Hi Again Shadow!!!

You have challenges ahead to be sure! Transition can be tough... doing it in a inhospitable environment tougher still and trying to find gainful employment while doing those two without a work history... is indeed, icing on the cake but... the good part is, you amongst friends and have a lot more people on your side now ... right here!

No worries about criminal history dear sister... I had a 17 year drug history ( My attempt at slow suicide!)... 14 years as a heavy methamphetamine user and dealer... arrested several times... I made money and I also eventually found myself homeless and eating out of dumpsters... left it all behind in 1995 and became " successful" in most ways except in being me... the real me!... We all had lives before we got here!!!

You haven't mentioned the liberal city you are near... you may have sisters here that know of resources, training, housing opportunities etc there....

You could try posting a new thread mentioning where you are and that you are seeking input on those things... there are a lot of caring folks here and we have tentacles reaching all over the world!!!

Let's keep hope in our heart and keep moving forward together!!!

Btw... on the Adam's apple front... mine was huge too... trach shave was the first thing I did,

You can see it in my " before" shot here in post #1052

https://www.susans.org/forums/index.php/topic,224896.msg2060612.html#msg2060612

Onward we go girl!!!

Ashley 😀❤️🌻

Hang on there, stop pretending to be male and just dress femininely (yet conservatively and age appropriately). If your neighbors opinion matters to you - be nice to them and say hi. If there's a church everyone goes to - maybe it would be a nice idea to start attending Sunday services dressed appropriately for a women. Focus your energy on helping others and helping yourself (financially and otherwise), and stop thinking on bad things that might happen - being more vulnerable is a part of being female, so take it as a part of the package.


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Hey you all Thank You so much. As a thanks I will drop this site a little donation in the coming weeks. I have never reached out to the LGBT or transgender community in my city, but will check those resources.

I still legally have my male name but I am getting it changed real soon. It's expensive and getting my name changed on all documents is time-consuming and I do procrastinate sometimes! Luckily the state where I was born and where I now live have lawmakers with their heads somewhat screwed on straight so getting all my papers changed to feminine name/gender marker is not like some epic battle royale. Also I plan to get the ball rolling on getting my bottom surgery. As precarious as my situation seems, I still do have some support here with my father, who promised to not kick me out, knock on wood, but once I get a name change and surgery it may be wise for me to move on and look at housing. I am just worried it will be in some ghetto or with people who will hurt me. I am not expecting anything upscale, but I still am concerned for my safety. Barring all that, I think it may be best to try and look for things like employment and stuff once I am full time. I want to work. I want to work full time so bad and support myself and I don't even have high aspirations because a one bedroom apt in at least a respectable neighborhood that's not some war-torn, drug infested danger zone is enough. That's what sometimes gets me... even something so simple, a simple life in a  simple apartment with a simple car seems like it may as well be wanting a Malibu mansion and a Rolls.

I am curious, however, as to what type of jobs LGBT groups can get for trans women like me without experience? Does anyone out there with experience in that have any insight? Do the jobs offered just pretty much run the gamut?  Let me ask like this: What are some jobs that you all think would be good for me to work towards when just getting started? My real weakness, like many others, is math. What industries are generally more liberal/accepting?


It will be a little while before I can respond back, but I am here reading everything posted and will take time to respond later. Sorry if I do not respond directly to everyone, I don't want anyone to feel like their posts to me were ignored or not appreciated.


[edits for clarity]

Women work in almost any profession these days. We rent to a women who runs a truck trailer repair business. Before that, one of the job she held was working underground maintaining the tunnel boring equipment. Women also work construction and other male dominated professions. A long shot but I saw a show once where a former inmate worked in a lock smith shop and became so skilled and trusted that the owner gave him the key to to shop.

Most states have a state employment service and that would be a good place to start. They may be able to connect you with training if needed or advice you on possible professions. I suspect you are relatively smart as running a scam requires the ability work the system without getting caught for a while. There are many jobs where a hard worker who can use their head are needed and most will train you. If you spend some time seriously looking for work in the right places, there should be a job available for you. Just remember that some of the most unlikely jobs may be good options. Walmart has supported the transition of several of our members.

Quote from: Shadowsister on December 28, 2017, 03:55:26 PM
I can sorta relate. I am 35 and started hormones at 34 years old. That feels so old for this because it feels like I have just missed out on so much. Plus I am tall, 6' on the money. I don't know what to do. Gender dysphoria has messed me up so much that even at this age I have never held a job for over six months, ever. Never once. I am on SSI and everything. I actually still live at home and never was able to live on my own. I just feel lost and not passing feels like just another

I just wanted to say I noticed this part of your posts and wanted to say... you aren't alone at all. I am 35 and on SSI disability after spending most of my life as a shut-in. I have never lived alone, living with my mother until I was 32 and then, after she passed away from cancer in 2014, I moved in with my father where I currently reside. Never was able to make it to a job, much less hold one down. But it's important to know remember it's not hopeless! Since my mother's death I was sort of shaken awake, and have spent the past few years improving myself in so many ways I thought I never could (weight loss, working on a degree online, getting my drivers license), which is what led me to addressing being transgender a few months ago to begin with. You have shown so much courage by starting hormones, and even looking to address your fears and worries on these forums is a huge deal, don't sell yourself short!

