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Hi everyone, Happy Friday!!! Some follow-up from last week, there was one friend I hadn't heard from after I emailed him last week, I wasn't too worried, but I admit I was a little worried (he doesn't live nearby, so i don't get to see him in person as much). Anyway, I texted him yesterday to see if he had gotten the email, he hadn't (some problem accessing his Yahoo email). He now has seen it and was as supportive and I expected (before getting pointlessly worried because of not getting a response). I told my sister last Thursday night. It went as I would have predicted if I had thought about it. She wasn't supportive - not openly hostile, but she was denying and rejecting and thoughtless and insensitive. She might come around, the problem is that the "thoughtless and insensitive" part is pretty recurring. That's why I knew I had to tell all of my friends first. Now I'm trying to think about my next steps. I think I'm at or near a tipping point where almost anything I do is going to be very obvious, essentially a public "coming out." The things I've done so far have feminized my look, but not to the point where most people would start wondering what's going on. Fortunately it's a good time of the year at work, we're about to go into exam period and then summer break, so it will mostly be staff around for the next few months. That gives me a chance to take more steps with a more limited audience and get used to it before a lot of students are around. I think my next big step is going to be to work on my female voice. I've done it in the past, but not consistently enough that I've felt comfortable using it in front of anyone. Since I decided to start going back to the Thursday night TG/CD group I want to be ready by then to try it publicly, even if it's not flawless (which seems reasonable). And I want to thank everyone here again for all your wonderful comments and support! This site has been vital to me in this journey! xoxo Christie

Just a quick addition - I'm wearing a pair of Jennifer Lopez jeans today, and when I passed a mirror in the rest room just now I noticed that they kinda make my butt look really good. I needed to share that with someone :-)

Happy Friday everyone. I hope that all of you had a good week. I am finishing up the first week on Spironolactone. So far I haven't really noticed much. I feel better, but I don't think it is because of the medication, it is more about starting HRT. I had electrolysis and "touch up" laser. I think that I doubled the pain with that approach. I'm going to try to do both again in two weeks. But if it is too much, I'll schedule separate appointments. The electrolysis wasn't too bad. She mostly worked around by mouth and chin. She did say that my complexion is really good but the hairs go really deep. Hopefully that does not mean I have to do a million treatments and I can get away with only doing 4 or 5. Other than that, we had a couple people leave work for better opportunities. My kids figured out I was the Easter bunny today. My daughter figured out I was the tooth fairy today as well and was really upset. So I was "outted". Lol! They still think Santa is real, though. --Lisa

My mother and I were chatting on the phone yesterday and the topic went to her had calling my ex-wife. They talked about me now as a female and my ex-wife said she remembered the two of us going out for Halloween to a bar that was promoting Halloween and I went as a female. She told my mother that she virtually got no attention (and she is a looker) while I drew a crowd of men who had no clue I was not female. I will admit that I was not prepared for this at all in regards to men offering to buy me drinks. I did enjoy the attention no matter the case. After going home I vaguely remember my ex-wife not happy about the events of the night and that I was not allowed to do this again. For me that was a moment in time that I cherish to this day and wish I had started my journey back then but then again it was simply the wrong time as thinking back I was in a battle with myself to my true identity. Being married to a good looking female in part satisfied part of my identity conflict as it allowed me in a strange (not so strange to someone needing to transition) to some that I had that female body (my ex-wife) with me. That brings to mind one of the last women I dated before starting my journey, in my eyes she was very beautiful and had the body of a twenty year old. Same thing applied in that I had this perfect female body to be with which would partly satisfy my desire to be female. The picture below is from our first date back in 2007 and at first glance pretty much fell in love with each other. She was here from Mexico to visit her family and found me on Yahoo dating which was when I was still battling with my identity. She contacted me, asked if I would come to dinner at her sister's house which I did. She had to go back to Mexico but said she would be back in two months. In the mean time we chatted on the phone several times a week. Once back in Oregon we spent a weekend together then before leaving asked if when she came back again next month if she could stay at my house with me which I said but of course, let's see how we get along together. She came back and we had a fantastic week but near the end of the week the female inside of me began to resist going any farther with the relationship and that's when the decline happened on the last two days. I needed to be Karen and realized that I was fooling myself into thinking that this relationship would solve my identity issues. She caught on that something was wrong and no sure how it happened but it never went to my identity but instead something else which was at one point she asked me to move to Mexico and live with her. She actually wanted to support me and she could as she is a doctor and lives very comfortably in Mexico. Any ways it would had failed and both of us would had been in a bad ways. That was all in 2007 and was the real turning point for Kevin becoming Karen. Before posting this entry I was only going to mention that parts about my mother and ex-wife but somehow got into the last part about Kevin and Guadalupe. Sure wish she was a lesbian.

