"Stress living with a Transsexual living in secret."
Before I would discuss life after finding out my spouse is TS and planning SRS.
I feel what you will read here should come first. It will help others understand the road that has brought us to where we are. It's Stresses and stress that may be related to their partner, spouse, or significant other's perception of what is going on in the intimacy arena. Also the affects this stress could cause.
The self-analyzing is unbelievable. One thinks it's them that make's the one they care so deeply for not be interested. Maybe it's a women thing to be so self-centered to think it all evolves around their shape, the moves, the looks, the hair in the face, the lack of breast, the not big enough derrière, wrong color of eyes, wrong color of hair, you name it and hundreds more pass through the mind stay, awhile and haunt. It's the womanly nature to need to be pleasing to her mate and devastating to her ego when she's not. Man's ego can only compare in the realm of needing it longer or a more masculine muscular build and admiring the man in the mirror looking back... "The Handsomest Man in Siam Yes I Am". Even our creator let it edge in when creating all male species the more beautiful, more colorful, most often strongest and so on.
When Leah and I first met I was a widow. Prior to that marriage I was divorced from a very bad Marriage. A marriage I was not made to feel adequate in the intimacy arena. IN the next marriage my husband that died was really great to me. All though we had 2 children that doesn't mean sex was good or enjoyed. It was apart of married life. Nothing to write your big sister you told everything to growing up...nothing interesting for the girls you chummed with in high school or college and listened to their tales and wished you could compare.
I was small breasted. I barely filled and A cup. I was female and new where and how to find what could conceal this flaw in the dress and daily life mode but in the bedroom there was no hiding it. I would only undress with the lights off. So always sex for us was touch and feel as though we were blind. Silly me I don't know what made me think if them tiny breast couldn't be seen none would be the wiser. Leah told me anything bigger than a mouth full or a hand full went to waist to make me feel better. But too much teasing and taunting by family and guys in school had scared me in that department and my whole life after development was filled with wishes and longings of having breast implants. When I was in high school my best friend was a girl that was very short 4 foot something and had very huge breasts. If she and I were gone from school on the same day the remarks from the guys when one or the other or both returned was on the lines " Ah, I lost that bet. I thought you went in for surgery and were getting some boobs from her" I couldn't help but feel that small breasts were why things changed later in our marriage.
Before Leah came I had vowed never again would I love and marry and hurt so deeply at losing someone again. Leah was handsome and caring and gentle and kind and was interested in what I wanted out of life, and great with my boys. But for 19 years she was a he for all I knew. She was so great at it that any Hollywood actor would get an Oscar for playing the part so well. A male body to die for and women drooled over. The character only made irresistible desires that much harder to be true to the self-vow.
Sexually speaking... it always seemed one-sided. Leah was the one allowed the freedom to enjoy and explore the body laying beside her... my body. To touch caress and pet and then when she was sure I was satisfied would roll over and fall asleep. She was so intoned to my body and paid attention to patterns and rhythm and desired likes and turn-ons.
It was like that for about the first 5 years and frequent. Sometimes 4 or 5 times a week after the initial new wore off, (several times a day then). I could initiate my desire for sexual attention whenever I wanted and Leah would respond. But my hands were never aloud to roam below the Leah's waist. During the next few years it went to maybe 2 a month, then to 2 a year. It's been six years now since Leah told me her desires for TS and SRS. The 2 years before that she had not touched me sexually. Everything else in our life was as normal as it could be given that. Through the years I would be turned over in bed and cry silently wanting to have that sexual and intimate need met. As it got harder and harder to cry quietly I would stay up doing other things to not be in the one place it was hard to bare the reality of not having a partner, mate for life and companion interested in me and my body. Little did I know Leah was hurting and wanting not to be with me for another reason.
I was a Dance and Gymnastic teacher. I was very good at it too. I had been a National Champaign and train many over a 33-year span to accomplish the same. I also was what was termed a Pageant Coordinator. Instructing and bring out the best in girls and young women competing in the various pageants in the USA including one that had made it all the way and captured the Miss Universe Title. This like everything I do was full speed ahead paying attention to the little things and making sure everything was just right regardless of time it took to get it done. That's where our relationship was beginning to suffer for it. I kept myself busy with my student and our son's activities to be able to not dwell on what really meant more to me than anything...the distancing Leah was putting between us. I didn't know why or how to ask her about it without making an idiot of myself.
I designed and sewed all the cloths for my students at night. When I wasn't teaching or looking after the boys needs and meeting Leah in a safe unthreatening place to grab our precious minutes together. I told myself I knew could live with her in a relationship that wasn't sexually satisfying any more because she was putting up with me. Lacking in all the ways that I must have been. Beside there is still hope Leah still reaches for my hand and asks me to ride along with her on her rat killing as an "Okie "expression goes. It means the day's business. She still kissed me. The verbal "I love you", came less often and that wasn't very often to begin with. That was not in the make up for character. I would say it all the time to Leah, as often as a couple times an hour even just to get her to say you to because I needed to hear it.
