Need advice and if anyoen has gone threw this

[RayRae]

First let me say hello i am new to this forum.
Where to start....

I came out to my wife over a year ago i had a break down or at least best way to describe it.
And told her that my entire life i have felt forced to be what i was..not by her but to be a man in general.
And i actually thought i was gay till i was around 21 or so.Not because i dated men..but because i felt like a woman and thought like one everything i did was considered homosexual to everyone around me.
I never heard of being transgender  or anything to give it any thought.

Well to make a long story short.
I was married for 10 year's before i came out to my wife about my life before i met her.
The men and why i think i was with them before i tried  to date women.
Btw i am only attracted to women yes i have had men ask me since and i cant do it.


My wife say's she love's me that i don't doubt!! & that she just want's me to be happy.
But i know my wife better than she knows herself ..and little stuff makes me think now she is having major doubts but she wont ever come out and say .
And being happy is  a two way street if she isn't happy there is no way i can ever be.

She constantly says "you don't have to have sex with me if you don't want to" ..after the deeds been done in bed.
I ask why every time do you keep thinking i don't want to?
Always the same thing in reply..well you have been with men and you thought you was gay..now your on hormones to become a woman.it leads me to think your really like men and are ashamed to be with men as a man...
I try to explain being honest as a child i felt like a girl inside and so i had no idea that a person could be trapped in the wrong body.So i just assumed i must be  homosexual.

One week we are fine she helps me with my hair nails and outfit's.
The next she screams and cry's even start's a argument with me then say's hurtful stuff like i married a man not a woman..i get floored and break down and feel stupid for trying to transition and  I know i cant live without her i love her that much.So i cut my nails off start wearing guy cloths again like a beat down pup.

Then she gets mad at me again for doing  the guy thing..say's if i stop transitioning it isn't gonna be her fault....

She then dolls me back up make's me feel good for a week or so i come back out of my shell..and poooof...i ask her being honest cause no matter what i do in life i managed for 36 years to be a man i will be ok with what ever as long as i have her...yes i love her that much.

But i ask her do you prefer me better a man or a woman?
She says as a man. BUT she said i am hateful and depressed acting in man mode as i call it.
And in girl mode i am gentle and kind and almost over loving...and she love's that ..
But it's makes me think if i continue to be the woman i think i was meant to be..she will eventually leave me cause she prefers men..i understand that and can not blame her if she did.

But has anyone ever dealt with this  what ive said ?

I would rather live my life as a man than to ever loose her she is my soul mate..
Can you see my predicament?

We are in counseling but apparently she never speaks of this to him..So i don't know what to think.

[suzifrommd]

Welcome to Susan's.

You could be describing my married life with a few minor changes.

For one, my wife has declared she no longer is attracted to me.

However, she says she wants to stay with me and be supportive. She's done a lot of supportive things, like shopping with me, giving me clothes, etc.

But it's clear she's unhappy watching me turn into a woman before her eyes. The phrase "dragged behind a horse" has entered our marital lexicon because she feels she has no control over the changes she sees in me. OTOH she doesn't want me to slow down my transition because she understands how unhappy I am living as a male.

Bottom line: It's a hard pill to swallow. She's going to need to get used to it on her own time. Will we stay together in the end? I'll let you know when I get my crystal ball back from the cleaners.

One thing I'll have to comment on from your post:

I would rather live my life as a man than to ever loose her she is my soul mate..

Can you really do that? Because I couldn't stand that. It would be no kind of life.

Good luck Rae. I hope this helps.

[Rita]

After being with someone for so long, if I were with someone for that long.  As long as she was a good person I could sympathize with the staying as a man comment.

Longest I have been with someone is 4 years~

[Hopefull]

Whatever you deside to do, there are people who support you. There is not much I can say that could help you without sounding bias.
Lol, im no help. 

[blue.ocean.girl]

Your situation sounds just like my situation was not even three months ago.

Even the remaining as a man thing... My wife was the same with moods-some days seeming ok and even enthusiastic about helping me, other days getting very angry and/or depressed over the situation-in fact she still has her moments sometimes.

We weren't married as long--5 years, almost 6--but we've always had a real strong relationship. And we are great friends now.

Of course every situation is different. At first my wife said she was ok with everything and that she loved me, supported me, and wanted to help me, but we also stopped having sex with me almost immediately after I began hormones. She just said she couldn't, she wasn't interested in girls. It hurt me, but I also understood.

