Thought I would give an update.

[Guest Amanda Whyte]

Though not much has changed, I thought I would give an update.

Still just doing counseling and wearing panties and knee high hose/boot socks under clothes. I have decently long fingernails, just dont know what to do with them, and paint them with clear coat. I shave my legs, chest and stomach and wear my female pj's to bed most nights.

My wife does do little things that help as long as they dont cross any lines in her mind. Today she just bought me more of the hose/socks I like.

However on the actuall accepting my trans front she hasnt changed any. This weekend we had another talk and she still doesnt want me to go any further. Her opinion seems to be either my first counselor gave me an answer about feeling inadequate and I am making up everything else to fill in the blanks to make the answer right, or I have been lieing to her our whole life. She just cant believe I have had these feelings my whole life and never told anybody.

Right now the main physical dysphoric feelings I have is, mainly, above the waist. I cant stand my chest area, and really am starting to hait my hair (or lack there of). My main issues is just not being able to stand being treated like a man. I dont like men only conversations and really hate any confrontations.

The hair thing is an example of a place where I have lied to my wife for years. I have been balding since my 20's and have always said, "I dont care." I mainly kept my hair cut really short and just ignored it. It really eats at me and I cant stand it. So this is a major example of my lieing to her over the years that causes a problem.

I keep explaining my feelings as not feeling part of the human race. I live on the other side of some sort of imaginary boundary and while I react with the "real" world I am not really part of it. The main question she gets me with is why cant her and the kids be enough for me? or why cant they make me feel part of the human race? The various forms of this question about drives me batty with guilt.

Why cant they be enough? I dont know and it kills me.

Well I guess that is about it. I know I have not been around much but when I am at home I have been spending more and more time with my family. That probably wont stop but I will check in when I have the chance.

[Guest Amanda Whyte]

Oh, I forgot to mention that it is kind of odd but since awakening to being trans and coming out to here we have been closer than we have in years, if ever. If we are home at the same time it is almost gauranteed we will be sitting next to each other. Our new intimacy goes into the bedroom as well.

[Guest Shari]

Hi Mandy,

Hang in there little Sis. You know how hard it is to explain your feelings, just imagine how hard it is for someone else to get it?

I've had many of the same feelings as you have, and just like you I kept it all hidden my entire life. Don't think you've done anything wrong by not talking about it, it took this long for you to figure it all out. When I get those guilty feelings, I remind myself that I lived one way, miserably, most of my life to take care of everyone else. Now it's my turn to be taken care of (and I only have myself to do it).

Take care,

Shari

[Guest Elizabeth K]

Hang in there dearheart, your wife needs a lot of room to work through all this. Be very very patient with her!

Lizzie

[Guest Amanda Whyte]

Shari and Lizzie, thank you. It helps to hear people be understanding of me moving slowly for my wife. While I think I would be very happy moving faster, I desperately want to stay with my wife. I am willing to go slowly for that chance.

[Guest Gregg Jameson]

Hi Amanda,

I totally understand the feelings of guilt. I hope you can work through that and let that go in time.

I also understand wanting to maintain your loving relationship with your wife. I hope this works out for you!

It is all a process, as you know. Yes, as Lizzie mentions, "Patience."

It is sometimes difficult to have more patience when we already feel like we have waited to very long to be free to be ourselves!

Yet, patience is in order with ourselves and with our loved ones.

As we start feeling more like ourselves, we tend to want to move toward our goals of being more fully ourselves much more often, of course!

Always glad to catch up on how things are going for you and your beloved.

With Admiration,

Brad

[Guest Amanda Whyte]

Thank you Brad. As always I love your input. I kind of picture all of this as a valcano. At some point it is going to erupt. It could be next week, next year, or in several years. Until it does there are going to be periodict venting of steam and gasses. I am trying to get past those ventings until therapy helps me figure out a way to survive the eruption. I dont think it is going to happen in the near future but am scared what it is going to take to survive it when it happens.

[Guest Svenna]

Mandy,

Patience, patience, patience...

