the same again.



Ok, so that was a bit too dramatic, yes? It really did change my life. It's a feeling I can't quite describe, but it is one I will never forget. I remember the strange sensation in my skin. A moment of perfect clarity. Like a secret of the universe decided to reveal itself to me. It was the beginning of the end of my life as a boy, I guess you could say.

After this I scoured the internet. I looked up everything I could on this. Hormones.. their effects.. what to expect. What procedures could be done. I even found a few things on how to pass easier(though they wouldn't be useful for a few more years). I told myself I'd do it. I wouldn't be like all these other people that waited so long to come out. I was terrified by puberty.

A horrible stereotype

By horrible I mean that I did the overly stereotypical things for a gender confused boy. This fast forwards a bit.. closer to puberty... but not quite. Dangerously close to when I finally came out. I started to become more and more aware of what was in store for me and girls. Of course that meant being a girl became more important to me. I was nearing what felt like a point of no return.

I didn't do anything spectacularly different from the norm. Like any other boy in my position, I did the one thing I could think of to help ease my desire to be a girl. I snitched my mom's things from time to time and dressed up.

For the longest time I had one of her sports bras. I used that because it fit more easily than anything else(it stretched!). A sports bra was also easier to pad to my desire than a typical bra. My mother is quite.. endowed. Filling up normal cups would have looked ridiculous. Alright, more ridiculous than a little boy wearing a stuffed sports bra. I'd fill it up a bit and posed in front of a mirror. I'd do this a lot. Whenever I was left alone? I'd take it out of where I hid it and put it on. Late at night when I was the only one awake? I'd take the chance that I wouldn't be disturbed. Being at separate ends of the house helped this(it was a big house.. one floor but lots of space). It was fun, I admit. I wanted to grow my own pair one day. A few times I even wore it.. the whole day. I'd wear a nice loose shirt over it. One that had a tight collar too. It was.. thrilling. I was so happy. Doing it felt natural.. like I should have been doing it. At the time I wished I had the nerve to do it all the time.. maybe even wear it to school(though I never did). I never got caught. My mother still doesn't know I ever did that.

While I was posing in front of the mirror, I participated in another overly stereotypical activity. This one started further away from puberty, but I still didn't start it till I was closing in. I'd take a towel and put it over my head as if it were long hair. It was shamefully silly, but I couldn't resist.

So picture it. A prepubescent boy standing in the bathroom in a padded sports bra wearing a towel on his head. It actually makes me laugh thinking back. It was.. just.. absurd. A few times I even took the chance to add mascara and lipstick. She knew about that simply from how her makeup was moved, but I think she chalked it up to normal curiosity over mother's girly stuff.

There was once, and only once, that I got brave enough to take an entire dress. I put it on and stuffed up the bosom. Hold your breath because you might not believe what I did next. I walked around the entire house. OUTSIDE. It was the dead of night so no one saw me, but I nearly died from the anxiety. I was trying to prove something to myself that night. I could do it. I could be a girl if I tried. It was a test of sorts. If I couldn't muster up the strength to walk outside with that on and risk being caught, I'd never be a girl.

But I did, and look at where I am now.

Thus we leave my early childhood behind. All that could be said has been. It was an uneventful time.. at least concerning my identity as a girl. I could relate stories of how I was picked on all day because other kids could sense I wasn't normal, but that is unnecessary. I was only young enough to understand I wanted to be a girl. I didn't know how to go about it. I didn't know what, exactly, was wrong with me. I couldn't do anything but dream the sweet dreams.

More Than Two Choices

If you haven't read the previous post then please do so now. It contains an important point I wanted to get across before saying this. I didn't want the messages to get confused.

Male or female. For most it is one or the other, but it isn't that simple. It'd be nice if it were, wouldn't it? It's more of a sliding scale of sorts. There are manly men... not so manly men. Women that act like men. Of course then you get into the women that have become men, and the men that have become women. Even if you don't decide to grow a pair of boobs(or get them removed) you probably don't fit perfectly on either end. Barriers have continued to degrade over the decades. The lines become less and less clear. Traditional roles have all but disappeared. We're reaching the point where we can't really say what a man or woman should be. The old stereotypes can get downright offensive in this day and age.

