I am not sure I know what this means?   Do we just mean that it will become safe and normal to be an LGBTQ+ person in society? I HOPE SO.    I am not sure we need more than that?    I really feel like what we should HOPE is that it will be safe and ordinary. Not even remarkable, and then we can focus on all the much bigger parts of identity? 

Dear friend dying, feeling mighty low.

Do you think LGBTQIA2S+ people will be affirmed in society in your lifetime?

Thank you Petra. I think it is important to take part in any validated research study to help future generations provide support to all LGBTQIA2S+ people. So, I signed up.

Hi Joanie - I'm glad you are coming to terms with yourself and I am extremely proud of you. It is so hard to take that step. I tried to avoid the real me into my 60's for much the same reasons as you and after reading a wonderful workbook called Gender Identity by Dara Hoffman-Fox, about $15 on Amazon, I was able to focus more on who I was and who I felt most comfortable being. Dara is a gender specialist and asks a wide variety of questions and asks you to answer based on your life and helps to organize your thoughts and be you. The most important thing is to be YOU and not what anyone else expects you to be. Glad you are here, found the strength to let us know you and hope you keep coming back and sharing your journey with us. Hugs, Heather

Welcome to TGP, Joanie!! Thank you for trusting us enough to share a bit of your story. As Kathy Lauren said, while we are each unique, we also often share many similarities. You are not alone. You are accepted. You are valued. You are loved...no matter who you are or how you present.   Gender is, unlike society like to portray it, a wide spectrum and not an either/or construct. Finding where you fall on the spectrum is the key and sometimes can be elusive. Have you considered working with a gender-qualified therapist? Many of us have found that to be the key that opens our lives.   Many of us have also gone for decades being the person we were told to be until we finally found our true selves. While we might look back with regrets of times and things missed, looking forward is a much more productive and happy approach. Find yourself and live the rest of your life. Each part of our past has shaped us and remains a part of us.   I look forward to getting to know you.

Welcome Raphael, I'm happy you are here and know we will answer any questions you might have as they come to you. I am proud of you and glad you found us. All we want is for you to feel you are part of a community and not alone and all we want for you is your happiness. Also I'm glad you are into music. Music helped me a lot and being a songwriter, helped direct my song content. I also play guitar, bass, and record my songs. Welcome abroad. Heather

Hey @Max Happy Weekend!   We live right by the beach, so we went for a walk yesterday evening after dinner. And we wonder why we don't do this more often, especially in this weather. I had a proper paddle in the ocean!   I hope you are doing OK today, and have something fun to do today too? 

Hey Joanie !   It's so lovely to meet you, and it is an honour to be able to meet you as yourself!  I am pretty much the same age as you, and even though we are travelling in different directions, I hope we can share things about the journey, I look forward to getting to know you more. 

Welcome Joanie!  I am glad you found us.  Your story is quite familiar, and I think you will find you have a lot in common with many people here.  Feel free to look around the site, and to comment and ask questions.

My name Joanie,   It is finally great for me to write that to others at the age of 54. How to be or who exactly who I am is still a puzzle to me at times. I have mostly lived in public as Jon and in private as Joanie. I refer to myself as genderfluid, as I have been happy at times as he, but predominently spend my time as she, and am far happier and feel more natural in myself. If I could live the rest of my life as Joanie then I think that would be the true me so whatever gender terms there are Im just me. As I believe is often a pattern, I have been married twice and never been able to be fully comfortable with the life that I had and that was, somewhat chosen for me by my Strict Methodist upbringing and strong family male led sporting heritage (Rugby, cricket and Football)  Having said that I do acctually love watching my sports and was myself successful in track and in rugby which did bring me joy, even though I didnt feel I quite fitted in as afterwards would want to get home and just be me rather than hanging out at the sports club. To be brutally honest, I have been in tears trying to write something about me, some for who I may have been and the time lost and some for feeling so vunerable, but mostly happy that each time I felt scared to write anything the lady in the mirror urged me to carry on and for just being me and sharing a tiny bit about of myself.    Where I am, how things pan out for me and how my life looks from now, I am unsure but It is a relief and a step in the right direction (I hope) to finally be a little more open.  

We have been asked to bring the following Research to your attention.   Purpose and Scope of Research Study I am currently completing my thesis project at Western Sydney University, the School of Psychology, which focuses on evaluating a current educational resource for gender affirming healthcare. As part of this study, I am examining an educational video designed to teach cis gendered healthcare students about providing gender affirming care in general healthcare settings. To ensure the resource is both informative and reflective of real experiences, I am seeking feedback from both transgender and gender diverse (TGD) community members and healthcare students. The perspectives of TGD people are essential to understanding whether this resource accurately represents their experiences and whether it may be useful in shaping future educational materials aimed at improving healthcare accessibility for TGD communities. The research will evaluate an educational video resource created for the purpose of providing information on the experience of transgender and gender diverse experiences in healthcare. This evaluation will identify areas for refinement and assess the future potential of these film-based modules, including expansion to additional disciplines and practicing clinicians. Finding from the research will be included in a psychology honours thesis. Institution Supervising Research Study Western Sydney University Web Address for Study Participation https://surveyswesternsydney.au1.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_09yOeVWRyMoUVFk

Life has been so weird lately I do not know WTH is going on. I just Googled "Are villains good sportsman?"