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Briannah
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Blog Entries posted by Briannah
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He took our conversation seriously and rallied round when the guild teasing turned to me. I'm so sick I just wanna hide and he was all nope we're leaving Bree alone tonight she'll play with you guys next week. It was a great practice start. Love my Nikki. Wanna collPse quietly in a corner. Germs you win. I surrender.
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Okay, I did set ONE rule for the sexy time stuff. (and teh same common sense financial ones that i live buy, but that is just even marital treatment). If he is buying something like that for him, he buys something he wants to see on me. (It's sort of an extension we used to have on video games, so no one was unhappy by not getting things they wanted and it was kinda fair, only he won that by default because they stopped making the kinds of games I like en masse).
Yes, I'm totally going to ride this train into feeling more appealing to him.
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Awake stupidly early. Spent much of yesterday sleeping or cuddled up in the blankets next to Nikki who was watching movies after the meltdown. So we're both on this new supposedly low dose blood pressure medication since we're minority's but consistently above the normal range. And my camel status has been officially revoked to a degree that is crazy. So between waking up at four am again or explode all that sleep and I feel really bad is not letting me get back to sleep. And my voice is going under. Which will make my job fun because I answer the phones. Bree has a weird voice to begin with. Add the dead frog effect and even Nikki has to really sort out what I'm saying.
Nikki working with me on what can be a marriage breaking issue that I didn't realize I was even carrying around has relieved so much internal unhappy. It's funny how little we really know ourselves sometimes until the right thing makes us see.
Froggy Bree is done rambling weirdly now and signing off.
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So as some of you know i sort of went on an obsessive research binge to understand transgenderism in general and specific to what is needed to make my marriage successful. Only what isn't showing is that I'm still almost obsessively researching the social aspects of this. And I do mean almost obsessionally. And my friend M asked me why I'm stuck in this, and things gestalted. I have a huge problem in this marriage that has nothing to do with Nikki's transgenderism, but is being triggered by it.
Nikki never has my back in a conflict situation. I'm always on my own. I hate conflict every bit as deeply as he does, and i get physically sick from it, and terrified and spirally. Whenever Nikki gets into a conflict situation, I always have his back and am right there as his first line of defense if it's an untrue or misunderstood issue, or give him space to work with this information if Nikki is in the wrong. I've never left him alone on the hook, and he's been clear he never wants me to. And I never really consciously realized it, I couldn't figure out what was wrong in our marriage prior to this coming out, and why the increased closeness and working things out wasn't <b>fixing</b> me in the thought it would. And why I was so hung up on him throwing me under the bus in our talk with L on an issue i"d worked really hard to correct before any of this came out and was making a lot of strides, and when I explained my problem with Nikki saying now, she basically put it on me that i ask for to much. So that amkes sense, whenever I ask something from Nikki, he says no. EVERY single time. And then does it. Now, I have no gauge when no MEANS no. Nikki got angry with me if I accepted no and tried to do it myself or went to do something else if I was asking him to do an activity with me, and he got angry with me if didn't accept no because i literally can't tell anymore. When L asked what other issues were being worked on, and I brought that up, she brought up I ask him to do many things for me and that I was blaming him somehow when I as trying to express that I am literally confused about what NO means based on his behaviors. And I said I don't think that was what was going on but I"d work on it, and he literally said nothing until she asked the next qustion, and I let it go because that's what I always do. But the more I was doing for myself, the less I was feeling in a marriage because I was still on my own when it was hard and not being taken care of in a physical sense to substitute for it. I know, substitution is never a healthy thing in something like this. Nikki has been working really hard on that because h'es realizing I've lost my guage and I don't take it in a flirty way, and has been cosciously stopping that. That helps tremendously with that problem.
It took a bit to gestalt, but I'm substituting the emotional feelings of 'he cares' when he does something for me to cover the realization that I'm on my own when things aren't pleasant and happy. And how much I really hate knowing that. When I asked him about not mentioning to L that I had realized that on my own and worked to get it under control, was he misleading me that I had have great success? He replied no, he was just uncomfortable with arguing with her. If he can't say to one of his bets freinds "She's worked really hard on that, it's not part of my thinking it's cute to say no every time she asks for something and confusing her and not hearing that she doesn't find it cute" how can I ever expect him to have my back with my ongoing issues wtih my parents, or in a new social setting like bars and nightclubs while he's dressed?
This forum has been beautiful, but some weren't. Some were really clear to me that I"m just collateral damage or baggage, or that I'm now allowed to have needs or am shallow for thinking that bodies matter and if I love/find him sexually attractive as a male I should automatically be able to do so as a female. I can choose to pick a forum where I can connect with people emotionally and learn from that interaction in a positive way. But in a face to face situation I don't really know how to not just want to cry and feel ashamed of being me. And Nikki honestly admitted I would be on my own. I don't know what to DO with all this. He said he'll try to work on it like I have with his new needs, but it's all so confusing. It tangles up in my head with how does someone value you if they are only really there when it's easy or when the difficulty is on their side and they need you?
