Hi everyone! Hope everyone is doing well. So my plan is to come out in November to everyone. I want to start with my present girlfriend. We have been together for nearly 3.5 years and am scared of losing her. She knows I'm transgender(1 of the 2 that know) and we have talked about this stuff before. Short story is I told her I was going to try and not transition because she doesn't want to date a woman and I was doing okay for like 3 monthes, but I can't handle it and really want to start transitioning. I dont know what to say and how to say it. I want to stay together, but I feel like that's not going to happen. Any advice would be amazing. Thanks so much! Everyone here is wonderful and beautiful! Thanks again

Hi Olivia88

Welcome to Susan's I hope you enjoy your time here. Coming out was one of the hardest things for me to do, but what I did realise is felt so much better for doing it. Reactions can vary and take quite some time to show. So remember someone's first reaction may not be their final reaction.

Regards

Liz

Coming out to my wife was the hardest thing I have ever done.  But it was necessary.

Be realistic in your expectations.  Your girlfriend might decide to stay with you or she might not.  You need to be ready for either possibility.  You already know that you have to transition, so going forward is the only option, whatever that leads to.

As for what to say, you have the advantage that she already knows that you are trans.  Your need to transition may be a disappointment to her, but it will not be a surprise.  Just tell it like it is: "Honey, I feel like I need to transition" or something to that effect.

Good luck!

Speaking from a very similar situation, I would tell her that I would really rather not have to transition, but you need to take care of yourself and there is no other option that would allow you to be healthy and happy.  It's just the truth.


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Quote from: Olivia88 on October 07, 2016, 02:56:46 AM
Hi everyone! Hope everyone is doing well. So my plan is to come out in November to everyone. I want to start with my present girlfriend. We have been together for nearly 3.5 years and am scared of losing her. She knows I'm transgender(1 of the 2 that know) and we have talked about this stuff before. Short story is I told her I was going to try and not transition because she doesn't want to date a woman and I was doing okay for like 3 monthes, but I can't handle it and really want to start transitioning. I dont know what to say and how to say it. I want to stay together, but I feel like that's not going to happen. Any advice would be amazing. Thanks so much! Everyone here is wonderful and beautiful! Thanks again

QuoteThe important thing is this: To be willing to give up what you are, for what you could become. -Charles Dubois

I was afraid to tell others who I really was, because that's all I had, so if they rejected that, then they rejected everything. However, once I allowed myself to be myself, I was introduced to the reality of my very own personhood and I started living authentically. What a relief. As someone else once said, "I did not know how heavy a load I carried until I set it down."

Thank you all so much! I know I just have to go for it. This is something I'm very nervous for, but also excited. I can't wait to start my journey. I will let everyone know how it goes when I do it. Oh and really quick. I have a good group of friends that I do not get to see all the time and I was thinking about texting them. Has this worked out before or is it a bad idea? Thanks loves

Quote from: Olivia88 on October 07, 2016, 11:01:25 AM
Thank you all so much! I know I just have to go for it. This is something I'm very nervous for, but also excited. I can't wait to start my journey. I will let everyone know how it goes when I do it. Oh and really quick. I have a good group of friends that I do not get to see all the time and I was thinking about texting them. Has this worked out before or is it a bad idea? Thanks loves

My information is 40 years old, having transitioned right after Stonewall. I did reveal for a while, however, up to about 15 years ago, then stopped telling people, even romantic partners. In my experience, if you tell anyone, you no longer control the story or how it is retold. If you put anything in writing, it can be passed on very quickly. Consistently over the years, I have found it takes most people 24 to 48 hours to get in touch with their real feelings after they have heard the news.

Also, people who knew from before have a great deal more trouble than people who know you in your new life. in both cases, they have difficulty imagining you any other way than they picture you.

