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The Burden Of Being Ts


Guest SouthernBelle

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Guest SouthernBelle

Lately, I've been under a lot of stress due to the fact that being transsexual means that you can choose to either make your loved ones happy or to make yourself happy. Since coming out, I have been faced with this.

All my life, I have been living for all those around me. I have been trying to seem male, macho, and masculine when, in fact, I am female, (opposite of macho), and feminine. As I'm sure you can all relate, doing so has caused me so much needless pain. And now that I'm coming out, I'm starting to see the pain that my transition is causing to my loved ones (wife and parents, thus far). It's hard on me.

I just wanted to state that and to ask if anyone else has had a similar feeling. Does anyone else know what I'm talking about?

LOVE YOU ALL

Belle

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Guest chngnwnd

Oh yes, I do. I can't help but to think my ex's bad behavior is the result of her sensing who I really was before I was ready to come to terms with it myself. Also, sometimes I think that part of the reason she is being so cruel to me right now is that she sees me coming out as a personal attack on her femininity.

I have not come out to my parents or children yet - partly because I am afraid the kids will blame me for driving their mother away when, in fact, she is the one that chooses to ignore them. Also, I can imagine hearing my mother accuse me of being selfish and thoughtless for "choosing" this, as if it were a choice.

I worked so hard for many years to be what they all expected me to be and I just can't do it anymore...

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Belle, your post is so true to the difficulties we all got to face up to .

We go through our lives in pain and then when we decide we have

to Transition we got to face up to so much more,,where on earth do

we find the strength ??? . Only this morning I said to one of ours here

we got to dig so deep into our reserves of strength/ moral belief"s

just to find our way through this mass of objections and general

dislike of us <<we truly are made of strong stuff . And so yes , Hun,

know where you are coming from there . BUT,,,,we got here , we got

Laura"s Playground , our safe haven . There are times I really do find

I replenish my batteries here among like minded folk . Just to finish

Belle,,stay focussed , you are a wonderful human being , you are

entitled to your happiness ,,,its worth the climb . luv,viv :)

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Guest ricka

Belle, you raise some great points and yes all of us--without exception probably have had to face, and continue to face the dilemmas you are struggling with.

Here are a few of my thoughts: For one happiness for myself or anyone else is possible to the degree that we are able to fully accept reality, to learn to accept Life on Life's terms. For some of us that is being the gender we are inside, not our assigned birth gender which was based almost entirely on the genitalia we were born with. I liked to dress as a girl and play with dolls as a child. Looking back at family movies by the time I was 5 I had decidedly female traits and a feminine face. By the time I reached puberty I was developing breasts. But it took me decades into my adult hood to accept the reality of who I was and the cost of non-acceptance was staggering for me, and for those close to me, because I was never happy with myself. Because I could not love myself I could not love others. But when I began accepting myself as God made me, then I found myself on the road to recover myself as I am. In my journey it meant accepting my sexuality as well as my gender identity. It also meant learning to love myself and finally coming to the point of being able to love and accept others unconditionally. I cannot make another human being happy---or unhappy. I can give my love, my acceptance, my authentic self. That is all I can do. Making judgments is the opposite of reality acceptance and we so very often cause ourselves and others misery because of our judgments about ourselves and others. Dearheart, I believe that coming out we do not really make others unhappy. It is their judgments about us that make them so.

Hugs, Ricka

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Guest erikka2046

Hi Belle,

I do understand your feeling and stress. I've been pretend to be someone who is not the real me, trying to do what suppose to be 'normal' to keep everyone happy. But after so many years I know I failed and have to choose what I have to do ...to live the real me.

I feel transition is always a journey like climbing...one thing after another, one route after another. Before coming out, there was so much worries in my mind about the reacting and acceptance of my SO, family, friends....etc. After coming out, I am facing a new stress like you....I keep asking myself: I choose transition, I'll be happy but they may not VS I don't transit, they are happy but I'm not. What should I choose? I do find out is not my decision, I just born this way and cannot keep on doing something that not the real me.... I think evetually my loved ones do understand and let me live my life. Are they happy when I go transition? I think is not a black and white thing. My SO and some of my family members are quite happy, but some are in between like a grey area, of course some won't. Of course I hope everyone will be happy and accept, but reality is always another story. Transsexual is not common and most people don't understand and don't know how to face us. The easiest solution is we keep staying the old way and seems make sense to them....they don't really understand why we take so much burden and suffer so much to live the life we want to be.

Don't worry hon, we are all here for you and many of us went through the same thing. After I came out, I do find out giving my loved ones as much of info, real life stories of other people helps a lot. It seems making them understand they are not the only one have this situation and easier to accept my decision. Also, they are not losing me but just the same me come in a different package. I know my loved ones also face stress and pressure from other people around them because of me.... the only things I can give them is more info and after all, I am just another normal girl wants to have a normal life like everyone else.