This is a godawful time to come to this realization too. Nikki will be home soon and wants to talk about this and I don't even know how to verbalize any of this. That's why I wrote it down, maybe he'll just agree to read it and then ask me questions so that I can get some sort of internal sense of direction and what I actually WANT to make this better. I don't even know what is realistic and fair to ask for.
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when you're browsing transgender oriented stores for your mate and suddenly are considering things for yourself too. Is this something like what Nikki feels shopping on the woman's websites? That this stuff is nice, I'm not the intended clientele, but dangit I want to wear some of this. Then I trip over my own social paranoia like I'm not supposed to take these items and wear them, they're not meant for me, and then I realize wow, that is a silly feeling if the whole idea of embracing this new adventure we're on is that it doesn't matter who the clothes were meant for, only how the person who wears them feels. Nikki is on an unholy quest to find me things he wants to see me in, after I (somewhat more timidly than I like to admit, behave dismorphia, embrace that Nikki finds me pretty and dress up for him) asked him if maybe the answer for my really awkward body shape and weight distribution might be found in these stores. It never even occured to me before this to look. I didn't close down Nikki's world, and for that he's opening up mine and maybe this won't help at all, but the possibility and looking at things is fun and good bonding with Nikki.
He's also threatening to take up sewing and waved an unholy amount of scratchy-type lace at me that will make my skin go crazy...I think it's supposed to be motivation to work hard on finding better clothing with him. It also made me realize the last thing I ever sewed was my first wedding dress (made my own!) and how long ago that was. Talk about skill atrophy.
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I was scrolling around in the crossdresser's forum to get more familiar with the topics discussed since the more Nikki talks the more he 'fits' the category at this point in time, so I wanted to learn more to help him be his best her on those days. And I ran into this thread, and it's surreal. I understand all the view points, but I realize so many things.
My insane life experience has made me uniquely qualified for this moment with Nikki and for once is a plus. I believe I dealt with the 'confrontation' conversation thoughtfully, and firmly on the 'this thing you did is dangerous and scary and it's a real medical professional or nothing' angle while at the same time firmly deflecting him when he tried to lie again with a "I'm not here to be angry but I'm done with being shut out of my marriage and if I can't lie to you niether can you to me and this is safe" attitude I hope helped while taking as much care as I could to reassure him this was a conversation and not a lifetime decision or freakout.
Then I went to learn. I read website after website. This is 11 years after this other woman, and obviously there are more resources. I am much younger. I had brush ups before. I had a life experience that has led me to a certain fluidty of life experience understanding. My hangups and stuck points were completely different. But I could understand both her views and the responders. I had trouble with some of the responses on both sides of the issue. Love in a case like this does not conquer all, for example. Love is fluid like everything else. And it is absolutely possible to truly love a person and be truly unable to live with them in a marital situation. I have seen this play out, and know this as fact of the emotional experience of mankind. There is an inherent unfairness in finding out this is a thing in your life after so many years, just as there is an inherent unfairness in having to try to 'cure' yourself of this thing or hide away who you truly are, neither of which are healthy. Sometimes fair goes out the damn window and you are just left with what is.
I didn't realize how WELL I've grown until I read that woman's post, in much the same position I was in, and the responses. And I realized that you can be in pain and fear and confusion, and never lose sight of the fact that you are talking to real human beings, and coming to them to asking them to share themselves with you to help you learn. I think even the first day when I broke down in a crying frenzy to S (the only transgender woman I know for certain that I know who I could think to ask to help me understand and was so gracious and open with me on everything from what it's like to live with and helped me organize and prioritize what things i needed to know to start talking to Nikki about instead of bumbling around in the dark) I was already open to learning to deal with this reality even though I was terrified and wanted it all to just go away on day one. I knew it didnt' work like that.
And the reception I got here was beautiful and helpful, and that was something I had earned by how i honestly think. I didn't do a persona, I didn't try to make myself fit any molds to fit in, I had worked my whole life to be a good turtle, and apparently it's worked.
But reading that is so surreal. And I can't imagine what would have happened to my delicate Nikki if I was more like that woman and less me. So thank you everyone along my life from Grandpa to here, for all the learning and growing you help me achieve and continue to achieve.
