Claire likes to celebrate not just her birthday but the anniversary of the day she regards as her “rebirthday.” That’s the day when she made the firm decision to abandon her male masquerade and live the rest of my life as who she always knew she was — a woman.
Lynda Martini recounts a road trip to the Washington, D.C. area that gave her a chance to listen to a band called Swamp Poodle, have some good food and a few glasses of Prosseco, then see the world premier of a short form documentary film titled The Makeover. The film is about Lynda’s friends, Giselle and Beth. They met when Giselle wanted a male to female makeover and went to Beth, a noted makeup person. One thing led another and they fell in love, Giselle transitioned and two filmmakers followed them around for a few years. Join Lynda as she hangs out with the stars.
Claire Hall asks if she is a transgender woman? A woman who happens to be transgender? Or simply a woman? After transitioning and beginning her life again as Claire she is still not clear on the answer. For the first weeks and months the joy of being herself after years of frustration kept her feeling a natural high. But then the current political climate that allows anti-transgender messages to seep from our capital brought on a bout of depression. out of that depression Claire found an answer to her question.
Males and females have been assigned different characteristics by our evolving culture. Men are “supposed” to be stoic, unemotional, problem solvers. Women are “supposed” to be more willing to share things and support their female friends. While guys bury their problems and talk about football and cars, women listen to their friend’s and don’t try to immediately solve their problem. Claire Hall’s post talks about how she has experienced a shift from the stereotypically male approach to friendship and embraced the feminine model of friendship.
As Claire moves forward into her new life as a woman she is buoyed by support from friends and associates. For the most part her circle has approved of the move she made. But she is also a public official and that means she is open to a wider range of criticism than a private citizen. Her friends said she shouldn’t read the comments on her Facebook page but she did. Was that a good idea? Give her newest blog entry a look.
Back in 2014 Dana’s transition was about to take off. She had been on hormone therapy for a few years and the rest of her plan was set to implement. Then, because life is not predictable, she had to put the brakes on transition. What Dana calls “transitionus interruptus.” When something else in life keeps you from moving ahead with transition it is called a “flight.” It can be a family obligation, military service, getting that advanced degree, or any other thing that keeps one from moving forward with their gender transition. Read on and learn how various “flights” kept Dana trapped between genders.
Debbie Louise Cannon is a Transformation Coach who has been going through her own transgender transition since July 2012. Debbie helps people by facilitating the process of overcoming their main fears and all the obstacles preventing them from following their truth. Today she talks with The Artist D! about how she works to help trans people live their truth.
In around twenty nine days Claire will “go public” with her new gender presentation. She is excited to cast off the persona that was holding her down and anxious to enter the waters of women world. She has already come out to a few select people in her life and they are for the most part either supportive or indifferent. One of her female friends remarked that as much as Claire enjoyed the trappings of femininity that wasn’t what makes a woman a woman. Claire thought it over and shares her opinion on that in today’s blog post.
There is a saying that “the devil is in the details.” Sometimes no matter how much work you’ve put in some little detail will get overlooked and major problems will occur. For one trans woman just one lapse into inappropriate body language was enough to cause her a big hassle. Former TGF contributor Cassie Ann Sanders returns to TGForum with a new short fiction piece that illustrates how it’s the little things.
Linda Jensen lives in Canada but often winters in Florida during the coldest months. While vacationing there several years ago she met a fellow Canadian name Stephanie and they would get together with mutual friends for en femme lunches. They did this for several years and then, abruptly, the luncheon invitations stopped coming. Imagine Linda’s surprise when she turned on the television and there was her old friend Stephanie.
Sophie welcomes the spring season with thoughts on her life since she decided to live as her true self five springs ago. She remembers the rainy spring days when as a child she would walk around in her small town and wonder why she didn’t fit in, why she was different and how could God be punishing her. Those lonely, wondering days are in the past. Now flowers are starting to bloom, warmer days are coming more often and Sophie is being herself.
Music columnist Pam DeGroff returns to TGForum with a review of a new video by FtM musician and song writer Ryan Cassata. The song is titled Daughter and is about how gender transition changed many relationships in his life. In particular it changed the father-daughter relationship. Where his father had established bonds to a daughter, after Ryan’s transition his father had to learn how to change that relationship to bond with his new son. But Ryan will always be his dad’s little girl. Watch the video and read Pam’s review.
The Who had a song on their 1973 Quadrophenia album titled The Real Me. The lyrics are about the singer’s lack of a solid identity and his effort to find his real self. Today Amanda wonders where her real self has gone. While she has pursued her dream of transition for over six years she isn’t finding the peace and satisfaction she thought she would experience as a full time woman. She is haunted by anxiety. And she wonders if she moved into transition too fast while she was caught up in The Pink Cloud of joy experienced by many who give themselves the freedom to express their feminine nature. This is serious. She is even talking about de-transitioning.
