Partial transition

[Autrement]

Like several others on the forum, I do not have the possibility to go full time to a full transition. My reason is to keep my 30 year marriage together, with a loving wife who accepts me as a TG, she also accepts my HRT, but she can not stand to see me dressed as a woman when she is around. Therefore, I only take the opportunity to do so when I visit my therapist and a few trans and cis friends with whom I am out.

Who is in such a situation and would have some experience of such "compromise" to share? Is it doable for a long time?


Pascale

[AnonyMs]

I did low dose HRT for a while. There's a really good post in it here.

https://www.susans.org/forums/index.php?topic=130268.0

Then I increased it to a transitioning dose. Been about 10 years now, still presenting male.

[Kirsteneklund7]

Like several others on the forum, I do not have the possibility to go full time to a full transition. My reason is to keep my 30 year marriage together, with a loving wife who accepts me as a TG, she also accepts my HRT, but she can not stand to see me dressed as a woman when she is around. Therefore, I only take the opportunity to do so when I visit my therapist and a few trans and cis friends with whom I am out.

Who is in such a situation and would have some experience of such "compromise" to share? Is it doable for a long time?


Pascale

Hi Autrement,
                         This is exactly how I manage my angst, unease & dissatisfaction of not being female. My wife will allow skirts and dresses when I come home from work. She doesn't tolerate more extreme presentation though. The more feminine dresses that reveal cleavage & makeup are off limits.
The most feminine presentation must happen when she is not around. The agreement is " I don't want to see it "

My wife does know about all of the cross-dressing though and sometimes sees the residual mascara ect.

HRT + feminine expression keeps me going. The distraction and mental burden of gender misalignment is too much otherwise. So far this method has worked since November 2015.

I want to keep up HRT so that when an opportunity to push the envelope or go full time is available I won't miss the boat. I can't really live without HRT anyway.

On the whole I like my life, I am very thankful for everything, I love my wife and 2 sons. This scenario keeps me quite happy & functional.

  Yours truly, Kirsten [emoji126].

PS How far would you personally go if the opportunity was there ?

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[Autrement]

Many thanks AnonyMs and Kirsten.

AnonyMs: the thread you are quoting is great, I follow it with a lot of interest. I would like to know how Luna Nyan is doing as she did not post since a long time.

Kirsten: do you mean you are out at work, or you just CD when you are back? You have a very good question as PS: the more is goes, the more I believe I would be ready to go far if opportunity allows. But I would see when I am there!

[HappyMoni]

Pascale,
   A dear friend of mine started a thread a while back that may be of interest to you. https://www.susans.org/forums/index.php/topic,234332.0.html  Unfortunately she is no longer with us, but she showed tremendous class in dealing with not being able to fully transition. I admired her and her strength. I wish you only the best.
Moni

[Rachel_Christina]

I really don't think she accepts you as transgender atall going by what you said.
I don't know how you do it in the sense that you now must hold back all of who you are for the sake of someone who doesn't love all of you. :/
Compromise should not involve compromising oneself.
Compromise on the car the house other things, but not yourself.

Just how I feel about it

[Virginia]

I am a survivor of childhood sexual and psychological abuse with Dissociative Identity/Multiple Personality Disorder (DID/MPD). My female alter and I have lived completely separate cisgender lives, ala Tootsie, Victor/Victoria/Mrs.Doubtfire for 9 years now. Apart from my my immediate family and the medical professionals who treat me, neither of us is "out" to anyone in either of our lives. NO ONE has seen us both or is privy to the details of my condition.

HRT brought great peace to my System. I have an androgynous body and neither me more my female alter have any problems being seen as our gender by the people in our lives. Psychological bleed through between me and any of the alters in my System is beyond the ability of my mind at this point in recovery, but neither my female alter nor my wife want to "see" each other. It would destroy the delusion my mind uses to protect me from the feelings and memories contained in my female alter. Our couple's psychologist explained is simply not possible for my wife to conceive of one person as both a man and a woman.  Accepting my female alter would destroy her image of me as her husband.

It takes a little juggling, but my wife and I are both retired and have been at this long enough that accommodating my female alters need to be out and about living her life two days a week is the least of our problems dealing with my DID. This works very well for my System, but I am not sure a nondissociative person's mind would be able to keep up the level of compartmentalization this requires.

[Kirsteneklund7]

Many thanks AnonyMs and Kirsten.

AnonyMs: the thread you are quoting is great, I follow it with a lot of interest. I would like to know how Luna Nyan is doing as she did not post since a long time.

Kirsten: do you mean you are out at work, or you just CD when you are back? You have a very good question as PS: the more is goes, the more I believe I would be ready to go far if opportunity allows. But I would see when I am there!

I am not out at work at this time. I do get some questions though about my appearance and not always male disposition. In the end the team will have to know.


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[Kirsteneklund7]

Hi Rachel_Christina,
                                    The reply of "I really don't think she accepts you as transgender" gets me thinking to a certain extent. I do appreciate the honest comment. It is true my wife is dealing with something she didn't sign up for when we got married. I would dearly love her to support my transition but she does support  my sons and me in so many ways. She does an excellent job as wife and mother to 2 sons. She has gone from nil acceptance of my femininity to on board with a degree of female expression. She has filled my hormone script for me. So HRT is not a roadblock.

I am hoping & confident of going full en femme while she is present.

The truth remains at this stage, her natural instinct as a cis woman does not bide well with a husband that often presents as a woman. She has felt something was not fully male about me for the last 20 years - now she knows- this doesn't mean she fully accepts it.

