I have recently had somewhat of a epiphany. For about 3 decades, I felt I was a failure of a man. Besides the haunting desires to dress and look like a woman, I just could never come up with the amount of masculinity to be a "man" And even today, I would love to be a tough rugged man. There is a part of me that wants to be that. I wish sometimes I could be that man, but I am not. Lord knows I tried to be. I will always have a certain masculinity about me.... my many interests and attitudes, and a certain way of being which all connects with being a man.
BUT.....
Just as much of me connects to women and how they think, how they act, react, how they feel. I may not be a woman, but I do connect with them on many levels. I also wish I looked like one. I like to dress as one, as it makes me feel comfortable, relaxed.... a part of myself I just am.
For 30 years I tried unsuccessfully to rid these things from myself. Every time I had a desire to look like a woman, to wish to wear what a woman wears, I felt like a failure. That I had emotions more typical of a woman, that a had mannerisms more typical of a woman, that I sometimes acted or reacted like one.
I tried to "man up" I tried to be tougher.... which is funny because for my size I can be extremely tough.... for my size. But I never really truly wanted to be. It was my employment more than anything else that made me tougher actually, I have worked with human violence for quite a bit. Not that I ever liked it, but it is what it is. I don't despise it either. I just rolled with it, literally.
So for 30 years, I felt like what so many think of us, a freak. I feared what I was. I tried desperately to rid myself of this whatever it was that made me this way, always thinking I just needed to try harder. Always envious of those whose masculinity was natural and came easy or automatically to them, whereas I had to try, and try hard to cover up my femininity.
But fairly recently, I have come to realize, I am a good person!! maybe not a masculine person, maybe I am a feminine person, but a good person nonetheless. I have been a good parent and have kids that are not in trouble and are successful. I have good friends. I am doing right by my mother. I was with my father the night he passed. I gave his eulogy. I earn ok money. I own a house. I am not a failure, just feminine, and that is ok too.