I was sitting here thinking and if you were in my area, I know of 3 companies that are hiring if you are the right person.
1. Truck paint shop that will train but needs a hard worker to do repairs and refinishing.
2. Truck trailer repair, again hard worker to do repairs and they hire people who have records.
3. A guy just starting a medal fabrication business who will train on medal cutting machine and other fabrication equipments, welding and anything else the job requires.
All of theses business have a common problem of the people they hire just don't want to do the work. If somebody is willing to put out the effort, they would have a job for life. All of these jobs are located on a 30 acre industrial park and the first two have been hiring for a while. Also gender wouldn't be a restriction on any of these jobs.

Fear I understand. I did push going full time and I don't regret it, but I got beat up bad not long after. I didn't pass really but I was drowning and I HAD to go full time for my mental health. That was one year on hormones. I have a friend that started the same time as me and is just now presenting female and going full time. It's different for all of us. Don't be discouraged about not passing just yet, there is time.

Sorry if this is all out of order, I am having a hard time focusing.

I am 48 and I don't know how I pass but I do. I feel very lucky. The fear has not gone away though. Knowing, not guessing, knowing that laws are the ONLY thing keeping some people beating me up or killing me if they knew. My best friends boyfriend hates trans people and always looks daggers at me. He shoots cats that wander through his yard and talks about all the people who deserve to be shot. If that guy ever snapps, I don't want to be around. There is reason to be afraid BUT that should never stop us, make us cautious sure but not stop us. Every time we drive we are in mortal peril. We have to trust that all the other drivers are doing what they are supposed to be doing or we would never leave the house.

If you look at a lot of older transitioners timelines, well this is for all of us I guess, but there is a moment where you can pickit out. Like There! That is the moment when the male is gone and only the female remains. I think you will find that that point is rarely around a year, usually it is 2-3 years. Genetics and age play a part but that is a good average.

Last year's local trans pride event I saw a lot of people who changed how I view passing. Two in particular, both young, one a crossdresser and one a transsexual. To look at them they were flawless and beautiful but neither of them passed well at all because of their presentation. The one did okay on stage but the moment he stepped off it was gone the other was trying but just didn't have any experience at it. Then I saw a friend from work who was walking with a woman that I assumed was his wife, turned out to be his sister. Not in anyway standing out, just an average woman. After a few minutes talking I asked if they were there for the show, he already knew about me for a long time so he wasn't surprised I was there. Nope, his sister had recently came out as a transsexual woman and wanted some support when she went to the pride event as a girl. I was so impressed, not beautiful no glamour in any way but completely passable. She actually reminded me of my aunt so much so that I had to stop myself from calling her my aunt's name. A little gruff, smoked 2 packs of cigarettes a day since she was 16 voice and a mischievous twinkle in her eye. Presentation is so important. A beautiful woman who in every way acts and talks like a brah will not pass any more than Jay Leno wearing a dress. Presentation is a huge percentage of what makes us passable.

Anyway, this stupid headache is demanding that I take something for it and go to bed.
Night, hope you feel better tomorrow.

So as you can see im no CoverGirl. I can be a lil blunt but here is a little of my success.

1. LOSE THE FEAR  gain some confidence. .... its all baby steps.
2. THE VOICE TAKES ALOT OF PRACTICE. find a pitch you are comfortable with. 180 to 200 hertz and work that pitch starting at what is comfy to at least an hour a day. Listen to females, copy their inflection and intonation.  talk slightly slower and use a lot of describing colorful language.  study women

3. BODY LANGUAGE  hold elbows close to side and "talk " with hands, eye movent and facial expression. are key to help be convincing.  keep yourself small elbows in knees close or crossed

4.   SMALL CONFIDENCE BUILDERS, a necklace clear nail polish are all reminders of who you are and who you wanna be its all baby steps.

5. DONT RUSH. slow and easy improvement, not perfection

6.  HAIRSTYLE  grow out hair or get a wig... one that  frames your face

This was the start of me being afraid of leaving my house to almost 3 years rlt. Do I get treated as a woman? For the most part yes.  Do I get misgendered?  Not as much as before.

Just some friendly pointers hope it helps.

Grr! I forgot work!

