Yesterday I worked some more on my web site. Hopefully it will be up soon!
Today was a fun day. I didn't get depressed at all. ::yay!::
We picked up Sarah and wrapped Christmas presents together. Sarah brought over her old crusty POS computer -- a Compaq Presario 4112 -- and asked me to "fix it" for her. I installed more memory, a faster processor, a 3Com NIC, and a bigger hard drive, then I installed Win98SE. Man that computer SUCKS! Compaq must have been really smoking the crack pipe when they came up with their BIOS-on-disk system! Then I went to the Post Office with Mel and mailed the few that we had ready to go. Three of the four we had went to Mel's sister, Jen! We took Sarah home and then went to Wal*Mart to look for the $50 digital camera that they had been advertising. Apparently, Bonnie wanted to buy it for Angie, another of Mel's sisters. We found it, but it was a major POS. It didn't even have an LCD screen. Oh well. At Wal*Mart, we called Bonnie and told her of the find, and agreed to meet her for dinner. We agreed on a place called Los Pinos. We arrived there, only to find that the booths were too small and all of their chairs had arms! Mel wasn't too happy, so we waited in the parking lot for Bonnie to arrive. Bonnie got there, and we all agreed to go try another Mexican joint not too far from Bonnie's place called "Las Palmas." After determining that the seating was adequate, we all ordered. It was pretty good. On the way home, Mel and I talked and we agreed that we would tell Bonnie tomorrow. After we got home, I started working on the site some more (it will probably be going up tomorrow after some more cross-platform testing). While online, I checked one of my daily must-read sites, deal-mac.com. They had a Samsung digital camera (with an LCD screen) for only $49! I called Bonnie in and she ordered it right away. :-) I am glad I was able to help her get a cheap camera for Angie.
Oh well, enough for today, hopefully tomorrow I can announce that the site is up! :-)
_erin
Last night I went Christmas shopping. I know, I know... It was the Saturday before Christmas. The mall was a madhouse, as expected. I guess I am just a major procrastinator. Well, anyways, we went to Lane Bryant to get something for Melissa's sister, Angela. I didn't even know her size, so we had to call her best friend Jill to ask. While there, I was totally checking out all of the new clothes. I haven't been to a Lane Bryant in quite a while. A lot of new things were on the racks and I liked a lot of them! As we left with Angie's present, I told Melissa, "Now we need to go shopping for Angie!"
Before the shopping trip yesterday, I was in a crappy mood. I don't know why. Mel even asked me what she did wrong and why I was mad at her.... I told her that she didn't do anything, because, well, that was the truth. I swear these hormones are really taking my emotions on a roller-coaster ride. Some days I am as happy as can be, others I am practically suicidal.
After we got home, we saw a movie that we had bought on VHS called "About Schmidt," starring Jack Nicholson. When the movie was over, I told Mel that I wanted my two hours back.
Oh well, gotta go back out shopping for more presents. I can only imagine what the malls will be like today!
_erin
I originally wrote this back on December 13th, 2003 for posting to my website. I will eventually put it up there (I am currently re-designing the web site), but I figured I would put it up here for now. I wrote this in the very early morning hours of the 13th, a night when I couldn't sleep very well.... Anywho, here goes:
~~~~~~~~
Apparently, I am unusual for having childhood memories as early as 1.5 – 2 years old. I've heard that most children's earliest memories begin at 3 – 4 years old. How do I know my earliest memories were before then? Well, see, I was born in Maryland in late 1975. When I was 1 and a half, we moved to New Jersey due to my father's job. We lived in New Jersey for a year before moving back to the same neighborhood in Maryland, again because of my father being transferred (this time, back to headquarters in the Washington, D.C. area). What is unusual though, is that I remember the house in New Jersey. I remember the name of the street we lived on. I remember the creek that ran through our back yard (and all of the mosquitoes that lived in it!). I remember the park next door to our house. I remember the floor plan of the house. I remember which room was my parents', which room was my grandmother's, which room was mine. Geesh, I even remember the rainbow-colored tiles of the kitchen floor.
