Damn Girl!

2017

One evening, I needed to make a phone call. We got terrible cell phone reception at home sometimes, and frequently needed to go outside to communicate effectively. Anyway, I dressed and went out to the driveway. Honestly, I didn’t think much about how I dressed, but merely put on what I was comfortable in. That outfit was a moisture wicking t-shirt, a pair of flip-flops, and a denim knee length skirt.

So I was out on the driveway, on the phone. The sun had gone down, and I was standing in the driveway, in the dim light. The sidewalk wasn’t too far away, and as I was listening to the person I was talking with on the phone, a man walked past me on the sidewalk in the dim light as I stood there, the cell phone to my ear, with my hand partially blocking my face. He couldn’t possibly have seen my face clearly.

I saw him looking my way as he passed, and I heard him say to himself “Damn, girl!”. Suddenly, I realized I was smiling. He had liked what he saw in that dim light, and that was an amazing feeling!

Have you ever felt like that? Casual, unplanned moment of feeling good?

Is He?!?!?

2018

A few weeks ago, my wife and I visited the church we had recently left. We popped in in the middle of the day. The associate pastor was thrilled to see us, hugged me, etc. I was dressed in women's shorts, a woman's t-shirt, and women's canvas shoes. He doesn't know the truth about me.

The Senior Pastor, who now knows the truth about me, was more reserved than he had been in years past.

We did what we had stopped in for, and departed.

A few weeks later, my wife happened to be in the presence of this same minister, the Senior Pastor. He asked her if I was now wearing makeup and dresses because that'd be wrong. Seriously???

Several days later, he was in the hospital for a few days. Is it wrong of me that I wanted to go buy a dress, put on some makeup, and go visit him in the hospital? Captive audience, and all. I didn't do it, though.

How Do You Know?

How Do You Know You're Transgender???

Well, this is a fair question. It's both difficult to explain, and easy to explain at the same time.

Simply put, how do you know you're cis-gender? You're a woman and have always been a woman, or you're a man, and have always been a man, right? You didn't have to wonder. You just are.

Well, that's often how it is with trans people. We know from the very beginning, even if we don't admit it to ourselves, even if we push it away with all our might, Even if we don't understand fully, even if we try hard as we can to be the gender we were assigned.

Sure, many of us are gendered male at birth and are female, or we're gendered female at birth, but are male, or some of us are somewhere in the middle, such as agender, or genderfluid, or non-binary. Sometimes it takes years to figure it out, because the clamor of, well, wrongness, can be deafening, and it's hard to navigate through what's going on through the noise.

But eventually, it comes into focus. You just know. It's no stranger for trans people than it is for cis people. We just know. We just are.

Bathrooms Aren't a Safe Place if You're Trans

Bathrooms and locker rooms have always been a problem for me

I'm the brunette, transgender wife.

Bathrooms and locker rooms have always been a problem for me. I always thought they were problems for everyone, I guess. You can’t really have that conversation with your friends at school. “So, I was wondering, does being naked in the locker room make you want to hide?”. Not a chance I was going to have that conversation. Not knowing any differently, I assumed pretty much everyone had issues with bathrooms and locker rooms. It wasn't until years later when I started to realize that this wasn’t the case, that I understood how different I truly am.

I remember how it was back in grade school. Yes, grade school. In fourth grade, I noticed that I didn’t like it when I was in the restroom, and other kids came in. I was a little bit uncomfortable and didn’t know why. If I walked in, and other kids were in there, I would just stand around until they had cleared out, and then do my thing, and leave. If that wasn’t possible, the stalls were my friend, but since there were no doors, that only helped a little. I quickly learned to go during class, rather than between class, because otherwise, I would be late. Also, the bathroom was typically empty during class times. I always was ahead in my classes, so it was easy to get permission during class if I needed to.

The restroom on the fourth and fifth-grade side of the school had these gigantic urinals. They were as tall as I was and went all the way down to the floor. They had an oddly shaped bottom, and you couldn’t stand right up against them. You had to stand back and aim. So, the boys had this thing they did where they tried to trick other boys into seeing their genitals. They seemed to find it hilarious. It just made me feel awkward.

Transgender in Middle School

As I moved on into middle school, this all became much more pronounced. I absolutely hated using the restroom at school or in public. I think the best way to explain it would be that I felt vulnerable, and exposed, and I didn’t like that at all. Older boys in middle school are starting to develop, and are discovering their genitals, and there was a lot of horseplay and foolishness that revolved around this in the bathrooms. I didn’t want to use the boy’s restrooms, but there were no options at all. So that’s what I did because you do what you have to do.

But the worst part, for me, was the bathrooms at the school gym, both in middle school and especially in high school. After the gym, we were required to shower. Failing to shower meant an F for the day, and that adds up fast. I tried to use a washcloth and clean up that way, but naturally, that quickly brought scorn. The teacher started checking to see who actually showered, and I knew I couldn’t keep getting F’s. I knew that I had no choice but to shower.

Thus, I found myself naked in front of an entire room full of guys. I didn’t at all want to be in that room. I didn’t look at anyone, didn’t waste a second, didn’t at all like how I felt. I was embarrassed and ashamed. I felt miserable. That was the first time ever, there in the sixth grade, that I actually wondered what was wrong with me.

I became an expert at lightning fast showers. By that, I mean that at the end of gym class I ran into the bathroom, and was already in the shower when pretty much everyone else was still coming into the bathroom, horse-playing and loudly “preening their feathers”. My gym teachers told my parents that they loved that I was so motivated I even ran off the gym floor into the locker room every day. I told my parents it was the soccer player in me.

The shower had two entrances, one directly from the locker area, and a back way through the restroom stalls. I would shower as fast as possible, in the back of the shower room, and slip out the back way, and get back to my locker while the other boys were just moving as a group into the shower room through the front, horseplaying and loud. I’d be dressed and out of the gym before most of them finished, which was fine with me, because seeing them naked was pretty embarrassing too.

Transgender in High School

As bad as middle school was, high school was much worse. The guys were bigger. They were stronger, more brash, more vocal, louder, more masculine. Everything I wasn’t. Proving you were manly was the thing that was done. But, I knew that wasn't something that worked, for me. Bathrooms visits were at least quicker, since the guys hanging out in the bathrooms only wanted to smoke cigarettes or weed.

However, the showers after gym class my Freshman and Sophomore years were, to say the least, not good. There was one way in, one way out, no partitions to hide behind. I remember one time, I was sitting on a bench in the rows of lockers. I had already showered, and was trying to get dressed and get out of there. I pulled on a sock, picked up a shoe, heard a noise, and looked up. There, totally unexpected, right in front of my face, no more than 18 inches away from me, was an enormous set of male genitals. 

