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Yesterday was a strange day. It was difficult at times but ultimately fulfilling. Trying to avoid yet another argument with my husband, I went online, searching for my own place to live (my husband knows I've been doing this). I found a place that looked great and I called the estate agent to make an appointment to view it (I'm going to see this place today). My husband overheard me making the appointment. I could tell he wasn't impressed so I started a conversation about why I felt I had to move out. After I'd explained my point of view, he said he agreed with all I'd said but that he didn't want to lose me. That started a whole new conversation where he said he would totally support me if I wanted to transition and he said I didn't have to move out - but if I really wanted to, maybe I should just make it temporary rather than permanent. I had been thinking about purchasing somewhere, but now I'm thinking about renting, for maybe six months, just to see how it goes. I still believe we need space from each other. He doesn't want me to go. He said he would always be here when I wanted to come back. He also said he would come with me when I try to find a therapist and a sympathetic doctor. He said he fell in love with what's in my head and in my heart, not what my body looks like. Everything looks different today. He wants to support me. I asked him if he still wanted to be married to me and he said yes. When I pointed out that, if I go ahead with transitioning, he would be viewed as gay by many people, he said he didn't give a **** what other people thought of him. I asked if he would be okay with a same-sex marriage and he said yes, because he married me, not my body. He wants me. He still wants me. We spent hours discussing my options. Through our talking, I now have a better idea of my end goal. I think I know now what I would be most comfortable with. And that's because I understand his point of view better. I laughed at one point. He got annoyed and offended when I explained how the law works here (England) with regards to obtaining a Gender Recognition Certificate. He said the law was obscene. Which it is. He said there was no way he would veto my application for a GRC. That's comforting. But that time is still a long way off. Even so, I feel so relieved today. It's going to make coming out at work next week so much easier.
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My first relationship was with a girl. At the time, I told myself that it was alright to be with a girl; in fact, I was supposed to be with a girl, because inside I wasn't a girl. I never told her that, though. During my teenage years, I convinced myself it would be okay if everyone thought I was a lesbian. It was preferable to the truth. I looked female and, if I was with a female, I could play the more masculine role in the relationship. And I did. It was only years later that I realised that I had been using women in that fashion. Guilty secret. My first relationship with a man happened when I was nineteen and at university. I never told him I had been with women. He had long blond hair and he had a slim build. He was quite feminine-looking, although I didn't think, at the time, that had an influence on me. But maybe it did. I was also attracted to a woman named Pippa at university. She was the girlfriend of one of Mike’s friends. A year into the relationship with Mike, I discovered they had been secretly seeing each other. I split with Mike. Pippa found out that I knew and she ended her relationships with both men. And then we got together. But it didn't last long. Eventually I returned to Mike, after seeing a few people in between. I told some of those people that I was bisexual and invariably that caused problems. Issues that made me regret disclosing that aspect of me, too. I was still with Mike when I met my husband. Looking back, I can see that none of my relationships were especially healthy. I was never very good at them. And I can blame all kinds of things for that but I know it’s me. My opinion of my own body gets in the way. I can playact at things for a while and then it gets too much to bear and I stop pretending. That means the other person in the relationship stops getting the things they need from me. And for a lot of people that’s a rejection and invalidation. It’s funny that I know I need my own validation but I'm very good at dishing out invalidation to others. That’s wrong and I understand that now. And I also know now that I could never have received the validation I needed because my persona is based on lies and deception, because I've never really been straight with anyone. Sometimes I wonder whether my attraction to women is real. Sometimes I wonder if I've constructed it to give myself opportunities to act out my male-role fantasies. Sometimes I wonder, because I've always been attracted to the male form even though I threw myself into relationships with women first. And sometimes I think about something else that scares me. If I think about the possibility (an extremely remote one, I know) of undergoing gender reassignment surgery, and if I ever received the male body that I always wanted, I would still be attracted to men, first and foremost. And what gay man would ever want me, when there’s a whole bunch of attractive, real gay men out there that they could have instead? I would still be a freak. I'm always going to be a freak, no matter what my body looks like.
