A Christmas Blessing For Sage Smith's Family

http://www.newsplex.com/home/headlines/Local-Group-Donates-Christmas-Gifts-to-Missing-Teens-Family-363232921.html

Today I found that this was run on television in Charlottesville, VA dated today and I wanted to share a small bright spot in the tragedy of Sage Smith's disappearance. We all pray she is still alive, but we also pray for peace for her family.......

CHARLOTTESVILLE, VA (NEWSPLEX) -- This year, many members of the Charlottesville community came together to buy and wrapChristmas gifts for the family of Dashad "Sage" Smith, a transgender female who disappeared back in 2012.

Sage went missing after planning to meet a man near the Amtrak train on West Main Street.

Thanks to the Stand for the Silent and Central Virginia Friends and Family Support Group, gifts were donated from all over, and activists from across the Commonwealth drove to Charlottesville to lend a helping hand.

"We have to keep these people in the public eye," said Pamela Clark of Cue Search and Rescue. "Because if we don't, they kind of get lost in the shuffle because there's so many murdered and missing in America."

Since Sage first disappeared, these groups have been pushing to keep hope alive. They want the Charlottesville Police Department to do a little more to help bring closure to the family.

They feel that sexual orientation and the fact that Sage was black has an influence on the case.

"You know they gathered people to search and there were maybe 100, 200 people," said anti-bullying advocate Joann Robertson. "So there's a vast majority of difference with whats happening in some cases versus the others and again Sage is still missing so we want to bring awareness."

One of their goals is to put the same support and effort into finding Sage as was put into finding Hannah Graham and Morgan Harrington. Even though the outcome of those two cases was heartbreaking, the group of women just want to assist and be of comfort to the family.

"We just want to help," said Robertson. "Whatever it is we can do, whether it's fundraising for the search fun or anything we can do, we're here please let's not move Sage to the back burner."

As fall has turned to winter and yet another Christmas is about to pass, this group can only pray that Sage's family gets the justice they deserve.

The gifts that were donated were given to a member of the Smith family, who will then make sure they are distributed just in time for Christmas. Community Bikes in Charlottesville donated bicycles to the smaller children.

Hello Russia!

Russia is the nation with the second most views of my blog for all time after my own country, the USA. For the past month, I've had 600 views from Russia, not many less than my own country's views.

As an amateur student of Russian History and Russian Literature, I am curious about what it means to be a transsexual or transgender person in Russia or in Eastern Europe and in the former member states of the former Soviet Union.

My interest in Russia goes back to my adolescent years when I first saw the movie Nicholas and Alexandra. In my undergraduate studies.  I took a course in Russian History. I began to read literature by Dostoevsky, Chekov, and Solzhenitsyn. I found Ayn Rand on my own and have embraced many) of her philosophical ideas in my own personal philosophy (along with much of the philosophy of B.F. Skinner and Behaviorism). I was also fascinated by the influence of Grigory Rasputin (referred to as the "Mad Monk" over the Czarina Alexandra as well as his own story.

I grew up in the 1960's and 1970's in the era of what we call in America "The Cold War". One of my earliest memories was of the Cuban Missile Crisis. Here in the USA, my early childhood memory was of the adults fearing we were going to die at what seemed to be the beginning of World War III. Thankfully, that event would not become the catalyst of the destruction of two great countries and perhaps the entirety of Western Civilization.

I was a young adult when Ronald Reagan implored Gorbachev to tear down the wall separating East Berlin and West Berlin and saw that wall fall on television along with the disintegration of the United Soviet Socialist Republic, or as we called it, the Soviet Union.

 As an American transsexual who is a mental health professional, my practice is partly devoted to working with transgender people. I am quite interested in how people such as myself fare in other countries. My audience for this blog is truly international. I have readers in every continent, even from Middle Eastern countries and African countries where people such as myself suffer unspeakable persecution, to the point of torture and loss of life because of who they are. There are things worse than dying for who one is or one's religious belief, though, such as being tortured or living under extreme oppression.

I seldom get comments from people from foreign countries who read my blog. My guess is that in some of the countries my readers come from that they dare not leave a trace that they have read what I have written.

As I mentioned, I am quite interested in the lives of transgender people in other countries and other cultures. I would like to invite my Russian readers to participate in commenting on your lives, your struggles and your triumphs to live an authentic life.

Thank you my Russian friends!

Further Along: Summer's Last Days

Labor Day has passed for 2015. In about two weeks the Autumnal Equinox, that day when darkness and light are perfectly balanced before the days grow shorter and the nights grow longer until we reach the soul’s longest night, the Winter Solstice. Then the cycle renews itself and the days grow longer again with the promise of Spring and the rebirth of life, come March.

With my gender transition, I find myself more in harmony with the cycle of the seasons, of the earth and of life. This summer I have rekindled a dream from long ago to live off my land to as great a degree as I am able. A dream left behind in my twenties. One that was left behind when I left this place I love so much when I was 18 and went off to college. Though I returned to live here in my mid 30’s and made a few stabs at successful gardening, I had lost the vision of wanting to homestead on my own land and of what was possible.

Perhaps it was being inspired again by watching several of the television shows about life in Alaska, particularly the ones where we see people wholly living and subsisting off the land. Perhaps it was the realization that in only six years Patty and I will lose between 20 to 25% of our take home income.

Perhaps it is watching the breakdown of our social order and recognizing that our government over the past 30 years has squandered our prosperity and national security. Both of our political parties have had a hand in that. We have led a life of illusion thinking our government will keep us safe and secure and because of that we shall not know want. But now our own natural born citizens are increasingly finding themselves without jobs and going hungry. Some find it more profitable to be on public welfare rather than work because they almost make as much living on the dole than they would make taking a job at entry level pay and don't have to work as hard, because those jobs are hard jobs for the most part. The influx of illegal aliens who will work for less than many Americans will work for only exacerbates the problem.

We can't take care of our own anymore because of the flood of illegal aliens from Mexico, Central America and South America. Additionally, we are increasingly pressured to take in Muslim refugees who are flooding Europe. Apparently they don't defend their own borders anymore either. Our government will not and cannot keep us safe anymore. By promising to be all things to all people, it has greatly reduced the opportunity to become prosperous.  It had driven us to accept mediocrity as the highest aspiration and punishes excellence. Our enemies are coming for us and we are told not to worry. We are told that we should just appease them and the threat will go away. We just aren't tolerant enough.

 We have become so dependent on technology and computers that our children don’t even know how to write because writing is not taught. We rely on computers to run everything. Most people don’t know how to do anything without them, including how to relate to each other on a face to face basis. Too many people interact or socialize only over social media. We are just one electromagnetic pulse away from collapse.

