Hectic Pace Has to Slow Down...!

[Guest Charlotte J.]

I haven't been around here for a while. This month has been very busy and I've had a shift in my routine where I haven't had the time and opportunity to dress that I had before. I've been in guy mode quite a bit. I've had very little to no privacy to process everything that's going through my head and heart, and time to process is something that I've always needed. I feel like a lot of the progress that I made after April of this year has been buried over just coping with the day-to-day.

And part of me feels like that's just life. Life's difficult and stressful. Deal with it.

But then I turn around and wonder how much joy I'm denying myself and being denied by not taking/having time to take care of myself.

The thing is, being trans* is one facet of who I am. How important is it? I know longer feel as certain as I did that this is something that demands a great deal of my attention... yet I do miss the feeling of ease that I had when I was engaging my femininity more actively. And I do continue to feminize my appearance by shaving, wearing jewelry, and applying light cosmetics and perfumes from time to time.

I am still trans*; that doesn't change. I'm just struggling a bit with how much I can do about it at this point in my life. I've been thrown back into a more regressive state of coping, rather than feeling like I'm moving forward. In a couple of weeks I will have more time open every day, which will help.

Just checking in here.

[Guest]

what I'm understanding is that you deal with it at you own rhythm. That's a good thing. Being in girl mode is not an obligatory thing.

[gennee]

Life does get in the way. You'll have the time to be in girl mode. Sometimes the break away is a time to assess where you are now and where you want to go. I remember early on when I made up excuses to go out just to be in fem mode. Now I dress every day so that issue has been eliminated.

[Guest Charlotte J.]

what I'm understanding is that you deal with it at you own rhythm. That's a good thing. Being in girl mode is not an obligatory thing.

But it's not at my own rhythm, that's the thing. There's too much going on day-to-day for me to engage with gender right now. It's not at my own rhythm, but life's rhythm, and life is bigger than me and my gender.

And for me it just doesn't seem so much an either/or at this point, but a both/and. I really feel like non-binary describes me, and that's a confusing place to be. There's a lot of stereotypically male stuff that I don't get and I think there's a lot of stereotypically female stuff that I don't get. I just feel fairly undefined in regard to gender at this point. That's an unfortunately familiar feeling.

I come on here and I see so many people who take this one route: hormones. And maybe that would be helpful for me to do, too. Lord knows I feel fairly miserable right now. But I'm familiar with miserable from earlier in my life...

It's just hard to figure out. And I guess I won't ever know if hormones might be right for me until I start taking them. And even then I might not be sure. And even if I'm sure, and I feel great, I'll need to deal with that sharp physical transition and all the social fall out. I'm just not sure I can handle that.

Maybe I can, but don't have the strength right now because I feel pushed down by the day-to-day. Maybe, if how I was feeling a couple of months ago is an indication, affirming my feminine nature will give me the strength I need.

But I also don't think that I have the energy or inclination to put into some aspects of transition, like voice. Being trans* is about coming into myself and becoming more fully myself, and shifting my voice just seems like such a non-authentic thing to do. I have never had much tolerance for engaging in things that seem to me to be purely social etiquette. I feel like changing my voice is etiquette: "Oh, hi. I'm presenting in ways that are female, therefore you are going to assume that my voice sounds a certain way..."

And that said, I do find Caitlyn Jenner's voice in her ESPY speech incredibly jarring. I can analyze that a bit, I think. Because Caitlyn is presenting in such a feminized way, with a flowing gown, styled hair, and make-up, her voice--which seems distinctly unchanged, distinctly male--comes across as incredibly dissonant.

I don't know.