“Oh my God!” I heard myself cry out in shock, as I dropped my shoe. Three guys nearby started laughing. The guy right in front of me, who had simply been moving past, stopped, shook himself in front of my face several times, and moved on. I felt myself turning beet red. Quickly dressing, I was out of there.

If I were in the shower, and a guy came in, I would quickly turn away, trying to not let him see any more of me than possible. On multiple occasions I was laughed at for crossing my arms over my chest. I didn't plan to do it. It was an automatic reaction.

There would be roughly 30 guys, all naked, in the locker room, and me. Testosterone, everywhere. I wanted to be anywhere but there. I didn’t want to be around 3 naked guys in a locker room, let alone 30. I felt alien. I had heard of the concept, but had never really experienced it. I felt alone, in a room full of people. I kept trying to look at their faces, but kept noticing their nakedness, and my own.

I always had to be careful, in the shower. I was curious, and envious. Envious at the easy way they were masculine, simply being themselves, and thus naturally being what I knew I needed to be, but increasingly, failed at. Curious about the bodies, a few of which I found very interesting. But then, there would be an involuntary reaction, and oh my gosh that couldn’t ever be seen! Most of the guys were frankly unattractive to me. So, I would try to shower nearest them, and thus avoid the unthinkable. But goodness, a few of the guys were, um, interesting!

The Joyous Buffet of Negative Feelings

Thus, I got the joyous buffet of negative feelings. Embarrassment, humiliation, shyness, fear, vulnerability. Best of all, I got to ask myself over and over again, what in the world was wrong with me?!?!? Why did I feel like I did? Why did I like what I liked, and dislike what I disliked? Have you ever hated yourself?

I still have massive problems with men's restrooms and locker rooms. I guess some things never change. There's fear. Nervousness. Am I going to be safe? Am I going to be accosted? Have I been in that restroom before? If so, what's the fastest way to go in, get to a stall, get done, and get out?

The reality is that there are those among us who, like me, have to pause for a moment, before entering that bathroom door, and steel themselves against what could happen in that room, before pushing the door open. Every. Single. Time. Something has to change.

An Eagle Scout?!?

1983

I was a Boy Scout. I started when young, with the Cub Scouts. I went all the way through the BSA, becoming an Eagle Scout, and a leader in the Order of the Arrow, which is an honor group within the Boy Scouts, to which you must be elected by your peers to join, and then becoming an Explorer, and finally, an Assistant Scoutmaster. Now, if you were not involved with Boy Scouts, those terms might not mean much to you. Suffice it to say that if it could be done in the Boy Scouts, at that time, I did it.

Some of it was fun. Some of it was challenging. Some of it was boring. Some of it seemed foolish. Some of it seemed pointless. Some of it was amazing. But through it all, I found myself feeling, over and over, that I was a fish out of the water. I felt awkward, at times exposed and vulnerable, at times embarrassed, at times weird. I am not sure I much felt like I belonged. But I tried so very hard to fit in. The worst thing of all that was that though I often felt like a fish out of water, I felt like I had to be successful in the Boy Scouts. I had to. My brother was in the same troop and excelling. My Dad had been a scout. It was expected of me

Boys to Men

The Boy Scouts of America (now Scouts BSA) in my childhood was what made boys into men. Camping, rappelling, hiking, rock climbing, canoeing, archery, rifle shooting, plant identification, tracking, all sorts of things. When I was young, I wanted so very badly to fit in, to belong, to become the man I was supposed to be becoming. Nothing else seemed to be in the cards for me. I excelled in the Boy Scouts, earning the highest awards I could get.

But over and over, it seemed to be a fool’s errand. Summer camp was especially awful. Yes, that’s the word, awful. I had to stay in a tent with a boy. Between that and the pool and the shower house and the stupid skinny dipping or shower games, I was so uncomfortable and felt so exposed. I had no choice in those situations, but my hands were shaking the whole time, and I couldn’t bring myself to look at anyone. I tried really hard not to participate in the roughhousing, and so forth. So, everyone else got to play "let’s laugh at the weird kid".

I guess the thing that most pervaded those situations was the feeling of shame. I felt like I was a failure at becoming a man. I felt like something must be wrong with me for how I felt about stripping in front of the guys when they all just yanked off their clothes.

I very much enjoyed hiking, and many of the activities were interesting. I liked being challenged. I liked learning. But I didn’t like being there, with the guys, like that. The feeling of being out of place was so strong. But at the same time, the need to work harder and harder to become the man I was supposed to become was pounding on me. The feeling that I was failing at doing what it seemed everyone around me was doing so very well pounded on me even worse. So, I worked at it even harder.

More Boy Than the Other Boys

When I achieved Eagle Scout in 1983, there was a lot of attention. Honestly, the world was a different place then than now. There was a big public ceremony, held at the church I attended, and I dislike being the center of attention. Several respected people from the church, from the Boy Scouts, and from the community got up and talked about what a great young man I was, an example to other boys, and then they read a congratulatory letter from the President of the United States, Ronald Reagan. The theme through it all was that I was an example for other boys to emulate, that I was more boy than the other boys around me!

Then it was time for me to get up and talk. Have I mentioned that I don’t like being the center of attention? But there didn't seem to be a choice. Anyway, I got up to talk, and my hands were shaking, and my voice was shaky and weird. People told me later they thought I was going to cry. That’s because I really was about to cry. Not because I was feeling so happy and proud. No. That would have been nice, actually.

I didn’t feel like I was any of those things they were saying about me. I didn’t want to be an example for boys. I didn’t even want to be a boy! Heck, I was amazed they let me in the Order of the Arrow, it was for boys! Then my brain heard those thoughts echoing in my head, standing up front in that church, and said to itself “wait, what?!?!?” and went to the blue screen, and my mouth froze, and it took me a few moments to shake those thoughts off and reboot. My Dad told me later I was smart, pausing to gather my thoughts before speaking. Yeah. That’s what I was. Smart. Pacing myself, you see. Thinking before I spoke. That's what I was doing. Sure. 

Oh Yes, I'm the Great Pretender

Not for the last time in my life, I felt like I was pretending. On a day that was supposed to be the crowning achievement of my life to that point, all I felt was that I wanted to be anywhere else but there. I was standing there, at the church pulpit, a few hundred people looking at me, and I wanted to cry. But I couldn’t do that, no matter what. There was no way in the world I could do that. So, I was the boy I was supposed to be. I talked.

It was awful.

My Perspective (I'm the the redheaded sarcastic wife) Part I

My wife (she's the trans woman - in a marriage of two women, reading our story can get confusing) was struggling with some issues after being evaluated for PTSD.  We discovered some things that were, well, odd, and some that seemed out of place.

