Trans panic, a revision to "Lesbians, Pretendbians and the rest of us," a few things about trans* life, and a little bit of how hormones have changed me over the past four years.

So I've been meaning to write this post for a while. My opinion has changed slightly since I wrote the post "Lesbians, Pretendbians, and the rest of us." It's my most read post so I wanted to write an update. Also a friend had an attack of trans panic, and that has me re-evaluating that post further, and just a few conversations I've had over the last few days that makes me realize how little non trans* people, even within the LGBT community, actually know about trans* culture and reality.

I wrote about trans panic recently in my post All about trans panic: what is it? and love.  I think all trans* people experience it. (I just want to clarify that this is different from the legal defense of the same name) I told my friend that the thing to remember is that there isn't anything wrong with us, it's the society that we live in that is wrong.

Honestly, given our situations, we react as any boy or girl/man or woman would react. I realized this when I allowed myself to ask the question: "Hypthetically, if I really am a girl [as in my mind is wired (for lack of a better term) to have a female anatomy] how am I any different from how any other girl would be in my situation?" The answer: I'm not.

Suddenly, everything I've done and thought my entire life, (eg: all the times when my pre-teen self put on a bra and stuffed it to see what I would look like with breasts, etc.) and my sexuality, became uncomplicated and basically normal.

It took me a long time to reach the point where I was willing to ask that question. I think I always knew what my answer would be, just like I think I always knew that if I ever allowed myself to go out in public as a trans-feminine person (not going out as a woman--I'd done that a few times--but admitting that my dressing as a woman wasn't just something I did but an integral part of who I am) there would be no stopping my transition.

So really, if you accept trans* people as what we say we are, we aren't that weird, or different. We're just dealing with a circumstance most people don't have to deal with, and can't hardly even imagine.

Really, a lot of the time, I don't think it's that cis people can't understand, it's that they don't want to understand. In a weird way, the insistence of some cis people that our genitals determine our gender is proof that trans* people do exist.


Here's that logic:

-If we look around and human culture we can observe just how important one's sense of gender is to their sense of self. One's gender, (a trans* person I know), is an unchangeable, immutable fact (and I'm not arguing for a binary, or even against bi-gender people). Expressing our gender is apparently incredibly important to the human psyche. Just look at all the tools (makeup, clothing, voice intonation, body language etc.) that we use to express and categorize ourselves (largely) into one of two categories, male or female.  Also there is a very fine  between a "male" appearing body, and a "female" appearing body, I know, I've crossed it. It amazes me how seemingly blind most people are to that, or for that matter how blind I was to it for so many years. Proportionately I am average for woman, and my actual size is well within common averages.
-But we aren't actually that blind. For our entire lives we've encountered large muscular women, and small dainty men.
-So there is a conflict between the physical reality that men and women aren't actually all that different--we're actually talking slight differences in averages, not polar opposite sexes--and how important our internal sense of gender is.
-The proof is just how willing people are to think their entire identity and sense of self is determined by our sexual reproductive organs.
-It's absurd, really: Oh, this baby has a penis. He'll grow up and like sports, and cars, not have any desire to express himself through makeup or clothing...
-But gender is for some reason something that is primary for most people, whereas gender stereotypes rarely fit anyone perfectly. So instead of being able to say "I'm this because I like these things." we say "I am this because I have a (insert genitalia here)"
-And it scares people that maybe (insert genitalia here) is not what makes you a (insert gender pronoun). It really scares people because it is SO important to our sense of self.
-And the importance of gender to our sense of self  is exactly why trans* people exist.

Convoluted, hard to follow argument?


A trans* person's sense of self must be self-justified, or unfortunately they rely on stereotypes and make the rest of us look bad.

But people need to categorize.

And constantly we hear that a man is "x" and a woman is "y."

You know every once in a while I start thinking: what if everyone was right? What if I am really just some sort of extreme cross-dresser living a fantasy? Because that it what a lot of people think, whether they know it or not.

