How can one sentence hurt so bad

[Megumi]

I want to start off first with I know it's something that wasn't done on purpose since they don't know about the real me yet.

Today I had to go get gas at a specific station after work to get pure 100% gas. I use the gas that doesn't have ethanol in it which is in the town that my parents live in. So while I was driving there I call my parents up to see if they'd like me to pick up a pizza and bring it over to eat a early dinner together. Everything was fine, then we talked a little bit about our days and such, just normal chit chat and nothing serious as I'm not ready for the real serious discussion yet and then I left to go to my house. She usually doesn't feel too well since she suffers from a debilitating back injury that causes her a lot of pain & limits her ability to get around and requires a lot of meds to subdue the pain in the process. Later that night my Mom sent me a text about how happy she was that I called and offered to get dinner because she was feeling absolutely terrible since she had done some strenuous physical labor around the house which irritated her back again and didn't think she would have been able to cook dinner that night. My dad has never ever been able to cook, he can barely heat up a tv dinner in the microwave and that's the extent of his culinary ability so she really would have had no choice but to tough it out in agony to whip something up quickly since for some crazy reason he gets bent out of shape when he has to do anything in the kitchen when the woman he has been married to for almost 35 years can't physically do anything at the moment. It was the next sentence in her text that made me feel awful and it wasn't done that way on her part one bit. "You're a great son to always think of doing things like that!" Which that's the way I've always been with my parents, I do nice things for them and never ask for anything in return. But reading that made me feel awful since I know what I will be doing to their world soon and it just makes me feel terrible knowing that I'm metaphorically going to kill off their son in the process to be the real me. I know I shouldn't get hung up on a simple compliment like that especially given the fact that they simply just don't know how I really feel yet. Every time they praise me on how much of a man I've become it just hurts me to my very core because I know I'll never live up to their image of me and how I have to get over that part of my thinking as it's my life that I have to live. I'm pretty sure that they will be supportive of me in the end no matter what I do, maybe not at first but over time they will as they'll see I'm still going to be the same great caring person that I've always been but I'll just look and sound different than before. Thanks for reading, I just wanted to vent a little bit.

[Xhianil]

You won't be killing off their son, they never had a son to start with, they had a daughter in a male body. They only praise you for being a "Man" because thats the most common thing to do, if they knew you were a girl they'd compliment how feminine you are.

[Marina mtf]

Given your family situation it is natural that your mother projects on you her desires to have a MAN in her life, given that your dad, from what you have said, has not helped her a lot.

Many moms projects their unfulfilled marital needs on their sons and this is a serious situation to handle, even for "normal" sons (which are not TG). For you it is more serious because not only it is not healthy for a mom to project to her son (but she must do all in her possibility to make him a real man, independent), but in this case because, involuntary, she gives to you a sense of guilt.

I think that the situation should be divided in two sub-problems.

First you have to become independent as a persona, male or female it does not matter. Then, you can come out, otherwise you could hurt her and, worse, give her the excuse to think that you are TS ONLY to escape from her, which is not true. _{by the way this is what you dad has done, escaping...}

[Janae]

I can relate to your situation. I'm my mothers only "boy" so this comes up a lot. We are very close and even though I'm her fav child and she's accepts me more than most people, I know in a small way she's sad her child is changing. Ever since I was younger she's told me how she wouldn't stop until she had a boy & a girl. Now we joke that she had two in one all along. Despite this she still uses my birth name & uses male pronouns. I'm not 24/7 yet so I try not to be hurt. Ever since confirming my trans-ness when she does it stings a little. I just put on her shoes and think how it must feel. The odd thing is we talk about boys, make up, hair, my new "boobs" which she's obsessed with lol etc like were two bff girlfriends. She'll even slip in female pronouns and things when were just talking about random stuff so she's trying.

I say this to say that mothers love their sons. It's never an easy thing to watch a child morph into another gender. And in your case with your moms condition I'm sure she appreciates having her son there to look out for her. She love you and wants the best for you as most mothers do. I'm sure once you realize this and come out to your parents, they'll just be happy to know your doing whats best to become whole. And even if they don't that doesn't have to change how you love and look out for them.

[Murbella]

Started typing and this is turning into more of a journal entry for my own thoughts... but hopefully still helpful

Again, you won't be killing off her son, but frequently people do go through very similar stages of grief as if you had died.  I tend to relate this all back to the idea of how the human mind perceives reality.  Our brains do not actually view reality as it physically exists outside our head, only a simulation of reality that exists exclusively in our own mind.  The mind constantly generates simulations of people, objects and situations and uses past experience to apply properties to those simulations in order to understand how they might react to our actions or the actions of others.  As you meet a new person and get to know them, you are constantly revising your model of that person so that you can better predict their reactions to situations and better interact with them on an interpersonal level.  One of the first things that humans do when generating this simulation is attribute a gender.  In general gender brings with it many other accurate expectations on how a person will react to situations and actions.  This becomes a core property of your understanding of that person.  The longer you've known a person as that gender, the more foundational that becomes in how you see that person. 

