[Absentia]

ColorQuiz

2005-10-20T12:37:00.000-04:00

Viv took the free ColorQuiz.com personality test!

"Has a powerful drive towards sensuousness...."

Click here to read the rest of the results.

2005-10-20T09:19:00.000-04:00

I was a bit sick of the previous, pompous blog name so there... I changed it. Also, I'd like to say that I am safely out of my depressive semester but into my "so fragile" one. Really... I feel emotionally fragile. What does this mean? Well, lots of things, but mainly that I don't feel like seeing anyone but a couple of people, don't feel like going out or anything. Just getting used to life as 90% transitioned, meaning everywhere except work, no surgeries. Sucks at a very patent level, but it's also wonderful to be this far along.

So, moving on.

I started singing lessons about two weeks ago. I'm going for mezzo-soprano opera singing (oooooooh), which I've always loved. I have the fondest memories of singing along to the few opera cassettes that my grandfather had (he was a big Vivaldi and baroque fan, but mostly instrumental stuff)

The challenge (there's always a challenge in transition/self-realization stuff) is that I started HRT about two years ago with my vocal cords already thickened by Testosterone. So "naturally" singing high is no longer an option.
I guess if I had to characterise my voice I'd say it's easily a female alto/male countertenor. For the longest time I believed my voice was incredibly low, which in my female perception was, but really wasn't. In chest voice I'm easily a tenor and I slide comfortably to head voice and beyond.
In regards to speaking voice, I haven't been sir'd on the phone in a loooooooong long time.

Speaking I got mostly down pat; now singing, that's a different challenge.
My technical target is to become a mezzo-soprano/soprano through the sopranista path and achieve a voice as awesome as that of Joerg Waschinski () and many others.

Lunch... ttyl.

Your newscast for this hour

2005-08-24T09:11:00.000-04:00

:(((( Unkymoods.com is gone :(((

Their emoticons were really cool and free :(

Oh anyway...

I started writing 'diaries' at around 12 years of age and even though I've struggled with the idea, I'll never be able to write a 'diary' per se. That is, a daily account of feelings and impressions. Instead, they are more like state of me flashes every month or so.

My thoughts for today...

Testosterone-induced sex has a way of perverting feelings to the core, warm female feelings we get during growing up. Men are sexual and always oversexed after puberty starts shooting stars into their heads, and since you're supposed to behave in this stupid way, your normal girl yearnings get twisted into sex fetishes we don't want to admit to. Because, if you like to feel a child's warmth and softness and want to hug them and protect them, at some point the testosterone will ask you if you wouldn't like something *else*. Or pregnant women. Or things related to women's world that you yearn for. Since testosterone behaves as an independent agent in its interaction with conscience and the body, one feels ashamed by this unknown voice that always seems to "know" you are really just a dirty guy at the bottom.
And this causes shame and distrust of oneself, so much that it either alienates one's budding sexuality into masturbation or forces recognition in the wrong way, as a fetish, adding to the misunderstanding.

pudgy?!

2005-07-19T19:04:00.000-04:00

Here I am... struggling with myself for the resolve to go to the gym. I'm not fat, but I've gotten kind of pudgy this passing winter of hormone-induced reshaping.
And I can't. I can't go more than once every three weeks or so. Pretty bad, I know.

Probably the fact that I pass about 95% or more of the time has made me comfy in my fat :) Or that I am considered attractive by a considerable group of people, men and women. Very cute men and women... btw.

Ok wait... that was HISTORIC. Recap.

Close to 100% passing? (with my work uniform I still pass pretty good, but it decreases my chances)
People who think I'm attractive and sexy and who don't see me as anything else than a a woman?

Batman you shay?? :D

And what about this one? About 3 weeks ago I went out with a guy for the first time in my life! Is it me, is this Vivian... isn't all that the stuff of dreams? Despite the drier legal aspects I am a woman to the world!

I started blogging here last year in June... only three months after starting hormones. I was 16 pounds lighter (ouch) but also didn't have a semblance of the feminine appearance I have now. Thanks hormones. Thanks job for letting me afford facial hair removal.

man...! I fell asleep writing while laying here on my bed! I'm gone to see Mr and Mrs. Smith with my roommate! :)

Angeles

2005-07-19T02:32:00.000-04:00

Angeles
Originally uploaded by firebee.

She's my niece and I adore her. We were celebrating her 3rd birthday at a Chuck E. Cheese's and I was clicking like crazy... only to find 90% of the pics were *seriously* out of focus. Oh well, at least a couple turned out ok in an artistic sort of way :P
And no, she's not asian ;)

Miss Independent

2005-07-11T11:33:00.000-04:00

I don't like Kelly Clarkson's stuff but I think "Miss Independent" is not a bad song (I consider myself to be like that a little bit, heh :P); the music wasn't bad, she sings ok in a Mariah-Careyish way, but it's still really light and merely "entertaining" as a friend would put it ;)
That without mentioning the video, which sucked totally.
The Hani Radio Mix of that song is a lot like the song I'd have liked "Miss Independent" to be. It's totally house but with touches of good electronica, as in the fact that it still feels like a real song and not just dance fodder.

So hello! ^.^ It's been a while again since I wrote something here and interesting stuff has been happening.
I went through a bad patch again of depressive feelings... not outright depression like last time but feeling pretty helpless and hopeless. Thankfully, little things almost everyday helped cheer me up. Like the fact that on the phone I'm automatically ma'amed and/or thought of as female without even trying a single bit. Also, the same happens 90-98% of the time I'm out with people. My worst times are those close to or right after laser when I have a shadow and it brings out male details to my face which I really *don't* need and *don't* want. Besides, to put it simply, when I have the shadow on my face I look like a woman with an ugly black skin condition. Even if I pass, I look terrible and I don't like that.

Another life-saver has been my family. My found family not my blood relations: D., N., S., and the children A., T. and K. Their love is my support everyday. Funny how I could never have enjoyed their love if I hadn't transitioned and been able to appreciate it.

2005-05-23T08:10:00.000-04:00

I know this is old news but going back to the ridiculous male pretense this morning feels so strange. I had a nice chat with a vendor lady this morning and she didn't hesitate to call me "ma'am", even after me giving her my boy name. I also called Bose to check on an order and the guy was totally ma'aming me and being nice.

What a stupid charade.

Btw... I'm listening to some music from an unpublished new friend I met last weekend at a gender conference and to be honest it's pretty good. And I am *not* a friendly critic... ever.

2005-05-13T09:43:00.000-04:00

Everything turned out OK yesterday , yay!

* D. had her corrective lipo and it went really well, she is now recovering at home, yay!

* S. is back from GRS, yay!

* I got to talk to N. and she's coming over next tuesday, yay!

As for me, I'm ok. Going through a period of emotional indifference to transition issues which I hope will last. I am also flooded by the good vibes from D. and S. They are so happy!

In an effort to understand S.'s GRS (and total morbid curiosity) I watched a slideshow of Meltzer performing a vaginoplasty.
It did stir me a little all those feelings of "never" I have, but I'm ok. I'm trying to see it in as clinical a way as possible, no emotional involvement.

Warning: *VERY GRAPHIC*

And it's a beautiful friday morning.

*yawn*

I'm sleepy... zzzz

yawn

2005-05-12T06:41:00.000-04:00

Today is going to be a long day. Not a bad day or anything though. I'm going to watch over D. while she has some surgery and later at night going to pick up S. to the airport.

Feeling kind of like "k whatever". More than a tad cynical and on the verge of having my transition issues in the forefront, but for now I'm holding on. In the last few months not only did my friend S. did have GRS but another friend had FFS. Also lately I was reading this board and found out about lots more people having GRS ('tis the season, getting ready for summer) and about one very young and pretty girl having FFS (which I always thought she never needed). She was working as a waitress last I heard so I wonder where she got her $40K. Parents probably. Some people have cool parents in this world, yeah. And some of them are even rich.

Overall, feeling "blah functional", which is the blah where you can still function with your friends and family without making an issue of your internal state.
Feeling *very* avoidant though. Don't want to have any kind of contact with anyone but my family and friends.
I am also feeling like I don't give a heck about passing or anything like that. I'm just content with my androgyny for now; like the David Bowie song says, I feel that "there's no point in re-exposing you". Myself, in this case.

Anyway, got to do some work. Hope it's a sunny day outside.

The Motel
David Bowie

(excerpts)

For we're living in a safety zone
Don't be holding back from me
We're living from hour to hour down here
And we'll take it when we can

When nothing is vanity nothing's too slow
It's not Eden but it's no sham

lol

2005-05-11T16:00:00.000-04:00

Lots of TSs who are about to undergo or that have had GRS are afraid of the surgery, of the anesthesia, of this of that. Also they say that they dread the dilations.

*shakes head*

I would be so happy that the only nervousness I could have would be of sheer excitement. Dilations? Ever wonder what the dilations MEAN?

When you've had it easy it seems that priorities get confused.

/cynical

But GRS is not for me, right?

*sigh*

Just be...

2005-05-11T15:30:00.000-04:00

...whatever I can. This non-existance is not worth prolonging. It won't happen in the next five years: get over it. Not as a reprimand, but as a thought worth considering. Options are depleted for now: I depleted them. I have done everything I can. Like hormonal changes, it is just incertitude and time. That's all there is for now. Incertitude and time. Hitting my head against the wall won't move the granite wall, only make me more bloody. I'll have to wait for another chance and take it.

Just be as me as much as I can. I know these empty words will mean NOTHING by the time of my next depression, but I need to contend with the fact that I am going to be adressed by my boy name, that I will have to work as a guy, that people are going to treat me as a freak.

There will be happiness too, but everything related to transition as a process will be downright depressing. Ok, I'm sure my hormonal changes will still delight me and make me smile, like other nice things in my life (which I will list in a future post) and that I acknowledge exist.

It feels bad. I entered transition not with a timetable (since I knew this day could eventually come) but with lots of hope and wishes for the future. I still have hope, but it's been *greatly* diminished, a mere fraction of what it used to be. My wishes are in cold storage. Keeping all that up has been a tremendous effort which I can't muster anymore.

So, something should come up. I guess. In the meantime I'll see what I do with my life. I can still play PS2 (hehe), that is a relief. I'd been thinking about taking singing classes or a language course but I guess not. Not for now. At least not while I cringe every time someone "he"'s me. Besides, even if I got myself to do it I'll be under such mental pressure it's not worth it: people I don't know, being looked at in that strange way, etc, etc. Not worth it.

Just that.

2005-05-10T14:35:00.000-04:00

We have lingered in the chambers of the sea
By sea-girls wreathed with seaweed red and brown
Till human voices wake us, and we drown.

tuesday tuesday and more tuesday

2005-05-10T13:56:00.000-04:00

Welcome back to the world of the Dummy Masochist!

Seeing (in pictures) or reading about people done and happy with their transitions makes me so sad. Sorry people, I still wish you the very best, but it really hurts sometimes. Why don't I just learn that I can't visit TS boards anymore?

Went to lunch with my niece and her mom and couldn't help not being all that happy. I am always playing around with my little niece but this time I couldn't help being blahish. It's only gotten worse.

tuesday tuesday

2005-05-10T11:30:00.000-04:00

The early week lumbers on as usual. Today my jets seem to be fueled enough so that the dark cloud of All Those Bad Things About Transition doesn't engulf me, so my mood is not completely spoiled.
No, jet metaphors aren't very girlie. Awful modern though. Almost futuristic.

Anyway. The thought of GRS I'm still able to brush away and focus on something else, but (the dreadful) Living As A Young Man doesn't spare me a day for punches.

It gets worse, so go read a more interesting, happy blog if you will. You've been warned.

I was pleasantly ma'amed on the phone again today. I'm (gasp!) sort of used to it by now. Even yesterday as I was getting gas service for my new apartment, the nice lady who helped me through the phone with it called me Ms.[lastname] even after she asked for "your" name and I (had to) gave her my full boyname. She was very nice, sweet people make your day. It's true what they say about smiles and niceties, offer them whenever you can.
I am facing some sort of frustration with my physical appearance. It hurts when sometimes all your effort at just conveying who you are gets slammed in the mud by one or two dummy details. People stop seeing you as female and as their eyes grow more distant, you are relayed to the category of Gender Contrivance or worse, Weird Man.
Would that stop with FT or GRS? (ahhh, clever tie-in) No, but when you can dedicate yourself to just being you, everything changes. It changes radically after FT; it changes more after GRS. How do I know? I've read, I've listened, I've seen. You don't have to be awfully perceptive to realize that something has changed (and I count myself as fairly perceptive). It's like the day you "come out to yourself" or when you start HRT. Those I know :)

It's a road with milestones and thousands of little flowers to pick. Too bad it is so hard for some of us.

My mantras du jour:

"Teach us to care and not to care. Teach us to sit still."

"This too shall pass"

"Chance is a kind of religion when you're damned to plain hard luck"

2005-05-09T13:36:00.000-04:00

Temperatures are a-risin' around here so on Saturday I wore a skirt for the first time in months. I love skirts. Last year when I went to Daytona Beach on vacation I packed nothing but skirts so I could make myself face the fear of wearing them. Up to that point I had worn women's pants for months but I couldn't bring myself to do the skirt thing. You see, I did NOT want to be seen as a man in a skirt, so I was really afraid.
Transition-wise everything went fine with the trip. For the first time I was tasting what walking around mostly unnoticed by people meant, not being sir'd and (so cool) my friend D. and I be called "ladies" once. I was walking on clouds.

D., who was my SO at the time, didn't have a good time at all. These were the days which finally brought down our prior relationship. It was a beautiful sunset beach we were walking when I finally gathered some courage and told her I wanted to go ahead with full transition. I had been four-five months on HRT then but it was all so clear, totally clear from the first week really. I didn't know all the particulars and how it came to figure in every aspect of my life, but I was sure at heart that that was what I wanted. It hurt. We had been together for 8 years and she was/is the love of my life.
There followed terrible months where everything hurt. From my full commitment to being me to she dating others (which was a way to find herself too). But eventually we made it through and we are now more than best friends. We recently moved together to a new apartment with two separate bedrooms and we enjoy the freedom to be whatever we want to be.

2005-05-06T15:40:00.000-04:00

*sigh* These past few days I'd been reading someone's diary who seemed in a similar rut as mine: longing for FT and GRS but with not much hope (still, she had lots more possibilities). I also could relate to her observations and feelings a lot.
Poking around her website I learned she had GRS not long ago and I only read up to the moment when she comes upon some money and starts on the path to surgery.
That's it. I couldn't read any more. Transition is for everyone some kind of path that leads them as far as they want to go. There's pain along the way, but all those willing transition in a few years. Not for me.
On the internet there's a website that's big with TS people, a young girl's diary that relates her transition from nothing to FFS and GRS. Everyone always refers to it as "inspiring", for me it's downright depressing.

So anyway...
I've come to the conclusion that even if I could go FT and all, I don't think I could: I don't have any money or a big CV or a good job (read: good paying) where I could transition. My actual job is the antithesis of that.
I should get off my ass and find some new job where I can get better paid... but I cringe at the thought of yet again having to prop up as if he existed at all.
When my first big problem is cleared (I *pray* for that to happen) I'll still won't be able to go FT, but that is small potatoes, really. Being poor is nothing compared to the other thing.

