Dear DeeDee,

Part of your pain is that your wife is getting involved with a man she hardly knows "on the rebound," possibly to spite you, but what she is not yet aware of is that she is about to shoot herself in the foot. 

Am concerned her "fiance" is not truly free to marry, and that he has an acrimonious relationship with his "ex-wife." If she could just get out of the place where she wants to spite you and save face, she could calm down and slow down. It would behoove her to get to know her "fiance's" friends, family, and most importantly, ex-wife. 

If you love your wife and can see beyond your pain, I beg you to visit this website:

https://www.lovefraud.com

Please study it carefully, because I am sure your ex-wife is about to be skinned alive by this man!

Once you have educated yourself (it is a very information-dense website like TGGuide), I beg you to share it with her.

NO DECENT MAN RUSHES THE RELATIONSHIP!

Please keep us posted, as we all are thinking of and praying for you.

Your friend,

Monica

Thank you ladies,

I have just woken up and while I am chasing the kids around to get them organised for school, I just kind of automatically pop on to see what folks have been up to.

5 hours ago, MonicaPz said:

Please study it carefully, because I am sure your ex-wife is about to be skinned alive by this man!

I thank you Monica but she has known this man for over a decade - she has been on holiday with him and his children and has even met the ex-wife, they were both singers and won their respective competitions at the same time - I had assumed it was a friendship similar to the others she knows who do the circuit too and meets when she's away.  My wife has already admitted to starting to date him last time we split (5yrs back now) and effectively admitted that he did something that made her come back to me - while I thought at the time that she truly wanted to make a go of the marriage. Our marriage has been a sham for a while, but while I was trying to build a future and writing off lack of intimate contact to her condition (she has Crohns and has genuinely nearly died with it a couple of times) she was trying to pluck up the courage to leave.  Her treatment of me despite me defending her is what has led to just about all of our mutual friends refusing to speak to her but happily talking to me, I just will not listen to her being bad mouthed because she is the mother of my children and I know that while she can be selfish and manipulative she also has a huge heart buried inside and does feel the pain of others.

5 hours ago, Christy said:

I am seeing the whole world again with the wonderment of the younger me. Only this time with all the great things in my life that I didn’t have before and I get to do it without hiding the real me.

The high of the weekend where I felt feminine and accepted even without wearing the right clothes or makeup was so quickly destroyed last night, and I know it was just a moment of self pity - I truthfully could not invest in another relationship at the moment - not without being 100% genuine about the fact that I am increasingly seeing Dee as who I want to be. Christy (Christa?) I stopped mountain biking and playing ultimate and camping and hill walking and fresh water swimming and all of those other activities that would take me away for hours at a time because I would always get moaned at for being out of touch. My wife hated me going out with my female friends and coming back in drunk, but it was fine for her to do the same I never once texted her asking how long she would be and yet it happened all the time for me - there is a chance for me to start re-finding all of these things I enjoy and add things like spa visits and massages and getting my nails done onto these in the future but for now I am still just trying to reconnect physically with some of friends - I just do not want to tell most of them about Dee until I am more comfortable with the idea of being her in front of others.

1 hour ago, Christy said:

I might have to get some of them drunk first 😂

I know the feeling - I think that on a night out with my friends everyone I know would just shrug, take it in their stride and then start making plans for Dee, but also, no one would want to be the one to be seen as being phobic. It would be the next few days that would really sort folk out as they sat and talked it out among themselves, I genuinely think me walking in wearing a wig would get a bigger reaction than me walking in wearing a dress.  Work-wise I will wait until I am 100% sure I want to transition and well on my way as that is something that cannot be reversed once it is out in the open, and I would talk to my employer before anyone else to get their recommendations as it would also affect the people around me. I'll need to have thicker skin by then, and as my new electrologist said - have my ducks in a row.

Your post made me smile Christa - thank you for your enthusiasm   - I've never been into bikes or cars, but I can appreciate the beauty in a lot of the older curvier designs and I used to say when I had my midlife crisis I would buy a trike to go cruising. Turns out I'm buying t-shirts with butterfly designs and trying to find a little black dress to look good in - I hope you have a great day! 😙

3 hours ago, Christy said:

Christa, everyone already knows something is going on with your gender. They are just being polite (then we went through all of the scenarios). 

I would be curious if you are able/willing to expand about this Christa because so far neither of my sisters and neither of the two sets of couples I told said they had noticed anything about my gender - at all - one of my male friends had to acknowledge my complete un-interest when it came to sports, but they have all always just seen me as a nice, well balanced male. Not even slightly effeminate just not overtly alpha, just quietly confident.

I suppose because I have not even met with a gender therapist yet, let alone started with hrt that I am very aware that what people will see is just a man in drag if I did start ewaring my Dee clothes more.

