I just wanted to say that everyone I've ever known who had successfully transitioned was right.

It IS worth the pain and frustration.

It DOES get better.

It IS allowing me to finally be myself for once.

I WAS meant to be a woman.

I'm practically stealth now.  I still get weird looks now and then but for the most part, strangers react to me just as they would to any woman.  As my body changes and responds to HRT, laser hair removal, and a little preening, and as my fashion sense (which I didn't even know I had!) starts waking up and taking over how I dress, accessorize, and carry myself, I find that I'm actually happier than I've been in a long time.  A friend I hadn't seen in years actually said I look better as a woman than I ever did as a man.

Suddenly I realize just how much of a dark cloud the constant need to assert my maleness was; I swear, a lot of the men in our society want to turn everything into a competition!  It's a relief not to have to constantly defend the masculinity I never wanted in the first place. 

I don't even refer to myself as "transsexual."  I'm just a woman with a late start and for once in my life, I'm finally happy.

So for all you girls who made it and egged me on, you were right, you were right, a thousand times, you were right!  Thank you!

So, who else has started to find gender euphoria?

 

I definitely found gender Euphoria myself! Isn't it a great feeling to lie to the world NO MORE? I am full time, out and about and loving every minute. 

It's a good feeling to openly dress and act the way I feel on the inside. I'm not full time yet. But so far it's been well worth the admittance fee. It's the little things like seeing my nails or looking down and seeing a female body I enjoy the most.

Kyra if I looked half as good as you I would be EXTREMELY Euphoric! You need to go full time Sister of mine.

Can't wait to reach this point, though I am surprisingly optimistic and hopeful that I will. Sure I see myself now and still think "yeah, impossible that this could ever be considered fully female" but I know that these thoughts are common so I just try to keep telling myself "soon enough Ill have my looking back moment and realize how foolish I was to worry"

I seriously can't wait to find myself looking in the mirror a year later (speaking generously) and say "wow, my life has finally unraveled as it was meant to." Thanks for this post, it's always a relief to see that there are others who struggle in the beginning as well and then reach the ultimate euphoria of it all, makes me feel a little less worried. <3

Quote from: LittleEmily24 on May 28, 2014, 07:38:53 AMThanks for this post, it's always a relief to see that there are others who struggle in the beginning as well and then reach the ultimate euphoria of it all, makes me feel a little less worried. <3

Meanwhile, you have some friends to share the journey with by coming here.

Quote from: Rose City Rose on May 27, 2014, 09:38:18 PM

So, who else has started to find gender euphoria?

Me.

Though I haven't yet had the experience that I'm just a woman. I'm in a community where everyone knows I've transitioned, so stealth is impossible. I think I've decided that's OK - that my transition is a part of my past and shapes who I am, so it's part of me.

Quote from: LordKAT on May 28, 2014, 07:53:50 AM
Meanwhile, you have some friends to share the journey with by coming here.

True :3 i go through bouts of vanishings and reappearances though >_< sometimes i can't handle being on here because i start to feel like everyone's progress is moving monumentally faster than mine (which im always happy for but still causes me to feel like I'm making no progress at all). I still haven't gotten a good grip on my emotions/patience/hope =/ still can't find the seat belt on this rollercoaster, once I do I'm sure i'll enjoy the ride much more lol I think I might be sitting on it 0_o too scared to stand up and find out xD

... ok i might've gone a bit overboard with that metaphor hehe..

my transition has been an intense feeling of reality and freedom

After nearly three years "out and about", euphoria may be a little over the top, but as others have described, a dark cloud that had been over my life has sure been lifted.  There is a feeling of peace that I had not had in 6 decades of a life of acting and hiding.  The pressure is off of my life, and even humdrum existence seems -- just comfortable!! 

Who cares what the neighbors think, Guilt and Shame for being different that had been constant companions have been buried in a trash pile in some distant canyon, and no one in my life is looking for their corpses.