I'm afraid my transition could never happen or that it could come much later in life. My instincts tell me I *will* be suffering this same thing for years to come. How many? 5? 10? 5 seems solid, but 10 seems excessive. Some kind of solution should pop up before then. 8 looks good.

Who'll believe my psychic proddings anyway? I wish they told me I was to transition fully during next year, GRS and all (I'm not asking for much, am I?). And then they would come true!

Sure.

Suure.

2005-05-06T07:37:00.000-04:00

I'm feeling better this morning, don't know if it's the laser session yesterday, having slept 10 hours last night or just the wave of sadness letting on a bit. I saw a post today about someone's experiences after GRS and it was like a strong wind shaking my walls though. I didn't stay too much on the board, for now I still have the sense (or the strength) not to dwell on that.
My 6th laser session yesterday went really well. The power was amped up to 30j (the highest it's ever been) and believe it or not, this is the first time since I started having them that a session hurt *less* than the one before! Yes! The 5th was the cusp of pain but also the one that gave me best results (I rarely if ever wore anything more than powder after it), I was talking to people up close and I wasn't being read. That was major cool. Today my face is looking bad mostly because of the swelling that hasn't subsided, and my face is not full of red areas like last time. It really looks like I'm "beyond the curve", that my facial shadow is going FOR REAL!

I washed my hair yesterday and it's looking super-curly :P Not really a "guy" look but what the heck, the only place where I'm consistently a "guy" is at work and it's quite obvious that everyone can see I'm not "just a guy". I wonder if anyone has noticed my breasts yet. I wear a uniform three-four sizes bigger than myself, a sports bra and a T-shirt underneath, but they are still noticeable, specially in the rounded shape of my upper torso.
I can still pass as a guy if I want (no, I don't). It's mostly about voice and slipping into the solid guy stance I learned in my teens (I guess all of us mtf TSs can). But being able to doesn't mean you *want* to. Doing a guy voice for example feels like killing my feminine voice and behaving accordingly is almost plain impossible... it's like going against your own self. And it brings bad, bad memories and feelings.
No, I don't do it if I can help it :)

2005-05-05T13:33:00.000-04:00

Or a father. Or a family? Yes, a family now that you mention it, why not? Not just a bunch of... ack anyway, what gives.

I guess being geographically away from my family saved me a lot of pain and suffering in the early stages. I can only imagine my mother's cold look or my father's anger. But what do they know? Nothing. They worked SO hard to keep me from emigrating and now they say it's the best thing I could have done given the bad, bad situation where I'm from. Another of those situations they would ignore my opinions about stuff only for it to come true afterwards.

Some day I'll write a decade-by-decade story of my life (there's only two and some of those now anyway) or maybe in five year intervals. What I wanted to say is that my GID kept me apart from not only my parents but the world in general, but no one cared to look beyond the walls anyway. I stopped confiding in my mother when I was about 13 or so, whenever she was mad at me she'd use what I'd told her against me. Also, she would divulge it to my stepfather. Great.

2005-05-05T13:12:00.000-04:00

Hey there...

I've been trying to post stuff but I just delete it after writing it. It all seems so stupid.

I miss having a mom. I used to think a loooong time ago that my mom loved me, but years of her have firmly convinced me of the contrary. Same for my father and my stepfather. They care less about me now than they did before and that is something to say, I tell you.
I wish I had a mom who cared about me, who was interested in who I am and who wanted to stand by me. A mom who accepted me and liked me as I am.

Don't misinterpret this... I tried giving our relationship a chance after years of not communicating in any way and she just stopped writing when past chit-chat time and the how are you doing's. She wasn't interested in working out the kinks of our relationship. For her there was nothing wrong with it, only me.

A mom to share girl stuff with. That would be nice. Someone I could go buy clothes with, that I could sit down and chat with, that would give me motherly advice and be proud of me. Someone I could help with christmas dinners (strictly *help*, I suck at cooking :) ). My bio mom was the "recipient" of some cool family recipes from my great-grandmother and my grandfather. Would have been nice, even if I was going to screw it up with my cooking skills.

A mom to talk about guys I am (hypothetically) going out with, a mom I could hold and comfort in her low moments (even though parents generally comfort their children :P)

A mom proud to have a daughter like me.

two vignettes

2004-12-23T20:49:00.000-05:00

So much to talk about, but first let me refer two funny things that happened to me today. This post is going to be hurried, so sorry for the lack of detail.

My boss and I were having lunch at a salad place we go frequently. I got up to get some dessert after having some salad and was picking up a piece of gingerbread when I heard two people talking behind me. First they said something briefly about the blueberry pie which I didn't catch and then they went, kind of quietly but not too much:

Her: "I thought she was a woman"
Him: "Yeah. Me too."

I was in my work uniform, shadow showing, hair pulled back, chest compressed. Nothing too revealing. My sort-of-boy mode. Ahh.. Cool

After that we returned from lunch and my boss called me to his office. The big boss and him wanted to talk about something work related (which we didafterwards). With them was a lady that used to work with us and her 7 year old daughter. They were visiting.
I hugged her mom, asked how she was blah blah blah and then her mother said to the little girl:

"Maddy, say hi to Mr. [boy name]"

Maddy looked at her, looked at me and came running to hold me by the legs and press her head against them. She wouldn't let go either, she just stayed there while I caressed her little blonde head and hugged her for a while.
The other adults were puzzled at her reaction, apparently she was quite shy. My big boss said:

big boss: "It must be the long hair..." (which I had tied back by the way)

What a revealing comment... Was he suggesting she may have thought I was a girl?
Beyond all appearance considerations, I think that finally my charm with children is coming back. Up until about mid-adolescence children would always seek me, after that, they would feel the opposite and avoid me. Whew! It feels so good to regain my best qualities and the original me... the long sleep is finally over.

23rd in the morning

2004-12-23T10:08:00.000-05:00

Rainy morning with wet golden leaves lying around sporadically here and there. There's a wind blowing which is pleasant and breezy but just a little bit too cold for my own comfort. 42 degrees... Did I tell you I'm cold-natured? :) I want to spend the next New Year's in New York city (Times Square, 3,2,1, *fireworks*) but there's no way I'm walking in snow at night without lots of furry stuff on :)

The end of the year is coming fast and I still need to buy a new dress and go to the hairstylist's... argh. If only this facial shadow would just disappear! Have you ever felt like you don't want by any means to be a freak? That's how I feel now. The feminine physical cues are more apparent but I still have that devil of a shade present. Laser though is doing a great job, I know most of the dark I see now is the charred heads which haven't yet been shed. Still...
I inhabit a physical land of gender indefinition, boy or girl mode....I'm terrified to go try a dress or to the hairdresser's because I'll get read and whatnot. I know it's kind of stupid, I'm starting to look more and more like a big girl than anything else and passing in everyday life mostly works. People don't stare, kids mostly pass me by (though I get some that look puzzled and wary sometimes, little girls of course). Those that do read me or who sense something wrong visibly can't decide one way or the other. Out of this world. Me?
Yet...

So, regarding going out into the world, the most sensible thing would be to wait until the face looks better in a few days... or until my paranoia has quieted down :P

From the "unrelated" bin... I've been considering switching to Linux on my old trusty(crusty) IBM Thinkpad 600x (PIII y'all :D) but I'm a bit wary. I've lost hard drives full of stuff thanks to windows/hardware malfunctions more than once in the past and I'm a little reluctant to disturb the somewhat slow but otherwise working little world of my Windows 2000AS.

English and Spanish

2004-12-20T08:58:00.000-05:00

My friend H. says I'm a good friend (knowing him, this means I'm a *very* good friend) and I feel that way about him too, we go back almost fifteen years. We met when he was a teenage computer whiz working with my stepfather developing custom made real estate and financial programs for local companies and I was just a kid of about 9.

We always understood each other like only great friends can.

For the last 2 years our communication has been a little sporadic though, with me going through "something very important for me" as I told him one night. It was the difficult first era of my transition of which he of course has no idea.
He understood, made no further questions: "write again when it's ok for you". In the end it was him who emailed me wanting to know where the heck I was. He asked if things were better (he hadn't forgotten) but nothing else. No prying, respectful. Very gentlemanly. We just went on talking like nothing had happened. In spanish mostly of course.

Spanish is the basic language we chat in and it's definitely not a T-friendly venue of expression. In spanish all things are gendered: the speakers are male, the rug is female, the glasses are male, the stars are female... What's worse, adjectives are also gendered. It's impossible to refer to oneself in a non-gendered way like english allows so whenever you need to talk about yourself, you have to gender adjectives male or female in accordance with your own gender.

In spanish, I would say, gendering myself female:
Siempre me senti sola y abandonada (I always felt lonely and abandoned) [excuse the melodrama, it's for didactic purposes :)]

But since I can't do that, instead of changing the last letter of the adjectives, I go:
Siempre estuve en soledad y sentia como que me habian abandonado (I was always in loneliness and feeling as if I had been abandoned)
In the perfect mode adjectives always default to a male ending which is really (and feels like) a neutral.

Well I haven't self-gendered male in a long time in Spanish, retreating into a tokyo mixture of english and spanish when needed or making those linguistic roundabouts. Chatting with people back in the old country (or spanish speakers here who don't "know") is a hassle... good thing there aren't that many. I always wonder, has anyone noticed my verbal gymnastics?
So far, no one has said anything directly, but strangely it's created an aura of non-gender about me (obvious for those who meet me in R/L due to my appearance). People use the roundabout ways more when referring to me, or more interestingly, feel obviously a little awkward when they *have* to gender me male.
Not that they don't of course, but there's a little unease in the air between us.

My friend H.
He says now he might come by San Francisco to attend an Open Source conference and will take a plane to Georgia to pay me a visit and "have a beer together". After all, we haven't seen each other in more than 3 years.

Gulp.

Vivi

out and about (what a lame name for a post)

2004-12-18T22:02:00.000-05:00

Interesting: we are our worst judges.

As I said earlier, I went for the andro look today going out. The laser casualties were showing so the only thing I could do was to soften the look with some makeup.
I wore some boy jeans (but let them hang from my hips), a bra that wouldn't make my breasts prominent and a fitted girl shirt in which I've always looked pretty androgynous. Funny thing is I hadn't worn it for a while and now it looked 10x better than it used to. Now I'm making use for the first time of the "extra room" under the armpits all girl shirts have Very Happy
So my roommate (a GG) and I went to Applebee's for lunch. I was really flustered about the face thing and wanted to hide under my bed. I even skipped going for the dress today since I wouldn't be able to go into the girl's fitting room without suspicious looks. Before I started passing, I'd boldly go where no T had gone before, I wouldn't care about people's looks or whatever. Now if I'm not going to pass I'd rather not. I guess one gets used to the good stuff Smile
So we went to Applebee's and the server didn't address us in any particular way at the beginning (which made me more paranoid, you can guess). However when she came back with the food she was "ladies" this, "ladies" that. "Is everything ok ladies?", "Do you need anything ladies". Needless to say, that dispeled most of my doubts (you always wonder, "isn't she JUST being nice?".

Move on to a couple of hours later and we had to cancel the shopping trip because a friend of my roommate's mom had been taken to the hospital (hope she's ok by now). I had to send some christmas cards overseas so I headed for the post office at the mall. My spirits were up but when I saw the mall brimming with people I felt like turning back but since I also wanted to buy my roommate a christmas present I pressed on.
Surprisingly, no one looked at me weird, no one stared. I was either passing as me or passing as a guy (I don't think so). So I went into this store to buy a couple of pearl studs for her and the lady showing them to me is "ma'am" this "ma'am" that. *smiles* And this with those white floodlights everywhere!

So yeah, we are our worst critics. I guess there's a moment in your transition when the combination of voice, demeanor and general appearance due to hrt make things like some visible shadow not a guy trying to pass as a girl, but a girl with a skin condition (which in the end all of us are). When that changeover moment happens I really don't know, but I have been pining for and expecting it for soooo long. I know I will get sir'd in the future sometimes (though that hasn't happened much lately and I make a big fuss in my mind when it does Razz), but somehow it's not life-defining as it used to be.

And that, friends and neighbours, concludes this post and the first stage of my transition Smile

Sleep, dresses, lasers and pills

2004-12-18T09:13:00.000-05:00

7:30 in the morning. Saturday. What am I doing up so early? I should be sleeping in!
Well yesterday after I got home from work all I felt like doing was sleeping. And I slept for a couple hours, woke up, still felt like sleeping, went back to sleep. One hour later, around 7, my roommate got home from work, I said hi from the bed... went back to sleep.
Then later she left for a dance club and I could barely keep my eyes open. I said bye, went back to sleep. Hours later I woke up when she came back with the air of the outside world about her. I said hi, went potty, got my Spiro and my Estrofem and back to bed. Only this time sleep wouldn't come, apparently I'd slept enough. So I lay there thinking about stuff and drifted in and out once or twice before going deep again and waking up at 7:20. To tell you the truth, I could sleep again if I
I had some long-long dream which had me "as me" (funny how now I either dream of myself in the androgynous me that I dreamt all my life or me as a girl) but I don't remember how it went.
Am I sleeping too much? I had a time back when I was going to college when I slept for like 2 days. I couldn't stay up. Weird.

In other news, I'm going shopping for a New Year's dress today. I don't know what I'm going to get but I'm shooting for an LBD or cocktail dress. I love those! They are so classy and cool at the same time.
I own an LBD and it's the most versatile thing there is. Put a cute denim jacket on and it's cool casual, take it off and you can step into a dress party. Mine in particular: hang it from the shoulders (cute), hang it from the upper arms and top of the breasts (sexy).
And of course the accesorizing options are endless, they are such great backdrops for anything you might add to them.

Still, I know I'm going to have a hard time out shopping today.
I had my third laser session on tuesday (bless concentrated light) and the girl operating it told me I had had a great response. This however means that a lot of black charred heads are lurking just beneath my epidermis where no razor can get. Dissappointingly, no makeup can cover that either without making me look like an escapee from Madame Tussaud's so I've opted to go more androgynous.
(On a side note, my laser session went well. It seems like it hurts a bit more every time, but that's ok. She's been kicking up the power a bit more too every time and it's working. Often she will ask as the laser zaps and zaps on my face "Do you want to take a breather" and I just close my eyes, clench my hands to the chair and say no. The sooner it's done the better. The only part where I have to stop between shots is my upper lip... that hurts SO much.)

Androgynous and no makeup is my choice lately for presentation. Back a couple of months ago I was having some passing issues and decided in the end to expect little to no passing. I'm not FT yet so I have that "luxury".
I was surprised however how *girl* I look in any outfit, most of all my old guy's stuff, I definitely don't belong in there anymore. This was nice to see and reminded me how with transition one looks different every single day and how the changes the hormones bring are like a stalactite's growth: slowly but surely.

Ok, enough for now... Cya! :)

HRT (hormones) count: 8 months, 20 days

gotta have it

2004-12-08T13:15:00.000-05:00

And on with the adventures of Vivi, the slightly glammy rock girl...

I'm pouring ketchup over my barbbecue beans,
Is that sinful? It tastes good.

You don't want to to talk to me today... or maybe yes. Really? I'm so freaking bored!

I hate eating alone. And I hate the fuming stuff in my life I can't change. Change, dammit!