Someone who enjoys wearing womens clothes, that is not the impression I want to give, I do enjoy wearing them, but it is more than just fashion, most of the time they do not sit right at the bust area and they may not know me as Dee the same way that folks online do, but I am trying to drop a lot of my masking techniques and be myself a bit more the odd time I do meet up.  Due to my marriage and the power balance in it I have not had a physical social life for many years and 2 years ago moved away from where my friends were mostly based for work, isolating myself even more - we all still chat on FB but it is basically big birthdays and weddings etc when we see each other these days.  I have nowhere I can go out and just chill out as Dee.

I honestly don't even know if I want to, part of me does, but part of me is still saying no - I look at transitioning as a which is better? deal at the moment - I know I am unhappy as I am, I was surprised by the sheer intensity of the joy when people use "her" pronouns to discuss my blog, or compliment the odd picture I share, Monica welcoming me to sisterhood just makes me smile thinking about it.

Yet I wonder if it is all just a crutch or a distraction technique to take me away from facing up to my problems - I under dressed for the first time in ages yesterday - I know I was feeling low and wearing my panties and socks while I went about my day just made things a little easier to handle. I do not shave as often as I did when I was questioning, my legs, arms and chest have been relegated to once every week or even fortnight if I am busy or know I will not get much me time because I am too flat to bother now. Am I fighting natural me? or am I fighting to be natural me?

I love your passion and positive energy and determination to be Christa and embrace her, it feels to me through your posts like you are introducing her slowly to all the different aspects of your life. You are at peace with what you are doing and why. I do not feel that at all.

Sorry, I've gone all rambly again.

Thanks Christa, I was hoping you would expand on the bit about people already knowing there is something with your gender that you and your friend were talking about.

I appreciate you being so candid and sharing so much of your process with me.  It is obviously one of the things I still struggle with a bit, my list helped me to see that I have done many thins to try and be girly as I went from a child into a teen and then adult, but other than occasional wishful thinking about wanting to be a girl I never wished my privates away or got suicidal - something that seems to be prevalent online when you hear about those who have transitioned. I've basically had a pretty good life and always took for granted that I was a boy - like literally until last year - I was just one with a secret fetish about dressing up and pretending to be a girl.

Daydreaming about being female with my partner (or sometimes becoming or being made to be female in front of others) daydreaming about having a cleavage, and being included in some of the all girls things my sisters did instead of being left sitting with the guys.  Always just daydreams or erotic fantasies, even in my buying and purging the excuse was that it was for my wife and then once I'd worn it a few times it got chucked before anyone found out. 

I have been skunk drunk and never blurted out anything about wanting to be a woman because I suppose I just wasn't - but while drunk I could enjoy myself more, and sing and dance and hug and be expressive and no one would bat an eyelid (and yes once or twice I was that hysterical crying drunk too that no one likes) but binge drinking is a part of the culture and settles down once kids come along, most of the time I would be playing mother hen to everyone else - holding their hair while they puked and cleaning them and the house up, or making sure they got home safe... 

Many people have commented about me being a great dad but I have always thought I was a fraud and a crap father - I never do any of the traditional dad stuff (stuff my dad and grandad did) - tinkering in the shed, learning to throw and catch, DIY - I struggle to hang pictures properly - we read and go swimming and I keep trying to get them into D&D, and we bake and sew costumes for their fancy dress days and play computer games and board games, I've taught them how to load and unload the dishwasher and make their packed lunches for school and do their laundry (not that they ever do it but they know what the machine does).

All the things that I love about myself are what would stereotypically have been seen as womanly qualities, in today's world though it is just not being a dinosaur.

It is my own feelings of inadequacy in my male role that makes me so strongly drawn to the woman in me.

I love being called Dee online, I love the people hat I am getting to know and I have found it so helpful to blog my process and actually be able to pour my heart out and in all of that the people I come into contact with have just automatically counted me as female - responded to me as Dee, complimented me as Dee - and none of it feels wrong or weird or strange or false, sometimes I find myself wishing my sisters would call me Dee - but it cannot work while all the kids are still in the dark. When my online counsellor called me Dee it just felt right and natural, it inwardly made me smile a few times and in our last session I was dressed how I wanted complete with wig and had not given it a second thought - my counsellor never commented on it but I read people well enough to spot the pleasant surprise on her face when the call connected. Shouldn't it feel more like acting and pretending if I only saw Dee as a release - when often I feel man-me is the one wewaring the costume for work and socialising...

Losing the erotic side did not get rid of the desire to dress, losing the body hair really made me feel good about my body for the first time in a long long time. Going out for a walk, while carrying some of that old "excitement at being spotted" as I was going from man-me to Dee in the car but when I was out I just enjoyed the walk - the first exercise I have done in almost 6 months. 

