Not full time yet (but a date in site sorta)

[JenniferZ2009]

So I am not full time yet and am really frustraited. I do have a plan in place and my therapist is giving me my letter but my first appointment with my hospitals tans-care expert in Internal Medicine is June 29th. So far away.

In the meantime I have talked with HR and my managers. It is weird being a contractor at a company I worked for full time for 3 years. I have to deal with people I know very good (those on site) and people who I have only met via email and a phone call (my contract agency). Everyone who needs to know knows right now and I could go full time right now but I am finishing my hair removal and name change and everything else.

I plan to leave work and go to school full time and that is when I will go full time as a woman as well. This leads me to my frustration and I think occasional self doubt.

Im living the double life thing right now and more often then not I am driving to/from work or at work and I am presenting myself as male durring this time. That time however is about 80% of my life right now.

I have absolutely no time to live as a female I only get to get out at night after I get home and often I get dressed real quick so I can run down the street 5 minutes away to go to the store and get some food and beer and then come home and go to bed. Weekends I dream about but; OHH, I have a sudden project deadline and I have to work on Saturday and Sunday. Weekend gone again and it is such perfect weather for a skirt I should get up early but I just hit 53 hours at work with another 8 to go. I am sleeping in.

I go to a speach therapist and leave work in the middle of the day and rush home get changed rush to therapy rush home, stoping by the market (yeah!!!! Im outside as a female in the sun, oh the sun feels sooooo good on my skin) get changed rush back to work to work late to make up the 5 hours it took me to do all that.

I listen to people at work call me Mr. ###### and I want to crawl out of my skin.

So this got me a little more flustered than I thought it would. My statement/question is am I just a crossdresser? Am i really ready to get my name changed next week? Get hormones? Go full time? Live as a female 24/7/365?

I want to but what have I really done to get there but tell people I am trans and go to support groups and go out when I have a chance, and have a therapist and checking the boxes for transition. Yep, Laser, Yep Clothing ( I dont even have time to go shopping for shoes that fit), Yep voice work, Yep therapist, Yep Hormone/doctors appointmen!!! Am I real?

[luvSophia]

Well, all of this is sort of confusing. What letter is your therapist giving you, a hormone letter? Is that what the appointment with the Internal Med Specialist is? If so, isn't that kind of overkill? My family doctor wrote my scripts.

If you are not going to go full time at work why involve your manager and HR?

"Finishing" hair removal is going to take years. How long have you been at it? Most of the women I know have gone through their SRS without being done getting rid of hair.

If you are planning on starting school this fall you need to look at how long it takes to get your name changed. It is not absolutely necessary, but it would be nice to have proper ID and a way to spend money (Credit card/Debit card) before starting school. Changing your name is a long, time consuming process.

[Super Amanda]

I had so many "stumbling blocks" before I could go full time, or so I thought. In fact I think I even made a thread called "Stumbling Blocks for Transitioning" or something.

One of the gals here had told me that the only stumbling blocks were the ones I put there myself, which at the time kind of made me feel like she didn't understand my reasons. But she was right.

I had planned on going full time by the end of this year, maybe the beginning of next year, but after having great results from laser, I realized that there was only myself stopping me from full time. It's not like my beard shadow is gone, but I feel far better about myself, and that feeling is golden.

Granted, I am unemployed and single, which I realize simplifies my situation, but I am a single parent, so it's not like I'm carefree either.

My point is, I was kind of waiting for the morning that I looked in the mirror and saw a different person, then I would go full time, but the hard truth is that I'm not going to change a whole lot more than I already have without surgery, so unless I want to wait years to go full time, I better get to getting.

Hang in there, girl, it's well worth it. Honestly the build up is so intense, that the reality of full time life is kind of anti-climactic! Life just goes right on, no matter what gender we are!

[JenniferZ2009]

I'm involving my manager and HR because I am taking a lot of time off to take care of legal and medical stuff related to my transition. Also there is a chance I may go full time at work as well.

The big thing is my career. I was trained as a cryptologist in the Navy with some electronics thrown in and have been working for the same company since I got out. I have 4 years of training and experience in mechanical engineering, model making (vertical mill and lathe work metals and plastics) in a R&D environment, manufacturing maintenance and operations. I just barely missed becoming the next Senior technician in R&D becaue they needed an electronics heavy person and I brought more mechanical heavyness.