Hmmmm... no pineapple... I had it all yesterday. Fat freak. Fact freak. Yeah both. Whatever it tasted great.
I'd love to find a recipe to pickle the stem, it'd be so yummy. I'd cut them like french fries and have them.
I can have one of those ice cream fudge bars though. Low-cal, 80 cal. Fudge, what a funny word. Fudge-sludge.

Do you hate your mom? Not really

Jeez that alarm beeping again. Will it be vibrations from the electric tower nearby? Maybe a dead zone in my brain.

Gosh, whatever.

Remember. Must cook meat for V.

:~)

2004-12-06T13:49:00.000-05:00

I found a couple of clips of "Hello Sandybell" on the web... It used to be my favorite cartoon and I haven't watched it in over 15 years.

God I'm crying. I'm 7 all over again... :)

Star Wars, still so grand

2004-12-03T09:34:00.000-05:00

I am amazed at how good the old star wars movies are in comparison to the new. Can you believe that watching the "original trilogy" made me feel like (gulp!) watching Phantom Menace and the Clones again?
Maybe that's the power of great movies with disturbingly bad sequels or spin-offs (think Batman & Robin), the sense of wonder and enchantment they ellicit makes you do the unthinkable and give the proven bad another chance. That is also the power of good people as I recall.

I must have watched all three Star Wars movies back in '86-'88 on TV. They were shown in the course of two-three days. I was thrilled, elder people had told me the movies were nice, but I was blown away. I have this memory in my mind of staying up late at night after my mother and stepfather had gone to sleep, mesmerized with the climax sequence of The Empire Strikes Back. The stark contrast of twisting shadows and ambient red light of Luke's first confrontation with Darth Vader totally got me and every time the lightsabers clashed, I shuddered. They had frozen poor Han Solo for god's sake! They wanted to do it to poor Luke too! I think my heart gave a little skip when he fell into the freezing chamber and Vader went, as he flipped the switch with his mind powers, "All too easy" with disappointment. After that, when they are still fighting on top of the catwalk over the central shaft of Bespin, heading for the momentuous revelation, I was truly concerned for Luke's destiny; Darth Vader was so obviously *better*, so much more powerful and experienced than young Luke. You truly felt the Tattooine farmboy had gotten way over his head with thinking he could be a hero.
They became my all-time favorite movies for a long time, and they are still in that list.
As I watched that night, curled up in a chair and barely blinking, I felt my parents (who had left halfway through the show) could never understand the deep connection the movie and I were sharing. Over the years I'd have *definite* confirmation that my parents/stepfather were born in a different universe than mine. Art appreciation (and at times, creation) was taking its place as my most prominent "additional sense" and life vocation.

When The Phantom Menace came out in 1999 I was literally reaching the end of the tether of my "old-life" phase. Leaving the place I'd desperately kicked about for 21 years was fast becoming an actual plan and my gender issues were starting to move on their own. Queen Amidala did it, bland as her character is. I felt a yearning for her femininity and cuteness which had nothing to do with *posessing* but with *being*. Much like the slightly ambivalent way I'd always felt about girls and women all through my life, but in a rare emotional outburst for my testosterone-riddled, fresh-out-of-my-teens self. I always saw having girlfriends as some sort of experience to have someday (much like riding a nice roller coaster or some experience I'd never had) and definite proof that I was not *weird*. Participating of femininity, what I always wanted, I had to learn was barred to me by birth forever (I know that's not the case now :) ).
In the subsequent days of watching the movie I was the only one among my friends commenting on the awesome outfits of the Queen. Of course, it was all in a stylistic vein, wasn't it? :) Watching on TV the fans getting mad at the premieres, dressed up like the characters and having jedi fights at the multiplex lobbies, a girl in Amidala makeup filled me with the feeling that there was really *no* other costume I'd do more. Sure, the Jedis and their flowing capes were awesome, but they were not *me*. While my friend was going crazy over how cool it'd be to wear jedi outfits I nodded and smiled, trying unsuccessfully to like their customes and not Amidala's beautiful dresses.
It's hard to convey these pre GID revelation moments, how strong the dysphoria felt and at the same time how much of an aunknown forbidden country it was for me. In those moments I beheld the huge obscured parts move by themselves in unison, making perfect sense in their message.

I've got to go now, I'll come back to this in another post.

8

2004-12-02T14:49:00.000-05:00

8 months on hormones last week.

Wow

ok, other things

2004-11-30T11:08:00.000-05:00

I checked out a random post from before the crash and I see that my concerns are still the same. Is transition all I think about? Actually pretty much yes, but with good reason: thanks to my addressing this lifelong issue I am going back to my creative forces and to what makes me me (even if it's something I've redefined completely during the last year). Ok, this is complicated enough already. Examples:
I've been thinking about going back to learn languages (one of my true vocations). I'd love to take japanese but I believe I've got a natural ease for romance languages and thus would be better off starting there: italian, portuguese, french are my most likely first courses. It's damn costly though! :P
I'm also dying to become the woman jazz singer I always wanted to be... like Isabella Rosellini, "the blue lady" in Lynch's "Blue Velvet". If not a jazz singer, then a rock singer like Shirley Manson from Garbage! That would be SO cool.
I didn't want to mention transition issues in this post (at least directly he he :P) but my voice has imporoved lots from my early days. It still sounds a little fake, but if it is as my friend C. said that it's "very good, almost natural" (actually she gave me a big explanation, this is the cliff's notes), then I must be doing good. I got ma'amed on the phone and have been for a while now... it's just that I don't make *that* many phone calls! I'm SHY! Someone recommended in a web site to pick any number and call to ask nonsense like prices and opening/closing times... but I'm TOO SHY! Also, with two full languages and lesser bits from others running around my brain... it gets hard in full panic alarm! :P

Ahh... so fun to write again.

hi!/me/ft

2004-11-30T08:51:00.000-05:00

I've been putting off this "comeback" post for so long it doesn't make sense.
Yes, I'm sort of here again :) Having gone through one of the worst depressions in my life, here I am again... I hope that for a long while (though with me regarding matters of constancy it's always hard to tell).

What's on my mind now? ummmmmmm Forefront in my mind for the past few days has been the announcement by one of the girls in my circle of friends to finally go FT. That is, Full Time, change name, change everything, live as a woman, the boy relegated to the shadow of the past and a few bodily scars.
I'm so happy for her; liberation from the chains of the given is what we all seek as TS girls/women and being ourselves unrestrained in the world at large is truly living for the first time. I wish her the very best in her journey ahead.
Another girl of my circle will be FT also in about a month, and then she'll be free to explore her life. She's getting facial surgery early next year too, and then bye bye to all passing concerns. With facial, wven if you do *tell* people you were not born a woman, their gut feeling will wrench them otherwise and your gender place in everyday life is secure. Isn't it nifty?

Now for the expected "but": I'm still the only one with transition plans sort of on hold. Like the last single girl in a group of friends where everyone desires fervently to be married, I can feel the tremors of spinsterdom, of being left behind and failure. More importantly, one begins to ponder on the why's and if still hopeful (like I am), the when's. If one is in total desperation (like I was), the "why me"'s and the "why she"'s take hold with an maddening iron grip.

Don't get me wrong, I have found genuine happiness in seeing my friends do well and for that little fact I am very grateful to HRT (hormone therapy) and self-discovery.
I am though a bit afraid about my future. I walk the path as fully as I can for now but the bi-gendered/nongendered experience of living is very, very trying. More so when you genuinely don't care for it and just want to make a clean crossing over to the other shore where your soul was born.

anyway, see you on the next post :)

A brief note on Full Time:
Of course, and this is for people who do not share the experience of being TS, FT is no bed of roses. After successfully becoming yourself legally, still jobs may very well not take you because of your transition history (which you have to disclose if you don't want to be an adult with no work experience) when you fill out the dreaded "Have you ever been known by any other name?" blank. Current name: Susan, formerly known as James. Also, if you're not a petite, pretty, outgoing, cool-as-a-cucumber femmy thing chances are you *will* be read (regarded as TS or worse, "man in a dress" comes to mind). That brings us to the problem of finding someone to be with during the pre-op state where your body is obviously defective for anything beyond kissing and caressing.
But do you want to know something? FT is the dream we yearn for. At least we TSs who have felt the wrongness of our given place for ever (me anyway). All the steps forward in this journey are such treasures and feel so *right* once we're there, FT with all its imperfections is a life of immense bliss. It's one of the things most dear to our hearts.

ramblo undetermined

2004-11-20T13:15:00.000-05:00

Strangely, I guess, everything figures with my latest moods as I prepare to re-enter the world and its influence, back from isolation.
So watching both Groundhog Day and Mulholland Drive on the same day has brought to the light some of my most persistent fears. Such as that of failure, as mirrored by the doomed life of Diane Selwyn in M.D. or that of being left alone like the sarcastic and barren know-it-all Phil of G.D.

What do I know now?

The past is our anchor to reality. If good, it's reassurance, if bad it's heartache and doubt/shame, the suicide stone. Letting go of the old and accepting there might not be much "new" to embrace for a while is paramount to my moving on.
No, I was not born rich, talented and beautiful or any combination of those and for the longest time I thought I had to "make me" like that. This has left me with a deeply skewed version of myself

I can be myself in the world, that is a woman. I went out dancing with the girls for the first time last week and had oodles of fun but also my fair share of paranoia. Is everyone reading me? Do I pass? If so, what percentage of the time? In which situations? How close?

I can convince others who appreciate me in any way of my unworthiness very well.
I have become a master (mistress, *whipcrack*) of crushing others' good feelings about me. In deep denial that people can see and expect something good of me, I do my best to convince them of the contrary. I'm convinced I'm just this fake, failed, unattractive and sad person and I work actively to set others' ideas accordingly. Originally, this was a cry for help (I guess it still is, but it works in reverse.
Few people survive this onslaught and eventually everyone buckles to a certain extent given time. D and S are some of the only people who have gotten close to the dark poisonous flame inside me and still like me.
I need to stop it and I've been trying, though at this stage it still takes a. Lately I "screwed up" again with some people, but not *that* much

I don't want to end up like Diane.
Failed starlet Diane Selwyn succumbs under the pressure of her own crushed high expectations of herself, much like me. If I had taken drastic measures during one of my darkest depressions, our lives would have been very similar in their rise and fall.
Like me, she comes from abroad in search of her destiny and to realise her dream of being a star. She from Deep River, Ontario; me from the boondocks. She to Hollywood, me here.

There is a future, or at least it's worth investing in staying around. Mincing no words, I have been thinking of dying lately a lot. This was never a natural way out for me but in the last months this has been more and more persistent in my mind. During those long crying depressions the assertion that there is no hope has become stronger. I need to get out of this terminal stage.

Love cannot redeem me. Friendship cannot redeem me. Success cannot redeem me.

I hate myself too much, and that is serious stuff. Everyone who cares about me has felt this in a way. Self-absorbed in my hatred, I cannot feel empathy for others or their problems. Who cares, right? No one cares about MY problems which are *bad* enough anyway. Such thinking is poisonous and has finally added more self-loathing as I get further and further of the nice and sweet human being I want to be.

why i'm not here

2004-10-01T18:11:00.000-04:00

This blog's update schedule has been terrible at best in the last month. I'm currently going through some bouts of depression and change (for the better, I think) so I'm not in the mood for writing much. I'll come back soon (I hope)
Take care everyone,

Love,
Vivi

compliments

2004-09-14T08:41:00.000-04:00

Compliments are like a hot potato for me, whenever someone hands me one I get all nervous and restless, sweating in my mind until I can find a way to deflect it or destroy it.

Someone will say: "Your hair looks beautiful today" and I'll say "Thanks" and smile a bit ruefully hoping to end the whole episode and thinking to myself things like "She's/He's just being nice" or "Well they had to say something to make me feel welcome". Or if I do believe for a split second my hair does look good today I'll find a mirror and look at it enough so I can say to myself "I don't know what they see, it's horrible". I've found that these kind of emotional responses (whoee.. feeling, my social bane) dramatically reduce the odds that I will be getting another compliment in the future. Only when people persevere, undeterred by my shrugging off the compliment or downright attack of it, do they give me a boost in self-confidence (very diminished by the circumstances though).

Case in point:
There's no picture of myself that I truly like. In times of self-confidence high I might have one or two, but mostly I just hate myself in pictures; and the hatred seems to be as high as my eagerness or how much I'd love to be social or look good in pictures.

I emailed some pictures to a friend who was complimenting me on how I looked here, how I looked there, my hair, my smile, blah blah blah. I sincerely couldn't believe it, there was no emotional response for her compliments, empty. On the other hand I did have some heavy hatred for several things about myself in those pics: my bone structure, the look of my eyes, my skin problems, etc., etc. etc.
Finally, I got to beat down the compliments and made her "admit" that this and that looked terrible, and when someone who had previously complimented me formulates some kind of criticism of me it's my reason to say "Aha! THIS is what you truly think!" and dismiss all future compliments. It's like I'm trying to convince everyone NOT to compliment me in the future. Strangely, if someone would only criticize me and never praise me I'd make it a personal battle and be resilient to all negative comment, and by opposition think that indeed my hair looks terrific if ze had expressed hirself to the contrary.

Yes, it sucks being me sometimes, but it's my own doing. For example, I don't think I look particularly fem. I mean, I do (what would be the point if I didn't at least a bit)but not in the realm of passing. Others differ, and sometimes I get to see that they might be right: whenever I pass (a compliment on my femininity really) I get nervous and somehow give them reason to doubt me.

These days I've been down, and all these thoughts have come to the surface. There's so much work to be done on the inside! It seems like where I care I'm naturally the stark opposite of what I'd want to be.

Money

2004-09-10T01:14:00.000-04:00

I need to:
-Stop moaning and get better at the job I have now (it's a man's job, but what the hell). It pays my bills and whatever transition I've done.
-Get another job. I have absolutely no idea what I could do, but I think I will soon. I don't know if it pays so much to get a job kind of like McDonald's for example but as a last resort I'd take it. Waitressing would be fun but not before I kill this beard shadow, it's not only a self-confidence weight but also a liability, I need to pass. I don't know who would take TG waitresses anyway, because I don't pass all the time.

My cons (depressants)

-My job is on the low end of pay (better than the scraping-the-bottom jobs but kind of limited financially nonetheless)
-x
-I don't have any relations which could help me. Everyone I know is poor but decent like me (without the decent).
-I have a rock bottom self esteem, looow. It is definitely improving but most hurdles seem still too high to even think of going over them. Therapy would help.
-I can't afford therapy, it's too expensive to pay ca. $160 meds a month and $60-$120 therapy sessions.

My pros (I'm feeling better already)

-I am not unattractive, I'm slim and tall (6 1/2, 155 lbs) and hormones are delivering very good feminization. I have a 36A bust and a much more curvy body than before. I do have a kind of "distinct" beauty which people may like or not, but I am definitely not stranded in the looks department :) Last time I went to do my hair the stylist asked me if I was a model. WHOOOEEE!!
-I'm 25 (26 in october!), still a somewhat "young" transitioner with most of her life in the future.
-I have an endless well of contempt for the morons' opinions and space, so I'll dress and act the way I goddamn want when I goddamn want so to speak. Ok not at work.
-I am corageous, I'll jump into something new fairly easily, it's keeping up what I find an uphill battle. So after some tossing and turning I'd brave the elements and go get a job as a girl, something that is still quite a test for me.

