What a difference a day makes…

Its been a while (again), sorry.   Things have been very busy and work and other charitable interests have kind of taken over my life for months now.   To be honest, I’m always up and down, but I’ve been in a downward funk for a while too.  You could probably tell that from my recent posts - its all been a bit half hearted.  Over the last year and a bit, the issue I’ve had is diminishing confidence.  You will recall that last time I went out publicly in Rhiannon mode, I was sirred for the whole night by the waiters.  This set me off and together with spending increasingly less time as me, I just gave up on myself.

Of late, the desperation and longing to stop pretending that I’m male has grown.  The internal voice that reminds me that my outside doesn’t match the inside, has been bellowing louder and louder.  Several months ago, this voice caused me, almost without thinking to make a very out of character hair related decision.

Since I began presenting as Rhiannon, I have had a succession of relatively inexpensive, lower quality wigs.  They have been perfectly serviceable, but I obtained them in the least obvious way - i.e. not going into a shop and saying, “I’m trans, give me hair.” but more either on eBay or when I was visiting the lovely Tracey at the now defunct Trans-Femme.

About 8-9 months ago, the very lovely Ruth from the blog Ruth’s Odyssey, who also lives in this part of the country, recommended Andrea’s Hairroom in her blog.  I went once and got new hair - as featured here previously.  Despite it being a big step up, it wasn’t my forever hair (!) and I wanted something that matched more closely to my eyebrows and that fitted my head a little better.  Andrea is genuinely joyful to visit - an amazing ball of lively and engaging Trans-friendly energy.  I started talking about what I was looking for and Andrea responded that what I probably needed was something that was fitted properly for me so that it was more difficult to tell that it wasn’t my real hair.  We discussed the options and I decided to really go for it to get a very high quality human hair - from the right sources - wig specifically created for my head.  I knew that it was going to be expensive and in the aftermath, it seemed very frivolous.  What had I done?  I don’t even present as me very much before.  But she was right, it was what was needed, so I went with it.

Three and a half months past and last Monday, the date for my fitting arrived.  I was excited and scared at the same time.  Excited to see how I might look, but nervous because it could be that despite spending all of this money, I might still not look that great.  Would it really make any difference?  Even nice hair doesn’t change the confidence that you feel inside, surely?

So I went along for the fitting.  The first challenge for someone with my confidence levels was that this time it needed to be in Rhiannon-mode.  To properly see the effect of it, to make sure it worked with me as a woman, I needed to be presenting correctly.  I haven’t been out publicly since I can’t remember when.  The thought just terrified me and I was tempted to welch on the appointment.  So I did what any girl would do, I sought moral support.  I asked a girl pal, A, to accompany me to and thank goodness, she graciously agreed.

I arrived early to work, got ready and spent the day very happily working as me.  Its amazing how my whole mood and countenance changes when I get the chance to present in this way.  Then after several telephone conferences, at 2pm, the time arrived.  The toughest part for me is always ‘the walk of shame’.  Getting from my office to the car is the most difficult part - will I be seen by people who otherwise see me as a boy every day?  Will they put two and two together?  With A there by this stage, I was calm and a grumpy stare from one man didn’t phase me too badly.

Once I was in my car, I was ok.  Surprisingly calm and by the time we arrived for the fitting, I was relaxing.  Andrea was her usual amazing self and I was immediately sucked into a time of acceptance and happiness.  But more than that, new hair.  I’ve never really thought of myself as the type of girl who has epiphanies.  But at that fitting I had one.  To say that I walked out completely different is probably overstating the case, but its not a million miles from the truth.

I messaged a few friends that evening with a text along the lines of: “I got my new wig today.  Felt amazing. Very happy.  I don't think I've ever felt so amazing, relaxed, unafraid and happy. So exhilarated. x such a big smile.”  I will do another blog about the mechanics of the new wig at another time (with more, better photos!), but for now, I want to focus on the effect of it.  I’ve never worn a wig that wasn’t in some way flawed.  It never quite looked, from all angles, like hair should.  It never really passed as hair.  In the last week, just simply having something that looks like it grew out of my scalp and that it has always been there has almost, in one go, restored my confidence to where it was before I lost it.

Immediately following my fitting, A and I had discussed going out for dinner which I never for a moment thought I would actually do.  I thought that I would chicken out.  Whereas actually, this time, I felt so lovely that I wanted to go.  So we went.  I’m sure I got clocked, but actually, I didn’t care, I just was floating on a cloud of confidence.  So much so, I went shopping afterwards in Rhiannon mode too.  I’m not sure what’s happened, but something just clicked into place in my head.  Two days later, I spent the whole day in the office in Rhiannon mode again and usually when I’m like that and we have visitors (e.g. deliveries), I scuttle out of the room and hide.  That day, I felt happy with how I looked and just smiled sweetly and stayed at my desk.  The next day I was desperate to be me again.  The weekend has disappointed because I’m at home and can’t be me.

