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So. It took me 12 years of alarm clocks, schedules, and struggles with insomnia and exhaustion to get my body to a roughly midnight to 8 am sleep schedule. Where I still needed the alarm clock, but most days I woke up without it or just before it went off. But there was that knowledge that it wasn't fully reliable and I had better have that thing set so I didn't get fired. And it's taken roughly...four weeks to end up back on my native 4 am to noon sleep habit. And now I get tired around the same time every night. I am asleep within a half hour generally of hitting the pillow, I still get the occasional insomnia I can't sleep for a few hours, but it's been twice in the last three months, not four times a week like before. I don't need sleeping pills four outta seven nights a week anymore. I sleep solidly around 8 hours. I no longer have this exhausted desperate need for a nap in the middle of the day anymore. I occasionally do enjoy a nap, but it's not the same I need one every day or I fall apart in the evenings. Why am I talking about this? Because many people kept telling me that sleep schedules are easily adjusted, and completely overlook the physical effects side of changing it. Evolution has NOT caught up with our modern lives. We evolved multiple internal sleep clocks as a survival tool, someone in the group was always awake to alert the others to dangers. But a tool that worked for us for thousands of years didn't just vanish. I'm not saying it won't evolve out. Our brains a whole still are, the shapes of cars in the last couple of decades has been added to the 'instant recognition of a basic shape that is not a threat moving around us' reflex. That was a fascinating article, about how we subconsciously identify threat vs. harmless by overall silhouette shape, and what has been introduced to that catalog in our brains. Even for children and people who don't drive, because they are such a common thing in our world now. But people in places where they are not have not added the shape. Sorry, got off on a tangent. Night owls unite. We just are what we are. And if you're like me and just can't adjust to the day shift world, do try to find a night shift somehwere, you're body will be happier for it.

Watching Unusual Suspects while waiting to get sleepy(Deadly Women auto qeued this) and I think the cold medicine is making me wonky, but the murder victim's name is Brianna, and despite it being a pen name, it's really creepy to keep hearing "And he murdered Brianna..." Mr. Plus Turtle says he'll defend me though. I'm not sure I like cold medicine anymore. I couldn't take anything for years, most of it contains pseudoephidrine, and you can't mix that with the daily powdered asthma control inhaler I was on for years, so I just got used to colds and dealing. Aspirin if my throat was really unhappy cuz I'm kinda wimpy. But I don't have to take Advair anymore for like three years now, so I took the NyQuil pills Nikki offered me, and I just feel loopy. I don't think I feel better, I think I just care slightly less that I don't feel good from the medication.

This morning I came across this wonderful post on Joanna Santos' blog: https://joannabefree.blogspot.com/2016/10/my-own-coming-out.html I know we don't typically reference sites off of TGG but I feel this is important. There, she posts a video that really resonated with me, that labels such as gay, male, white, transgender, etc., may set us up for "us vs. them" feelings, thus leading to isolation and our considering ourselves only within that label, which is only a part of our overall self. I've recently been thinking, okay I am transgender but that is not all that I am. But it kind of felt that way. Worse, I fear my wife feels this way, too. It's as if my being trans is the only thing now. And neither of us want that. In the video the person (can't recall his name) makes the point that if we say "I have gender dysphoria" that we can more naturally consider things like:1. How will I accept, manage, and live with my gender dysphoria?2. What does gender dysphoria mean for me in the context of my total life?I think that is healthy to consider. I recently came out to a couple of our friends as transgender. They were okay with it at least to my face but now I think I may return to them and refine myself as "I'm me, with gender dysphoria." I mean, who cares what the label is? I'm simply working on ways to manage my dysphoria (which is undeniable) and be happy as a total person, with my wife, friends, and doing whatever it is that we do.

Hi Christie, Thank you very much for supplying your thoughts and feedback. As I imagine you saw in yesterday's blog post (and perhaps getting weary of hearing me say it) I am yet again accepting the fact that I'm transgender. So, that's a label I wear and it's the one I've used when coming out recently to family and friends. For most the way I started the conversation was by saying something that is very true for me, "since I was about 4 or 5 years old I always wanted to play on the girls' team." I wanted to be a girl, plain and simple. And now at 60 I'm not sure what other label I should use for myself or if I even need one. I don't know what I feel comfortable with. I imagine that will come with time and experience. Hi Bree, Excellent points my friend. In fact I was thinking that way exactly as I mentally prepared to come out to my sons, and I hoped it would start a conversation. I did give them the first line that I quoted above, and then as a follow on said that I am transgender. For my 28 year old, it was the start of a lot of talk, emails, and SMSs over the following week or so. It was fun for me because he was so interested in learning more, and completely accepting. For my 32 year old it was more of a quick, "Okay, you're transgender, and no, I don't need to know more than that." He didn't say it negatively and since I had no idea how to interpret his response I let it go. We spent the rest of the time just catching up on our lives and plans. Take care and be well! Emma

I think it's way to easy to forget that those label's are the start of a conversation, not the end. They're a way to indicate a common ground, I'm a nerd, I'm an animal lover, I'm a mother, but then the individuality needs to be explored after. Examples of what I mean: I'm a nerd, as in I like a lot of the nerdy entertainments and science, but I can't hack or program a computer. I'm an animal lover, but I like to eat meat and believe in the cycles of life, including death(for the record I am againts eating endangered species though, they need to be preserved until they have a healthy enough population again, other animals are eating them they don't need to feed us too until a healthy balance can happen). I'm a mother, but I don't fit in with a lot of of the other mothers who want to shield the children from everything, I believe just talk about topics to the kids and adjust them to the real world they'll have to enter when they are grown anyway in small steps as you encounter it. Everyone has labels, mass mass plural. No one has just one label. Reven in ALL of them my friend!

Emma, There's a lot packed into this post - let me start by saying that I think everyone should be free to identify as they will (within reason of course, if I tried to identify as black for example I would expect to be challenged or flat-out mocked). I think it changes the conversation a bit to look at identities vs labels - it feels to me a little more substantive and whether we like it or not identity differences do exist and they do matter (they may be social constructs but even a social construct is real). I could, for example, claim that my being white isn't important - but since white is a "privileged" identity I would be wrong. Anyway, being trans is obviously different (since there is no such thing as "trans privilege") so I agree that we are each free to incorporate it into own lives as we want. Personally I've gone from highlighting it ("trans woman") to burying it ("woman") to pushing it back ("woman who is transgender") - and I generally only mention it to people as we get closer. One other thing - to one of Monica's points - to me being transgender is part of me body, mind, and soul - for some it may be primarily in the mind, but I don't think that's universal by any means. Xoxo Chrissy