Topic: Chapter 5: I am Emma

[Emma1017]

Dear All:

I started my thread March 14, 2018 but really became part of this community on August 24, 2018.  Like many I “ghosted” this site, afraid of who and what I was.
 
I have learned so much.  I have learned that it is ok to be transgender.  It is ok to be selfish.  I also learned that I truly can’t suppress any longer who I am from myself.

Regardless of how I physically manifest myself to the world, I am Emma and I love it.  I don’t even care if I am called “Emma” by the world and I don’t care if everyone knows.  I know.

When I first heard “true self” or “authentic self” I dismissed those phrases as pure psychological manipulations.  I learned that I was amazingly wrong an I am happy to admit it here.

So I am starting a new chapter and I hope it will be far more joyful than the last four chapters.   I hope that I can share the laughable experiences I will have embracing life on a new planet, after my flight from Mars to Venus.

Thank you to all again for your endless support and wonderful love.

I can summarize the four prior chapters as "Do I have gender dysphoria?", "Am I transgender?", "What am I transitioning to?" and “This is who I am.”

Here are the links:

Chapter 1:  Which Hurts Less? https://www.susans.org/forums/index.php/topic,240370.0.html

Chapter 2:  So I am Trans, Now What?  https://www.susans.org/forums/index.php/topic,248609.0.html

Chapter 3:  Great so I am Transitioning, Now What?  https://www.susans.org/forums/index.php/topic,252749.0.html

Chapter 4:  Becoming Emma  https://www.susans.org/forums/index.php/topic,253672.0.html

Hugs, 

Emma

[Northern Star Girl]

@Emma1017
Dear Emma:
I am thrilled to see that you have moved on to your Chapter 5 titled "I am Emma"

With eagerness I will be looking for your new comment replies as you start your Chapter 5.

I am always wishing you success and wishing you well.
HUGS and my best wishes to you as you continue in your journey.
Danielle

[Confused1]

Hi Emma,

I have remained in the shadows for awhile, but I have continued to read your thread. I am happy to see the name of this one. You ARE Emma. I have felt this since I first read your threads and realized who I am as well. I hope for nothing but happiness for you in the days ahead.

Hugs,
Mike

[Emma1017]

Danielle thank you for sorting me out.  Lord knows I need a lot of that...

Mike thank you for your thoughts.  I wrote this for myself this morning and it seems right to share it here:

When I was younger, I ran and swam competitively.  In both sports I was positioned on a starting block, waiting for the sound of the starters pistol.  In both cases, I could feel my entire body coiled and tensed, poised and waiting for the bang of the gun.  This immense tension inside of me waiting to explode out of the blocks.

I always loved the sense of release, that explosion of my suppressed energy as I just let it all go.  It was always exciting.  It was liberating.

I never thought I would have that sensation again.

After 61 years of suppression, denial and the incredible pain of gender dysphoria, I finally accepted that I was transgender.  It took almost three years of therapy and two years of hormones to get there. Over the last few months as my acceptance took hold, a slow glow of inner happiness took hold.  In the beginning it was so faint, so weak that I overlooked it but over time I felt it grow.

I suddenly feel like I am standing in the starters block again. I feel this building energy that needs to be released, just waiting for the sound of the gun.  It is just so exciting and I never thought that at this stage of my life that I would ever feel that excitement ever again.

For the last three years I have been dissecting and challenging myself in so many deep and painful ways. To know that this brutal experience has given me the opportunity to feel this incredible energy of joyous happiness is almost as hard to describe.  It is as if the dark pain of gender dysphoria was a counterpoint to this sense of joy and emotional release.
 
It comes with finally discovering me, all of me. 

It is just waiting for the starters pistol to sound.


Hugs,

Emma

[AngelaJade]

Dear Emma..

Welcome to what some people refer as ‘gender euphoria’. 
That’s the feeling, the feeling when you arrive at a place of ‘self’.  It’s not a destination (although it may be for some), but it takes a lot of things to combine together to feel it.. and it’s an achievement in itself.

those who know, and have felt it, will join me in sending you warmth and hugs.. remember this moment, for there will be more and there will also be times when you need to remember to help you through difficult moments on the path ahead.. it works..