She continued to experience things that caused us concern, and we knew some things weren't typical, about her experience. When things started to seem more heavily piled on, she called and left a message to a therapist that she had a card for.  Although we didn't know it, this person turned out to be the LGBT coordinator for the VA.  The therapist set up an appointment for us to sit down and talk with her.  I knew something was bothering my wife.  I know her very well.  I am usually able to tell her what is going on within themselves before she even realizes it.  We met with the therapist and started talking about how my wife felt like they were going crazy.  She talked about not feeling right in her own skin.  The more we talked and the more we learned about Gender Dysphoria and trans-gender stuff the more the pieces of the puzzle, so to speak, fell into place.

We realized that my husband wasn't really my husband but my partner/wife.  At that time my wife felt she might be Non-Binary Transgender.  I was skeptical of this because of the way she would react with certain things.  I felt she was not non-binary, but rather female. She was much more girly than she realized. Her face would light up if she saw a piece of clothing that was pink. She was, and is, drawn big time to anything pink.  It was fun teasing her about this. She exhibited a lot of feminine characteristics, and the only remotely masculine thing I saw was her body, and even then, she was pretty feminine. Her gestures were feminine, and the way she talked and the things she was interested in were not typical for a man.

One thing I noticed right away was that as we talked more and more, over the next few months, and she began to understand things about herself that she hadn't before, she was so much more relaxed than ever before.  I was glad to see this.

We moved forward, making sure that we met regularly with our therapist.  It was important to both of us that our marriage, which has always been good, remained strong.  It made sense to us that if we were moving forward together, then the transition, whatever that ended up looking like, would be much more smooth.

At this time we felt we should tell our daughters what was going on with "Dad".  Thus my wife wrote letters to the girls telling them about the real person she was.  There were a lot of tears.  If you have read the post about telling your children, you know that it wasn't easy for her to do this.  One thing that really stood out though was that after they knew, the girls said they loved their Optimus Beyonce Dad and that she was more millennial than they were.  It was pretty funny, that the girls came up with that name.

One big concern that the girls had was how is Mom handling this.  Am I okay? Are we, my wife and I, okay within our relationship?  The girls were very concerned that we might be going to divorce because when you read stories online, that is the typical result.  I made sure to reassure them that I was okay with this and that I was on this journey with their Dad.

To be Continued

Compliment at Church

2017

As I grew more confident in how I was expressing my gender identity, I began dressing in a much more androgynous fashion at church. Now, this was a huge step for me, because the church we attended at the time was very conservative. I had not, to this point, dressed in anything remotely approaching "non-dude".

One Sunday, I was wearing an outfit that I felt good in. First, we had been allowing my hair to grow out. This was very unusual for me because I was still in the Army Reserve. But recently, haircut regulations had eased considerably, so there was some leeway. Though I had known that for a while, I hadn’t considered growing my hair out. But by this point in my life, my wife and I had decided to let it grow. At this point, my hair was so much longer than people I had been going to church with for years didn’t recognize me at first.

So, my hair was much longer, though still relatively masculine in appearance. My eyebrows were waxed as well. I had on a pair of tight khaki pants that had straight legs, with no pleats or cuffs. I had on a purple and white checkered shirt with very small squares, and a pair of brown women’s boots that looked fairly androgynous. Overall, I was dressed as femininely as possible, while remaining clothed just masculine enough to get by. I felt both nervous and at the same time, happy because I felt much better in these clothes! There is enormous freedom in putting on clothing that makes you feel more like “you”.

As I walked through the church building, I turned a corner, and there was a very conservative woman who I had known for a few years. She is a nice person, but also, not someone who would likely accept me for who I am. She looked up as I approached, looked me over from head to toe, saw the clothes without it registering who I was (I think), and said “Hi! You look really cute today!”

I was completely surprised. I could tell from her expression and the way she continued conversing with the person she had been talking with, that she didn’t even realize what she had said. The other person in that conversation, a wonderful friend of mine who knows the truth about me, just started chuckling and gave me a hug.

It really shouldn’t matter. I know it shouldn’t. But wow, did it feel good, hearing those words spoken to me by a woman, at the sight of me in the same way she might have told any woman. 

He, They, She

2018

As we progressed through the transition, many things have changed, and to us, changed for the better. But along the way, there have been hiccups, speed bumps, and odd moments.

Recently, I noticed something that I thought was pretty funny. My wife, a super strong supporter of me, was all over the place in how she referred to me in conversation. I would say that the funniest thing was when I heard her refer to me as "he", "they", and "she", all in the same sentence.

She is trying really hard, and to be honest, changing from three decades of calling me "he", to calling me "she", is not an easy thing to do at all. She is sincere and means well, and she knows what reality is, but sometimes, habit takes over for a moment. who knows? She might well be messing it up off and on for years to come. You know what? That's okay!

Caitlyn Jenner

2015

Caitlyn Jenner Horrified Me

Caitlyn Jenner horrified me. But not for the same reasons she horrified most people. In 2015, Caitlyn Jenner burst upon the world. She was previously known as Bruce Jenner, an athlete known in pretty much every home in America, and many across the world. Jenner’s coming out as a trans woman shocked people from coast to coast, and caused some others to stand and applaud. As in any other dramatic change, some people were thrilled, some people were offended, and most others had no idea how to react.

I had a strong reaction. I was horrified. Not because of some sort of religious objection, though that appeared quickly, and just as quickly was discounted, because the honest reaction was something much more visceral. Fear. Horror. Abjectly uncomfortable distress. While I knew this sort of thing had been done in other people’s lives, I had managed to ignore it. But now, for the first time, I was honestly confronted with the unavoidable reality that a man had become a woman.

Parts Is Parts

Caitlyn was born as a man. Caitlyn had “man parts”, looked like a man, had competed in sporting events as a man. Good grief, Jenner was one of the most athletic men in the world! If even that man could have this happen to him, what did that say about me, and my concerns? Caitlyn Jenner represented everything that scared me about gender!

I was vocally against Jenner. We had conversations about her at church, and at home, and I firmly denounced what she was experiencing. People shared jokes on Facebook making fun of her, and I laughed. I insisted on calling Jenner “he”. Doing so made a lie out of what she was saying, and doing. I desperately needed Caitlyn Jenner to be a lie. I honestly didn't even grasp how very badly I needed it to be a lie.

It Wasn't True. Was It?

It couldn’t be true. It couldn’t be real. Jenner was certainly making the whole thing up. So, that made it safer. If she wasn’t real, then all the stuff I had been feeling and thinking and experiencing wasn’t real either. If Jenner was pretending, lying, still a man, then I was still a man. Right? I WAS a man, darn it! Thus, she was clearly lying.