I am WOMAN. Hear me ROAR. That was the gist of the previous post. I am a woman. No matter what you think of my choice, treat me as a woman. That is the only thing I ask. That is all I want. To be one of the girls. I might have the wrong thing between my legs, but I am still like any other woman. Well, not quite. It's a complicated issue. I'm not like any other woman. I talk the talk. I walk the walk, but I am still not quite like any other girl. My experiences are unique. Anyone happy with their gender wouldn't understand what I went through.. just as I couldn't understand being happy with how I was made. I'm a strange mix of man and woman. I'm something different altogether.

I actually.. kind of like it. Don't get me wrong. I don't regret my path till now. It was hard, but I'd do it all again. I like where I am. I like how I am treated like any other woman. I wouldn't have it any other way. I hated having to struggle to fill the male role. I hated having to pretend. I hated not living up to expectations of me. It was horrible. I wouldn't wish it on anyone. Still, over time I've become attached to the idea of being a chick with a little something extra. When I started I thought I would go all the way. I'd get it cut off and a hole put in its place, but I've found that I am enjoying where I am now. Rather than striving and struggling to fit the perfect female image.. I've managed to find some place in the middle that I am comfortable being at. Much more woman than man, but still not all the way. I'm a strange and unique creature, and that suits me just fine. I'm not the only one either. More and more find more comfort in dancing in the middle rather than off to one side.

You don't have to change anything about yourself physically. You merely need to stop hiding your own quirks. Don't be afraid to walk down that doll isle. Won't you join me in the fun? Dancing in that strange land in between. Enjoying the fine line that separates the two.

Then again, everyone has something that makes them unique. Not every girl is the same. Not every man is the same. Maybe this is just what makes me special?

Gender and Sex

There is a difference between the two.

Sex is only what is between the legs. No more. No less. Gender has more to do with the person as a whole. It is not only the attitude and the mind of the person, but it is also secondary sexual characteristics(such as breasts). The body as a whole as well as the mind.

Take me. I look like a woman. I talk like a woman. I think like a woman. I expect to be, and enjoy being, treated as a woman. My head's always been wired up female. I am female in every way that matters. I am a woman now. I just happen to have the wrong thing jammed between my legs. Female in mind and body. Just with something extra.

Consider it like this. You have a being that is indistinguishable from a woman in every aspect except one. This being thinks, talks, walks, and looks like a woman. You'd call this being a woman, right? That would be the appropriate way to treat this being. You don't have to find her sexually appealing, but it is a woman.

It's something I still struggle with from time to time. I have no intention of undergoing sex reassignment surgery. The satisfaction I would gain doesn't outweigh the risks. There is every chance I would end up with nothing at all for the pain and expense. I don't hate my own dick so much that I would risk ending up with one non functioning hole. Worse things could happen too, and I can't reverse the decision. I look like a woman, and I am treated like one. Those are my two greatest desires. Having a hole to stick things in is low on the list of priorities. In the end that is all it is. A hole to cram things in. It isn't the be all or end all of womanhood. It's the least important thing.

Still, there are those that do not like my lifestyle, and even those in the trans community itself, that would use this fact to denounce any right I have to being treated in the way that I want and rip my claim to womanhood from my grasp. The first group I can understand. They don't like it.. or it scares them. They'll use any excuse they can find to call me wrong. The ones I really don't get though.. the ones I don't get are the trans elite. The ones that undergo SRS and do an about face and denounce anyone that doesn't do the exactly what they did. You aren't really a woman unless you have some random hole in your body. I don't get them. I won't say all do this.. or even most.. but they are there. I can ignore the folks that just refuse to learn about things and instead shun anything different. We all have to deal with that type in life, but that is just.. a betrayal. It hurts coming from anyone, but that hurts more.

Then there are those that say I can't give birth. That is what makes a vagina so important to womanhood. The ability to give birth. Even surgery can't give me that. Oh really? Is that the be all end all? There are many women unable to give birth for one reason or another, and many that choose not to. Does this make any of them men..? Does it make them lesser women? Of course not.

Yeah, my sex is male, but my gender is female. I am a woman. You don't have to like my choice. You don't have to find the prospect of a girl with a dick sexually exciting, but I am a woman. All I ask is to be treated as one.

Beware, emotional content!

Well.. after struggling with blogger to actually recognize that yes.. my email does actually exist..

I figure it would help people that don't live with this sort of thing if I elaborated what was going through my head way back when.

It is probably hard.. or even impossible.. for someone on the other side to understand what it is like to hate your own body. Well, I wouldn't describe it as hate. At least not back then. I barely even understood the differences between boys and girls. I just knew there were, and I wanted nothing more than to be a girl.