Xx Ang

[Dorit]

I am so happy to see this, Emma!    I have these special moments throughout the week of awareness in joy and gratefulness that I transitioned.   No more closet, no more shame, I am Dorit!

[Emma1017]

Ang and Dorit thank you for your warm thoughts.  I do feel a great sense of internal joy inside.  It has taken so much pain to finally get here.

My transition is an on-going process but at least I am no longer crawling through an field of emotional broken glass.

Every time that I see or feel Emma, every step I take recognizing I am Emma, is simply an immense personal joy.

Just so no one thinks that this euphoria has become delusional, I have plenty to keep me grounded, namely, the pandemic, my relationship with my wife, my job, sciatica that won't leave but at least the US election is over!


Hugs,

Emma

[Alice]

Emma,

I am glad you feel that joy. It is an important part of the journey. I look forward to reading the more positive posts in this thread.

Alice

[Emma1017]

Thank you Alice. I use this thread without filters so the emotions I exposed were fear, anger, sadness and pain.  The least I can do is share the joy, happiness and humor as well.

In that vane, I went for my first manicure and pedicure. OMG why did I wait soooo long. I am never touching my nails again!  I even had her put on a top coat polish...wow I am becoming high maintenance   

Hugs,

Emma

[Pammie]

Thank you Alice. I use this thread without filters so the emotions I exposed were fear, anger, sadness and pain.  The least I can do is share the joy, happiness and humor as well.

In that vane, I went for my first manicure and pedicure. OMG why did I wait soooo long. I am never touching my nails again!  I even had her put on a top coat polish...wow I am becoming high maintenance   

Hugs,

Emma

Wonderful! You go girl! Xxx


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[Emma1017]

Awww thanks Pammie.

[EllenW]

In that vane, I went for my first manicure and pedicure. OMG why did I wait soooo long. I am never touching my nails again!  I even had her put on a top coat polish...

Emma
I am so happy you enjoyed your first mani/pedi.  My wife and I enjoy them on a regular basis. Hopefully someday you and your wife will also.

Ellen

[Emma1017]

Ellen that is my hope as well.  I hope we can laugh together at my amateur attempts at female style .

I wrote the following for Medium in my never-ending attempts at explaining all this to others. There are so many friends and family that I hope will understand and accept. I am trying to think of as many ways as possible to explain. After that they are militantly ignorant and on their own.

In my heart at least I tried.

                                                          Close Your Eyes

Trust me for a moment.  I promise no harm will come to you in this brief experiment.

I want you to close your eyes and simply ask yourself the following question:
               
                           “What gender am I?” and then say it out loud.

The one rule is that you are not allowed to touch any part of your body for reassurance, you just need to feel your gender. 

What was your answer?
                               
How long did it take you to say it?  Was there any pause or confusion?  If there was none, without any visual confirmation, where does that confidence come from?

Did you just know?  How?

Did you just know that without touching your body or looking in a mirror?  Those around you, your family, friends, and society at large, do they all accept that what you see and what you feel are the same? 

If your sense of gender and your physical body match, then you are cisgender.

Now let’s try a new experiment.  You can close your eyes if you want.

Imagine waking up tomorrow morning and seeing your opposite gender staring back at you from the mirror.  Suddenly what you feel inside does not match the image you see in the mirror.  You then look down at your genitals and they are the wrong ones.  Look in your closet.  What clothes will you wear?   

You’re not in the right body.  You just know it is wrong, despite the physical evidence.  You are not you.
Now try and explain that to your family, friends and society.

I am transgender.  My sense of gender, the one wired into my brain before I was born, does not match the genitalia that I was born with.  For my entire life I could not explain this incongruence to myself, much less find a way to share it with family and friends.  Forget about society.  It would like explaining a round earth to a medieval pope.  It is just not in their belief system.

But you are more sophisticated than a medieval pope.  You know the earth is round without flying around it to prove it.  It is in your belief system.  What I would like you to do is challenge your current gender belief system.  Accept that I and hundreds of thousands of others like me exist in this gender middle ground between gender and sex, between what is between your ears and what is between your legs.  Appreciate the incredible emotional pain that this incongruence produces for people who simply want to live their lives, trying make it all work and simply express who they are. 

