The Woman Within

I shudder at times when I look back on my blog, at my writings and my posts from years ago.  It's like a different person was writing, a different person was living, a different person was seeing.  How do I begin this entry?  Where do I start?  There are so many things that have changed in my life that it's like the person who wrote, who lived just a few short years before, was someone else... someone else who saw the world through blinders, through rose colored glasses and who swam through life in the shallow waters of some swimming pool.  Now the woman staring back in the mirror is swimming for her life in deeper waters of the the blue Atlantic toward the distant shore of lands at the edge of a limitless horizon. Those still happily playing in the shallow end of the pool, surrounded by the safety of the ladders and the lifeguards can scarcely perceive that the swim I am making is one for my life now.  I'm not drowning but I cannot stop where I am now....

Have you ever had a dream that seemed so vivid, so real, that it was something you found you would remember for years to come?  They don't happen for me that often but this most recent of dreams was an incredibly relevant analog to the choices, the decisions and the changes and the challenges in my own life that I have been facing.  It was a simple dream but one which I believe will resonate with many.  Perhaps my dream was a manifestation of an old Twilight Zone Episode that resounds strongly with me each time I randomly happen to see it.  In any event, this is how it went..... I was on a train traveling to another city.  The day was bright and sunny and the scenery outside my window was whipping past my window as I looked around the coach from the comfortable window seat I was in.  The idyllic Currier and Ives scene was not to last as I suddenly had a premonition.  In that moment I saw the future.  There was to be a huge train wreck.  The...

Again, it has been a while since I have posted on here.  A lot has been happening around and within me.  Living now full time as a woman publicly has brought a sense of peace and contentment to me internally in ways I have never felt before internally. No matter what hardships I may incur as a result of this life change, it is a decision I could never regret.  To have such a personal sense of peace like no other is at once reaffirming and calming.  There is no way that anyone who is not transgender could understand the feeling of dysphoria in not being able to live authentically to their own sense of self.  Likewise, there was no way I could have known how comfortable it was for those born into a gender that fits from birth.....until now.  Now I understand what I was feeling before; the anxiety, the withdrawal from society, the angst and pensiveness.  The lack of comfortability in others who felt ill at ease with me as a person playing the male role ...

With the recent "coming out" of Caitlyn Jenner, there has been an explosion in the media from many angles as a response.  One of the most poignant of those has been the intersection between the feminists and transgender women.  A polarization between these two groups has manifested and coalesced into article after article appearing in the media by feminists as to what it means to be a woman.  The ideology of womanhood itself is at question and is under scrutiny and challenge as the very core of womanhood is at once rethought, reshaped and redefined in the eyes of many. At the core of the argument by feminists arises the conception that many transgender women are stereotyping the construct of femininity into the very thing they, themselves have been trying to break away from.  Caitlyn Jenner's comments in her interview with Diane Sawyer revealed several remarks in which she proudly announced that she would finally be able to wear her nail polish freely now as a woma...

Life has really ramped up lately for me.  It seems, in fact, that my life has taken a route of it's own and is driving me forward rather than the other way around.  I find myself amidst opportunities which are either presenting themselves by chance or through others who are offering them to me and I find myself surrounded more and more, by supportive women who have made a huge positive impact in my life as a woman.  Let me expand just a little on these and put them all in the context of what is transpiring and what it perhaps means. Opportunities:  In the past year alone, I have been asked to co-chair the state chapter of a nationally recognized support organization, PFLAG and to help in the efforts to bring about support to families, parents and children who either are or who support someone who is GLBT.  Being able to make a difference through regular meetings we host or in the many speaking engagements I find myself a part of at both schools and churches is...

It is approaching the one year mark now on hormone replacement.  Simply put, that means that I've chemically reduced my male hormones and, in replacement, have introduced a female hormone regimen to replicate that of most natal women.  The action of doing this was NOT to suddenly transform me magically into a woman.  Heck no.  I've been easily moving through society now and seen as a woman for a long time prior to my ever starting hormones.  It wasn't solely for just obtaining breasts either (even though I realize that seems to be a major aspect or even, for some, a wishful fantasy). No, breasts are another thing to deal with that require yet another piece of restrictive clothing to retain them in their place.  Ok, well they are nice in filling out my outfits so I guess, overall,  it's a wash. No, the reason I started on hormone replacement was to see how they would affect me mentally and if they would quell the disparity that I have always felt bet...

Transitioning genders, contrary to what some may believe, is NOT a choice.  When it comes right down to it, why would anyone choose to upset the entirety of their lives in so doing?  So then if I am saying this is NOT a choice, then why do it?  Well, the reason is really as starkly simple as it is complex.....it is because the choice NOT to transition would result in greater pain and in many cases, as in my own, a likely slow, cancerous demise and a spiraling dance downwards until death. I would never choose to see my spouse watching her husband "die" before her eyes as the vision of "he" becomes slowly and steadily "she".  I would not willingly wish to risk my job, my friends, and the potential loss of acceptance by those around me simply to fulfill some fantastic notion or desire.  I would not choose in an often hidden yet silently misogynistic society still known in many circles as "a man's world" to "become" a woman and to str...