Now take your mother, in most cases, she is the person who has known you as your birth gender the longest.  Through changing diapers and baths she has deeply ingrained visual evidence to back that up.  By being transgender, you in effect have to help her to rebuild her simulation of you as a person from foundation up.  This is why people close to us go through such grief when coming out, but that isn't to say that you can't show her that you are the same person you always have been.

[vlmitchell]

From where I've been and what I know, it hurts because you know what they want. They want you to grow up and be a happy man with his wife and family and all that stuff. It hurts because you know that you can't ever live up to that expectation. It hurts because you know that's what *they* want but it's not what *you* want. You don't want to grow up and be a guy. You want to grow and mature into the woman you know you are.

That conflict hurts like hell. I've been there. I cannot tell you how many times my family told me what a good man I was becoming as I got older. It made me uncomfortable. It hurt. It felt like they were reveling in the thing that I wanted least in the world and it hurt because I knew it to be the lie that it was. I knew that I was a good person. I knew that I was considerate and kind. I knew that I wanted love and happiness but I also knew that I couldn't find that in the way that they wanted me to. It's the expectations of others pressing onto our own needs and desires that causes conflict and, right now, you're the only one aware of that conflict.

You will have to deal with a lot of things here. First, you're going to have to come to grips with who you are. You're you. You can't be what others want you to be. You can just be you. Period. Done. Nothing else to say here.

What Murbella said above is true. People have an image of you which is very different from the person you actually are. What you'll be doing when you come out is not, as some would say, destroying the person they know but really just showing them who you really are and how their view of you isn't accurate. Make sure that you treat it kindly though, don't get defensive, and really understand that, to them, you'll be killing off the person that they knew. Eventually they'll realize that is not the case but it'll take time. It will hurt. It will hurt them and it will hurt you. This is a growth spurt that everyone here has gone through who's gone down the road of transition. It's hard and it is not comfortable but, after a while, life will return to normal just, you won't be faking who you are anymore and the stress of doing so will be gone from your life.

That said, hon, I really do understand. My mom went through so much anguish when I came out to her. She blamed herself, god, me, my father. She cried for days and I had to brace myself for the fact that would happen before I opened my mouth to tell her the truth. There's no way to make it all go well at first if its not going to. Maybe you'll get lucky and your parents will be fine with it. Maybe not. Take it slow, know that you're doing this as the best thing for you and know that, ultimately, that's what your parents want.

Make peace with this in any way that you can though as it's coming if you're serious about this and putting it off once you've made up your mind is just going to do you more harm and isn't going to do your parents any good.

We'll be here to talk to when you need to deal with what happens. I'm hoping that there won't be much to deal with.

[Lexi Belle]

Yeah, this happens to me a lot lately, my mother refers to me as a boy or even when my family calls me "uncle" since my sister just had a baby, they're like stabs in the heart.  They know my situation, but I'm also not out as myself yet. (my 12 year old cousins who I share a room with doesn't know)

So I definitely know how this is.  They say 1 thing that's innocent, and your heart just sinks.  Unfortunately, I think the only way to solve that problem is by coming out.  You can hide the hurt all you want, but it's just gonna build up in the long run.

[Dedwards]

I suppose yes, in the long run in the closet it will hurt. And if they see you hurting they'll have not a clue why, even if the cause was standing right there.

I've only ever heard of people having like this after they'd come out.
-hugs-

[DrBobbi]

You're still you. Different sex, but you. No difference.

[Megumi]

Thanks everyone for the kind words. I know I'll get over this feeling eventually and it's something I'm slowly coming to terms with as it has to happen no matter what. There's no going back from this point on and with some luck and a lot of hopes I think they will be accepting of it. I say killing their son figuratively as I will look different on the outside but I will still be the same person who they've always known. It just feels that way to me as I have to kill the man off to be the real woman that I am.