Many trans women are reluctant to express their true selves for many reasons. One reason looms over the others for some. While they may be average height for a male they are taller than the average female. This makes them reluctant to go forth into the world expressing their true gender. They feel that being over six feet (1.8288 meter) tall may draw negative attention to them. Today Claire H. talks about how her 6′ 1″ size made her feel she couldn’t ever be herself. Then she started to find other tall women to provide inspiration. One of them is Tula.
Someone said that the only constant is constant change. If you think you’re always going to be exactly who you are you should learn the wisdom shared by The Artist D! “With age and experience comes wisdom. That is true because with age and experience comes complete and utter exhaustion regarding the things that used to be so damned important.”
Sophie Lynne has attended every Keystone Conference since the beginning so even though she is currently unemployed she couldn’t miss Keystone X. Along with buying some books in the vendor room that she will review in her Page Pundit book blog she ran into a lot of old friends and made some new ones during the event. Today she delves into what the conference has meant for her personally. It helped her stop thinking that transgender people were just a local phenomenon and made her aware of the coalescing of a nationwide trans community.
Claire just came to terms with her trans nature a short while ago but she has been thinking about it and musing on it and being frustrated by it for many years. Once she made up her mind her road to transition to living as a woman seems to be rushing by under her wheels. Her goal is to say goodbye to her male persona in just a few months. She is preparing her coworkers and her circle of friends and acquaintances that the change is coming. Her blog post today will let you know how it’s going.
It was the 1960s. I was a young man, a very young man, torn between spending the summer on his expected path of taking accelerated post-graduate studies at the university or diverting toward testing life as a young transgender woman. In those days, unfortunately, continuing my studies and being a transgender woman was not an […]
Sophie Lynne has been putting up with a job that exposes her daily to rude comments from customers and she has had to take it with a smile or risk being fired. A job that once fulfilled her has turned into a soul sucking burden that she can’t afford to quit. She needs the money. All that changed last week when she was suddenly, without prior warning, relieved of her soul sucking job when they showed her the door. Now the question becomes, will not having to suffer in a bad job allow her to blossom into another area, or will she succumb to the soul sucking despair of depression?
It’s only been a few months since Claire H. took her first steps toward living as her true self. She finds that as she moves into the future every barrier she saw ahead would dissolve away as she approached. Today she writes that while she had not been expecting to start hormone therapy till April the advocacy of her therapist got her an early appointment with a nurse practitioner and she can begin hormones this week. Will all of the obstacles be as easily overcome?
Constant vigilance is necessary as the media are often not through in researching who they use as an “expert” in shows dealing with trans issues. Dana Bevan is always on the look out for the inclusion of discredited “experts” and she recently caught one on the TLC show I Am Jazz. The offender in question was Susan Bradley, formerly of the Clarke Institute which morphed into the now closed Canadian Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH) center. Bradley is against allowing trans kids to be the gender they feel. Read on and find out what other misinformation the show allowed to air.
Claire H. though that she could move forward in life dabbling in crossdressing in private and taking out-of-town trips for en femme getaways now and then. During her first session with a therapist she realized that wasn’t going to be enough. Now the dam that has held back her feminine nature for many, many years is cracking. The water inside is starting to pour out and Claire is both excited and scared.
On November 22 Sophie was there to witness her friend Kimberly legally become Kimberly. Sophie went to Washington the night before to be with her friend for one of the most important days she would face. Her day in court. Changing the way the world sees you and addresses you is not a simple thing, even though the legal name change is accomplished in a brief encounter with a judge. Sophie went to support Kimberly because she feels that no one should have to stand before that judge alone.
As a lady coming out late in life our newest blogger Claire H. found inspiration and courage in the story of Maura Pfefferman on “Transparent.” The character resonated with her even though she was older than Claire. Thanks to Maura Claire began to move toward expressing her innate femininity. Then, in the swirl of sexual harassment charges leveled against many prominent men, she learned that the actor who so wonderfully portrayed Maura would be leaving the show. Today she expresses her reaction to that.
After waiting fifty-plus years to transition Cate O’Malley wanted to get her hands on a trans rule book. She wanted some kind of guide as she set out on her gender journey. What she found did not seem adequate. There was the WPATH Standards of Care and Ethical Guidelines but that seemed long and complex. Not what she was looking for. Somehow she found the right path to her goal and in the process ended up following most of the WPATH guidelines. How does she new feel about the idea of a Transgender Rule Book? Read on!
How trans is trans? Is it necessary to “go all the way” and have hormone therapy, surgery, and legal name change to be transsexual? Kimberly Hirschel considers herself a non-operative transsexual. Some might say she is just fearful of going all the way, but Kimberly presents her case for maintaining her current status quo.