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So after the movie we started talking, and I realized that Nikki has made an extremely comfortable place for me in this. Which is both wonderful and truly scary. I'm included in his personal world where no one has been, and actively participating in the practical demands and the emotional ones. I'm finally at the level of closeness to him that was just slightly off, and I had started to think maybe I had internalized too much social romance culture and didn't exist and was doubting myself that something was off as time went by and life was great. He makes sure it all goes at my pace, and for me really sat down and examined his own needs and feelings to find out what they were. His google fu when looking for something speicific is amazing and a skill I count on because I often want to find very specific things on the internet, but my ability to big picture and connect varying things that are related but not obviously so led him to a wealth of information about what is going on with him he didn't have access too. While I had to redifine my understanding of him, he had to do it also, and we did it together. We have a healthy balance of his need for me to emotionally care for him the way he physically cares for me, and him dong it for himself that I don't think we had before. I can't even say how much positive there has been to me blundering into it. I learned that the reason he indicated to me the first time that he wanted the hrt was he'd sort of picked up from people on the forums he tried a few years ago it was inevitable, and he didn't really have a clear understanding of it's effects himself until I was showing him my research that i did in an attempt to ease my negative reaction to the idea, and unfortunately strengthened it into a coherent I don't know that I can do this point. Also I'm completely free to ask for either mode, and I did ask for girl mode last night so that I could use my vday plans I'd worked really hard on dangit. That was the first time I asked for actual girl mode vs. asking to let me see him like that and adjust. That was, I wanted to be with you like that and got myself into this mindset and let's fulfill our emotional romance urges together. I don't know how much of that he perceived, but I think that is a huge breakthrough in my head. And it let me go further in making my brain ignore the creepy outer plastic of the forms to try to give him a more natural full experience.
But that's why it's so scary. And I had this talk with him last night. So many real voices I speak with talk about how it progresses as they go, and I do have real internal fears on a lot of things. When I first started looking for places and tried to talk to real people instead of reading pyschological information, I was either mocked for my commitment to remain with Nikki (Support groups are so not supportive if they required a foregone conclusion of action to fit in damnit) or I was mocked for having sexual and emotional issues and needs of my own dealing with this. And Nikki has a problem where he wasn't okay with either, but he's very conflict resistant and so started stewing. Originally I was looking for him to guide me into this world, I didn't realize how much he'd jumped to conclusions vs. actual self-examination and was working under the misunderstanding that he'd scoped this all out and was just waiting for the courage to talk to me or the day I blundered into it. That wasn't working out so great, so my I will find us someplace kicked in. That is how I was the one to find this place and dip in first, that may have seemed strange to people, but that's our dynamic. There is an underlying assumption between our personalities that i will always protect him. The first clue I got when I arrived and started talking that this was the place was that no one thought it was weird or commented that I was the first to land, and people treated me like I belonged. Even though I am cis, there is no part of what happens to Nikki that doesn't affect me and the supportive education I'm getting here on his feelings, mine, and all of yours is invaluable as we figure this all out and you all keep me on an even emotional keel so that I CAN even figure out what frightens me, what makes me happy, what I need to be able to make him happy (and I am progressing with the prosthetics, Nikki was beyond pleased last night). You have all completely changed the coming out story in a truly positive way. Just because I have the commitment and love for him did not mean I had to tools to even being to understand myself or him in this time. And I really fear losing my comfortable place where I embrace just about everything that makes him feel good in both modes.
And then I did something I'd never done, asked him to fill a need I have that is as scary to him as the first time I went to see him dressed like a woman with breasts. I think he's incredibly uncomfortable with what i asked (and it's NOT a trigger physical activity). I've always been the initiator in sexuality matters. Nikki is uncomfortable doing so, and the rare times he has is because I was so caught up in life and wasn't doing it and physical urges overrode his natural submission. And it was a tentative would you like to...? sort of moment. But part of my dismorphia that was cycling around for years unspoken and not even understood by me that his perceived lack of interest in starting that activity with me, even though rationally understood and accepted, was hitting my disorder in a very real way convincing me he didn't really want me, he only does that with me because I make it easily obtainable for him. That was a terrifying moment for me, but I don't want him to hide from me, and since I had realized this in all this mess, I'm not going to hide from him. It's all in for both of us or we might as well stop. That being said, I don't mean he has to turn into a crazed maniac. I think the proposed plan was he sets a repeating alarm on his clock for like every to weeks to remind hm to ask me to go upstairs with him. My stupid brain doesn't need a full blown seduction attempt of the kind i actually enjoy putting on for him, it's sort of a really fun creative challenge for me how to reach and hit all his emotional buttons, which is why it kind of threw me that my Vday plan had been for girl mode and I had to come up with something on the fly.
This is a very comfortable and amazing place for me, despite the ongoing confusion. And there is still a lot of confusion on my end, when I try to talk to Nikki about what being a woman inside means to him, his answers are ALWAYS fixated on the physical aspect. This is not a judgement on my part, please understand, but this creates a communications disconnect for me and a lot of confusion, because my physical parts are a biproduct of it, and I rarely think about them beyond trying to wrangle their health and convenience, fitting into the damn bras and not hitting my own damn face with boobs, sexual aspects, etc. So now I'm left trying to understand if Nikki has just not developed that part because of his kind of emotionally stunting family and didn't have a period in teenage hood like me where he realized how much he'd missed out on and actively set out to learn it for himself, or if his particular flavor of the transgender umbrella is really his brain focusing for whatever reason on the physical aspects, most strongly on body hair, general body shape, and breasts, but it likes his boy parts and psyche just fine. LIterally, he puts on the forms and bra, and most of the time wears his normal boy clothes and does what he does around the house, and the only thing that changes is the stress switch in his head is flipped back to quiet. Am I trying to connect to and nurture something neglected, or is it something just not there? And Nikki can't answer until he works on this and finds out for himself. But that crystallized some of why I'm scared about the future.
