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Are you stopping and smelling the roses?


Guest Lizzie McTrucker

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Guest Lizzie McTrucker

While on this crazy journey we call transition, do you ever take some time to enjoy the sights? Many people are so focused on the end goal but I always wonder...do you take some time to enjoy and appreciate the journey? Do you take a rest break while on the transition highway to just stop and admire the view? Do you reflect on where you started and where you are now, thinking about all the crazy adventures you've had, or think about how much you've grown, how much you've changed?

Do you stop and smell the roses?

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Guest Lacey Lynne

Yes!

Every single day, LIzzie. Thanks for starting this thread. Let's see what people have to say!

Peace & Joy / Lacey Lynne

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  • Forum Moderator

That is one reason i so love Laura's. I see folks come here who are so much like i was. I also seem to meet them somehow in the outside world as well and as they share with me i can see myself and the road i've travelled. I don't know if i always see it as i'm normally busy just living but in sharing with others years of change flash before me and i remember. I also try to open to how wonderful and blessed i am now. I often dreamed of being female as a child and now i'm living that dream and doing pretty well at accepting that which i cannot change. It is a beautiful world. Thanks for reminding me Lizzie!

Hugs,

Charlize

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Guest Deenah

My life is so busy, it's hard to find that time and reflect back on where it all started. I did however have a bit of time away from my busy life and traveled back to that starting point.

The memories came rushing in and made me cry. As I looked back, I had forgotten just how far I had come on this journey. August 10 of this year will already be two years that I have been on hrt.

It's amazing just how much I have changed mentally and physically. My career, my family and friend base is totally different now.

A few days ago I seen the women I lived with when I started my transition. She didn't recognize me, but I wanted to go say hello.

I remember clearly looking at the package that said Estrodiol, opening it up, and inducing myself with a new life. It was hard to wait for the changes as I took the meds every day. Now two years later, I'm happy to say, I finally love myself.

Deenah

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Last night at the fireworks, I was with my next door neighbor who has only known me for two years. She told me that when I first met you, I thought you were a very feminine gay man. And then almost overnight you changed from looking like a famine man into a feminine woman. She told me that she can no longer picture as a man because I'm so comfortable being a woman that it's just comes naturally to me.

That's when I smelled the roses. I've arrived and I am where I belong now. I love being Kathy now and it is a blessing to be her now. No regrets now. With the rest of my life before me. Just one more step of having GRS surgery in just a few weeks and life will become complete. Kathy

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Guest DianeATL

Yes I do every now and then. I reflect on how far I have come so fast. I was reflecting today that this summer is probably my last of being able to sunbathe topless (unless I go to a topless beach). It's something I will miss about being a guy only because women here in the states aren't allowed to do it. I would love to do it as woman, not stay a man so I could.

Yesterday I ran the Peachtree 10K and had to run it as a male since that is what my ID and registration was. My pubesent nipples were not ready for it and I ended up with bloody ones and red dots all over my top. It will be the last time I do that.

I am saying good bye to these male rites not with regret or remorse but more as milestones of my transition.

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Guest Sarah Faith

I do occasionally, there are times when I am feeling particularly reflective.. but a lot of where I have been and and where I am now goes beyond just trans issues. To go from where I was 5-6 years ago to where I am now I've had to overcome a HUGE hole that I dug my self over the years, so when I am reflective it often goes beyond just how far I've come with my gender. I tend to get a little emotional when I think about it really.

Honestly though I don't think too much about the whole trans thing too often anymore unless I am doing transrelated support online, or a friend in the community brings it up. While I reflect every now and then I am more focused on living in the moment and building my life now that I am finally just about out of the giant hole I mentioned earlier. I had my University Orientation just a few days ago and the trans thing just never came up and I never felt the need to inform people to make it into a conversational topic. I made a lot of new friends and really I'm just happy living in the moment and finally enjoying a little peace in my life when it comes to my identity.

Besides.. Pre-Med will and already is keeping me plenty busy, I dunno how reflective I'll be getting in the next 8 years.

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Guest Lacey Lynne

Lizzie McTrucker:

Oh, Lizzie, the most amazing part for me is to reflect back to the very beginning of my journey ... driving from Valrico, Florida on the Cross Town Expressway ... crossing 7 miles of water on the Howard Franklin Bridge ... seeing my gender therapist at Christ the Lighthouse Church in Pinellas Park.

Sigh!

Who knew? The journey has been AMAZING! I an eternally grateful to she who made it all possible for me, Dr. F. !!!

Peace & Joy :friends::friends::friends: Lacey Lynne

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Love your Posts Lizzie. :friends:

I just spent ±2 weeks enjoying WorldPride.

Stopped and smelled the roses every chance I was given.

The culmination was the 5 hour+ Pride Parade.

I realized I have made leaps and bounds since beginning this latest part of my Journey.

Huggs, :wub:

Joann

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Guest Lizzie McTrucker

Lizzie McTrucker:

Oh, Lizzie, the most amazing part for me is to reflect back to the very beginning of my journey ... driving from Valrico, Florida on the Cross Town Expressway ... crossing 7 miles of water on the Howard Franklin Bridge ... seeing my gender therapist at Christ the Lighthouse Church in Pinellas Park.

Sigh!

Who knew? The journey has been AMAZING! I an eternally grateful to she who made it all possible for me, Dr. F. !!!

Peace & Joy :friends::friends::friends: Lacey Lynne

Really? Well this is an interesting coincidence.

Guess who my gender therapist is?

Uh huh... :)

(she's moved locations, but that's where I had my first few sessions, too)

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  • 3 months later...
Guest Jamie61

Hey Lizzie,

My good friend Marie recently gave me that same advice. It's really giving me peace to know that I can/should enjoy this journey. Currently I have been really enjoying the positive interactions I experience (savoring them ) and viewing the negative ones as the filter I need to separate from negative people. I reflect on how down I was after puberty, so destructive and looking for a very short life. I think I needed to go the long route just to get to a place where I could accept and like me.

I enjoy learning my craft and getting better and better at dress, makeup, hair, voice. When it's start to feel like work, I just back off and do what most women do, I just do what is easy and familiar! So knowing that I have developed an "easy button" is a pretty amazing bit of progress to be appreciated.

Speaking of roses... I love roses. I used to make frosting ones for my mom's cake decorating business by the dozen. I really like making pink and white ones where the petal color transitioned from pink to white, to a slight pink tip, then a beautiful spring green stem and leaf.

Presently I am really enjoying the fall in the Midwest, seeing the leaves make their beautiful journey so very peaceful.

Jamie

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Guest KerryUK

I saw this today and wondered why I hadn't added to it before (sorry Lizzie),

I have asked myself the very same question on quite a few occasions. You know, those doubting moments when somebody has been mean or 'slipped up'. Then, I have had to remind myself of:-

1) how far I've come

2) what life was like before

I think that as time passes and the milage increases along this difficult journey - the roses don't have much scent to begin with (a bit like when you smell that beautiful rose over somebody's fence but there is hardly any perfume) and one feels that you don't 'pass very well' etc. But as time goes by and one 'passes' and is accepted by others in society more and more - things do improve (like moving to the next rose along in that garden and it having the most wonderful scent). Then one is reminded 'ah yes, roses can have beautiful scent' just the same as I've needed to remind myself - 'I have indeed travelled a very long way and my goodness, my life now is so much better that it was before.

Stop to smell the roses? Oh yes indeedy but sometimes it can take a little while to find the right one with the strongest and most beautiful scent :) .

Hugs
Kerry x.

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