I had FFS and met a friend who I had not seen in about 20 years. She recognized me at the restaurant where we had lunch. Half way through she commented, "you keep morphing before my eyes." It may have been the FFS. It may have been just seeing me in role. I had to remember while I had a lifetime to process my transition with sleepless nights, most people have to absorb this in a matter of hours and may never have given it any thought and only have Jenner as a touchstone and most of us don't look, act, or sound like her,not that there is anything bad about Jenner per se.

The main thing they will have to deal with is: would this female ever be the friend (whatever) I would have ever had? Was it the male stuff that pulled me in? Bad example. The friend thinks: that's the guy I used to watch football with and drink beers with. Would I do that with a girl? ANY girl ever? Another bad example Do I have to open doors for her? What if she turns me on? Man, it might be fun to kiss her. Oh ->-bleeped-<-! What do I do if she starts flirting with me? (Of course this is all in their own heads, but they are suddenly processing a hell of a lot at once with no one to help them through it.)

An email blast might not be as helpful as sitting down, one by one, and talking with people, knowing that as you do this, that the story could spread like wildfire and be told in a way you would not agree was true.

Finally, I was quite surprised who struck with me. A lot of "big liberals" threw me under the bus while some of the most conservative born-agains embraced me in my new role and never missed a pronoun and treated me only with respect.

It's crazy, but once it's over, it's over and you find out who your real friends are . . . and not. And then you move on.

I didn't come out to my wife and she left me for a Doctor she worked with. Now she says she would have understood. thirty seven year later. Sure would have saved a lifetime of depression and guilt. I was dysphoric before I met her but unfortunately this was the seventies and nobody knew much. Instead I kept silent because at the time being transgender was considered perversion. Even though I never felt I was a pervert, just confused. Thanks to the pathfinders like Dena I can talk freely about it today.

Oh how I hate hearing "You are not like other guys..."

Wife #1 did not respond well at all to learning I was a CD. It took her just a few weeks to start seeing a real man with a separation and divorce soon following.

She was followed by another woman I eventually came out to and was OK with me being a CD. We later became engaged. As wedding date pressure mounted she bolted. I wasn't a real man

My G/F, wife, BFF, and Reality Therapist of some 30 years knew I had gender issues from about day 1. For all that time I was resigned to being "just a cross-dresser". Which when you are 6ft tall, balding since 14, deeper then normal voice and big everything, about my best option after 2 failed transition experiments. Both of which, including HRT she also knew about. In time she became comfortable with staying home during my once monthly or so escapes from maleness, otherwise known as my dress-up days. Actually just hours. But enough to keep the corks mostly submerged.

Life was good, untill the excrement hit the air handler yet again for me. An event that got me to realize how much of the crap that happened was rooted in how I was NOT handling being trans. The stuffing, the denial, the living up to some idealized image. By the end of my third ever in my life TG support group meeting I knew I'd be lucky if it wasn't too late to let my wife wife know what was up. (I was working wayyyy out of state at the time)

Seven years after dropping the T-Bomb we are still together. Seven years later I still get the occasional "I did not marry a woman" or "If I only knew back then...." I also still live and present primarily as male.

Your g/f knows you have "issues" and that is both a blessing and a curse. You also have a hint of her vision of a future. You also have a clear(?) insight into your vision of a future for yourself.

The one and only thing that enabled my wife and I to work through things and to continue working through things were the oft times difficult brutally honest from the heart discussions. The most difficult part generally being trying to ignore the raw emotional, sometimes hurtful, things said during times of extremely high emotional stress. For us both knowing just how we both always placed the others happiness above our own made it easier to temporarily ignore the slight.

Seven years later we still play it One Day at a Time. Just as back then I have no clear vision of what I need. In a perfect world I would fully transition. In a more perfect world then today's I'd be back to spending more time living part-time as female. I also have many other competing needs and wants which place pretty high on the priority list. We both juggle and compromise. We both have our bad days. We both see that the majority of days are far better then they were thanks to how much I've been growing as a person.