Once you make up your mind about something, it is much easier to deal with it. So, Caitlyn became a non-entity to me. Why? Because Jenner was lying. The problem is, as discussed elsewhere, pushing away your problems doesn’t really get rid of them. It didn’t change anything about the reality of my life, and me as a person. It was a band-aid, something that made me feel better for a time. I was able to convince myself, primarily from the strong negative reactions of people around me, that Caitlyn Jenner was a fraud. But in reality, nothing  had changed. It just got swept under the rug, for a time. It was hidden, even from myself.

But now the clock was ticking. There would come a time I would realize that she was telling the truth.

The Rhythmettes

5th Grade, 1979

My elementary school had a gym teacher that was a bit of an unusual person. No one really knew how to take him, but everyone seemed to like him. His name was Mr. Legg, which I admit, was a name that made me smile every time I heard it. He was the sort of teacher that students opened up to.

Mr. Legg created a program at the school called The Rhythmettes. It was a girls dance team and was only open to 5th-grade girls. Being on that dance team was the ultimate status symbol in the school, for the girls. They had cool looking uniforms that resembled cheerleader uniforms of royal purple and white. They were the popular girls. These girls were in the position in elementary school that varsity cheerleaders are in high school. The Rhythmettes performed at school functions.

When I became a 5^th grader, there was a boy who joined The Rhythmettes. I can’t recall his name, but he was short for a 5^th grader. There had never been a boy on The Rythmettes before, but Mr. Legg allowed it and got him a uniform of purple shirt, and bell bottom white pants, and white shoes. The boys made fun of him, and so did many of the girls. He was actually a pretty good dancer, though, for elementary school.

Toward the end of my 5th-grade year, we were out in the school yard doing a sports and activity day. We had a “picnic”, which was really just eating the school food outside. At one point, we were standing in a circle, around The Rhythmettes as they performed. The boy was out there with them, of course, and I remember there were two boys near me making fun of him. They were saying he looked like an idiot, and they were really being cruel, and suddenly I was horrified to hear myself say “I don’t know, he looks pretty happy. Sure, he’s dressed like a girl, but it might be fun.”

The boys weren’t sure they had heard me right. There was a shocked silence. “What did you just say?!?” they asked. I mumbled something, and turned away, and walked to another part of the circle, glad they hadn’t heard me well enough to be sure. But that boy looked like the happiest person in school.

A Painful Lesson

6^th grade, 1979

I moved out of the path of an 8th-grade cheerleader. She was one of the richest girls in school, pretty and built (for being an 8^th grader) and knew it, and I admired her for her beauty and disliked her for it at the same time. She walked arrogantly down the hallway, right down the middle like a Coast Guard cutter slicing through the sea. The hallway was crowded, and I had to move back to the right side. The middle school hallways always seemed to follow the same sort of rules as the roads in town did. Traffic stayed to the right, unless you were important, or at least felt that you were. 

The boy’s restroom sign came into view, and honestly, none too soon, as I had needed to use the restroom all the way through math. I had several minutes before my next class, which was right down the hall. I veered into the restroom and headed toward a urinal.

Without warning, there was a hard blow on my back, propelling me into a wall, one of those cinder block wall types. I rebounded like a basketball and was grabbed and spun around. He pushed me against the wall and gripped me by the front of the neck. I was a small kid, one of the youngest in my 6th-grade class, short and thin. The boy facing me was much larger, an 8th-grade football player, and naturally, because these sorts of things never involve one boy, he had three of his friends with him, to cheer him on. He was much larger than me and crazy strong, and I remember thinking how big his arms were.  He was wearing a black and white school shirt. Northwood Panthers. I didn’t recall his name, though I recognized him, and oddly, my brain locked onto trying to recall his name. Instinctively, I pulled my books tighter against my chest, close to my body. I remember that he smelled like sweat.

He said something that I didn’t hear because I was still working on figuring out his name. Then he grabbed my books out of my arms and threw them into the trash can. Spinning around, he grabbed me by the front of my shirt, and demanded to know what “a fag like me was doing in the boy’s bathroom”. I protested that I wasn’t a fag, and he demanded to know why I carry my books like a girl. You might recall that middle school kids will seize on any little thing to belittle someone else, and thus elevate their own status. Meanwhile, all boys knew that being labeled a “fag” (homosexual) was essentially the kiss of death.

Suddenly, I was confronted with what I hadn’t ever realized. I typically carried my books in my arm, against my chest, just like that aforementioned cheerleader did. Like girls all over school did. There was an unwritten rule, you see, that boys carried their books down at their side, and girls carried their books against their chest, tilting them out as if they had breasts, trying to look like the high school girls did. So now I’m being confronted by this football player, who is literally yelling at me, and all my brain can do now is wonder why in the world I was carrying my books like that, and why it mattered at all. Until this moment, I hadn’t realized, believe it or not, that I carried my books like that. I just carried them how it felt comfortable to me. But that was the wrong way to do it. Right? So, I’m now focusing on the way, and have forgotten the search for his name.

I was standing there, feeling extremely vulnerable, for some reason folding my arms across my chest. I had never felt like that in my life. He demanded to know what I was doing in the “men’s room”. Now they were men, notice. Boys a moment ago, men now.

Though I’m sure it made him feel manly, the punch to the stomach that followed wasn’t exactly a blessing, in my viewpoint. Then, punched again, I was on the floor, being punched and kicked. One. Then another kick, then a third, really hard kick, that one from another boy. One kick to the stomach, one to the side, one to the small of the back. Lots of punches. Chest, stomach, side, back, thigh. None of the blows fell on my face or arms, but only in places that wouldn’t leave marks. If I tried to cover an area, they simply shifted to a different area. I couldn’t catch my breath. Then the obligatory laughter, and one of them spit on me. I remember the feel of it, wet and disgusting, on the side of my neck. They discussed for a moment whether they should pee on me. Then, of course, the obligatory threat to never return to the men’s room, and they left.

I was in a lot of pain. I was crying at this point. Shocked. Horrified. Very, very afraid. The floor was cold. My throat hurt from where he had gripped it. My head hurt from striking the floor. My stomach, site of multiple punches, and a kick, hurt. I finally got my books out of the trash can, an act that disgusted me, because I really have never liked unsanitary areas. That’s an understatement. I went into a stall, and sat down on a toilet seat lid, but that didn’t help at all. There were no stall doors, and I was crying and shaking in the boy’s room. I had to get out of there.

 I worked desperately to stop crying, then grabbed some paper towels, and washed my face and neck. I looked in the mirror, had a realization that my eyes were red and my cheeks blotchy, and then was ashamed that I cared how my face looked.  I finally went to class, extremely late, of course. The teacher, sending me to the principal’s office for being late, assumed that my lateness was why I was upset. There, I got the “I’m disappointed in you, I thought you were a good kid” lecture, and was sent back to class. I have no idea, to this day, why I never told. The first person I ever told was my wife, 38 years later.