I get it, I do. When I was looking for work I had friends that were like, why don't you do this or why don't you do that? Well, okay lemme break some things down for you. Tree service where there are all guys and I would be stuck in that stupid truck with them at least a little every day? You are joking right? While we are at it let's just scratch off ANY almost exclusive male field. Beats selling my body on the street, doubt that anyone would pay for it anyway, but not by much. Unless someone has experienced that they have no idea. Constant name calling, little pushes to outright shoves and the list goes on and on.

There are places that offer trans friendly environments even advertise it.
Retirement communities are good. Well as long as you can handle the old men grabbing at you or offering his "services". I volunteer at one and I have never had a problem. Ah hem, other than the horny old men.
Healthcare period is good, even moping the floor pays well and no one cares what you are there.
Target is a trans friendly place to work and I know two girls that are very happy there.
I now work in customer service for a cabinet manufacturer. Your voice will get awesome in no time.

It may seem overwhelming at first but there are jobs available.

Take care.

Ugh! Back again, sorry.

What Laurie K said. All good I would just like to add a little.

Pitch is important BUT without the right resonance your voice can still give you away. The local news weather lady`s voice is considerably lower pitched than mine but no one would ever think she is male by her voice. God, it is so warm and smooth. I have had the VA offer voice therapy recently and when I turned it down they asked, "Wouldn't you like to get your pitch higher?" My pitch is around 185-190 which is fine I think but they were convinced they could help. I had to ask them if there was any way or context that my voice would be construed as anything other than female? Um... no. Will my voice ever give me away as trans? Um... no. Does my voice sound in any way less natural than any woman you have talked to today? Well no but... don't you want to have a higher pitch? Um.... no. If it ain't broke, don't fix it. Pitch is important BUT resonance will get you passing in situations where they are in doubt much quicker than pitch.

Laurie had talked about movement. This is the perfect time of year to observe male and female movement. Everyone is wearing bulkier clothes. Except UPS drivers, what's up with that? 20 degrees and you are wearing shorts?!? Anyway it is much more difficult to differentiate between male and female, but watch the way they move. Can't you tell? Can't everyone? Even the way they change direction, men at the shoulder, women at the hips. There are movements we make that scream to anyone and everyone, this is a dude or this is a chick. The next time you find yourself walking next to someone that you can only see barely in your peripheral vision, try to determine if they are female or male by their movements. I am betting that you can.

The point is, the things that make us truly pass are not the hormones, it's the lifetime of girls imitating other girls that we have to catch up on. It takes work and TIME. Give yourself a little break. 😁

I've done a lot of stupid things I probably should have been dead but here I am. My point is life will drag us down sometimes but it's not over if you're still breathing.

I don't know about passing because I haven't given it much thought yet. I figure people will clock me and they do. It's always embarrassing when they stare, point and whisper/laugh with someone next to them.

Yeah it brings me down a bit because what they do is childish and just uneccessary. I look at myself and say what's wrong with me?

I will say it builds a sort of resentment in me because I realize "not passing" (whatever that means) is my shield to protect me from ignorant people. These strangers are a waste of my time anyway.

I know that wasn't much help with tips and advice. I'm sure that for me it'll take ffs to help me pass and even then I'm not sure

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Just a thought, but you may be able to throw in a small sum with your Medicaid covered surgeries to add in some small ffs procedures. Since they're already in there. Like fat transfer for a breast augmentation and they toss a little in your face... etc. Surgeons will generally work with you on a sliding scale.

Hey everyone, I am back. I needed some sleep.

Read everything you all wrote and will be taking a lot of the advice that has been laid out for me here, extremely hard though it may be. Sometimes it's to hard to remain positive and I need a little help. It feels bad knowing that I'll probably never have a good man, a family, and this political climate we're in can all just be so draining. Tired of being the butt of jokes, and being a political pawn and every so often it's like it overwhelms me.

Quote from: Dena on December 29, 2017, 12:07:50 AM
I was sitting here thinking and if you were in my area, I know of 3 companies that are hiring if you are the right person.
1. Truck paint shop that will train but needs a hard worker to do repairs and refinishing.
2. Truck trailer repair, again hard worker to do repairs and they hire people who have records.
3. A guy just starting a medal fabrication business who will train on medal cutting machine and other fabrication equipments, welding and anything else the job requires.
All of theses business have a common problem of the people they hire just don't want to do the work. If somebody is willing to put out the effort, they would have a job for life. All of these jobs are located on a 30 acre industrial park and the first two have been hiring for a while. Also gender wouldn't be a restriction on any of these jobs.

Hi Shadow,

Looking at the things Dena has kindly put forward here ...

Perhaps a totally new city to build a new life is just what is called for.... Please don't write off the things you want in your life.... When I decided to transition... I thought that although it was the right decision ... Relationship wise it would be a very lonely road... Happily I was wrong... I am married now to the greatest guy in the world and we celebrated our first anniversary last September...