How short our institutional memory is as a result of living in a life of instant gratification and a throw away culture that does not produce things we that last and does not value self- reliance or individualism. In fact we produce very little ourselves. We have shipped our manufacturing capabilities overseas. My parents were children during the Great Depression and World War II. Few are left to teach us the lessons of endurance and survival, the willingness to fight for our way of life, and that the price of Freedom was paid through personal sacrifice.

As a result, my dream of homesteading has been reborn. Nothing too grandiose to begin with, mind you. We grew some vegetables on the patio this summer. Nothing more than something to enjoy here and there as something bore a few vegetables. Some fresh spices to use in cooking too! Something to rekindle the imagination to create the desire to explore and see what possible goals could be realized with our beautiful country home.

This summer we have learned to can vegetables. That’s nothing spectacular; people have been doing it forever it seems. We have been buying from the local farmer’s market and a local produce farm to can enough food to last us into the next growing season when our own garden begins to produce vegetables that we have grown through our own efforts. This will save us money from not having to buy at the grocery store. Even with buying from our local farmers directly, we will save hundreds of dollars over the coming year. Canning is so easy that it was not hard to learn to do at all!

Nothing succeeds like success, as the old saying goes. We have a six year plan. We don’t have to do it all in a year. Next year we are planning to grow a garden for two people’s needs for a year. We will again supplement what we still need for the coming fall, winter and spring with produce bought at the farmer’s market and a local farm. Then we will expand it by growing for two more people each year until we have enough for ourselves and have our own produce to sell to others to supplement our income.

This coming year we will try several different ways to garden. I have had very good results with raised bed gardens in past years. Additionally, we plan to try straw bale gardening and using grow bags to determine which methods are easiest, and most cost effective in producing a bountiful harvest.  We plan to grow potatoes and corn in the traditional tilled earth manner. We also plan on trying winter gardening beginning next fall, something I have never done before. I have started composting on a moderate scale as well. Why put things in the landfill that will become fertilizer for  next year's garden?

We plan to have our own chickens for producing eggs beginning in the spring. This winter I will build a chicken coop and we will start with a rooster and three hens. We plan on expanding this part of the operation until we have enough eggs for ourselves each week and be able to sell the eggs. Fresh eggs from free range chickens are wonderful; another savings from not having to buy eggs at the grocery store and a source of income from selling what we can produce ourselves.

There’s plenty of help and advice available to take advantage of for free from the Virginia Tech agriculture extension agent. I've also found the local farmers to be willing to offer their advice based on their experiences and a willingness to help with things like plowing and tilling for a very reasonable price.

Other projects include harvesting blackberries in the early summer, which are abundant on our property as well as gathering walnuts, hickory nuts and chestnuts in the fall to sell. All of these are good moneymakers with economy of effort as well.

Our lake is large enough for us to pump water for the garden in dry conditions and also big enough to sustain feeding us a meal of fish once a week when the weather is warm enough to want to fish without having to worry about restocking the lake every year.

Though I have no desire to hunt or kill animals, I do enjoy venison. Our land is large enough and the deer are plentiful. I could easily harvest a deer or two in extremely difficult times if I were in need of meat, and squirrels, rabbits and wild geese are plentiful as well. I hope that I will not have to do that, though.

It seems we are only limited here by our imagination and physical ability to do the work. I look forward to the challenge, the adventure and the realization of a long time held dream.

Spirituality: Creating a Religion of One’s Own

I was privileged, as I had mentioned earlier, to have attended a workshop in Birmingham, Alabama recently on the topic of spirituality and psychotherapy. I believe that the path of being transsexual is a profoundly spiritual journey. To the degree that one develops their spiritual life on this journey reflects the enhancement and sense of wellbeing we experience throughout the decision to transition, the transition itself and the quality of life we lead after we transition. Many people assume that once the transition is complete, you have arrived at your journey, but I, like many others recognize the journey continues and we are faced with many challenges. Many of these challenges are the same one faces whether they have been through the transsexual experience or not, but there are still unique situations that will come along. Having a well-developed sense of spirituality will help you to not only weather the storms of life, but will also enhance the pleasure one finds in everyday life as well.

In this article, I would like to begin to share the concepts that Dr. Moore believes will help someone to develop a deeper spiritual life. This is the first installment in a series.

1.     Deepen your formal religion

Many of us have a background of having been raised in a church, synagogue, or Islamic place of worship. It is something that is ingrained in our being and affects us in many profound ways, both positive and in negative ways, depending on the orientation of our faith and in the way a particular denomination of our faith teaches us about God and how we need to behave within our faith. I was fortunate enough to have attended a Southern Baptist church during my adolescence that taught love and tolerance for each other. Other people have experienced and learned that their denomination or church were very legalistic and were condemning, particularly if they were gay or transsexual. 

In my adult life, I experienced this with a United Methodist pastor. Her condemnation led me to leave that church and find a home in the Episcopal Church where I am welcome and made to feel part of the church family. Having found a place where I can formally worship is very important to my spiritual life, though over the years, I have been an episodic attendee. I may attend for a year or so at a time and then find myself not being very active in formal worship. Most recently, I stopped attending due to the death of my father a year and a half ago. I simply did not have the energy to go during that time, which coincided with my work transition. Yet I find that I do better all the way around when I attend on a regular basis. Formal worship keeps you from neglecting your spiritual life. 

The most profound spiritual experience I ever had was when I visited a church my friend Marsha attends in New Jersey. It was the first opportunity I had ever had to stand before my God and worship as I am with others who accepted me as I am. It was also the first time I had ever taken communion as I am and I remember tears running down my cheeks during the whole service. It was something that had been missing and  much needed in my life to move forward on my journey as Lauren. 

2.     Get to know one or more other faith traditions. 

The idea of becoming more familiar with other faith traditions is one that is not often encouraged. Some of us who are more spiritually advanced than I are familiar not only with their own faith, but have deeply explored other faiths as well. 

I have explored Taoism to a certain degree and have read several translations of the Tao Te Ching (Book of Changes), written by Lao Tzu. From that I have learned to be still and allow events to unfold, not wishing them to be anything other than what it is. It teaches acceptance and to live harmoniously with nature and in your culture. These lessons I do not practice faithfully, but having explored this avenue of spirituality has made a positive impact on me at various times of my life.

I have been interested in learning more about Islam. I think because of the acts of terrorists who falsely claim their actions are due to teachings of Islam, as well as the poor treatment of women by Middle Eastern cultures who practice Islam, many westerners have a decidedly negative view of that faith. My opinion is that each of the monotheistic religions has leaders and followers who claim to follow their faith. They pervert the message to use it to spread hatred and condemnation of those who do not adhere to their version of their faith. Knowing that my faith tradition has such people and knowing the truth of my faith, I have felt some sense of the need to learn more about Islam rather than to reject it out of hand without real examination. So perhaps this is another faith that I will learn more about to harvest what it holds that can aid me in my spiritual journey.