Is there a clear deal breaker for us? Aside from another major betrayal by me? We do not know. Her biggest worry/fear is as I learn more and more who Joanne really is as a person that a male love interest is in my future. In fact she is certain of that aspect. While I am not so certain, I know if/when/ if-ever I go full-time it is a very real possibility vs the "Are you Crazy???" the prospect was after seeing many years ago the reality of being with a guy was a lot different then the fantasy. Today, there is no more deeply rooted "Some guy in a dress" guilt cloud hanging over me. Now just the shear joy of being out in the real world as the real me. Not only do I want feel that I am attractive to guys, guys are a heck of a lot more attractive to me. It's oft times scary the ways my mind wonders, even in male mode.

Hope for the best, but plan for the worse. Above all be totally honest. Saying "I don't Know" is a valid answer. Not everything in life is clear cut. Needing to experiment some or "to see..." may be where you truly are now, in search of some sort of relief from the GD.

Olivia being open and honest with her is going to be important at some point. As JoanneB stated, you hope for the best but plan for the worst. It's possible if she was included in the process and had some input in it that she might be okay with you transitioning depending on how far you plan on taking it. Sounds like your close the breaking point though in regards to needing to transition. At some point your going to need to choose between the possibility of losing your spouse and transitioning. It's very possible that you still might not lose her and get to transition which is the scenario that I hope occurs for you. For me telling my ex-boyfriend it was necessary and I was willing to take the risk, but I knew for our relationship to go anywhere it needed to be based on trust and I had to tell whether he could handle or even live with it or not. Turns out in the end he could, but that was his loss. In the end it comes down to you and what you need. Life is full of risks and unknowns and lets face transition is full of them. Coming out to an SO is probably one of the hardest things I ever had to do so I can totally relate to why your struggling to tell yours that you need to transition. Hugs
Mariah

JoanneB's post hits the nail on the head.

Perhaps this post is something of a rant or perhaps, better, a cathartic observation.  It is not a criticism per se.

The "You are not like the other guys..." comment is so true.  This has been a central theme in discussions with my therapist lately, central to the discussions about disclosure to my wife.  It is ironic that she was attracted to me for the feminine qualities that are central to my being and personality even though I would be identified by all that know me as a well socialized male, having mostly alpha roles.  It is clear to me that she would find it hard to stay with me or at minimum, would cease any closeness and intimacy with me if I overtly disclosed MtF transgender status to her.  I've had very open conversations with her where I query what exactly she was attracted to when we met and were dating.  Much of it was the classically feminine, not testosterone-laden maleness.  Despite this realization on her part, she cannot see what is right before her eyes, surely because she does not wish to or cannot face the reality of it and will not allow herself to see it.

How many times has it been written in posts on this forum  concerning wives and SO's:  "I married a man to be my husband..."   "I'm not a lesbian, I don't want to be married to a woman..."  "Why do you need to do this?  Why would you want to take hormones, destroy your genitalia?" and on and on and on.

It seems OK to have a limited number of feminine traits but the tables are turned when the story plays out to be frank ->-bleeped-<-.

You guys are all awesome. Thanks for the replies and helpful info. I am just going to go for it and as Joanna said, "hope for the best, but plan for the worst". I know I want to transition and at some point go full time. You guys are helping me to take the step. I know that it will be unhealthy if I don't tell her or anyone about myself. She has told me she isn't lesbian and is not attracted to women. I know she will see me and think of me as a woman when I transition so I don't see it working, but maybe it will. Thank you Mariah! I hope all goes well I'm your life and thank you steph! Are you still with your wife? And Joanna thank you! I hope everything goes well with your wife and your transtion. I also think guys are more attractive and would make me feel more feminine, but when you love someone it doesn't really matter. Well that's how I think.

Olivia,
I'm still with my wife, planning to stay that way.  I think I've found sufficient peace with my current situation.  Not the perfect outcome I might hope for in a perfect world but one I can live with for the foreseeable future assuming dysphoria does not flare up to unmanageable levels. 


