I would like input on this if others are going through open transition that would be great.
Is the goal to be happy with yourself?
To show other that we are human just as they are with hopes and dreams?
That we seek to be loved by others?
That we would love to fit in even though we stand out?

Hi Jainie,

Not too sure what you mean about open transition?

Cindy

By open do you mean out and proud? Because that's how I have been. I've advertised the fact that anyone around me is welcome to ask me anything.

It's actually drawn people to me rather than pushed them away, and it's opened doors that I wouldn't have even known existed if I wasn't broadcasting my transition openly. In fact, there's been several new friends in the local trans community I met because they were stealth but knew I was someone they could approach safely.

I want to be a gender therapist, so I will have to be open about certain things. However, I don't want to announce to the world my trans status every time I meet someone, or go out into the world, but I will not hide it if asked.

The way I look at it, I am a woman who is transgendered. But I absolutely, and highly, respect those women, men, and in-between who are out and proud. We really need more visibility in our community.

Quote from: LifeInNeon on October 09, 2011, 01:57:02 AM
By open do you mean out and proud? Because that's how I have been. I've advertised the fact that anyone around me is welcome to ask me anything.

It's actually drawn people to me rather than pushed them away, and it's opened doors that I wouldn't have even known existed if I wasn't broadcasting my transition openly. In fact, there's been several new friends in the local trans community I met because they were stealth but knew I was someone they could approach safely.

yes out and proud would have to be it. as far as doors opening support at work and at home.

OK in that case I have been open and happy.

I haven't run around and declared anything, I'm just me and changing. If anyone asks I tell them If they don't ask I don't tell them, but I do not hide.  I think I come from the perspective that what I do, in this respect,  has got nothing to do with anyone but me. Why should people have a public opinion about me. I don't have one about them.

Is this what you meant?

Cindy

I'm not necessarily supported everywhere I go, but my transition is pretty open. More than I'd like it to be, honestly. But my life is so complicated, and I really don't have any privacy. And my gosh word spreads like wildfire. So people who know me know, and others I interact with tend to find out. I'm as stealth as possible with the general public, but so many things get in the way of that.

So yeah. And it's interesting. I feel like it has helped others at times, and it has definitely at times led to goodwill and warmth from unexpected sources.

Though lol it often just confuses people.

I went from telling one person at a time to telling noone and everyone else telling each other. Ex-wife likes to tell everyone. At first I was getting a little scaried but I'm okay now.

Are you worried about control of the situation?

Is it a threat to you in some way?  Either way it doesn't really matter. there is no going back. You can't remove the tag. We are all fearful but finally it doesn't matter. Once you are out to one person that is it.  We are human beings who have equal rights to everyone else, so don't worry.

Cindy

I'm completely open about it (though I plan to hide it from any employer I get in the near future), but once everything's said and done I hope to move and live in stealth.

@Cindy James
I'm not worried just still hurt by ex-eployee. Good thing is he won't be coming back to work there. My employor told me if anyone gives me crap to let her know. They don't put up with any form of hurrasment.
@Amaranth
I have moved a way many times but begin to miss my home town and turn around and go back.

right now I live in stealth cause my old home town is full of bigotry and hatred for different people. However me and  my wife, soon to be my hubby since he's FTM, are moving in with some friends in a new town for a fresh start and we are done hiding.*Potential employers excluded*

But it's one of those things where we are prepared toi accept the results of that and I have a good friend ready to back me. Amazing what one really good friend can do to help you take on the world.

It depends on the situation for me. I have no problem answering anyone's questions but I also don't feel like I want to wear a sign either.
At times personal safety and restrooms usage have a priority for me. I am not being seen as male any more at all so I can't afford to be
harassed in ladies room. Also when I have my daughter with me I prefer to stay stealth for the occasional chat with other parents.

At everyone who is planning to not to disclose the transition to the new employer and is still pre-op. In the US you can't legally change your gender mark with the Social Security Administration unless you have a surgeon's letter of preformed SRS. I know some one here mentioned she changed the gender mark with SSA while still pre-OP but this seems to be rather an exception to not to say an error on the part of administration.

You could end up with so called "no match" issue when you give to your perspective employer your SS number as the SSA will not have your number associated with the gender you are presenting in and therefore you might be running in trouble for providing false SS number or having to then come out.
I am stuck with the driver's license with F on it while having an M under my SS number.
I was also presented with the SSA documentation to back up this criteria and my physician's/endocrinologist's latter of approval did not help. 

If anyone knows of a workaround please hit me up!