A huge potential problem is...Nikki and I really prefer the same kind of female, which he can't be in a relationship. Which is way closer to me than him. So while his tastes and desire for me present no conflict if transition is an inevitability he was originally led to believe (and I now now that the spectrum presents a lot of choice, and only with a lot of hard work will he know what his future life and needs will be like) that presents a huge emotional conflict and desire issue for me. My tastes run to softer males and harder females. I think if had been allowed to develop naturally, I would have been way more submissive than I am and acted on my inner taste for dominant males (I drool over Sabretuth, Snake Pliskin, Raislint Majere, etc.). I enjoy dominant types. However, my formative years being wired by a crazy man who hurt me over and over (met ex husband when I was 16 adn jsut starting out on the sexuality explorations and settings) made that impossible for me to ever trust and fully engage with in that with a man. Nature v. nurture.
And, let's be real, him being a mix of both together, often as the same time, really works for me on all the levels, emotional, physical, and connectibility. I think I am going beyond adjusting into full on this is my life and I like it, and I don't want to lose this.
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So since Nikki was gone all morning I called my friend M and binged like a madwoman on catching up and going over our recent marital issues. It was a great reality check for me, I reacted extremely because my bond with Nikki was threatened by the unknown, her bond with her husband was actually severed by his choices(nothing to do with anything like what Nikki is going through, think really badly handled midlife crisis choices). And then when he realized his mistake, now he suddenly cares and is trying to fix it after some really brutal choices. And she's a great person to know, she loves you with a whole heart and is really honest with you. I don't think of my life in terms of worst case scenario in general, but I realize we had a fairly easy and quick sorting out of the initial phase as much as is possible at this point, and am so grateful for that.
And...I sort of floored her. She knew from yesterday's face to face time friend we had a thing, but friend didn't tell M what it was, just that she might want to check on me, and shared some of the concerns L had about it based on my flaws and some positives they wanted to help me reinforce from my strengths. So leaving from L's I texted her indicating I wanted to talk to her this morning and not do it on text again. This is the kind of friendship we have, helping each other be shiny and overcome the dull spots, and L was worried she so emphasized with A she might not be getting me so asked M who is way like me but was in a healthier place with it earlier to reach out. So M and I hadn't really talked closely in several years, we got busy with lives and live nearly four hours apart. But it's the kind of friendship that you can pick up at a moments notice. But she told me she was floored by how much I've grown, changed, and overcome my past issues. Apparently L feels that I have more blame language than I realize, but also that I fully do not mean to be doing it. So M said she would work with me and of course Nikki has agreed to point out if he catches any, but Nikki didn't quite feel that the comment I made that triggered L's thought was blamy. So this is going to be hard improving what i don't quiet get, but I'm not dead yet, so I'll give it my best. Cleaning emotional house with her was a wondrous reality check for both of us on where we are in our lives, and that it's okay to now know the best path forward and we'll figure it out together as we go. We'll just never get to Cleveland. LOL We didn't get to Cleveland on the phone today either, but we did affirm our shared love of Nikki, and our agreement that her husband has a lot of work to do and it's okay for her to explore her feelings and decide if she wants to repair the marriage or not and owes him nothing until she decides either way. I promised NIkki and I would make the drive to her in March, since logistically it's easier that way. Offspring will care for my animals for a day trip, she doesn't have anyone for hers. We're gonna catch up and eat amazing food. Everytime we see M there is some new amazing food thing I can't believe I'd never had before. She was the first time I ate Panera bread, Nutella, and a variety of other things. OMG Nutella on pound cake. Just saying.
An analogy I used to explain to Nikki WHY I want to be part of the journey and not just the destination, why confused and uncertain but shared is not only okay to me, but desirable. He likes to go on a trip with the route mapped, a clear destination, and as little disruption as possible. So it's like getting into L's car. But I like the journey, that is where I grow and do my best adaptation as the situations go. I once got in a car with M and we were trying to go from Toledo to Cleveland (I lived in T-town then) and we ended up crossing half of Ohio and back at my house. But it was the most fun road trip ever the minute we realized we were both lost and just went with it and used the time to chatter and have a blast. And we learned more about each other and forged a lifetime bond that we have both relied on during various disasters over the years than we would have with a smooth trip to Cleveland. And saw some really weird crap, Ohio, you are weird. I think I've finally expressed my feeling to him, which was vague and probably really confusing to him prior to this conversation. He never did understand WHY I kept getting in cars with M and being late to...well...everything we ever tried to go to together.