No, I'm not. For one, cis-gender people (even cross-dressers) can't live for extended amounts of time as someone they are not. Norah Vincent, in Self Made Man lived for a year as a man as research for a book--it caused her to have a nervous breakdown. Living as a man nearly caused me to have a nervous breakdown. It's been four years since I went anywhere as a man and the very idea of doing it again makes my skin crawl. No, this is what I got. My experience as a man was similar to Norah Vincent's. I felt it confining, and inauthentic.

I have to go through this whenever I get trans panic.

Here's where I changed my opinion from "Lesbians, Pretendbians, and the rest of us:" I could date a pre-op trans* woman, and it's hard for me to defend someone (attracted to women) who couldn't. I would have to be attracted to her (which for me means she'd have to have a lot of cis feminine features) and she'd have to have the same attitude towards her penis that I have towards mine--I'm not into dicks and it wouldn't work with anyone who expected me do anything with one. But just the fact that she had one wouldn't rule her out.

This is what I get as an out trans* woman. I'll be talking to a lesbian and I sense her initial attraction, and then almost immediately afterwards I sense her fear, and whatever attraction she felt she suppresses--I'm sorry, but I'm now more apt to blame that on prejudice or ignorance. Except for one body part (that I am not comfortable exposing or sharing with a partner) my body is a woman's, an attractive woman's, and I wouldn't be comfortable doing anything sexually that would be like being with a man--worse is when it's her friends. It doesn't happen so much anymore because everyone knows me and I'm really out, but when I'm making out with a girl and her friends pull her aside to tell her about me and she's no longer interested.

It's the idea of something they haven't seen and wouldn't see that kills my chances. It isn't what I look like, or who I am, it's just an abstract idea of something people think I am that I don't identify with.

Still, some people are attracted vagina and not women, or rather vagina first and women second. I don't think that's necessarily wrong, but I also don't think that's the majority of people.

No, really it's a problem with our culture and the ideas people have about trans*women.

When I got my second letter of support for my Gender Confirmation Surgery it almost felt like the therapist was trying to talk me into dating men. "You know," she said, "as a trans* woman it will be really hard to find women to date. Men, men don't really care, but it's really hard for trans* women who like women."

I wrote a status on Facebook once that said "You know, to me all you LGB people are straight." It didn't go over well. "What do you mean by that?" was the common response.

Okay.

My sexuality is not entirely compatible with my body (and won't be until I have a surgery) so I've had to work around that. Even talking masturbation any sex I have/any sex I am capable of having is queer. TMI, but I don't masturbate like a man (and never have), and because of my anatomy I don't masturbate entirely like a woman.
I've talked masturbation with my trans guy friends and it's a similar situation. But beyond that...

It's every once in a while I'm talking something trans* with another member of the community and I have to explain just so much that for me is just common knowledge and experience. So I thought it would be fun to make a list:

Tucking, and techniques for tucking. One technique is to tuck you pop your testicles back up into your body (where your ovaries would be) and then secure your penis between your legs It is actually possible to make a penis look like a vagina. It's a bit of work and still can't be penetrated so I haven't really done it in a while but it is possible.

For that matter there is the vee-string which can be penetrated, but they look kinda gnarly, and are a little expensive. Also it seems they're geared more to cross-dressers than to trans*women.

Trans* men DO have penises. T (testosterone) makes them grow. I've seen them they're legit, but small. Most trans* guys I know wear and use packers and refer to them as their penises. They're good for peeing, penetrating, and packing. I don't know a whole lot about them because I've never used one.

Some abbreviations I'm familiar with. TV, CD, TS, TG, MTF or MtF, FTM FtM, M2F, F2M, T2M, T2F, (I've even seen) M2M and F2F (the idea that we were always men and women to begin with)

There's top surgery, and bottom surgery and a lot of different techniques.

 As far a vaginoplasty goes Thailand is probably the best, Trinadad Colorado was the world capital for a while, I don't know if it still is. The results are good, near perfect. Gynecologists can't always tell the difference between a natal vagina and a reconstructed vagina.

I will have to dilate though, and that will be painful for the first month or two. Oh and also I'll be bleeding, and my hormones will be all out of wack because I'll have to stop taking them for a bit. So I'll never have a period, but recovery from surgery will be no walk in the park.