When I left school that day, the same boys were outside, just finishing destroying my bicycle. I unbent things as best I could, and rode home. There, my extremely conservative parents questioned me about my bicycle, announcing when I tried to explain (leaving out the bathroom incident, mind you) that there was no reason for other boys to damage my bicycle. That, naturally, comforted me not at all. Since there was no way I could tell them what happened, I was punished for lying, because I had said I didn’t do the damage, but wouldn’t give an alternate explanation. Then, I was punished for not taking care of my bicycle.

Oddly, some of the girls were nicer to me after all this happened. I didn’t know why, but I was glad someone was nice to me. I saw the boys many times, of course, after that day. They always made a point of laughing or flipping me off. Otherwise, they left me alone, probably deciding they had made their point. But I was careful, after that. I was careful when entering restrooms.  I watched outside for a minute or so, and looked carefully inside before fully entering. If someone was there, I left. If the restroom was unoccupied, I finished quickly, leaving as fast as humanly possible. I was careful how I carried my books too, making sure they were in my hand, down at my side, because that’s how the boys carried their books. I was a boy. So, do it right. Or else.

Breakfast at Bob Evans

2018

This is part three of the trilogy discussing how a church responded to transgender people. I recommend reading the first two parts, for clarity.

you can find part 1 here: https://highheelsandankleboots.blogspot.com/2018/07/ok-e-mail-from-transgender-person.html

You can find part 2 here: https://highheelsandankleboots.blogspot.com/2018/08/church-bylaws.html

You're Not Having...

As previously discussed, my wife and I had left the church we were attending. The Senior Pastor there still had no idea why, and he and his family were vocal about wanting us to return. My wife and I decided that the best thing to do was to sit down and talk with him, and tell him bluntly why we left.

We met at a local Bob Evans restaurant, for breakfast. There, we small talked, and wasted time, and ate, until it got to the point that we couldn't ignore the elephant in the room any longer. So, I took a lot of deep breaths, and with a shaky voice, told the Senior Pastor why we had left his church.

He didn't act surprised, but he had to have been. I doubt he had any inkling of the situation, previously. From the moment the words "I'm transgender" left my mouth, he never again said he wanted us to return. Instead, at the end of our talk, he agreed that it was best that we go.

Then he looked at me and asked something I still can't believe he actually said. "You're not having sex with men, are you?" he asked. 'Because if you do, that's it for you."

Let me ask you a question, dear reader. How exactly is that any of his business? One of the things trans people always seem to get are questions about their genitals and about their sex life. Neither are okay. I don't ask you, and that's for a reason. It's none of my business.

I'm not going to do that

He then asked me what it took to help people like me feel more welcome. I told him that it'd be nice for people to have a place to pee. He said "We've got that now", a reference to the redesignated bathroom that they only changed because insurance had told them to. I told him that people look for churches with groups that aren't gendered. In other words, churches that have activities and Bible studies, not "men's Bible study" and "women's golf outings". He indicated that this wasn't likely to be put into place. That's when I told him it might be best to take "All are welcome here" off of the church sign, because I for sure hadn't felt welcome, and there were some other who hadn't as well. You see, in the last two years, some young people who were lesbians or bisexual had left, totaling 9 people that I knew of, including my family. I explained to him that he had other trans people in the church, and a couple of lesbians, a few porn addicts, etc.

The next thing he mentioned was in response to my statements about the attitudes of church leadership. He was concerned, but not like you'd think. He wasn't thinking of changing the attitude of church leadership. Rather, he asked me if when another person like me visited the church, would they be able to pick up on the church's attitude, or would it be hidden well enough? It's possible, he said, that I only knew about their attitude because I had been in leadership?

I explained that the right thing to do was for him to stand up on Sunday and bluntly confront the church's prevailing attitude. He said he wasn't going to do that, and the conversation broke up a few minutes later. Off we went.

I honestly don't know why I was even upset. I hadn't expected anything, in particular, to come from the talk. Yet, I was disappointed. But you know what? Walking away was the best thing we could have done.

Pronouns Make Me Cry

2018

She Called Me "She"

Last night, for the first time ever, my awesome wife referred to me as "her" and "she" in conversation. It might not be the first time she did it, but it is the first time I heard her do it.

Now, this conversation wasn't something that is going to make headlines. It wasn't with anyone who is likely to repeat the conversation with someone else.  To be honest, the conversation was with our golden retriever. I was in the kitchen, and heard my partner ask the dog "Where did she go?? That was followed by the sound of a tail thumping on something. "Go get her!" The dog, who loves to play "go get them" games, cam running to look for me.

When You're Transgender, Pronouns really Do Matter

It's silly. It's no massive, groundbreaking thing. But it brought tears to the corners of my eyes. She. Her. Pronouns really do matter. I hadn't realized how very much they do until that moment.

Church Bylaws

2017

At this point, if you haven’t read the story about the e-mail from the Transgender person, it would be best to get that background, as it will lend clarity to this vignette. You can find it here: E-mail from a Transgender Person

I'm the brunette, transgender wife. 

I was the Chair of the Church Board of Trustees. We attended an extremely conservative church, which sometimes caused some issues for my wife and I, regarding church teachings. But, honestly, though there were some things that got to us, we had been able to shrug it off. It’s amazing what you can shrug off in the name of normalcy. 

As the chair of the Trustees, I was vested with a lot of authority and was the number 2 person in authority in the church, behind the Senior Pastor. Mind you, despite the previous event with the e-mails, the church had taken no official position regarding transgender people.

Things were going well. We lived our lives, but the people at church had no idea of the truth about me, which frankly frequently caused me to feel that I was being dishonest. Overall, things were going decently. But since life is life, all good things must come to an end. Like many churches, how things are done in that church was guided by bylaws. The Senior Pastor had been wanting to make some changes, in language and punctuation. So, a committee was formed to consider the changes.

One day, the Senior Pastor sent out an e-mail to all of the church leadership, detailing the decision of the bylaws committee adding a few paragraphs to the church bylaws. The text of the paragraphs was:

We believe that the term “marriage” has only one meaning and that is marriage sanctioned by God which joins one man and one woman in a single, exclusive union as delineated in Scripture. We believe that God intends sexual intimacy to occur between a man and a woman who are married to each other. We believe God has commanded that no intimate sexual activity engage in outside of a marriage between a man and a woman. 

We believe that any form of sexual immorality, such as adultery, fornication, homosexuality, bisexual conduct, bestiality, incest, pornography or any attempt to change one’s sex or disagreement with one’s biological sex, is sinful and an offensive to God.

