My mind hasn't caught up with my body

[Nero]

Hi all.
I'm really hesitant to write this because I should be past any issues with transition. I mean, my transition's over (or should be). I've been on T for a year and a half, had the only surgery I'm going to have, all the paperwork and therapy is done. Anyway, in general I'm a lot less prone to talking about things now I'm on T. But here goes:

It all feels so surreal, I guess. My dream came true and other dreams are beginning to follow that path. But it feels like my mind really hasn't caught up with all this. I was a lot more sure of myself before all this happened. About 4 years ago I had everything together mentally in regards to transition. I had already made a mental transition. Then a few things happened: several people in my life died or disappeared, my health got bad so I had to wait before I could go on physically with transition, and I developed an alcohol problem to deal. Then I got better, had surgery and T, changed all the paperwork. I mostly don't drink anymore where I used to every waking moment.

Things are good physically. But I seem to have lost a lot of the progress I had had mentally before all this happened. But only with regard to transition. I've made leaps mentally in all other areas. I'm probably not explaining this very well, but it seems like my mind hasn't caught up with my body as far as transition. I think I just took it for granted and did all the physical stuff while neglecting the mental work. It's like I see my new name and body and think 'how did I have the balls to do this and where did those balls go?' I lost my confidence as a man back there somewhere. Now I feel (and look) like a little boy who just dropped from the sky. I don't know if it has anything to do with suddenly being perceived as someone 20 years my junior or not.

I'm not saying I have doubts about my gender or whether transition was right for me (it was), but that I haven't caught up mentally with all the changes. I'm kind of in a state of shock. When I look in the mirror, this person I always so desperately loved and needed to be has materialized. I touch his skin and feel numb and confused. It seems as unreal as if I dreamed of a unicorn and it suddenly appeared in my backyard. I've just molded myself out of thin air. Everything I've ever known about myself and my world has been turned upside down. There's the me who orchestrated all this and me the creation.

Then there's the fact that I'm super-conscious of my humanity when people look at and talk to me now. I'm visible now. I feel naked. My outer covering is gone. I've always interacted behind a shield. It's gone and the world sees me. I feel shy and newborn and on a strange planet.

I've never heard anyone else mention this, so I assume it's just me and how I process things.
I should also probably mention that even though I've been on T awhile, I seem to be irregular in how long it's taken me to actually look male and pass. So, this is all new to me.

[Janet_Girl]

One thing that got me thinking was some thing I said to my therapist.  We were chatting, catching up for my SRS letter, when he asked me what I was going to do after SRS.  I sat there and said that I have not given it much thought.

We get so focused on our transitions that we lose sight of "What comes next".  I am, like you Dear Brother, happy with the person in the mirror.  She has been a long time coming into the world.  She has one more step to be whole.  After that anything will be gravy.  But she has been so focused on SRS, she has not given any thought to what to do after.

You have went through so much and accomplished so much.  No one is more proud of you than your big Sister.  But now your mind has nothing to focus on.  And it feels lost.  It is time to look at what you want to do now that you are a man.

Figure out what you want to be when you grow up and go for it.  I am sorta of in a simpler boat.  I have a few things yet to do before SRS, I really need to think about what I want to do afterwards.

Hugs and love Little Brother.

[Cindy]

Hi Nero & Janet,

Funny I went through this last weekend. I was talking to my sister in law, who is extremely supportive of me. And she asked THE question. What are you going to do after you live FT as Cindy? Hadn't even got to SRS, just living FT with all the problems that will have. I sort of lamely said the same as I do now but in a happy way. But it has set a train of thoughts going, life will never be the same for me or anyone who has ever interacted or worked with me. In some way I will totally and completely destroy many peoples' belief in me. They always thought I was X, worked with me and respected my opinions and suddenly X will turn up as Cindy; a person they have always known but that they never knew. How do I deal with that? 

