Soul Asylum

As I have mentioned my one year anniversary has left me reflecting on my life in deep thought. Even though trying to figure out who I am, what gender I am, my orientation, etc. has been on my mind all of my life I never could have imagined being where I am now.

I've recently realized I have made a mistake in my thinking. I have always associated my desire to be a woman with sexual desire. It was something I would always fantasize about, with growing intensity as the years passed. My mistake is not seeing how much it was in my life, how it truly was on all levels. My sexual fantasy was just the most powerful. Sexual desire being as all consuming as it is, it was how I would try to let my gender confusion out to the occasional person. I attached myself to the transvestite/bdsm world in order to make sense of it to myself. However the stigma of "men that want to be girls" kept me ashamed for a long, long time.

I had all but forgotten how much of my entire life these thoughts were in. I would regularly wonder what it would be like to do anything, on a long list of random things, as a woman. Walking down the street, getting my hair cut, being friends with other women, going to school, buying clothes. It was something that never left my mind. Seeing this lately has given me the strongly sought after, if not dangerous to need, validation from my past of being transgender. My personal quest to understand everything on an intellectual level has gotten in the way of seeing how I have always tried to make sense of my confusion on an intellectual level in the past. I didn't just attempt to rationalize out my female sexual fantasies, I was trying to rationalize it out in all aspects of my life. I see too, now, how I am trying to do the impossible. I'm trying to place concrete thought and reasoning to pure feeling and emotion. Something I need to learn, or perhaps re-learn, is how to not do this anymore. That I need to just let some feelings and desires happen and stop looking for a reason or permission.

This has opened up another world of thought for me however, yet something else I realize I need to break down. I have slowly come to terms with the fact that I have never thought or felt like a man, neither have I ever thought or felt like a cis person, man or woman. I have convinced myself that seeing both sides of the gender spectrum has given me some clarity that most others will not be able to have. In reality though, I know nothing about not being a transgender woman. How could I? How can I assume I know what a cis man or woman is thinking or feeling when I have never been either of those things, never? My thoughts have always been plagued with my gender dysphoria, never, or rarely, being clear enough to think like the rest of the 99% of the population.

Also, I've started to see how completely alone I have been through this in the past. I have spoken with a few people that have had the empathy enough to ask me, "So who knew when you were younger? Did you have any support?" The answer to that is no one knew, I had no support. It was the look on one woman's face in particular upon hearing my answer that made me see the reality of it. Honestly, I have thought fairly little about how much I have had to deal with this on my own. When I wasn't telling myself it is a dark secret that know one could know about, I was telling myself it is something I had to deal with on my own anyway, telling someone wouldn't help. It is dealing with it on my own that has created all of the walls I now have to climb over.

As a side note, making sure other young transgender people don't struggle through this alone is exactly why we need more transgender awareness and education. Both to give the transgender person someone to talk to, something to learn about themselves with and to rid the world of the stigma transgender people have.

Because I have done so much to myself, convinced myself of so many things that are not true about myself, I find it very hard to trust my own thoughts. I have spoken with my therapist about this and she brought up a good point. I tend to have trouble trusting my positive thoughts only, the negative thoughts are readily absorbed. This is a combination of my self worth and general confusion from my life long battle with being transgender. I feel I have gotten to the point that I need to stop analyzing the results of my internal analysis. I need to start letting things go. I am happier now, almost all of the time. I need to tell myself, I need to actually believe, that I can trust my own feelings and thoughts again. That the person I am showing to the world and myself is the real me now. I'm not doing things to hide, I'm doing things to free myself. My feelings over them are genuine. It is a testament to how difficult life becomes as a transgender person that their own feelings and thoughts get questioned so strongly, and harshly, by their selves... my self.

Again, this is something that sounds bad, maybe even like I'm complaining, but it is not the case. seeing these things as the truth they are is freeing me from the confusion they held over me. I am a truth seeker, plain and simple. I have always been, about everything, most deeply about myself. Every bit of truth I find, or barrier toward truth I break though gives me more understanding and ultimately happiness and love of myself. Often the initial realization of such deep emotional struggle leaves me hurt, I see how much of my life I have wasted hiding the truth from myself. Eventually however, this pain turns to strength. I see the true me, the transgender woman who managed to live through an inner war that less then 1% of the population has managed to live through. I may not have the complete binary perspective package I thought I did, but I do have a perspective that is obviously very different then most. Like practically all people that have been through trauma and eventually grew to live with it I too will eventually grow to accept this and be that much stronger and confident for it, each slice of my life truth that I see taking me further along that path.

Where I am now is a transwoman, courageously out to the world with nothing ot hide anymore. The secret I have kept viciously guarded from everyone is now openly presented for all to see. Not just see either, I welcome, I encourage questions, or for people to spend time with me. As each day passes I am becoming confident in myself, in my place in life, my worth to the world. I have a lot of confusion left but none of it as consuming and relentless as the beginning question of "Am I transgender?". I am happier now. I am able to see now how much peace of mind my transition is giving me. How calm my inner.... soul for lack of better words, has become.