We believe that to preserve the function and integrity of the church as the local Body of Christ, and to provide a biblical role model to the church attendees and the community, it is imperative that all persons employed by the church in any capacity, or who serve as volunteers, should abide by and agree to this Statement of Marriage and Sexuality and conduct themselves accordingly.

As you might imagine, this presented me with multiple quandaries. First, because I am a transgender person, this would mean that I not only could not ethically continue in my current position, nor any other position, but that I also couldn’t serve in any capacity whatsoever, not even as a volunteer.

Additionally, the statement makes it clear that the church’s new position would be that I was considered to be sinful, and an offense to God, simply because of who I am as a person.

Also, I was driven more than a little nuts by the typos in what is supposed to be a legal document. But that’s another story.

Lastly, I don’t find in scripture the things the statement says are in scripture.

I was greatly distressed upon reading this statement, and what made it even worse was the overwhelming support from the entirety of church leadership for the inclusion of the statement. Only one other person voiced any dissent.

I engaged in a very logical, tense, but not heated discussion with the Senior Pastor, which included numerous e-mails, telephone calls, and face-to-face conversations with him. I actually was eventually able to persuade him that including the statement was morally reprehensible, and he then persuaded the remainder of the bylaws committee. The statement was NOT included in the new bylaws!

But that didn’t change the fact that I had seen the heart of the members of the church leadership team. I had been given a very rude awakening, and I no longer felt comfortable there. I now knew what was going to happen when, eventually, they found out the truth about me.

My wife and I talked at length about all this, and we spoke repeatedly with our therapist. The final decision was honestly life-altering. I have now resigned as Chair of the Board of Trustees, and from the board itself. We have withdrawn as backup Sunday School teachers and resigned from the fellowship committee, which plans church meals, etc. We also resigned from the church's community outreach program that we had been in charge of. Over the last few months, we have attended several other churches, and that will continue, as we search for a church that will not condemn me.

This story is wrapped up in this writing, Breakfast at Bob Evans

E-mail From a Transgender Person

2017

A Homophobic / Transphobic Church

I'm the brunette, transgender wife.

As background, the church I was a part of was a rather conservative church. However, to this point, there had been no real discussion regarding transgender people. I was the chair of the Board of Trustees, which meant that I was the leader of the group that made most financial decisions and administered church assets. The church had become more than a bit stagnant over the last several years. They decided to undertake a leadership retreat to try to get things going again.

As you may, or may not know, many transgender people are uncomfortable in restroom situations, being faced with a choice of using a restroom they feel in their heart is wrong, or getting in trouble for using the restroom their very being tells them to use. Being transgender, I attempted in May of 2017 to convince the church leadership to re-designate a single-use men’s restroom as a family restroom or simply as a restroom, without revealing my reason for wanting this. This attempt was bluntly rejected, with members of the Board of Trustees saying that if they did that, then this would encourage “those people who crossdress" (meaning transgender people) to want to use the restroom, and perhaps wish to attend the church, and that couldn’t be permitted. There was a short discussion about how disgusting these people were, with me sitting there in shocked silence. The cost of a new restroom sign was $35, and they decided it wasn't worth the money, despite them having a budget of hundreds of thousands of dollars. I was bluntly told that there was no reason to change the restroom and that the matter was tabled by a majority vote. 

Conversation during the meeting included comments that transgender people are only out to force churches to accede to their demands, that they all have the same agenda, that transgender people weren't real, that transgender people were abominations, that transgender people were deviants, and that transgender people were mentally ill. Mind you, they had no idea that sitting among them was a transgender person.

A Retreat That Wasn't

Later that same month, the church leadership, including me, attended that weekend retreat I mentioned earlier. Toward the end of the retreat, the person guiding the retreat, a Senior Pastor at another church in our denomination, made the observation that we had to solve our issues because there were bigger issues out there waiting. As an illustration of this, he shared that their church was having to deal with a transgender person attending.

Do you hear the sentiment in that statement? There were gasps, and heads shaking. One woman said "Oh no!" The facilitator told the story of how difficult it had been for their church, because of this person. They had even had to re-designate a single-use bathroom! I overheard someone in the room, a man, say that it was disgusting.

Mind you, this person the facilitator referred to had attended that church their entire life. The entire church knew this person and had known them their entire life, this person now being a young adult. Based on what this Pastor said, this transgender person apparently didn’t want any massive changes on the church's part since they had come out, but the church leadership there saw this as a series of problems they had to solve, to protect themselves. He talked about how much turmoil they had experienced and lamented the many hours spent in discussion of how to protect themselves. Our church leadership was rather concerned by all this.

An E-mail From a Transgender Person

Fast forward just a few weeks. Someone contacted our Senior Pastor using the “Contact the Pastor” link on the church web page. They stated that they were a transgender person, with a wife and kids. They had not come out, so no one knew, other than their wife and kids. They were searching for a church that would at least allow them to attend, and participate in events. He asked what our church’s teaching regarding transgender persons was. The Senior Pastor sent out the text of this person’s e-mail, including their name and e-mail address, to members of church leadership, roughly 11 people including me, and invited comments. 

The reactions bordered on hysteria. E-mails flew back and forth. There were expressions of dismay, followed quickly by a discussion regarding how to legally protect the church in this situation and overall an expression of the intention of not allowing this person to participate in any way. The prevailing opinion was that this person was clearly setting the church up to be sued. The Senior Pastor also contacted lawyers as well as the state office for our denomination, and also our liability insurance carrier, seeking how to best protect the church.

One woman, who was the chair of our Missions Committee, and I took the opposite path and attempted to convince the others that this was not the end of the world but rather an opportunity and that as Christians, we should welcome this person and their family. Everyone else in leadership took the exclusionary path. In the end, no reply at all was sent to the person. A few weeks later, the person sent another message. This too was not replied to. They never heard a peep from the church. Not one word. Ever. What if this was the last church they ever contacted? What if they were desperate, had faced rejection over and over, and this was the last time they tried?

It's probably just as well that they didn't hear from the church, though. The Senior Pastor had, after all, outed this person by name to all of the church leadership. There was no consideration that someone there might know this person, work with them, whatever. There was no consideration that outing them might end up costing this person their job or even their relationships. Had that family attended, at the minimum there would have been whispering and pointing.

Ch Ch Ch Changes...

Changes were coming, though. The insurance carrier, having been asked what to do in response to the e-mail,  recommended that since the church had actually been contacted, that the church should play it safe, since the church felt they were being set up, to go ahead and re-designate a restroom, in order to avoid a lawsuit. Mind you, the person had said absolutely nothing at all about restrooms. The lawyers agreed that this seemed wise. The church Board of Trustees, taking up discussion on that point, determined that the safest move was to re-designate a single-use restroom, and thus voted to re-designate the very same restroom I had requested that they re-designate just one month earlier. Do you see the message there? They weren't willing to do it to help someone, but they quickly did it to protect their own butts.