I just can’t wait for the next chance to go out publicly as me.  Maybe you could argue that I’ve just found a new crutch that has helped. but if that’s the case, I don’t care.  I’ve not felt like this for a long time, I’m enjoying being me, again.  I’m excited to push the boundaries, again and finally, again, it starts.

Emotions

They say that girls are more sensitive (for that, read emotional).  Personally, I don’t think that is strictly true.  I think that it is much more person specific.  I do buy into the idea that girls are "allowed" to show their emotions more than boys.  Boys are encouraged to button up their feelings.

Imagine for a moment that the scale of emotion is 1 to 10:
1 equals unemotional and where emotion is completely inwardly contained
5 equals feeling emotions inside, but not showing them outwardly
10 equals being visibly upset and crying at the drop of a hat

If a someone is at 5 and something upsetting happens that moves them to 10, they cry.  If someone is at a 1 and the same thing happens, they could move from 1 to 5.  For them, this would be a really emotional response, after all they have reacted similarly, but no-one would spot it because outwardly, it doesn’t show.

What I was wondering was whether men, in general, were conditioned to be 1-5 and women something like 5-10?  If that is true, where does a trans person sit on this spectrum -- is it in line with the gender they feel inside or with the way they were brought up?  Or neither?

I've had a couple of upsets of late.  Silly little things, not meant by the people in the way that I took them, but they still got to me.  One of them was a weight related comment.  I am fat.  In the past I always said that I yoyo'd my weight, but over the last few years it yo'd up and stayed there really.  My genetic family are all on the large side and I use food and where possible alcohol to forget how sad I am most of the time.  The effect of this means I’m large and that I hate my appearance and by association I hate myself.  It is part of the reason why I don’t present as Rhiannon so much.  5’11 and really fat makes me feel like I stand out as a ‘bloke in a dress’.  It is a point that has been raised to me in the past by not nice people.  And at the end of the day, I am fat, so despite having the wrong motivation to tell me, they are speaking the truth.

What is interesting me is that when I do get these negative comments about my appearance, how do I react?  Sometimes, it is like water off a ducks back.  I just ignore it and laugh it off.  As I said, it is in reality true.  Other times, if I get the same comment, it's the end of the world.

So why is it that sometimes I react like that and sometimes I don't?  Is it that when I am in (or thinking in) male mode, I have a reaction more aligned with my up-bringing?  At those times,  I feel like an actor pretending to be something different.  When comments are made, they are not really talking about the real me, so I'm not bothered.  Its like I’m at a 3 on the sensitivity scale and a comment might push me to a 5.  It hurts inside but wouldn’t outwardly register.   The training to feel like this was good and despite being a relatively emotional person, I have always been good at controlling my feelings -- it is why I was able to hide Rhiannon for so long.

But increasingly, I am trying to stop it and to respond in accordance with my true feelings.  This isn't without its problems.  When I expose my true self, I just can't cope with any negative comment.  It feels like I can spend days going up and down between 6 and 10.  So, for example, when comments are made about fat people, I feel that everyone is looking at me and directing the comment at me because I am like an oversized elephant.  10 is reached with no effort at all.  Despite it being horrible to get upset and to feel the pain of it, somehow it makes me feel alive.  I need to find ways of not overreacting, but at the same time being ok with letting my emotions run their course.

It strikes me that this is one of the battlegrounds of changing your gender.  I am really comforted by my ability to be more emotional.  It probably is sexist and for that I apologise, but being sensitive or emotional makes me feel more feminine and in tune with my true gender.

I wish was that brave...

So.  Tomorrow is the Transgender Day of Visibility and I've toyed long and hard as to whether to go through with becoming more visible.  I fear that it wouldn't end well, but I'm just sick of hiding.  So I prepared this for my male Facebook page:

And this to go alongside it: "This is probably not the wisest decision I have ever made, but I’m in my 40th year and the thought that another Day of Visibility goes by without me saying something just seems wrong.  Truth be told, however, I’m terrified of doing this.  Whilst some of you lovely people know already and have been fantastic, for some it will be surprise or a disappointment.  I guess I can’t control or help that.  For some, it will be a source of embarrassment and pain.  But I can’t stop being me.  You see, I’ve known about this my whole life.  Well, since I was 4.  I’ve been ashamed of who I am and hated and loathed myself for most of that time.  Much as I’ve fought this, I’ve never won.  So here you are.  Me.  Now you know and I hope with everything in me that you stay my friend, but if you don’t, I understand.  I want you to know that I don’t think any worse of you, whatever you think of me.  To the rest, thank you.  If you ever want to discuss it or to know more about who I am, you only have to ask.  Take care x"

If only I had the poor sense and judgement to push the button.  Just as I have on here...