3.     Explore secular sources of spiritual insight

When Dr. Moore began to talk about this, it puzzled me about how to go about doing that. One of many ways to do this is through service work. Become involved in activities that serve others who are less fortunate. By doing so, it takes you out of your usual life of thinking of yourself and your needs and puts you in the position of giving to others and being with people who are in service to others. This is particularly true when engaging in a service activity that allows one to interact with the people who are benefitting from your service work directly. The examples that first come to mind are participating in programs like Meals on Wheels, Special Olympics or volunteering at a nursing home or to read to children at the library. Participating in Big Brothers or Big Sisters is another example of secular activities that will deepen your spiritual life and there are countless others.

Pink Essence: Why I Chose to Discontinue My Membership

I was a member of Pink Essence for a number of years and I recently decided to discontinue my membership as did Patty.

There were many benefits that I got from being a member and my decision to end my membership in this community ultimately has to do with a decision that Chloe Prince made to open up Pink Essence access to the World Wide Web.

I have known about this decision for quite a long time and at times worried about what the personal implications for my private life might be. Then again, I have this blog which would throw into question why I might be so concerned about my privacy. After all, I have given a great number of workshops around the eastern U.S. over the past 5 years and I have documented my transition here as well as on Pink Essence.

However, when I decided to write my own blog, I made the decision to be more public. When Ms. Prince made the decision to open Pink Essence up to the internet at large she made a decision that has the potential to harm many people who are not prepared to be potentially discovered by family or employers or by friends. It is a difficult path that we walk and for those who are not ready to deal with being outed at a time when they are just coming to terms with themselves, this is potentially disastrous. When  one considers that we have a rate of over 40% of us who attempt suicide at some point in our lives due to the heavy price we pay for attempting to come to a place of peace with ourselves and the associated losses of families, friends and careers, among other things, perhaps Pink Essence is no longer a safe haven for those who are just coming to terms with themselves.

In my situation, family did discover my presence on Pink Essence and it did recently cost me and Patty some relationships that we held dear. I don't fault Pink Essence for my own losses, but I think someone not as far down the path as I am and who has not worked as hard at self acceptance as I have may not be as emotionally prepared to pay the price that Patty and I just paid by not ending my membership when I first became aware of the new policy opening up Pink Essence to the World Wide Web.

The value of Pink Essence is mostly for new people who are coming to terms with their gender identity. They are also the most vulnerable people on Pink Essence. Having made the decision to open up Pink Essence to the World Wide Web puts the most vulnerable of us at risk.

Unfortunately, I have seen a huge turnover in membership. This is most likely because many of us who have transitioned and accomplished what we set out to accomplish (a successful transition), have no need for what Pink Essence offers. Other people who have successfully transitioned stick around to offer advice on what worked and what didn't on our journey to becoming whole.

I believe that opening up Pink Essence is a huge disadvantage to those who have transitioned and want to live a private life, even if they wish to contribute in a positive way to the lives of others who feel lost and are trying to figure out how to be happy and live a fulfilled life.

It is also a huge disadvantage for those who need a safe and private place to discuss the often painful issues that we face on our way to finding peace and happiness.

I only wish Chloe Prince well, as well as future success. I hope that those who join Pink Essence find what they need on their journey, but I also hope people will be aware of the risks associated with membership on Pink Essence and make a wise decision if the benefits of membership will outweigh the risks involved.

To read an article I wrote about the benefits of belonging to social websites such as Pink Essence that I wrote earlier, please follow this link:

http://twoworldstranstherapist.blogspot.com/2012/08/in-praise-of-pink-essence-and-social.html

Remembering Gianna Israel

Did you know Gianna Israel? She was one of the most remarkable women I've ever met. I met Gianna before she met me, reading her columns in Transgender Tapestry. What she was writing about us and our lives was better than anything else I was reading about overcoming our struggles and how to overcome them, keep the people we love in our lives and to be happier in our affirmed gender.

I sent her an email and to my surprise and joy, she answered back. This was in 1996. I never think that people who have accomplished so much will have time to spend on me. I'm always wrong about that. Happens every time. Now, in some ways that is a pretty sad comment on how I feel about myself at times, but on the other hand, imagine how happy I am when someone of her stature writes back to me and even better, we become friends! That's the part I mainly end up thinking about.

Gianna and I wrote back and forth, then we started calling each other on the phone from time to time. I'll always remember her wonderfully hilarious sense of humor; once she had been complaining to me about her little dog, a Yorkie, for a while. Her dog was lavishing her affections on her roommate and ignoring Gianna, much to her disgust. She used to refer to that dog as "that farm animal" and was always talking about getting rid of it and getting another dog. I about rolled on the floor laughing the first time she called her a farm animal, and after that I always had to get updates on the farm animal!

 One day she sent me a picture of the dog over the internet labeled "farm animal. jpg. When I opened it, there was this little dog sitting on the roasting pan in the oven surrounded by potatoes, onions and carrots looking at the camera with her little bright eyes and a doggie smile on her face! I just about died laughing and still laugh when I think about it today.
Another time I had been complaining about how long it took to shave my legs and body. She said she had something that really helped her speed up the process and sent me this picture of a disposable razor with three heads! She was just about the funniest woman I ever met.

As our friendship grew, we would call each other once or twice a month between our emails and I would call upon her to consult with me on my transgender patients when I had just started working with others, or just for some nice girl talk.

As a professional courtesy, she did my evaluation for HRT, but I didn't use it until 2006 due to my own fear and indecisiveness about whether to transition or not. I kept the letter all these years and used it for the doctor I was going to see originally, who I have been referring to over the past 15 years. I have that letter in my scrap book I am making and I cherish it.

What was the most interesting thing about Gianna, was that even though she had been a throw away transsexual street kid and never even earned her G.E.D., she was highly self educated and was one of the best gender scholars I have ever known. She wrote and edited the book Transgender Care as the principle author with Donald Tarver M.D. The book discusses in depth how to provide quality comprehensive services for transsexuals and proposed revisions and additional recommendations that informed the American Psychiatric Association and the World Professional Association of Transgender Health of which she was a member, (At the time of the publication of her book, this organization was still known as The Harry Benjamin Gender Dysphoria Association) on revisions to enhance the quality of lives for people uncomfortable with their assigned birth gender.

But what I admired most about Gianna was that she had the most remarkably kind attitude and love for life despite having been thrown out on the streets as a very young teenager, having to cope with a seizure disorder and was suffering from AIDS. She eventually succumbed to neurological complications while writing and editing another book on treating transgendered people that I was supposed to write a chapter for on family preservation.

When we lost Gianna on February 22nd, 2004, we lost a bright shining light of love and hope in our community. In my own little way, to honor her presence in my life and that I may never forget how much she meant to me as a friend, I still keep her name and phone number on my cell phone as it gives me a reminder of who she was and of our friendship.