M didn't know about my dismorphia, and feels like I crossed that last barrier of trying to hide things and so much she couldn't figure out about me is clear. Adulting is hard, I want to just turtle.
So Nikki got home from Valentine's day, in full on boy mode to my surprise, I thought we were still in girl mode honeymoon phase, but okay, I adjusted my Valentine day cuddle plans accordingly and had a lovely morning with him. No big deal, my entire plan was tailored to things he said he wanted from me, so I have them in reserve for the day he does want them. I'm prepared! We're going to see Deadpool in a bit, and it is only my deep devotion to making that boy happy that is getting my cold shell outta this house into the SIXTEEN DEGREES that Ohio has decided to grace us with. I need more layers. Deadpool had best be as funny as people tell me he is. Cuz our theater doesn't believe in heat.
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So today is kind of a scary day. Were supposed to meet up with a mutual friend who has agreed to talk to Nikki about her childhood abuse, since they suffered similar pain. I"m terrified for Nikki. He's already stressy and nervous, and this will be the first time he's ever going to try talking to someone more than a brief "this happened" sort of thing. He's doing this form himself, not for me, not for any advice, but because he wants to sit face to face with another human that shares his life experience. He didn't want to wait until he gets in with the therapist. I asked them to decide if I should be there or not, and they both requested I do so because I give good hugs. It has been a long time since I sat in on a conversation like this. And I'm scared for how Nikki feels and wll feel in a few hours. And I want to find the person that did this to him and do things I won't get graphic about here. I do have a rage for this faceless person that hurt baby Nikki. And a general one for all people who harm others. It really sucks that my best love and support, while important, can't really help him feel better, he has to experience this for himself to work through is feelings.
I guess this is where healing begins, whether you talk to a professional, spouse, or another survivor. You have to let it hurt and face it before it gets better, I know that, but I have this unrealistic urge to somehow magically make it all better for Nikki and am frustrated that i can't. I think he feels a similar frustration when I'm broken and on the floor in a mess and he can't fix it. But I can't protect him from this, I can only love on him and let him know he's not alone. Nikki is very much is a problem solver, he wants to always 'fix' whatever is wrong right then, and sometimes we have problems communicating on things that can't be fixed, only lived through. I honestly feel like that contributed into his fear to talk to me. Because he didn't know how to 'fix' either his feelings or our day to day life to work with them. That is part of why I had so MUCH confusion when I first found out, his relations to me and behaviors are so typically waht I understood to be masculine(so much so I really had to learn to understand that cleaning my windows wasn't a whim, but literally his way of "I love you, and I'm showing you by doing this thing that will make you happy, there was a time when I wondered if I was some kind of living sex doll for him and if he remembered I was actually here, but once I figured it out I was floored by the sheer avalanche of ways he showered love on me), but I absolutely believed him when tells me that he feels like he's supposed to be a woman and the confusions he has going on inside, so I went into a crazy spiral of just confusion.
I asked him if someone let him go back to the day before I found out, would he sanitize the journal entries I stumbled into, or would he let it play out? He thought hard, and said he would go back and do neither, but instead do what he should have and talked to me(That was his words, not mine that he should have). So I did get he answer I was looking for, he IS happier and this IS what he wants, for me to know and have been able to make my choices on how this works for me and have the chance to try to live up to his wants and needs from me.
Going forward I think we are stronger. I think we have learned to talk better to each other, talk more completely to each other, and to hear each others actual voice instead of echoes of our own issues in our heads. We have a good foundation for a therapist to work with! LOL We have also made a tentative plan ever fifth anniversary to take a staycation and do intensive marital examination like we did after this, because keeping better behaviors is a lifelong process and commitment to earning them through work and communication. Apparently before I found out, this was a dip in and out thing and Nikki didn't really self-examine all that closely, but my need to understand helped him focus and find some answers in himself to know what he feels and wants. Nikki has always been very focused on doing whatever it took to make me happy, in big and small things. So I suppose honestly beforehand really digging into his distress and confusion would have presented a conflict with that desire, but now that I know and <b>I</b> needed that to regain my footing and security, it became much easier for him to do. He told me me that me knowing and asking and researching and sharing what I see both the positives and negatives, helped him start to come to terms with everything in himself instead of being a nebulous cloud. So we're learning together, and I like that. I think he likes that.
Now we just have to get through today, and through the work he'll have to do in therapy to conquer his depression and regain his joy in life. I wish for him to feel as much joy in himself and his life as he tells me he feels in having my love and how hard I work to make him happy to.
Today's good mindset: Scary things are okay. Overcoming is what brings health, happiness, and security.
Today's Fear: Oh my god what is this going to do to my Nikki.
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I am so cold. My job is cheap with the heat, and I sit by a window. And I"m in the middle of a mass of office equipment, so a space heater is not practical. So I'm freezing cold, struggling with the four new steps they decided to add to an overly complicated invoicing process on a day when apparently the pricing dude decided not to deal with it so I have two weeks backed up. Stressed out. SO...Nikki had mentioned girl mode today and playing with the clothing and the forms, so I told him to take selfies for me and show them to me after work so I had something to think about besides the rest of my office trying to kill me by death from a thousand paper cuts.