Depression sets in

2004-09-04T11:19:00.000-04:00

I've been reading the DubyaSpeak site so please don't-- if I don't make sense, which is what they say where I come from, she's a good person anyway, if they doesn't make sense, let them be, for they are the salt of the earth, see. The speech pattern of our fabulous president are incredible sticky.

My meds reserve has been dwindling these last days and will soon be out completely if Inhouse doesn't deliver today or tomorrow. I ran out of progesterone three days ago, I had already cut down the spiro dose and estrofem disappeared yesterday. This is the first time that this happens, they have always been very reliable, always delivering within seven days. Past times like these (never this bad) have been solely my fault, but I ordered ahead this time. Now I'm just running on hopes.
I feel the effects of the hormonal change already. My head is getting more foggy and I've been feeling steadily discouraged about myself. Not only that, I was feeling pretty motivated the days prior about everything and very happy; now the whole world can crumble down, I don't care (no food in any quantity tastes good these days, my weight holds at 155 mostly or swings between 153 and 156 depending on how much I eat). I'm also more clumsy, and since I am also a bit clumsy by nature I'm getting the distinct feeling of becoming more stupid. When the body speaks, all else is hollow...
It's official... I'll never ever tell anyone again when I'm going to get my shadow lasered off. My SO had an accident last week and the car was totaled (She's OK, she walked out with just some abrasions for which I'm very very relieved) so now we have to look for a new car and lots of other side expenses. I guess it could have been much worse, but I'm still bitter about the fact that twice already I've built up my hopes to get laser only to be crushed by some out-of-the-blue expense.
These last few days I also took the Myers-Briggs test at Bloginality.com several times and found I'm an INTP, the Introverted iNtuitive Thinking Perceiving. Reading the descriptions with my SO I had to agree it fits me right down to a T. Even when I have absolutely no ability or taste for math or physics, I always thought that I could have been a theoretical physicist if I didn't have to learn Physics :/
I'm going to my support meeting today... I hope I do okay. Being a m2f INTP is no joke, INTP is naturally the antithesis of gregarious feminine behaviour, devoid of self-confidence, small-talk abilities and appeal. Speaking of appeal, is it just me being depressive or I look way better in pictures where you can't see my eyes? I don't know, it's like their look is repealing.
There... I'm depressed again.

tummy tummy

2004-08-29T18:36:00.000-04:00

Gosh... there's a bunch of posts i want to finish and publish but not today... no, not today... but they are good ideas! ....doesn't matter, tummy don't feel like writing :(

Chinese Vivi

2004-08-28T22:27:00.000-04:00

My name in chinese. Courtesy of www.goodorient.com :) I wish I knew what those kanji meant though... If anyone has an idea, let me know :D

Becoming

2004-08-28T01:38:00.000-04:00

I know gender-wise, I am ready to transition to full time. Even to transition at work, I think I could muster the courage for the momentuous revelation. And yet, although I know I am ready to fully transition, I also know I am not.
Such is not a contradictory statement. I believe that I still have a lot to learn regarding self-confidence and stability as a woman, that if I did transition, I'd have a lot of pitfalls due to my lack of basic knowledge of not just female social interaction but social interaction period. The overwhelming presence of GID in my life was an unseen handicap which never allowed me to develop the way I should have. I want to be more myself before I go completely public, to find myself for real this time and not be a ghost with a walk-in part in the world, who only says hi and stays silent in conversations, terrified around people. I want to become the shining woman I always thought I should have been.
I mentioned yesterday I would like to experience being with a guy, dating, him holding me, kissing me, making love to me. But for any relationship to succeed in anyway (including my current one) I need to move forward as a woman and develop some substance to my being there. In other words, have my own real life without confusion; and I don't mean gender confusion, I mean natural confusion of the how's and where's of my future. I'm going to be me for me first, and then I'll go out into the world. I know I'll make a greater impression that way and be much more comfortable with my personal development. It was a mistake to put everyone's opinion before my own regarding matters of the soul and that's a mistake I will not make again.
I'm happy with the way I dress now, I think it's much more feminine in a real way. I am still more adventurous than conservative (guess it's my new teens), but the experiments look fine and feel fine.. I've been passing more than ever

Sometimes you want to go...

2004-08-27T22:40:00.000-04:00

.. where everybody knows your na-ame, and they're always glad you ca-ame...

So goes the Cheers theme, and I think it might well apply for this Starbucks I'm frequenting now. Ok, I've only been here thrice, and I don't know if they are glad I came (they are nice though) but they sure know my name! Wow, and I only told them once what it was (the second time I came they didn't write any name on it). Still "Vivien" ;) I mean, I'm positive I'm read all over but at least I'm read as trans and not as a man (I hope). Reading yesterday an account of a FTM I find his words resonating strongly inside: he pondered that even if he was never seen as a man, he'd rather be regarded as a transsexual rather than a woman. This is so true you all not-GIDers! There's no connection really with our birth sex and the gender it brings along so we'd rather be regarded as "something else" or "trying" hard than, in his case "woman" and in mine "man". I understand the mechanics of gender nowadays much more than I did before. When I was younger I couldn't believe there were people happy with their assigned gender, it was like an impossibility for me. Thus, even though I was forced to live there, I went off in tangents everytime I could. Anything else was better than that because, honestly, I could never at heart enjoy male gender expression.
Today, after reading the chapter on telling your family in "True Selves", I was pondering the value and consequences of telling my own. It's not something I'd do for them really, I'm still very touchy about our mutual past, but I think I've noted before that ever since I acknowledged gid within me I've begun to make peace with everything in my life. I've escaped so much from everything (mostly justifiably), family, future, friends, town, my life was little more than retreat after retreat from everything I could be or have. I now know why I resisted development in my life, and why everything felt so very wrong. Truly, beyond all medical definitions or nomenclature controversies there is nothing like transitioning to be one once and for all, not some waste sliming along the years and only getting older. I was thinking to myself yesterday how much more I smile now and how petty stuff remains petty stuff for me. It used to be anything could cause a landslide within and destroy my mood for the day, or days even.
I used to have certain pictures to describe myself. When my preteens came and the grip of social rules had just started to take hold I saw myself as various masked heroes of my own creation. There was this one who was always tortured and died tragically in the aid of his friends, and was never forgotten even though in life people didn't care much for him. There was, most remarkably and daring for my level of repression even at that time, a shadow being who everyone assumed to be male (because of the menacing way it looked, sort of like a japanese samurai helmet with horns and a flowing black cape for everything else, red slit eyes) but was instead revealed to be a girl.
It's interesting... it seems that I find more hidden clues everyday within my past that point to my GID. Before, they pointed to nothing really, they were regarded as flukes by my mind which would NOT admit maybe I wanted to be a girl instead of a boy.
Later in life and with adolescence raging (and my drawing abilities not improving.. bwaaaaaa!) my self picture changed to that of a hardened warrior who everyone feared/respected but that had no friends. No one knew him, he was really the embodiment of a mistery. Obviously fatally tainted, but still a performing tool. Or later, when I learned from it, that of the poisoned dragon with all its majesty unjustly and cowardly subdued. This is not something I am inferring now, this is real me from back then, I was intelligent enough to know the interpretations. Really, I felt I had no aim in life, nothing pleased me, social relationships seldom worked.
Then came the image of the captain, the submarine captain who dived with his crew (he wasn't really "he" or "she", it didn't have a face) under the polar ice and mapped the unfathomable depths. There came a time (around 17) when I realized I didn't know what was wrong with me, but it was very wrong and the only way to change that or at least find out was for the captain to dive deeper and deeper into the black, frozen waters. And the ice water here is very symbolic really, for I am very sensitive to cold and am terribly afraid freezing to death. The only way out was in, there was no escape. I knew what I had to do... and eventually did it. It just took me years of silent reflection, this time aimed at untangling the mess inside.
Meanwhile and for the years between ages 20 and 23 I untied a very very old gag and acknowledged I saw myself as a sort of ugly butch lesbian who was condemned to be like that all of her life.
I was coming back to work today from lunch at noon and it came to me that the captain had indeed walked its path successfully, it had awakened the lost atlantis at the bottom and lighted the waters.
She's sort of retired now, the captain I mean, and hangs around offering her wisdom (yes, she turned out to be a she) to the new explorers. Her sub which brought me back to reality still inspires me to go farther and be more.

Tat!

2004-08-26T16:32:00.000-04:00

I've always wanted to get a tattoo but could never identify enough with anything much in my "former" life to actually get done. Well, there were a bunch of things but they weren't as aesthetically pleasing as the one I'm thinking about getting. I've been wanting to get this for years but in a male it would have looked awkward (but daring)
My first tat! I'm now trying to find out prices, how soon I get it highly depends on that really, I'm not afraid. It's not going to be too big, about 4x4-5 inches, and in the small of the back. What it is.. I won't tell you yet, but I promise to post a picture when I get it! Hope it's not too costly, the b. shadow removal comes first really.... I have so many things I'd like to get and do and enjoy, I sure wouldn't be bored if I had money! :D

My first 110 pulls!

2004-08-25T01:09:00.000-04:00

Someone else besides me and a couple others must be reading this blog... 110 pulls only in the last week! Well, to everyone who does read, thank you and I hope you can find some value in my own experiences to enrich your life! :-D

walking out

2004-08-25T01:03:00.000-04:00

I went to Starbucks yesterday again. This time to read "True Selves" and not in a skirt and heels but combat pants, keds and a tank top. I feel much much more confident now than I used to then (a little over a month ago, remember that long post?) and only now do I feel I don't look un-feminine without obvious clothing or accesory cues. Getting more and more used to just be me has helped bunches, I just mostly don't interact as male anymore. If boy stealth is needed I just go more neutral, but never into male territory; it's becoming more and more difficult every day anyway, progressively less natural transition follows.
My next steps in coming out involve attending some class (presumably language, I so want to go back to learn languages) and taking a part-time job, both as a girl of course, how else? :) I've been thinking of waiting tables, but I'd rather work at a store counter. Walking out of my place with a reasonable chance to pass will be a reality after I start treatment on my facial shadow. The greasy covers just don't do it for me, not only they are disgusting to wear but dark shows all over anyway so it's not really a solution. That's the reason I want to wait on the laser to start venturing out farther, since with a beard shadow it's only a matter of minutes until I'm read and my confidence drops to minus one. I know I've been mentioning this subject on almost every post for some time, but it is of paramount importance to my actual stage. Now I'm overall much more feminine than male so the aforementioned handicap destroys a whole lot of achievements when interacting with someone.
I do know that after I solve this problem more will crop up, and my horizon will shift farther, but it will be a different game. I can still be read due to other factors, jaw, adam's apple, general size of my body, etc. But all of them, excluding the adam's apple, could be present in a big girl such as me. Beard is totally alien.
Oh yes... I'm sure I'll want a tracheal shave too, and a bilateral orchiectomy to kill all androgens. But they will be goals in a path of overall happiness, I know. Back when I started all this my attitude was very much like the Depeche Mode song that goes "Whatever I've done/beats staring down the barrel of a gun". I had reached a point where I could not go on living as a male anymore, it was like breathing poison. I either opened myself to the possibilities of exploring a transgender identity or some form of death. I have said it before: even though I wasn't ready for suicide (hope always got the best of me), I did wish to die and fade away and honestly couldn't see myself past age 25-27; I felt so terribly old all through my early twenties. I'm going to say it all over again but now the future is there and has me as me not some construct someone placed over my head when I was a child. Now I believe.
That is why I need to step out of my social cave and forge myself in the world. Because that's who I am and how I am going to develop my real self. Truly? I tremble at the thought of doing things like working as me, interviewing as TG, befriending other girls, going out with a guy, him kissing me, having sex with him... these are all things I know are essential to my own flavor of TG experience and which will prepare me to become the woman I never grew up to be. I know I will do these things, it's just a matter of when and where and who. This time I not only believe I can but I know I'm becoming the person who can.

Love,
Vivi

lunch time!

2004-08-24T12:22:00.000-04:00

I guess there's just too many things you squeeze into your lunch hour. Like me now, I want to write a post, order meds and... eat without choking! I need to leave about 10 to 1 though, and it's alreay 12:25!
Anyway!
I've been very pensive these couple of days regarding my teens. They are a troubled era of my life and I feel only now I have the tools and emotional strength to analize it and draw the right conclusions. The mysteries have been clearing, memories that were lost have been returning to harbor, and peace begins to settle over the land as a blanket of light.
The song "Ugly" by the Smashing Pumpkins is a great example of how I felt during those days:

i don't look in the mirror
i don't like what i see staring back at me
everything is clearer
i'll never see what you see
it's not me
so beautiful and free
i'll never be what you need
can't help at all
i was born so beautiful
but now i'm ugly

and i rot in my skin
as a piece of me dies everyday
i know i'm nothing
i know there's nothing i can say
to change
the judgment in their ways
i'll never be what you need
can't help at all
my love was so beautiful
but now i'm ugly
yeah...

i'm good enough, but i don't care
i'm good enough, but i'm not there
i'm good enough, but i don't care
the sun is out, but i'm not there

(i can go anywhere) i'm good enough, but i don't care (...somewhere)
(i can go anywhere) the sun is out, but i'm not there (...somewhere)
(i can go anywhere) i'm good enough (...somewhere)
(i can go anywhere) i'm good enough (...somewhere)

((c) Smashing Pumpkins)

It hits so many right notes I'd be inclined to ask Billy how he felt when he was a teen and if there's nothing unresolved stowed away somewhere. But now he's thrown himself so much into religion, "filling the God hole", that I don't know, in his posts at BillyCorgan.com he sounds very much zealoty. So different from the artist he used to be. But... I'll have my say over Billy Corgan, the Pumpkins and how they influenced my life later.
Speaking of singers and rock and roll, I'd die to have a voice like The Cranberries' Dolores O'Riordan! I was listening to that old song "Dreams" in the car and I myself dreamed of having that range and richness of sound. Of note, anyway, is that my own range has expanded considerably. I've always liked the Cranberries and Dreams is a personal favorite, so I've been singing it to myself for a while: never did it sound as good as today! My voice is now not only higher in pitch but also populated with more feminine inflexions and resonance.
Something funny and voice-related happened today at work. My boss told me to order so me stuff for him so I went ahead and called a couple of vendors for prices. I was doing a fem voice, but not the full fem I do when I'm on my own (I was at work after all and someone could walk in and hear me) but nevertheless I went ahead. Two funny things happened actually. The first one was a telephone operator who stopped short of calling me sir, like "yes, s.. right away!" On the second call I thought I sucked because the guy over the line was giving me the cold shoulder (what hetero guys do when they think you're gay) and then we went through with it and hung up. My boss came up later and said the guy had called him back regarding an address (I left my boss' name [dumb, but I hate to relate my fem voice to my boy name]) and he said about an order a lady had just placed. :)))) He looked puzzled, and I shook my head, made a "really? how terrible" gesture and changed the subject. I could see my boss wanted to know more but he was at a loss for words. Whew! OK, time go rush back to work! I also want to go to Ulta and buy me a nice brush set for my makeup but that will happen after I come home and "dress properly" ;)

into feminine beauty

2004-08-24T12:20:00.000-04:00

This is a post draft from 8/16... guess I forgot to publish it :)