Judge Not, Lest Ye Be Judged: Is it Possible You Might be Cisphobic?

I had an experience this past week that I would like to share with you. It does not reflect the best of me, though it turned out well. I think the lesson I took from this is one I would like to share because we can all benefit from it. It is a lesson that has been profoundly repeated at least weekly, if not almost daily since I made the decision to complete my transition over the past 6 years or so. It occurs so frequently now that in many ways I have begun to take it for granted. It is the more poignant examples that I now find to be emotionally moving.

There is another type of bias and prejudice that I have described in vague ways. It is something that we must search within ourselves and sit in judgment of ourselves. It is a form of oppression of the worst kind. It is oppression of the self and it is called CISPHOBIA. It occurs when we expect cisgendered people to discriminate against us, hate us, or perpetrate violence against us with no basis for that expectation. It is rarely discussed and even more rarely described.

Do cisgendered people at times discriminate and publically express hatred towards us, even to the point of having perpetrated violence against us solely for the reason we are transgendered? That is an unequivocal YES. It is the legacy that I grew up with, the same type of virulent hatred also characterized by racism and homophobia, however we must also recognize the tremendous advances our society has made in accepting us and recognizing our right to participate openly in a free and just society with respect to our Constitutional rights. There is, however much that remains to be done to further the progress we all have made. That progress benefits cisgendered people as well as transgendered people.

Incumbent upon us is that we also reflect and identify those areas of potential and/ or unrecognized cisphobia that impair our ability to experience a fully free and self actualized life. It is also incumbent to make necessary changes in our own personal attitudes when necessary to eliminate cisphobia in our lives.

The example I would like to share with you involves a former patient of mine who I had not worked with for about two years. Quite frankly, the experience of informing all of my current patients that I was transitioning, while very successful (I retained over 97% of my patients), was also very stressful, at times exhausting, and it was an experience that I am glad is over. On occasion, I still have to disclose to a former patient who is insistent about wanting to work with me. I don't look forward to the times I have to do this. I just want to live my life without having to review the past, but in my choice of work, that is not always possible. Here is where the problem arises and it is where I have personally struggled with an area of cisphobia.

This patient came to the office two weeks ago, unaware that I had transitioned. He had asked to see me for a few minutes, but because of the unanticipated nature of the visit and that I had already seen 9 patients with a serious crisis patient in the afternoon I was not prepared to deal with the situation.

My thoughts were that due factors of his cultural background, his religious background and his personality that there was no way that he would be accepting. In other words, I made a cisphobic judgement about him. It turns out that I was grossly unfair to this gentleman.

The front office staff did an admirable job handling the situation. They began to try to explain without discussing my transition that I (my former male self) was no longer there. Out of genuine concern and care, he pressed them to tell himwhat happened to me as he was clearly worried that something tragic had befallen me. So they explained in simple terms that I had undergone a gender transition. His response to them was that it did not matter a bit to him and that he felt that because of the work I had done with him that I had saved his life. (No I didn't save his life, I was simply the tool he chose to use to save his own life).

The front desk staff relayed this information back to me and I asked that he come by on another occasion. It had indeed been a very long day and I was tired.

Yesterday my patient had an appointment with me and saw me for the first time. The first order of business was to apologize to him for my misjudgment. He graciously told me that no apology was necessary, but I insisted that I had been wrong, apologized to him again and thanked him for his acceptance of me.

In the past, I have seen opinions expressed that people who are oppressed cannot be oppressors themselves because of their oppressed status. I have always sharply disagreed with that opinion. By the act of being bigoted, prejudiced or biased against people, whether they are members of an oppressed class of people, or by the act of being bigoted, prejudiced or biased against people who are members of a class of people who have been oppressive towards another class, we perpetrate the impedance of societal progress. We injure those we have unfairly judged. We injure ourselves by depriving ourselves of the opportunity to take advantage of the progress we have made as a society. We slow the process and the progress of our own full integration into society.

Now I am someone who believes I am fully assimilated in daily life; I do not fear going to the ladies room, using the ladies dressing room in stores, nor do I fear an encounter with the police, going through TSA when I travel or interact in any way with the predominant culture. I generally don't see myself as a person who is cisphobic, but there are these areas of cisphobia that apparently do exist in my life.

It is my hope, through my own personal growth in this area and by bringing this potential problem to the attention of other transgendered people that we can do our part to make our society a more free and open society.

Do Transsexuals Discriminate Against Each Other?

I was exchanging emails with my friend Amanda who is a relatively new friend I met on Pink Essence. Amanda is a very sweet lady who is coming to terms with her gender identity later in life. This is not unusual for people in their 40's, 50's, 60's and even 70's or older. There just weren't any resources readily available to people of our age.

The few sources of medical research and psychological research suggested in the 1960's and 1970's that people such as me were extremely rare, so rare that the estimate of our population was around one in 33,000 (1:33000). In 1970, when I was 12 and went to the public library in Charlottesville, Virginia to read about people like me in books by Harry Benjamin, Robert Stoller and Richard Green, the principle authors of the time, Charlottesville, in 1970,  had a population of about 30,000. I knew this because on the Interstate signs for the exits for Charlottesville, they posted the population at that time.

 Can you imagine how alone I felt as a 12 year old? It was a terrible feeling and I continued to feel that sense of terminal uniqueness until about 1990 when I got a subscription to Compuserve and found live time chat called "CB channels". Compuserve was very expensive at the time. It cost over $6.00 USD an hour over the basic plan. It didn't take too long for someone who was dire in need to talk to people who were like me to run up a huge bill and this limited how often I could talk to another transsexual after weeding out the fetishists and people with various interests other than realizing their internal gender identity.

Just before that, I had taken a "mental health" day off from work and watched Geraldo Rivera's daytime talk show that afternoon. Marsha Botzner was on his show. She was (and is) the director of the Ingersoll Center and the next day, I called her in Seattle where she is located. She was the very first person like myself I had ever spoken to and that gave me a tiny glimmer of hope. She was extremely encouraging with me, but it wasn't until 1997 that I made the decision to begin taking baby steps to actively seek my own transition and stop living with the misery of living with my secret.

My dearest friend Christina and my wonderful beautiful wife Patty were my rock in beginning the painful process of coming to terms with myself and the world I live in. Although I had been helping other transgendered people, it wasn't until 5 years ago that I found the strength to seek therapy for my own gender dysphoria. I deeply appreciate what my therapist Dana has done to help me find my way on a difficult life journey. She had no experience with people such as me. I'm the only therapist around for about a 3 and a half hour drive who works with adult transgender people. She is a highly skilled therapist and had the courage and compassion to stretch herself in her own growth as a professional to help me. I could have easily skirted the standards of care in obtaining my hormones, but I followed the process that I ask others to follow. I believe in the WPATH Standards of Care and cannot exclude myself from following them.