Challenge your belief system.  Educate yourself.  Try to understand that transgender is no more an aberration than being left-handed or red headed.  It is another way some one is built. 

Do you really want everyone to look like you?

 

[Emma1017]

I have been away from this forum because I have a vicious case of sciatica that has made sitting and pretty much everything else amazingly painful.  I have never experienced anything like it in my life.  It is like it is the physical sympathy pain to balance out the emotional pain of gender dysphoria.  It has been a miserable three weeks.

Thankfully I am working from home so I am spared commuting to work every day.

My on-deck list is to finally start electrolysis again, let my hair grow and talk to the GCS surgeon in January.  The FFS surgeon is in San Francisco so the pandemic pretty much controls the timing on that.

My wife and I are lovingly still together.  With my crippling bout of sciatica and her amazing help and support plus the brutal stress of the election and the pandemic, I don't want to beat her with the transgender "baseball bat".  I am letting it be for now.  We both know it is there.

I hope you all are well and safe.

Hugs,

Emma

[Pammie]

I have been away from this forum because I have a vicious case of sciatica that has made sitting and pretty much everything else amazingly painful.  I have never experienced anything like it in my life.  It is like it is the physical sympathy pain to balance out the emotional pain of gender dysphoria.  It has been a miserable three weeks.

Thankfully I am working from home so I am spared commuting to work every day.

My on-deck list is to finally start electrolysis again, let my hair grow and talk to the GCS surgeon in January.  The FFS surgeon is in San Francisco so the pandemic pretty much controls the timing on that.

My wife and I are lovingly still together.  With my crippling bout of sciatica and her amazing help and support plus the brutal stress of the election and the pandemic, I don't want to beat her with the transgender "baseball bat".  I am letting it be for now.  We both know it is there.

I hope you all are well and safe.

Hugs,

Emma

So sorry to hear about the sciatica - that sounds awful!
That’s quite an on-deck list, how much is your wife aware of your plans? I can certainly understand why you have put the transgender subject on the back burner but im sure ur aware how easy it would be to keep finding reasons so to do!

Sending gentle hugs xxx


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[Emma1017]

Pammie every day I keep asking myself if I am delaying out of fear or the reality of my current circumstances.

It is just waiting for the starters pistol to sound.

So Pammie it is no longer if, it is simply when.


Hugs,

Emma

[Pammie]

Pammie every day I keep asking myself if I am delaying out of fear or the reality of my current circumstances.

It is just waiting for the starters pistol to sound.

So Pammie it is no longer if, it is simply when.


Hugs,

Emma

That’s a long way forward so well done you! It makes sense to choose your moment given just how critical it is xxx


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[Emma1017]

Pammie the “moment” is when the starters pistol fires.  I don’t want to jump the gun.  I want to do all I can to do it right. I won’t get a second chance but at least it won’t be for want of trying.

[Emma1017]

I have been thinking about “the moment” and I realized I am very afraid. Fear has never been a issue for before. Of course I have had it but I have always been able to deal with it.

This is different. 

There so many variables and s in o many potential disasters.  I feel this immense vulnerability, another sensation that I never had. 

And of course there is this bleak sense of loneliness with the decision. 

I know I am capable of happiness and sharing happiness. That and hope keep me going. 

It’s a lot to carry.   I haven’t folded yet.

[Pammie]

I have been thinking about “the moment” and I realized I am very afraid. Fear has never been a issue for before. Of course I have had it but I have always been able to deal with it.

This is different. 

There so many variables and s in o many potential disasters.  I feel this immense vulnerability, another sensation that I never had. 

And of course there is this bleak sense of loneliness with the decision. 

I know I am capable of happiness and sharing happiness. That and hope keep me going. 

It’s a lot to carry.   I haven’t folded yet.

It’s very understandable - I think I was very fortunate in that I was single with grown up children so the negatives were less in my face. Sadly, only you can make this decision but we have your back.  Xx


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