Hi, I'm Lalauri. Okay, that's not my real name, it's a name I made up for an RP character when I was a teenager, but I've always liked it, so I'm keeping it.
I signed up to Susan's around the same time I did another forum a few weeks ago, but was at the time daunted by the sheer amount and range of discussion going on here. Fortunately lurking these last few weeks has let me see that this place seems very supportive and I'm ready to start contributing.
I basically admitted to myself, at the age of 30, that there's a strong possibility I may be trans just a few weeks ago after a job I did at work involving a teenage trans girl forced me to confront it. Prior to that I was very much denying and repressing my feelings ever since I was a kid. On a couple of occasions I've been forced to confront the idea but have always choked it back down. Fortunately my wife is very supportive and has been helping me to explore what that might mean as much as possible.
I'm a Brit living in Australia for reasons of said supportive wife being an Aussie. I moved over here a couple of years ago and last year we got married. We are both really hoping that marriage equality becomes a reality in Australia soon and that the law acknowledges the existence of trans people in marriages who might not want to get divorced, to make an already complex situation as easy as possible. To be honest the number of administrative hoops between Australia and the UK that I may have to jump through over the coming months and years are one of only two things that really terrify me about this.
The second is coming out to my parents, who have always been very loving and supportive, but I'm worried this may go too far for them to understand and I might end up losing them, which I am terrified of. We are going back over there to see them in late October and I think I'm going to have to come out to them then, but hopefully I will have been at least able to talk to a therapist before then.
At the moment my wife and I are stuck in a mid-sized town in Central Queensland which isn't exactly known for it's tolerance and diversity; there is exactly one psychologist in town and she's a crazy cat lady who I saw last year and who seemed to have decided she would rather be a dietician than a psychologist, as all she talked about was what I ate, so not very helpful. Hopefully very soon we will be moving down to a state capital though, where options look a bit more open.
Anyway, I guess that's enough about me for now. I look forward to getting to know people here and being able to contribute in future!