Even though I don't think much of myself looks wise (due to deep rooted feelings of inadequacy coming from way back), I am slowly coming to appreciate my feminine beauty. You see, I had no idea of what to look for, I know I'm tall, have large feet and adam's apple. But I'm not an XYU (XY Unpassable), and I think with time, mones and proper feminine grooming I'll end up looking way more like an XY (AIS) woman than a man. I'll never be petite cute as I would 've liked, but I won't be a tired old mask of masculinity. Just another girl :)
What do I think of beauty? Beauty is very important to me as a woman (I strive for it), but it's not the most important thing at all. If I could pass all the time and be regarded as a woman always, even as a not very pretty woman... I'm ok. As long as I can live and thrive in my life from this side of the bridge, it works for me. I'm now at the point where I pass from, say, 10 feet and that's very relieving. My SO and I went to the food court of a mall the other day (crowded) and I don't recall any disgusted looks. Going out a couple of women looked at me in a puzzled way, but I'm sure that's because I am still dealing with facial shadow and in me it begins to show a couple of hours after I put on makeup... you guessed, it's a bitch. Even after these almost 5 months HRT. With laser starting still a distant two months away, I'm putting off things like going into the women's restroom. I have done so in the past a few times with no problems, but there could be some paranoid lady trying to make a statement about TG women so for now I hold it until I get home. I don't go to men's restrooms anymore as you might have guessed; for a while at first I did, I was doing more androgynous at the time and I hadn't begun HRT so I could pass as a fem (gay, thought of as) guy, which I wasn't, but I was still holding up the male flag. Now I dress very femininely and going to the men's is out of the question. Several reasons why:
1) I don't feel like a man at all. I do have to go to the men's at work but it's disgusting and I try to avoid it.
2) Why bring maleness upon myself? The last times I went androgynous to the men's I got puzzled looks from the guys and it didn't feel ok anymore.
3) I don't want to be thought of as some kind of weirdo, I want to be regarded as a woman. I quit a martial arts class I was having twice a week because of that. Since I obviously had to use the male change room, everyone was getting increasingly nervous about my gender status. I didn't get naked there or even remotely (I just put on my gi jacket) but the changes brought on by HRT were becoming very patent (boobies!) and to tell you the truth, my male image was wavering a lot. I didn't want it anymore, so I rebelled against being grouped with the guys
4) It's just not right, however, my facial shadow still prevents me from going to the girl's when I need to. Not only because of freaked out old ladies but my own self-confidence. I've noted that when I lose confidence in myself I retreat into the male cowl of old which I still haven't gotten rid of. I'd love to be able to, in a "social danger" situation, react completely as a woman.

Bra sizes

2004-08-20T17:39:00.000-04:00

The bra sizer at the Ladies' Home Journal gives me a 36B bra size.... flattering, but not really
Ann's Bra Shop gives me instead a 36A. That's more like it.
The Bravo Sizer says I'm a 38A which is both right and wrong. I can wear a 36 bra comfortably in the middle hook and a 38 feels a little loose (though I've never tried a 38A, only a 38C I used to stuff).
My measurements are something like this nowadays:

over bust= 34
bust= 36.5
under bust= 34
waist= 29 (I lost an inch from my last measurement!)
weight= 155 (holding steady for about 2 1/2 weeks!)

Voice

2004-08-18T00:56:00.000-04:00

My voice has slacked off a little bit I think. On the one hand I can now whip up a very femmy sounding voice without much effort, but it still lacks the defining power of passing. Maybe it's just me... I haven't been using it much on the phone lately and the only one I've been doing is the toned-down version of r/l without much self confidence (lower, a bit nasal, fakey).
One of my goals in this part of my development is to work up my voice from the resonating rich male I do sometimes to something much higher. As long as I talk male (ho-ho), i'll pass as a guy. This has proven somewhat hard for me, as in my work environment I'm expected to be male my stupid male-male voice comes out sometimes and ruins feminine perceptions of me.
Another thing...I'm very impatient to get my beard lasered off..... I wonder if I'll pass as female in boy mode when I do. I know right now my facial shadow is my single most defining male characteristic and it makes everything else look bad. I have dark dark hair on white skin so you guess its visibility is 100% in guy mode and.... much more of what I'd like in fem mode... something like 60% I'd say. Sadly, by itself the stupid shadow has me read as male over all the other good feminine qualities I've accumulated.
Jeez... can't wait for my maleness to get out of my body.... does that say anything about me? :)

GoToMyHRT

2004-08-18T00:34:00.000-04:00

This is my DIY HRT as of today:

400 mg Spirotone (Spironolactone)
6mg Estrofem (17-b Estradiol)
100mg Prometrium (Progesterone)
5mg Fincar (Finasteride)

For what I've read around it may be a little high and in fact for the last week I'd reduced to 4mg Estrofem and 300 mg Spiro, but then I started to get more body hair and some acne so I've gone back to the high dose.
After I got my stint with herbals for about 2-3 months, my doses were something like this (I based my regimen off the Transgendercare website):

4 mg Estrofem
200 mg Spiro

I tried it kind of slowly for a couple of months, then added the 5 mg finasteride. After I was comfortable with that I tried Provera and... bam! Instant depression! Headaches 5 minutes after taking the pill! Needless to say, I dumped it. I tried it again with a divided dose and it was the same, only a little milder (but still bothersome).
I'm almost 5 months now into HRT and just a couple of weeks ago I added Prometrium to the mix. Changes have been good and stabe, though now I feel I've stalled a little. Hmmm.... Got to work this out some way... You see, I believe that I have a high testo operation going on in my body and that that is the main culprit. I'd dearly love to get SRS or at least an orchi in the near future, T is the enemy inside.

Passing and not passing

2004-08-17T22:18:00.000-04:00

I've been a bit crazed about the idea of passing this last week and like all high emotional states, it's crashed today. All in all it wasn't like a nosedive into the desert type of crash but more of a jungle crash landing. The good news: the crew was saved. I think I have to contend with the fact that I don't pass as nearly as much as I'd like to... yet. The future will be better. I carefully avoided letting feelings of the "I'm so horrid" and "I'm so mannish I'll never pass" type settle in my mind ane become minefields. One thing the hormones have given me is emotional amplitude so now I just let that kind of stuff dilute away in my expanded emotions.
I hope I can hold this state of mind when I step out of my door, but I think I'm not going to *try HARD* to pass... I'll kind of let it flow and find my own way to things. I have the feeling I'll pick up better observations (and confidence) this way than the high-strung one I'm doing now.

Sugar is bad for your HRT...

2004-08-17T12:37:00.000-04:00

... but cheesecake tastes so GOOD! My gosh I just love it! 48g of sugar per slice but wha the heck...
Anyway, my little break is over. I'd been more lenient about the stuff I was eating because (trumpets!) I reached my target weight of 155 lbs. about two weeks ago! I've even gone to 153, which makes it about 50 pounds lost since I started! My little respite from diet is over though, especially sugary stuff as it interferes with HRT by killing estrogen.
Oh yes... fruit makes a wonderful dessert... :P

Ohh, interesting news: I'm preparing my first ever "coming out" email. It's for a friend who I never see in r/l (he lives in my hometown of Distant, Neverbebackalia) but with whom I've just restarted corresponding and with whom I want to be straight about my gender situation.

the pic II

2004-08-12T18:57:00.000-04:00

I have decided to pull my pic off this blog for the time being. At least until I can be "out" everywhere. btw, I'm not getting divorced, hiding from estranged children or psycho relatives, just so you know ;)

mom

2004-08-12T18:19:00.000-04:00

My mother and I are very far away, both geographically and spiritually. Ours is a story of mishappenings and misunderstandings, of chances lost and love that went down the drain. We talk now, not much, but we do. A change from the years I wouldn't talk to her. She calls me "dear son", but she is not to blame for that really, she doesn't know her "son" was always a fiction, a cosmic joke. I have toyed with the idea lately of sending her "the email" with all the details. I don't even know how to word it, the concept is so alien to her mind, she'd freak for sure. And if it's like I think, that she suspected of my gender stuff, even worse; she fought it, I know she did, she always preferred boys over girls. This would be not only strange but (maybe) some kind of defeat for her, which in a way I now come to realize would be good. I had to "defeat" her in lots of things to gain her respect. Maybe this is the last big barrier between us.
A point I think I should make sure of driving home is the sheer force of my transsexuality and it's far-reaching consequences in my life, that I'm a woman inside (and gradually becoming one outside), not a man who likes to dress. In fact, if I'm to send her any picture of me without a big poncho I should begin to tell her of my hrt and most importantly, of the why's of it.
This transition of mine is slowly bringing me out of the emotional dark I suffered for so many years, all the rancors I collected like leeches on my skin. My mother did a lot of wrong to me, as did my two fathers (my mother's husband and my bio father), but lately I've been sorting out my feelings and even though I still am right in holding them responsible for the things they did, I don't want any more hatred in my life. I want to look towards the future and not the darkened past. If I could just tell them of myself and they understood, everything would be archived for good. We start over, but knowing about each other. Bittersweet miracle, huh?
My baby sister is pregnant. A little girl. It makes me so giddy and, honestly, a little sad; that's the way I should have been born, my starting point. But also I'm so happy for her since family is so important for her well-being... now she's got her own. I won't go over my own feelings for motherhood now, ok? ;) Also, I would love to tell her of another girl, this one late in coming. Oh... ok, i'm so obvious... :*)

2004-08-10T18:42:00.000-04:00

What do you think? I bought it last weekend at the Guess store. I think it's classy and cool at the same time. I'm just dying to wear it! :D

si es cuestion de confesar...

2004-08-09T19:50:00.000-04:00

These days have been kind of crazy and emotionally draining for me. Transition means a lot of changes in very little time which makes for high-strung emotions. Add to that 3 days without Spiro (dumb me missed the order date) and you've got something nasty.
Today it's Monday when the weekend is over and I need to go back to work. It feels so strange doing the male thing again... It's like coming back from a faraway land and finding you don't relate to your surroundings anymore. It's been happening every Monday for about a month, the inescapable feeling that presenting as male is more than a remote idea now for me. During the weekends I couldn't be happier, doing new things, exploring myself, eradicating fear and just plain being. Monday (I don't care about you) comes and I'm in for small depressions and feelings of worthlessness. Depressions, I should report, are definitely not nearly as strong as the deep, all-encompassing funks I used to be before HRT. Going to work is terrible. Not because of the work itself which I've learned to accept for the time being even if it's not what I'd rather be doing, but because of my presentation issue. I'm not fat now (even though I gained 5 pounds in the last week which puts me in 160 ) but my work clothes are so oversized I look like I'm a shapeless thing 20 pounds fatter. I don't get to decide what to wear, being I have to don the company uniform. The size is horrible but I really don't have a choice; my breasts are now very close to full A's and they show under everything. They got so pointy and noticeable people were staring perplexed at my chest. And the thing really is that it doesn't bother me so much that people will take me for transgendered, it's that at work I'm without any makeup, with the baggy clothes, the horrible beard shadow (and my face has become much more feminized now so the beard shadow looks weird), no feminine accessories and my hair more fem than anything else.
I hope I don't freak out every one reading this blog... the one in the pic is really me and I don't have that much makeup on! It's just that I feel the me I present at work is like a ragged, dirty version of what I really am. Well... I'd say people at work are onto me anyway. I know they think I'm some kind of queer thing (and since they know I'm with a GG, even queerer), and I'm almost positive someone's seen me dressed and told everybody. They are very respectful and keep their distance though which sometimes leads me to the belief that if I was more confident and more out at the same time they wouldn't bother. Self-Confidence.... the culprit of most of my life's problems. I'm actually a pretty courageous girl really but courage is one thing and self-confidence another for me. Actually my courage is what has kept me alive throughout the darkest times of my life. I'm working on my self confidence.... and I have to say there's a little progress, nothing to write home about but for me a step ahead is a step ahead. It feels very good.

Last weekend my SO and I went shopping for clothes together. We spent a wonderful day together looking at (and getting!) stuff. My confidence started low in the morning but quickly became high. I passed a lot there, I need to tell you. And when I didn't pass and people read me as Trans, they were generally very nice. A lady at a store kept calling me "lady", "ma'am" and "she" repeatedly to her daughters. Her mother even told me a certain top would look beautiful on me. It was beautiful but I was so shocked! For a moment I didn't know what to do... I was being regarded as a woman! It's so much easier when people are reading you as female to keep up your face, your demeanor or your voice. There was even an instance where at the Gap there was a queue for the changing room on the ladies' side and a clerk told everyone there was another one on the other side of the store. As I walked into it I realised it was the mens! The woman there was kind of shocked, she could really not place me as male even though my barging into the mens' changing room made her notice my male characteristics and (I guess) the thin beard shadow under my makeup. She was visibly shocked at first but then (after I came out of the changing room, i did use if after all) was cooler and distant, like "You can't fool me, I won't treat you like a woman". But she was the only one, and only because of my dumb mistake. All others I met were real nice and I even sensed something I've only felt for a short time: girl-girl connection with other women. It still catches me off-guard most of the times but I'm learning how to promote it. That's something that's beginning to fascinate me now, how with enough confidence I can be an active woman and not just a calendar girl.
I'm going to sleep now, I've been staying up too many days in a row :) I still have a lot of stuff to write about but that's for tomorrow.

By the way, I hope you liked the picture I posted. It was about time you people got a glimpse of the the goddess herself... :P

I am not gay

2004-08-04T16:11:00.000-04:00

I'm not gay. If I look fem, if I act fem in this awful stupid gross male drab it's because I have no choice but to wear it. If it was for me I'd be wearing a skirt or a dress or girl pants or a nice shirt. I am not freakin' gay. I am TRANS ok? It's cool being gay, but it would imply that I'm a man in some way which I AM NOT. I'm not gay, you. Gay is a guy who likes other guys. I am a woman and from that I spring.

the state of passing now (& more)

2004-08-01T18:53:00.000-04:00

I've been meaning to write a post regarding what's currently boiling in my mind but I didn't get beyond news about my life and some commentary. Transition continues and I'm just who I am, I'm not explaining myself to anyone, this is me: deal with it. Current song paralell: "You gotta walk through hell/Scream you're not around". Surprisingly I'm beginning to pass a whole lot if I don't interact with people, then they know. It's something you can feel in those around you. When I was more apparently male I used to cause a stir everywhere I went and even though I was never afraid to contradict people's tastes it got bothersome. People just HAD to show their disgust. Guys would look down on me and women would have contempt.
Now it's different, women mostly don't bother having me around most of the time, they've even addressed me as an equal in casual chit-chat more than a few times which has made me awfully happy (bats lashes). Everyone is confused with my gender, but guys are the most clueless. They realise that at this stage of my transition it's ok for them to check me out as they would a non apparently trans woman but upon learning I'm "one of those", they mostly look away. When I'm doing the guy drab they obviously know something is not right, but ignore it (Sometimes. When I began to feminise my mannerisms for good an acquaintance guy that I saw 3 or 4 times before and during that time and with whom I had a nice rapport distanced himself from me and never called again. Be afraid, be very afraid)
I've been yanking myself out of the shell these days. I'm already living 3/4 time so going to the store and everything is becoming more and more routine. I do well with "hello-thank you" social contact. Socializing is still a big no-no for me though. I don't know if it's a) I have no imagination. Conversation stumps me. b) Socializing kills all my confidence and I'm too self-conscious for even babbling. c) I haven't found interesting people or people I feel comfortable with.
My bet is on b and c. When I do hit my stride with someone, I rarely lose it and I've been getiing better and better as my self-confidence improves. I think I need less patience from others to come out of the shell than I used to. I've been thinking seriously about getting therapy for those issues but the cost is prohibitive: $120 a session? Yeah, sure. I can buy meds for roughly a month. I don't have much of a problem with gender issues now really (just the usual), I'm pretty sure what I am/want to be and don't need a lot of help there. The self-confidence issue is queen.
Though... I wonder.... if both problems are intertwined and lack of self esteem and self confidence is caused by the gender thing, then I'll have to go for it too. Hmm

Life... updated: The Vivian Channel

2004-07-31T12:23:00.000-04:00

i hope you can forgive the self-serving and full of !!!!!!CHEESE!!!!!! subject line. I'm not a 13-year old, I'm really not! I don't even think it was funny!