I need those references and when someone called up and says did Jennifer work for you and they say "Who is Jennifer?" that is alot of tim down the bucket.

The doctor in internal medicine I am seeing specializes in HRT. My doctor has no experience in this matter and she refereed my to an endo and they said that this person is better equipped. It is never overkill to see a specialist, sometimes they can catch things other cant see.

in Washington state it does not take long to get your name changed. I am going in on the 25th and should come out as Jennifer the same day. Then head over to the DMV for a new license and then call up the school and register for Fall semester. Head over to the bank and get things changed and then start talking with Social security and so on.

[JenniferZ2009]

Amanda,

Thanks. I do need to get ride of those stumbling blocks. I have gotten ride of alot but there are still some left. If I wasnt working every weekend then things might be better.

I actually just stormed out of work an hour ago so i could go shoe shopping but I reallized I have no cash until payday. So here i am at home calming down wondering what I should were to the store.

[luvSophia]

Okay, thanks. Now I am a lot less confused. If you are counting on using your CT skills and training in the future make sure you know what affect that may have on a security clearance.

I also understand about the Internal Med visit, I have just never heard of anyone having to go that high in the food chain for HRT.

As far as the name change is concerned, if you are getting any sort of financial aid for school don't forget to include that.

[Faith_G]

Jennifer, I thought my double life was crazy! I am so thankful that I only need to put in 40 hours a week and I live 15 minutes away. I don't have it so bad I guess.

Your post is a little confusing to me. It seems like you are frustrated that you're not full-time yet, and you are also doubtful that you are ready to go full-time? Is it one, the other, or a little of both? Because I can understand it all around. I too feel kind of like I haven't really "done" anything that makes me TS.

Like Amanda, I keep moving my full-time date closer. First it was going to be late fall, then late summer, and now it's "as soon as the name change is done." Who knows, one day soon I might just say "Screw it!" and tell my work I'm going full time in two weeks.

What has happened is that my confidence as a woman has risen and the stress of switching back to presenting male has gotten worse. So I am less scared and hung up about going full-time while at the same time feeling more urgency to go full-time. The gas pedal is stuck and the brakes are fading, so I am steadily picking up speed.

[JenniferZ2009]

The double life thing is what is really getting to me at this point I think.

I think it is even worse right now because the spa that I go to for laser and everything. I have yet to go to dressed as a female. Everyone knows I am trans there and I even schedule my appointments on weekends but it just so happens that I have to work the weekends I have laser or something. So I stop by there on my way to work and thus since i am on my way to work I am not presenting myself as female. I have been going there for a frikin year now.

I just had a laser session on Saturday so that may have hit a nerve. Well I am hedding back into work. Hopefully the building is cool enough now. No AC on weekends, it a green thing. I hate it.

[Kaitlyn Michele]

It sucks. But it goes one day at a time... my thought process sounds very similar to yours..i would think about whether i was a crossdresser that fantasized about womanhood more than most ...and i wondered constantly about myself, and looked to therapy and others to answer the tough questions.

you are moving forward to improve your life and that's all you can do..but its really really hard

[luvSophia]

Like Amanda, I keep moving my full-time date closer. First it was going to be late fall, then late summer, and now it's "as soon as the name change is done." Who knows, one day soon I might just say "Screw it!" and tell my work I'm going full time in two weeks.

That's pretty much my story too. Except my two week notice to work turned out a bit literal. I was given the opportunity to resign the last day I was to appear at work in male mode.

Flip-flopping gender modes gets to be very stressful. Especially when you feel mostly flop but have to spend the majority of your time as flip! What helped me a lot was a move to more gender neutral appearing clothes. By the time I went 24/7 all of the pants I wore were from the woman's wear aisle as were my socks and underwear. Half of my shoes and tops were also.

[Katesback]

I have had all the operations and I still need to shave every morning!

If you are using the facial hair as a guide to transition then I think you are missing the boat here.

Also a name change is quite important since without doing that nobody at work will take you seriously! Soooooo why havent you changed your name?

Are you sure that transitioning is REALLY that important to you?

Katie