Introduction Hello From Katie

[Katie_Dee]

I feel the deep need after 50 years to embrace Katie and to let her come out and live.

Has certainly been a confusing journey yet I hope the rest of my life will be one of greater inner peace.

We all have so many chapters and I hope to be able to share them with friends.

My daughter, 19 is attending College now; I have raised her alone. Had to be the politically correct Dad. Soon I will be having my first pro makeover and photo shoot to see the face I have waited so long to see. My face.

Embracing the Katie within is not the challenge, the challenge is the closed mindedness of others who are locked into a culture of preprocessing and expectations according to physical gender.

There are many attributes of mine that are considered to be feminine and I celebrate them all.


Posted at: April 01, 2006, 03:23:12 PMKindergarden

In Columbus Ohio the year was 1962. During playtime I always played house with the girls. I played in the play kitchen and we would dress up and play with dolls.

During share time there was a sweet freckled face girl named Pamela who wore her tutu to class one day because she was taking balerina lessons. I recall I felt how much I wanted a tutu like hers. I even asked my mom to get me one.

Something happened I think because the teacher talked with me at school one day and said I could not play house with the girls anymore. I had to only play with the boys. The teacher would remind me to play with the boy stuff and to stay away from the girls.

Only girls did girl things and only boys did boy things and things had to stay that way.

I got in lots of fights....


Posted at: April 01, 2006, 03:41:37 PMI had a military career and while away at Persian Gulf War 1; My wife became involved in behavior that was very unhealthy and her lifestyle had impacted my daughter who was 4 at the time.

Upon my return I sued for divorce and custody. After a year of court battles I won sole custody and was granted a divorce.

My wife's attorneys and state social workers tried to scapegoat me as a bad person because I had a private history of cross dressing. My wife used my cross dressing as an attempt to get the courts to overlook her own irresponsible behavior. It did not work.

Social workers fought to have my daughter placed in her mothers custody or as a ward of the state.

I won and my daughter won.

My wife could only have supervised visits and of course she never visited or contributed in any manner to the welfare of my daughter.

So ... here we are today.. My daughter is now 19 and I have completed the role of cultural proper gendered Dad. On at least 2 occasions I am aware of social services doing a follow up on me because of the previous cross gender concerns.

My daughter is now a legal adult and I am free of the influence and attempted control by the social moral police.

I am a good Dad and I have also been a good mother too.

I am going to get a professional make over and get some photo's done.

Katie is coming out....

Best and Warmest Regards, Katie

P.S. In many ways I feel I am a pioneer because this all happened in the Deep South of America. The bible thumpin right wing conservative south; and I won.

Here's .......... Katie ..................... 

[MaryEllen]

Hello Katie,

Welcome to Susan's. Your story on growning up is very similar to mine. I wanted to play with girls but was made to play with boys. It sounds like you did an excellent job of raising your daughter under those adverse conditions. It's your time to shine, girl. Go get that makeover. You won't regret it.

{{{Hugs}}}

MaryEllen   

[stephanie_craxford]

Welcome to Susan's Katie.

That is a wonderful introduction.  I think that you will quite at home here and your experiences will add to the variety.  Please feel free to join in the topics, and post your own points of view where you can.  We are a freindly bunch and we are here to help, advise, or just hang out with.

Enjoy your stay and I'm sure that we will chat later.

Steph

[Katie_Dee]

Thank You MaryEllen for the warm welcome and the hug.
This girl is going to shine ...
Or at least do my very best to be the girl that is deep within my soul...

{{{Hugs}}}

Katie


Posted at: April 01, 2006, 05:49:07 PMThank You Steph, I really look forward to chatting and sharing with my sisterhood of friends. Along the way I hope I learn much and maybe in some way provide insights of experience.

Katie is growing after all this time ... Thank Gawd !!

- Katie

[Robyn]

Hi, Katie.

Over 50 and a TS veteran.  Hmmmmm.

Let me mention three news lists you might consider joining:

TSVets, a Yahoo Groups news list.  Primary area of interest is VA health services for transexxuals. 

ElderTG, a group of MTFs, FTMs, and a few SOs age 50+.  This is on OnLinePolicy,net.

I run both; so you can cotact me at robynw@cablespeed.com if interested.

The other is the Transgender American Veterans Association <www.tavausa.org> a 501 c 3 educational organization supporting transgender veterans.

Robyn

[Katie_Dee]

Thanks Robyn, Us older girls have a unigue challenge and instead of looking back, I want to look forward to enjoy the roses each day may bring. Of course a thorn or two may also appear but the scent of the rose cannot be disdained by a simple thorn.

How I wish the VA could assist girls like me to become whole. They knew about it when I was active duty and I completed my career. Maybe someday ... until then I place my change in a jar and hope.

[caitlyn]

Hi and Welcome Katie, 

Thank you for your kind words in your welcome to me.

I have enjoyed transitioning in my later years, and would not have wanted to miss raising my children for anything.  I did at the time feel the loss, but watching my grandchildren now makes the wait all worth while. After a lot of soul searching I decided to go through the SRS and I am not sorry about it.  For me the surgery was a piece of cake.  I had surgery on Monday morning and went to church on the following Sunday, those hard pews were not much fun I grant you, but it was not painful either.   

I am sure you will understand when I write the worst part of the whole process for an engineer is all of the research that goes into the various steps.  Trying to fight through all of the garbage that is written out there, and the well intended advice, was the worst of the process.   The good news is for me it was all worthwhile. 

Best of luck to both you and your daughter on your new adventures!.

Caitlyn

[Katie_Dee]

Thank You Caitlyn, Your story is so encouraging to me. perhaps I too will be able to experience SRS so that my body can match who I am. Today I feel that my body is so tired from having to be locked into cultural expectations from others about who I am supposed to be.

