(rambling daydream alert)

Maybe I'm just feeling wistful today, but did you ever feel like kicking yourself in the butt for your career choices after you realized you were trans?

I was so aimless with my life, in terms of career choices. So ridiculously aimless. I traveled a lot, so at least there was that. I'm an artist at heart.

I never wanted to be a mom, but in my explorations of that, one of the rationalizations I gave myself was, "I don't want kids yet because I don't have a job that would let me support them AND be there for them." So now I have an extremely feminine job with a schedule conducive to raising children, good pay (for myself, anyway), and it isn't stressful on my body.

Still didn't make me want kids, though. I just don't ever want to experience pregnancy because my software does not match the hardware.

I've said flippantly before that I wouldn't care if I had kids, if all I had to do was make tons of money and let my wife spend it on whatever she wants. But there is some truth in that I would feel more comfortable in a traditional provider role.

I've been reading lots of interesting happily ever after stories about trans men ending up with straight cis women. I have no idea what path I will end up taking, but it did make me stop and think. And wonder.

I do not make enough money to support an entire family doing what I do. (A lot of people don't, no matter who they are, but I'm daydreaming.) It makes me feel a little bit like less of a man? Which is kind of silly? I never wanted that kind of familial role as a woman, either.

And maybe at the end of the day I'd just decide, screw this, I'm an artist, and my artistic sensibilities would still overtake everything?

I'm a little bummed I didn't have a crystal ball that would have told me the future so I could have made a different decision. But that is generic life regrets 101 and I would be silly to get hung up on that. "If I had known I would grow up to be a man..."

The truth is, I have killer domestic skills... and a job insanely conducive to raising kids if I ever have them. I'm sure some women would find that valuable.

I make enough money to at least pick up the tab for dinner once a week, so I can enjoy my ten seconds of manliness there. (I feel like such a boss when my friends come to visit from out of state and I pay for them. Mwahaha.)

There really isn't a question or a moral to the story here... I'm just imagining things that I never thought possible before.

My magic eight ball says the odds are still overwhelmingly in favor of no kids. I could also end up with a man.

It doesn't answer when I ask if the weird transformation novel I'm writing will make me the next J. K. Rowling, so maybe I can still have my dreams of being a sugar daddy and eat them, too. 

Quote from: blackcat on May 30, 2018, 06:57:37 PMdid you ever feel like kicking yourself in the butt for your career choices after you realized you were trans?

I don't spend a lot of time kicking myself for past decisions.  Water under the bridge.  But, yes, I could have made better career choices.

I started out by joining the air force while I was in university.  It was very practical: they would pay for my education.  And they would teach me to fly.  How cool is that?  But the reason I was doing it was to "prove my manhood".  Yeah, right, like that was going to work out!

I ended up being a flying instructor, and loved it.  But, I knew I wasn't a soldier, and however good the job was, it was the wrong career for me.

I took the safe route and, like so many other trans people, got into IT.  Computers don't judge, after all. 

I should have gone back to university and gotten an education degree.  Teaching was what I was good at, and what gave me a sense of satisfaction.  Oh well.

I quit my job at age 45, having no idea what I wanted to do next.  After a year of living off savings and working retail, I begged for my old IT job back.  Playing it safe again.  I got it, as a part-time position, as a consultant.  Should have just gone part time without quitting, and I would have kept my pension plan.

So, yes, I have stuff I could kick myself for.  But what the heck.  It all got me to where I am today.  All's well that ends well.

I've made it a habit in life to never look back at something I could have done differently.  You can't change the decision and I like to think I made the best choice for me at the time.  No one can tell the future accurately.  Live and learn.  Works for me...
Judi

A difficult question, are you taking direction from @Purplewolf ?

I always wanted to be mom. Always. More so than a career, so I've muddled along and because of coping skills always end up at the stressful sharp end.

Regrets, no, as it's enabled a lot of things I probably wouldn't have experienced, which in and of itself robs those accomplishments of some of their satisfaction, but c'est la guerre.

Rowan

Is Purplewolf giving directions? 

I'm not UPSET thinking about these things. But it's interesting to think everything out because I haven't before. I'm like a kid with a new toy and just realized I can extend my daydreaming beyond the immediate present, to forward or backward in time.

I COULD go back to school to do something else--who knows, maybe I will? I could. But considering my age, the time it would take to graduate (I couldn't go to school full time right now), get a job, get that new ridiculous mountain of debt paid off... I'm probably better off continuing the path I've taken.

I know in all actuality I'd be at the bottom of a lake with breezeblocks tied around my ankles if I had attempted motherhood for real. I also have a sneaking suspicion that being forced to conform hardcore to the male binary would feel just as stressful.

So that leaves me at non-binary, half-gay, cooking and cleaning, potentially-someday-non-biological-father, working in a female-dominated industry, making amazing key lime pie, collecting eccentric sunglasses and selling art for coffee money. It's livable, and more importantly, it allows me to transition.

I'm no longer a paycheck-to-paycheck drifter, so I suppose I've made something of myself.

My dad is like a 4.0 engineering genius and made millions in the stock market. I always felt like I disappointed my dad because I never pursued some kind of rigorous academia. I wonder if I would have faced more pressure, had I been male.

Or maybe I did take that path, decided it was BS, and went MtF in a parallel universe. 

I guess if I can't pay for every single date unflinchingly with every single future girlfriend for the rest of my life, I have to cultivate other redeeming qualities. 

No but he seems to spend his time dreaming up difficult questions for us all

Maybe in a parallel universe I am a mom. Now that's a dream.

Rowan

Since coming out to the world and living MtF full-time, I decided that if I'm going to be authentic, go all the way. So, I'm back in school preparing for a second career in nursing, which I'm very excited about. Being ever so cautious about conforming to my assigned-at-birth gender, I wouldn't have pursued my passion for a traditionally female role, if I hadn't begun to live as my true self. It's never too late to do what you want.

yes and no.

I always wanted to be an actor, I was set to attend a particular school for that but I couldn't deal with going through the schooling and working up a CV as a female, esp. if I would then have to flip over and start again as a dude. I remember revising audition pieces for that which had to be woman's parts and just feeling like I'd be a massive fraud trying to connect with female motivations, because I usually can't. I thought I would have made the most wooden actress in the world.

I always got bored with regular jobs that have no variety, and I've done a lot of those, so I ended up as an artist anyway which I still am.

But I do want to go back to acting now that my transition is well under way. Ironically, I'm better at exploring the "feminine side" now that my hormones are correct, damn it. Lol

I'm still trying to figure out what I'm going to do as a career.  might have been there by now if things had been different, but they weren't.  so now, even if I am behind everyone else my age, I have nowhere to go but forward.  doesn't stop me from thinking about all the woulda coulda shoulda sometimes, but all that does is upset me so I try to focus on the things I want and finding a way to get them.  it would help if I could figure out what I want, of course...

I can think of only one thing to ask. How do you see yourself in 10 years. I would think you would want to be transitioned but what would your day to day life look like. if it's different than now, it's time to start reshaping your life to make it what you want. People often have a mid life crisis when they discover they made a mistake in their life plan so the fact your considering it now may prevent this in your future.