But at first she was so distraught on the inside that she began dating other people without telling me. That really hurt when I found out later, because I always thought we had this amazing trust with one another. Again, I understand, she lost it for a bit. Then, a little later, she would talk to me about coming back to her as a man. And I actually considered it, because I just didn't want to destroy our family... thats not why I started this. But then she would say the same things: I was obviously so much happier as a woman, not the depressed passive aggressive wreck I had been trying to live as man. In the end, she really doesn't want to go back to that, and I don't want to either.

But for me, while all these other things were happening in our relationship, I had actually begun to notice men. I think, for me, I just had never allowed myself to do that before maybe--I had never really been very attracted specifically to women before either, I originally fell in love with my wife just because she was a beautiful person both inside and out--but nevertheless I am very attracted to men now.

So in the end, my wife and I decided we are really just friends--and of course even this realization came in tears, because you always have those memories and its like the closing of an era. We are still married for now, but we plan on separating sometime in the future. We have kids, so we are more concerned about them at the moment.

So I do see  your predicament. I was there. The answer to it is just something time has to sort out I think. I don't know if my experience has helped at all, but I thought I'd share. I hope it all works out.

Laura

[Elspeth]

She then dolls me back up make's me feel good for a week or so i come back out of my shell..and poooof...i ask her being honest cause no matter what i do in life i managed for 36 years to be a man i will be ok with what ever as long as i have her...yes i love her that much.

...

I would rather live my life as a man than to ever loose her she is my soul mate..
Can you see my predicament?

I can definitely empathize. Small differences, but this was the story of my marriage, particularly after I made myself and my identity clearer to her.

What I can't answer for you is what the future holds. On the the plus side, to echo a pattern common to lesbians, we remain on the best of terms. We're still working together to serve our children's best interests.

But at some point she did conclude that she wanted to be married to a man, not someone who was faking it. She has yet to find such a man, ten years down the line, and part of me hopes that at some point she will come out to herself as lesbian. But I'm not sure I'll be able to afford or survive transition at this age, and I'm not sure if she does come out that she'd want me, when there are other, more attractive women she could probably romance instead. My only hope is that she might realize some day that for me, we were always two women together.

To whatever degree you can manage it, avoid the denial and the bargaining stages... they won't do you much good and they may lead to further confusion. Be as open and as honest with her about how you feel and how you have always felt. Breaking from that openness can poison the relationship faster than anything else. And learn to accept that you're not in control here, and that bargaining with chips you don't necessarily have to offer, may delay things, but it may also just make things worse, for both of you.

Apologize where necessary, but don't make promises you know deep down you aren't likely to be able to keep. No one wants to see herself as the thing that is keeping you a prisoner of something that's eating you to pieces.

We were together as a couple for 18 years, married for 16. We've now been divorced for nearly 10.

[Tanya]

I would say give her time.  You have dealt with your desire to transition one way or another for a very long time.  Your wife has not had that much time to adjust.  Its a lot to take in.  Imagine if the roles were reversed and she came out to you that she wanted to transition to being a man.  How long would it take you to wrap your mind around that?
Love her as you have and there is a good chance she will come around.
Good luck!
Tanya

[Elspeth]

I would say give her time.  You have dealt with your desire to transition one way or another for a very long time.  Your wife has not had that much time to adjust.  Its a lot to take in.  Imagine if the roles were reversed and she came out to you that she wanted to transition to being a man.  How long would it take you to wrap your mind around that?

As someone who came out to a cisgendered spouse, and whose son has been out as a transman to both myself and his mother for over a year, I have to say this is not really a good analogy. 

I had some concerns when my son came out explicitly, but I'd been noticing the hints for much longer than that. I can go back and see them, and our conversations even before he came out often gave me insights that my ex has tended to miss, or reinterpret. 

My ex is having many of the same kinds of issues with acceptance and understanding with my son that she had with me (though not quite as badly handled on the second time around). 

If a spouse is truly cisgendered, they are not entirely likely to fully understand or empathize, and it's important for someone who is trans to keep that in mind, since (at least for me) I assumed that, being the essentially decent person I fell in love with, and someone who was actually largely accepting of many of my oddities and differences before they had the trans label attached to them, I had unreal expectations of how things would go between us. (I really hoped, for instance, that she would find it possible to continue to be attracted to me when I was no longer hiding and suppressing those aspects of myself that had always been essential in my mind, but hidden from view after years of learning that they would be a trigger to mistreatment, ridicule and other forms of abuse.)