"Tranny" is now considered by most to be offensive. As is "She-male," and "He-She, Chicks with dicks" etc. Oh and for that matter. We shrink when we start hormones, so the likelyhood of finding a trans*woman with a huge dick isn't very likely, and we (I for one) don't like it up the ass.

Tranny chasers do exist. They're usually creepy men and feel they have the right to say really nasty things to trans*women. I've been asked (more than a few times) if I liked it up the ass (see above) and usually this is how they introduce themselves. Women chasers aren't as rude, but still I don't want to be anyone's fetish. I'm not the best of both worlds.

Oh and hormones are really effective. My hips are five inches wider, my waist is four inches narrower, my breasts are pushing double d cups and it's all natural. I've also lost a lot of muscle mass, and do not have body hair like I used to. I can go a couple weeks without shaving my legs and it not really being noticeable, vs like two or three days, and I haven't shaved my chest in like three years. Oh and softer skin, softer hair, my face shape has changed, and a whole bunch of other things. Also if you're wondering, my testicles are probably about 1/4 the size they used to be, my penis is smaller also (I'm not sure how much) I rarely have a full erection or ejaculate anymore. If I do it's a very small amount and clear.

Happy Thanksgiving

The day before Thanksgiving four years ago was the last time I went anywhere as a guy. I wore a fedora, black and white wing tip shoes, a vintage skinny tie and I don't remember whether it was my dark gray suit or my black one--guess it doesn't really matter, they looked the same.

I had started living socially (aka: "part time) as a woman for my twenty-eighth birthday two months earlier. It had been my plan to live that way for an entire year and transition to living "full-time" for my twenty-ninth birthday. By Thanksgiving weekend that year I was "passing" in most situations (even though I wouldn't start hormones for another month) and surprisingly I had found that it was easier and much less stressful for me than "passing" as a man. I was looking forward to my four day weekend and not having to worry about doing the man thing.

Actually, my ability to "pass" as a man was really suffering. Clients were noticing. It isn't that I'd changed much physically or that my mannerisms were effeminate, but something else. My last client that day was a woman nearing seventy who had seventeen cats. She loved me. She told me I had a really sensitive soul. We talked for about two hours--I never got acclimated to the smell in her house.

I ate Thanksgiving dinner by myself at Shoney's. My parents were out of town, but honestly having just come out to them I didn't want to spend the day with them anyway. All weekend long, no matter where I went people called me "she, miss, and ma'am." No one gave me any second looks. When my alarm went off on Monday morning for me to go into the office (as a man), I just couldn't do it. At that point there was no turning back. I haven't gone anywhere as a man since.

I guess I could bind my breasts and cut my hair if I ever wanted to be read as male again, but honestly that isn't something I could do. I really don't have that ability anymore. I guess that's why telling me I'm doing such a good job at being a woman is so insulting to me...it isn't really like I have anything else to choose from.

And still people think this isn't my authentic self...in subtle ways. Every time I'm talking to a lesbian and I see she is attracted to me and then immediately I see that it scares her and she dismisses it--just how many people would never even consider dating a woman like me. The TERFs who call me a rapist, people who care about me mis-gendering me because they don't/won't understand that things like that can get me killed, the fact that as a trans* woman I have a 1 in 12 chance of being murdered, the fact that if I am murdered my killer will likely only serve three years (if that or any) because "trans panic" is still a viable defense and lawyers will say I tricked my killer into thinking I was a woman, or the occasional gay guy who thinks I'm like them, or for that matter how incredibly unbelievable it is for so many people that I am exclusively attracted to woman--I've been told I'm lying about that so many times. Or how people see maleness in my proportions and size even though something like 60% of all women share my proportions and that I am hardly outside the average size range or American women (actually I'm thankful for those two facts)

Really, as important as I think it is to be out as a trans* person I really feel how being one really negatively affects the quality of my life.