Venus Envy has also woke up from the slumber of lack of updates and it's been blazing with them for like two weeks. Great! I guess this also means I *have* to get myself writing new reviews and present the much anticipated (by me at least) Venus Envy review... ... I've been through a lot of stuff these weeks with my job and my personal life which isn't quite done... The preliminary conclusions have been drawn though, which makes me immensely happy:
* MY SO and I have faced the music and recognized we need to change the way our relationship works. Focus on the wealth of good things, be more free towards each other and ourselves and accept that it's not the same world from a few years back we live in.
Basically meaning the deep deep things that connect us need not be lost by petty everyday-living grievances and age-old rancor, they're just more important. We are who we are and even without my boatload of gender related tension our thing was never the picket fences. I now believe I have a future of connecting with her in lots of different, freer ways and not just the regret of failure. It makes me very happy to see we'll not lose each other as soulmates after all.
As Placebo would put it, Soulmate dry your eyes/Soulmate dry your eyes/Soulmates never die.
*IT LOOKS like I'm not going to be out of a job in the next few months which is absolutely uber cool! Granted, it's still the same lousy type of manly job I'm at now, but at least that's what's paying for my transition needs and life in general so you could say happiness is still coming :)
In the future I'll be looking for a better job anyway, but at least with something to fall back on. This money dry season is also going to end, oh yes..... I miss shopping so much! snifff snifff sniff
Completely unrelated, but also new: As soon as I get accepted by the Admins at Genderpeace.com (a forum mostly for TS Gen X'ers and Gen Y'ers) I'll be posting yet another bio piece on the life of the gal. It's interesting how these life info blurbs change the more you move through your transition, how you remember stuff you had blocked and gain new understanding of things. The past is changing all the time said Leto II, and he was right.

Stay cool,
Vivi

TG webcomic update

2004-07-29T09:05:00.000-04:00

Looks like From Then On Forth is back. The art has improved lots and the comic looks and feels even more Venus Envy-ish (don't kill me Elizabeth) than before. The jokes are still not too strong but I'm sure she'll hit her stride with time. Welcome back! :)

blog

2004-07-27T08:29:00.000-04:00

I haven't been happy lately with the look of my blog. I should learn some HTML and have it look better. Hmmm.

Since I haven't posted a decent piece of writing in so long I might as well share some news with you:

My first support meeting went really well. The atmosphere, even though most were very self-conscious, was relaxed. The woman in charge of the meetings is wonderful, I'd rather not say anything than interrupt her. She's got a strong, powerful voice, deep yet feminine for a woman her age. She's a minister and like teachers, ministers learn to give power and resonance to their voices in order to be heard. She would throw me into a lake if she knew but she reminded me in various respects of my grandmother. She's quite younger but the look was very much like my granny's at that age and also her voice and way of speaking. Interesting.
My grandma.... I need to call her. I haven't done so in a while. When I left where I left she was the only family person I was sad about leaving on her own. She played a big part in me coming to the big city. Speaking of, last sunday my honey and I went to see Madonna at Phillips Arena. It was AWESOME! The show was unbelievable, the dancing wonderful and the song versions rocked! Phillips has terrible acoustics though and at times one could only hear an indisctinct mash of sound and voice. We had a great time my SO and I, we didn't want it to end.
It was pouring rain when we got out, pouring really, there were rivers flowing into the storm drains and at every street corner. 3 long blocks to get to the car.... oh well. We got soaked of course. I was wearing a black corset top, red skirt with a cute star patch and black 3 inch strappy sandal heels which had gotten real slippery. At one point I did what most women would were doing: take off my shoes and run. Boy that rain was too cold for comfort. Or is it that I'm more susceptible to temperature changes now? When we got home it was still raining hard and we had to park a little far from our apartment. We got out again and right away I started getting these shivers all over. I was all shaky, my teeth were chattering like crazy and I couldn't say a word without repeating syllables. I'm definitely not as resistant all over since I started on the mones; but that goes with the territory, right? Even though I never liked being too strong or big (6'), it does have its uses. You need to depend less from other people to do stuff and it's a security plus when someone is eyeing you for something nasty too. I used to get beat up at school up until I was about 10. After that the big galoot gene kicked in and guys thought it twice before messing with me. I was in the process of shutting down myself for the long night of adolescence so my oozing soul darkness also helped keep them at bay. I haven't been in a fight since my 2nd year of high school, for which I'm grateful now. I don't want to get into anything that will cause me harm.
Aaaaaanyway, going back the support group, it was a very nice experience (which I'm eager to duplicate). I even made a friend there with whom we've emailed or chatted regularly since then. I liked it there that everyone had gender issues to deal with and nobody was judgmental. It certainly felt very warm there in our little circle. I'm fretting now whether to go or not to the SCC planning party where there's bound to be a lot more TGs and my social skills will have to improve a notch... I'm really nervous :[

On a side note, I've got a sore throat. I think I'd been coming down with it for some days but all the top-of-my-voice singing at the concert wrecked it for good. My fem voice is coming out much better now technically but since I'm unable to reach the high notes, I'm forced to the resonant bassoon. Speaking of voice, I feel like a teenager again. I've progressively raised the pitch and I'm now getting more comfortable
My friend from the support group tells me my voice sounds great, but I know she's a dear. I do know it's much better now than a month ago though. My next step is to eliminate more traces of maledom from my voice and rise from the dull nasal tomb. That last part is proving hard but I'm optimistic about the future. I think that bar some bone-set male traits I'm becoming a nice looking woman in my own right. And looking more and more like my mother and the women on her side of the family in the process... jeez :)

ground to major bye bye tom

2004-07-22T19:44:00.000-04:00

do you like girls or boys?
it's confusing these days

support group!

2004-07-17T09:21:00.000-04:00

Today I'm going to my FIRST SUPPORT GROUP MEETING! I'm so excited I'm biting my elbows!

Small Jean Genie

2004-07-15T22:54:00.000-04:00

Last Tuesday I went out with my laptop and "let the blood flow on the keys". I was kinda depressed, I have to tell you. I feel positively stupid about the fact that I went to the outside of a night club to write in a laptop but well.. that's me for now. I'm posting it raw, I won't do any editing, so if you find inconsistencies or poor worded feelings think of it as a pseudo stream of consciousness notes piece ;)

It's strange, but nice. I'm writing one of these posts off line, in Notepad and outside Le Buzz in Marietta, GA (a cafe popular with TG people in these parts, mostly gay guys in bermuda shorts though). I'd never been here and the fact that there's little movement doesbn't tell me much about the place's habitual life. It's 9:20 on a Thursday, after all. I'm outside now and a guy came to talk to me and was really nice, he must have thought I'm from a newspaper writing a review on the club, me clacking away on my laptop. I do have to write a thing on it if I ever come back properly, that is with some other company than a laptop. Some new girlFRIENDS maybe? Yes!
People come and go and sounds come from inside, but no one stops here. I guess I must be really strange out here on my own, no drink or anything while everyone is there inside. But that's Vivian for you... very shy :o The music is not bad though, at least not bothersome, Guess you could call it "generic euro club" with some current hit every once in a while (I've heard two versions of Beyonce's cry of sexiness already). I have to say I don't know if it's the right place to come with a laptop to write, but then again that's me. COMPLETELY unable to do anything normal.
A techno version of "You're so vain" A couple of lesbian girls go by now, I recognize a butchy one by watching her walk. Another lesbian, she talks to me this time. I sound so horrible, I have no idea of what to say or how to. I'm going to be a pain in the ass for any half-socialite I team up with. She looked nice and all, the lesbian woman mean, all guyish and strong. Letting myself at last be the way I was meant to be is proving to be a strange but pleasant ride. There's little male inside me anymore, I've eradicated most of it zone by zone. All my male is on the outside, my bones, my voice, my wall. My wall... it still holds up. One of the main problems I guess is the fact that I'm not full time. I still have to interact as male everyday at work (TRY at least, everyone knows I'm not succeeding though
"I'm every woman" plays now. I wonder which will be the "gay music" of 2020. Madonna?
The stone butch went by again, walking all straight like a guy. Just add toothpick to mouth.
It might seem that I'm laughing at these people but nothing is farther from the truth. I respect them, I'm TG after all, it's just that I'm feeling a little strange, that's all.
I always feel jumpy when around people and night spots make me dizzy with self-consciousness. I guess it'll pass, but for now I need a little group security.
Sigh, but I'm determined to get myself to the support group this Saturday. Terrified as I am, I have to move out of this shell. Also because it's a sad remnant of my yesteryears. Back then it was necessary, today it's more like something that it's just there, like a Norman castle. It's ruinous and everything but its walls still cry repel.

I came here to finish a poem I'm writing (The Angel Tree) but I'm kind of stuck, it won't go any further from its twenty scattered verses or so.

Same night, an hour later.
I left the premises of LeBuzz after I finally realized I was not finishing my poem and most important of all, that I was sticking out like a sore thumb.
I'm at a $tupidBuck$ now, amid fratboys and middle aged newspaper readers. Just a pun though, the place is quiet and nice, and it looks like I could have a lot of their drinks. The Chai Tea Latte is awesome. It's my first time in a Starbucks (they spelled my name "Vivien" and not "Vivian" on the cup, guess I can live with that. I like it that way too.)
I don't like the building itself much. It's a modern tall ceilinged thing with exposed air conditioning ducts, which makes it not comfy at all. They close at 11 :(
Voice report: Well, even though I've achieved some sort of good pitch and diction at home, I'm a total mess when people are looking at me. I manage an improved "Mr. Softee" voice (refer to earlier post for definition) but it just doesn't do the trick. That I'm not terribly passable and my demeanor is terrible should add to the problem. And I HAVE to shave my arms before tomorrow; the hair subtracts from my otherwise nice forearms and hands.
I'm not going to talk about my Adam's apple tonight. NOTE TO SELF: NEXT TIME GET A STRAW, that way I won't have to flash "the apple" to everyone around.
I have a problem right here (points head) with avoidancy. I'm missing a lot of stuff, and that's only because I shun all human contact by looking away. People must think I'm always looking at something else in a spacey manner, in fact, I'm just fixing my gaze elsewhere.
Gosh, this Chai Latte is good! At least I dont look THAT out of place here though, even among the fratboys and the middle aged readers. Back at the cafe my gender variance was normal, though my activities were abnormal (shunning everyone, sooooooo inconspicuous), here the clacking is just fine, and my TGness is abnormal. Girls are cutesy around here, boys rough but pampered.
The clerks were polite enough to me (I was terrified). I am sitting in one of the four corners of the place, another of those inconspicuous places I choose.
If I ever get the money and the will to go to a therapist my avoidance should be the first thing on the table. I really hate it, and would be very happy without it.
It wasn't always this way though, I became hyper-avoidant during the grueling last years of my adolescence, early 20's (who'd say I'll be 26 in a few months!)
A couple of black guys scribble notes in legal pads, one of them looks at a book with pictures (I'd say medical, though it could be Moon shots for all I know), underlining stuff.
From far, I pass easily. Close, they figure me out and I'm not a tall woman anymore but a cute tranny with small obviously femenine boobs. Strange, when people see me now en femme they don't think "crossdresser" anymore, the word in their minds (the concept in their minds anyway) is "transsexual". And it doesn't bother me as I regard myself as a cute tranny, but I'd like it to move forward from that soon. Of course it's not going to happen soon, but dreaming costs nothing as they say where I was born.
4 minutes till close. I guess I'll pack my stuff and leave now. VOICE VOICE VOICE VOICE

Raspberry Beret (that's what I'm listening to)

Well guess what,no one said goodbye to me so I didn't have to use my voice. I guess I'd done enough revealing for one night. 11:20. Blogger is down for another hour so I think I'll spend it writing and browsing. I rarely sign on to Messenger these days, I don't feel like chatting with anybody. I haven't been on irc for a while also, I can never find someone fun to talk.

Guess my RLT is running in these instances. RLT means you can't skulk back into your male shell for protection. RLT means facing the music. It's as hard as it seemed it would be!

Why would a guy as fem and with such a nice voice as Prince sing things such as "when I was your man blah blah blah". Prince is truly androgynous though, like David Bowie. You don't have to be beautiful to turn me on, you know ;)

Wheeee!

2004-07-12T20:01:00.000-04:00

I bought me a new car! Well it's not exactly new but it's 2001 which makes it six years younger than the rolling junk I had before. Now I'm enjoying the luxuries of air conditioning, a stereo that actually sounds good and a smooth ride.
This Saturday I'm going to my first support group meeting... my heart takes a fall, my teeth chatter, my hands shake uncontrollably! Yes, I'm KIND of shy.
Last time I tried to go to a support group I got lost in the slums of Atlanta and without air conditioning in my car I was half baked by the sun. Needless to say my hair was a mess, my makeup was ruined and my mood was... stormy. It's best that I didn't make it that time though, it'd have been triple hell. Anyway,

These are my guidelines for Saturday

Dress
@ Don't be over the top
@ Use your pros (breasts, legs, waist, smile)
@ Play down your cons (jaw, rib cage, arms, hips)
@ dress hip and cool, but kind of normal

Voice+Speaking
@ don't forget to push back and up your larynx
@ a high pitch is always better than a low pitch
@ relax and let your diction flow
@ speak melodically not in a monotone (hard!!)
@ speak slowly!!!!!!
@ don't freeze
@ don't panic

Demeanor
@ just be yourself
@ avoid 'gay' mannerisms
@ do not try to overtly impress everyone with your accomplishments

Socialization
@ don't be afraid
@ be prepared to see people much more advanced than you (don't let your spirits fall)
@ be prepared to see people much less advanced than you (don't think you've made it)
@ relax, be the girl you are
@ let yourself "fall into" conversations, you don't need to be the life of the party

role models but mostly the future in the past

2004-07-10T11:28:00.000-04:00

It used to be when I was a kid that I'd look up to this strange and wonderful world where everything found a spot, and rejoiced. People who were happy and successful in their lives were in my future, if not in my present, and I was to be like that. Later came some bruising truth, swooping down from the unknown heights unmerciful. I still saw those people and those happy places as something hard to reach, but I'd get there someday.
My total breakdown started around the end of my adolescence and just paused to gather its strength while I enjoyed loving my partner, though when it came, it was horrible. Years piled on years of frustration and incertitude, of sharp displacement and being lost, of disconnection with my family and the few friends I'd known, of silence; my whole life came down. I looked at the successful people and the happy places then and thought time had worn me too much for such beauty; my best option was to die and be done with it. I didn't kill myself not out of lack of courage (though the prospect scared me terribly), but because there was a deep bright flame inside me which inspired me to keep on, to walk past those feelings.
I was a kind of Major Tom, alone and cold in the silence of my tin can and with no way of getting anywhere, myself lost in the void with no stars.

