Late life transitioning

[xsocialworker]

It seems so much of the topics are about transitioning (or not) at what I would call a young age. I am a facilitator of a support group where there are people just coming out in their fifties and sixties.
Anybody have stories or issues to share about this?

Thanks

[Nero]

well, what do you as a support group facilitator think about it? 

[K8]

I am 65 and finally dealing with my life-long gender issues.  I had come out to my wife, daughter, gay friends, and doctor before this year; but now I've been coming out to my straight friends and almost anyone else who will listen.  Even though my earliest memories are of wanting to be a girl, I had always thought of myself as a cross dresser.  As I am more open with others I am finding that I am probably transsexual.  I now hope to live fulltime as a woman and perhaps have the surgery.  (I don't want to get my hopes up and so try to look only at the next step.)

There are several age-related issues that I can identify.  I feel I need to hurry up and get this done before I get much older.  I am a little wiser than I was at 20, although that isn't too difficult considering how I was at 20.  I have the confidence to approach the theater voice coach, the DMV, my bank, my doctor, etc. and just state my issues.  I have many more really good friends than I did when I was younger.  And I won't even consider a tracheal shave because of the hardness of the cartilage at this age.  I also lived a long time as the wrong gender.  Like most things, there are pluses and minuses.

- Kate

[K8]

A couple of more thoghts... (Is that age related?  )  I'm still early in this process and haven't started hormones yet.  I've only had one laser treatment on my face to clear out the whiskers.  I have some grey hair, so I'll have to do electrolysis as well - another age-related issue.  I expect to take one step at a time and if successful go on to the next step.  I think I've developed more patience and a certain wariness over the years.  I am probably less willing to consider self-destructive behavior than I was when I was younger.  I am less concerned with becoming an attractive woman - attractiveness at my age is more in behavior and attitude, thankfully.

I just feel fortunate to be able to finally do this.

Cheers,
Kate

[K8]

OK.  One more: Family.  I am probably less enmeshed in family than a younger person.  While younger people worry about telling their parents, that is not an issue for me.  My parents have both been dead for over 15 years.  M wife died two years ago.  My daughter is an adult, living with her husband.  My sister and brother are older and, while we are all on very good terms, we are not close.  For me, the family I've created of friends is more important to me than my blood family (other than my daughter, who will always be in a special part of my heart).

- Kate

[sarahF]

ok. I to am older 62 and have started HRT. I'm finally feeling good about myself. Thanks all for the chatter.It has helped alot
Sarah

[sneakersjay]

I'm 48 and transitioned last year.

I think for older people there was a huge stigma when we were growing up; being lesbian or gay was scandalous, let alone people who got a 'sex change'.  They were all portrayed as sexual deviants and freaks of nature.  No wonder many of us suppressed ourselves to avoid ridicule.

I knew I wasn't a freak or sexual deviant, and wasn't like 'those people' (how they were portrayed, not how they likely truly were).  But as we all know it doesn't go away.

So it took me longer to figure it out, be 'diagnosed' and then I was all over the cure (transition).  I still think there is more of a stigma for ladies (mtf) than men (ftm), and I do know a lot of ladies who wait until their parents pass, so as not to upset them.

Younger kids have it a bit easier; people are more open about variations in biology and sexual orientation than in the past.  Not that it's a cakewalk, but there a lot of information out there, easily accessible on the web, that just didn't exist when I was in my teens and 20s.

Jay

[Chrissty]

Pre-transition, I have to agree with most of what has been said so far.

I was having an interesting discussion with my therapist the other day. She says that 80% of the people who go to her for counselling have lost control of their GID due to a trauma of one sort or another. The scale of trauma required was very much down to the individual, but it could vary from a "minor" accident, to a loved one dying unexpectedly, or illness.

As we focus our minds on dealing with the post-traumatic stress, it allows the GID to surface as the ability to control it is weakened.

For those of us who are older, a number of our life goals have been achieved and we can 'loose focus' while we are moving on, and re-evaluating our 'reasons to live'. The term mid-life crisis seems to apply these days over a much wider age band, and then there is also retirement, providing more milestones to re-evaluate life.

If you combine these factors together, add the improved awareness, and then throw in the increasing risk of trauma as we get older.....

.... it's easy to start seeing life 45+ to be a potential GID minefield.


Chrissty

[imaz]

That's a very interesting theory and I agree with it t a certain point but it kind of cuts both ways. When things are really bad I find the last thing on my mind are GID issues. It's all about just surviving at that point.

[K8]

For those of us who are older, a number of our life goals have been achieved and we can 'loose focus' while we are moving on, and re-evaluating our 'reasons to live'. The term mid-life crisis seems to apply these days over a much wider age band, and then there is also retirement, providing more milestones to re-evaluate life.

