Things about to hit the fan

[Guest ArianaD]

I shared this with a friend on this site. I figured I would post it to open it up for any advice.

This past week I was on my way to get electrolysis on my facial hair and I turned around and cancelled the appointment because I was doing it behind my wife's back. She is still pushing very hard for me to stop my HRT. My 6 month mark is only 1 week away. I do not want to stop!! When I came back from the cancelled appointment, I told her all about how I came back and felt like God was leading me to come back because I should not have been going under those circumstances. Somehow during that conversation I led her to believe I was thinking of stopping HRT. I truly have been looking for guidance on whether or not I should stop it. It would be the easy solution to saving my family from all sorts of possible pain and struggle, but yet I still can't commit to stopping.

Ugh. I know I need to seek like minded people and get some support. I am drowning here and through everything she says my wife is very transparent in her view that if I was really listening to God he would be telling me to choose to be the best MALE father and husband I can be and to just "cope" with my issue. Those are not her words, but that is the message that is coming from her.

I think things may be blowing up in my life soon.

I need to be myself. That is all I am asking to do. She literally said to me that she does not understand because my quality of life has not improved, but has gotten worse. Maybe it is because I am living with someone who wants to push me back in the closet and nail it shut.

[Guest]

Ariana, I'm sorry that you're having all this conflict, it makes a tough situation so much worse. As for the God part, my response would be something to the effect of "what makes you think you know what god would say"?

I'm no expert, but it seems that you both have some decisions to make. Good look, hun......

**HUGS**

-Fiona

[Guest alexaz]

Ariana

How happy will you be if you do what your wife wants you to do ?

Please be honest with yourself here.

alexaz

[VickySGV]

How happy will you be if you do what your wife wants you to do ?

Please be honest with yourself here.

alexaz

Alex has it right there. Your identity and how you express it is yours and only yours to decide. It took waking up one morning very much alive to realize that God as I knew God had told me flat out, by my being alive that I could be Healed but not Cured of my GD. The healing was by educating people around me, and permitting myself to live in the joy and freedom that was the true answer to hours of prayer. If your spouse will not allow herself to be healed that is her life. I do think you did the right thing in NOT doing the other Behind Her Back, but now she knows and you are n charge there. Good luck babe!!

[Guest Kenna Dixon]

From someone who's dodged the bullet:

Live like today's your last day on earth. Leave no one unloved and nothing unsaid. You get one shot at a happy life Find the target and fire.

"God" is in you - not outside, wagging a disapproving finger. Don't let the Bible be a weapon for those who would bend you to their thinking. Some minds are so narrow that there's no space left for new facts.

People have many motives for blocking your path to happiness. It's their problem - not yours. You can choose to try to please others, but if that doesn't work, move on.

Unkind is bad. Selfish can be good, when it means simply taking charge of your own life and making the most of it.

[Charlize]

You have gotten some very good advice here. You must live your life. No one else lives it for you. When i went full time i knew it would be a struggle. Things did go downhill for a bit. Just like when we have surgery it takes time to get going full speed again. You are being honest with your wife. That alone is such a step towards liberation. I presume you have a GT. Mine looked at me at one point and simply said if you want to be honest you have to live as and for yourself. I had spent years being what i wasn't and alcoholism was one of the results.

Talk to your GT and make a decision as hard as it might be. We all take our own road. Please remember we will offer the support we can.

"Got your back"

Hugs,

Charlize

[Guest Raya]

God bless you, Arianna.

To have come so far then think you may get stalled - akkk.

Only thing I could add to the wisdom shared so far is that you will be the best person you can be, without being held back by fighting gender.

The God thing? My experience was that 40 years of praying to be healed were not answered; on the day I broke down and chose to accept myself, I prayed a simple "thank you". I felt, immediately, "you're welcome" and felt the smile attached.

God loves you and so do we

[Guest Mickey]

When I realized that I had been "bearing false witness" about who I was, my whole life, I knew that I had to be my true self and that God approved. God does not want us to "bear false witness", that's why it's a part of the 10 commandments. I've done a lot of study over the last 2 years, both in the Bible and in the languages used in the original writings. The context of Bible verses are very important. I am always happy to share what I've learned, should anybody care to know more.

[Guest]

Lots of good advice here and I am in agreement with Mickey that you have to consider that to be something you aren't is to deceive.

Now with that being said, let me tell you a quick story.

In Aug 2013, I finally had my "do or die" moment and I could no longer pretend to be something I wasn't for the sake of the world around me (literally I was living for what the world wanted instead of asking God what He wanted of me). At that point, I vowed to just be me. I wasn't going to like things just because that's what guys like and I wasn't going to dislike things just because society says guys shouldn't like that. At that point, I began to change my life in ways that did make people turn their heads, but not enough to say, "hey, I wanna be a girl." I started shopping based on what I liked, not what section I was in. If I found tees in the women's or guys, that's what I would buy. Same for pants, shorts, shoes, etc. Turns out I liked a lot more women's stuff, but I can assure you that the bible says nothing wrong about the types of clothes you wear.

Of course the bible also says nothing about getting healing help from a professional medical practitioner being wrong and in fact, Jesus was a healer and even did it so that God would be glorified saying that was the purpose. For me, estrogen actually soothed the mind and made me more stable and that's no different than using anti-depressants or anti-anxiety meds. It just happens this med is a female hormone.

My point is that you can not be something you're not (that's deception, or at a minimum conforming to the ways of this world), but that doesn't mean you have to change your body to be yourself. You can easily be a woman who was born with a slightly different body than most women. I chose hair removal because I hated shaving and wanted a smooth face. Once I learned that facial hair was just a biological by-product of testosterone, it was simply a matter of saying, this is biology and not necessarily a choice of God for me specifically. The bible doesn't give us enough information to make a discernment.