Sometimes euphoria, sometimes just a deep seated knowledge of the rightness of all this.  I live authentically and in a spiritual state of grace.  Some of it is the accoutrements of femininity but mostly it is the unspoken knowledge that I am right where I need and ought to be.  For a long time I sang "Somewhere" from West Side Story hoping that I would one day find a place and time where I didn't have to feel wrong and afraid.  I don't feel broken anymore, I feel reborn, transcendent, fearless. 

It has taken a couple of years and more pills than I can count, but my body and my mind mesh. My spirit soars with each new success, and each new adventure.  And adventure is what my life is all about these days.  I don't post as much because I am living instead of talking about living.  I'll be on the forums even less going forward, because I have a life that suddenly filled up.  And a job that I really must attend to more often lol.

So yes, to those who came before and paid the price so that I can live as I am; I give thanks.  To you who have helped me find this lovely woman named Julie; I will be forever grateful.  To everyone who finds the joy of living authentically; halleluiah!

There is a place for us. There is a time for us.  It is wherever we are, and the eternal now.

Blessings,
Julie

Quote from: Jessica Merriman on May 28, 2014, 12:24:17 AM
Kyra if I looked half as good as you I would be EXTREMELY Euphoric! You need to go full time Sister of mine.

+1 !

A lovely positive post - transition can go great, and as long as the expectations are realistic then any disappointments once one crosses the threshold are likely to be minimal. For myself, my dysphoria was largely about being excluded from being "one of the girls" as much as anything else. Having now transitioned two months ago I find that increasingly my inclusion by other women in women's activities is becoming natural and common - now that makes me euphoric!

Quote from: Ms Grace on May 28, 2014, 02:01:17 PM
A lovely positive post - transition can go great, and as long as the expectations are realistic then any disappointments once one crosses the threshold are likely to be minimal. For myself, my dysphoria was largely about being excluded from being "one of the girls" as much as anything else. Having now transitioned two months ago I find that increasingly my inclusion by other women in women's activities is becoming natural and common - now that makes me euphoric!

I think that's been a big part of my dysphoria

Quote from: LittleEmily24 on May 28, 2014, 07:38:53 AM
Sure I see myself now and still think "yeah, impossible that this could ever be considered fully female" but I know that these thoughts are common so I just try to keep telling myself "soon enough Ill have my looking back moment and realize how foolish I was to worry"

Thank you for saying this- it's exactly what I needed to hear. I've been full of those hopeless and self harming thoughts and now I know what to tell myself! I wish I had read this 3 days ago.

Quote from: EllieM on May 28, 2014, 01:11:50 PM

+1 !

Quote from: Jessica Merriman on May 28, 2014, 12:24:17 AM
Kyra if I looked half as good as you I would be EXTREMELY Euphoric! You need to go full time Sister of mine.

Your to kind ladies, thank you. I do feel happy to see myself at this stage. But I'm waiting for HRT to do its thing before I go full time. In the mean time I'm stocking up on clothes and other needed items.

Nearly every day I exclaim out loud, 'I love my life!'. I make sure I spend at least two hours a week dancing with joy. More than two years as my self and the cake keeps getting better. Going to Thailand in 11 days to put some icing on my cake but if I couldn't I would still love being me. Euphoria? Rightness! Feeling fully alive.

Quote from: JulieBlair on May 28, 2014, 12:27:24 PM
For a long time I sang "Somewhere" from West Side Story hoping that I would one day find a place and time where I didn't have to feel wrong and afraid.

That's a song I know well, especially from those last few months of struggling in the Bible Belt trying to get away.  I moved to Oregon to make my transition easier and every day, even if I didn't sing or think of that song, it would have meant something to me for sure.

Quote from: Kyra553 on May 28, 2014, 12:07:08 AM
It's a good feeling to openly dress and act the way I feel on the inside. I'm not full time yet. But so far it's been well worth the admittance fee. It's the little things like seeing my nails or looking down and seeing a female body I enjoy the most.

Keep it up!  You're gorgeous!