randomness

Finding time to blog has been challenging this last week. Not having the normal childcare sure makes one appreciative of the childcare that we usually have. Although I love my child, I am burnt out after just one week of being the full time stay home daddy as well as a whole new respect for single parents.  It is so much work! Thankfully this week I have a little help, so that I can at least collect my thoughts.

We are doing fertility treatments this week and it is really good because I hate shots and having to give myself multiple every day is good training to get used to needles and doing my own. Especially because I have my doctors appointment to start testosterone next week! I can hardly believe it is already here. It is happening so fast. I suppose though that I just came to terms with my transgender identity last summer, so really only about 6 months ago. There is a small part of me that is not getting scared but realizing the enormity of what I am about to do. I am not having second thoughts, but more like really thinking about and processing what this all means. Not that I didn't do that before now, because I did. However life has changed since then, how I feel about it has changed since then, my feelings especially about the military has changed. Before I was moving forward with transitioning because I felt like I had to move forward with it. I didn't have a choice, it was life or death. There was a small aspect of excitement to finally be making my insides and outsides match but that was really overshadowed by the feeling of "have to" and now that I am farther from that initial realization I can really start to get excited about it in a way I was unable to before.

A perfect example of something I am excited about is being able to be anywhere in this city and run into people from my past and know that they won't know who I am. Right now I run into people who I would really rather not and it is really challenging. They are still heavily involved in the church and religion I used to be, and when I choose to leave what I truly believe to be a cult (so do many others believe the same thing) it was extremely devastating to my life. I lost a lot, at that time what felt like everything. There are a lot of people with whom I still have unresolved baggage. Over time it is getting easier to run into them, but it is still hard. Sometime they don't recognize me but I can't wait for it to be that I can go anywhere and now worry who I will run into and what condemning thing they might feel they want to say (or not say but I can see on their face because I was part of it for so long).

Okay so that is just something I am excited about that involves personal, emotional baggage. I am also getting really excited about the physical changes which are coming such as facial hair, voice dropping etc. More than anything though I am getting REALLY excited about being able to pass. Which one of these days has to happen.

I had so fabulous insight into that problem this holiday weekend. That it really is how I interact with my baby. Dad's interact with their kids, but not the way I do. I interact with her the way a mom does. A lot of that is how I was raised around kids in a daycare setting so I am naturally prone to love children and interact with them on a kid level. However men don't do that, at least not the way I do. There might be other things that give me away but that seems to be why when I am out with my daughter I am ALWAYS addressed as mom. It drives me insane. Another thing that came to my attention last week was how before I was trying to pass I was just being myself, comfortable in my skin or at least to some degree. So I was often mistaken for a guy. However now I am very insecure, uncomfortable in my body and who I am today. I worry about passing. I worry about having a male name and people knowing I am a woman etc. So I am pretty much obsessed with passing or not passing and so it never happens. I am trying too hard. Of course that is helpful, but I don't know what to do about it. Maybe being on "T" will help that, help ease some of that anxiety that I feel. I sure hope it does because something has to change.

So I am struggling with my family. They have been fabulous about accepting things, and trying hard to call me Jackson. The male pronouns seem to be very challenging for them but even that is starting to come around. What I am having a difficult time with is when I call my sister for example, and get her voicemail. I am uncomfortable saying "hey this is Jackson" or "hey this is your brother" for some reason. So I just say "hey it is me" and she knows who it is but still I don't know how to get over that weird feeling of it not feeling right. Yet I don't feel like I can say "hey this is your sister" because that doesn't feel right. I feel that way with my parents too....when I call up and they answer I feel weird saying "hey it is Jackson". I don't really know how to get over it. Maybe there is no better way than to start doing it. I don't really know how, but it seems like so many of these things take so much mental energy to do them.

I never realized how much work is required to transition, both mentally and emotionally. Although I know it won't magically happen when I have surgery or start "T" part of me wants it to. At the very least I feel like it will make it easier. Because as long as I don't pass I feel like I am just playing a part that I am not good at playing. Another thing I am realizing, I need to hang out more with the guys I know. I think that might really help a lot. I do pass more when I am with them, but if I am with my girl friends or partner I never do.

Grieving sucks, big time. I am finding that with the repeal of DADT and my starting "T" so soon that I really do still have a lot of grieving to do around the issue of my military service and how I left without closure because my circumstances would not really allow closure. Some days I feel like I want to run as far away from it as I can, and other days I have bittersweet memories I don't really mind thinking about. It depends upon the day. As the day I start hormones gets closer though the more the reality that I am really done with the military hits me. The more the reality that once I start hormones there will never be a going back is a very sad and hard one that I am realizing I have yet to deal with. How do I deal with it though is the question? I am not sure, so I just continue to not deal with it.

I guess I don't really have much profound to say, just a lot of ramblings going on in my head. It is my first little bit of time alone that isn't late at night in a long time. I am sure I will collect my thoughts and have more to say soon.