Hello all,
I'm Samantha. I've been a long time coming to this site and have come to be very thankful for its existence and the community that comes with it. I have always just been lurking as a guest, reading all the wonderful conversations. It has certainly made me feel less alone. I feel a little bit of guilt for so long not taking part with all of you, but, alas, I'm a shy one when it comes down to it.
As to myself, I admitted to myself that I was a transsexual when I was around 18 and sadly spent the next two decades trying to dance around the situation. I never went to the hyper-masculine place some people talk of, but instead allowed myself refuge in a sort of hippie-geek-guy place. It's a place you seem to be able to avoid some of the discomfort both others and yourself can feel being a little out of place. My friends have always known about me, so that part hasn't been so bad. However, these days I am starting to feel that they mostly see it as something slightly askew from what is really is.
A couple of years ago I cam to a place in my life I have read others referring to ... a point of no return where hiding from the reality of myself simply wasn't an option. It was an amazingly dark place I had found myself in suddenly, though the truth I could not see was that I had been building that situation through inaction for years. I am not sure I have recovered from that fairly complete collapse of what life I had yet, in fact I am fairly certain I haven't. However when I search myself, I know that my spirit is not completely broken and I am thankful for that.
The place I have come to reside in now is certainly not where I would like to be. I have been unemployed for more than two years, not due to discrimination, but, to my discredit, due to my fear of such and a complete lack of knowing how to be the woman I know I am out amongst the world. I am so very lucky to have the friends I have. Two of them, who were friends of mine before they were married, have taken me in and cared for me, something my dignity continually has a hard time with. I clean and take care of things around the house, and for their part, they truly seem to be happy with the arrangement.
These days I just feel lost. I know the only way for me to get anywhere is to move forward with things, but allowing myself to be crippled by fear is keeping me without means to do anything about it. It feels like watching myself bleed out and doing nothing to staunch the wound. I have a lot of days that are fairly heavily dysphoric, some that are not so bad, and a few here and there where I truly feel like myself.
I hope this was not too long for people to digest and I truly hope that it doesn't just read as a bunch doom and gloom. It was not meant as such. More it was meant as an honest description of things to both all of you and myself. It has helped me just putting many of these thoughts down.
Well, that's my intro for what it is. I look forward to joining in the conversations and meeting all of you.
Samantha