I am sitting at home depressed most days - getting away with it because everyone assumes it is because my marriage has ended - and some of it definitely is that, telling yourself you are better off without someone is much easier than believing it, but I have done it before - last time I took up ceroc which was like modern jive dancing, though I stopped going when I got back together with my wife, but some of it is also just trying to wrap my head around the fact that I enjoy being treated like a girl in my interactions - I am looking forward to this weekend because it will be another girly weekend - I wont have the kids, so may even take my Christmas PJ's down to wear while I chat with my sister at night and then I will have my first proper laser treatment to get rid of some of the weeds on Saturday - and in my head I am already wondering how long it will be before I ask her to call me Dee while I am there and if there is a way I can be Dee while I am out in town

- I really need to start figuring out if Dee is just a part of man-me that needs some form of creative expression (I've always loved art and am-dram, probably why I like fancy dress so much) and because the rest of my life has so much control, or if man me was created to hide Dee who has just been asleep or hiding most of my life and is just jumping at the opportunity to get out!

Once I know I can quieten the doubt, I can make plans and I can move forwards.  It is odd that part of me can accept being trans while part of me is still looking for excuses and comparisons not to be - I think in my head if I could start hormones and feel the difference I would know instantly if it is better or worse for me, but that is a long way off.  I never said but I have two butterfly tees - one is grey with a pastel pink single butterfly wing and the other is an asymmetrical tee - teal colour with small butterflies diagonally across it and the wings are outlined in small sequins - it looks great with dark jeans. (I love the asymmetrical clothes - I think they suit me and flatter my figure)  I also have two little black dresses but I have not worn them as I feel fat and ugly at the moment - I have been putting on weight instead of taking it off - a situation i dislike but in spite of it all I still find myself reaching for the chocolate in the evenings. It's like I am deliberately sabotaging myself because I actually thought I was starting to look good.

I found myself rewatching some of Kristins trans life early videos this afternoon instead of doing my work - how do I know which is genuinely me? 💖

10 hours ago, Christy said:

Then after a while people started to admit that they knew something was going on. I think it’s because I am changing so much. I have boobs and my butt is a girl butt. My face has changed.

My sister has said that the face changing is quite noticable, or it was for her friend.  So there was not really anything specific that people could look back to, just the kind of Columbo moment where they flash back to the clues lol...  Thank you.

I naturally sit down 80% of the time anyway, it is usually only when I am out that I try to avoid the stalls because they're usually gross - like is it really that hard to lift the seat or give it a wipe after you've sprayed all over it? yeuch.  

I will probably not link in to a lot of these tg groups I hear about, the ones close by would be too close for me to dress at hem safely and I think the one in the town where my sisters stay meet is mid-week so I will have the kids and not be able to travel down.  I may start looking into it again soon to make sure, how does the whole group thing work?

hahaha as for the experiment, yes - I pouted like a child reading it, and I will not do it this weekend - I cannot lose the cost of my appointment which I would for cancelling this close, but more than that I simply do not think that it is the right step for me at the moment.

I am still trying to learn about myself and trying to do that without being ashamed of wanting to be Dee or physically excited by looking like her, taking the steps to see what it feels like being Dee out in public - just going to the shops or for that cup of coffee that I am determined to have, each attempt or failed attempt tells me something as I go over it in my head - just ignoring it was what I was doing until last October - I would just throw myself into something else to distract me. 2 years is the longest I have gone without clothes after purging, but the daydreams were still there.

I also do not think cutting myself off from these sites would be good either - I am forming friendships and asking questions and finding out all sorts of things that are useful for someone questioning their existence, with the best will in the world I cannot stop my brain from thinking about it all or I would have already lol.

So now I've put up all (some of) my excuses - it is interesting that NO! was my first reaction to your experiment  x

10 hours ago, Christy said:

But try it, no release, no gender expression at all for Dee. Then look in the mirror and ask yourself what do I want.

I may try to do it further down the line though - so do not be surprised if I say I'm going off for a while at some point. Thank you. I'll pm about the book, google is not being helpful just going by the title  💛

16 hours ago, Christy said:

One time there was a guy who was just staring at me in line trying to figure me out so I put my elbows on the counter and wiggled my butt just slightly. Fun stuff.

Sounds like you are going to give some poor old boy a heart attack if you keep that up! lol I have just finished reading an online article by her called the gender variant phenomenon, and that rang quite a few bells - thank you. 

💛

16 hours ago, Christy said:

How is your face changing if you are not on hrt?

Sorry - crossed wires, my face has not changed at all, all I do is shave and sometimes put on a bit of makeup, but my sister has a friend who transtioned mtf and she commented that her face shape totally changed so folks not recognising you in the street is not a surprise.

16 hours ago, Christy said:

Haha! I figured you would say no. I would have said the same thing when I was at your stage of Discovery.

