A Trans Story - Self Confidence

Self confidence is such an ephemeral entity.

You can find it, and all too quickly it can be dashed and taken away from you.

Growing up I never had much in the way of self confidence. I always felt that I was shy and introverted, but now I don't think that was accurate. When younger I hated talking to people, and yet I still wanted to be the center of attention, but only if someone else made me the center. I loved it when people made a big deal of me, or something that had happened to me, but I would never be the person to volunteer that information.

It always took me time to make friends. In any new situation I was always quiet and reserved, atleast until I got to know people, and then my brashness would surface. Another thing I learned was how to fake it. Under certain circumstances I learned to fake self confidence, particularly in interviews. I was quick to learn that potential employers like people with just the right balance of self confidence. They prefer people that are confident enough in their abilities to work really well, but not overly confident in that they become arrogant. Whenever interviewing I could easily fake confidence, partly because I do believe in my abilities.

While I can fake it during interviews, when getting a new job that is entirely different. Every time I have started something new, I have always been quiet, rarely speaking, until spoken to. But once I start to get confident then I open up with people, and then I can actually start getting brash, almost cocky, but I think that is actually me over compensating for my lack of confidence.

My belief or lack thereof has never been about my abilities, but mostly about my appearance. I have never, ever thought of myself as anywhere close to good looking. I suppose most people feel the same. I have rarely met anyone who is satisfied with how they look. With me, it was somewhat different. Even if I had been good looking, in good shape or anything I still would not have been satisfied with how I looked, seeing as how that external shape was always masculine. And so since I hated my outward appearance and thought I was homely at best, I could just never feel confident in most circumstances.

It was not until finally accepting myself and beginning my transition that I started to find my confidence. It took a lot of work and there were many ups and downs involved. My transitioning showed me that my confidence was directly tied to my masculine shape and as soon as I started to form more feminine qualities my confidence began to grow.

About a year in to my transition I was actually beginning to really like my shape. Oh I was not a model, and probably never will be, but I was starting to be happy with  my weight too. While I would still like to lose a few pounds, maybe 10 or 15, I don't want to lose too much.

But for the first time in my life, I could look at myself in the mirror and I could actually like what I saw. I love the curves, and my new shape and was beginning to think of myself as attractive. And with that my confidence grew more. It was not all based upon my outward appearance, but the fact that my body was finally taking the shape congruent with my mind and emotions helped too.

Still it was a work in progress. There was a lot of self analysis involved, particularly during my emotional meltdown at the beginning of 2016. I had to really learn about myself, learn about my full range of emotions and accept them as part of who I was. That journey of self discovery also helped me grow in confidence and I was beginning to fully accept myself and I was owning the label that society gave to me and I was growing into a very proud Trans Woman.

But not too long ago I discovered how fragile self confidence really is. My recent altercation with my sister in law seriously deflated me. Like I said in my previous blog she really got to me, raising self doubt, or rather some old fears that I thought had been put to bed. Her attack on me really wasn't much at all. Other Trans people go through so much more than I did. People have lost all their family and friends, while for me it has been a journey with a lot of acceptance, and only one person completely against me. And that person is pretty much meaningless to me, and yet her attack shattered my confidence for a while. Lack of support from other members of my family didn't really help, but I was shocked at how much she got to me.

But recently some things occurred to help restore my confidence.

Oh I tried several other ways. I continued to wear dresses and to be the most feminine version of myself that I could be. I wrote a letter to my mother, all in an attempt to regain my power, but none of that really worked.

What did work, was other people.

And it came at just the right time. It helped me face this weekend and my upcoming electrolysis appointment. The weekends before that are never easy for me, since I need to let my facial hair grow a bit, and so going out on a Saturday before the appointment is always a challenge to me.

Firstly my wife. She was totally awesome and as always fully supportive of me. I love how she is always there for me during the hard times, as well as the good times. She took me dress shopping a week or so ago. There is nothing like buying a few dresses to make someone feel good. Its not so much about the dresses or the material aspect, it is simply because my wife believes in me and encourages me to be the best woman I can be.

Secondly while I was at work I got a very flattering compliment. During the day I usually go out twice to walk around downtown. I like getting out of the office for 10 minutes and being in the downtown area is great. Anyway a few days back, while I was out walking a random woman approached me. She actually walked past me once, looking at me. I kind of thought she was checking me out. As it turns out she might have been, cause she ended up coming back down the street toward me. She leaned in and said "You are very pretty" - I was like wow. It was so completely unexpected. And to hear it from a random stranger really had an impact. You can hear compliments like that from friends and family all day long. But a complete stranger, well that's different. Friends and family can be somewhat expected to say nice things about you.

When I received that compliment I was wearing one of my new dresses. It did indeed help to boost my ego quite a bit.

And thirdly was my cousin, a woman I have always admired. I invited her to like my facebook page and that led her to this blog. After reading my blog she felt compelled to message me. And she had some wonderful and powerful words to say to me. Basically what she said was that I did not look like a "freak in a frock" and that I looked like a beautiful woman who dresses with style and flare. Not a cross dresser, not a man dressed as a woman but a woman who knows what suits her and much younger than her years.

