The time around Christmas is a struggle for us right now. With everyone asking what we want, we are having to bite our tongue and not say a dress or some cute pumps.  Even though our wife knows, we have to translate it to mean, "What does Maleme want?"   One thing that makes this trickier is that a few years ago, Christmas came only a couple of months after she came home early and caught us in the middle of slipping out of our dress followed by weeks of difficult conversations.  She surprised us when we got home after the midnight service Christmas Eve with a special gift for Amanda-me of a couple of skirts, a coordinating blouse, and a coordinating necklace. We were almost in tears and could hardly speak.  The problem is that we have to work hard to remember  that was a gift and not to expect that every year. Maleme is much better at that kind of rational thought. I-Amanda long for those signs of acceptance so much. It is not really about the clothes, but about the acceptance they signify.  We would be happy just to find some clip-on earrings or a cheap costume jewelry necklace in our stocking.

The combination of more Amanda time when we are able to take a few more days off than our wife, but having more public times of having to be in Maleme mode is also not easy to navigate. We have been fantasizing about showing up a church in a dress and heels while keeping the beard a lot the past few days.

Sounds good to me!

Here in Thailand, showing up at a Buddhist temple in a dress and beard wouldn't make anyone bat an eye.

Not only are transgender mixed presentations accepted, males in both Buddhism and Muslim faiths often wear robes and/or embroidered skirts, handmade jewelry, and Buddhist men often have long hair as well.

I tend to buy Thai men's jewelry while skating along the border to pass as female.

Its the heart that gives.

When we are trams, and are loved, as time goes on, more acceptance comes.  They may not feed the she in us, the he in us, the we in us.

But as time goes on, things change.

I went to my kids stealth male androgyne, fpr their needs.

One gave a nice andro bracelet, another an ankle bracelet, the third andro/fem slippers.

Unexpected, and wonderful.
The wife gave cash, foods i love.  Amd her heart, i woke in her arms and i sleep full out transitioned sh'e.

Time and love.  And no expectations.

The rest will come.

Merry Christmas or Happy Holidays, to the Unicorns, and all on this board.

Satin Joy

Thanks for the kind thoughts. It is not that we do not know that it will take time and patience without expectations, but we do need to be reminded of it now and then from someone other than Maleme. It is so easy to fall back into fear and despair when it seems like things will never change. I-Amanda am getting tired of hiding away and so much want our friends and family to know me even if it risks rejection and estrangement. 

I think being any kind of trans can be lonely, even if one just to wants to be understood. Hiding aspects of oneself is difficult and takes an emotional toll.

I don't have it bad at all, compared to a MtF, since I'm only a partial transmale, and don't have to physically transition, but the inner persona still wants recognition.

It has taken a very long time, and each person has a different acceptance level.

I am very fortunate.

If i always presented female it would not have worked out well at all.

But since I socially work the gender matrix, things go better.

Its tough for them if they walk in when i let my hair down.

I dont put the pic up in here but i am very transitioned to sh'e and pass stealth female.

They walk in while i am in jeans and a cami, there isn't much guy at all.

And in yhose times you cant tell me from androgyne to ts woman.

Its hard to explain.

Hope we all survived Christmas.  I have a lot of friends who are in a lot of pain right now.

This was a VERY difficult Christmas for me.

I usually survive by working through the holidays, since Thailand doesn't officially recognize Christmas, but this year I was off all December, so had to face myself.

My daughter came to visit on Christmas last year, and stayed for two months, so that was wonderful, but this year it seemed totally empty without her.

The Thai king recently died, so the entire country is in mourning, so I couldn't count on the festive lights, Christmas trees, music, outdoor booths, etc that usually fill the streets and malls of Thai towns and cities from late December through Feb, combining both Thai and Chinese New Year festivals with Christmas.
It was dark and silent, even in the main modern malls...like in some post-apocalyptic movie.

I had no idea it would affect me so negatively.

I went shopping anyway, went to the beach, went hiking, went birding in the mountains, did online teaching, cleaned my apartment, watched Netflix movies with my pet Asian Fairy-bluebird, blabbed online with my USA friends (that I have left, after the election) and messaged with my daughter.

My ex-husband began cautiously negotiating to come live with me, saying he's going to transition into living as a non-binary female, but this only triggered more stress response, since when we were together he was a dangerously treacherous and jealous type, who tended to take secret revenge for imagined slights. Yet rejecting him seemed like I was not willing to help a fellow transgender person, perhaps what he'd counted on, being a master manipulator, while I'm a straight-dealing male type.

Yet through it all, if I stopped for a moment, I could feel the faint idea that I don't even know what I am, where I fit in. The derris scandens capsules keep me functional and happy for the most part, but in the silence I missed my daughter, missed being part of a family, having a significant other, attending family gatherings, being accepted in society, making my children proud of me. Right now, I live as a voluntary exile.

And it's not because I transitioned and was rejected.
I look the same, but it was my own internal awakening to my transmale reality that drove me abroad, to a country where I somehow knew I'd be seen as normal.

