Just an update for anyone who remembers me and cares enough to read.
I have been in therapy now since my last posting here, gosh it must be a few months now I think, time has drug on and flew by at the same time.
Working with a therapist has been helpful and confusing at the same time. In all honesty it has opened up more questions than answers. I can't recall the number of times I have told him that I feel like I have all the answers I just don't know what to do with them.
The big answer that I have come to realize is that despite the fact that I have many days I feel "manly" or feel masculine, I am, without any reservation a woman. I can say that with a clear heart and clear mind and not think twice about it, not second guess myself and most importantly, know that I am being honest with myself. That alone is just as liberating as it is infuriating and caging.
It is caging because no matter how hard we work at it, no matter what I can't get past my deeply emotional side of not wanting to hurt those I love. I just can't do it, and frankly, I don't want to. Even though many of those I don't want to hurt have hurt me in the past, present and probably will in the future, I need to raise above that for myself.
I have found through therapy that it has been ingrained in me since day one that you do things to please everyone around you and you don't worry about yourself, as long as you do what you are expected you will have a happy life. I went through a "rebellious" phase in my teen years where it was further reinforced that I didn't matter, and a relationship through most of my twenties where well...I just really didn't matter at all. So there is a lot of healing and growing I have left to do, I am kind of permanantly locked in a childlike state because well...I was never allowed to do anything for me. It is a long process but my recovery has started I believe, slowly but surely.
I have to choose to do things for me, because it is what I want, what I need, and I have chosen to remain non-operative and closeted because I don't LIKE hurting others. I have chosen this path despite knowing it will be hell and constant torment for me to keep this massive secret. I have chosen a hard road and it just plain out sucks and I am miserable inn this body. I have also decided that if and when I am left alone in this world, I will go through and live my life as I wish I could now. And if my relationship ever ends as it is, I know it will be impossible to find someone who understands, though I would be honest about it up front.
Of course, all of this may change in the future, this is just my current path. I first have to make peace with the fact that half my life has passed and so many of the things I want to do I can no longer do and that it is exponentially harder to make friends and find people with common interests as I age. I missed out on so much and I am terribly depressed by that. And choosing to stay non-op, I feel like it will also be harder to find other people that I could trust to talk to about it in person and harder to relate with operative trans people.
I am beginning a time in my life where I am learning to cope with all of the crazy realities that I must now live with. The biggest one being that even if one day I do transition, I am not completely sure that it will help my ever worsening dysphoria. The main reason being is that when I close my eyes, the person I see myself as in my mind and my heart can never, ever be attained for me short of a working brain transplant. The person I see myself as, that I KNOW that I am is much shorter, much smaller bone structure and a girl. Not a six and a half foot tall giant boned fat man.
So, that is my update. Thanks for reading if you did.