Still, I'm thankful. I'm thankful in so many ways that I couldn't even begin to explain, like the feeling the softness of my breasts when I wake up, and not feeling like a clown every time I have to dress up, and not dealing with the [masculine] gendered assumptions people used to make about me from the moment they met me, or for that matter people don't tell me I'm a "really weird girl" like they used to tell me I was a "really weird guy," and knowing my instincts are "normal."

Everyday I wish I was born cis-gendered. I wish I could have the childhood, and teens, and early twenties years that I missed out on, or even that I didn't remember thinking my life was a horrible weird nightmare just praying I could wake up and it would be over.

It is over. And every morning the first thing I think when I wake up is "Thank god! thank god! thank god I'm a woman."

Not going home for the holidays,

That Arctic cold front has hit and it's getting chilly outside. It's chilly in my apartment so I have the oven cranked at 500 and the door open, as well as a space heater going. The thermostat is not hooked up properly and my apartment is really drafty. It reminds me of the house I grew up in.

It really reminds me of the house I grew up in. That house has since been demolished. I liked it. It was on a 365 acre farm, in the Northern Neck, and it really wasn't that dilapidated--just old and drafty. Anyway, I'll never be able to share it with my future wife and kids.

Well don't know about the kids anymore. I don't think I was put on this earth to be a parent.

Anyway, I was talking to a friend today about surfing the internet back in the early nineties, looking up the personal pages and blogs of other transsexuals, waiting five to ten minutes for each page to load, and feeling guilty about what I was reading, thinking it was along the same lines as porn. (I kept a solitaire game and ready to click on, and my email in another window in case my mother or father walked into the office where I surfed the web)

So, weirdly, perhaps nostalgically I felt like getting on line in this chilly apartment and blogging about being trans*.

No, not about being trans*. I transitioned. It's in the past. Thank GOD! (if you want to read about it click here!)

So my mother is rather pissed off at me right now. I'm not going home for Thanksgiving. Nor will I go home for Christmas. I won't say never again, but definitely not this year. It would be too stressful for me.

One thing I've realized over the past few months is that I definitely have some PTSD related to my life before I transitioned. So the Northern Neck is a trigger for me, my brother and I do not get along, and I've (guiltily) been contemplating cutting him out of my life entirely--we've never really gotten along, and this year he's sent me some texts that I found particularly offensive, and both of my grandmothers will be visiting.

One grandmother sent me a very sweet letter when I came out, that I really appreciate and still have on my fridge (and perhaps always will), but she's gotten really senile since and last time I saw her constantly messed up the pronouns even so bad as to call me a man. The other never responded when I came out...I wrote three letters, and I am a little embarrassed about what I wrote (I was very much an adolescent girl). I'm done justifying myself.

It's a combination of all these factors. It hurts every time someone calls me he. (That's another trigger) so with both grandmas and my father messing up the pronouns all day, my grandmother who has never responded to my coming out, my brother, and being in the Northern Neck is just too much.

Despite what my mother told me on the phone last time we spoke, I am an adult and I'm not being selfish by refusing to put myself through that.

If I hadn't transitioned I'd be dead right now. I did what I had to do for my health, my sanity, and my life, and now I am basically living the life I wanted to live. I am not going to put myself in situations that make me feel like my transition never happened. I do not deserve to be punished for the decisions I've made.

Oh yeah, my mother told me that I couldn't live in a bubble with people who don't ever refer to me with masculine pronouns, and that I made this decision and had to live with people mis-gendering me--I don't and I can.

She must not see me. I can wake-up hungover, throw on a guy's t-shirt without a bra, not shave, not put on makeup and walk groggily with unbrushed hair to the convenience store (or grocery store, or laundromat, or where ever) and people will still call me "Miss" and "Ma'am," and refer to me with female pronouns.

It's been four years and getting the pronouns right isn't that hard. My senile grandmother messing up I understand, my father I grit my teeth and correct him. But it really hurts...especially coming from people who know and love me.

Other people have written about what that feels like, and believe me it feels awful (it says that you think I am wrong in my most basic understanding of myself among other things) so I won't write too much more about it. Or how if you're accidentally messing up on my pronouns at home you're going to slip in public sometime and you and I don't know that that person at the next table or in line behind us isn't one of those transphobic people who would come after me and kill me. Yeah, it's that serious.

