I'm really struggling with the voice of self-criticism. Every mistake I make lately is being magnified to something terminal, and I dont know how to turn off this voice.

Help?

I'm not depressed, exactly, but I feel like ... I dont know. All my life I was stuck in boy world, with my face pressed against the glass looking in at girl world, so envious I was salivating like a starving person watching people enjoying a five star meal. Now, I at last found an entrance into that land, but I wonder if I will ever be seen as anything but an immigrant. Will I ever .... just fit in?

I'd like to take a moment and talk about my Phoenix stories. Those who get bored easily might want to skip this one.

Did a little math for fun, and figured out I've had 5,103 kudos since I first started posting stories here. Neat, huh?

One of the members of my trans support group and her amazing spouse treated me to a shopping spree at a second hand store. It was .... fantastic. I'm so, so blessed.

First, the fantastic part. A friend from my trans support group had heard I was struggling with feeling ugly, and invited me to come to her house for a bit of a makeover. It was absolutely amazing what difference a pretty blouse, a new hair style, and some lipstick could make. Then she listened to me as I talked about my situation, and helped me with the memories of my rape.

I'm having trouble controlling my emotions at the moment. one minute I'm depressed, the next I'm angry, the next giggly - just like a teen girl. For someone like me who normally doesnt have a lot of filter between "feeling" and "doing", its at least a good exercise in using the one thing I have that a teen girl doesnt - a lifetime of experience to damper the extremes. Keep cheering me on, okay?

Just got back from picking up my daughter, and something interesting happened. There is a boy who for the last while has called me "smiley" whenever he's seen me at the school, and somehow, he's now got other kids doing it too. (I blush like crazy when he does it, I have no idea why). Then the ball dropped. As I was leaving with Sam, I heard him ask, "Is that a woman's coat?" So I guess I'm not as stealth as I thought, and if a kid notices, I'm sure Sam's teacher has noticed too. Oh well, as long as nobody makes a fuss about it....

I'm missing having a church to go to. I work Sundays, so that's just a no-go. There is one church near that has a Saturday evening service, but I've been reluctant to go because I cant seem to find out how they would feel about someone like me. I may just go, and if I'm welcomed, I will make it a weekly thing.

Well, I managed to live through a pretty tough night. Basically, I managed to lose track of time so I was more than 15 minutes late to go get the ex at her job. She had gone, so I tried the doctor's office she cleans, and the closest bus stops, and didnt see her. Meanwhile, my daughter was trying to help prevent me from beating myself up about it. Finally, I had to take my daughter back home to my mom, and ask her to take her to the ex when the ex called, as I was now late for work.

I was thinking the other day about the band Klaatu. I grew up on their music, and I find I miss it even now. I'm not really sure why it spoke to me the way it did, but somehow, it reached me in a way that few other bands have ever managed. Its too bad they didnt have a bigger following, but maybe that was part of the appeal.

I was thinking about spring yesterday. Right now, with a sweater and a coat on every time I go out, I dont have to worry about the wrong person (ie: my ex) noticing the fact that I'm in ladies clothes. Wont be able to do that once it gets warm, so I'm not sure what I'll do.

Ah, well.

Well, I managed to hit myself in the face last night at work. Not fun.

Well, last night, before I went to work, my mom let me know that my ex mentioned reading my letter when she dropped off Sam after having her for the day. Mom said that my ex's only comment was, "Well, he'll always be Todd to me." If that's the wost that comes out of this, its a pretty darn good result.

Then, I got to work, and my supervisor passed on a compliment from the day staff in the fashion department . He said they had said, "Can we keep her?" So that made me feel pretty good.

I think I'm getting stronger, and I dont mean physical strength. One way I'm getting stronger is the ability to stop beating myself up over mistakes. For example, yesterday I started to regret getting my hair done. I realized it was not the best use of the money I had gotten for my bottles, that I had other things I should have done first. But rather than spend hours calling myself names, which would have been my response before, I simply filed the whole thing in a mental box called "stuff to learn from", and let it go.