If you combine these factors together, add the improved awareness, and then throw in the increasing risk of trauma as we get older.....

.... it's easy to start seeing life 45+ to be a potential GID minefield.


Chrissty

I'm going to have to think about this a bit.  My GID was increasing gradually but took a big jump when I retired from the military and started working in the civilian world.  When times were tough I would retreat into crossdressing as a way to calm myself.  When I finally retired from civilian work, I didn't have the stress but my GID graduallly increased.  I think to some extent it was just an unresolved issue that I had been able to control better when I was young.  My wife's illness was hell and I only survived with the help of my friends.  Her death was also tough, even after knowing it was coming.  After her death I did a lot of re-evaluating and looking at life goals.  I'm still doing that.

But I get back to the gender issues being unresolved.  I think as we get older we feel the need to resolve as many of our life issues as possible.  My wife always had a very difficult relationship with her mother and as they both got older it became more important to my wife to resolve that somehow.  (She never did.)

So now I'm an old genderqueer, thinking that perhaps I can finally be a woman like I wished I could be when I was 4.

-Kate

[Linus]

Pre-transition, I have to agree with most of what has been said so far.

I was having an interesting discussion with my therapist the other day. She says that 80% of the people who go to her for counselling have lost control of their GID due to a trauma of one sort or another. The scale of trauma required was very much down to the individual, but it could vary from a "minor" accident, to a loved one dying unexpectedly, or illness.

As we focus our minds on dealing with the post-traumatic stress, it allows the GID to surface as the ability to control it is weakened.

For those of us who are older, a number of our life goals have been achieved and we can 'loose focus' while we are moving on, and re-evaluating our 'reasons to live'. The term mid-life crisis seems to apply these days over a much wider age band, and then there is also retirement, providing more milestones to re-evaluate life.

If you combine these factors together, add the improved awareness, and then throw in the increasing risk of trauma as we get older.....

.... it's easy to start seeing life 45+ to be a potential GID minefield.


Chrissty

Wow. That just made a puzzle piece fit for me.



BTW, can I just say your picture is hot!

[K8]

That's a very interesting theory and I agree with it t a certain point but it kind of cuts both ways. When things are really bad I find the last thing on my mind are GID issues. It's all about just surviving at that point.

I agree with this, too.  I had always found crossdressing to be calming during difficult times, but during the worst of my wife's illness I didn't dress.  At that point it was survival, and putting on a bra and skirt wasn't survival.  Kind of like Maslov's hierarchy, where you have to have certain needs met before you are even capable about worrying about those at the next level.

- Kate

[Janet_Girl]

I am 55 and have been on HRT going a year now.  I have been living in my true gender for 6 months, and I could not be happier.

The younger ones have their youth on their side.  HRT can and does work wonders on their young bodies.  HRT will not make major changes for us, because we stopped growing along time ago.  But we older folks, for the most part have established ourselves in our professions.  Which can give us a network to continue on with our chosen profession.  And many of us are reaching retirement.

Family issues with parents for the most part are nil.  We have been making our own decisions for decades.  We made our mistakes and learned from them.  They don't have the luxury of that OJT.

But they did not have to face the pain and misery of years of living a lie.

Just my humble thoughts.
Janet

[Chrissty]

That's a very interesting theory and I agree with it t a certain point but it kind of cuts both ways. When things are really bad I find the last thing on my mind are GID issues. It's all about just surviving at that point.

I agree with this, too.  I had always found crossdressing to be calming during difficult times, but during the worst of my wife's illness I didn't dress.  At that point it was survival, and putting on a bra and skirt wasn't survival.  Kind of like Maslov's hierarchy, where you have to have certain needs met before you are even capable about worrying about those at the next level.

- Kate

The way it works is that you do not run off and dress/transition as such, but when you try settle back to 'normal' the 'bar has been raised' and you can find priorites shuffled.

I have actually come to realise that my GID is worst when I do try to realax, but when stressed I tend to focus and deal with the problems in front of me....so I agree with your comments..

BTW, can I just say your picture is hot!

Thanks Linus * Blush*


...and.... Hi Sis !

But they did not have to face the pain and misery of years of living a lie.

That sounds like me for a little while yet 



Chrissty

[Arch]

I was having an interesting discussion with my therapist the other day. She says that 80% of the people who go to her for counselling have lost control of their GID due to a trauma of one sort or another. The scale of trauma required was very much down to the individual, but it could vary from a "minor" accident, to a loved one dying unexpectedly, or illness.

As we focus our minds on dealing with the post-traumatic stress, it allows the GID to surface as the ability to control it is weakened.