Before the age of ten it was just feeling out of place. Physically there isn't much of a difference between a little boy and a little girl, but they get treated vastly different. I disliked being treated like a boy. Being naturally sensitive(read crybaby) was made even harder by the expectation that I should be able to take anything childhood threw at me without batting an eye. I couldn't, and I hated it. I wanted to be in a dress. I wanted to play the girl games. I wanted to do the things little girls did. I knew I wasn't aloud though. It was taboo for a boy to do that. I could play with the boys, but I didn't want to. Even ASKING if I could play with the girls brought much ridicule, and the boys could tell I did't fit in. It was a very lonely feeling. I had no place to belong. That might be a good way of putting it. It's like feeling you have absolutely nowhere to belong.

Speaking of girly toys, I remember when I visited my cousin.. a girl. Well, of course all her stuff is girl stuff(oh boy.. that room could give someone diabetes). If I wanted to play.. it would be with dolls. This ended rather.. disastrously. She invited a friend over. I couldn't help hovering nearby and watching them play with my cousin's Barbie dolls. She had barbie.. a house.. the car. I desperately wanted to play.

I was still.. very young at this point.. and foolish. I knew it was taboo, but I hadn't quite learned my lesson about that. I asked to play. They said no, of course. I kept insisting.. and of course the worst happened. I cried. It drew the adults. I explained that I was being left out. They comforted me.. but did nothing to correct the behavior of my cousin. I spent the rest of the visit sitting distraught in the hall.. wanting nothing more than to just go home.

I can't even count the number of times I was at the store with my mom where I wanted to just walk down the doll aisle. Not get anything. Just walk.. and look. That was my greatest desire.. just to look at all the pretty toys. I can count on one hand the number of times I actually worked up the courage to walk down it.

Give me long beautiful hair!

One more to kick off this blog and I will give it a rest for today. I'm sleepy. Nothing terribly important or revealing. Just a bit of vanity. I'd rather start this thing on a happy note than diving right into the deep and dark of my past.

How others treated me at times certainly didn't help matters. They didn't know they were doing it, but they where. It was almost like a sort of torture.. but also a joy every time it came up.

Still quite young. It never failed. Every time I went to get my hair cut the hair dresser would say, "I'd KILL to have your hair!" or, "Lots of women would kill to have your hair." I was born with a head full of curly hair. It's thick.. it's black.. it's curly. My mom commented on it.. my babysitter would say things about it. It made me happy every time. Tell me about my great hair! Come to think of it, this might be a part of the origin of my mysterious obsession with my hair. I can't even look in the mirror for a moment without brushing it. I hate having a single hair out of place. The other part is probably long hair being a traditionally feminine trait.

Anyway, I hated having my hair cut short. I couldn't even tell anyone how I wanted it cut because I hated all short styles(I resorted to shrugging till my mom told the hair dresser what to do), but I always loved hearing those words, "I'd kill for your hair." I could smile to myself. It was.. fantastic. Kind of like I wasn't quite a boy.

Where to start?

I have lots of random thoughts that come flooding back now that I think about it, but what do I write about first?

On some level, I've always known I wanted to be a girl. I might not have been able to put it into words, but as soon as I could grasp(even on the most basic level) the idea that boys and girls are different, I knew I wasn't comfortable with the hand I was dealt. By this point I wasn't obsessed. I was too young to really understand just what it all meant, but something inside me did.

It's.. a very strange dream I had. I recall it being before I was in kindergarten.. or maybe when I was. I was quite young at any rate. Certainly not past first grade.

The dream is still very vivid in my own mind.. even now. I remember walking into the room with the washer and dryer in it. Everything seemed normal, but when I closed the door the lights went out. No window.. so it was pitch black. I'm stuck in this tiny room in the darkness.. when suddenly the floor opens up and I drop down. I landed on a long table, and I am immediately strapped in. Metal cuffs at the ankles and wrists. I look over and see a mad scientist of some sort at a machine. He remarks that I will make a pretty girl. My hair grows out into lovely bond locks... and I'm suddenly in a pretty little dress. I can feel my breathing speed up and my heart pound in the dream. A strange mixture of fear over what was happening and being thrilled beyond imagination. I wake up immediately after the dress is on. As soon as I realize it was a dream I become a bit disappointed. I had hoped to wake up and find I had turned into a girl.

It was my wakeup call. I realized I desperately wanted to be a girl.. and I couldn't even tie my own shoes yet!

It was cute dress too. Think Dorothy from The Wizard of Oz. Something like that. I REALLY wanted that damn dress, dammit.