ready to loose everything

[bas1985]

Sometimes it is said in this forum that to be ready to transition you have many practical things to do (therapy, electrolysis...) but most of all you have to prepare to the worst, that is to loose everything of your past (family, house, friends). The outcome may be better, but be prepared for the worst.

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In my case I have started therapy six months ago and now we are at the end of the gatekeeping... I will be given an answer to start HRT in two-three weeks. But I was not ready... until some days ago.

That is... I was always in fear to loose my children, I still present as male to them, and my ex wife does not really know that I want to transition. Some days ago I came out to the social workers, completely, and they were supportive, they urged me to come out to my ex wife, because she has to be prepared for this big change.

I spoke to my lawyer and she said that it is right, even if this news could have an impact on the custody. It is not fair, but this is reality. Waiting is not really an option, because in any case, after the divorce sentence everything can be reopened if conditions change and the gender change of the ex husband is really a change...

But... this is the news. I do not care.

Do not take me wrong, I love my kids, they are my most precious thing... but they are not me, my fulfillment, my goal is to be what I am, and if this "I am" at the core is female I will follow that route, even if this may have some impact on them. On my relationship with them. On their point of view about their father, but the turning point is that I can handle it later, first and foremost I want to be what I am, and teach them that being true is the most important thing.

But I don't want to make excuses.

I understand that this is a major decision and that I may regret, but the cost of not going forward for me it is simply too high. I am ready for the worst, but hope for the better.

Any one of you, in the last days before the first dose of HRT, has had this feeling of "no choice"? Of "I go forward, the world will follow in some way, I will handle it"?

Can you relate to this choice-less moment of unconditional love of oneself?

[Kaitlyn Michele]

For me I was on a family vacation ..mom, dad, brother, sister...all at the beach.. None of them knew at the time... in my case, I had decided to start HRT, stay at work, see if the HRT helped me be less hopeless about my future... my own path included feeling strongly that I could never transition...I was yet to overcome many of the thoughts you describe...

I had let hair grow back on my body, my hair only a teeny bit longer than usual...

anyway... I would sit on the beach with a giant tshirt covering me and sunglasses and while my kids played in the ocean I would just cry and cry...

Looking back I fell I knew that I was going to transition...I had already done some electrolysis..i had met many ts women that were advising me and coaching me... I just had blinders on..
once I got home I got rid of all the hair, and started my HRT cream the next day...

For what its worth, almost the instant I applied the cream , I felt better... it felt like I was doing something real .. that's when I started thinking I was going to have to transition and that I would just handle it...that I really wasn't making a choice I was just following the natural order of things (at least for me).. you can't fight mother nature... oddly enough that applies to us more than anybody...

[I Am Paula]

I think that most of us have a moment, like epiphany, where very suddenly we realize that this is something we have to do, damn the consequences. Some, like me, take years to lead up to this point. Others, I'm sure very quickly. The actual moment of descision is very quick. I remember not only the time, but where I was standing, when I decided to transition.
I agree we have to prepare for the worst, but, in my case, I lost almost nobody. On the contrary, a lot of my friends offered help, and support. My family can plainly see that I am happier, and are glad for me. My colleagues have wished me nothing but the best, and treat me like I was always the girl in a male dominated field.
Each transition is different. You do what you know is right, and I hope you have the best possible outcome.

[Angela Campbell]

No starting HRT wasn't a point of no return for me. I still had the fears but the hormones didn't change that much either way. There is nothing about the hormones that makes this an irreversible thing. Coming out is the irreversible thing.

[bas1985]

I agree that coming out is irreversible, in fact I feel in this way after I have come out to my lawyer . In 20 or so days I will come out to my ex wife, it depends, because we meet usually at a mediator, and we have scheduled an appointment at March 31st.

Yes, we cannot fight Nature, oddly enough... I too hope for the best and in some way I "Know" that I will NOT loose my children, no matter what behavior my wife's family will enact. I know that my children will always love me, and even if for some months (years?) we will be divided it really is not that important, at least as a fear to not transition now.

The cost of regretting the transition at 50, because I could have started at 41, it is too much, and I would project a not existent blame on my kids, so, for absurd, for the love to my children is better for me to transition asap.

[Kaitlyn Michele]

I felt the same way about my kids and I had to go through about a year of really mean spirits from my exwife ... I don't blame her..She was hurt and lost in her own way...

One good thing I would say is that once you start really moving on this, many people (and that could easily include your kids) will overcome their fear and start realizing you are doing something that is good for you.

That will help them a lot.

[Angela Campbell]

Yes clearly there is the chance of losing everything, but it doesn't have to turn out that way. I had that fear and it was overwhelming for a time. As it turns out I lost little. I have a few difficulties but maybe one day they too will improve. It wasn't nearly as bad as I had feared. Being prepared for the worst made it better when it didn't happen.

[LeaP]

Can you relate to this choice-less moment of unconditional love of oneself?

Twice. With the start of therapy and with the start of hormones. Both were for me.

The point of no return seems to be notification at work for me.

[Jennifer S]

I understand completely how you are feeling. At some point you reach a point where you no longer care what people think and you are willing to just accept whatever consequences come. I'm not all the way there yet but I can feel those emotions tugging at me. I wish you the very best of luck. We are here for support.