When I read that, I was like Wow. That was so awesome to hear. Like I said, I have always admired my cousin. We got on well together when I was younger, and I have always regarded her as a very intelligent and beautiful woman. Those words coming from her only reinforced everything else that had occurred recently.

Slowly I am beginning to regain my confidence. I am beginning to once again own myself and be my own proud Trans Woman. Oh I know that physical appearance is not everything and that beauty is always in the eye of the beholder. But in this aspect I think I needed to hear from people regarding how I looked. My sister in law had brought doubt upon me regarding my feminine appearance. She had awoken all my old doubts and fears about if I could ever be feminine enough and that kind of belief I could not replace with just my own thoughts. I have always tried to tell myself that it doesn't matter what other people think of me, but when it comes to my femininity, I do want people to see a feminine woman. My sister in law made me doubt my femininity, and so I needed external help in gaining that back. I am not completely there yet, but I am absolutely working back toward it, and once again starting to like my own shape.

So someone came along and shattered my self confidence, but then several people worked to start restoring the foundations, and as of right now I can say that - I'm back.

So look out world, I'm a wild Child.

This beautiful, proud Trans Woman refuses to be beaten down ever again.

I am a Woman, I am feminine. I will never forget that again.

A Trans story - Reflections

Refection’s

So doing this blog has had me processing a lot of memories and emotions that I thought I was beyond, forgot or had moved on from. But that is not the case. Mostly what I had been doing was ignoring everything.

I have found that I still harbor some resentment, particularly to my father. It’s not even sensible resentment, but it’s still there. I mentioned in a previous blog that I grew up never feeling I was boy enough for him. Nothing was ever really said about it and then when I was 18 he had to go and die on me, and there went any chance of ever resolving anything – therein lies my resentment. I resent the feelings I had growing up and I resent that nothing was resolved and that he took that chance away from me. Also seems to be quite a selfish emotion I have, which makes me resent it all the more. Emotions are certainly a lot more complex than many of us realise. 

When my father died, I didn’t actually grieve for him. I convinced myself that I was dealing with it and that I had moved on. But now I am not so sure. I think perhaps that I was preventing myself from grieving because of my resentment. Now I am discovering that I never really moved on at all. 
But in reality, what could have been done. I never spoke to anyone about anything, so I am resenting people for not being able to read my mind. It’s kinda crazy when you think about it, but something I need to deal with and find a way to move on in a healthy manner.

It’s not like my Dad would have had any indication about what I was going through, since I was so good at hiding it from my family. He never had reason to question my gender, nor was he in any way cruel toward me. Distant perhaps, but no more than most Fathers in Scotland. Emotion is not held in high regard in my family, and that is quite prevalent throughout Scotland. We hide our feelings behind rough banter and jokes and never really face anything deeply moving. So to be honest I cannot blame my Dad for not realizing what was wrong. I cannot blame him for wanting me to do boyish activities when for all he knew I was a boy through and through. Basically I cannot blame anyone other than myself. I and I alone knew that something was wrong and I am the only one that should bear responsibility for not saying something to my parents.

Through this blog I am finding a great many unresolved issues.

Another one would be religion, belief in God, spirituality – call it what you will. I never had any particularly profound beliefs growing up, and yet despite my doubts on the existence and caring nature of a God, I still bear resentment toward that being.

My parents did not raise us with any particular beliefs. I believe my Dad was atheist. My Mother perhaps went to church once a month. Her sister and parents were the regular church goers. Me, well my beliefs have always been complicated, perhaps because of my imagination and my interest in history and mythology and fantasy novels. All that makes me look at things in a different perspective.
I was never formally educated in biblical teachings, atleast not till High School. But even then the class was religious education and covered most of the main stream religions, which I did appreciate and found them all quite interesting. But I never felt that any particular set of beliefs was right for me. Even now I don’t know where I stand on the God issue. I think there is a being out there. I think someone must have designed all this, but I also think that after kicking it off, that being has taken a back seat.  So that thought makes me wonder if a God does get involved the way people think and does that being really care about all the crap that we go through on a daily basis.

I am not one to believe in one God either. Where there is one, there can just as easily be many. And an all knowing, all powerful God – well that just doesn’t sit well with me at all. If she/he is all knowing and has a master plan and we are part of that plan then that would mean we have no free will at all. The notions of free will and an omniscient God are a paradox to my mind. I just don’t see how they can work together.

I could never get behind all the doctrine that was taught in any religion – it’s all taken too seriously in my opinion. And all those rules – sheesh, talk about taking the fun out of life. What God would create a people and design them to be miserable. Which she/he must have done if they created LGBT folks and then says its sin to accept yourself. So said God wants each of us to be miserable our entire lives. Well that is a God I could never accept and so I spent a great deal of my teenage years rebelling from those beliefs.