From those earliest memories, and for as long as I can remember, I've known something was wrong with me. I didn't know why, but I always felt like something was missing in my life. I wasn't sure what that "something" was until I was about 5. Let me explain:
At this age, my parents had just split up. My mom moved out of the house and left me behind living with my father, my grandmother (my mom's mom), and my younger brother. See, my parents had made an arrangement with grandma, that she would take care of us while they worked their 9-to-5s, and they would provide her with room and board. My father kept this arrangement with my grandmother, even after my mom and dad split-up.
When my mom moved out, she moved into her own apartment. It was a modest apartment in the same town as my father's house. She worked a few blocks away from her new apartment, and could even walk to work on nice days. Well, getting back to the story… After the divorce was finalized in 1981, the courts awarded her joint custody of my younger brother and me. It was arranged so that we would visit her every other weekend, and that she and my dad would agree on a schedule to determine which holidays we would spend with which parent.
It was on one of these every-other-weekend visits that I realized what the "something" that I was missing was. I was sitting on the floor, watching TV when I saw a pair of mom's high-heeled boots sitting on the floor. I figured, "why not?" and tried them on. It was fun to run around in them. I walked all over the apartment with them on in the middle of the day. I had tons of fun, and even mom thought I was cute in them! After I took them off, I hid them under her bed so I could wear them later. I kept them under her bed and every weekend I would come over and go for the hiding spot, put them on and run around the apartment. I liked them so much, I asked mom if she had any higher heels that I could wear. She looked in her closet, but couldn't find any that she would let me run around in (I guess she wanted to keep her nice shoes in good condition). This was fine with me, as I still had the boots to wear.
From that day forward though, I knew what I was missing in my life – my feminine side.
I'm not going to give you a blow-by-blow accounting of my growing up from that point, but I will just say a few things that I'm sure you've heard before from other transsexuals' stories:
* I've always been more effeminate than masculine,
* I've always been more polite than most boys,
* I preferred to play with girls in school,
* I didn't like gym class, I preferred art, history and languages.
All of the typical "why-didn't-I-see it-coming?"-type tell-tale signs. Of course, to use the old cliché, "hindsight is 20/20."
I hid my feminine identity as best I could. I went into the Cub Scouts and later the Boy Scouts. I actually enjoyed Scouting, and learned many valuable lessons through my experiences there. I ended up being the best cook of the scout troop. I actually won awards for my Dutch-oven and campfire creations. Other kids wanted to be in my patrol just because we always had the best food. We would eat steaks while others ate hot dogs. We would eat pancakes and bacon while others were eating cold cereal. I quickly became popular and rose as a leader in the troop. I ended up with a ton of merit badges and a high rank, and almost made Eagle Scout, the highest rank in Scouting. The only problem (to me, at least), is that I wasn't being genuine. I was right there along with the other guys making "fag" jokes. I was disgusted with myself.
While growing up, I had accumulated several pieces of women's' clothing, including bras, panties, dresses, heels, etc. My grandmother walked in on me when I was dressed on more than one occasion. She always got very upset and threatened to tell dad and my Scout friends. She even asked me if I wanted to be a girl, but the only response I could muster was crying and shaking my head "no." Several times she made me stay dressed and then woke up my brother to humiliate me in front of him. She told my father after the third time she caught me dressed. My father was worried enough to take me to a psychiatrist up in Baltimore about my "problem." He never asked me about it directly, though.
The psychiatrist asked me if I wanted to be a girl. I didn't trust him and lied to him the whole time. We went to him weekly for about a year. During that time, I mostly avoided the transsexual topic and we mostly talked about my family life, the divorce, etc. At the end of the therapy, based upon my lies to him, he told my parents that I had a fetish for pantyhose. He said I used them to masturbate. At this time, I hadn't even masturbated once, let alone all year. I still hadn't even "come" for my first time.
One thing that the psychiatrist helped me understand was that I wasn't gay. At this time (I was only 11) I didn't really know what "gay," "cross dresser," "transsexual" or any of the related terms meant. He explained them to me, so in my head I knew I was a transsexual. That was a relief to me (at least then it was), because then I knew I wasn't gay, because being gay was "bad" as my grandmother and mother had told me repeatedly.
