Cinema

I'm going to try to be positive!

I went to the cinema yesterday. Probably the 4th trip since transitioning and the first time that didn't feel remotely nervous about being there! I felt about as confident there as I ever did as Steve. Maybe more so.

What makes the big difference now is having a viable female voice. Its hard to deal with a cinema trip if you haven't got a suitable voice. Or anything really.

I arrived in Greenwich after work, wearing quite light clothing...  a maxi skirt and a tee shirt top with a cardy! So it was a little cold for me! I bought chips, I ate them by the Cutty Sark, and then I went into see my film. All with great confidence!!

The film was called "Before I Go To Sleep", a psychological thriller starring Nicole Kidman. I decided Monday that I wanted to see a film and had looked to see what was on. I picked this out from the list of about 3 possibles because the psychological nature of the plot appealed to me and I thought it would be more interesting than the usual space ships/ explosions/ running about type films that gets put on these days.

In the auditorium I was annoyed tremendously by the other members of the audience who had decided to sit there rustling giant bags of food. All the way through the film, as it happened!! I tried to ignore it. I tried really hard to ignore it!!!  I had to move seats once as the noise was drowning out the film!!

The film was mostly as I had hoped. An old fashioned Hitchcockianish thriller set in the now, but with a curiously dated feel, and with a plot that unfolded slowly, and was never completely predictable. The acting was a bit average at times and the ending was soooo dragged out to be untrue, but apart from those little niggle points it was interesting enough to keep me watching.

Time seemed to fly by. I was literally on the edge of my seat during some violent scenes. Oh and the violence was the sort of violence you'd have seen in a film 40 or 50 years ago, not gore and not nasty! It pushed my newly installed emotional buttons too and its a film where you can shamelessly root for the woman to win!!

After I got home I got through half a bottle of white wine and went to bed around 1am after DMing my fabulous Canadian friend on Twitter.

Today I am flipping well knackered!!

In the office today with new eye shadow



Couldn't resist a selfie with the fantastic lighting in the ladies' loo

Today I saw the doctor about taking something for my anxiety and he agreed. I'm on a month trial now to see how I get on!

I came to work in a very short black skirt today and you know what? I can carry it off!!! But the meds made me nauseous and now I'm incredibly drowsy. Lucky I'm, still only on 5 hours a day.

Today was quite postive as it happens. Not only did I feel I was back on top as far as my confidence goes and my ability to pass as female, but I interacted more with my colleagues at work today than i have done for months! One of the girls is leaving tomorrow and is holding a farewell breakfast before work tomorrow. I thought I'd been overlooked but I got my invite today. she'd been ill and hadn;t got around to inviting me apparently. Whatever the truth there, I'm grateful to be back in the fold!

Bar Wotever

Yesterday I decided to go back to Bar Wotever. I haven't been for a year and I wanted to know how I felt about the place now I'd transitioned and that there would be no fraught and furtive changing in the shower room, or sneaking out without anyone seeing me!

It also helped me realise how far I'd come in a year. I joked that I might get hit on by a lesbian but as most of the girls frequenting Bar Wotever are young enough to be my daughter that was never likely, even if I did get read as female.

 I think before I used to be mostly identified as male or "tranny" at Wotever, of which there are a few regulars and are treated accordingly. I even got called 'mate' at the bar a few times by staff who really ought to know better. Last year I was smiled at by some of the female patrons and other trans women used to acknowledge me! But this time it seemed I was treated completely as female! A trans woman I used to drink with was standing right next to me at the bar and she never even recognised me! And I never gave myself away either.... I like my own company too much!

There is always a compromise to be made. The one I was making last year was that LGB venues were safe and tolerant, but on the other hand LGB people don't really understand us. And I knew that while I didn't pass I would always be taken as part time, "tranny", cross-dresser rather than a transgendered M to F woman, but that I would always be tolerated regardless, however i dressed and however I identified! From my experience I do think a lot of gay people really do see trans as a life style choice or even a sexual fetish! It's neither! Of course!

But at a venue like this I was mixing with drag queens, fetishists, part time women and trans people like myself. The differences became increasingly clear to me through this period. The part timers were always over dressed and looked out of place and rarely passed. Drag queens even less so but were usually more appropriately dressed for an LGBT bar.

Amongst the crowds in 2013 I identified trans men and women and scrutinised them from afar. To me then trans people appeared to be the most beautiful people of all and I could only dream and hope that I might be one of them. But as time went on I came to know I was one of these people and I just needed to learn a few things and get some experience. I now like to think I'm well on my way and that some novice CDer might see me as a role model at some point! When I turned up last night I felt like I'd achieved everything I'd set out to do and more!

It's disappointing in a way that I don't get the attention I got last year when I went out and about as a crossdressing man learning to be a woman, but the fact that I don't get that attention now is has to be a big mark of success!!