Cinderella…you shall go to the ball, just as you are

Of late, I’ve been fine.  Sorry that I’ve not been on here, but work has been busy, immersive, non-stop and intense.  I also have various out of work commitments - committees, trusteeships et al, that have been all encompassing.   Rhiannon days have come in fits and starts.  A month or so ago, I had three or four days in a row where I presented as I feel inside and it was lovely.  But really, it is too time draining for this time poor lass.

Work are very kind to me and let me dress when I want, but we work in a complex with other companies.  I don’t necessarily want to make it too obvious to the other people around that I’m trans as I’m not fully out to them all.  I’m a little bit in a weird limbo.  If I was going to go full time, it would be fine, but in this weird in-between stage, letting a load of people know about me who don’t know me would be weird.

When I do it, I tend to get to work early to make up and dress.  Just before the end of the afternoon, I undo it all and get ready to go home.  Mrs A still disapproves, so I just have to pretend.  When I have a dressed day, it is an hour out of my day that I need to use for working at the moment.  If I could get ready in the morning, before I get to work and then have it on all evening, it would be different, but that’s not how it works - I have instead to get dressed and ready twice.  During the day I’m distracted by it because I’m worried that people are going to traipse in the office - postmen, couriers, workmen etc.  And I just am not ready for everyone to know.  I find it hard to keep taking my armour on and off.

Essentially, I rhiannon when the pain and mental anguish of not being Rhiannon is so strong and palpable that I have no choice but to do it.  That happens fairly frequently.  But the rest of the time, if I can resist, I resist.  Its horrible knowing that I have this pain in my life and to be made to feel so sad for being me is just horrible.  My life consists of working, going home, working some more, eating, falling asleep, starting again the next day.  I’ve gone back into the mode of not thinking about it and avoiding it by replacing it with distractions.

Then there are days like yesterday.  I’ve blogged about it before, so you won’t be surprised.  But it was a special day.  My wife and mother were getting dressed up.  Just like Cinderella, I was helping them look great and feminine.  Touching up nail polish, advising on dresses, discussing make up options, making them feel great about combinations of clothing.  But I had to put on a suit and tie.  The thing that I am straight jacketed with every day at work.  Instead I just wanted to scream, weep, cry and run away.  But I can’t.  I just have to endure it.  Unlike Cinderella, no fairy godmother is coming for me.  No-one is going to wave a magic wand.

I thought about the Cinderella analogy a lot during the day.  Its interesting isn’t it.  The Fairy Godmother is the best that could have happened.  Imagine instead that Cinder’s family had inflicted a worse punishment.  Imagine instead that they said she could go, but that she was have to go in the rags that she wore in the kitchen cellar where they kept her.  How ugly and inappropriate for the ball she would have felt.  The prince probably would have looked twice at her, but only to wonder why someone bought her amongst the finery looking so wrong. That’s how I felt yesterday.  I was dressed completely wrong for the ball.

If I want to change it, I have to do it.  But I come back to the cost.  Lost home, family, wife, and on and on and on.  And I stop myself.

Never met another Rhiannon?

Just a quick one today.  Do you ever have those moments when you just wish you had the wherewithal, albeit dressed in boy mode, to just yell out that you are not the boring guy sat in jeans and a horrible top, but that you are really a girl just dying to leap out of yourself?  I’m guessing that for the majority of my readers there is a simple yes answer there.

I keep myself under control most of the time.  The number of times per day that I out myself has significantly reduced.  But today I was sorely tempted.

Just for context, not for boasting, I’m in Washington DC.  For those of you who don’t know, I sometimes travel with work and this time, en route (ish) home, I stopped off for 4 days in Washington.  I arrived at the end of last week and have been on a mad museum, art and famous place fest for the last three days.  I’ve just had the most brilliant time.  I’m on my own, so am free to do whatever I like, when I like and how I like with no reference to anyone else.  This is the only time my work travel will seem glamourous.  Normally when away, I work Monday to Friday, seeing only hotels and the office and do my flying on Saturday and Sunday, effectively losing two weekends every time I travel.  Not glamourous at all.