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Quote from: Olivia88 on October 07, 2016, 02:56:46 AM
Hi everyone! Hope everyone is doing well. So my plan is to come out in November to everyone. I want to start with my present girlfriend. We have been together for nearly 3.5 years and am scared of losing her. She knows I'm transgender(1 of the 2 that know) and we have talked about this stuff before. Short story is I told her I was going to try and not transition because she doesn't want to date a woman and I was doing okay for like 3 monthes, but I can't handle it and really want to start transitioning. I dont know what to say and how to say it. I want to stay together, but I feel like that's not going to happen. Any advice would be amazing. Thanks so much! Everyone here is wonderful and beautiful! Thanks again

Just be upfront about what you want to accomplish, how you feel. How long you've felt that way, Why you want to go forward. Why you would risk so much. I lost my wife of two years because i kept secrets. Of course I know a lot more now than I did way back then. But it has haunted me for 37 years. Put it down in writing either with a letter,  or notes. If she hints she is upset for ignoring her, tell her why. Go into detail if you know why. If not, look through the wiki material here on Susans. Education is strength as in all things. Why on earth would you want to take some pills that will change your personality, Change your body, Perhaps going as far as surgery. Don't forget your earnings potential keep that in focus. I told my second wife when we met I crossdressed. and reinforced I wanted transition when I found my situation stems not from something I dreamt up one day. But it appears due to events in utero, I was predestined, I am so happy I finally decided to do something about it. I am lucky I have the wife I do . She doesn't necessarily understand but she also does  not judge. The relief of coming clean is priceless. When I did, all my worries and stress disappeared, at least until I go in public.

This may sound contrary, but here's the thing -- you aren't married, you're under no vows or obligations legal or otherwise.  And frankly, you don't know how your sexuality is going to play out.  It often changes under hormones.  You are going to change.

To change to the best of your ability it will help more to not be in an intimate relationship with someone who has that old image and personality rooted in their brain.

So, consider a best case scenario as one where she decides to move on.  Don't hold on.  Don't plead for her to stay, don't beg, don't hope.  You're doing something entirely for you, so she gets to do something entirely for her.  Let her know that she'll be sacrificing years of her life taking care of you (emotional work, I mean) while you transition, and you won't be able to guarantee that you'll even be able to stay monogamous with or, or attracted to her, when all is said and done.  (Me, I finally realized I would need to have sex with men.  I had to know.  I didn't share this information with her, and by the time I did, it was a huge betrayal.)  And if and only if then, after saying all that, does she decide to stay do you count your lucky stars.

Go then, there are other worlds than these.

Coming out to loved ones is, in my opinion the biggest downside of the whole transition process, and regardless of how optimistic you remain, barring extenuating circumstances, you're going to face at least some sense of loss. 

The decision to transition is something that people will use to blame you for all that goes wrong, but remember that YOU need to put YOU before all others.  Many transitioners assume that they'll eventually work things out, but reality says that probably greater than 90% of trans relationships ultimately fail.  The statistics truly are horrifying.

In my relationship with my wife we discussed things before I actually transitioned, but I kept her involved with all my decisions every step of the way.  I sought her advice on choice of new name.  Though I may not have been very enthusiastic with her choice, I went with the name she chose and got her involved.  I used her as a mentor, asking her advice, watching and learning a whole new way of living life from her.  I got her to teach me mannerisms, how to walk, talk, and present myself to others.  She taught me to do my makeup perfectly, and we spent many, many weekends engaged in new hobbies like doing each others acrylic/gel nails, or silly crafts that hang on our walls and remind us of the good times we had together.  We learned to love a new life together, and it's been the secret of our success.  Earlier this year we celebrated 26 years living together, and we'll be celebrating our 20th wedding anniversary in 3 weeks!  Be creative, honest and open with her, and learn to transition TOGETHER.   

Good luck!

Quote from: Sophia Sage on October 13, 2016, 04:16:34 PM
This may sound contrary, but here's the thing -- you aren't married, you're under no vows or obligations legal or otherwise.  And frankly, you don't know how your sexuality is going to play out.  It often changes under hormones.  You are going to change.

