A quick follow up...met with my mother today. She told my father he was welcome to come but he declined...oh well, his loss! In some ways it was for the better, my mum and I had "high tea" at this poshy little tea house and given 90%+ of the people there were women it's clearly more of a "ladies" thing to do. And besides it was good to have a great chat with her, we nattered away about all sorts of things and mostly not about my transition.
We did touch on the topic though, I wanted to share how things had been going and some of the positive and funny stories from the last four weeks but I also got her to talk about how she and dad are taking it. Dad seems to be having some conceptual problems, he'll still talk to me, like today I rang to talk to my mother about parking arrangements at the cafe, dad answered the phone, we exchanged pleasantries before he passed me on (nothing different from normal there) but I did hear him say to my mother "it's 'male name'" as he gave her the phone. Whatever, it's disappointing but to be expected. According to my mother he "can't see the need for it ('it' being transition)", I said to her, "well, I'm still alive aren't I?"
Anyway, she said she would have trouble adjusting and yet she was able to be with me and talk as if nothing was different. She talked about her concerns, but overall she seemed comfortable. She agreed I was presentable and that I wasn't drawing any undue attention or odd looks from customers or staff (I was being called "madam" and we were called "ladies"
), she even said she thought I was "pretty"
We were there for about two hours. I had a good time, she had a good time....in many ways it was no different than other times I've taken her out. We gave each other a huge hug at the end. She's maybe not there 100% yet but she's well on her way. As for my father, he's apparently happy to have a meet up, one on one, probably to tell me how he feels about it all - but I have to arrange it. Sounds like an opening to me.