This is exactly what happened to me. I lost two people I loved in the same week. I dragged around like a zombie for months but pulled myself together--pretty well, I thought. Then the first anniversary began to loom, and I became more and more strung out. I spent a few months knowing that something was horribly wrong with me but not knowing what it was. I thought that since more than a year had gone by since the deaths, it couldn't be related to them.

I held myself together until summer break. Then my gender and sexuality issues exploded out of me. All of the issues in my life, including things I thought I had dealt with long ago, came back to haunt me and took on gargantuan proportions. I've been doing triage ever since. At my age, a person can have a LOT of baggage.

I never thought of my situation in terms of PTSD, but now that I think about it, it fits.

[tekla]

At my age, a person can have a LOT of baggage

At your age, or at any age really, people have all the baggage with them that they CHOOSE to carry with them.  At the time you choose NOT to deal with something, you in effect, and in reality, choose to stick it in your baggage.  And its going to sit there no matter how many other things you do around it, until you deal with it, straight up, and flat out.

Though GID is very real, I suspect that for many people it becomes its own escape.  Its easy to lump everything into one basket, but dealing with the GID may well not solve all the problems you had going in.  Hence a higher than average suicide rate for people post-transition.  Transition solved a problem, it did not solve all the problems. 

[Nero]

It sucks to be transitioning late. I was supposed to 3 years ago. I'm such a loser. I'm 30. I never thought I'd be transitioing at 30! What the hell?

[Linus]

It sucks to be transitioning late. I was supposed to 3 years ago. I'm such a loser. I'm 30. I never thought I'd be transitioing at 30! What the hell?

Dude, I'm 39 and only started contemplating transition at age 36. It is not the length of the journey but that you're on the journey that matters.

[Wendy]

Crissty wrote,

I was having an interesting discussion with my therapist the other day. She says that 80% of the people who go to her for counselling have lost control of their GID due to a trauma of one sort or another. The scale of trauma required was very much down to the individual, but it could vary from a "minor" accident, to a loved one dying unexpectedly, or illness.

As we focus our minds on dealing with the post-traumatic stress, it allows the GID to surface as the ability to control it is weakened.

I'm a mess but I would say I no longer could separate all of life's issues and in the end I expend large amounts of energy in trying to figure how to transition.

I have no idea what I will do.  I guess I will keep pushing the bounds on the gender.

However I had a great life.  I have a beautiful family and a beautiful wife.  I would not trade my life for a 26 year old beach girl.  (Beach might not be a good choice of words.)  However it has been a lonely journey.  I share nothing.  I did well in school and had reasonably good jobs.  But the stuff has always bothered me.  I have tried to cope with it for decades.

Hey I've made a couple good girlfriends these days.  One even spends time with me and makes me laugh at myself.  Some days are O.K.

I am ashamed to say that I get jealous of many young MTF's but they probably are jealous of me.  I still have a chapter or two left in me so that we will see what happens.

Oh by the way many old ladies are quite "old".  Hey I would have less pressure to look pretty since I am already "old". 

K

[Arch]

At my age, a person can have a LOT of baggage

At your age, or at any age really, people have all the baggage with them that they CHOOSE to carry with them.  At the time you choose NOT to deal with something, you in effect, and in reality, choose to stick it in your baggage.  And its going to sit there no matter how many other things you do around it, until you deal with it, straight up, and flat out.

Though GID is very real, I suspect that for many people it becomes its own escape.  Its easy to lump everything into one basket, but dealing with the GID may well not solve all the problems you had going in.  Hence a higher than average suicide rate for people post-transition.  Transition solved a problem, it did not solve all the problems.

I see your remark about choice as sort of true. Or perhaps we only differ with respect to timelines and/or process.

From a very early age, I learned to cope by boxing things off and not working through them. When I was a kid, I really couldn't work through them. Denial and repression kept me sane. They kept me alive.

And since I got good at compartmentalizing and repressing, I often didn't realize that I had so much baggage. When I did realize, I worked through stuff as far as I could on my own. Then I guess I reached an impasse and went back to repressing. I essentially lied to myself about it.

I didn't realize how much undealt-with baggage I had until I came out of the closet. I can't simply choose not to carry this stuff around--I have to work through it and THEN choose not to carry it around. And that's what I've been doing in therapy for the past seven or eight months. I spent six months working through baggage before I started hormones. Consequently, I've been able to let go of some things. But I'm still processing a lot of stuff. I guess I still have a long way to go.

I stay in therapy because I'm still working through my sh**. I stay because I want to let go of all of this baggage but am only now learning how. And I stay because I know that transition won't magically fix me.