Did you know that in the United States "trans panic" is still a viable defense for anyone accused of murdering a trans* person. It usually results in the charges being reduced to manslaughter.

I am not mis-representing myself when I say I'm a woman.

And as a woman, I don't feel like I need to put myself in an environment, or surround myself with people who constantly refer to me as "he and him." Nor would I work with someone like that, nor do I tolerate that. I also don't think I need to justify myself as a woman. I am because I am.

But anyway...I don't even need to explain this that much. I do not need to go to my parents' house for Thanksgiving. I did briefly want to talk about it because of my mother's manipulative reaction--I found out (from my therapist) a very typical reaction of bi-polar people, and that the best way to deal with bi-polar people is to set firm boundaries.

Which was really nice to learn. For one, I don't have to repeat, or fear, that type of manipulation in my relationships. It isn't normal or healthy. Also, my firm boundaries that I have with most everyone suddenly makes a lot of sense--two things I've wanted to leave behind, and two things that have been very destructive for me in trying to find a fulfilling relationship.

Also, apparently in our thirties we start to separate ourselves from our nuclear families...I'm developmentally doing (by taking this firm stand with my mother that I won't go home) doing exactly what I should be doing. So contrary to what my mother told me, me not going home is not me being a child, it's me being a grown woman.

Well, at any rate, (and I told my therapist this) I can't go home now; my mother would continue to use guilt trips to get me to do what she wants. Quite honestly she doesn't know what is best for me anymore.

And on top of everything else, I really like the direction my life is heading in, and I'm not going to let something like family derail that.

Since leaving home I've found the entire holiday season to be really depressing, but I think I'm going to have a good holiday season this year. I'm not going to put myself in the stressful situations I did before, and I'm not going to feel guilty about it.

All about trans panic: what is it? and love.

I meant to write a post Sunday night, and then Monday, and then yesterday, but well...I never got around to it. I'm painting again, not that that has anything to do with why I didn't post, but I thought I'd mention it. I'll write more on that later.

Really, what I meant to write about is the case of trans panic I had Saturday night.

I don't get trans panic very often anymore. Really, this is only the second time since early in my transition. It used to happen frequently. It halted my first two attempts at transitioning hormonally in their tracks.

Which is why, when I did start hormonally transitioning the third time I spoke to a therapist for several months prior...I wanted someone to be there when I had that inevitable trans panic attack.

Okay, I need to back up a bit. It turns out that a lot of people don't even know what trans panic is. I define it as something separate from dysphoria. Dysphoria is something I feel constantly about my genitals, and used to feel constantly about the gender I was assigned to. Dysphoria is no joke. I wish I could make people understand how intense it feels, then no one would have any questions about why I transitioned in the first place or why I need Gender Confirmation Surgery urgently. Trans panic is when I feel panicky about being trans, as in: Oh my God! What am I? Where do I fit in? I'm never going to be completely accepted as a woman and now I'm somewhere in between and I can't deal with it. Or, it was that fear of being in between that made transitioning so difficult in the first place.

I go a few months on hormones, my body would start to change, and I was terrified to come out as trans to anyone, and terrified of ending up somewhere in between male and female.

I guess, no scratch that, I know that some most people think I'm in between genders now. If only because I haven't been able to raise the funds for my surgery yet. Sometimes only because I'm out of the closet as a trans person.

It is so tempting to go stealth. I think about it a lot actually, to move somewhere where no one knows I'm trans and not tell anyone and just be treated like a normal human being...God that would be nice.

But no, for me personally it is really important to be an out trans person. It shouldn't make any difference if someone is trans or not, and we need more people willing to be out so that trans can be seen for what it is: a naturally occurring variation.