Actually I hate getting attention and I found all that nonsense midly embarrassing. Good to be a middle aged anonymous looking woman blending in with the crowd!

Bar Wotever at the Royal Vauxhall Tavern

seperated at birth?

My come back starts here

          

 On Friday I went to work in an overtly feminine mode cos I felt I needed to after Thursdays jeans and black top! Then on Saturday I had to race round getting jobs done in the morning so I was free to travel to Greenwich in the afternoon to meet a Tweep I've known on Twitter for a while. 

I'm always worried when I meet a Tweep, but so far I've not had a bad experience. I found quite a few friends, flatmates, and even a lover through meeting Tweeps in real life or talking on the phone!

The trick is not to meet peeps unless you feel you know them fairly well on Twitter. And don't move in with them unless you've been to at least a couple of gigs with them first!! 

Had a great couple of hours in Greenwich, and I don't think we stopped talking for a second! The old me would have been amazed! Its great now to be able to connect with a woman without it having to develop into a date, or any of that awkwardness! I can be friends and no more! A meal with a man, on the other hand...  not tried that yet! But of course, women are much more interesting than men!

 On Saturday I wore a knee length denim skirt and quite a feminine top with my fake leather jacket. Pulling back from the feminine look I had on Friday. And on Sunday, me and my housemates travelled to Epping to see the Epping Ongar railway. I wore a cord skirt, patterned tights and a black top! I felt frumpy. It was a bad choice. also my hair was shit!! 

Sunday turned out to be quite a stressful day overall, though I'm glad we did what we did. I was exhausted at the end of it. Despite everything I felt I passed completely as female while we were out. Got called love by blokes! That's always a good sign! 

Today I decided to stay plain and wore a knee length black jersey skirt and a blue and white stripey top with my current fave cardigan (see pic,top). 

I felt reasonably good today and confident. I have to keep reminding myself of where I've come from! In 2010 I travelled on a train, as a woman, for the first time ever, and I wore a wig and kept myself hidden as much as possible. In 2014 I travel everywhere as a woman, with my real hair and I NEVER hide!! Nor do I ever feel ashamed or embarrassed! 

It was only in August 2013, just over a year ago, that I first travelled across the country as a woman, from my home  in East London into Central London and via train to North Wales. Then back again a couple of days later. I didn't take any men's clothes with me and that was a big step!! It was the beginning of starting to go full time! 

Today I feel I do almost everything that Steve would have done! Though I'm more careful when I'm out late at night, I don't feel that its limiting me. On the contrary I'm more determined to go out at night now than I was as a man! 

I'm the same, but I'm different. I'm different to the extent that I am now fully myself, wheras before I kept parts of me hidden. And it showed!

Rock Bottom

I'd like to think I've bottomed out now. This morning I woke up exhausted and numb. I thought I was calm but I blew up in anger at something fairly minor. Luckily it passed. Anyway I was given a little chemical boost to my system by a friend who thought it would help. Legal, I might add and prescribed, but not prescribed to me. Anyway it worked wonders and I started feeling human again in no time. I felt calm like it was a cool summers day by the seaside!

This then enabled me to stop shaking and stop panicking and begin to get a few things done! I'd really cacked my hair up trying to get it to look reasonable for work. The straighteners did nothing and the hairspray made it look like I hadn't washed it in days!! So I went back to square one and washed my hair, took my make up off and this time asked my friend to help me to get it looking decent, which she did!

Despite my massive tantrum and what felt to me like a nervous breakdown I think I left the house with all three of us friends again! I got goodbyes from out of both upstairs windows as I walked off and I've never had that before! I can understand if people who know me are a bit worried about me! In fact I'd be disapointed if they weren't!!

So next week I'm going to ask my doctor for some sort of anti anxiety drug to ease me through the days. I think this might be the cause of everything I've bee going through!

After yesterdays collapse of self esteem I decided to go ultra femme and wear a long floral skirt I've had for a few weeks with a lacey top and my favourite cardy (security blanket).

I think I'm past the worst now... sometimes you just know! I'm meeting a Twitter supporter for coffee tomorrow and off to see some trains with my housemates on Sunday...  so it should be a nice weekend! 

Crisis

I'm a quivering wreck today. all I want to do is hide. But that's not possible when you have a job. I'm not even sure what it is that's causing this but nothing seems to be as it should today. When I look in a mirror I see the old me. My hair is just awful! My body looks blokey and voice is cracked and croaky. I had to leave home in jeans today I felt so unfeminine.

It could be that I'm seeing things as they are, and I really am turning back into a bloke, or it could be merely that I'm picking up on things that don't normally bother me. I say merely, but that's probably the single worse thing that could happen to me at this point. Since last summer I've carried myself along with the confidence born from knowing that I'm trans gendered and being happy with that and the attitude that world can like it or fuck off! Its not my problem its yours!!