On reflection I feel I have lost my childhood, the grounding to my life was taken away from me and another put in its place.  I hated being a boy child but I was one, treated as one and taught, trained and indoctrinated as one. Even though I was always there.
I feel that I have been in prison for a very long time. I'm finally been let out. No one told me how to cope with the outside world. Here is freedom; deal with it.

I'm not sure if I can.

Sorry

Cindy

[rejennyrated]

The effect is well known in engineering and broadcasting.

It's called post-project blues and we all get it.

You work at something and take it to the point where it is ready to fly. Then you have to let go of it and see what will happen. Suddenly you are faced with the realisation that you have to go back to the beginning.

You have to start something else. To be a beginner again. It's a huge loss of status. You are no longer nearly at your goal. Now you have scored and the ball goes back into the center. There is everything to play for, and maybe this time it will be your opponents who score!

The only cure I know for post project blues is to find and throw yourself into a new project as soon as possible.

Oh and if your last project was SRS it is probably best to choose something different for the next one too!  otherwise   you could end up going around in circles!

[jmaxley]

I have a feeling of being lost sometimes, even though I haven't medically transitioned yet, due to funds; I am trying to live as full-time as possible in a town where everyone I know knew me as female.  I look in the mirror and see my short hair, my flat chest (thank you, binder), my man clothes, and wonder, who is this person?  Sometimes (a lot of time, actually) I can't believe I had the courage to make it this far.  Embracing my male side has brought me more happiness than anything has in a long time, despite the looks I get from people, despite my mom's reaction, and the nagging guilt in the background over that, despite the disrespect and sometimes hostility of the medical and mental health people I've come in contact with.  I was wondering tonight, what would my life be like after transition.  These last several months feel surreal.

[Julie Marie]

The one thing I learned that I never heard or read was mental transition was much harder and took longer than physical transition.  Let's face it, if you have all your letters and enough money, you can physically transition in about a year.  But erasing all the mental conditioning, much of it happening over decades, takes time.  And then you have to replace it with the new reality of living in the correct gender. 

Before I divorced someone told me for every year you were married, it takes one month to get over the marriage.  I guess one could come up with a similar formula for transition because the longer you have been playing in the role of your birth gender, the longer it takes to adjust to your new life.  When you think of all the steering and conditioning we get as kids so as to take on our assigned gender roles it boggles the mind how many tiny details we are taught over the years, all in an effort to get us to conform to socially approved gender roles.

Transition requires us to identify consciously all those things we did subconsciously and make the necessary changes.  Doing that in the amount of time we make our physical transition is a pretty tall order.  We just have to be patient while working through this stage of our transition.  And maybe we need to stress to those who are considering transition how important mental transition is.  We focus far too heavily on physical transition.  It's just the tip of the iceberg.

[Inanna]

I'm not saying I have doubts about my gender or whether transition was right for me (it was), but that I haven't caught up mentally with all the changes. I'm kind of in a state of shock. When I look in the mirror, this person I always so desperately loved and needed to be has materialized. I touch his skin and feel numb and confused. It seems as unreal as if I dreamed of a unicorn and it suddenly appeared in my backyard. I've just molded myself out of thin air. Everything I've ever known about myself and my world has been turned upside down. There's the me who orchestrated all this and me the creation.

Wow, that's a really fascinating description.  I think I may understand. 

Perhaps it's like...  life beforehand is one great attempt to adapt to that which cannot be, yet at the same time also trying to coexist around the sex we should have naturally been, seeing them alive and doing rather well every day.  The result of joining these two impossibilities is a feeling of the "other gender" being somewhat surreal, like a dream or story that can never be touched or held onto for long.  The contents of which are certainly not part of the same category of stuff that includes going to work or school, paying bills and other parts of life, more commonly known as reality.

And then one day, we find that this dream can be solidly touched and held onto, that it isn't slipping through our fingers when we wake up.  It's no longer in the same category as dreams or fiction or fantasy, but the common sense part of us is still too used to dealing with it as though it is. 

I expect a few years will settle such feelings.  However, I admit a small part of me actually enjoys this feeling of bewilderment from time to time, just to remind me how far I've come.