I have to do this for me and me alone, whether they are supportive or not I'm going the distance because I want to be happy for once in my life. I just can't see myself continuing on the same path that I've been on for my entire life so far without just fading away into nothingness. I just have a lot of fear "probably just about 99% of it is completely irrational" that they won't be there to be happy with me. Family is one of the few things I have in this world that actually means something to me. What has me worried were things have been said in the past that put giant mountains of fear into my mind. The biggest one is about my mom. About 3 years ago we were watching tv and just happened to flip over to Discovery Health and there was a show about TG people where they were getting their SRS done. My heart started pounding so hard as my sister stopped on the channel and kept it there. Then we all chit chatted about it and then all the sudden mom says to both me and my sister, I don't think I could bear it if either of you would go that far. Which I should be happy in a way because she kind of did say without saying it that she would be ok as long as we never had SRS done, but it still makes me sad as that's the direction I will be going in life. It's just another hurtle I have to jump over and keep moving on. My parents have asked me why I look so sad quite a few times recently so I know they know something is up but I haven't mustered up the courage to tell them everything yet. That will happen soon as I don't think I can keep my poker face up much longer and I really want to come out before I turn 30 which will happen in just a few more months!!! Also next week I'll be having my first person to person therapy session and I know that is going to help me a bunch. I'm excited for it to begin, this is the first time in what feels like ever that I actually feel good about myself and I like this feeling  

[Aina]

I am under the same situation sadly it was me turning 30 that got me to come to terms with what I was doing with my life.  I feel the same way I not sure how I am going to over come the fear and insecurity I have about telling my parents, and not sure how they will be yet that small part of me says. "They will be fine they will love you still, even if they don't understand"

Hopefully everything goes well for you Megan!

[Megumi]

I am under the same situation sadly it was me turning 30 that got me to come to terms with what I was doing with my life.  I feel the same way I not sure how I am going to over come the fear and insecurity I have about telling my parents, and not sure how they will be yet that small part of me says. "They will be fine they will love you still, even if they don't understand"

Hopefully everything goes well for you Megan!

I hope things go well for you to Aina

The way I look at it right now is that I have two options on the table for coming out to my parents.
Plan A: Wait for the next time that they ask me why I look so sad or ask what's bugging me. Then pull myself out of the seemingly bottomless fear pool and tell them everything as long as they are the only ones there. I'm not ready to come out to my sister and her husband let alone my niece and nephew and parents all at the same time. It's scary enough just coming out to two people let alone my entire immediate family. Though it would probably be easier to do it that way but I have heard after you tell the first few people it gets easier and easier to do.

Plan B: This one scares me a lot more than Plan A. Basically set a specific date in November and either invite them to my house for dinner to tell them or tell them I want to talk at their house and tell them everything. Having a specific come out of the closet date terrifies me but I have to do this to push myself forward in life. I don't want to be perpetually stuck in this phase of my life of being but not being. The further along I get the more and more being stuck scares me than actually coming out. Either way I'll reach a breaking point where I will have to talk and I know it whether or not I'm ready. My reservoir can only hold so much water and the dam is already beginning to crack.

[ErinM]

So much of this echoes my own story too.

We lost my dad when I was only 20, and being the only child and "male" at that my mom started to see me as a surrogate to dad and I was forced into the man of the house role.  At the time I was deeply in denial about the whole thing finding ways to keep myself numb.

Fast forward 9 years when the walls of denial broke down. Almost 2 years later things started to hit a critical point. One of the main catalysts? Receiving Christmas and birthday cards from my mom and grandparents taking about the wonderful man I had become.

I realized that I needed to do something but the thought of transition and what it would do to my mom (a devout Catholic) was a lot to bear.

The problem for me was that I had made a vow to never hurt my family by committing suicide (I had attempted in my teens).  To save my mothers child I had to face my ->-bleeped-<-.

Now as I progress and my mother has seen her son slowly "replaced" by her daughter she has acknowledged that she needs som way to grieve this loss.  That's why I want to work with her to have some kind of ceremony to commemorate this.

As for when to come out I've used a combination of planned and unplanned times.  Coming out to my mother was semi-planned. I live at home and needed some way to explain my sudden persistent anxiety and would need to have an explanation whenever I went to therapy. The day I made my first appointment from my car at work I told her as soon as I got home.

[Aina]

I hope things go well for you to Aina

The way I look at it right now is that I have two options on the table for coming out to my parents.
Plan A: Wait for the next time that they ask me why I look so sad or ask what's bugging me. Then pull myself out of the seemingly bottomless fear pool and tell them everything as long as they are the only ones there. I'm not ready to come out to my sister and her husband let alone my niece and nephew and parents all at the same time. It's scary enough just coming out to two people let alone my entire immediate family. Though it would probably be easier to do it that way but I have heard after you tell the first few people it gets easier and easier to do.