I think my trans panic stemmed from a couple things: I've been putting a little more effort into finding a relationship. When I first started transitioning it was my intention not to date until after my surgery, but well...I'm really lonely, and I'm tired of not having anyone to hold me, or stay in with. So, I've been trying to talk to some people on Okcupid. One girl, a bi girl (not that that makes any difference, but I guess I ignorantly assumed she might not have the hold-ups a lot of lesbians do about dating someone like me) told me she'd never dated a trans person before and didn't think she could deal with it—thanks for being upfront (no seriously actually, I appreciate that). Another girl contacted me, was really interested, and wrote like a page about herself. In my reply I told her I was trans, haven't heard back from her since. The second thing--I think the trigger--was a post I saw on Facebook. Some celebrity (I haven't heard of) was caught with a trans woman prostitute. I guess there was a huge scandal, and he responded to the press that she fooled him into thinking she was born a woman and then tried to extort him when he found out she wasn't. The trigger was the comment the person wrote who shared the article: see maybe was shouldn't judge people when these things happen—Seriously! The fact that he was with a prostitute is trumped by the fact he was with a trans woman? I'm so sick of people thinking it is somehow less straight (or less gay for that matter) to find women like me attractive. The hormones I take orally are the same hormones that occur naturally in cisgender women (who haven't gone through menopause or had a hysterectomy). The changes in my body they have caused are identical to the changes cis women go through in puberty. Everything about my body is natural, and my “sex change” surgery won't be a “sex change” so much as it will be genital reconstruction. Fuck, if I'd served in Iraq and had my vagina blasted out by a grenade no one would judge my vaginoplasty then...would they?

I think all this culminated with my having a case of trans panic on Saturday night. Slow breaths, calm down, looking at my boobs in a mirror helps actually.

So I wanted to write about that. But then it makes me think about how much love is dependent on the body someone has. If I was dating a girl and she told me one morning that she was really a he how long would it be before I was uncomfortable in the relationship? For me, it probably wouldn't be until after he started taking T and his body became a body that I related to as male, but still...

Most relationships and marriages end when one partner transitions.

So every person I have ever fallen in love with has been female bodied, and when I really think about it, a huge part of that love I've felt has been because of their bodies, not just their personality. We like to think that we exist as an entity separate from our bodies, but how many of us are capable of actually seeing someone as not their body. Our bodies are as much who we are as our souls. And I know this, because it wasn't enough to come to terms with having a female mind and soul, I needed a female body. How can anyone love me if they see me as anything other than female?

Of course then I think about friendship. Someone (I think CS Lewis) said friendship is the purest form of love...but is it really? Most friendship is circumstantial, and honestly selfish. Friends are people we enjoy spending time with, they're the people who enjoy the same things we do, who are going through the same things we are. What happens when we change? The sad truth, (and I know a lot about change) is that your friends don't want to see you change. They love you as you are, not who you are becoming. Every time I've gone through a major change I've lost friends.

It's the people who are still there when change happens. My two best friends have been there for a long time now. They were there when I was a huge partier in college, and while I was a drunk after college, and when I came out as trans, and while I grew up in my second puberty, through all my crushes, insecurities, and flaws.

I don't see either of them very frequently. We have completely different lives. The circumstances that brought us together in the first place have changed. But they're still there, and most other people aren't. It's like they always saw me, not the momentary me but the permanent me. The me that stays the same no matter what changes I go through.

So, I'm looking for a partner like that. Someone who loves me.

I finished my memoir about a month ago. It's something I worked for over two years on, then self-published on kindle. I'm not the same person I was before I published it.

There's been some upheaval in my friendships since, but I'm not really upset about it. I expected it. I'm disappointed because the people who stick are rarely the ones I expect. The people who seem to love me more than anyone else are usually the people who love who I was in that moment, that circumstance, and when change happens they're not the ones who stay.

But we always meet people in the moment. I guess part of what I was trying to share (with my friends specifically) in my memoir, is who I was before now, and maybe a glimpse of the permanent me. The part of me that hasn't changed. The way I think, the way I feel, the way I reacted to having a body at complete discord to who I am.

It's a need I have, that I think we all have, to share our inner-selves (to greater and lesser extents considering the relationship). I must say that having transitioned people see me more than they did before, but still to be trans is in some respects to be invisible. People see someone in transition, or someone who isn't quite a woman, or someone who isn't quite female, when my inner-self isn't at all in-between.