Along the way, from time to time, I would run into someone who would tell me that because I hadn't already transitioned, gone on hormones and had my genital reassignment surgery, that I wasn't a transsexual and that I was something else, less than the person who made these observations and not worthy of being friends with this person. I was "otherized". I found this reaction to be very painful and it would often increase my sense of emotional isolation and being unacceptable. I know my sister Christina experienced a lot of the same treatment by some of the other transsexuals with who were we were acquainted online.

It saddened me greatly to learn that Amanda had formed a close friendship on a transgender social website with another person who identified herself as a transsexual. After being friends and with someone who Amanda considered a close friend for a while, the friend learned that Amanda has chosen to honor her spouse's wishes that she not begin hormonal reassignment therapy and to not appear publically in her authentic gender identity. Her friend was not supportive of her, instead she was quite incensed that Amanda has chosen to make a compromise to preserve the relationship of many, many years with her spouse. In fact, she was so upset with Amanda's decision that she decided to "unfriend" Amanda. Amanda, understandably, was quite hurt by her friend's shallow an insensitive attitude towards her.

Now I do not know who Amanda was referring to and I do not care to know her identity. I think that this person must be very insecure with her own identity to insist that every transsexual follow in lockstep and begin HRT and eventually (the sooner, the better?) have genital reassignment surgery. it really matters not a whit, in my opinion whether someone begins HRT or has the surgery to confirm they are, indeed, a transsexual. There are many among us, particularly those who are older and in committed relationships who choose to not make our gender identity not "all about me". We love our spouses and want to remain with them for the rest of our lives. So, we make compromises that we are able to live with.  We try to find a middle road that our spouses can support as well as what brings us a level of congruency that allows us to live as comfortably as we can. It isn't the best of all possible worlds, but it is what works for us as individuals.  Gladys Knight and the Pips got it right in their song, Leaving on That Midnight Train To Georgia- " I'd rather live with him in his world than without him in mine".

Relationship is about compromise. To be in an intimate relationships, we have to find a middle ground with our partner. It doesn't matter what that compromise is, as long as we can live with it. Having a transsexual identity has nothing to do with what we do about it. It's simply about the identity.

We transsexuals frequently resent being lumped into the "transgender" umbrella. To me this is understandable because we don't care for the thought that we are identified by the public as being many things we are not. However, that has never influenced my choice of my friends. They are my friends because of their character and not because of their identity. It is particularly distressing to me that some of us who identify as transsexual will choose to denigrate others who identify as transsexual because of the compromises they choose to make to preserve the most important relationships in our lives.

I'm so glad you are my friend Amanda!

The Face of Trans Today

Over the past few months, I've begun to think about the question, "In the predominant culture (the United States, my culture) today, what is the image of being transgendered today?" I'm not sure that this is as easy a question to answer as it would appear on the surface.

This is something I've been thinking about since my adoptive niece Erica, made a comment about the featured speakers and content of the conference workshops at Trans Philadelphia Health Conference. Over the past few years, the content of workshops and speakers reflect a trend towards those who identify as "gender queers", particularly in the Northeast and West Coast.

According to the National Transgender Discrimination survey approximately 13% of people who were included in the survey identified as gender queer. Those who identify as gender queer are much younger than the general population obtained in the survey. 67% identified within the gender binary of male or female. Another 20% identified themselves as sometimes living as male and sometimes female, but still clearly identified with the gender binary concept to a large degree. 71% were under the age of 44 years, so the study does not accurately reflect the age distribution of transgendered people. 20% were in school at the time of this survey. It was also limited to those with internet access, so there are some confounding variables to this survey. In other words, the results cannot be considered statistically valid or reliable.

However, it remains the most important study on discrimination transgendered people face in the United States conducted to date. In my opinion, despite the limitations of the survey, it is the most accurate reflection of the life experiences of transgendered people in the US today.

 Individuals who identify as gender queer appear to be heavily influenced by an extreme left feminist ideology that is fashionable in academia at colleges and universities. It is known as third wave feminism. They advocate the ideological belief that individuals who identify with the gender binary schema are hurt by it as their lives are limited and scripted by having to conform to either a male or female identity. Instead, they argue, we must create a genderless society.

In October 2012, a Gallup Poll reported that a survey conducted from June 1, 2012 through September 30, 2012 found that approximately 3.4% of Americans identified as being transgendered. These are very similar results as reported in several other surveys since 2006 and can be considered a good estimate of the general population of the U.S. These surveys have a much higher degree of internal validity and reliability of the findings.

It is a more difficult task to ascertain how the culture perceives transgendered people. There are several ways of coming up with a general idea. One can look at how transgendered people are portrayed in the media such as in movies and television. Another way is to look at how transgendered people are portrayed in news sources. A third is to look at the programming presented at transgender conferences.

Curious to me, is the image that Jerry Springer provides on his television show. I'm also surprised that someone as strongly identified with liberal politics gets away with the way transgendered people are portrayed on his show and that he is so revered by the left. He regularly brings on the worst examples of transgendered people in our society. If one watches his show, one would draw the conclusion that transgendered people are promiscuous, adulterous, drug addicted and essentially shiftless people who engage in outrageous low life behavior. I do not dismiss the thought that at least some of what he portrays is staged, but I also think that some of the people he has on the show are real people. How Springer gets a pass on this from the transgender community is beyond me, but I see more far more attacks on conservatives who make negative comments about transgendered people and I can't ever recall anyone complaining about Springer. Yet he damages the image of transgendered people tremendously. Why is that? I wonder...

Another problem I see is very complicated and is a conundrum with no easy solution. We have a very high rate of suicide attempts, unemployment, addiction and alcoholism. Those of us who have been disenfranchised by lacking an education because of dropping out of school are also often marginalized and often end up working in the sex trades. I was very fortunate that despite being physically and emotionally abused in school for a significant portion of my high school years that I was able to endure that and later a brief period of homelessness (directly related to being who I am) and manage to overcome those experiences. I was fortunate to have overcome these experiences and I know that it was only by the grace of God that this happened. The majority of transgendered people are also people of color and in addition to the burden of institutionalized racism, bear the stigma of being transgendered.

Having said this, I clearly want to say this is not an attempt to "blame the victim". People do what they do to cope with being stigmatized. Transgendered people don’t have the same access to the opportunities that people who are not transgendered have and they experience a much higher rate of being victimized physically, emotionally and sexually.

 Remember, when you were in grade school on "career day" and the teacher asked the classroom "What do you want to be when you grow up? No one is raising their hands and waving them wildly exclaiming" I want to be an alcoholic and addict when I grow up!!" or "I want to prostitute myself when I grow up!!!!!"

