Being a sissy kid SUCKED I know that for sure.
i feel cautious giving my naive advice to an experienced member of the tribe but forgive yourself, get some make up and a really great dress. worked for me.

Quote from: alexbb on January 15, 2015, 10:26:44 PM
... get some make up and a really great dress. worked for me.

I have a few dresses, the ones I like best are the ones I made myself.  One is white taffeta with a fair amount of organza.  And battery-operated colored lights sewn to the lining.  Great at contra dances when they turn out the lights.

I'll pass on the make-up, though.  "I'm not that kind of (trans) girl!"  I don't even like to put sunscreen on.

+ + +

Sometimes thoughts/insights come to me like a note in a bottle.  Last night, near the end of a fairly enjoyable contra dance evening, a wave of discouragement and disconnection rolled over me, and the phrase "something died in me back then" came into my mind, and the thought that I will never be whole again until I die and the rest of me can join the part that died.  I keep thinking, that's overly dramatic, but I don't know if that's reasonable skepticism or just me gaslighting myself, the way I so often was and still am in my family.

Since I posted this, I've been noticing that I go through cycles:  I'll notice I'm feeling half-dead and say, I wish I could understand where this deadness is coming from, even hurting would be better than feeling dead.  Some time later, after I've forgotten the "I wish" part, I start feeling awful, like I am worse than a pigeon dropping and everything I do or don't do is further evidence that I am worthless and bad, and I go through a few days of wishing I could die just so the pain would stop.  Then, so slowly I don't notice it happening, the pain goes away.  Later, I notice feeling half-dead.  Rinse, repeat.

Maybe it's a case of "be careful what you wish for."

I think I've hit on an approach that is getting me somewhere.

I've been writing a story about myself -- an alternate childhood, starting back when I was eleven.  I started off imagining that I went beyond thinking about suicide and actually tried it, but survived, and that instead of being sent back home to be condemned for yet another high crime, I am put into a supportive environment (a theraputic boarding school, and yes, there are such places.)  I go on to imagine that my 11-year-old self gets what he needs, that the adults (and even the other children) try to make his life something he can succeed at, that he gets as much love and support and attention as he needs.  I think it's going to be a slow process.  It's a combination of figuring things out (like when writing any kind of story) and letting my subconscious lead me.  I get to a scene, spend a few hours or days waiting for something that feels right to seep out of my unconscious, then write a little bit.  I spend a lot of time rereading what I have written and experiencing the feelings that it evokes.

I'm not really any closer to remembering what it was like, let alone reliving it.  I may have sealed away the memories so well that I will never be able to retrieve them.  What I'm hoping is that by telling that 11-year-old that still lives inside of me (like the child in "The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas") a story in which he gets what he needs, things he never knew he needed but whose absence he suffered from, he will begin to heal.  Maybe he'll be able to put the past to rest.  It sounds silly when I say it -- how can something that exists only in my imagination banish events from the real world?  But then, that 11-year-old exists only in my mind, too.  And the events themselves only live on in my memory and in what they did to my inner self.  A virtual better life for a virtual self.

So I'm hoping.  Maybe someday the dead child inside me will come back to life.  Maybe someday I'll be able to cry again.

Quote from: Asche on March 17, 2015, 09:54:44 PM
It sounds silly when I say it -- how can something that exists only in my imagination banish events from the real world?  But then, that 11-year-old exists only in my mind, too.  And the events themselves only live on in my memory and in what they did to my inner self.  A virtual better life for a virtual self.

Not silly at all, Asche. Reframing the way you look at the past is a powerful tool. I hope it works for you.