Surgery will relieve this to an extent, hopefully enough that I can live a full complete life. But it scares me that maybe it won't. Maybe people will never see me for how I see myself. Or worse, they will but I won't ever know it.

I grew up with the same prejudices about trans people everyone else did. I've read the same articles about “Men” who want to be or think that they are really women, and I've seen the same talk shows with linebackers in mini-skirts insisting that they are real women.

And I think, that's trans panic. It's when the prejudices that I grew up with, and the prejudices that are so prevalent around me, and the prejudices I face collide with the fact that I am trans.

Virginia TIES, Our need for a trans*feminist movement

I went to the Equality Virginia sponsored transgender conference, Virginia TIES. So I guess I should write about that a little bit.

Okay, since you probably want to know what TIES stands for: Transgender Information and Empowerment Summit.

I have to say I enjoyed it. Registration was at 9 in the morning and I work late so that was rough. I went saw the opening remarks, talked to a lady about Affordable Care Act insurance, and then went home and took a nap. The morning seminars were about surgical techniques, and passing.

Let me just say that I find it a little offensive that there were seminars on passing. I'm not faulting Equality Virginia on this though, I went to a seminar they held this summer asking trans people to create videos (here's mine: I AM: Transgender Virginia Speaks) and they talked to us about the upcoming TIES. Apparently an awful lot of trans people in Virginia gave them feedback that they really wanted a seminar on passing.

So the one for women was called The ABCs of Passing: Appearing More Feminine. (This is where I have to take a break to say that I have passing privilege. I think it's sexist and demeaning to have a seminar devoted to teaching how to act and appear more feminine, but I'm saying that from the perspective of someone who passes very well. Regardless) I think we as trans people really need a trans*feminist movement.

Here's what I mean by that: We, particularly trans women need to stand up and say that it doesn't matter how we express our gender--whether or not we know how to wear makeup, how often or even if we do our nails, whether we can walk in heels, pick out a feminine outfit, wear skirts, pantyhose, dresses, do our hair right, or bat our eyes. We need to stop policing gender--I did not transition to be "a woman." I transitioned to be myself--We, as trans women, need to have our own feminist movement, as in there is no right or wrong way to be a trans*woman. Having, insisting on having, seminars on passing is only reinforcing the idea that some of us are doing a better job at being women than others.

There's a support group in Richmond that I don't care for. I think it's because I come from reading the writings of Kate Bornstein, and other radical trans theory, and that group is almost more about just dealing with being "new women."

This trans feminist movement that we need, needs to be almost post gender. I know that for those of us who are trans it is hard not to think about gender, but really: I identify as a woman let's get beyond that and really start thinking about things.

We need trans equality, and we're not going to get there through classes on passing. As long as passing is our focus we'll always (and somewhat rightly) be seen as trying to reinforce a sexist system that we have in place.

And I'm saying this as a femme, who likes wearing dresses and makeup (sometimes).

I didn't attend the ABCs of Passing. I did thoroughly enjoy the afternoon seminars of gender queer. I'll talk about that a little more in another entry. Actually, I'm thinking of blogging for the Huffington Post (or submitting a proposal).

To change the subject: I don't think that I have no chance with this girl I like. I think there's a chance. I'm just writing that because I really believe that writing something down sends a message to the universe and creates reality. So I'm putting it out there. I'm also going to say this: I had a close friendship with another girl I really loved once and I never appreciated it because I always wanted more. And then she left and we rarely talk anymore. I'm not going to let that happen a second time. It's really rare that I find someone I feel like I connect with on so many levels, that even if friendship is all we'll ever have, I'm not going to give that up. So regardless of how hard it might be for me, I'm going to be a friend.

Oh and another change of subject. I'm going to be interviewed for a blog, The Heroines of my Life. She's going to be asking about my book and other things. I'm rather excited about it actually. And of course I hope it drives up sales for Straight Boy/Queer Girl: a memoir.

Pride weekend in Virginia, an interesting memory from childhood, doing writer stuff, Stuffing at the Golden Corral, and relieved to be done with my book

My book Straight Boy/Queer Girl: a memoir. It's actually #13 in the kindle category Biographies and Memoirs>Specific Groups>Gay & Lesbian! so that's something to be proud of. The sales are still coming in slow. 