But we do have a responsibility to overcome the illness of addiction with treatment and 12 step programs, seek help for mental health disorders such as anxiety, depression and post-traumatic stress disorder. We do not have the luxury of just rolling over and giving up, as tempting as that may seem at times.

I looked at the content of workshops offered in recent years at transgender conferences as a way to understand how we are portraying ourselves to the public. I'm not sure that this is a way of discovering what the public's perceptions are, but based on the percentage of workshop programming devoted to gender queers. I do know that they are a very vocal and public image of the "transgender community", much as drag queens and kings" draw a lot of attention and possibly could be a strong influence on the perceived image we have by the predominant culture.

 Another element that influences the public image of transgendered people is something that I have seen decried frequently in our community. That is the tendency for transsexuals who have successfully transitioned to end their involvement in the transgendered community. Their attachment to the broader transgender community is often more tenuous than other transgendered people. They are often criticized harshly for not "giving back" to other transgendered people who are coming along and finding their own way on the long and winding road of successfully transitioning. Because they "disappear" into the predominant culture, the public has little context for these individuals in our society and this further skews the public perception of transsexuals (as opposed to transgendered individuals not including transsexuals). While this is ultimately the goal of most transsexuals, it is not necessarily what is desired by other transgendered people who have a strong attachment to the transgender culture.

My interpretation of what this represents is that the majority of transsexuals do not identify with other people considered to be transgendered and they do not share the same sense of community with drag kings and queens, cross dressers, gender queers, and other diverse identities that consider themselves members of the transgendered community.

In my opinion, a transsexual who has managed to transition and does not wish to continue being involved in the community has every right to do so. She does not owe the community or others coming behind her anything. Her sole responsibility is to herself. In the words of Oprah Winfrey “… to live your best life...”

Because of my profession and my experiences as a transsexual, I will remain active in the transgendered community to a large degree to help individuals with their transition and in overcoming addictions and mental health issues that we all too frequently have. This is a choice I make voluntarily as a professional, not a personal responsibility. This necessarily means that I will have less privacy about my identity than I desire, but because of my special set of skills I will continue to make my skills available to the transgender community.

These are just my observations. What do you think is the image of the transgendered community and what are the reasons for this? I'm very interested in your opinions and I hope you will share them!

 

 

 

What Happend to Sage?

Dashad "Sage" Smith has been missing since November 20th in Charlottesville, Virginia. A 20 year old woman of trans experience, she had met a man on Facebook from Minnesota, we are told. This man, Erik McFadden, according to the news reports came to Charlottesville from Minnesota and was to meet her at the Amtrak station, as reported in The Daily Progress. He was described in the press as a "person of interest", was interviewed by the local police and then disappeared. His whereabouts are not known, yet the local law enforcement has not seemed to upgraded his status to that of a "suspect".



Members of the Charlottesville area LGBT community are fearful for community members' safety and are angry about their belief that a lack of attention has been mounted as when a young female University of Virginia student disappeared after leaving an AC/DC concert the year before last.

Whether law enforcement has devoted the same intensity of effort in trying to find out what happened to Sage is difficult to ascertain. The University of Virginia student's were very wealthy and were able to bring tremendous attention to bear through their wealth through the media. Ms. Smith's family are of far more modest means and the attention to this potential crime has not been near the manitude of the attention directed to the U.Va. student.

No doubt, many will label this a hate crime if Ms. Smith is not found to be safe. My opinion is that this was not a hate crime, but a sex crime. The victim happened to be a woman of trans experience.

Young people are particularly vulnerable and Ms. Smith being of trans experience undoubtedly made her more vulnerable. She is a woman of color and is not as privileged as many of us in the trans community. As difficult as our lives can be at times, we who are white, have the benefit of good educations and better employment opportunities are not as likely to fall victims to sexual preditors. As lonely as our lives can be, it is easy to see how a young person who has little life experience can be exploited by a preditor who tells us we are attractive and desirable, and seem to be so attracted to us that they are willing to travel long distances to meet us and promise us love, romance, security and companionship.

Those are the ingredients that make the more emotionally vulnerable members of our community disregard everything we have been taught about personal safety growing up. This seems to be a growing problem in the age of electronic social networking. It bears discussing in depth and widely in as many forums as possible to educate people, particularly young people that these dangers are, unfortunately more and more present in our society and that we need to use restraint and good judgement in meeting people we have never met before after becoming acquainted to some degree on line.

I pray that Sage Smith is found safe and well. But with every day that goes by with no trace of her whereabouts, after searches of the city and surrounding areas, hope grows dimmer that she will be found alive.

Please join me in prayers for Sage and if, by a miracle, you read this and happen to have even the tiniest shred of information that might be helpful in solving this missing person case, please call the Charlottesville, Virginia Police at 434-977-4000.

Trans Conventions: Why Should You Go to One?

Each year, there are opportunities to attend one or more trans conferences around the country. As time has gone by, there are more and more conferences available to attend regionally, providing opportunities to learn more about ourselves, meet people like ourselves, have fun and find out about options for medical and aesthetic care. At some conventions there are also continuing education tracks available to educate professionals such as myself. We are taking the responsibility for finding professionals who can educate other professionals who are interested in helping us and providing these important opportunities. I have both given workshops to other professionals and received a substantial amount of continuing education over the past two years. That has allowed me to solely focus on studying sanctioned curricula by my profession and teach to other professionals. Because of these opportunities, I have completed 73 hours of continuing education in the last two years on top of the self directed studies that I have been engaging in over the past 16 years. That is equivalent to 4.5 semester hours in a graduate program.



Since 2009, I have been attending conferences to offer workshops on the history of mental health treatment of transsexualism and what is the present state of the art in transgender care. I do my best to provide education to other professionals and seek out the best education opportunities that I can find, as well as unravel the misconceptions about the WPATH Standard of Care, and myths that abound in the gender community to the members of our community.

I have not been to all the conferences available to go to, but have been going to Southern Comfort Conference each year. Southern Comfort is the largest conference I have attended and is one of the longest running and largest conferences in the U.S. This year will be my fourth time presenting a workshop there. This conference is the most dear to me because Southern Comfort gave me my first opportunity to present a workshop on my area of specialization.



 I have given a workshop at the Trans Philadelphia Health Conference, which is the largest health conference in the world on the topic of transgender care and last year chaired the mental health workshop selection committee for this conference. I have also attended the Keystone Conference in Harrisburg, Pa., TransOhio Conference in Columbus, and Chicago Be- All and I have to say, I have enjoyed them all. Besides the opportunity to give or get these educational opportunities, I have treasured the friendships I have made at the conferences and the opportunity to spend time with many wonderful friends that I have across the nation thanks to the Internet and through the past four years that I have been a member of Pink Essence. I attended five conferences last year.