I'm a few months ahead of you, but on a very similar track, so your words really resonate with me. I was in your shoes 4 months ago and I wouldn't want to have to re-live the conversations I had with my spouse over this 'trans thing' for anything...

I've wanted to go full time for a few months, but I have barely done anything in real life, only to protect the integrity of my commitment to my spouse. I KNOW what it like to YEARN to express myself without censoring my actions or words. But I cannot, not yet...

My spouse and I had a very difficult discussion again tonight. Again, she feels up against a wall and still wants me to explain the same things she has wanted explained since day one. All of the progress we've made undone by her state of denial. She is moving through the stages, we do a lot of 'bargaining' these days, but still won't accept me unconditionally. Seeing my family accept me without hesitation really upset her because she sees it has given me strength to press onward.

We talked tonight about surgeries and the mechanics of love. This did not go well...

So, I will relent until she approaches me with a suggestion for forward movement...

Push and relent, love and support, push and relent...

Slow and steady, like a starfish works, too. I learned that here!

Hang on, hang on...the best is yet to come...lol..

Love, love, Svenna

[JJ]

Amanda,

When I thought I had to live as a woman because my body dictated that was my fate I had to learn to play a role. I had to act like something I was not and fool everyone -not to deceive and be false but because it was the only way to be the best woman I could. To do what society expected of me. But that wears you down and takes a toll. Leaves you unaware that doing your best actually meant being false. For those of us who are committed to being truthful that is perhaps the source of a lot of our depression. To be good people we have to play a role. But playing a role is false and false is bad. A true catch-22 bind.

A few times when my daughter was struggling I suggested that she put her hair up under a ball cap and try to spend a day passibng as a man. Try hard to be a real man and maybe she could get a shadow of what my life was like trying to live as a woman. Sge declined but it did make her think.

As far as others being enough for us-that is just too simplistic for human realities. Our brains qare configured with needs that must be met. We have reserves but eventually they wear away and we are no longer able to meet the needs of those we love when we cannpt meet our own. That is something that being a social worker-it is rule number one. You cannot meet the beeds of others if you do not meet your own. Disaster is the inevitable result. For strong people it can take a long time but they tend to fall harder when they do fall.

Also I have never understood how someone who loves you can ask you to live in a lethal pain and misery. I understand denial-though the reality is that there is no undoing or going back. The truth is forever the elephant in the room whether someone wants to see it there or not, eventually it becomes undeniable.

Not to mention that the part of your relationship that was true and real-the vast majority in any good relationship-was with the very person she is denying. Because nature dictated that in heart and mind you are a woman whether she recognized it or not. It is the woman she loves and not the illusion of the man she believes she loves in all probability. If that is not the case then the relationship has no basis at all. And it is you the woman who loves her and not the false image -the creation to satisfy the demands of society.

Anyway that's my take on it. I was lucky and unlucky enough to not have an S/O when I transitioned. But my daughter has been my life-a different relationship by far I know- yet she struggled to accept even while supporting. Turned to me in pain and anger and accused me of making her an orphan. That hurt -so much. A real distance developed for awhile but I just kept doing what I had to do while telling her I loved her and not putting any pressure on her. I didn't stop T or avoid the issue but didn't force any discussions she was uncomfortable with except a few times when frustration got the best of me. But now after a year she is embracing the new me and we are closer than we have been in years.

I gelieve very nuch that we have to continue on one we start our journey and that stopping for someone else only makes the possibility of working that relationship out in the long run more unlikely. But we have to go very slowly with love and acceptance and understanding of the pain of those who love us. Who must transition with us when that is what they least want to do.

It sounds like you are doing well. I realize that the guilt is perhaps unavoidable but the truth is that there is nothing to be guilty about. You are all victims of a terrible birth accident -and you were just trying to do your best as you knew it. In the long run you will be a better partner and a better parent for transitioning. I am absolutely convinced of that.

Hugs

Johnny

[Guest rikkicd64]

Hi Mandy,

Hang in there little Sis. You know how hard it is to explain your feelings, just imagine how hard it is for someone else to get it?

