Transition - example of how powerful it is

[Kaitlyn Michele]

So i'm doing something called mindfulness meditation...

i have grown over 7 weeks to understand the point of it and feel meaningful benefits of it...in a nutshell you practice focusing on what is in the moment...they give you lots of tips/tricks/techniques ..its quite hard work which surprised me

part of it is guided meditation..."ride the breath"...you focus like a laser on your body or your breath and what happens is really interesting... your mind just wanders...everywhere... and its distressing at first because what they ask you to do is impossible...you feel like a loser

but then they teach you to just allow the thoughts...for what they are...just thoughts..and when you notice them...back to the breath...don't worry about it...

.and over 7 weeks i can't describe the thoughts i've had...
so much of my past dredged up, my mom...fear for my daughters..money worries..plus little things...bills to pay..appointment..do my taxes..i like the phillies...etcetc...when you focus on one thing, the mind floods in and you get what you get...there is a purity to it...

and they teach you to not judge the thoughts..so you can better deal with them in a positive way...always step back from your thoughts for a moment...then decide...good advice..

so it's been very emotional for the last 6-7 weeks and yesterday i did a SEVEN hour retreat...the guides are up front and about 200 people that take a vow of silence...
talk about brutal...but it was also incredible....it really cemented in lots of what i learned...enuf commercial...

driving home i felt alive and refreshed...open to possibility, confident that i had taken some small steps to improve my life..it felt great...

then it hit me...in seven weeks of meditiation...literally 100's of 20 and 30 minutes sessions of self reflection...one thought NEVER EVEN ONCE OCCURED TO ME>..

that i was a transitioned transsexual... not once...gender dysphoria never came up...regret never came up...celebration of it never came up...the nature of my gender is a given in my life to the point where it has no impact on how i think..it just is.. that's what transition is...

[Aprilrain]

I look forward to that day!

[LeaP]

Kaitlyn,

Great story.

I practiced essentially this kind of meditation years ago, though under another name. While it was ultimately a dead end, it did yield a few insights. The technique is still helpful once in a while in rooting out the causes underlying emotional reactions.

I wish I believed your punch line. But I don't. Oh, not that you are lying ... far from it ... but that the same relief would be afforded me.

Part of the post-transitioned girls' lack of credibility that's often discussed here is the tenacious hold that we (I) keep on our current state. It seems impossible that it could disappear.

[melissaK]

Thanks so much for sharing Kaitlyn! And it's nice you've found just "you"!!!

I get mindfulness, and found my way into it from the 70's transcendental meditation, LaMaze birth training (big on focusing on breathing), and my Bhuddist friends, and now my Yoga friends (Yoga seems the rage, my daughter in law is a big deal yoga instructor nowadays).

I have been resorting to meditation to cope with myself quite a bit. This am even.

This TS journey requires so many adjustments to my learned social values, it has been upsetting. What I knew from the past no longer works. This is loss of a past I knew is depressing.

And because I have emotional feeling for others who's responses to me change with their own understanding of social values about knowing or loving a TS, I am always being affected and my own emotions are always being knocked about by others. I can't control much about what others think of me if I reveal my whole TS self to them. This uncertainty of the future with them leads to great anxiety.

Centering on the present, on this moment, on this "involuntary act" called breathing, is in part how I've survived.

Now this is interesting, my mediation thoughts are mostly about these relationships, not about "me" and my identity. I know my identity. And my meditation thoughts are often about loneliness too. But being in the present takes me out of the depression cycle from missing a past, and out if the anxiety cycle of worrying about the future. And it helps.

Intellectually I can reason that at some point all the TS issues will no longer be a part of this because the TS changes will be in the past. And Kaitlyn, you've just told me this is so!! It's really encouraging.

Just don't leave us here on the Forum yet, OK? We (I at least) still need guidance in our journey. :-)

[kellycan27]

Part of the post-transitioned girls' lack of credibility that's often discussed here is the tenacious hold that we (I) keep on our current state. It seems impossible that it could disappear.


