intro post

[strobe_hearted]

Hi, my name is Laura, but I prefer to be called Lou. I have no gender pronoun preferences. I'm 28 and married, and am exploring my gender uncomfortability and gender identity questions in counseling currently. I am fairly active (in the activist way) in general and in trans groups in my community. Which leads me to the following

Comments

[nixicat]

I was 28 when I started transition, also married. I am 29, still married, though somewhat less comfortably so, for reasons with very little to do with my transition. I have been on testosterone for 5 months, top surgery scheduled for May 1

thank you

[strobe_hearted]

thank you for the welcome, and thank you for sharing your experience about moving from a genderless ideal toward your transition. i think the reason I cling to a genderless ideal has to do with my work for social justice -- I know gender does currently matter, but I would like to live in a world where it mattered less, I suppose. But yeah, I definitely respect and beleive in people who choose transition.
Privelege... I appreciate the "lecture" as you put it, I find it interesting to hear different perspectives on privilege. But I don't feel guilty for privilege. That may be your experience with other people who have made similar statments. What I feel is more subtle than guilt, and still more intense. I feel like there's someone screaming inside me: I AM NOT WHO YOU THINK I AM. basically. does that make *any* sense?

Re: thank you

[nixicat]

Ah! Definitely, I understand that.

That is a major impulse behind transition for me. All that respect I say that I have for those people who don't transition physically, but continue to claim an alternative identity? It is rooted in my understanding that I have run right out of whatever faculty it is that lets them do that. The I'm-not-what-you-think-you-see factor has just gotten too intense for me, I guess. I thought about it, as I left the house today... This is all a lot of trouble, isn't it. Maybe I could suck it up and deal with being a man with a female body. Maybe I could put that $7k to something more worthwhile than having some healthy tissue taken off my chest.

But no. I just can't. It strikes me as selfish and vain, and yet... I want outside to match inside, at least as much as can be, just once.

If I had never known it was possible, I suppose I would have been content. But knowing that the option is there, to be visibly me, creates a longing so profound that resisting it feels like self-betrayal.

oh, yes.

[strobe_hearted]

I don't think it's selfish and vain at all, and I don't think you should think of it as having "ran out" of anything(although I appreciate that feeling, too.) -- but I find it really beautiful the way you describe your desire to "match" yourself.
I definitely understand the self-betrayal thing; I feel that way nearly every time I wear a dress or skirt to work or put on lipgloss (usually because I've put on makeup to cover up a zit & then my lips look weird) ETC!!
on a nother note, fellow native, what is your tribe? I'm lakota/cherokee

[ftmichael]

Welcome aboard, mate.

Your name - yes, your real name - is Lou. The end. The only time your birth name is relevant is if it's also your legal name, and the only time your legal name is relevant is if you're filling out legal paperwork. We have no legal paperwork here, so we have no need to know your legal name. (If you're comfortable sharing your old name and want to, more power to you, but never, never feel as though you're supposed to or expected to. Don't qualify yourself.)

Other communities for you to check out: http://community.livejournal.com/ftm/3333868.html (including nc_ftmLinks for you

thank you!

[strobe_hearted]

thanks for the welcome!
people around me call me both names, and i'm comfortable with that (for now) but i am trying to slowly get more people to embrace "Lou" because it is less gender-specific and makes me feel fuzzy, partly because it is the nickname my family and husband call me. thank you for encouraging me to be all-Lou.
and thank you so much for the links & reading. I will definitely start going through it.

[jinxremoving]

hi! i am too hungover to formulate anything of much use, and i'm a bit of a lurker to be honest, but here is one more link: queerdammit. it sounds like something else you might appreciate. welcome!

[strobe_hearted]

omg that community looks so great! Thank you thank you!