I don't mean this to be a downer, but at some level, some people will never fully understand what being trans is like, even though they may try very hard, and want to be coming to this with their sense of love and attachment at the forefront. Above all, if you want to preserve the relationship, it will be important to find ways of talking about this that give her some greater understanding, without pushing too hard on any of the buttons she may have, for instance, in trying to blame herself or take responsibility for what you are and what you are going through.

Everyone is different, so you'll need to use all your own sense of empathy and understanding to watch for signs and be alert to when you might be saying things that could trigger reactions in her. Not saying to avoid them, as they are probably inevitable. Just saying to express some sympathy and understanding and patience for what she's going through, and be open to hearing her, even in some cases where it might also trigger things for you. Learning how to admit that your emotions are being triggered, without  blaming her for that, is a really tough skill to learn, and never really perfect, at least it wasn't for me, and I made a lot of mistakes there.

[Michelle G]

Rae,

   Your story is very similar to mine also! One day she is sharing her clothes with me and excited to go to the mall to shop for cute things, a few days later she cuts me down for any number of reasons.
  I understand it must be tough for her to take all this in after being together for twelve years, and now she feels awful that I kept it hidden since I was quite young.
It's a wild roller coaster ride and I'm surprised she is handling as well as she does

Your story is not unheard of at all.....comfort in numbers for sure!    That's why we are here for each other

[Shantel]

"There is nothing new under the sun!" Yes I can identify with this completely although I've never been with a man and am not particularly inclined, though I have entertained the thought since being on hormones for so long. I've been on HRT for 16 - 18 years or so now, I've lost track and have managed to keep a 43 year marriage intact in spite of all the ups, downs and drama. It's not a good place for everyone, sometimes it is very good and other times a personnel hell. I accepted it because it was of my own making and I put my wife and family above myself. This isn't meant to sound self-righteous either, if I was a lot younger and had my whole life still ahead of me and she didn't rely on me for her own existence, I would have cut her loose and we both would have pursued a different course for our lives. So age and love transcends this whole business, but if you're thirty maybe even forty and younger, do both of yourselves a favor and cut her loose!

[JoanneB]

My marriage is similar to yours in many ways. Perhaps the biggest difference is that my wife knew from day 1 about my "Hobby". By that point in my life after 2 failed experiments at transitioning I declared myself as a CD+. I went whole hog at being a responsible guy, doing everything I knew a man/husband needed to. It worked out fairly well for about 30 years untill the excrement hit the air handler

There have been the similar up's and down's with my wife. Let's face it, we spent a lifetime trying to understand ourselves and come to terms with being what we are. Our poor wifes have a ton to absorb in relatively no time at all. In many ways I believe they have it much harder than we do. I know more than once hearing "I married a man because I like guys. If I wanted to have sex with a woman I had plenty of opportunities for that".In all fairness, she is right. I did kick over the table.

I don't know how long it has been since you came out to your wife. It is now over 2 years since I knew for sure after attending a couple of TG meetings that I needed to be there and that it was time to tell her of this vast escalation. Only lately the peaks and valleys are being  flattened. It is still a wild ride since I am the one now kicking myself in the ass for daring to dream. A dream that has already cost me a lot and likely will cost me the one thing that means the most to my life. Her adament response has always been my happiness means the most to her.

I think your wife needs more time to get used to the news. The fact that she does not talk about your transitioning to the counseler sas to me she has a tremendous guilt and shame. Probably a lot more than your own. Those things can certainly cause her to run hot and cold. They sure do make me crazy. Up one hour, down the next.

I see no good solution for myself. Miserable if I don't, likely more miserable if I do. Time will tell. I can only recommend to be patient, don't rush things especially if she seems perhaps a tad too encouraging and be understang of her feelings and gropping in the dark trying to sort all this out.

[Henna]

Could have been written by myself. I'm almost exactly the same age as you, I've been 10 years with my GF and rest of your post sounded very familiar too.

Unfortunately I have no advice to give, as my GF behaves the same as your wife.

However I can really understand and sympathize your comment about living as a man than to loose your soul mate. I have been thinking that a lot and I do feel extremely bad about myself, that I'm hurting everyone around me and above all, the only person in my life who has accepted me as I was for 10 years.

I wish you good luck and hugs!