How has being transgender (any variation) hurt your relationships?

[Kendall]

I was thinking about my past one experience and some from others that I have read , where relationships drastically change or come to a end because of being transgender. So how has being transgender hurt relationships (love, family, work, friends or community).

[Tiffany2]

Kendra;

  Your post got me to thinking about a lot of things in my past and the freedom I have now that I have started this journey.

  I guess I'm not alone; but I have a ruined miltary carreer where "trying to be a man" didn't work. A whole string of failed jobs followed with people hurt along the way as mood swings would ruin friendships.

  It seems like all of my decisions were based on trying to be something I'm not and all it did was make me feel worse until I could finally be honest with myself. Learning what I am has been such a relief.

  Thank you so much for that question. The time to think about it blessed me.

  Tiffany

[Melissa]

Let's see.  My parents/brother/sister refuse to see me now.  I lost a job working for them because of transition.  I'm going through a divorce (but I think this would have happened anyways). I rarely ever see the person I used to call my best friend, due to lack of time on my part and differing interests.  He's been a great friend though.  Also I was forced to leave the church I went to.  That's about it.  I'm still happier now and have way more friends than I ever had before in my whole life.  I consider a friend as somebody you can call up in the middle of the night and talk to if you really need to.

Melissa

[LostInTime]

Hmm, I did not really lose a lot but then I did not start out with a lot either.  There are a couple of friends that I was close with that decided to end the friendship.  It hurt but now I could really care less.  My family was a little distant at first but that was because my first transition failed so badly.  Now that they see how well I am doing, it has improved.

Dating.  I cannot seem to find myself a nice person who does not end up questioning their sexuality because they are attracted to me.  Maybe that will change, maybe it will not.

Work.  Things were bad for awhile but have now mostly improved but it is not like it was before they knew the real me.  For some it was no biggie and for others, well their religion dictates that I am evil so they avoid me as much as possible.

[Kate]

So how has being transgender hurt relationships (love, family, work, or friends).

Aside from looking increasingly odd, I'm not officially "out" yet, so I can't speak about work or family beyond the usual damage trying to maintain such a huge, dark secret all these years. It ate away at me, made me withdraw into myself, becoming obsessively introspective and self-absorbed to the point where my social contacts suffered. I find it difficult to maintaiin friends, as I'm usually so busy self-pitying myself that I never think to pick up the phone and stay in touch. As booze becomes an alcoholic's best friend and mistress, so too became my TSism.

Marriage though. Sigh. By far, this is the most emotionally painful thing I've ever had to work through. It was inevitable though, as we've *always* had problems since day one - mostly sexual, and all from the TSism and my deceiving her (and myself) into thinking I was a normal, heterosexual guy (sex-wise). Sixteen years of a nearly sexless (intimacy, foreplay and affection - just very, very llittle sex) marriage have left her incredibly unhappy, and feeling like she's wasted her "best years."  Even if I *don't* transition, that problem still remains - and all because making love to a woman is such a heartbreaking, frustrating conflict of emotions for me.

We do love one another, and we work *great* together otherwise. It's just as she says: perhaps we should have been best friends - which is pretty much what we've always been anyway.

[Jessica]

My wife thinks I am possessed by demons.

We avoid the subject entirely.
She pretends it doesn't exist, and I spend every moment, waking and sleeping, thinking about it.

c'est la vie