[KellyJameson]

For me it was reaching the conviction that I had the right to "exist".

It is a fight for a form of survival done out of love for oneself because you stop devaluing yourself and start valuing yourself which is your natural right that you are born with.

My gender identity was murdered in childhood by others so in a sense I was murdered and than stayed murdered out of fear and a feeling of being unworthy to live.

I lived like a type of zombie (without identity). Not alive, not dead but in-between.

Once I understood what was done to me and what I was all the hard choices became much easier.

Than the fear shifted from the fear put into me by others by being "murdered" to the more practical fears as the risks of changing my body and the challenges this new life would bring.

I realized it is better to die trying to once again live than to die twice.

Once through my gender being murdered in childhood and a second time in death sometime in my unlived future.

In my opinion transitioning is a fight for life.

[Donna Joanne]

In my opinion transitioning is a fight for life.

It's not only a fight for life, more importantly a fight to LIVE the life you know you belong in. If only life really had a "do over" or "easy" button. When is transition worth it? When the gain outweighs the cost.

[celeste26]

There are ways to transition which do not require you to lose everything. They tend to be longer and gentler too. Gradually edge into life as a woman learning their culture, their ways of doing things. That takes time spent among GGs and not other Trans people. Becoming a woman with other women.

The surest way to lose everything to make demands, insist on instant changes and not learn what it really means to be a woman first.

The ultimate compliment for someone doing it that way is a comment that "its about time you made that transition." There are literally hundreds of people who have made transitions that way essentially invisibly, gracefully and without great loss.

[bas1985]

The ultimate compliment for someone doing it that way is a comment that "its about time you made that transition." There are literally hundreds of people who have made transitions that way essentially invisibly, gracefully and without great loss.

You are right, but even in the smoothest transition there is a D-Day when you "prefer" to be called she and not more he. When you apologize for all the discomfort you may cause but you have to change side, this is the choice less moment I refer to. When you don't know exactly the plan in all the details, the timings and the consequences, but you are sure that you will change your gender, from "o" to "a" (In Italian the first is the ending of masculine words , the latter of feminine ones --pizza--, usually), or from he to she, from Herr to Frau, whatever in your language.

I know that one can stay years in a no-man's land of androgynous presentation, maybe with HRT and a male name and ID at work, but in any case the difference is that the person knows it is only temporary and also the other people around her knows that it is temporary, the person has already come out and the transition in papers is simply delayed for other reasons (not last for financial reasons to collect money for surgeries...).

[Kaitlyn Michele]

For people that truly transition, most people that "lose everything" do so through no fault of their own.

People that transition with compromise are the ones that are most likely to fail (or lose a lot) in my opinion.
Give people a reason to doubt you and they will.

Misgendering and awkward moments are expected and must be dealt with and all of us should care and be responsive to other people's needs.
That is the golden rule and it applies to transition as much as anything else in life.

The ultimate compliment to me is no comment at all and a friendly smile or "hi Kaitlyn"

Celeste what does it mean to learn how to be a woman?
I didn't "learn their culture", I've been a woman the whole time.

The only way to learn is to do it...
and anything less than living your life in your correct gender is not doing it..(and i'm not talking about surgeries..i'm talking about living all day every day with no looking back..that's doing it)..

[arbon]

The worst would have been killing myself and I was pretty close to that end from trying to hold onto the life I had.
I don't know how much choice there was in it or not, it was something I had to do
I understood I was most likely to loose those closest to me and my job and I accepted that
but I ended up with a life better then I thought I could have, those that were important to me never left

[Marleena]

For people that truly transition, most people that "lose everything" do so through no fault of their own.

People that transition with compromise are the ones that are most likely to fail (or lose a lot) in my opinion.
Give people a reason to doubt you and they will.


This is so true and there are a few of us here trying to make compromises (usually a wife and/or job) and struggling with it (myself included). Usually it doesn't work as I'm finding out. I might be a coward too because I hate being read like a book and rather be ignored. Money, age, and compromise are my biggest problems but at least the GD is under control for now. I have days where well, you know...

There are many success stories of people that risk it all and it goes well but there are a few horror stories too. I hope all goes well for you and wish you the best.:)

[Kaitlyn Michele]

You are not a coward at all Marleena... I have no doubt about this.
You are still in a place where the idea of choice enters into it.

When I was thinking in terms of choice, there were years of self pity and doubt

...it wasn't my courage, it was my desperation that sent me forth..

I'm not proud that I transitioned.. I am proud that I did it my way and was successful at it...

[bas1985]

Yes, my OP was directed to that moment where we feel that there is no choice. I do not know if even a suicidal person, or a person that makes an extreme sport (like going to South Pole or something like that) or an astronaut have the same feeling. They know that there is a not small probability of dying, of loosing everything, but they do it and there is not choice, but love.

Ironically the moment of choice less is also a moment of pure love. I can loose every thing but I jump nonetheless. It may be a coincidence, but I notice that when I have fear I get clocked, when I am truly myself usually people do not clock me, and especially women treat me like one of them.

In a certain sense the "outside" world is telling me that it takes a greater effort to NOT transition completely than to allow the male side to return completely in the background: but the outside world is love. So love is telling me to not have fear, that I WILL NOT loose everything.

There is some religious connotation in here, but I would digress...