Rachel please put any comment out there about dealing with trans + family and friends. An authentic comment can be worth 10 sugary ones.

Now I have hijacked Pascale's thread. Sorry Pascale.

  Sending peace and love,
                                            Kirsten[emoji126]

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[Rachel_Christina]

Hey Kirsten, maybe if she can eventually learn to love all of you is another aspect to it. Maybe she needs time to develop and learn about herself. I think a person would need to be very honest about their willing and trying to accept. Otherwise for someone who knows they can never accept it, it's best just being honest so the trans one can go off and be there true selves, I think its the right thing to do.
Telling someone you might accept it at some point knowing full well they could never get round it, I think it's very cruel and selfish
I hope for those of you in this situation it works out.
It was the first thing in my head when I knew I was gonna come out about being this way. I could let none stand in my way.
Just my thoughts, hugs, Rachel

[Autrement]

HappyMoni, many thanks for telling me about this thread. Denni was definitely very courageous.

Virginia, thanks for your experience and your explanation about how you cope.

Rachel and Kristen, thanks for this interesting debate!

For me, 30 years of living together happily, building things together, loving and raising 4 children is very important. Yes, I am trans and this is a significant part of myself, but I am also a loving husband and father and I receive a lot of love from my family. I do love my wife and she does love me, even if my trans side makes her very sad, because she feels the is loosing the man I let her believe I was.

Therefore any kind of partial or full transition or non-transition choice includes a sacrifice. I have to find the right balance at a given time, to be authentic and also as ethical as I can...

For sure, the experience of others is really helping and inspiring and providing food for thought.

Many many thanks to all of you!

Hugs.

Pascale

[Kirsteneklund7]

Thanks Rachel, I do need to be careful not to fall back into the pressure cooker I was in prior to HRT.
  Also does your transition mean that you never present male these days? Is male mode totally a thing of the past?

  Pascale I would love to see how your female life developes.

Love& peace, Kirsten[emoji1652]


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[Rachel_Christina]

I can only imagine the pressure of 30 years of marriage and coming out do not go to well side by side :/ careful moves will be the best way forward, and alot of talk between you and your partner Autrement.

And yeah Kristen I don't like the though of how things where before it either. I could never go back.
And yeah I'm full time now, I had to do the old Facebook coming out thing before returning to Ireland from Switzerland.
It has been the most liberating time.
My main obstacle was and still is my father. He's fine other calling me by my old name and pronouns
I can't let that get to me though

[Kirsteneklund7]

Thanks Rachel, wishing for breakthrough with your father. I guess a lot of it is a bit new for him.

         Hugs,          Kirsten

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[Rachel_Christina]

Thanks Rachel, wishing for breakthrough with your father. I guess a lot of it is a bit new for him.

         Hugs,          Kirsten

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Thank girl, he's known for more than a year now hes just the very thick kind lol

[HappyMoni]

It is incredibly difficult as a trans person to have patience. Let's just say I was no good at it. I did have my family to consider when I turned my life upside down in there eyes. I was extremely careful and slow  in the things that I did, especially things that were visible. The frame of mind that they need to have to adjust to changes takes time. We think of our brains needing to change in our adjustments, I fully believe our loved ones brains have to change to adjust their perspectives. Some can not make that change. Pascale, your thoughts of fairness, being ethical and balanced in your approach with family is quite admirable. It will take great strength on your part. I did refer you to Denni. We had a long, close friendship. I transitioned, she did not. I could not have done what she did. She had an ability to be very disciplined and had great loyalty to her loved ones. I do believe she managed to carve out a path for herself that allowed her a good deal of happiness while not transitioning. I think it can be tougher than transitioning. I hope you find your path satisfying for all.
Moni

[Autrement]

Dear Monni,

Many thanks for your comments. I agree with you time is so important for everyone to realise, understand, get used to what is coming so suddenly. This is first of all what I want to let to my wife and children. And then, I will see if I can find a balance that make me happy enough or if I have to consider more. Both choices require courage anyway.

Hugs.

Pascale

[RobynD]

I'm not sure exactly what the difference is in "cannot accept" and "will not accept" and I'm not sure that it matters all that much in the long run. We all change over the course of our relationships and it is always the right of the other party to negotiate or head in a different direction.

My spouse accepted until she didn't as much anymore for her reasons. She asked for compromises but gave me a fairly short window in which to accept/implement them. By that time I was in another relationship ( we were poly anyway) but I was willing to put boundaries around myself in order to get her to feel better in being together.

But alas, she had other options and I had other options, so we split. This is also key sometimes people have few other options so they stay under some sort of truce. That is ok too. Like Rachel though, I believe ultimately we need to be able to accept and love the whole person, otherwise, neither person is living the way they need to live.

[Virginia]

I'm not sure exactly what the difference is in "cannot accept" and "will not accept"

The phrasing "Cannot Accept" does not involve the choice or decision of "Will Not Accept."  Am extremely importation distinction.

[SaraDanielle]

Autrement,

I think it is a perfectly reasonable position. I work in a conservative business with responsibility for many employees- I don't want to change my relationship with them.  I also have a wife that I've spent 10 great years with and would not do anything to jeopardize that relationship. 

I've been on HRT 4 months now, and it has helped. I'm growing my hair out and a few more minor items.  But I never had brutal dysphoria that made my life as difficult as I see many people on here suffer with.  It was just more frustrating than I wanted it to be - so I did something about it.

4 months isn't very long, but I hope it is sustainable. Knowing that I'm running on Estrogen on the inside has added joy.  Part of me does still desire to fully transition 10 years on or more, but I'm at peace for now.