I does of course mean I have to go out after work today - I can't just go home when I'm having a good butt day!

Hey Christie, This all sounds like a terrific plan to me. And yeah, the voice work is so important. I think you're lucky to have a weekly TG meeting that will help so much not only to provide feedback but also to notice your improvements over time. I'll bet you really rock those jeans, girl! Emma

I'm very drawn toward resources and ideas that I hope will help me practice and make automatic inner kindness. I need this as I have such a litany of self-directed put downs and labels that seem to come so automatically before I have a chance to prevent their affects. I've recently come across several that I hope I will find helpful and maybe you will too. I think of them like tools in my toolbox. But like any tools we need to use them enough so that they become familiar and automatic: Internalized Trans-Phobia This one feels risky for me to even post since I worry that TGG members and visitors will assume I have some sort of phobia against them. Truthfully this is not true at all. But that said, "It refers to how some people hate that part of themselves and are ashamed of it." As much as I am aware of my gender dysphoria and that it's a natural part of me I have to overcome my shame that has been with me for so many years. This article isn't a cure-all. It's a start as it says that we're okay if we have it and the place to begin is to be aware, acknowledge it, and accept that dealing with it is another aspect of our lives. James Altucher I've written about him before. He has a free email list (which you can subscribe to by clicking on his name). I don't like all of his writing, sure. But today he wrote one called "It's OK If You Don't". Among other things, he wrote: "At some point I gave myself permission: It's ok if you don't know what you want to do next. It's ok if you're scared. Scared sh*****ss. It's ok to not write a bestselling novel. It's ok to leave early. It's ok to not be a billionaire. It's ok to not start a charity that ends malaria. It's ok to get fired or to fail. Or even worse, to lose someone's money." The main message: it's okay to goof, to try and fail, to forget... to be human. It helps me to remember that from time to time. A Simple, Powerful Self-Compassion Method Leo Babauta has a website called Zen Habits, and he also has a free email. Sure, they don't all grab me. Sometimes they just don't fit. But this one I think is a great summary of a behavioral therapy approach to dealing with our inner Ms. Crapness. (Yeah, that's my word.) Notice it (be aware), Accept it (might as well), Comfort it like you would a small child who scraped her knee, and Love it and yourself. Easy to say, and all too easy to ignore for its touchy-feelyness. But hey, why not give it a try? And if it doesn't work its magic right away for you remember that it's okay for it to take a while. Love Your Inner Child My therapist recently gave me this homework: consider the questions, statements, and wants of me as a 3-7 year old, especially as it relates to his gender dysphoria. And then, write down what you'd like to tell him given what I know now. Example: Child: "I'd like to have a doll like Mary's." Me: "That sounds like that would be nice, doesn't it? Your birthday is coming pretty soon so it's good to know that's something you would like to have. Tell me, what is it that you like so much about her doll? What does it mean to you? What should I look for when I buy a doll for you?" After I tried to do this for a day or two I told him that I was torn between being fully supportive and possibly warning him that the other kids might give him a bad time for having such a doll. His advice?Give him (really, me) all the love and support, and forget the warnings and mixed-messages. None of us need that. Be kind to yourself. Practice inner kindness. Be well. Be you. Emma

Emma, This is a great piece! Thank you for sharing it, I plan to look into James Altucher. Christie