I've had many of the same feelings as you have, and just like you I kept it all hidden my entire life. Don't think you've done anything wrong by not talking about it, it took this long for you to figure it all out. When I get those guilty feelings, I remind myself that I lived one way, miserably, most of my life to take care of everyone else. Now it's my turn to be taken care of (and I only have myself to do it).

Take care,

Shari

Hi Shari,what you said is correct,at least for me,what you said is an exact mirror of my life.

Thanks.

Rikki...

[Guest Amanda Whyte]

Svenna, I always appreciate your input. Alot of our stories are very similar and it does help that you are a few steps ahead of me. Thank you very much. I actually think I am doing ok on the patience I just need to vent about things every once in a while to help.

JJ, as I have said numerous times I appreciate you input also. It helps to know that these thoughts and feelings make sense.

Rikki, Shari is an awsome lady and always has wonderfull input.

Another thing she does that drives me crazy is when she keeps relegating me to being the word husband or father. I am me and I want to be considered as me being me, not a word. Just venting though. I know that this is hard on her and in some ways harder on her. I just need to let my frustrations out sometimes.

The biggest urge I fight is when she says she is scared I will leave them, I want to tell her that it will be her that will kick me out and it wont be my choice. I do tell her that I dont want to leave them and will never voluntarily leave them. I know these are the same things but the urge hits to just put it bluntly that it will have to be her decision if we split up due to any reason.

[Guest rikkicd64]

Svenna, I always appreciate your input. Alot of our stories are very similar and it does help that you are a few steps ahead of me. Thank you very much. I actually think I am doing ok on the patience I just need to vent about things every once in a while to help.

JJ, as I have said numerous times I appreciate you input also. It helps to know that these thoughts and feelings make sense.

Rikki, Shari is an awsome lady and always has wonderfull input.

Another thing she does that drives me crazy is when she keeps relegating me to being the word husband or father. I am me and I want to be considered as me being me, not a word. Just venting though. I know that this is hard on her and in some ways harder on her. I just need to let my frustrations out sometimes.

The biggest urge I fight is when she says she is scared I will leave them, I want to tell her that it will be her that will kick me out and it wont be my choice. I do tell her that I dont want to leave them and will never voluntarily leave them. I know these are the same things but the urge hits to just put it bluntly that it will have to be her decision if we split up due to any reason.

You hang in there Amanda,you will work through it ok,I still have work daily on different issues of my transformation.

Huggs....Rikki....

[Guest Gregg Jameson]

Hi Amanda,

I hear how adamant you are about the fact that you will not voluntarily leave your wife and family!

You are very, very serious about this!

I also understand your wife's fears around the possibility of your leaving.

I am wondering if your wife knows you participate here and if she, somehow, is afraid this is a place where people "pick up" others for relationships? The reason I am asking is because I have just realized that some people around me think every transgender site is a place to "pick up" and/or to "start relationships" (sexual relationships) with others. This is a myth. Although I am sure there are some sites where this happens, this site, in my opinion, is not one of those sites.

(I deeply appreciate the fact that this is a site free of that type of an agenda. I am happy to have such a place to interact.)

Yet, I wonder if you wife somehow fears this may be a part of the agenda here at LP? If so, I wonder if an honest talk with her about this might put some of her fears to rest?

Just a thought.

My best to you and to your beloved, Amanda!

Brad

[Guest Amanda Whyte]

Thanx Brad. I never thought about that. She does know about Laura's and I have offered her to look over my posts or make an account of her own. She always declines. I have always described it as an online support group. I may have to figure out a way to bring the subject back up and ask her. For now we avoid talking about it till I have a chance to see my new therapist and see what she has to say.

Rikki, thank you for the support.

[gennee]

I've explained to my wife that I've always felt different. While I'm not going to transition she has seen the changes in me. Like you I'm not leaving my wife. I recently shared with my pastor that I'm transgender. However my wife won't go out with me if I'm dressed.

I won't force the issue on her.

[Guest Amanda Whyte]

I am happy that you have seemed to have found a happy place to be Gennee. I hope to find that place as well someday.