In my faith I know Mother Mary interceeds in prayer for me because I am one of her sisters whose heart is trapped in the wrong body.

Much of the challenge of being a single parent has been the closed mindedness of every day people who could not even accept that I could raise a daughter by myself. I cant help but feel if my body had matched with my heart, the journey would have been more accepted and easier.

My daughter is on a healthy path and it is about time I do the same for me.

There is so much to share and so much growth I need to do. Each step I take brings me closer.

-Katie

[HelenW]

Katie,  I have nothing to add to the welcomes you've received except my wish to be included.  This is a wonderful site and I hope you find what you need here.  I sure did!

I had a rueful laugh about Cailyn's point regarding research into this thing we've found out about ourselves.  I got so obsessed about reading everything I could scare up on the www that I almost outed myself at work way, way, too soon because I didn't have web access at home.  It became an obsession, I felt like couldn't help myself!

But, in the process I discovered this site and have benefitted greatly.  I hope you do too, and more, and am happy to again say,

WELCOME!
heln

[Katie_Dee]

Hello Helen, Thank you; I feel so welcome here... Nice to have a place to go to where people like me can chat and share.

Timing is everything ; I wonder if we can become so anxious about wanting to just be ourselves all the time, we may forget about the fact that people who live in boxes are just not open to anything outside the box.

I used to think it was me in the box but it is the other way around isnt it? People out there are in the box of rules and expectations. not able to understand because since birth it has been required to act the way the body looks.

I'm so weary of being pushed into the box and it is comforting to realize I have some sisters who like me are just trying to be who we are.

Looking forward to many visits and discussions.

- Katie   

[Shannon]

Hello Katie,

Welcome to Susan's.  I have only been on here myself for almost four weeks.  You will find many great resources here and lots of friendly people.  Your story of playing with dolls sounds a lot like what I did in Kindergarden thru 2nd grade.  I even played with my nieces Barbie Dolls as I was growing up and enjoyed doing girl things behind my parents back.  It sounds like you did an outstanding job of raising your daughter under those difficult circumstances.  You owe it to yourself to get out there, get that make over and photo shoot and have fun!   Good luck!   

Hugs,

Shannon

[Katie_Dee]

Hi Shannon,

Thanks for the warm welcome and I feel certain I will be around.

Grandmom taught me to do needle point and used to tell me I was supposed to have been a girl. My Mom always told me she wished I had been a girl. Grandma used to say I was pretty. When I was about 8 I got a really neat needlepoint kit .

Lots to share. I was the girl until Grandma passed away when I was about 12.

Lots to share , some of it sad but it is all about what has made me .... me.

Hugs

-Katie

[Peggiann]

Evening Katie,

Your daughter is very lucky to have been taught through actions the meaning of fighting for what you believe in and seeing it through to the end. How sad it is that her mother put herself first and missed out on being the mother you got to be. It's something she shall never get the oppertunity to replace all those lost years with such a special gift. You got to have a double blessing didn't you... You got to be Mom and Dad both such rewarding roles.

I'm Leah's S.O. We've been here awhile now. I was just sick for a few weeks so haven't posted much. I too was a single parent for a while before I met my life's partner. I took my boys fishing and camping and to the park to play ball. I raced them to the car from the store to see who would have to clean their room. Most of the time I won so they had to clean it. But when it was time for sorting and throwing out ccloths and toys I lost on purpose so I could do it without to much fuss. I miss my boys now because they live so far away for even just a short visit. Email and phone calls have replaced our long talks as I would drive them home from a sports even.

Now those 3 men of mine are married. From what I see daughters stay close to Mom's and Dad's more. So that's another plus for you. I must have help make my fellows feel very capible and self-asured, for they usually need not much help in anything these days.

OH gaush I was just going to say welcome to our family here at Susan's Place and look what else came out.

Smiles,
Peggiann

[Katie_Dee]

Good Morning Peggiann,

Isnt it wonderful to see the impact you have made on your sons? I think the greatest thing a parent can do is raise their child to know she/he is a unique person and an individual. WIth their own soul and spiritual sense of worth.

So many parents consider children as property without an acknowledgement that there is a person in there.

It was not easy, even though the ex was diagnosed as psychotic, when I sued for custody many social workers attempted to intervene and force my daughter to live with her psychopath mother. I think two things were very apparant. (1) A huge bias in the court system against the male gender in custody issues even when it is very clear the biological mom is a horrid irresponsible person. (2) Conservative moralists will stop at nothing to influence control over the lives of others in order to achieve the goal of people living the way the moralists think people should live.

Regardless of the law and regardless of what harm was done to the child the social system supports the bio mom. I fought for the safety and welfare of my daughter and we won.

One of the very neat things the judge said was that he did not care if I wore a dress as long as I did not do so in front of my daughter and I never did. The moralists attempted to make my dress wearing more important than the illegal behavior of my ex. It was just a mess.

When I look back, it seems comical now, (and sad) how the paranoid moralists would investigate me to find anything wrong. They could not stand the fact that I am a good parent, a good Dad and a good Mom, wearing all the hats to provide a life for my daughter.

My daughter has overcome the trauma of what happened to her while I was away at war. She is attending college and doing very well in Nursing School.

Maybe my wanting a makeover and photo shoot is about me celebrating the person within me that stood up for what is right and won in spite of the moralist gestapo who would rather my daughter live with a psychopath cocaine sniffing bio mom. I had no idea what the ex was doing while I was in the Middle East.  They had the nerve to say I was twisted because I liked to wear a dress. Talk about screwed up priorities !

Thanks so much for the warm welcome. I'm going to get my hair done ...

Take Care
-Katie