The most outspoken anti-trans board member said he would handle the sign change. This was the same man who had said just one month before that it wasn't worth $35 to make "those people" feel welcome. It took him several more months to get the sign changed, but the bathroom was eventually re-designated as a "family restroom". 

But, there was much more afoot than I knew... To be continued here: Church Bylaws

My First Sexual Assault

1981

This might be the hardest post to write I've done, thus far. I have a lot of emotions churning in me, writing this.

I was a freshman in high school. It was the fall, and I was in the boy's locker room. I was small for my age. I don't recall if it was because of soccer practice, or what, but I had been taking a shower. I was still in the shower area, having just wrapped up my shower, and was heading to where my towel was.

A Guy Came In

A guy came into the shower area, and as I reached for my towel, he put his hand on the back of my neck and pushed me roughly against the wall. I remember the left side of my face being pressed against the tile and the cold feel of the tile on the skin of my chest and stomach. He was a very big guy. I felt one of his legs push between mine, and he spread my legs apart. He rammed his lower body against me, pressing me against the wall, and then I felt him against me.  He was hard, and he pressed it against my butt and back, with both hands pushing my shoulders and head against the wall. He told me to hold still or else.

He was moving against me, and I remember him grunting into my ear. He was very strong, and I felt him holding me against the wall. I tried to push away from the wall, away from him. I couldn't move. I tried hard. The harder I tried, the harder he held me against the wall. I remember saying "please don't" over and over. "Shut the %^&# up and hold still!" he growled, and he smacked the side of my head and moved harder against me. He just kept moving, and moving, and moving.

I remember feeling helpless. I was crying by this point, and I heard his breathing increase. Suddenly, he pressed hard against me and groaned, and then I felt him finish on the small of my back. I remember the heat of it as he splashed wetly on me.

Then He Was Done

He pushed me roughly to my right, very hard, away from the entrance to the shower, and when I got my balance and turned around, he was already gone.

I was numb, crying, and felt sick to my stomach. I felt used and filthy, and all I wanted was to be clean. I quickly turned on the shower and washed as well as I could. Then I washed again, and again. I just wanted the feel of him off of me, to be clean, to be okay.

I have no idea who this guy was. He was large and strong, and white, with dark hair. I never saw his face. He would have had to be an upperclassman, because of his size, and the beard stubble I felt. I never knew who he was. For months, every time a large guy with dark hair passed me in the hallway, I shrank from him and tried to get away.

As often happens in traumatic situations, my brain eventually put the memory of this event away. That lasted for a lot of years. I existed in a state of not remembering what happened while going through the effects of it anyway.

This memory resurfaced, hitting me suddenly, a few weeks ago, at work. I have no idea what brought it to my mind. I was talking with some customers and walked back to my work truck, and suddenly I was there in the shower, feeling the cold shower wall, feeling his hands on me, feeling him against me. I must have looked like a crazy person, sobbing in my work truck.

I'm so thankful I have a good support system now because when this hit me, I was a wreck.

I CAN'T STRESS ENOUGH IF YOU ARE SEXUALLY ASSAULTED, GET HELP! Talk to someone, as often as you need to.

Susan On Stage (and my girly moment) 1985

Susan on Stage

In the fall of 1985, early in my senior year in high school, we were busily engaged in practice for our fall musical, for which I was the stage manager. Part of the musical required one of the female leads (a young woman I'll call Susan) to change outfits part way through.

Susan was one of the rich girls in school. Filthy rich. Her parents had bought her a sports car for her birthday. She was pretty, 15-year-old blonde, built, and a very talented singer and it was no shock to anyone that she had a lead part.

As the stage manager, I was aware of the various things that could derail a performance. Each play or musical has its own pitfalls. One of the potential issues of this show was that Susan had to hustle to get this wardrobe change done, or she would be late getting back out on stage. Routinely, this wardrobe change was not going well. She was moving pretty fast, but there’s no way she could get downstairs, where the drama room and changing booths were located, get changed, and get back up to the stage.

We tried a couple of different things, and finally, we just decided, with Susan’s full support, to locate the clothing she was supposed to change into at the back of the stage, behind the back curtain. This worked pretty well, actually. Finally, things were clicking, and just in time. The opening night was upon us.

There's a Naked Girl on Stage!

The first night of the performance, Susan exited the stage, and rushed to the back, behind the curtain. She got changed, and got back to her mark, just in the nick of time. But hey, it worked.

The second night, as time came for Susan to change, I was at the right rear corner of the stage, watching the props being readied, and also to make sure Susan didn’t have any issues. She exited the main stage and turned right past me, actually brushing me. Moving away from me, she lifted the hem of her dress up a bit as she walked so she wouldn’t trip. The clothing she was to change into were a tight pair of denim capris, a pair of red mary janes, and a white top with a low neckline.

As Susan approached her changing area, she yanked her dress over her head and tossed it aside, proceeding the last 10 feet or so wearing only a red thong, and a pair of black heels. Standing profile to me, she kicked off the heels, picked up the capri pants, and began slipping them on. Quickly, the pants were in place, the belt buckled. Still topless, she bent to grab her shirt, her breasts bouncing and swinging, and then she straightened back up. Turning topless toward me, she lifted her arms, and shrugged the top over her head, and adjusted it into place. The red Mary Janes were slipped on, a quick pass of the brush through her hair, and she was heading for her mark. Walking past me, she locked gazes with me and gave me a gigantic smile. She was at her mark with almost 20 seconds to spare.

My"Girly" Moment

I had been given what was likely the best view any student had been given at that school, outside of other girls seeing her in the locker room. The funny thing is that I wasn’t really turned on. Sure, she was very attractive, and I'd seen her in nothing but a thong. Rather, I was thinking, while watching her, that she had an amazing body, and that I was jealous of her chest, butt, and legs. The way that girl fit a thong was unfair, to say the least!

When that last thought crossed my mind, I was instantly horrified. I can’t explain the feeling that sweeps over a person who is MTF (male to female) transgender but doesn’t yet understand that when they have that sort of thought. You know, “Wow, I’d love to have legs like that” or the like. When your brain plays that thought back, it's distressing, in a "What's wrong with me???" sort of way.

So that was the day in high school when Susan caused me to have a girl moment. 

You're Trans? Just Ignore It

1985

Ah...High School

I was a high school junior, and I had a girlfriend, despite which I felt as if things were weird. I had a lot of instances of feeling like I was out of place, etc. The thing I was experiencing where I strongly disliked going into bathrooms was really starting to get to me, as were some other things that had happened over the years.