To change to the best of your ability it will help more to not be in an intimate relationship with someone who has that old image and personality rooted in their brain.

So, consider a best case scenario as one where she decides to move on.  Don't hold on.  Don't plead for her to stay, don't beg, don't hope.  You're doing something entirely for you, so she gets to do something entirely for her.  Let her know that she'll be sacrificing years of her life taking care of you (emotional work, I mean) while you transition, and you won't be able to guarantee that you'll even be able to stay monogamous with or, or attracted to her, when all is said and done.  (Me, I finally realized I would need to have sex with men.  I had to know.  I didn't share this information with her, and by the time I did, it was a huge betrayal.)  And if and only if then, after saying all that, does she decide to stay do you count your lucky stars.

Go then, there are other worlds than these.

I have heard that many trans people who were attracted to women before transitioning become more attracted to men, but I already am so Idk maybe it will make me strictly into men or I will stay bi, but thank you very much. I think I am going to just be honest and let her know everything and try not to beg her to stay with me

Quote from: Olivia88 on October 14, 2016, 02:13:23 AM
I have heard that many trans people who were attracted to women before transitioning become more attracted to men, but I already am so Idk maybe it will make me strictly into men or I will stay bi, but thank you very much. I think I am going to just be honest and let her know everything and try not to beg her to stay with me

You don't know untill if ever it happens, if at all. I know I always had the fantasy of being the woman with a man. Decades ago when I tried it..... let's say fantasy is where it should have stayed.

I always like to hope for the best in a situation like this and certainly that was the case for me when I came out to my partner.
But I have to agree with SophiaSage and would also add this...
Do you think she will be able to ride the highs and lows of transition.
She will want you to keep your penis if nothing else. You will say"Yes, I'll keep it"
Meanwhile you don't want to or are unsure or become sure later on, which is what happened with me.
I thought I could forgo gender affirmation surgery in order to save my marriage.
But after a few months on hormones I felt very differently.
Your feelings about men are not the only thing that might change.
Things you thought you wanted you won't, things you thought you could pass on will be given another look.
Will she be able to put up with the evolving transition plans?
If she leaves you it probably is a blessing in disguise.
I do understand that this is hard and we never want to lose someone we romantically love but after the loss we do heal eventually.
Now having said that, my partner and I are still together but we've been together 22 years and have a child of 18 years.
I know 3.5 years sounds like a long time and it is especially if you are a young person.
But what matters is, how solid is the relationship and what are her long range life expectations?
It sounds like you've got this though if you are going to say something and not try to hang on if she wants to go.
She will want a bit of time to think anyway so at least give her a chance to do that.

Just to say more about my own experience...

I was married, not even a year, when the dysphoria hit and soon I was getting electrolysis and seeing a therapist and of course I had to let Lisa know.  And she was heartbroken, but I didn't want to hurt her, I wanted to stay in the relationship for her.  And she went along with it.  She stuck it out through evenings where I cried under the coffee table. Through HRT, and figuring out clothes, and eventually facial surgery. 

The deal was that we would still have kids, and arrangements were made for that.

Well, about six months after Facial Reassignment, suddenly guys are flirting with me.  And I'm realizing I like it.  And even more... I don't want kids.  Not under this arrangement.  Her womanhood affirmed, staying home to take care of them, while eventually there would be the story told to them a few years down the line?  And what would that make me?  "I'll cycle my hormones and produce breast milk, even a little bit," I say, for I was getting some of that already.  Oh no, she didn't want me in on that action.

Eventually, the inevitable happened.  A guy kissed me, a stolen kiss, and yes I was over the moon.  So I told her, and the next day I was packing my bags at her insistence (barely six weeks before SRS!), but in truth, we were always going in different directions. 

I'm so grateful for that man stealing a kiss, propelling me down the path I always wanted to go down anyways, saving me from promises I never should have made in the first place.