A lot of beliefs were taught to me, a lot of the structure of many religions, which made the class really quite interesting. I wish I had taken it further and learned more, but that class was not considered cool at the time and I was having enough difficulty trying to fit in, so I dropped it.
During those years there were classes on Greek mythology and I loved them. They were absolutely fascinating to me, particularly how every God in the pantheon represented an aspect of human behavior. It was like humans segmented their personality, behaviours and gave names and a persona to them, so they didn’t have to accept responsibility for their own actions. 

When you get right down to it, that’s perhaps how I see religion. I see it as leaning against a higher being so you don’t have to accept responsibility. Who knows if that’s true and I do respect the beliefs of everyone, but that thought makes it almost impossible for me to fully embrace a God.

There is a point to all this rumination, I promise and I am coming to it right about now.

My point is that with all this lack of formal religious teachings within my family, I am having difficulty figuring out why they are not accepting me. It’s certainly not based upon religious beliefs that’s for sure. The person I was most concerned about – my Aunt (a very religious woman) has been the most accepting of my family. The least accepting is my Sister in law, which normally would not concern me at all. She has always been and will continue to be nothing to me. I have never cared for her, never thought much of her. But for some reason, right now, her verbal attacks on me have left me feeling wounded and carrying some self-doubt. This has led me to reflect upon it all, trying to find the source of her stance and to try and realise why she affected me so much. The fact that she did annoys me no end and it’s something I never want her to find out. I am a very prideful woman and would have a great deal of difficulty dealing with my feelings if she knew she had gotten to me in any way at all.

I can only put it down to her Scottish nature, which is difficult for me, since I am extremely Scottish myself, more so since I moved to the States. But I have to admit we have done and still do consider ourselves better than any other country. And therefore anything that is outside of our NORM is weird and anything that is weird must come from another country and therefore must be fought with all our strength. It’s a backward way of thinking to be honest, but only now am I beginning to realise how down we are upon other cultures. We are dismissive of countries, ideas and cultures not our own, which is a really crappy way to live. There is more to Earth than just Scotland, but we look down upon anyone outside our borders and we look down upon anyone seeking to be different.

This culture is the only thing I have come up with that can explain the strength of my Sister in Laws distaste over the path my life has taken. Ordinarily this would not be a problem, since I know that I am on the right path and that I am actually far better educated than she is. But that has led me to look down upon her too, a part of my culture that I have carried with me and one I now know that I need to get rid of. It’s not a particularly attractive aspect to my personality and now that I have been told “What I am doing is very American” I can see just how degrading we can be to other cultures.
No it’s not actually her attitude, or her arguments that bother me, it’s the fact that she woke up some doubts that I thought I had put behind me. And it’s that I got virtually no support or acceptance from my Mother, or my nieces. I had hoped that by now they might have come to terms with it, but the whole episode with my sister in law showed me that my Mother is still not facing it.

So the doubts that my sister in law woke up – well there is actually only one doubt. It’s a doubt about the end result and that was the doubt that kept me in the shadows the longest. To a certain extent I was really worried about acceptance, but it was, in actuality, the fear of the end result that kept me from becoming who I am supposed to be.

Simply put I was afraid of how it would turn out. I was concerned I would look like a freak in a frock, a dude in a dress or that I would just look downright stupid. But there was also another feeling, the feeling that I would never be entirely complete. Oh I can take hormones my entire life, I can have all the surgeries and all, but my body will never be 100% female. There are limitations to what can be done. And my bloody sister in law woke all that back up with her stupid, uneducated comments. But perhaps it can have a good outcome, since it’s something I, obviously, still need to come to terms with.

What makes it so silly to me, is that I know you cannot define yourself by your physical body. In so many aspects of life people need surgery to fix things, change things, keep things going – and that does not define who they are. I know all of that, I know that Gender is so much more than genitals, I know that there are so many combinations of chromosomes so having binary genders is stupid. And I know that Gender roles are a stupid construct for a silly society. Yes I know all this, but still, deep down, there is that nagging doubt that I will never be completely what I desire most.

Until the sister in law, I thought I had come to accept that. I was owning the label society gave me and living with the fact that I am and will always be a Trans Woman. But was I really accepting it? Or was I just hiding from it?

So now I need to find a way to truly live with it

At first I didn’t want to acknowledge or admit to these doubts and feelings, for fear they would validate the people who are against transitioning. But now I know that’s crazy. I know, beyond the shadow of a doubt, that I am on the right path. I know that Transition is right for me. I have never been happier, or more confident with myself than I am now. I just have these little nagging doubts, but perhaps they are not actual doubts. Perhaps they are resentments.

In the end maybe all that I am feeling can be put down to useless, paralyzing resentment, and it is something I have never learned to face, or deal with. Always before I have ignored my feelings, buried them and thought I was moving on. I thought I was so strong for not letting anything get me down. But perhaps I have been too weak to really face the problems.

So how do you move on from resenting someone who is dead?

How do you move on from resenting a divine being that you are not even sure you believe in, or how much of a role they play in creation?

How do you move on from resenting the decisions you made as a young child too scared to full accept?