David Bowie has some of the best and most beautiful songs for just about every feeling. This is Rock and Roll Suicide, but it could be just any suicide:

Time takes a cigarette, puts it in your mouth
You pull on your finger, then another finger, then your cigarette
The wall-to-wall is calling, it lingers, then you forget
Ohhh, you're a rock 'n' roll suicide

You're too old to lose it, too young to choose it
And the clocks waits so patiently on your song
You walk past a cafe but you don't eat when you've lived too long
Oh, no, no, no, you're a rock 'n' roll suciide

Chev brakes are snarling as you stumble across the road
But the day breaks instead so you hurry home
Don't let the sun blast your shadow
Don't let the milk float ride your mind
They're so natural - religiously unkind

And the second part, the one you know is true but would like to believe anyway:

Oh no love! you're not alone
You're watching yourself but you're too unfair
You got your head all tangled up but if I could only make you care
Oh no love! you're not alone
No matter what or who you've been
No matter when or where you've seen
All the knives seem to lacerate your brain
I've had my share, I'll help you with the pain
You're not alone

Just turn on with me and you're not alone
Let's turn on with me and you're not alone
Let's turn on and be not alone
Gimme your hands cause you're wonderful
Gimme your hands cause you're wonderful
Oh gimme your hands.

Ain't it cute when someone calls you "love"? ;]

afraid of all ghosts

2004-07-09T23:49:00.000-04:00

I'm kind of depressed. I feel that the first part of my life was largely wasted by the place I was raised in and my family. I was never supported the right way (or much in anything), the way which could have made my life better now. Parenting, that is another word for guidance.
If someone had cared back then to look beyond their own ideas I could have come to terms with the things which bothered me my whole life. My TGness would have been way advanced if my mother had just once been the guide I so much sought. So much heartache and doubt forever removed. Sometimes I think I'd benefit of a procedure like the one in Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. I'd have my parents erased, the memory replaced with benevolent icons who died tragically in a car crash.
My mother the village idiot, my father the stone-cold bastard, my stepfather the man in the iron mask. They never cared. If someone had cared I wouldn't be so scarred now with so much sadness. No, no; I could be teaching Literature or Philosophy, or I could be a great writer! I have well in my mind the constant problems that being discarded by those assigned to protect you brings. And money, which no one ever gave me beyond basic needs. How am I ever going to be in the same universe as a $30.000 Ousterhaut FFS? Oh yeah, it's not something you really NEED to live, but then again Epicurus says you don't really NEED to drink wine when water would do fine right?

The voice thing

2004-07-09T22:54:00.000-04:00

Changing one's voice is hard business. There's so many things! It's not just the hard pitch shift, but also the voice mannerisms and intonation. Whoever thinks that being trans is being lazy (ie not "trying hard enough" to be a man) should try this. Oh yeah :)
And it sounds so strange! I never realized how much I'm attached to my voice and way of talking until I heard this alien fem voice emerging from my throat. Bad and so beginner as it is, it's still much better than the soft rumble of my male voice.
I have to change everything. Even my way of pitching my voice for joking is very male, which bugs me since I joke all the time.
Anyway, I sense I'm lagging behind in my voice. I'm easing myself into this gay guy voice, a Mr. Softee of sorts, and it's something I dearly don't want. I mean, I don't mind being taken by gay (like I have a choice, no one takes me for a guy-guy anymore!), but that is not my goal. I want to pass and be regarded as the woman I am.

FFS

2004-07-08T17:26:00.000-04:00

I've been looking at my face and how easily recognizable as male it is. The illusion of femininity does hold up a bit, but from far and not for long. It's very brittle.
If I had the money or a good job I'd certainly go to Dr. Ousterhout, but do you have around $30.000 ? Me neither, so I'm thinking I'm going to be stuck with this old stupid farce, sorry face, for a while. Hormones have helped heaps though, my face used to be much more masculine and ugly than now. My expressions (especially when I smile) have a nice deal of femininity in them thanks to the hormones.
But well, other things look more reachable, like a tracheal shave (I'm afraid of the possible complications though), laser, an orchiectomy and the eventual boob job. SRS, with its high fees and high psych costs belongs in Ousterhaut land.

crunch

2004-07-08T16:48:00.000-04:00

These days have been getting progressively harder as they go by.
My job may be gone in less than two months, my partner and I are going through rocky roads and today... my shamble of a car broke down. And I was supposed to get my face lasered very soon, something which will so obviously not happen soon now. I'm a bit depressed by this, I hate my beard and all the things it brings (clocking, rashes, ingrown hairs, heaviness of the face, etc... brr!) but I must pull together and find a new job. Ideally, I'd love to find a job where I could express my gender variance but now any job which isn't too masculine (I couldn't stand one like that) will do.
I need to zap my facial hair, get a new car, get a new job and not lose my living standard in the process. All without any credit or monetary help. Looks hard. If I could get an IT job it'd be great.
Meanwhile, my transition goes on. My breasts keep on growing and changing and look now like (i believe) nice and large Tanner IIs. The best thing my mother gave me? Her breast genes ;) I'm also working everyday a bit on my voice and it's making a difference I think. Something I do find a bit alarming though is the fact that I'm hardly writing at all, something I thought would come back swiftly when my maleness was evicted. Anyway, I still have a "silent" depression over the fact that I lost everything I've written all my life when my hard drive expired. Stupidity, lack of backups, yes, and it hurts more because of that.
Anyway, it's going to get hard soon so I better find me something to do in the way of moneymaking and breadwinning. I shudder to think that I'd have to leave my hormones even if for a little time.

Bill O'Reilly on gender rights

2004-06-26T19:23:00.000-04:00

Gwendolyn Ann Smith: Interviews

The MAD magazine deconstruction spoof of The O'Reilly factor is pure gold. I haven't watched "the factor" much but the way Gwen Smith is treated here is outrageous. Why provide a counterpoint panelist if you are not going to listen to anything sie says?

"You win this time, Wee Bull!"

2004-06-26T00:06:00.000-04:00

I'm going to sleep. I need to work tomorrow and, anyway, nothing panned out for the night. Boredom won. Bye.

Frustration

2004-06-25T23:09:00.000-04:00

My god, Friday night and I'm again itching to go to a dance club or wherever. But I have not one friend here in Atlanta, so I'm condemned to stay home. Going on my own? I'm tired of that. I want to be able to relax with a friend, talk nonsense, whatever...

TG Moments, Kusanagi

2004-06-25T09:52:00.000-04:00

Something stirred violently inside me when I watched the credits and intro for 'Ghost in the Shell'. In it we are shown the creation of the protagonist, Major Motoko Kusanagi as she goes through a machine which turns her from a robot into a woman, becoming truly beautiful at the end. Add the mesmerizing music and my barriers were melted. It was my own deep buried monolith responding to calls from outer space. I so wished to BE her! She didn't have to care about what others said, she could be a woman and be what she wanted. My kid brother was amused at my obsession with finding pictures of her.
In restrospective, I think it must have been kind of obvious for a watchful eye that everything was not ok with me growing up. I haven't told my kid brother about my transition yet, but I remember him being puzzled as to why I always (always) chose and identified with female characters in games, anime and elsewhere.
My explanation? In games it was that females were generally more versatile and dextrous than males, in anime I didn't give much explanation but I hinted that they were cute and nicer to look at. He was entranced with Pokemon for some time (he stil likes it at 18) and we would watch it together. Brock, Ash, James had no appeal to me, but my heart moved unknown when Misty, the Nurses or especially Jessie would come onscreen. I loved Jessie, she was super cute in that lipstick, skirt and boots, a beauty I thought I could never possess in my life. Shortchanged at birth. Bad luck. Better luck next time. And she was OUT, she was a silly villain, but she was her own self (which I loved).

Wonderful Electric

2004-06-25T09:38:00.000-04:00

Ok, I'm listening to Goldfrapp's 'Strict Machine' so you'll have to bear the related title.
Emotions! I love them! It looks so dumb on a page, but it's so beautiful to be able to feel again! Experiencing things or just thinking of certain situations gives me now an emotional thrill. I'm reconnecting with my writing, and a big part of it comes from being able to feel.
I used to think that the whole "Commander Data gets emotions" line in Star Trek TNG was a dumb thing at the time and a sign of the show's decline, but I can really understand now what sie* was going through. Call it a late-realization TG moment. He looked positively womanish and silly when he had his emotional flashes and I remember resenting him for that. Before I realized my true nature I thought that well, I had nothing to do with being a man, being a woman was not an option (I didn't know you could) and I had a deep seated phobia implanted, so I'll be a nothing. No emotions, no nothing. Emotions=harm, emotions=being made fun of, emotions=feelings of not belonging, emotions=desiring to be a woman. Die emotions. Enter the void of stone and hatred of everything. Meeting my love brought incredible light to my soul and for a time I could continue and not abhor my life. But then that same light showed me things that had been hidden for a very long time, dark things. I chipped the dam a bit to see what was behind and there was no end to the flow.
As a child I positively wanted to be a girl. One of my favorite bedtime fantasies was being kidnapped and subjected to a strange procedure which magically turned me into a woman. How I resented life when I lost my child features and started getting rough and man-like in adolescence. I hated my face, always, but then I got used to it. I still hated it by default but I tried to put my mind elsewhere. I'd look at the mirror, have a brief sting of hatred, and then proceed lightly disheartened to brush my teeth. The human heart is very, very adaptable, and after repeated times of encountering a supposedly unsolvable situation where there is harm involved you just bury that part and keep going. I thought about suicide many times, but something kept me going that there would be a day when everything would be all right and I would see the cure for my internal bleeding.

*Neutral pronoun. Data was a male though, even had sex with Tasha Yar, and that was stupid. Why didn't they make him an androgyne or sexless? I can imagine Dr. Noonian Soong working on data's penis, yeah right.

TG Webcomic Review: Triquetra Cats by JessicaRaven Silverstone

2004-06-21T11:30:00.000-04:00

Read Triquetra Cats here

Imagine this: You're a 14 year old boy who's wanted to be a girl all your life; you are ostracized by your schoolmates because of this and, by the way, your last name is Jorgensen (Christine, anyone?). Pretty suggestive huh? And if it so happens that you were actually born a girl and were transmogrified in a pod to look like a boy? Whoa! And what if you could not only regain your "real girl" status via the same machine, but were also enlisted in fighting some evil group in a tight fitting suit complete with ears and a tail? Sign me up! Add to that a cool sentai sounding name and you're all set!
Unfortunately, for all its premise, Triquetra Cats never lifts above regular anime fare and its conventions. There's a group of heroes where everyone has their place (the intelligent one, the strong one, etc), they are all asociated to a certain element and most of its main characters are of high school age. There's also plenty (plenty) of fighting with moves like "Fetish Kick" and "Hentai Fist" (no kidding) and the comic relies too much on it to move forward, which makes for whole sequences where the central happening is a fight, and we get two-paneled page after two-paneled page of minute fight developments.
I don't judge a comic's look by its author's drawing proficiency for I believe in style and effect and not merely academia, but the whole first part looks like it needs a lot more work. Take a look at the Period 1 cover where a smiling Michael poses with the comic's emblem behind. The drawing doesn't look like it's been cleaned enough (check out the erased lines over the shoes) and the blue in Michael's school uniform spills outside the lines. Sometimes the comics even look like sketched cutouts glued over various cgi backgrounds. Instead of looking stylish, it looks cheap. And blurring... cgi blurring everywhere. Some of those panels gave me a headache.
It does improve though, and JessicaRaven's style consolidates some more in later stages to something I could actually like. There is a page (arguably the best yet) where a character's last transmission detailing the enemy's plans has a gritty scratched look which delivers more atmosphere than the comic in its entirety.
There's more panel control and experimentation in perspective, much cleaner lines and obvious improvement in Photoshop use. Also, the girls look more like girls instead of muscular crossdressers (which helps, since all the transgender stuff is dropped after the origins for chao-style cuties a tad too big being girly).
Story-wise, there are very few highlights. The plot moves predictably along and this is the place where the comic needs the most work; everything smells stale and the "been there-seen that" feeling is something you can never shake off. It starts on a techno based environment with speeders and futuristic suspended highways and powerful guns and the spirit could be Otomo's 'Akira', but later the anime rules start kicking in and a magic users story is introduced in a Final Fantasy-ish way. And yes, you guessed it, there's a conflux of evil raising an army for the utter destruction of mankind.
Things start to look better after the third "origins" story, but marginally so. JessicaRaven seems eager to leave the first part and move on to the cool catsuit wearing and as such the three origins stories look very similar, boring and stuffed with fighting.
The tone is also way too serious for such little actual content. She should either inject more humor and have a lighter side resembling, say, the Totally Cool Spies or continue to be dead-serious but with a real story adding some ingredient of a Miller 'Batman' or said 'Akira'.
As for the transgender ingredient, it's mostly there in name only (being more like 'masked biological sex' than transgender). There is no treatment of issues but the facing of school bullies (which is not TG exclusive). We see a lot of the Triquetra gals after transformation being as girlish as they possibly could be (somehow they've forgotten their past, it seems) and enjoying themselves as they discover their place in the world. Transgenders are also cast as special magic people. All this is very nice and though seen it could stand on its own (think Escaflowne, stuff mostly seen but so excellently done it breaks new ground), alas it is so bluntly delivered in a matter-of-fact way the magic is all but lost.

Aside: Apparently from 2643 on they diagnose GID (Gender Identity Disorder) as an inherited trait. Next time I see my parents (not), I'll know which questions to ask ;)

Webcomic reviews

2004-06-18T12:13:00.000-04:00

If you were one of the few, the proud, who actually read the now deleted post announcing the "Vivian Reads" blog, disregard it. Webcomic reviews and everything will still be posted here.

Lazyyy

2004-06-17T11:34:00.000-04:00

This blog is a mess, but I promise to set everything straight once I come back from vacation. Boy it's hot in Florida! Good thing I brought my skirts! Anyway, faithful audience of this mess (?), I promise a lot of new posts are coming. And reviews, by golly, a bunch of webcomic reviews. I want to be done with my TG webcomic review project and start reviewing others.
Speaking of, my two reviews got published at the Webcomic Forums (www.webcomicforums.com)! So far they're the only ones posted but I'm sure more will come as the site grows.
More good news. A girl from a list I belong to has pointed me to a tg-friendly doctor in Atlanta! I don't need to cringe anymore when I think about that. At least I hope so.

