Some of BeverlyColleen's posts have reminded me of a not-so-pleasant experience while I was doing my RLT.
I thought I would share what some of that was like for me.
I knew going in that my family, and especially my father, were not going to be well pleased with my transitioning. I was getting grudging support, but Dad was going to be a problem.
As I was getting ready, Dad came down with a lot of health problems complicated by a MRSA infection. He was not expected to last six months.
After much discussion with my therapist, we decided just not to tell him. I had special permission to de-transition whenever I saw Dad. Then, he started to improve. He came home and it was my job to take him to dialysis once a week (he had someone else do it the other two times.)
Things were getting complicated.
I remember one Saturday in particular where I had to take Dad to the clinic, return home to change for a get together with some friends (who only knew me as Janet), return home to change to pick up Dad, return home to change to get ready for support group... You get the picture.
I found that for me that once I let myself out of the 'bottle', I couldn't force myself back in. I understand anyone else who struggles with the same issues.
Just to finish the story, when I was six months in to RLT and six months away from surgery, my therapist told me that we had to tell Dad or re-start the clock on RLT.
Dad found out, not from me, and went ballistic. Not on the scale of the Sendai earthquake, but enough such that the family may never again be together. Over the past five years, Dad has passed and Mom is ever so slowly warming up. I doubt that I will ever hear from one of my sisters again.
I also think that Mom struggles as much, if not more, with my being a lesbian. I think she wonders what the whole point was.
While there were things that I would have liked to have gone differently, I still would have done the same. Being myself, becoming myself was the most important thing for me to do.
My heart and prayers go out to all of you, especially those who are still caught in the middle.
Comments
caught in the middle
oh yeah, I am definitely caught in the middle. Your story about having to change back and forth reminds me of how this week was going before I lost the job. Now, I dont have that stress, but instead i have the stress of not knowing where my next job is going to come from....
"Let me succeed. If I cannot succeed let me be brave in the attempt." Pledge of the Special Olympics.
dorothycolleen
Thank you
Thank you for sharing...
I did a bit of it when seeing my kids.
Before they knew what was happening. I can remember my ex saying to me, 'fold your arms or something, that bloke keeps staring at your chest,' and I was in supposed male guise at the time.
While we have to take the needs and feelings of others into account, we can ultimately only live our own lives by being true to ourselves.
Angharad
Angharad
Real Life Funnies
My dad had recently been through a nervous breakdown over job stress and his health (he was dying of cancer) and when I told my mother about my real life test, she insisted that I not tell my father. So I went through my whole RLT without doing so and a year beyond that. Each time I went to see my folks, I would dress in "boy-drag" and wear a breast-flattening sports bra under a sweatshirt.
Not telling my father also meant not telling my aunts and on one visit, one of my aunts gave one of my boobies a squeeze during a hug but she didn't say anything.
Finally, on one visit my father called me out on the porch for a talk. He said, "I may be dying but I'm not stupid. I know what's going on. Dress like yourself when you come to see me."
After that, Dad and I were closer than we had ever been and we had several more years and many, many hours together to enjoy before he passed away.
ST
Stuck in the middle!
Yep! That's one of the crux's for some of us. I don't know even where I stand on the TG Scale and I certainly don't trust any sort of 'psycho-quack' to try digging around in my head to find out. (God know's I had enough of that to last a million lifetimes as a child!!!)
I'm somewhere between TV and TG but not wholly TG. I do not want to lose my little boy bits (Though they're totally inoperable,) but I certainly wish I could pass without fail.
I'm taking self medicated horemones but my GP at least has reconciled himself to my determination to grow boobs and he gives me a blood.liver/kidney test every six months. (Free of course like all medication on the UK health system.)
He has seen my B-cup boobs and at least accepts that I don't know where the hell I am on any reputable scale of transgenderism. He just sits back and treats me for other stuff like Asthma and accepts my gender confusion.
You've sure got my sympathy and support Sparrowchild!
I like girls and would most definitely end up as a lesbian if I transitioned.
Just 'rubbin along' as a wierd ol'e tranny to the end of my days.
Bev.
Growing old disgracefully.
oh wow...
I totally misunderstood the way you've presented yourself and replied to your comment on my blog in a fashion that may have been improper... sorry.
Though what I said there still holds mostly true, I do think you're perhaps a little more feminine than I am, the only female clothing I'm wearing is my underclothes and of course any gloves I wear have to have a female cut or I destroy them within weeks since male gloves don't fit. All of this is simply for a proper fit though... I'm a guy, mostly, just an effeminate one. I have a few things wired femininely, but I do think I'm supposed to be male, just with some oddities because of strange acts of nature.
Abigail Drew.
I'm sorry your parents had such a tough time with it
big hugs.
Dorothycolleen