I do like the pictures, but he looks so serious. I think I bring more out in him than he does by himself, when I took photos the other night I got emotion all over the place from him in them and he was really into it. So now I'm really considering what that means, and what i come up with is make Nikki feel safe and free in either mode. He opens up when I'm around, always has in boy mode before I knew too compared to how he is when I'm not there. Our freinds at the summer retreat used to tell me that when I went down to the lake with E to swim Nikki would quiet up and bury himself in a book or videos, it took a few years before that stopped happening and he got more comfortable in this group.
But even one on one apparently I bring out the best in him. And that is the best thing ever for a life partner to be able to do for each other.
Now he's wrapped up in the new PJ"s we picked up from WomanWithin and I'm wrapped up in my new jacquard wrap, but the real reason I"m warm is Nikki loves me and needs me.
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Today is a very laid back day. We stopped in at the doctors office to follow up on my lab work since I didn't get the call that the order was put in (The computers were dead at our doctors the day we went, my prescription made it the pharmacy but Nikki's didn't, they were struggling so hard) and no one called like they said to tell me I could go in whenever. And sure enough the order wasn't in the computer, so the receptionist left a note for our doctor to enter it. And follow up making sure Nikki's referral got through the computer craziness. Because after crash coursing on the transgender experience, I also was crash coursing on transgender issues, and it's really scary. Knowing Nikki suffers depression and has anxiety attacks, it makes me really scared with him not being in counseling to help him overcome those. He doesn't exhibit any signs that he's a danger to himself, but I have a really paranoid brain and I just get flat out scared of things sometimes.
Then we had lunch, and now the best part has started. Lounging around the house lazily. Not going outside into the cold. It is so cold outside that when I left work I actually started crying, my eyes just filled up and flowed over because I was so cold. That was a WEIRD moment. I dream of palm trees and beaches in Florida, but with our current situation that's really not practical. But we dream, right? I don't even know why I love palm trees so much, they just make me happy as long as they are actual trees and not creepy neon plastic ones. This week is beginning to make me feel like I have some kind of weird feelings about plastic in general.
Nikki is still in an up mood, and if it's just from the relief of not having to keep secrets from me anymore like a sort of honeymoon phase, I'll take it. Please good mood last for him as long as it takes to get into the counselor! I do like seeing Nikki happy. Tonight we plan to take the mmo raid scene in our guild by storm, we missed the last couple of weeks on the nights Nikki is working on collecting items to make a weapon because we were doing so much talking and sorting out and redefining our marriage. I'm now of the opinion that everyone should have a sit down every five to ten years and intensely talk about how the marriage is working and what they want from it. This redefining period has really helped us bridge a lot of issues for both of us and improve the overall experience of living in it for both of us. I'm so grateful that I have a really adaptive personality in general, and was able to be what Nikki needed once he'd given me the space to absorb and wrap my head around it. In our early years Nikki always needed to have every problem solved RIGHT NOW and my brain just doesn't work like that. I need time to absorb the issue, and even identify what my feelings about it ARE let along be able to articulate them and express concerns that can be 'solved'. Usually between 1 hour and three days, depending on how complicated the subject is.
There are some things I can't adapt to. I have found the line between being able to adapt to a new thing and knowing I don't want to be part of a thing. I was in a relationship with a really nice man, it was a newish relationship, and he was up front with me that he was a big participant in the adult baby world and I needed to know if we were going to persue spending any more time together. He gave me resources to see and understand what it was. I took a few days and looked at all of them, and I understand it intellectually, but I couldn't participate. I had a very strong 'I did my trenches in the diaper wars years ago' emotional reaction, and wasn't sad that they were gone. I couldn't imagine my life centered around a perpetual infant-parent interaction, even though I could understand the need for nurturing that people who do participate have. So I told him honestly I couldn't participate and while I really liked him it was clear I was the wrong person for him, and we parted on good terms. That's how I know Nikki's reality is something that I"m not playing with because it's new and I"m trying to hold on to what we have at any costs. I know the difference between trying to force myself to fit and realizing a new thing is okay and I just have to work on making some adjustments. Somewhere after that marriage I let nearly kill me I learned to finally have a strong sense of self, and who I am, and what I can touch and what I can only intellectually understand. That is making this period relatively easy for me. So is the normalization that occurred from my Rocky Horror and anime convention periods of seeing men in full women's dress all over the place. Which ties into something I posted on the forums, exposure is a huge factor in acceptance, or in some cases at least respect. I respect ex boy and his choices, even if I couldn't join him, because he exposed me in a positive way that let me understand.