At times, I felt uncomfortable. At times, I felt fine. At times, I was so scared I was shaking. At times, I felt like something was wrong. At times, I felt distressed.

I started to think maybe it would be a good idea to talk with someone. But who in the world should I talk to? My Boy Scout leader? No way. He was creepy. My parents? Not in a million years. My Pastor? Yeah. Everyone wants to tell their pastor, as a teen, that they feel like something is wrong in their mind. It’s all physical, right? These are physical things I’m feeling. So I decided to talk to our family doctor. He was a D.O., and they’re trained in lots of extra things, compared to an M.D. He was a very good doctor, and thus had my respect. He’d know what was up.

You're Trans? Just Ignore It

So the next time I visited the doctor when he asked how I was doing, I told him the truth. I didn't tell him I was transgender. I'd never even heard the term, and I honestly didn't know what was wrong with me, but something clearly was. How am I, doc? Not good. I was not good. He sat down and listened quietly as I talked, and when I was done, he stood, put his hand on my shoulder, and told me that I was fine. Don’t worry about it, there’s nothing wrong, forget it. There’s nothing I need to be concerned about.

“But what about how I feel when…”

He cut me off. “Ignore it”, he said. Just ignore it. Bonus: He wasn't going to tell my parents. 

So I ignored it.

News: Ohio Bill Would Require Teachers, Health Care providers to Out Transgender Students

You can't make this stuff up

This poorly thought out bill is a knee-jerk reaction by some conservative Christians to a court decision in southwest Ohio. It would require teachers, guidance counselors, mental health counselors, and even clergy employed by public school systems or even private businesses or organizations who provide child care, to immediately inform parents in writing if they know, or suspect, that a child/teen might be trans. The bill intentionally doesn't take into account custody situations, in which if, say, an abusive parent has lost custody of their child, they still get informed, and both parents still must assent to any sort of trans-related counseling, medical care, and even must give consent before the child is given any information at all about transgender issues, concerns, care, or programs, regardless if they are custodial or not.

Really? Outing transgender kids?

I fervently hope that the Ohio General Assembly has enough intelligence and integrity to NOT pass this bill.

https://www.nbcnews.com/feature/nbc-out/ohio-bill-would-require-teachers-health-providers-out-transgender-students-n888751


Please contact your Ohio legislators through the website below, to speak against this bill.

https://www.legislature.ohio.gov/?1


There's a "find my legislators" search link on the right side.

Dead Forever

1982 

I'm the brunette, transgender wife.

Church Youth Group 

There came a time, in the summer, where the church I attended held a cookout for the youth. This church, which I attended throughout my childhood, because that was where my mom went, and because I didn’t know anything else, was very conservative. They would have said they were not super conservative, but looking back, I would have to disagree.

At this cookout, a young man came to speak. I estimated he was about 24. He was a college student at a Christian university, going for a graduate degree in the seminary there. Part of the time he spent talking with us was in giving a talk about gay people. This young man, whose name I do not recall, was very firm in his convictions. What he taught us as impressionable teens was that gay people were simply people who were controlled by the devil, and their only purpose in life was to lead other people astray. They wanted nothing more than to make us forget that God hates gay people.

Be Careful

So, we had to be careful. Very, very careful. He told us that the Bible says that men who touch men sexually, or women who touch women sexually, would burn forever in horrible torture, unlike anything we could imagine.

Are you kidding me? I have a great imagination, and I could imagine some rather horrible torture at that moment! Boys like girls and girls like boys, and that’s okay, but we must always be vigilant, or the devil would get us, because he was right behind us, just waiting to pounce, and trick us into liking each other's bodies, and we would be dead forever. Dead forever. Forever. Dead.

Without hope. Dead.

I was almost 14 years old, it was late at night, around a campfire. This person was in seminary, and was billed to us as a person wise in scripture. I was a young person who was always wondering why I felt so different. Can you conceive how that talk hit me?

It's Anticlimactic - Advice From Our Kids

One of our kids mentioned the other day that one thing that surprised them in all this was how anticlimactic it all has been. When I came out to our kids, they had very emotional reactions. Our younger daughter said later that she had thought, based on things she read online, that our world was going to dramatically change as a result of me coming out. She was surprised that this didn't happen.

You're the Same Person

"You're the same person you've always been. I thought there'd be a huge change, and it all has been pretty anticlimactic", she said. Our kids were expecting massive change, and that just didn't happen. I have the same sense of humor, like the same foods, sit in the same spot in the living room, work the same job, etc. I'm still me. This has been no massive deal at all.

If your loved one recently came out to you, relax. Not nearly as much will be changing as you think will be. For the most part, they'll be the same person they were before. Explore this with them, participate in their changes with them, and you'll be surprised at how normal this all is.

The Reality of Our Trans Marriage

OMG! I'm Trans!

I'm a Transgender woman. That rolls much more easily off the tongue than it used to, for me. I'm a girl, who spent 48 years living as a guy. I have spent my life becoming who I am, and I'll lay some of that history out for you. Some things have changed, some things didn't. Some things changed a lot! How did all this affect my relationships? How did it affect my job? How did it affect my self-esteem and self-image? How did it affect my social interactions?

I wasn't always happy. I used to think that God must hate me. I used to think there was something really, really wrong with me. But no longer.

Stay tuned. I dare you.

Sometimes, life sucks. Sometimes, it's amazing. I've laughed, I've cried. I've sobbed in anguish, and I've learned to be comfortable with who I am.

Why "High Heels and Ankle Boots"? Please, what girl doesn't like shoes?!?

I Have a Wife!

She's the redheaded, cis-gender, sarcastic wife. I'm the brunette, transgender, sarcastic wife.

I'm married to one of the most awesome and talented women who has ever walked the Earth. She has been wildly supportive and loving, even when she was upset, and if you're a spouse who just found out that your husband or wife is trans, this woman can really help you become more grounded in this reality. Please, read what she has to say! By the way, she's really cute. I'm blessed to be her wife.

Our relationship rocks! "But wait!: you say. "You're trans, and marriages involving trans people fail!" They don't have to fail, and transgender relationships can be breathtaking if you want them to be. 

We have kids!

We have two daughters who are amazing, talented, loving, smart young women.  They have been wonderful through this, and we hope their honesty and openness will help others who are in their position. 

We have a sweetheart of a golden retriever, and frankly, she has been absolutely fine through all this. A lot of people could learn from her. She's not our kid, but she for sure is our baby!

We are Christians!

No, I'm not kidding. We really are Christians. Our faith is a big part of who we are as people. We're not the sort to decide that your gender, gender identity, or sexuality somehow makes you a bad person. It doesn't.

I've been faced with bigoted comments from my own church and was told it was best if I went somewhere else.

What you'll find here:

- My personal experiences and history
- Advice and information from my Wife
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