When I knew I didn't really pass I never expected more. People would point at me and some would laugh. Others just fired abuse at me! But now I've entered the forbidden land. I've been read as female so many times now... several times a day... I've been accepted as female by many women and some men. Most days there's no question that I'm a woman and that's how I get treated! So much so that the shock of being read as male now really bothers me, probably more than it should. I'm like the bridge that no longer wobbles but falls over in the slightest wind!

I know I need to get over this. I think it may be my worst crisis since last October when I was verbally attacked on a train by a large group of lads. That time I didn't go out in an obviously feminine fashion for about a month, and I had to start again gradually. This morning I had that same horrible gut wrenching feeling. That of being ready and with somewhere to go but still not being able to step out the front door. Only this time there is no male me to retreat back into. I've burned all those bridges now!

Dark Times

I've had a long break from blogging now. A lot has happened. On a personal level I hit the 6 month mark for being on hormone replacement. I'm not in an ideal situation as I'm self medicating and my GP is refusing to take any responsibilty for this even though I declared I was suffering from severe gender issues well over a year ago and so far I've had bugger all support from anyone other than other trans ladies and a few friends!

About 4 or 5 weeks ago my GP told me that the Gender Clinic was desperately trying to contact me and asked if they could forward my current contact details. I said yes, of course, and they were faxed over. That was the last I heard about it! So naturally I'm concerned now that I've been taken off the list after waiting for a year now!

At work I am feeling increasingly isolated and sidelined and not able to do my job. This isn't entirely due to me transitioning. A lot of it is to do with having ASD and now being in a new office, with a new manager and with the transitioning on top I really am not coping and not able to do my job any more! This is extremely worrying for me! I asked for support but so far I've had none and every day I'm just sitting in an office full of people I can no longer connect with on any level! I have no idea what to do about this!

I had my nasal polyps removed at the end of July and I thought this would be a tremendous help for me! It is except that after the operation I received no further care and my allergies have kicked back in and I'm getting ill again. My polyps, almost inevitably will grow back if I am not treated. Seems like a waste of fucking money to me!!! And it took me a month to recover from the operations! And I'm still not well. I am working 5 hour days now instead of the normal 7 hours, but still barely able to make it through a working day and I feel like a quivering wreck every night!!

Since I've been off a month, all of my responsibilities at work have been taken off me. so I'm like a spare tyre now! And I'm not equipped to deal with this at all. My boss has been away ever since I've been back so no support! I saw a nurse but she couldn;t help. I saw a union guy but he don't know how to help me! I feel lost.

This is a classic situation transitioning people find themselves in. Successfully transitioning and yet losing all the support they had around them! Stella's future is seriously at risk now! She's here now but whether she'll still be here in a years time is very much dependent on things beyond her control now!

Bus stop selfie

 

I like this photo..  I mainly take selfies as a way of boosting my confidence. They usually look better than I expect which then allows me to hold my head up high when I'm out. 

Occasionally they don't turn out well, in which case I try again!

New dress for work

 

A sign of how far I've come is I no longer think twice about wearing whatever I want. If I fancy wearing a dress then I wear a dress. The only compromises I make with this is when its inappropriate for work, such as depot or trackside visits, or for family functions where me in a dress is still considered highly controversial.

Back in London

 

I got up around 7am and had breakfast in a busy hotel, dealt with rellies, ferried them around, visited my Grandmother in her new home for first time, loaded three heavy boxes into my car, and then drove all the way back to London in less than 4 hours. After all that I looked like this. I am pleased to see that my femininity still shines through! :-D

My sister got married

I nearly never came. I went out with Kath a while back to buy a lovely new dress for my sisters wedding. Mentioned this to my sister who wanted me to come, and then suddenly I've got my Dad on the phone, misgendering me and deadnaming me and telling me I can't wear a dress to the wedding, and that everyone would be embarrassed by me.

In the end I bought myself a pair of black trousers from Long Tall Sally (£50) and wore them with a really feminine lacey top and my animal; print jacket.

I was misgendered at the hotel which was fabulous. I told her not to call me sir and she sniggered. So I fied off a complaint to the management.

I had to stay in a hotel because my parents told me they didn;t have room for me. More likely they were too embarrassed to have me stay in their house with other relatives around. And on the evening before the Wedding I was far too scared to go out of the hotel even to go to the car, because of the gangs of young lads - pissed up and loud and obnoxious - I thought I'd be easy meat.

On the morning of the wedding I moved out of the hotel and loaded car, droe up to the Hoe to take in the view.

I live Tweeted the whole weekend even from the wedding.

Jacket

I got this jacket off ebay. It reminds me of the sort of thing my mum might have worn. That's not a bad thing, I always admired her taste in clothes.