I retired form teaching being named the National Outstanding Teacher of the Year 3 times during the last 7. Also an evening gown taking top honors beat out the person designing for our Miss America once they are crowned. I retired because Leah wasn't happy with all the time it took me away from home and the preoccupation while at home. Also by now our sons were in Jr. High and High School and sports and everything else took much time being a taxi driver. Also I was having health issues. The Dr.'s said it was related to stress. The only stress I could realize was that of teaching and the strain it was causing between Leah and I. Also the nerve racking fast pace of the competing events and concern had I done everything I could for preparing my students.
I had what they called Crones Disease. It was painful and costly to treat. I was also having trouble in my back and joints. At first I chalked it up to so many years of teaching dance and gymnastics. The Dr.'s did some tests and found I had Ankilosingspondilitis. A spinal disease caused by a bacteria producing in the colon from the Crones Disease. It attacks the vertebrae in the back and all the big joints of the body. We went everywhere we could, hunting a cure or help of some kind. I was on 17 different medications and taking 37 pills a day. I was to the point I had to use a platform cane to keep from falling so much. The nerve damage caused perception of how high to lift my leg to step or even the slightest unevenness in the ground or floor I was walking on could cause a fall. I had high blood pressure as a result of medication. So there's another one to add. I had high blood sugar do to the weight I had gained all at once when I stopped teaching and due to the stress I thought I was dealing ok with, Leah and I and our sexual and intimate relationship.
Time marches on, as Leah would phrase it, our boys out of the house and us dealing with the empty nest. I take on a desk clerk job at the ABF Truck turn around. I also work as an Answering Service Operator. Again choosing to work the night shift so as not to have Leah aware of my yearning for sexual activity and intimacy. They are different you know?
I even talked with our boys along this time about their Dad not being well. That he hardly ever touched me anymore and slept more and was very moody all the time. They responded with "Gees mom he's almost 50, he's getting old, he works hard, you'll need to learn to live with no more sex in your life, or even Mom I don't want to hear about you and Dad's sex life or the lack of in this case."
By now I am suffering from depression as well as all the rest. Maybe I should say because of all the rest. I no longer wanted to ride with Leah on the rat killing adventures of the day at hand. I didn't even want out of the house. I wanted no one to see me like I was now. Over weight, unkempt, (the slim, meticulous well dressed matching fashionable, once a model woman was gone) and cried all the time. I would sit on the couch and cry during the day and not eat all day and not know what had been on TV. Leah would come in and ask how I was and I would cry in her arms not knowing why.
I couldn't be depended on to be at work daily anymore. Our home was a wreck and unkempt. I needed to do something I could control time of day and energy it took for a job now. After thinking about it. I decided I needed to be around children again. I knew that they could make me smile and laugh again. So, I started tutoring school children and teens at the library. I started a preschool for Hispanic children that needed a jumpstart due to a language barrier. I did this for 2 years and enjoyed it. I was able to cancel if I needed. Surprisingly that was not often. Those children flourished under my tutelage. They are at the top of there class now. Leah and I shared in showing them a different kind of teaching and learning, that of hands on at our farm. They loved Leah and I enjoyed having her help.
During this time of tutoring it the library Leah and I would have lunch together. She worked on the drilling rigs and also had a janitorial service. I help with that service when she was unable to make it back to town off the rigs. It was very hard for me to move around. I was getting so bad that the Dr.'s were telling me to skip the walker and by that wheel chair, walker version because at the rate I was going I was going to be in one full time in six months to a year.
While at the library a lady would come in and we would visit. Over the course of about 3 months I noticed her losing weight and she told me about a Dr. here in town. He was from Canada and very good. I had been told to lose weight and had tried everything. She said she was sure he could help me. I was skeptical. I called and was seen that week. He said he thought I had Lupus and also a thing called Seritonin Deficiency. He said I had 21 of the symptoms chronically. We tested for Lupus. There was no test for the other. He said try this supplement for 7 to 11 days. With in that time I should be able to tell the difference and then we'd make adjustments from there. I said ok and took it. Two weeks later I was back in his office feeling better with each coming day. The test results on the Lupus were back I in fact had Lupus. I was given more pills and taken off others. In the next year and a half I was better than I had been in years. I lost 127 lbs. I went from a size 26 to a 16 again!
I was feeling so good I started another evening type job. I became a Tupperware consultant and Manager. I did...do in home parties. I had a blast and was/am being paid for it too. I became the fastest in the company to earn a Van. (7 weeks.) I earned 4 Vans and drove the miles off them and Tupperware gave me a new one each time during my first 2 years. Now I take the cash bonus instead. I still am a Tupperware Manager.
You'll remember Leah saying she went to the Physiatrists while I was a way on my first National Tupperware Meeting at which I was being rewarded for being the 25 Managers in the Nation. This was in only 6 months of being in the business. When I returned Leah was different, so down and depressed. I told her I needed to know what was causing this. She told me of her desires. I was really thrown for a while, and that brings us to the next writings.
In closing let me say that lack of communicating and sharing what is going on in relationships is not healthy for any involved. It's important to discuss what is ailing and causing strife. Health is so important to a long productive life. If you reading this, haven't told others in your life what you need to I hope this will help you see you must not dilly- dally in doing so.
I will share my health's marked improvement in the promised writings of "Life after finding out my spouse is TS and planning SRS." It unbelievable.
Please forgive the length but I have to say that almost 24 years does take up a lot of space.
Peggiann