What can you expect at these conferences? Be prepared to meet all sorts of people from every walk of life and from all over the U.S. It is not unusual to meet people from all over the U.S.



You will have an opportunity to attend workshops on various topics that include counseling, etiquette, how to move in a feminine manner, fashion styling, medical health issues such as hormone regimens, aesthetic and gender reassignment surgeries, voice therapy, how to transition at work, improving family and spousal relationships, sexuality, spirituality, substance abuse, laser and electrolysis hair removal, legal issues in identity management, advocacy and participating in the legislative process. There are many more topics too. If you are a female to male transperson, there are plenty of topics for you too!

Just as importantly there is time for FUN!! Usually there will be organized activities and excursions to see local points of interest, to shop, and get pampered in salons.



The conferences provide special attention to first time attendees, so they will not feel frightened. For some, this will be the first time she will have had to be in public and this can be very overwhelming. Some conferences will offer a "big sister or big brother" to help first time attendees. There are sad stories about people coming for their first time who were too afraid to even come out of their room and hid the whole time they were there. Often there are 12 step meetings available for our recovering brothers and sisters.

An illustration of the important role conferences play in some of our lives can be seen frequently on the last night. You will see many people who stay up all night that last night with friends who they wont get to see for another year. Most poignant is watching those who are sad that they will not have an opportunity to express who they truly are for another full year. They look so forlorn, it is heartbreaking. That is exactly how important these conferences are.

If for no other reason, this is an opportunity to learn more about yourself and sometimes you will learn a little bit about other people, different from yourself, but in some ways the same.

I hope to see those of you who I have met and meet many of you I have only met through the Internet this year!

In Praise of Pink Essence and Social Networking

To rip off old Willie Shakespeare and misquote him, I would like to say that I come here to praise Pink Essence, not to bury it (and other similar transgender social networking websites).

If you are not familiar with Pink Essence or other social networking websites such as URNotAlone, perhaps you might visit one of them and see if you enjoy being a part of an online community specifically for those who are transgendered and those who support them.

I speak specifically of Pink Essence in this article because that is the social networking website that I have been most familiar and I have participated to varying degrees of activity for almost 4 years. UrNotAlone is notable in that it was the first of it's kind and was begun in 1995. There are some others too that I have heard of in passing but I am not really knowledgeable about them.

There are a lot of people who love Pink Essence and those who don't care for it at all. There are members who have been active on the site and remain very involved to this day, those who briefly become members, find it is not their cup of tea and close their membership without ever having much involvement in the activities available and those who were once very active on the site who remain members, though participate almost in a nominal manner. This latter type of member would probably describe me best. Then there are the members who remain very active since they joined to this day.

There are people who vehemently loathe Pink Essence and denegrate it and its creator for various reasons. There are ardent members of the site who seem to devote much or all of their online life to it like some people on Face Book do.

The detractors complain about all sorts of things they don't like and some of them demonize the creator and owner of Pink Essence. Personally, I admire her. She has created something that has been a source of support during a terrifying time for a transgendered person when she comes to terms with who she is after years of either being in denial of herself, or being aware of who she is but living in terror others learn about her. Typically, she has never known anyone like herself or has no where to turn to gain access to support groups or knowlegable allied health care professionals who could be of help to her. Sometimes even when these resources are locally available she may almost be petrified with fear and a site like Pink Essence is her first foray into coping with herself in a healthier manner. This is one of the most important reasons that these sites exist.

In addition to that, Pink Essence also offers ways to express one's opinion on things Trans, non trans, and trans related including chat rooms and blogging. There is a forum on book reviews, on spirituality, on people who have the same career, information on how to contact professionals who help transgender people. There are political discussions and information on real world support groups, social gatherings and transgender conferences where one may meet others on a similiar journey and have the opportunity to speak with many professionals face to face. Most important of all is the opportunity to forge life long friendships like I have with some of the members of Pink Essence. They don't live very close, but they have become some of my dearest friends and I never would have gotten to know them without the presence of Pink Essence on the internet.

Is Pink Essence perfect? Of course not, silly! It has its strengths and its challenges. Some people call them faults, but I think a challenge is something that can be overcome. A fault is something there is no hope to ever change.

Pink Essence is really a big extended family. As in all families, there are squabbles; people get mad at each other and cut each other off emotionally. Sometimes they "kiss and make up" and sometimes they never have anything to do with each other ever again. They become estranged. They adore their "mother" (the website owner and creator) and sometimes they get angry at "mother" because something occurs they don't like.

Personally, while I have had some disagreements with the creator of Pink Essence, just as anyone does in any type of relationship. Most importantly though, I really admire and respect the creator of Pink Essence for what she has created. She has something she created that hasn't just helped people in the U.S., but it has helped people all over the world. I think that is pretty special, don't you?

For a later article I wrote on the potential downside of membership in Pink Essence and other social media websites please follow this link:
http://twoworldstranstherapist.blogspot.com/2014/05/pink-essence-why-i-chose-to-discontinue.html

I would like to again restate, I believe that Chloe Prince created something very positive for transgendered people, but nothing is seldom all good or all bad; it is up to the user of social media to be responsible in educating themselves about the benefits and risks of belonging so social support websites.

Cis Privilege and Trans Privilege

Coming home from my own therapy session with Dana, I began to think about Cis privilege and Trans privilege. I really can't tell you what made this come to mind. I'm usually fairly reflective after a session, but today I was rockin' out on the way home. I was listening to Derek and the Dominos, the Rolling Stones and the Red Hot Chili Peppers on the radio going home, so I can't really say I was focused on anything particular. I was thinking about what I had written on male and female privilege earlier and that is what triggered this line of thought.

We are all aware of what Cis privilege means as people who are transsexuals. Cis privilege means that you never have to worry about how someone might react to your presence in various situations of which we are all familiar. We might not be afforded the privilege of our true gender identity even when we are going about our lives as the gender we really are. It is possible that we might not be considered to be who we are. As a result, we could possibly be deprived of the privileges of the gender of our identity. It doesn't happen very frequently anymore, but I am sensitive to that discrimination when I sense it could be a real possibility. I most often pass along life seamlessly. Either people don't know I'm a transsexual and see me as a woman who was assigned at birth or they are polite and well mannered people who understand that I am just another woman, though my life history may be apparent. That is immaterial to me. I expect to be treated like a lady. That almost always happens now. (I am thankful!)