Plan B: This one scares me a lot more than Plan A. Basically set a specific date in November and either invite them to my house for dinner to tell them or tell them I want to talk at their house and tell them everything. Having a specific come out of the closet date terrifies me but I have to do this to push myself forward in life. I don't want to be perpetually stuck in this phase of my life of being but not being. The further along I get the more and more being stuck scares me than actually coming out. Either way I'll reach a breaking point where I will have to talk and I know it whether or not I'm ready. My reservoir can only hold so much water and the dam is already beginning to crack.

Kind of scary, I had a similar plan A if my parents ever asked me why I don't go out with a girl or anyone.
I Sadly I failed at Plan A similar to yours about a month ago. But I feel you on not wanting to come out when everyone is around. I think its harder for me because well I still live with my parents since I depend on them and the only reason I am still in college, also my Sister, Her husband, my niece and nephew live literately across the street. So they are always around.

I feel as if I came close a few times over the last few weeks, but getting a cold ironically has knocked most notions of coming out for the time being. I may as I stated early wait till I am fully done with college which will be some time next fall, then come out so I don't have that over my head.

But like you since turning 30 I look back at my life and if it were to flash before my eyes 85% of it me sitting on the computer doing much of nothing, playing video games, pretending to be female in some of them, surfing TGart stuff ect. That is literally outside of school and work what I've done over that last 20 years. I am starting to get tired of being this way, tired of hiding my desire to wake up or transform into a girl which will never happen unless I do something, tired of being scared of everything.

Blah here I go rambling again. Let me know if everything goes well if you end up doing Plan B!

[RosieD]

If it were me Megan I would go with plan B (and not just for musical reasons).  By setting a definite date you are taking control of the situation and giving yourself the opportunity to plan it out properly rather than risk blurting out something that is only half prepared and not quite what you wanted to say.

Write yourself a coming out speech (or at least the outline plan of one). Work out what you want to say. Practice saying it. Try to anticipate the questions you will be asked and have your responses ready.

Practice things a few more times.

Run through the very worst case scenario you realistically envisage happening and work out how you want to deal with it.

Practice things a bit.

Then do it.  The first time is very,  VERY much the hardest and by Midwinter (assuming you are able to arrange things for November) it is more than likely you will be wondering what it was you were worrying about.

Rosie.

[Megumi]

Now as I progress and my mother has seen her son slowly "replaced" by her daughter she has acknowledged that she needs som way to grieve this loss.  That's why I want to work with her to have some kind of ceremony to commemorate this.

I want to do something along those lines as well. My family will need to grieve the loss of their son/brother/inlaw and I want to do something to help them with that but I haven't quite figured out what I would do to help them get over the new reality of all of our situations. I know I won't be the only one with issues during this whole process.

[Megumi]

Kind of scary, I had a similar plan A if my parents ever asked me why I don't go out with a girl or anyone.
I Sadly I failed at Plan A similar to yours about a month ago. But I feel you on not wanting to come out when everyone is around. I think its harder for me because well I still live with my parents since I depend on them and the only reason I am still in college, also my Sister, Her husband, my niece and nephew live literately across the street. So they are always around.

I feel as if I came close a few times over the last few weeks, but getting a cold ironically has knocked most notions of coming out for the time being. I may as I stated early wait till I am fully done with college which will be some time next fall, then come out so I don't have that over my head.

But like you since turning 30 I look back at my life and if it were to flash before my eyes 85% of it me sitting on the computer doing much of nothing, playing video games, pretending to be female in some of them, surfing TGart stuff ect. That is literally outside of school and work what I've done over that last 20 years. I am starting to get tired of being this way, tired of hiding my desire to wake up or transform into a girl which will never happen unless I do something, tired of being scared of everything.

Blah here I go rambling again. Let me know if everything goes well if you end up doing Plan B!

Hugs hun, I feel the same way on looking back at my life. I've been beyond tired of feeling bad about myself and hating myself for not coming to terms with who I am sooner, not opening up to my family about how I feel and just being stuck in the situation where I didn't think I could come out. It's time to do something about it now as I can't keep going on that path much more.

Speaking of Plan A, I had a decent opportunity to do it today but I couldn't muster up the courage. We have a family night once a week and I got to their place early to give their dogs a bath since neither of my parents can bend over a tub to do it without ending up laid out in bed with a blown out back the next day. I had a terrible look on my face as I was agonizing internally to just say one word to get the ball rolling while I was washing the dogs. But by the time I got done mom was already in the kitchen working on making dinner and I just couldn't get the words out as it was just us 3 in the house at the time. But there was at least some glimmer of hope as later in the night after my sister and her husband showed up we watched a Christian show that's really in my opinion a infomercial for the product the person sells but during it he mentioned homosexuals are the cause of this and that and I hollered out that's a bunch of BS as the bible teaches us to love the person but hate the sin. Mom chimed in that's correct and I believe it too. My brother in law though doesn't feel that way and even as soon as I said it my sister leaned over and said but he doesn't then he chimed in. But at least I feel a lot better right now hearing my mom agree with me on a controversial issue "even though I don't think homosexuality is controversial at all". If it were just me mom and dad and not my sister and her husband also in the house at that moment I think I would have been spilling the beans from the euphoric feeling I had coursing through my body from hearing her say that. It gave me a lot of hope that things just might turn out ok with them after all. I have to handle my coming out with my sister and her husband way differently than I do with my parents. I need to work off of what she said to give me that boost of confidence!