Raell,

   Your story pulls at our heart. From what you have told about your ex, it is definitely good to keep them at a distance. We wish there was some magic wand we could wave that would give you those connections of family.

Thanks, Amanda!

Luckily, I start back at work next week, so at least I'll have that distraction. Even today, driving the motorbike to the beach and around downtown Songkhla, seeing all the black-draped mourning decorations, people dressed in black, no holiday lights, no festival food booths, I fought negative thoughts.

I guess I come to this forum because I can't discuss anything trans with anyone I know. Thai people don't discuss it, because it's a non-issue. People simply dress in the gender presentation they prefer, and go on like nothing happened.

Amanda, I know your frustration all to well myself. For me, my entire family (parents, siblings, children) are accepting and supportive except for my wife.  She can't even look at clothes I've bought for myself if they came out of the women's department.  So while other members of my family would have happily bought me feminine gifts, I had to log only masculine/male gifts on the shared gift registry that we use. I was really hoping for a small token of acceptance from my wife similar to what you describe receiving. 

On the bright side, my sister found a way around it (without any prompting from me mind you).  Just before Christmas we had planned to go to lunch and visit an Ulta Beauty so she could help me start building my makeup kit.  It was a great experience but as we were checking out she took one of the items from me and said "I'm buying this for you as you Christmas gift".  My wife wasn't thrilled about it but since she didn't have to watch me open it and get excited about it, that approach ended up working out well.  So I did at least get one femme gift this year.

For me, the bigger issue than the gifts was my presentation at our family Christmas. With my family being so supportive, I really wanted to go out in fully mixed presentation.  Again, however, my wife is not ready to face that yet so I ended up in all male attire. I'm hoping by next year that acting job will be no more.

Thanks Lisa,

It helps not to feel so alone in our experiences. We wish we could be out to our family like you are, but circumstances make it quite difficult. Our wife is very afraid of being judged or pitied by others and the more people that know the greater the likelihood of it becoming general knowledge by everyone who knows us.

Two of our grown children would likely be accepting, but one daughter tends to like things black and white and would likely feel threatened by us not being way society says are supposed to be. One of our sisters and her husband are fundamentalist Christians that believe that being trans or gay is a disease to be cured at best or a deadly willful sinful choice that makes us deserve to be punished at worst.  Our mother is just from that older generation before the women's movement and the LGBT rights movements. She would probably come around given a long time to process things, but it would be difficult for her. It would likely be something like loving us because we are her child, but never really completely understanding. She would also have to work through stopping blaming herself for how we turned out.

The one person in the family who we might be able to open up to is our other sister. She is accepting of others who are LGBT in her life. But, it might be different with someone she grew up with and changing form the person she thought she knew.. And, having to keep it secret from her kids and possibly her husband could color things.

Then, there is the fact that changing even partially is like the Maleme they know dying with this changeling Amanda taking his place (at least from their viewpoint). We have seen this in ourself with a person we know who identified as lesbian when they lived here, but came out as androgynous non-binary after moving away. It was very difficult to watch them on Facebook physically transitioning from the women we had formed psychological attachments to someone with more masculine facial features and a deeper voice like a teenage boy. Even knowing that we are lot like them, getting beyond the intellectual understanding to accepting that they were never really the women we thought we knew and letting her go is very hard to do.

I-Amanda had not meant to drop so much out there, but it looks like we really needed to vent a little. It is hard to be so open with our wife as we can here.

Amanda

I think you are all very brave.

I had the great advantage of getting divorced and moving to Thailand before realizing I'm partially transmale. Thailand accepts a Third Gender, so this is a great place to live.

I came out to my siblings in a brief email three years ago, and got no comments. Probably didn't understand what I was talking about.

But yesterday, while chatting on Skype with a close female relative who is very liberal (I thought) and runs with an LGBTQ crowd, I mentioned my "male side" and I don't know if she was having PMS, or what, but she went off on me in a screaming fit that frightened me so much, I hastily said I had to go and hung up.

Apparently, I'm a loser who ran away to some isolated place, and now I'm making up stuff, like other so-called transgenders because I'm whiner with a bad personality.

Maybe that's the consensus of the rest of the family as well. Even though my siblings, unlike her, are conservative Republicans, she seems to have similar attitudes.

Amanda, that is a very tough situation and I definitely feel fortunate to have the support I do. You should never feel guilt about venting here, hell that's what this place is all about.

The "fundamentalist Christian" views (I put that in quotes because in my mind those attitudes are anything but Christian) is a terrible thing to deal with.  It's essentially a form of hatred with no logical basis so it simply can't be reasoned with. I agree with Raell, I think you're very brave.

I hope you'll keep sharing openly with us as long as it's helpful to you in some way.  I can't imagine anyone here would hold that against you.  Getting support from people who can identify with your situation is the whole point of coming here.  I for one will be happy to "listen" any time you need to get something off your chest.