I work from home and I come here check up on and to talk to some of the good people I have met here since joining this site in 2009. For the past two years my visits have been far less frequent for a couple of reasons. The main reason is that I feel like a foreigner .... like I don't belong here. I read the posts and can relate to a lot of the issues that other girls have and are going through, but it's like looking in from the outside.
The battle to transition has been fought and won. The issues of transitioning have been replaced by the issues of life in general... Wife, mother, homemaker. Those important people who needed to know... know. I have no issues there. Nothing to hide nothing to keep secret. I don't think about transition or about being a transsexual and even as I write this I feel out of place.

[KellyJameson]

When you live "naturally" it is natural for it to feel like it has always been that way, as opposed to always having lived "unnaturally"


I think non-dualistic experiencing becomes "normal" when you are living opposite your body because it creates a permanent state of duality between body and mind and it was in this state that I natually gravitated toward eastern mysticism where mindfulness was born out of.

My brain/body dysphoria drew me naturally to non-dualistic thinking to resolve the dyshoria so eastern religions "made sense" to me. I learned to hold opposites inside my mind at the same time from living with the forced contrast of internal and external reality.

[Kaitlyn Michele]

i think a follow on to the comment is that as people here contemplate what may happen in the future for themselves...they should prepare for the fact that it is ALL you really get...

you get rid of the gender dypshoria....you get the incredible gift of NOT caring about your gender anymore... but nothing else really comes just from transition..

sure you can get lots more...but that's true of anyone's life...the difference is we live our lives having a gender problem grow inside of us like a tumor, and it takes and takes (and takes!)...and when its gone, the "now what?" part can be equal parts exhilarating and terrifying...and transition only helps making it gone...

its something that i have noticed steamrolling practically every woman i know that got srs.

..to me it was like a realization that i had all these other issues in my life, all these hopes and dreams(many of them out of reach), the peace of mind that replaced the 24/7 gender buzzing in my head was replaced by feeling the responsibility of living my own life...MY OWN LIFE...i have never had the feeling that i was living my own life before....this took some getting used to...

i don't know why i'm bringing it up other than its on my mind, and i'm feeling like its an important thing to say to people struggling with identity....

you really have to feel like what i'm saying is everything you could have ever wanted...that you can't live without it..and when you make your preparations, steel yourself and think about what the real you is going to do in her real life as best you can...
...if what i'm saying gives you pause...then jump for joy and pause, maybe the other side isn't so great after all..

[EnglishRose]

Even other changes can be a bit like this. My brain isn't fixated on "teh trans" anywhere near as much since going Full Time and while I need GRS, the fact it's a long time from coming means I don't think about that often. So the mind drifts to other unrelated life events, decisions, the future, with gender having no influence.

[Jonianne]

I love your post, Kaitlyn. I will be so happy when that day arrives for me, too, and it will. Also, years ago when I was doing meditation, I had the most terrifing experience when I was learning to let my mind just be. The fears just came over me in such a terrifing way and I have never been able to get back there. My counselors told me to just ride it out and I would get past them, but I've been too afraid to try. I know I should try again, though. One day I will. I'm glad you got through that part.

[Jennifer Marie P.]

Great post Kaitlyn I was so happy when my day came and the long transition process that goes with it and glad that I went through it.

[Laurie Ann]

Kaitlyn great post. I too look forward to the day I no longer think about my GD and all the related issues which come with it.