Visit to the doctor

2004-06-11T18:59:00.000-04:00

Sorry about the fact that the last post dates from almost a week ago. I've been working on more than one and actually didn't post any. Dumb me. I'll get them out today.
Guess it's all come together: the posts, the fact that I need to pack (I'm going on vacation, yay!) MORE things (I understand now why girls in movies and animation always take a lot of stuff when travelling), my allergies and yes, you guessedit: a small depression.
I went to the doctor today for some digestive problems that I have. Boy, was I nervous. It was my first time in years in a medical office, totally en femme and I hadn't eaten anything for five or six hours. Besides, I didn't want to tell him that I'm driving my own HRT (he'll want me to go to a psychologist, stop HRT or label me as a transsexual in my insurance which gives me the privilege of humongous premiums) so I was pretty nervous. All right, I was almost clawing the walls. And since my progress shows everywhere with my face softened, my breast growth and body shape change, they kept asking me if I was taking any medicines. Oh... I'm very "private" you may say (schizo bitch) and I get terribly nervous about people even when they DON'T ask me if I'm a crossdresser or about my sexual activities (which he did). Lord, if I had been made of stone I would've shaken into destruction! I just want to know what's wrong with my lousy digestive tract! Do I have to disclose every intimate detail of my life?

I'm going on vacation tomorrow which will allow me to purge my emotional system of a lot of ups and downs I've been having lately. I came out completely to my love's sister (I could barely speak) and she was completely supportive. She's even teaching our little niece to call me "aunt"! I'm so excited cause she's such a cutie! :D I never wanted to be a father really, I always saw it as a lump I had to carry because it was expected of me. A mommy I'd have loved to have been (LOVED to), but not a daddy.
Anyway, I've also gone through a series of shook-ups with my sweetie about us and my transition. Staying together

Rain

2004-06-08T23:06:00.000-04:00

This is for you transgender guys and girls out there: can you recall some fond "transgender moments"? And what's a "transgender moment"? When before becoming aware of your transgenderism or accepting it you felt a little tug inside seeing something on tv or reading a book.
I have plenty. One o the most heartwarming when I remember: I used to watch the anime "Hello Sandybell!" where this cute little girl with pigtails lived wonderful adventures and basically was awfully nice to everyone she met. My stepfather got real angry that I was watching girls' cartoons I must have been about 9 or 10 years old.
But more recent than that was the first time I saw Madonna's video for "Rain" (Erotica, 1992). I was about 14 and already struggling through adolescence. "You're a big boy now", I just couldn't get away without performing my male role more actively now. Slowly but surely my world was beginning to crack all around me and the future begun to narrow. The beginning of my Dark Ages, for sure.
Then I saw "Rain" at a friend's house and I was transfixed. I couldn't help bringing it up all the time that afternoon. Even today when I watch it I get the same feeling of wonder. There was Madonna, blue eyed, short haired and looking gorgeous.
She was what I wanted to grow up to be. That almost extraterrestrial lolicon goddess inhabiting a world of blue hues and a video shoot that went on forever.

"This is the voice I want to use", said Vivian to the clerk

2004-06-05T10:35:00.000-04:00

My mouse started doing all sorts of funny stuff and a quick check determined it was more the computer connector than the mouse itself. So I needed a USB mouse.
Off goes merry Vivian to the store! After I found one that would suit my needs and my budget (or maybe it's the other way around), I headed to the counter not really looking at anyone around me. The giggles and the whispering have subsided a lot these days, now replaced by palpable doubt; and I found myself thinking about something my sweetheart had told me more than once: that even though I didn't completely pass as female on close inspection, I didn't look like a man at all. That's so neat! I have left maleness enough to not stick out like a sore thumb everywhere I go. I wasn't very much dressed even: jeans, spaghetti tank, sandals, purse, nothing fancy.
Then it came the time to pay and my voice, even though it came out naturally, it was kind of muffled and strained. This gave me the jeebies and I got a little clumsy with the credit card reader. The clerk guy was really nice though, smiling all the time and not making me feel like a clumsy dummy ("You were banished because you were clumsy?"*).
It's something one builds on through time and experience, but sometimes I feel as if I couldn't speak at all. Silly me. Ok, my allergies are working me up too, but I think I need to work more in my fem voice. It's still too atonal and low and not too interesting, really. But it's becoming more and more me, though, more my own female voice and not something stilted and foreign like at first.

*the phantom menace

Blue Tigresses - A few thoughts

2004-06-05T01:18:00.000-04:00

I do know I take four a day and that they look pretty puny, but I'm still amazed at their ferocity. Thanks to those innocent round blue pills my whole sense of self has changed in very pleasant ways. Beyond the extensive fat displacement (extensive displacement, not extensive fat >P) and skin and facial feature softening, the sense of femininity which fills my every moment is wonderful. Such a relief from the male burden cannot be described simply, a sense of calm and collection coupled with a lively feminine spark. And it feels better the more I peel the old crusts of old male traits away. I'm not naive enough though to think that it's only the blue pills operating such a change in me. As far as the physical goes, yes, but I think a lot of the added peace that's poured into my soul comes from the fact that I'm not battling myself anymore over being something I am not.
I also feel I'm regaining my emotional breadth of old. When I was a child I used to be very loving and way more sensitive to everything around me. Then adolescence came, deep voice, big lump of muscle and hair in all the wrong places. Welcome to manhood (yuck).
My sensitivities deadened and my emotions became estranged, muffled partners as I tried and tried to conform to something I was not. The "Shut up and be a man" phase, where the only way to conform is to pour lye and salt on your soul, kill everything in sight. A walking stone is better than a walking contradiction, and you'll die anyway, and it'll all be over then, wait for your next incarnation (hopefully as a woman this time).
What a stupid, painful thing to do, yet we slough through it always lacking, never happy. I could never do a good job as a guy anyway, more often than not a gesture or something would give me away and immediately everyone would put me in cold storage. My heart was really not in it.
The sublinguals are mostly gone now, but the blue tigresses are off to do their thing. Coursing the paths of my veins, they turn desert into jungle and savannah as they run into the horizon.

Vignette:
Once or twice when I was 12 or so my stepfather jokingly asked a couple of friends and I if we needed to borrow some chest hair for our open shirts, and while I laughed with everyone, I thought chest hair was gross and not a desirable thing at all. I always wondered why I aversed being a guy so much, now I know ;)

My little project

2004-06-04T22:03:00.000-04:00

Wow, if I had a hit counter it'd already have like 4 digits! All zeros. Oh well, I'm pretty new anyway and I haven't really done any url advertising, so it figures.
I'm now in the process of reading and reviewing all transgendered webcomics I can find. I want to review each of them and then move on to regular webcomics.
Right now I have in queue Big Girls Don't Cry (ended), Venus Envy and Sparkling Generation Valkyrie Yuuki. I need to read Lean On Me too, but I haven't had the time and since I've already read the ones I've mentioned, I'll do them first :P

Know of a tg webcomic you'd like to see reviewed? Post the address here and have it added to the review queue!

TG Webcomic Review: From Then On Forth by Elizabeth Troub

2004-06-04T08:47:00.000-04:00

From Then On Forth

Mass e-mailing your friends and relatives a missive stating you're a transsexual doesn't seem like the safest way to get the best of them. More like a shot to the head than slicing your veins, (if you'll excuse the morbid comparison) it certainly is the quickest most effective way to get it out and its real value lies in forcing oneself to face the music and work from there. This is the way Seth/Rachel from "From Then on Forth" chooses to come out, and I understand the whole comic is more of a slight reworking of the life experiences of its author than a work of complete fiction. And while all TG comics have some measure of that, Elizabeth even relates some of the panels to actual things in her life in her forum. Whoa Liz, what guts, what craziness! That's not just coming out, that's shooting yourself through the door!
The most interesting issue raised by this comic and which makes it special among TG comics is that there is an interesting Seth/Rachel conflict. Unlike other TG comics where years of education and conditioning by society seem to have had no effect and the character is simply in the wrong place, Rachel/Seth is clearly lost in genderland with a single guiding star (the desire to become her own self) and a great big dark around. And it's not that Rachel wants to remain Seth or that cares much about being a boy, but education and the way one is brought up if you've placed trust in others to tell you what to do are hard to overcome. The "he" inside still fights and will not be put down easily while the "she" is still weak and is very much afraid. Throughout the comic this conflict will play out and Rachel will become more and more herself with the Seth self-doubt embodied by a haunting black figure in her dreams ("Shadoe", kind of a not too inspired name really).
Artistically, the comic has gone from its austere first panels to much more detailed hair, clothes, shadows and backgrounds. One can tell she's been practicing. Seth now even sports a noticeable Adam's apple which is a clever addition since it's a common appearance problem faced by Male to Female transsexuals. We also get every once in a while colored panels which look fine and have improved lots too. Much as I did find the encounter and swordfight with Shadoe sequence a little wordy and drawn, I liked the neon coloring and soft blending. I also got the feeling that if the sun came up over that land, it would resemble the endless empty wastes of DragonBall Z encounters. Buu!
Alas, I have a couple of gripes with "From Then On Forth". Some concepts need reworking, the crafting of new symbols; take for example the black shadow man that haunts Rachel's dreams: it's actually not the same Venom-like being that we saw in Venus Envy: Shadows of Juliet and earlier, but it's too close for comfort and serves the same purpose. Also, It'd help to see some fleshing out of Rachel's feelings, and for things to be presented in more symbolic terms and not only just plainly said: of course we know Shadoe embodies Elizabeth's fears, we don't need to be told that. The comic needs to become more "inspired" by Elizabeth's issues in life than a simple retelling, that will certainly give it the wings it needs to take off on its own.
Lately the comic has been down due to the author's computer going dead. Too bad. It'd be a pity if she dropped it now that she seems to have found a stronger narrative voice and a better grip on panel mechanics. A good example is the whole email aftermath sequence which is the most focused in the comic and includes the "face your parents" part (mom and dad don't live together for a change) which is well scripted if a little plain in its retelling of the well known transgender story.
On a final note, the title is very apt and sounds good. The sonic balance being almost perfect, "fr-mn-fr" with a "th" thrown in to let off the steam. The implied meaning applies well to transgender issues too. As a transgendered person, you begin to live your life for real the moment you make the decision to go forward with being yourself, and though it'll be hard, and your past will always hang around and make faces a couple of times a week, the best portion of life is still ahead. From then on forth, you who were dead shall live.

TG Webcomics you must read: Second Stage by Shawna Strobel

2004-06-03T18:21:00.000-04:00

Second Stage - Friday, June 4, 2004

First of all, congratulations on your graduation, Shawna! You show 'em girl!

Second Stage is a very sweet and at the same time powerful comic of what are presumably Shawna Strobel's own experiences as a transgendered girl in college. Indeed, her Keenspace bio says simply "read the comic". She is the main character and around whom the rest of the strip's world revolves. It is a vague, hazy world too, drawn in isolated pencil strokes which wander around the unforgiving white of the page.
This minimalist, black and white, doodle-like anime style adds more than it subtracts in its effective portrayal of loneliness and separation. Shawna is rarely ever actually happy and one of the things you notice from the first strips are her sad, droopy eyebrows which tell you everything you need to know about her past life and the world she lives in. This is one of her most prominent features and she manages to convey great emotion in the way the eyes are drawn.
One of the things that make this comic very different from other TG comics (maybe excepting Matt Nishii's Transe-Generation) and what appealed to me especially is the fact that Shawna has to contend with people who knew her as Shawn and with those that fall on her mercilessly when she doesn't pass (meaning she is seen as a guy in girls' clothes and not as the woman she feels she is, ye unwashed), which is most of the time. In strips such as Venus Envy, the pope of transgendered online comics, all TG characters pass flawlessly and their only concern regarding the matter is keeping their discordant body parts well hidden. "Second Stage" manages to keep it real (passing is an important issue for all of us TSs, whether we place any value on it or not, and something we all have to face) and still infuse itself with the magic and endless possibilities of a fictional world. Shawna oozes cuteness and friendliness, what makes it harder to understand why others are so mean to her and will not see her for what she is.
It's a strange feeling you get when a line like "I fear... I fear I will find no one to love" is presented in such a way as to make it credible and corn-free but Shawna manages it. It's like we're reading words off her diary and we can see the tear stains on the page at the same time that character Shawna touches us with tender expression. A very nice harmony of feeling between the "real" Shawna and "character" Shawna which the comic always manages very well. Or her treatment of the classic "face your parents" sequence where a painful vignette reinforces the feeling of basic transgender loneliness and is completed with a wonderful two page working of U2's "One".
It is not easy being who we really are if we don't happen to like the options we're given and every transgender knows this at heart. It's not just coincidence that the community sports a lot of high-iq or otherwise insightful people: questioning the received shape of the world sets gears in motion which most people never exercise, and that shows.
All in all, a beautiful webcomic which should it continue it will change a lot in the future I'm sure as Shawna's style evolves, but won't lose its sweet heart. Keep it up, girl.

PS: If only now she would add some email address for comments or a guestbook, that would make it even better!

Podium

2004-06-02T19:28:00.000-04:00

Hello everyone (o hypothetical ones!) and welcome to my stage. My name is Vivian and I am a transgendered MtF woman. I live around the the city of Atlanta, Georgia (that's in the USA, mind you) and have been here for around three years.
I have been "coming out" to myself and others about my TGness for two of those years now and I feel like I should be getting used to be treated as The Utmost Freaker and Object of Sheer Disgust by people around me, but I haven't. Recently I just had to quit a martial arts class I had been taking for a while because of it. Some people just can't hold their arsenic, right? No, they have to shoot you with their looks and burn you with their gestures. And you can just feel them basking in their light of societal acceptance, as if you're not only wrong but stupid for ditching macho ways for your own.
Anyway, welcome to my blog. It won't be always like this (I think). Or maybe yes. The whole purpose of this is to share what I think and feel with whoever wants to listen, and find others like me in the process.
Like I was saying, I've been coming out for a couple of years now. You must be wondering what all this "coming out to myself" talk means; because, come on, don't you just "come out" to others? Whether you're a Queer Language major or have barely brushed with the world of alternate gender expression/sexuality you know what "coming out" means. But it is mostly an internal process. We don't come out for others, we do it for ourselves, to set in motion the gears of the real us. To find our face among the bushes. Myself, I've been coming out slowly but surely in these two years, accepting and understanding what I am and where I'm headed.
The first thing that set me in motion was finding out that there were crossdressers and guys who felt like girls (or simply more feminine) in the world. You see, I come from a very repressed childhood and terrible adolescence and had always felt like I was caged in a place from where I could never move, a being of ether forced into bruteness and mud. It took that single piece of knowledge for my feelings to breach the wall, and then all hell broke loose in my life... literally. I left the place where I'd been born and raised, I left the people from whom I'd been born and who'd raised me, and cast my eyes towards the wide horizon. It's funny, actually, but what cast me away from house and lord was not my TGness, but all the thoughts its awareness raised.
It all came into perspective for the first time in my life, a puzzle that suddenly pieces itself together, a large canvas which I am still discovering and which doesn't cease to amaze me. It was sad too of course, very, very sad, but I'm encouraged now to live the real me for the rest of my life. I'm 25, so that should be a long time!
Welcome, then, to my blog again. That's thrice I've welcomed you, for three is not only the most magic of numbers, but also my birthday! If you will, go explore the rest of the world now, but stay tuned for the next post... :D