Don't feel bad for rambling on! Getting things out is always good and others who are reading might see something that will help them too

[Megumi]

If it were me Megan I would go with plan B (and not just for musical reasons).  By setting a definite date you are taking control of the situation and giving yourself the opportunity to plan it out properly rather than risk blurting out something that is only half prepared and not quite what you wanted to say.

Write yourself a coming out speech (or at least the outline plan of one). Work out what you want to say. Practice saying it. Try to anticipate the questions you will be asked and have your responses ready.

Practice things a few more times.

Run through the very worst case scenario you realistically envisage happening and work out how you want to deal with it.

Practice things a bit.

Then do it.  The first time is very,  VERY much the hardest and by Midwinter (assuming you are able to arrange things for November) it is more than likely you will be wondering what it was you were worrying about.

Rosie.

Right now I have both plans in effect. Plan A is my spontaneous it's going down right now with some planning behind it but it's all going to happen on the fly if I feel that the timing is right. I'm working on a very truthful letter for Plan B with a specific date set in place that this is what I'm going to do and no fear that I may still have will stop me from doing it. I want to bear my soul before them and cover every detail possible and have as many answers for them as possible. Every day for the past week or so I've been working on my speech when I'm driving either to work or home or to do errands, recalling past memories that were defining moments in my realization of who I am. All I know is I got a LOT to say to them when I do come out and I still feel like I'm no where near done by the time I make the 30 minute drive. It's all that's on my mind, when I'm at home, when I'm at the gym, when I'm shopping, when I walk outside during break and lunch, when I drive my car, it's not leaving my mind. Which is a good thing as the more and more I go over everything the more calm I feel about all of this. I think next Wednesday will help out a ton as I'm seeing a therapist for the very first time and I can't help but feel that telling just one in real life person everything will help me get over a lot of my fears. I'm still giddy as can be for next Wednesday to get here already.

[Lesley_Roberta]

Until you tell them you ARE their daughter (not son) though.

You can't hold it against people that don't know. Your pain is thus not their fault. Might not be yours, but they are not at fault for calling their SON a son.

My mother knows and she KNOWS it hurts when I get praised for being a great son. But it has not been easy for her to catch herself. She's nearly identical to your mom as well. She's 80 and lives with pain. I come to see her all the time, and I have told her 'mom you are not stopping baking, you are just not doing all the standing and physical all the time, but you ARE the brains in the kitchen when I bake here with you'. I still enjoy her doing meals n stuff, but I like going over and doing a meal and all the serving and all the clean up because it means she still gets to enjoy good old fashioned meals without the effort. Because I know, she often eats whatever and or just plain lame meals if it is a case of that or a lot of effort that wears too much on her.

My dad also was never in the kitchen. I have no idea if he could cook, he just assumed the wife did the cooking. Mom never had a beef with it that I know of.

I know what he'd have gotten though, if he were to TELL her to cook him dinner Sweet diddly with a side order of not bloody likely
Which is about all I would expect with that attitude too. I cook most of the better more involved things around here, but, I also have plenty of days when I am just wore down and the wife does something. She usually makes me sandwiches at the drop of a hat. I just hate making them. But I also do plenty around here as well that she is never required to do.

Anyway, getting back to the point. My mom is fully aware, that I want to be praised as her great 'daughter'. But I have already been introduced to so many older persons in her building as her son. And this before I made the change. And older people are often stuck on habit too. I plan though, to make it increasingly pointless to refer to me as a 'son'. Once I have the hair of a woman, and a woman's attire, it will eventually get weird calling me any form of male address. And in time, I plan to have no actual connection with anything male. At that point, people still calling me any manner of male form of address, well I won't likely be so interested in being supportive

You need to hurry up and make some things known if it is causing you discomfort.

[DrBobbi]

It's the most difficult thing in the world, coming out, but you'll be amazed at how easy it is once you start. You'll also feel like the noose around your neck is gone. Then the healing begins. October 11th is national coming out day!