Women's Rights

[DanaR]

When I was growing up, I had a close relationship with my mom. It was just the two of us; because of that I've always been sensitive to women’s issues. It has always been hard for me to understand why people (males and females) were treated differently. When I started going out as a crossdresser, I really started to notice and understand differences a little better. As a guy, I would walk down the street at night and not feel any fear; as a girl it is a lot different (this is just one item).

I have been married to the same lady since we were 19 years old. We have three daughters and one granddaughter. My wife has tried to be understanding of my transgender feelings and for the most part supported and helped me. We go out clothes shopping all of the time and I can dress at home or go out basically anytime that I would like.

About eight years ago, I did some volunteer work with domestic violence victims; this involved extensive training (almost 50 hours) and a background check. This was a real eye opener for me. After this, I've seen and felt discrimination from both sides. Here I am a male, sensitive to female issues and viewed as the enemy by some because I am male; wow, I just don't get it. It is difficult to understand, and there is no way that you can talk to people that don’t want to listen. Because of this it is sometimes difficult for me to understand some of the things that go on in our community as well.

I became interested in bellydance about six years ago and have talked to several dancers. We found that there are a lot of similarities between bellydance and crossdressing; at least as far as society is concerned, or views them.

Bellydance is all about femininity and movement; and I decided to take some classes about three years ago. The instructor has been great and has helped me a lot with feminine movement. She seemed to understand or be sensitive to me being transgendered; and she would talk to me about it all of the time. I always dressed (for the class) with an androgynous look, my hair is long, and it was usually down. We always dance barefooted and about half of the time my toes are painted. Last year she told me of another transgendered girl taking some of her evening classes. Most of my classes had about 4 to 6 students, all female except for me (or including me). At the end of each class our instructor would say, "alright ladies, thank you for coming and I'll see you next week". Sometimes she would tease me if I didn't do something right and she would say to me, "bad girl".

That was the way our class would be and it was fun, until several months ago. I had a bad cold or allergies this spring and missed several months of class. I called the instructor to check if she was still teaching the same days and she said yes, so I told her I would see her on Tuesday; she said that would be great (it was a couple weeks into the quarter of this class session). So I showed up the next Tuesday and there were four new students, and I was introduced to each one. They all seemed really nice and the class was great. The next day, the instructor called and told me that after class, all of the students met after I left and discussed me and then told the instructor that they didn't feel comfortable with me in the class. I really felt like I was put in an awkward position, the instructor would loose four students if I didn't leave. Until this point I really liked taking this class, now I'm just annoyed. I really have become very disillusioned by this and some other similar situations.

I guess I have become a victim of womens rights and it really doesn't feel very good.