The present vogue of conceptualizing everything as a "continuum" such as autism, gender identity and sexual orientation dictates that we look at male privilege and female privilege as a continuum too. Taking it a step farther, the predicate is that there is a continuum of Cis privelege and Trans privilege. I think the majority of us would have a pretty hard time of thinking of what in the world Trans privilege might be. I have, for the past 5 hours. My experience is that of becoming the woman publicly as opposed to being the woman I have always known I was. I can only comment on my own observations of what Trans privilege might be and I would really encourage your comments to add to this to help me on my thoughts on the topic.
I found this on an image search, it is from transachanism.com:

It fails to factor in any reference of female privilege or trans privilege, so it fails the test of modern conceptualization of health and social problems. It does not represent a true continuum. It appears to be a representation of third wave feminist sociopolitical ideology.
So what might trans privilege include? Well as I mentioned, I am female. So, I thought of these things. Most of them are things I view as a loss in life, but females assigned at birth would most likely say: You never had a period. You never were able to/ got pregnant, give birth or nurse your baby.You didn't grow up in fear of being raped or beaten or otherwise abused. (Oh yes. Some of us did, indeed). You weren't discouraged from a professional career and you most likely did not experience discrimination in getting a job or promotion (until we lived as who we truly are).


This is an example of what Cisgender privilege looks like sometimes to members of the transsexual community. I try to keep in mind that Freud himself once said "Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar". Here is another:



We see this from feminists like Janice Raymond and Mary Daily.




 Is it? What do you think?

But Enough About Us, Sherri! How About You?

Well my dears, I've had a lot of things to talk about lately, but I haven't been sharing about what I'm doing and what's going on in my life. It's time to catch up!

It's been a rollercoaster in some ways, I have been involved more with my mother and father since my father's heart attack in the beginning of May. We were told that he likely would not live more than six months and more likely two months due to the extent of his decline over all from old age and the failing of several organ systems. He has been ill for years and never recovered from his heart valve replacement which resulted in vascular dementia due to having some strokes during the operation. Because of this, I  have been grieving him for years as I watched him decline and was quite prepared for this perhaps being his last illness. That has been a rollercoaster in that it appeared he was near the end and since then he has rallied, to all of our surprise and it appears possible that he may be able to return home in a month or so. That is where the emotional ride gets bumpy for me as I become more hopeful that he will get better and be more active when he comes home, rather than slide back into his decline. It seems that perhaps being in the nursing home rehabilitation unit has given him much better care than he was getting at home with Mom. I have been making comments to my mother about how well he is doing and that he should stay there until he has gotten the full benefit of his rehabilitation potential, or at least until I return from vacation in mid July. My mother is in significant denial of his health problems and particularly of his dementia. One of the big problems for someone with dementia is apathy and she see's this as his being petulant or wanting to be catered to, which is not the case. He simply has no volition to engage in anything active and the structure of the rehabilitation unit pushes him to be active. As a result, he is more active than I have seen him in the past year. He is appetite is much improved and he is beginning to walk again when he wouldn't move out of his chair at home. I hate to have to say this but I think both he and my mother will both live longer if he stays there permanently. They tend to feed off each other and they both seem highly anxious together. Mom seems to have benefitted with him being away and being under less stress. she is more relaxed and more pleasant.

All of this has taken my full attention and much of my energy.  I have to help Mom more with her home and visit with him, which I don't do enough because after a full day of doing therapy, I have little energy to visit during the week. I do a fairly good job of keeping healthy boundaries and taking care of myself. I do enjoy mowing, being out in the sun and this is my time to meditate, enjoy the sunshine, watch wild life and pray.

What is frustrating about this situation, is it has slowed down my coming out at work, which is the most major task left to accomplish before I can transition there. My therapist Dana, who has helped me so much with managing a lot  the coming out process. She suggests that I start applying for jobs as myself and if I get a job offer then I have a bargaining chip in case the hospital decides they no longer require my services. I think this makes sense. I would like to stay at the hospital, I've been there almost 11 years and have 14 to go so I can have a 25 year pension there. I would also not wish to lose my transsexual patients. I want to be able to continue to coordinate and build upon the comprehensive health program I developed. It would be a loss for me. But it would allow me to live as who I am in that aspect of my life. That is important to me. A lot of my friends will be frustrated to see me throw up a road block delaying my journey. I do have to think about Patty who is unable to work due to disability. I bring home a majority of the income and provide the health care insurance, so it is important to me that I take care of her as best I can. We have huge medical bills.

Of lesser concern is the ongoing and growing realization that there will be a low likelihood of any kind of stealth while I live in this area for a variety of reasons. Not long ago I was introduced to a retired therapist who knew me as a male and is good friends with my department head. That was very uncomfortable to me at the time and I am concerned that my work situation could turn into another coming out at a time and on a field not of my choosing.

Interestingly, (to me anyway) was the fact that last weekend my High School had a reunion of multiple classes with many people with who I went to school. I had absolutely no desire to attend. There are only three people I care to keep up with, three women from my class. The experience of high school was very painful to me as I suffered years of physical and emotional abuse there and no one intervened to stop it, though it was quite visible in such a small school. It has taken years of therapy to deal with it. Therapy helps; I have nowhere near the guilt, shame and anger that I carried for years, nor do I suffer to the extent I have with the severe depression I've had over the past five years.

I was quite interested in the idea of going to one of the events held in a restaurant as myself so I could watch the dynamics and not have them see me. Then I decided they weren't worth it. I would most likely become angry/ sad/ depressed over thinking about what happened to me, so it would serve no good purpose for me.

Looking at the pictures posted on Facebook from the reunion, it dawned on me that if I had gone, it could have been a disaster. It turns out that one of the people from school who was a year or two behind me also goes to my church and is a member of the Vestry (that is a Deacon, for those of us with a Southern Baptist heritage). He knows me now as Sherri and not as who I was. If I had gone, he likely would have recognized me from church and then I would again be in a situation of coming out at a time and a field not of my choosing again and I find that very wearing, as I have written about in the past here.

Soon I do intend to let my three women friends know about me soon and I expect that at that point it will work its way around the alumni of my High School, and that will be ok. The difference being that I told who I wanted to tell who matter to me and if at that point, the rest of them find out, I don't care really.

What I don't like about the situation is my lack of the right to privacy, which we refer to as stealth. I become more and more aware that stealth for me at my age and situation is mostly not going to be. So I have been readjusting my thinking about how important is stealth in my life. After all, even if people do know about who I was, is it really a problem if I am treated as a woman and people interact with me as the woman I am? Is it realistic for me to expect any more given my dual professional identity and my presence in the community I grew up? I think that the expectation of my having a lifw where no one knows of my male past is unrealistic. It sets me up for feeling bad about myself, rather than enjoying the life I should have taken responsibility to have made happen literally decades ago.

The obverse of that coin is that I can't afford to dwell on the "wasted" years. Really? Wasted? No, not really. I have accomplished a lot, both personally and professionally. Rather, it is much better to be living in the moment of now, which is a much happier time in my life and look towards the future in which I will be who I always was, but hid so well.

So what about the man at church I know who went to school with me all those years ago? I think it is time to tell him. That will be good thing, I'm sure.