[Kaitlyn Michele]

just a quick update...

i shared this with my therapist (i hadn't seen her since last year) and she got a kick out of it...she said that in her experience, one of the best parts of her job was having a lunch or coffee with a patient from the past..by its nature her practice is filled with people that are struggling with this.

she shared with me that in her experience, transitioners have not regretted transition but many have struggled with consequences of bad decisions made during transition and the immediate time before it...mostly financial ...
as well as people dealing with the ongoing feelings of loss over people that may push us away...many stay in therapy to work on dealing with that part of it..
dealing with bad decisions , and dealing with things outside of our control is part of every aspect of life, not just our particular gender problem.

i know many sit back and wonder what it would be like...sometimes the focus that gets communicated is about the outside stuff...how we look..ffs...wigs...buying and wearing clothes..its all very natural and normal...we start out as teenage girls after all..

but it may be helpful to also consider that well coached and well supported people that transition are highly likely to improve quality of life despite what can be very high costs...ITS THAT SIMPLE...

personally i think its much more self selective than we might guess... people flow towards transition like water...water goes where it wants to go...always in the right direction for itself... the more i talk to people the more its clear to me...
so being stuck is just being stuck...time passes...you flow...that discussion we had on "when you knew" is a good example of how liquidy (hehe..a new word!!) this can be...and its always better to just do your best to be ok with where you are right now and no matter how much distress you feel, let the future be unknown for a bit, and have confidence that if you find yourself tilting into transition that there is a good chance things will be more ok than you think and its best to focus on the nuts and bolts decisions you are making ...

[stefan37]

Deep down I know the important stuff is how we feel inside and more importantly how do we project our inner self to the world at large. I think the focus on how we look seems important , and it is, but the ability to blend or pass makes dealing with the other stuff easier to handle. Only those with a strong sense of self and confidence can endure the negativity that the world throws at you while being yourself, but looking definitely male. You mention being stuck and we all feel that way for various reasons. I look it as long as I am doing something to progress no matter how small or insignificant I am moving forward towards my goal. You are right that fear and uncertainty of the unknown paralyzes many into standing still, frozen, not able to make a decision to improve their lives, but to remain as is with all the stress that creates. All of the reasons that prevented me from making the decision to transition many years ago were the internal barricades i would put up to prevent it. Once i started allowing myself to proceed and let those barriers fall, my true nature is emerging and it is causing stress amongst those around me. The thing is others are getting distressed and their lives are affected, but my stress from it is receding and I am the happier for it.

I am lucky in that I had a very insightful therapist and have developed a small network of knowledgeable woman more advanced than I to bounce ideas and problems off to hopefully avoid the mistakes that can sabotage a transition. I know I have and will make mistakes as i tend to do things "my way" against the advice of others. Since I have been doing that my entire life and have had to deal with the consequences of such choices I am used to the fallout that can occur from the wrong decision, but the important thought to take forward is to learn and hopefully avoid the same in the future.

You are right that water always flows and will find a way if it gets backed up. We have to do the same when we get backed to find a way forward much like the wind alluded to in another post. Once we are able to mentally get the resolve to knock down the barriers in front of us and find a way around those we can not move, only then are we able to hopefully find inner peace and possibly happiness. All the other stuff that goes on in our lives will still remain, such as finances, relationships, work etc..

I am looking forward ot the day when my gd is obliterated and I no longer have this nagging urge in my head. It can not come soon enough.

[ameliabee]

i think a follow on to the comment is that as people here contemplate what may happen in the future for themselves...they should prepare for the fact that it is ALL you really get...

you get rid of the gender dypshoria....you get the incredible gift of NOT caring about your gender anymore... but nothing else really comes just from transition..

So, what would you recommend someone who is ~3 months away from SRS do to make the, "Now what?" part a little easier?

Oddly enough, I have my SRS on June 29th and I graduate with my M.S. six weeks afterwards. Life is only now just beginning and I am seriously freaking out.

[Kaitlyn Michele]

enjoy the moment for what it is...it was truly transcendant in my case... at the time i felt it was everything i hoped for and more....i felt like i had climbed the mountain as they say... the feeling was immediate

and over time if you start feeling out of sorts and down, know you are not alone in it, and know that its a temporary and natural feeling...

you are going to live a female life...you are much younger than me...you have time...all i'm really pointing out is that getting rid of GD leaves a big open space that is up to you to fill up..