Huggs

Erikka :)

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Guest NatashaJade

Belle,

One of my biggest roadblocks in transitioning is how it will effect my wife's relationships with our friends and family. While I am afraid to lose people in my life (and I know there are a few I would probably lose that would be difficult for me), I am more concerned because these same friends are my wife's close friends and it would break her heart to have a schism between me and them. I don't want to see her torn in two, knowing that I am the cause of it. Most of our friends are pretty liberal and if you asked them out of the context of me being trans how they felt about us, they would probably all say that it was no big thing. What I see as the issue is always that feeling that I have somehow been deceiving them, that they don't really know me. I really don't want them to feel that way and perhaps I am not giving them enough credit, but risk is difficult and, at the moment, I don't have to do it. I'm very much waiting to cross bridges until I come to them. Ans I will come to them sooner or later.

luv

Gin

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Guest Melanie Dawn
Lately, I've been under a lot of stress due to the fact that being transsexual means that you can choose to either make your loved ones happy or to make yourself happy. Since coming out, I have been faced with this.

All my life, I have been living for all those around me. I have been trying to seem male, macho, and masculine when, in fact, I am female, (opposite of macho), and feminine. As I'm sure you can all relate, doing so has caused me so much needless pain. And now that I'm coming out, I'm starting to see the pain that my transition is causing to my loved ones (wife and parents, thus far). It's hard on me.

I just wanted to state that and to ask if anyone else has had a similar feeling. Does anyone else know what I'm talking about?

LOVE YOU ALL

Belle

That is exactly me, it's ironic that you bring this up, as I plan a nice long post on my blog (probably monday) on this exact subject.

Hugs to Belle

Melanie Dawn

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Guest SouthernBelle
Belle, your post is so true to the difficulties we all got to face up to .

We go through our lives in pain and then when we decide we have

to Transition we got to face up to so much more,,where on earth do

we find the strength ??? . Only this morning I said to one of ours here

we got to dig so deep into our reserves of strength/ moral belief"s

just to find our way through this mass of objections and general

dislike of us <<we truly are made of strong stuff . And so yes , Hun,

know where you are coming from there . BUT,,,,we got here , we got

Laura"s Playground , our safe haven . There are times I really do find

I replenish my batteries here among like minded folk . Just to finish

Belle,,stay focussed , you are a wonderful human being , you are

entitled to your happiness ,,,its worth the climb . luv,viv :)

Thanks, Viv. Don't worry! I got my chin up!!

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Guest SouthernBelle
Belle,

One of my biggest roadblocks in transitioning is how it will effect my wife's relationships with our friends and family. While I am afraid to lose people in my life (and I know there are a few I would probably lose that would be difficult for me), I am more concerned because these same friends are my wife's close friends and it would break her heart to have a schism between me and them. I don't want to see her torn in two, knowing that I am the cause of it. Most of our friends are pretty liberal and if you asked them out of the context of me being trans how they felt about us, they would probably all say that it was no big thing. What I see as the issue is always that feeling that I have somehow been deceiving them, that they don't really know me. I really don't want them to feel that way and perhaps I am not giving them enough credit, but risk is difficult and, at the moment, I don't have to do it. I'm very much waiting to cross bridges until I come to them. Ans I will come to them sooner or later.

luv

Gin

Oh, wow. That has much to do with my struggle... While I came out to my parents very recently, my wife has known for a few months (she was the first) and she has even expressed to me her fears of when I DO come out to her family/our friends. She's afraid they will hate her or disown her, which is exactly what I fear about myself. And so now I'm not only worried about the strain my transition will inevitably cause on MY personal relationships, but the strain it will inevitably cause on MY WIFE'S as well. And to make matters worse, my OWN fears about how transitioning will effect both me and my wife are intensified because I know she is going through the same stuff, except that she has made no choice of her own in the matter! (aside from sticking by me, of course)

And that's not even to mention my deal with my parents. My parents have hardly talked to me about my transition since I told them. They have been very loving towards me, but it has been the same amount of love as it has always been.

So they know that I'm a transsexual now and it's great that they're still being cool to me, but now there's this gigantic elephant sitting in the room every time I see them. I can see their pain behind their eyes as they speak and I can only imagine what their true feelings are, because they both wish to ignore the subject altogether! But please don't get me wrong... I'm not bitter that they are keeping quiet. I know that their silence is a blessing in comparison to how else they could be reacting. It's just that their silence speaks to me. I know that this is killing them. I am sure that they are going through all the same stuff that my wife and I are going through and probably a 'Pandora's Box'-worth of additional emotional ordeals considering that they are the ones that raised me from a baby.

It kills me. I know that I did not choose to be transsexual, that transition is the greatest thing I have ever done for myself, and that I should not view my transition in a negative light as a result of how it effects others. And, to be honest, I don't see my transition as a negative thing, but, even though I have lived a life of trauma in trying to make my loved ones happy, it makes me sad to know that ending my trauma is a rather traumatic experience for all of them.

...Then I worry about everyone that doesn't know yet (eek!)

Anyway, that was a very long reply. I think I really just wanted to elaborate on what I'm going through. (whew!)

Please, everyone, know that I am not having a breakdown. I am STILL the same Belle with her head held high, carrying the very same positive outlook. I am happy to be me! I tell myself everyday just how much I love myself and that I am the girl of my dreams! I just needed to vent my stresses a little.

LOVE YOU ALL (sry Gin... somehow this reply ended up being to everyone...)

Belle :P

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Guest SouthernBelle
That is exactly me, it's ironic that you bring this up, as I plan a nice long post on my blog (probably monday) on this exact subject.

Hugs to Belle

Melanie Dawn

Oh, PLEASE PM me once you've posted it! I'd love to 'hear' your take on this subject!!!

HUGGS

Belle

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