If I Was a Woman & You Were a Man
The Artist D
I can’t say enough about the tough times the man that I am has had to deal with. He’s really taken the brunt of the trouble in my life. Let’s face it; he’s been the one who has been there most. He’s like the nerdy lover to the woman I also happen to be. He makes the money, pays the bills and she gets to just be fabulous. At least that’s how it seems when I take a nice long introspective look at the life and times of . . .
The boy got picked on in school a lot. It was the boy who had to be driven to suicidal tendencies and padded rooms. That poor fat kid couldn’t catch a break. That poor teenager hopped up on pills and liquor trying to drown the voices around him. Then there was me. There she was in all her fabulousness. Who knew a wig and a pair of heels could turn it all around? Well, they did say a new frock changes everything.
I was born transgender and I will always be transgender, but I have to wonder the many “what if’s” that a lot of us wonder. Sure, this is science to some and a lot of “us” are trapped in a body. I never felt trapped in a body. I felt trapped in a person who was rather unpopular. Then again how very unpopular of me to ponder where transgender stops and ego takes the stage. Was I more interested in becoming a woman to fulfill my ego? I can guarantee the boy would never have gotten this much attention or have found what love is.
When I put on that wig and became The Artist D I found my escape into Oz. I felt better because I looked better and people loved me. They loved me more than they loved him. While the science existed that I was a male feeling more female, I was also an unpopular geek wanting to be a supermodel. Would I dress as a woman just to get attention if I was not effeminate? I wouldn’t know the answer to that but I guess not. It doesn’t rule out the fact that part of me likes being a woman. It has always meant power and confidence to me. Looking like the woman I feel connected to has brought me to see myself. You can take that as some sort of comfort that transgender is as transgender does and it’s got more to do with it than ego may ever.
As I grow older I sometimes get swept up into corporate America and normal sheepdog society. That guy out there pounding the pavement and bringing in the money exists so she can thrive. The more he gets into the male role of worker bee the less like himself I find myself being. It’s a multiple personality disorder gone wild. At the end of the day he looks into the mirror and he’s just that guy. He’s unattractive to himself and a slave to the wage. Then I get that whim again. I shave off all the hair, put the dress back on and go have lunch with a girlfriend in Los Angeles. Suddenly I’m having fun again and I’m actually acting like someone with character. I am quite the character.
The older we get we’re supposed to become one, but I seem to be ripping in two. He has nothing to do with her and she wants nothing to do with him. I’m in the middle of a custody battle over myself. Here exists two minds and two bodies all for the price of one. He’s a nobody and wishes to stay that way much like the boy he once was. She wants all the attention because she deserves it.
It all came to me the other day when I did schedule that very lunch date. It took no time at all to decide what I was going to show up looking like. This time there was no shame involved. There was none of that wondering who would see me or what they would think. This time I’d be throwing on the wig and prancing myself up to the table as she often does. For the first time he didn’t even fit into the equation. He was going to stay at home.
I used to have long talks with myself before meeting friends. Should I go “as a woman” or go “as a man” as if I wasn’t either and both were Halloween costumes. They actually kind of were! Somewhere over time he has become so lackluster and she has become so much more of a true person that it has turned into a complete non-issue. This all may make you think I’m in quite the quandary running around as two completely different people, but in reality I finally know exactly who I am. Every one of me.
Who are you?
The Artist D is executive editor of Fourculture Magazine. He is also unearthing the underground as host of The Fabulous D Show every Sunday night at 7 PM EST .
Category: Transgender Body & Soul, Transgender Opinion
About the Author (Author Profile)
The Artist D is a true raconteur and provocateur! He has been performing online since the mid 1990s. A relic from the cam show age before MySpace was any space. Author of In Bed with Myself, an autobiographical tale of transgenderism and Internet celebrity. Executive Editor of Fourculture Magazine and host of the Kawfeehaus podcast.Subscribe
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“Who knew a wig and a pair of heels could turn it all around?”
“I never felt trapped in a body. I felt trapped in a person who was rather unpopular.”
“When I put on that wig and became The Artist D I found my escape into Oz. I felt better because I looked better and people loved me.”
None of this sounds like transsexualism – it’s much more akin to the dual-personality of a crossdresser, albeit an extreme case. I know because I was once there myself, and it was tough – being happy with one’s maleness to the point where I didn’t want to lose it … yet being increasingly drawn to the glamour of one’s femaleness and the freedom it represents. Like Artist D, my introvert male persona Graham earned the money so that my extrovert female persona Sally (known affectionately as Sally the Tart) could go out and party. I was on prescription drugs (not hormones) for six months so that I could stand the pace of the life I was living. I lost a lot of weight, and for a short time I despised returning to my male persona so much that I considered whether I could be transsexual.
But I’m not transsexual – I’m a crossdresser who, at 40 years old, was finally living the fantasy life of a teenage girl. The difference between my personae was one of the most extreme cases I encountered … and this, I believe, is where Artist D currently is. I should say as an aside that if it doesn’t create problems, then don’t go looking for them; in particular, if “he” is happy to earn the money so that “she” can enjoy herself, what’s wrong with that arrangement? It’s more than most men experience, and I certainly feel lucky to have been able to do it.
My personal story progressed, and I found a rather unusual solution to the crossdresser’s dichotomy. After a few years, I came to realise that what I actually liked about Sally was that she got to wear nice clothes (in addition to the trashy party outfits), and to that end, I experimented with “true” crossdressing – women’s clothes, jewellery, and make-up … but no wig, no breasts, and no female name. I continued working at my job in a global communications company in the UK while presenting that way, and was privileged to be invited to create an employee transgender policy for them.
Nowadays, 12 years after giving away my last pair of trousers, I’ve never been happier. Although I sometimes need to wear something formal, most of my casual skirts and dresses are short – far shorter than most women beyond their teenage years would dare to wear. But age isn’t a reason that I should have to look like a frump! So women in their mid-50s don’t wear a 15-inch tartan hipster skirt to go to the supermarket … so what? I feel I’ve earned the right to create my own rulebook … and my friends seem to agree – they respect me for who I am, rather than despise me for what I’m trying to be. But what’s even more curious is that some of Sally’s outgoing nature has been transferred to Graham – as a “composite” individual, I’m now much more extrovert and confident than I ever was before Sally arrived on the scene!
OK – so going out in public as a man wearing women’s clothes may not be to everyone’s taste … but it works for me. The point is that there are more options available to a crossdresser than being torn apart by the continual flip-flopping from one gender presentation to the other. Take the best bits of both, and integrate them. Create a middle ground that works for you. You may be surprised at what you find there.
I think you are brave. I was VERY fortunate that by the time I was born, gender dysphoria and transsexuals were not so reviled, except in some ignorant people, and as medical professionals – once I been definitively diagnosed, they accepted it, and helped me. I was able to get puberty delaying meds and other help to prevent me from developing to far beyond female norms (plus I in my teens “appropriated female hormones to develop breasts because I was so jealous of other girls!).
It is because of brave pioneers and heroines, like Anne Richards, Monica Stewart, my surgeon Dr. Christine McGinn and countless others, that I was able to have as normal a girlhood as was possible.
Today, I’m a happy college student at 20, had my SRS at 18, and couldn’t be happier planning on a full feminine life! And excited about it. I have a handsome, intelligent boyfriend, and want to than you and so many others that made MY life possible.
Warmest regards,
Lisagirl7
Whether or not you go full-time as a woman, stop hating the guy.
He was there with you all of the way, and even now supports you. Somewhere down the road you and the guy may separate as friends, but remember, you once were friends.
It’s clear which gender you are more comfortable with. Why not just live full time as a woman?