Honestly, I think it's an important book to get out there. I think the story needed to be told. So please everyone check it out. 

Also, check out my author page on amazon: Natalie Gates. It has links to my blog posts, my biography, and a link to my twitter account. Yes, I sold out and finally have a twitter. 

Other things going on in my life right now: 

1. It's pride weekend in Virginia. That means I'm going to be super super busy at work, and no I am not going to Pride again this year. I don't really know many of the performers, so I can't say with certainty that none of them are particularly of interest to me as a trans person.

Okay, so I'm also a lesbian. 

The thing is, growing up the fact that I was attracted to women was not what made people whisper about me behind my back, and it isn't something I've fought, and eventually come to accept. I like women and I always have and I think also after having come out as a transsexual it kind of trumps anything about my sexuality anyway.

You know what I mean? I'm the queer one in a group of queer people. Who honestly gives a shit whether I like men or women.

But I guess that's it. I guess that's why I really think more effort should be given to include trans people in Virginia Pride, (which maybe they have and I just don't know the performers, and there is a reading group for trans children--a small token). But oh well. 

2. Just a small thing, but interesting. I was talking to this trans guy friend of mine and he told me how in kindergarten he lined up in the boys' line and had to be corrected by the teacher. I remember doing the same thing (in the girls' line, of course). I didn't even think about it. 

It's weird though (and I think it comes across in my book) for me anyway, it wasn't that I didn't know I was a boy but it's that I really just didn't understand gender (not the same as my classmates). I was going to grow up to be a woman because, well, why wouldn't I. It was just a bunch of little things: 

"You can't be pretty, you can be handsome. You can't be a princess but you can be a prince."

Who the hell wants to be a handsome prince! Talk about boring. Jeez!

3. I'm going to hang out with my friend Nikki and do writer stuff this afternoon. You should remember her name. We're going to be famous authors together; she had a dream about it.

She has a blog also. (I think that's one of the things we talked about when we first met.) anyway you should check it out: Hummuscidalmaniac.

She's really funny, and writes a lot of good vegan recipes.

4. I was craving stuffing, and roast poultry this morning (afternoon). So I went to the Golden Corral on Midlothian. 

I don't know if I wrote about the time a waitress refused to serve me at the one on Gaskins. She totally ignored me, talked to every table seated near me and refused to even look at me. I complained to the corporate office and got a phone call from the manager. I described myself as "LGBT" which he had to look up because he'd never heard of it. 

Kinda makes you think doesn't it. It hadn't occurred to me that there were still people who didn't know what LGBT was. 

Also, you know, I didn't describe myself as trans when I complained. And I'm not sure why, except more and more I just don't want strangers to know.

5. About the book again, Straight Boy/Queer Girl (and I know I'm shamelessy plugging it): I am so glad I'm finished with it. Especially the past couple months working on it basically full-time, as in eight (plus) hours a day five days a week, it really affected my mood. My mood just lifted when I published it and didn't have to think about it anymore, or not so intensely. 

I think I have PTSD related to my life before transition. I seriously do. And really, talk about a traumatic event: living in the wrong gender. But I feel like my old self again, or rather my new self, or I don't know.

Prior to transitioning I was depressed and irritable all the time, but since transitioning I'm basically a happy person. No, I was never Eeyore. I did my best to smile and laugh and tell jokes, but sincere happiness...I don't think I knew that before I transitioned. And this book really put me back in that place, at least partially anyway. Like I even had a couple dreams that I hadn't transitioned, and OMG! I just can't imagine.

Anyway, it's over and done and I'm glad it is and I deserve to make a lot of money with it. I'm back to waking up in the morning seeing my breasts and feeling my fleshy thighs and ass and soft skin and just everything the past four years taking estrogen has done and just before I can even really stop myself, saying; "Oh, thank God! Thank God! It's over! Thank God!" 

If you haven't lived it, having your body develop all wrong is one of the most horrible things to ever have to experience.