🤭 

Just being me going out is one of my more common daydreams - I don't tend to remember my night dreams very often, but I know I have them. I do not have major aspirations as Dee, I want to learn to surf, and maybe take up dancing again once I am a bit fitter (I used to sweat terribly when I started last time and take a towel with me), but I do not have dreams of being a catwalk model or female president of some small dictatorship, but just being able to do really boring mundane stuff without anyone pointing me out or talking about it like it is a big deal lol.

The problem with salad is that it just is not as appetising in cold weather!  I am getting there though - today I feel quite good about myself, I am sat thinking about exercise I enjoy and looking to see what I can do in my area - I've always liked swimming but our local small leisure pool tends to operate odd hours for public swimming.

I spent over an hour in the shower yesterday shaving everything but my face and while I am wearing male clothes they are cream and pastel instead of my more usual dark blue or black tees. I am effectively in a good mood and hope that the rest of the day will be good too - even with the imminent pain...

x

On 3/16/2019 at 2:10 PM, Christy said:

Yes that article is really a small part of the book. The book goes into far more detail. So if it rang some bells then I recommend you read the book. It truly gave me a better understanding of how and why I felt the way I did and do.

Thanks Christa, I'll order it - my sons birthday this month coupled with starting laser has eaten into my funds considerably but I've found it and stuck it on my wishlist for the end of the month. 

Laser doesn't just hurt the pocket though! ouch! My sister said it looked like I had nappy rash on my face it was so red and that was after an hour of having a cooling gel on it, but apparently in order to be effective (eg permanent) I need the highest strength laser for my black hairs, the new posh laser for the red hairs and then electrolysis for the white hairs - so it will be a long long road... Under my jaw line was the most painful, but I'm guessing that it was due to the nerves near the ear. The test patches did not even come close to the pain of the whole face being done - I may look into numbing creams for next time...

I had intended to go visiting but because I looked like I had a nasty skin condition I just went back to my sisters and sat and watched the six nations rugby with my nephew.

I left just before halftime to drive home as Scotland were losing badly, which seemed to be a good luck sign as I missed an amazing comeback lol typical. 

I don't mind veg I'm just so used to having it with meat or carbs...am feeling motivated just now though so intend to crack on this week to start my weight loss by exercise and proper food management again.

Hi Dee,  It was a BIG step for me starting laser.  I started 5 weeks ago with my first treatment. Had my second last week..  She uses a "Light Sheer Diode Laser and Vectus Laser,  wavelength 810.  My biggest problem (and fear) in going out,  was my shadow and how quickly it would return after shaving, but that was quickly eliminated with my first treatment.  After laser for me,  one day of (sunburn feeling), a couple of days clumps of dark hair would force their way out through my pores, and from the 3rd day after to a week, my skin broke out somewhat. Which I didn't expect, because I never had acne or pimple problems).  I cleaned my face often using a defoliating cleanser and kept it moisturized with an oil free moisturizer.  Within a week everything was back to normal, except no dark hairs!😍  Shaving was so much easier.  I also started electrolysis a week after my first laser treatment, because most if the hair on my lower chin and neck was light hair, (probably an age thing?)  Have had about 10 hours so far and the results are definitely noticeable, but will need many, many more.  As far as pain,  neither were much of an issue for me, ( the first laser treatment bit me quite a lot right below my nose and around my lips, though!).  The second was easier.  Witch hazel is a good and in-expensive remedy which my electrologist let me in on.  Yes, the cost is hard to swallow, but if it's any consolation, the amount of make-up I need has reduced to almost nothing!  You are going to love the feeling, not just the physical feeling, but the psychological one too!🙋‍♀️  Jess

Hi Jess, mine has been an electrologist for 30 plus years and knows her stuff which I was delighted about considering I had one of 3 places to choose from - no BS - she took one look and said I wasn't going to be straightforward lol. She uses an IPL which was what she used the first time at max setting to blast the darkest hairs, which is why it stung so much but she refers to that as pretty much just clearing out the worst of the weeds to see what needs to be done, my next appt is in 3 weeks time to let the growth cycle start up again so she can see what is left, but she is moving on to the NDYAG laser which is more powerful but hits a smaller area to get the other colours, both are thermolysis so effectively use heat to completely destroy the hair permanently and then electrolysis will be left for the stragglers that have little to no pigment. Starting this before I see a gender therapist to see if I am "trans" through the NHS might not make sense to some, but for me I know I cannot stand having to shave all the time so getting a smooth face will be totally worth it regardless. Plus when I do wear makeup just now I hate the pad or wipe being torn apart when I clean my neck after only a few hrs. My sunburn is almost gone, just my neck is still red now, if it gives me a bit more confidence too then it cannot be a bad thing! 💛