That was the first time that I knew what I was technically called. I had always known that I was a girl in a boy's body. But I didn't know what to do about it. So I didn't really do anything active except continue dressing in private. Once I got to high school, I started researching medical textbooks as to what a transsexual was. I realized that this was in fact my problem, and saw that there were "cures" for this "disease!" I was ecstatic with my newfound knowledge – the knowledge that with surgery, I could become the girl that I had always been inside.
I continued to dress throughout high school and college. The first two years of college I lived at home, and I dressed pretty much every night. The last years of college, I moved on campus and lived in a dorm with 4 other guys in my apartment. I almost was discovered dressing twice by my roommates that first year. Luckily, because I was a senior, my last year on campus I lived in a single room so I could dress as much as I liked.
During college, I used the Internet to learn more about my condition. While researching, I came across the homepages of many others out there with the same problem as myself. I quickly learned to use AOL and chat rooms and talked with my "sisters" about our little problems. I made a lot of friends then, some of whom I still talk to online today.
Since college, I have found a wonderful, understanding wife. I told her about my "problem" the first night we met. It took all I had in me to be able to confide in her my secret. I trembled and cried when I finally told her. Amazingly, she shrugged her shoulders and asked, "That's all?" I fell into her arms sobbing, and I've been hers ever since.
We've gone out together several times while I've been in "girl-mode." We went to a concert, a comedy show, to the movies, etc. We even met a member of a transgender support group in a Starbucks to discuss joining the group.
When we both realized that this was a permanent part of me and would be with me the rest of my life, we began seeing a counselor. I went to about 5 different counselors, all of whom had experience with Gender Identity Disorder (GID). I chose the one that I liked the best, and we stayed with her for over a year. This time, I told her only the truth. It felt so good to get all of these pent-up feelings off of my chest.
I started taking hormones on August 18th, 2003. I have already (December, 2003) noticed plenty of changes. My moods are definitely on a roller-coaster ride to hell. Some days I am happy – very happy. Other days I just want to be alone. Some days I have so much energy that I can't sleep well. Others, I just want to sleep all day. Overall, I have become more sensitive. Things taste slightly different. Objects feel different when I touch them. Orgasms have definitely improved with the hormones.
Physical changes caused by the hormones are all for the better. My skin is softer. My breasts are developing. At first they were very sore, but now they are only slightly sore, and only just behind the nipples. The nipples are getting bigger, as are the areolas. My male pattern baldness is growing back in with very fine hairs. My body hair has decreased dramatically, making shaving a much easier chore. I no longer need to shave my arms or back. I still shave my chest and face every day, though the hair in both of those places is getting thinner and is growing slower than they used to.
And that brings me to today, December 2003. I have decided it is time for me to come out to my parents and close friends, and to start living full-time as a woman. I hope to do this by January, as kind of a new year's resolution. I have written a letter to mom and dad as well as several of my closest friends, and will send them in the next few days.
I still have a long road ahead: electrolysis, facial feminization surgery (FFS), genital reassignment surgery (GRS)… It is a long, painful and expensive path to take, but it is a necessary one for my continued happiness and well-being. Luckily, I now know the road I need to take to get further towards my goal of being who I truly am inside.
December 13th, 2003
After writing the above "history" in the early-morning hours, I went to sleep. When I awoke, I told Mel that I wanted to tell Bonnie about my GID and that I wanted to send the letters that I had written. Mel basically asked me to hold off telling Bonnie. She did say that I could send the letters, especially because the people that I am sending letters to are far away from my life these days. I didn't tell Mel about my goal to live full-time in January. I will probably do that later tonight.
On another note, we went to see the movie "Love, Actually" today. I cried throughout a bunch of the movie, as it was very emotional. I just loved the way the character "Natalie" looked in the film and would indeed use her as a role model after which to fashion myself. After the movie, Bonnie, Jill, Angie, Mel, Rachel, David and I all went to that yummy Greek restaurant in Greektown. Now I am at home, finishing the letters up and fixing Jill's laptop. Jill and Angie lost their CDs with the pictures of Freddie's funeral and burial, so I had to make them extra copies. Yay!
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