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So the new full prosthetic breast forms Nikki and I picked out arrived. Visually, they're perfect. But I think I just got hit in the face with expectation vs. reality. I was expecting totally different tactile feel. Think...um....silicone real feel marital aids. The plastic on the outer edges weirds me out. Both in the one he got me to wear so I actually fit properly into a bra and his. I'll adjust, but really, what is with the creepy plastic? Wouldn't people, both those who don't have their own or those who lost them, want something that feels more ... real? I'm not repulsed, I'm not having any sort of backslide or backing away. This is purely a I think everyone deserves better boobs feeling I guess. And I am worried again that the plastic outer coating will trigger the excema on mine. I think I will have to acquire a square of silk or something to wrap it in.
But Nikki is wandering around the house, and I encouraged him to dress up fully and enjoy it. So I think he's at least fully happy with them, and with me, and for that internet, bring on all the plastic you want. I can face it!
*whispers* But if anyone knows a place to get nice touchable ones since I know he wants me to when his weight drops more (he's been working really hard at it) do please send a link my way.
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Am having a really shaky morning. It's hard when a friend has gone somewhere you can't follow. I miss him so much already. He was a beautiful person who readily opened the window for me to his part of the world and shared his culture and that soft Scottish brogue. I felt better when Nikki was home, but alone it hits harder and there are no hugs. Four more hours and I can get my hugs. This really hurts. And people saying internet friends shouldn't hurt this bad when they're gone piss me off. Friendship is friendship. It doesn't matter that we never sat in the same room, it matters that he told me Scottish tales and comforted me when I had a bad day and shared a snark with me about someone we found equally irritating and all the other little details of friendship.
I had a talk today with one of our joint best friends, who shares a trauma experience with Nikki, and invited us to her home this weekend to open that box together with him (and me, I'm invited to this but said I would stay home if either or both preferred, but apparently I give good hug). He's still shy about telling people, so he asked me to talk it over with her, so I just got done telling her the story (From my chronological point of view, since I"m shaky on Nikki's timetable, but it's getting clearer as we go). One of the reasons she's such a great friend is she instantly saw both our points of view, how they dovetail and how they click, and offered me some advice on how to deal with my often unstable emotions. She was there the time someone I had let really close to me hurt me badly, and saw the emotionally spirally effect i go into that poor NIkki had to live with while I sorted it out. And he was a victim in that too, it was actually him ex-friend lashed out against without warning. Nikki wanted her to know before so that he could speak freely about how all tangled up it is, and she's wonderfully non-judgmental in all things and supportive of us both just like the wonderful people here. But it's his first face to face talk with someone other than me about this, that has to be big for him.
Todays Good Mindset: I had a wonderful friend. It doesn't hurt like this if it wasn't amazing.
Today's Stupid fear: That my stomach will flip out on me. It feels shaky, and I hate feeling sick, and it freaks Nikki out that I'm in immediate need of surgery again these days. But my stomach responds hard to my emotion and feels swirly. Work with me stomach! Let's not get sick at work, okay? At least til we get home? Please?
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EmmaSweet suggested I start a blog, and I think she has a point. And never ask people for advice if you're not willing to try it! So here I am, sorting out a lot of changes in my life.
So today, it's time to tackle a joint issue we both share. Hoarding. We're not going to show up on a tv show or anything, it's not the dramatically bad. However, it runs in my family on both sides. My mother is a hoarder, and getting worse as she ages. And my father's mother was nearly tv show ready except that she managed to keep it mostly out of the living room and kitchen areas. But every other room in the house was filled with stuff. And I mean filled, there was a tiny aisle to walk through. And you literally risked your life going into the attic, those piles were not stable. So I noticed while I was going through my closet looking for things that were worth sharing (a lot of my clothes needed to be thrown out, holes/stains, but there were a lot of good pieces Nikki actually liked), my eyes fell on the shelving in the back. FIlled with boxes. That some of them I think I packed to move in with Nikki when I spent the first year in EXTREMELY TINY TOWN and we accidentally ended up living next to the KKK dudes, which was a problem since our son is biracial black/white. Yeah, that was fun. Nikki agreed to take us back to the larger town I had been living in for offspring's safety even though he was scared to leave the familiar small town he did it for us, and I think really enjoyed it.
I"m sorry, I ramble a lot. The add makes my brain go from topic to topic. So I've seen that hoarding is not a sudden behavior, but a long slow buildup just like the junk. So it's time to deal with this boxes, determine if things in there that I haven't thought about wanting for fifteen or so years are really worth keeping, and if they are but not worth dispaying, then into rubbermaid totes and the basement. There is a practical side to living with Nikki's newly open reality, he literally has two wardrobes. It's a really good thing he's into sharing! I think I have half a wardrobe that currently fits/functions. But he has a LOT of clothing. Including eleventy billion tshirts from his job, they LOVE to tshirt people, it's actually kinda creepy how many tshirts come home from work with him. I threatened to make them into a flag once and hang it from the roof.