Good luck to you and your journey. Ultimately you need to do what God calls you to do. Sometimes we have to "hate" our mother, father, brothers, sisters, wives, husbands, etc to follow Christ. No one said it would be easy, but Christ will always be there and in the end, it will be rewarding.

God bless

Ashley

[Guest Mickey]

For those that don't know, I'm the one Ashley is talking about when she said that she agreed with what Mickey said. All my friends call me Mickey. She knew this from Facebook.

signed,

the girl with more than one name

Mickey

[Charlize]

Cute Micky.

Hugs,

Charlize

[Guest ArianaD]

Thank you all. We just had another counseling session. A lot was laid on table. At one point I said that I refused to go back to living how others want me to live. I spoke about how everyone else takes it for granted that they get up in the morning and can be themselves. I don't have that and that is what I want. My wife said out loud that this is already not the marriage she wants because I have already changed so much and this has all already changed our relationship. She also said that she feels uncomfortable in the bed next to me sometimes now. She feels unsafe because she is worried about what else she does not know about.

I spoke about how painful it is that we are both on polar opposites about my right to change my body. She is convinced it is "wrong" to do so. I told them both that my only real struggle right now is the fact that my hope that my wife may eventually come around has almost completely faded.

Our counselor challenged us to try to start fresh in the sense that we now tackle everything going forward with better communication to see if there is still a third option out there, but I don't think either of us are feeling that to be the case. We drove all the way home without saying a word. I am sure we will talk more tonight, though. My wife said that I need to talk to my parents and that we need to talk to her Mom sooner rather than later. That frustrates me because I was in a holding pattern for her and for this counseling process, now she wants to rush it all. I would have done it already with most of them and could have taken each step carefully. She is worried that the changes are almost too obvious already and that something may happen at an upcoming visit with them when our kids are in the room.

so tired right now

and I have to somehow deal with being on conference calls all afternoon with work

please send prayers

[Guest Raya]

You are and will be in my prayers, Ariana. I don't know what else to say.

[Guest ArianaD]

Just had another 2+ hour long talk with my wife. We both fell asleep from exhaustion and crying. I woke back up from the dryer beeping loudly and realized the kitchen was still a wreck. I took care of that wondering how many more times I will have the privilege of cleaning up after my family. I can't even begin to recount the whole conversation, but will try to hit the main points. At one point my wife stormed out the door heading to the bathroom saying "Go do what you want, since that is what you are doing anyway.. See ya!" This was after I again told her why I did not want to stop HRT and why for me it really did not feel like it was a choice. She came back from the bathroom with still a very tense tone and asked me what I felt staying on the HRT would look like then. I told her that I feel like I am fighting for my life right now in this moment. I said that I am not going to just say "Screw you then!", and leave my family. I told her that I know I am a transgender woman. I told her that it has taken my whole life to understand this and to figure out that HRT and transitioning could and HAS ALREADY helped me feel like a more whole person. I told her that my brain and the hormones my body is now working on were meant to be functioning in this way. I compared it to someone who is born a diabetic and needs to add something to their body to survive. She immediately said, "I wish you would stop comparing this to diabetes, but I told her that I would continue to use that example because it IS A VALID COMPARISON. I told her that I know she thinks that I am changing the way God has made me, but that I have instead ACCEPTED how he has made me and he made me with this mind and body that were out of sync. I told her that He has helped me get to this point and has opened doors in the past year to allow me to begin my transition. I told her that I believe I am on the right path and that somehow this will work out eventually to be the happiest path for our whole family. She challenged that because I had made the decision to begin HRT on my own without talking with Christians I trusted or with her. We have had that argument before so I simply said we have already been over that one. The dysphoria and pain has been holding me back from so much in my life. Socially, physically, emotionally, and even spiritually, I have not been able to be myself at the core.. so all of these things have suffered.

At this point the tears were really flowing from me and I told her how I had spent so many hours crying and unable to form words, but instead emitting those groans that come from deep inside begging God to not make this be the reality I had to face.. that I would have to tell my wife that she would lose her husband as she knew him, that I would have to tell my kids that they would lose their Dad (in a sense - even though I am still really just me). I admitted to her that at times I was believing the lie that it would be better for the three of them if I would drop dead, because then the insurance money would provide all of the things that I never could because I have been so broken for so long. After that she did speak softly for a minute, saying that her reactions tonight are coming from panic and that she just doesn't know who she even is anymore now what she can do.

Tomorrow is a new day. The stage has been set now for hopefully a new chapter in our lives. I am determined to not make my wife an enemy. I want her to remain my best friend. I want to be there for her always. I do not expect her to remain my wife if she decides she can't be married to a woman. That does not mean that I can't still help take care of her, my best friend. This conversation and everything leading to this point have helped me to know more completely that I AM DOING THIS. I AM GOING TO KEEP FIGHTING FOR THE RIGHT TO BE MYSELF, even if the fight has to be with those I love the most.

[Guest Raya]

Wow, Ariana, I really hope today can be more peaceful for you. I know the talking it through is important, but dang, sometimes you just need rest

[Guest amberismycolor]

this is a rough one i wish you the best for you and family. and thx for sharing the struggle, it helps folks like me that will have to have these same battles. thx you.

one thing you might point out is that you were made this way. its not wrong. yes you are changing but people are always changing, nothing is static and life does not happen in a vacuum. what is wrong is that western culture is very binary and controlling in what is acceptable. other cultures handle it better. yet what is acceptable is changing. look at what is going on.... for example state by state gay marriage as one example that is becoming a reality. tv shows with transgender characters, or gay couples is pretty mainstream.

i wish you luck! fight the good fight. as a share(if you are comfortable in sharing) how many kids do you have and how old?