Onward we go brave sister!!!

Ashley 😀💗🌻

Quote from: Dena on December 29, 2017, 12:07:50 AM
I was sitting here thinking and if you were in my area, I know of 3 companies that are hiring if you are the right person.
1. Truck paint shop that will train but needs a hard worker to do repairs and refinishing.
2. Truck trailer repair, again hard worker to do repairs and they hire people who have records.
3. A guy just starting a medal fabrication business who will train on medal cutting machine and other fabrication equipments, welding and anything else the job requires.
All of theses business have a common problem of the people they hire just don't want to do the work. If somebody is willing to put out the effort, they would have a job for life. All of these jobs are located on a 30 acre industrial park and the first two have been hiring for a while. Also gender wouldn't be a restriction on any of these jobs.

I may be interested! Lol are these in arizona?

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Quote from: tgirlamc on December 29, 2017, 12:51:44 PM
Hi Shadow,

Looking at the things Dena has kindly put forward here ...

Perhaps a totally new city to build a new life is just what is called for.... Please don't write off the things you want in your life.... When I decided to transition... I thought that although it was the right decision ... Relationship wise it would be a very lonely road... Happily I was wrong... I am married now to the greatest guy in the world and we celebrated our first anniversary last September...

Onward we go brave sister!!!

Ashley 😀💗🌻

Congratulations on your first anniversary. You really do offer me a lot of hope.

What cities are good to look at? Sadly it always looks like the most friendly and open cities are the most expensive, places like San Fran, Seattle, and NY. I hear many places in New England are okay, places like Vermont. But I am not so sure since I am a racial minority, they may not be so welcoming there.  Any experience with good cities/states to consider? 

Quote from: Shadowsister on December 29, 2017, 02:41:19 PM
Congratulations on your first anniversary. You really do offer me a lot of hope.

What cities are good to look at? Sadly it always looks like the most friendly and open cities are the most expensive, places like San Fran, Seattle, and NY. I hear many places in New England are okay, places like Vermont. But I am not so sure since I am a racial minority, they may not be so welcoming there.  Any experience with good cities/states to consider?

Hey Shadow,

It sounds like a place where an income could be secured would be a large piece of the puzzle... if you were to start exploring options in other cities, you might want to start with ones with a large University presence... The university towns are often more accepting in my experience... If the job opportunities that Dena mentioned are in the Phoenix, AZ area... I know they have a fairly good LGBTQ presence... I use to go down there quite a bit for electrolysis and met quite a few transwomen...

After my long decent into methamphetamine... I had pretty much next to zero legitimate work history... I started working for Temporary Staffing Agencies and turned down nothing offered... I quickly became a go to person to call because I was always ready to hit the ground running... it gave me a wide variety of experience to form a resume in a short time and many places were using that route to find people they liked to hire full time..I had many offers and opportunities that came along. I had a nice job for a couple years in the aviation industry doing parts production for helicopters... we were even assembling a couple for the Mexican Navy!

Anyway sister, don't be afraid to think way outside the box on this stuff and keep knocking stuff around here and some very nice things might happen!!!

Hugs and Hope that the new year brings you amazing change in your life!!!

Onward we go brave sister!!!

Ashley 😀❤️🌻

The jobs I discussed are in the phoenix area however I suspect most cities have jobs available like this. Kids coming out of school now have the attitude that they are worth $60 and hour and the job should be easy to do. As the result, there are many lower paying jobs where you have to work hard with your hands but if you are good, you will be promoted. If you have ever seen the TV show Dirty Jobs you will understand there are many jobs available out there that don't require a college education. Consider and electrician, plumber carpenter, mechanic and many other jobs. Yes you get dirty doing them but on the job training or trade school knowledge is all that's required along with the desire to work hard.

Dena speaks truth!!!...  These days I think willingness to show up and do hard work puts you head and shoulders above the crowd...

I had an 18 year career in the environmental remediation industry... most of the contracts I worked on were for The Army Corp of Engineers, Navy and EPA... Pay was very good and based on local union scales... The starting place in being hired in that industry is getting 40 hour OSHA HAZWOPER training... often the employers will pay for your class if they want to hire you and I think you may be able to do the whole course online these days....often the contracts are written to address diversity in the workforce...

More food for thought my friend!

Hugs!!!

A 😀❤️🌻

Hey what do you all think of data entry? I hear it's pretty easy to find jobs doing that, and even though data entry does not pay tons of dollars, with positions like Medical Transcriber one may be able to make a decenmt living. Does anyone have any insight on those type of jobs?


Also for coding, how good at math does one really have to be? I have heard/read some people say you need to be really good at it and others say you don't need any at all.