I sometimes want to give up and shout out to the world, "YES, I'm a transguy, I am a genetically female man. I'm a little bit different from the rest of you guys and this is why." I do get a little frustrated sometimes about living stealth, especially since, as a lesbian, I was very not stealth. I didn't feel the need to hide anything. But in this day and age, in this part of the world, and while living with a stealth FTM roommate whose coworkers might very well kick his ass and treat him like ->-bleeped-<- if they found out he was living with any kind of queer, I refuse to be anything but stealth. Right now, being open about my transsexuality is not an option.

I am, however, very happy to partake in any kind of political event that encourages rights for oppressed groups and I'm pretty quick to admit I have no issues with transfolk or gays. I sometimes start to sweat at the brow when I imagine someone straight-up asking me if I am trans. It's something I don't want to lie about. I do think that because I was not born biologically male it's immoral of me to lie and have people believe I am if I'm confronted with the question. But there are definitely easy ways of avoiding answering, like turning the question around and asking why the hell they care or why they'd ask such a question in the first place.

Anyway. I applaud anyone with the strength and bravery to be openly trans. Maybe some day I will join you but that's quite far off in the future.

Quote from: envie on October 09, 2011, 10:56:35 AM
It depends on the situation for me. I have no problem answering anyone's questions but I also don't feel like I want to wear a sign either.
At times personal safety and restrooms usage have a priority for me. I am not being seen as male any more at all so I can't afford to be
harassed in ladies room. Also when I have my daughter with me I prefer to stay stealth for the occasional chat with other parents.

At everyone who is planning to not to disclose the transition to the new employer and is still pre-op. In the US you can't legally change your gender mark with the Social Security Administration unless you have a surgeon's letter of preformed SRS. I know some one here mentioned she changed the gender mark with SSA while still pre-OP but this seems to be rather an exception to not to say an error on the part of administration.

You could end up with so called "no match" issue when you give to your perspective employer your SS number as the SSA will not have your number associated with the gender you are presenting in and therefore you might be running in trouble for providing false SS number or having to then come out.

This is actually no longer the case. As of Sept 26th, the SSA no longer reports gender to third parties and any requests for it return a blank in that space.

The state department dropped the surgery requirement, and changed the language of their guidelines. Now, they require a physician's letter that states the person has undergone "appropriate treatment", and what constitutes appropriate treatment is left to the treating physician. This seems to be the direction other state and federal entities are going as well, but some state laws and DOT guidelines may still require an explicit statement of surgery (for driver's license/birth certificate).

I try to be as open as possible when I can. If someone has a question and they ask is politely enough I have no problem responding. I don't go around announcing that I am trans to total strangers, but when I get to know someone I don't mind if they find out I am trans. Since I have not legally changed my name/gender yet I am applying to jobs/internships as Abbey, and once I get a positive response I will bring up the fact that I am trans, in a "Matter-of-fact" way. The way I see it, If they are not open to having a transgender employee I wouldn't want to work for them anyway.

It seems like by avoiding the subject some people make it a bigger deal than it has to be. By being as nonchalant as possible, I hope that other people will follow suit. I already mentioned this in another thread but I think people need to see and get to know transgendered people before they can really accept us.

@ LifeInNeon,

You have to be kidding me I got rejected on September 23rd with the "undergone appropriate treatment" letter  in my hand. Do you have any link to any evidence of this change? Since it is so new I am not surprised it has not been posted everywhere yet. Also the administrator took for ever to find all the paper work she needed to file on her own part. She also seemed to not to know much about changing the gender mark in my files, so it would be great to find the evidence of this recent change to be able to present it to them.

I am so glad about this change. I feel so harassed and discriminated by some officials and institutions by the question "what do you have in you underpants?"
I never ask anyone to prove their sex so why should it be any different for us? sorry this turned into a little rent on my part.

Oh, the "appropriate treatment" part is for the State Department (passports and the like), not the SSA. I thought the SSA had adopted the State Department's guidelines but if not then that's unfortunate and I'm sorry that happened to you. :-/ I'm gearing up to deal with that myself next week when my name change is final.

The fact that all of these laws and regulations are a jumbled hodgepodge leaving us stuck somewhere in between depending upon jurisdiction is one of the major forms of institutional discrimination we face, sadly.