So after work, we are tackling the closet. Together. So it doesn't eat anyone. Although I"ll probably be the one in the bowels of it on the basis that i"m shorter and it's a slanted closet. For once my height works in my favor! But he'll have to scrunch for heavy stuff. After getting my abdominal hernia fixed when I incarcerated it last summer (man, I scared my poor Nikki, they were talking about me dying if i didn't get that fixed right away) I either pulled it partically back open or ripped a new one just above it. It's more practical to lose weight and then get it fixed at this point, so heavy lifting is out.
It's why we have a rowing machine, it's the only thing that is both strength/cardio that will help me lose weight at all, every other machine is one or the other. But most importantly, after Nikki put in a serious research binge, it's safe for me to use with my hernia issue. It won't encourage another incarceration event (where I basically caught six - eight inches of intestine, but luckily felt sick and Nikki got me help so fast I didn't actually injure my inner bits) or force it to tear open more. I feel loved, he put so much effort into finding me something that will work and is safe. I repeat that to myself as I row and fight my inherently lazy nature wondering why I'm torturing my body voluntarily.
Today's Good mindset: Nikki and I can do anything working together. We're strong and we will weather whatever happens to us, internally and externally.
Today's Stupid Fear: I'm intruding on Nikki's private world and don't belong, even though he says it feels supportive and connective to him that I am so involved. And the squirrel staring at me through the window wants to eat me.
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Starting over is weirdly freeing and oddly disturbing at the same time, whether the scale is large or small. I really wasnt' sure I would do well when Nikki decided we needed to change EVERYTHING, not just how our marriage worked and my knowing about and understanding his gender fluidity. As much as it can be understood, he's still learning as he goes too. But EVERYTHING was going to change. My home, the jobs, the lifestyle, the diet choices, our clothing, even our hobbies; literally nothing is the same as it was last year. I'm dealing, but I have fits of depression and weird resentments. I hadn't realized there were huge parts of my life I was really attached to in a way that I didn't notice every day, just reveled in subconsciously until they were gone. And finally having to stop lying to myself about the state of my relationship with my maternal family not really being any better than my paternal family, just more discreet about how unhealthy it functions was not surprisingly unpleasant.
I think I can safely say I'm adjusting though, and I suspicion by this time next year I will have adapted and re-normalized.
I sorta envy people who see starting over as a grand adventure and love it. I just sorta wade through it patiently and pretend I'm having a good time, nothing to see here, move along. It helps that I love my house, and now that my things are here and starting to settle into place I feel lest lost, as long as I stay downstairs. Upstairs is still an alien place. My bed sits in this great big empty room with a bunch of boxes creating a maze I injure myself on nightly trying to get to the bathroom, which is now surprisingly far away. The other two rooms are literally still empty, and it's weird how that empty plays on my subconscious.
Nikki's love of his new job is becoming problematic, and I work there with him. But it's company first all the time, and I'm lucky if I get some leftover scraps of attention. And there is the weird side effect of after weathering the sorting out of the gender issues and not ending up divorced, he's completely comfortable in our marriage. Comfortable to the point that he takes out all the frustration other people in the company build up in him on me because I'm 'safe' to let it all out on. Ya'll can imagine how thrilled I am about this new behavior. Especially since I'd crosstrained to work under him in an effort to try to get more home time (I was a carpool captive).
We have some more marital work to do, it never really ends does it? As long as you are two people in a relationship, there will ALWAYS be some new problem to work on. But after I got really quiet at home because I'm tired of talking about work and telling him verbally we needed to do more marriage time and less work time and he finally pushed my temper into reminding him I can be volcanic when pushed when after someone was rude to me and didn't give me the information I needed he didn't even ask what happened, just tried to silence my voice by gas-lighting me that I didn't understand the interaction I was in (and he wasn't) and I let him know clearly that was so not happening EVER AGAIN, he's working on it with me. Which makes me realize that old, underlying problem is still there, I can tell him about a problem until I'm blue in the face, but until it affects him by me puling away or losing my temper on him, he doesn't take it seriously. I'm thinking of suggesting marital counseling once he settles back into individual therapy for the dysthymia again. 20 years or marriage doesn't make anyone immune to the need for a little help sometimes.
On the plus side he's working on reducing his addiction to constant electronic entertainment and actually exploring our new area with me. There is a REALLY pretty town a bit south of us (stupid expensive to live in, and close enough to drive to form where we live but the commute would have been overmuch) with a lovely bookstore. Since my town has none. So that's a fun place to go. We're going to go to this super bizarre almost tourist attraction grocery store either this weekend or next, adn the space museum (Nikki loves Nasa stuff). I hope they have a planetarium at the space museum, I do love a good planetarium I must admit.
I guess all in all I'm fine, life is just continuing to happen both to me and around me. But the scenery outside is better. I have a super awesome hangout porch now to enjoy the last days of summer drifting by. The neighbors have been pleasant to us, and he said hello to me as he got home and I was reading a book on the porch and we had a nice conversation. So much better than the crazy, half dressed, theiving ones from our former town. I"m moving up in the world!
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