Today is the last day of my time here and so I went for breakfast (in boy mode) this morning and was munching away (in a delicate lady-like fashion) when a very exuberant twenty-something American lady walked past.  (Is everyone exuberant in this country? It does feel like it.)  Anyway, I was sat at my table when she excitedly went past saying, “The most amazing thing happened this week.  I met another Rhiannon for the first time ever.  We were both (like) talking and she said that she was Rhiannon and I was just so amazed because I’ve never met another one before.” (etc, etc, etc).

You can imagine why I was tempted.

There used to be an advertisement in the UK where the tagline was something like, “When a man you’ve never met before suddenly gives you flowers…that’s Impulse”.  it advertised a body spray.  Well, this scenario was a bit like that.  “When a man you’ve never met before suddenly tells you that he’s the second Rhiannon you’ve met in one week…that’s probably weird and a little creepy.”  So I didn’t.  But today I was sorely tempted.  And hope that one day I will.

Dysphoric Moments

So truth be told, I’ve not been diagnosed with gender dysphoria.  And I’m relaxed about getting the label - if I am, I am, if I’m not I’m not.  I know that whatever medically or psychologically the Doctors decide, I can’t bear being in the gender that was assigned to me at birth.  I saw my GP and told them about my gender confusion a few weeks ago and so the process of thinking about that has begun.  Normally the feeling of awkwardness and dislocation is at a low-ish level of volume in the background.  Granted, it is there all the time, and I can feel it.  I’ve said it before but at least every 15-20 minutes of my life, something reminds me and my mind turns to it.

Last night, I had what I describe as a ‘dysphoric moment’.  Irregularly, and fortunately not frequently, I get a burst of intense panic where I have the most intense emotional feeling that I can’t live for a moment longer without expressing myself as a female.  When I say “can’t live”, you understand my meaning - I’m 100% not saying I’m suicidal.  My thoughts rarely turn that dark.  But when these ‘dysphoric moments’ strike, I feel beside myself with strong, difficult to control emotions where I feel that I'm about to explode and am literally beside myself.  Given that, knowing my personal circumstances, I can’t get into Rhiannon-mode as I desperately want to at that moment, I just have to ride it out and wait for it to pass.

Sounds easy doesn’t it?  But those of you who experience this, also know that it is more complicated than that.  My problem is that I'm a bit of an externaliser and when provoked, a talker. Bursts of intense dysphoria normally make me want to talk to someone, anyone about what is going on in my head.  I wish that my answer to it would be a cup of tea or a drive or to play some music.  But it isn’t.  In the past, these moments have led me to undertake some fairly stupid (and not particularly well thought through) self-outings to people.  I’ve done it, just so that I could talk to someone.

The worst thing is when I have the combination of having those feelings and being sat near any device or laptop with access to my Facebook account which remains in my male name for now.  It is a recipe for disaster!  Many times I've written and deleted statuses (or is that statii?) that have told the whole world who I really am! Fortunately tonight two people - a very good friend who, when the mood catches them, will talk the hind legs off a donkey and a female friend who knows about Rhiannon and is completely lovely - were both on line and willing to talk.  It meant that I could just blow off steam, have a general chat, and talk until the moment past.  I’m ashamed to say that my old coping mechanism that I shouldn’t revert to - i.e. a glass of wine, also came into play.

I got past it.  The intense period passed reasonably quickly and the residue went after a while and I was back to low level background noise.  It gets set off so easily that I’m now just waiting for the next one.  I hope its not soon…

2015 Anthems

Happy New Year!  Let's see what 2015 has in store for us.  It is at least going to start positive.

I know that this is probably little behind the times, but as a sad 'Legally Blonde' fan, over the last few weeks, I've been drawn again and again to the song from the soundtrack, 'Watch Me Shine' by Joanna Pacitti.  The lyrics really do encapsulate how I feel:

"I'm not your average type of girl
I'm gonna show the world the strength in me
That sometimes they can't see

I'm about to switch my style
And soon things may get wild
But I will prove that I can conquer anything

So from my head to toe
I'm taking full control
I'll make it on my own this time
(Better watch me shine)

Better watch out going for the knockout
And I won't stop till I'm on top now
Not gonna give up until I get what's mine

Better check that I'm about to upset
And I'm hot now so you better step back

So get ready here I come
Until the job is done, no time to waste
There's nothing stopping me

Oh, but you don't hear me though
So now it's time to show
And prove I'm gonna be the best I can be"


Apologies for a schmaltzy New Year cheese fest, but occasionally I feel the need to be inspired and right now this is helping! :o)  I think this might be playing on loop for a while...


(One of the YouTube offerings of the song, incase you are feeling the same!)