Apropos the topic, that's why I am transitioning openly. I'm public about what I go through in this, so that cis people around me understand that it's not just about surgery and reciting the names of prostitutes on the Day of Remembrance. There are struggles that we face that, while not as dramatic as murder, directly impact our ability to be safe, healthy, and happy. Too much of our wellbeing depends upon luck: finding multiple sympathetic doctors, getting a sympathetic clerk at the DMV, getting a police officer who knows better than to assume we're sex workers when we're victims, finding a job with trans-inclusive policies and benefits(or hell, just finding a job that doesn't refuse to hire us for being trans). It's a house of cards, and as soon as one of those things is out of place, it directly negatively affects our health.

• Get an attending hospitalist who sees the gender mark on the license and assumes your hormones are in your old sex's range? Woops, sorry about that blood clot!


• Get a judge who doesn't think gender transition should constitute a reason to change the name on the birth certificate? Congratulations, you've got a new ID and you'll be kicking back no matches on background checks the rest of your life (or until you fork over the $$ for legal fees all over again to get an order to change just the B.C.).


• Male coworker of yours get a speeding ticket from a cop who thinks "any guy with a ->-bleeped-<- must be paying for sex" who spots you in the passenger seat? I hope you didn't have plans tonight while you sit in holding until they decide there's no evidence.


• Hit the porcelain above the water line while peeing and thus make no noise in the bathroom in a state that has no public accommodations protections? "Omg that's a man! Someone tell the manager there's a pervert in here!"

However, for an honest appraisal, I will have to say that on the whole, I have had an overwhelmingly positive experience being openly transsexual. As someone who doesn't pass well, I don't have much choice there so I am totally embracing it instead of being ashamed of it. I can't hide in my house and still afford the procedures and hormones I need, so I just put on my big girl pants and get out there.

My coworkers have been fantastic. I've spoken one-on-one at great length with all of the women in my primary area of responsibility, and all of them have been very supportive. The one that knew me from before (I went to school with her daughter even) describes me as "radiant" because I am so happy all the time. :-D

The security badge I was issued only opens the women's restrooms, and security and HR are supportive of my right to use them. I've made it clear that I still tend to use the gender neutral ones at my workplace because I have an interest in not creating more of a hassle for myself by causing an incident, regardless of the support. But that, more than anything else, made me feel truly welcome in the workplace, to know that they wanted to be up front with my right to use the one I was most comfortable with.

I did have a minor, minor hiccup now that I am training in a new department. It's a different group and none of them knew me from before. At last I had to break the ice a couple nights ago and say, "Look, now that there's no one in line, I want you to know that it's true, I am in transition from male to female, and I have no problem talking about it. So don't feel awkward asking questions." Pretty much as soon as I finished saying that, one of my coworkers launched into, "So what's it like being on hormones?" :-P Sometimes they're just waiting for you to say it's ok, haha.

One more major thing I've noticed: No one respects my femininity until I tell them I'm trans. However, once I explain even just the bare minimum stuff—yes, hormones give me PMS and I do get more emotional; yes, I told my parents when I was 6 years old; yes, I am mostly interested in men now; yes, I do want children some day—I have what I've started to call a "keys to the clubhouse" moment: the women listening all collectively decide, "Yep, she's one of us. Welcome to the club. Here's your key. Meetings are on Saturdays. It's Liz's birthday next week, so she'll be bringing treats for everyone. . ." and I'm brought right in. But until that moment, it's this awkward, intangible, keeping-at-arm's-length uncertainty about me where I'm usually treated like some trumped up crossdresser people have to show at least a minimum amount of politeness toward. I like that moment, naturally, but I don't like needing to wait for it to be accepted.

thanks for all the info LifeInNeon,

Last week my boss mentioned something about SSA plans of abandoning the gender mark all together so there might be something cooking along the lines of needing only the "appropriate treatment letter".  I'll be following this.

I had very similar experience with my co-workers so we actually keep talking about the changes as I am going through the transition.
But also I find myself just becoming more hesitant to come out to people who I just meet now as I am passing fairly well.
Few times I have come out to people I met recently and they were rather surprised and shocked about me being trans. I only talked about my transition assuming they must read me and I wanted to be open and honest. Not that they were put off but rather they had hard time believing and then it took them some time to get adjusted to me again after gaining this knowledge about my background.
In both of those instances I thought to myself how unnecessary it was to run my mouth. Also I am trying to date men and particularly there I don't feel like disclosing my status right away.

Quote from: LifeInNeon on October 09, 2011, 12:48:24 PM

• Hit the porcelain above the water line while peeing and thus make no noise in the bathroom in a state that has no public accommodations protections? "Omg that's a man! Someone tell the manager there's a pervert in here!"

this is so interesting. While I am not exactly afraid of consequences of not making any noise in restroom I do make sure I aim for the water just in case someone was wondering