The Learning Curve

Perhaps some of the things I write about here (on the seemingly very rare occasions that I add to this blog nowadays) seem pretty unremarkable to most people.

I write of my own observations on life as it (life) seems to apply to me, in the hope that maybe someday this may be found by someone to whom the same life appears to apply, and that then, that someone might not feel so lonesome as I often get to feel.

 life is often harsh and very isolating, for a multitude of reasons that are never even imagined let-alone considered or prepared for ahead of time.

I often find myself feeling a long way behind the curve and floundering without anyone or anything to grasp onto for support.

Of late it is adjusting to and learning to control my own sexuality I’ve been musing over (constantly it seems).

Being born transsexual, a mental female without the genitalia and reproductive organs to function  as your mind/instincts demand, see’s the development and maturation of your sexuality stunted. 

For most (Non-transsexual) people growing into their sexuality is a process that starts early in life and continues over decades.

For me, my instincts and desires, if I’d let people see them, would have probably made people think I was gay (most probably thought I was anyway, I don’t know).

I didn’t let people see them. 

I don’t recall knowing anyone who was (openly) gay when I was growing up, but I do remember that anything I ever heard about homosexuality had a distinct “negative” connotation associated with it.

Having said that, (for those of you who will point to the above and say/suggest it’s internalised homophobia that caused my transsexualism) being a “girl” had a mostly negative connotations as well…..

As for transsexuals, what where they?

I had SRS in my twenties, and at that point I’d never had sex or a relationship with anyone of either sex.

The girls I wanted to be friends with at school, (which would probably have helped me understand myself better), all avoided me so they didn’t get teased by others, I guess it was apparent to all the other kids that I wasn’t “normal”.

There where one or two that didn’t shun me completely.

 One was a year older and a grade higher, (I guess) she kept me around because I listened to her talk about the problems in her home life and I tried to be sympathetic (also she lived on a neighbouring farm to me so we caught the school bus together for a couple of hours most days). 

She was the second youngest of four sisters and I suspect now (although I, regrettably, didn’t fully realise at the time, because I was too busy wrestling with my own sexuality issues to recognise things other girls where going through) that their father was probably abusing them. Looking back now, I deeply regret that I couldn’t be the friend I think she probably needed, I wish I could have given her a hug, but she probable wouldn’t have received it the way it was intended.

The second, although she was  dating boys when we where at school and she was quite “popular” and very pretty, appears (from Facebook) to be a lesbian, so I guess she was wrestling with her own internal demons back then as well. 

Again, I don’t think a hug would have been received as it was intended back then but I wish me “now” could have given her a hug. (having said that, it appears that at least you can hide your homosexuality in some cases, if that’s who or what you are, and “fit in” at school which might have alleviated SOME of the pressure back then, I don’t know, I hope things weren’t as hard for her as they were for me).

I don’t have contact with either of these girls now, I’d like to think they’d look at me now and finally understand me like I try to understand them, but I suspect they probably wouldn’t, there’d likely be the usual string of “you look great!”’s and and “I’m happy for you” etc etc but no, I don’t think they’d put 2+2 together, and I suspect the second girl might even be pretty hostile towards me given how transgenders are  encroaching increasingly on lesbian lives these days.

And so, my school days where pretty lonely, spent mostly sitting in corridors and stairwells or the library at lunch times reading books on my own where no-one would notice me to try and make my life harder.

After My SRS, when I finally started looking for attention, it turns out that most guys who met me (regardless of their home situation, some had wives and children) seemed quite interested in having sex with me (things probably wouldn't have been that way admittedly, if they'd know my birth situation), and this is the start of what has been such an adjustment and really, what this post was supposed to be about.

by the time they’re in their twenties (as I now was) most girls are well and truly used to the idea that boys desire them and want to have sex with them, they adjust to it together, as it all starts to happen at similar times for most of them, I expect many probably talk to each other about it and work out together how things apply to them individually (I guess as the two above were in some ways trying to do with me, in smaller ways than I was, they where different to other girls too, and so they thought/sensed I might have some understanding). 

By the time they’re in their twenties (especially if the have good strong adult female role models or mentors, their mom perhaps) hopefully they’ve learned a little about men, and sex and how to be “selective”.

To start learning that from the very beginning in your twenties, with no-one around to bounce Ideas off of…. there’s great potential to get treated VERY poorly, and to embarrass yourself in a multitude of ways.

I could have done that, been treated poorly, embarrassed myself. Thankfully I had learned a small amount of maturity from having to survive my life in the year or two leading up to my SRS (and after having told my parents and been pretty well shunned by my family), and I was also fortunate in that my partner came into my life pretty early on after SRS.

One thing though, that I find remarkable now is, although I love J with everything I have, and although I feel he is absolutely beautiful, I’m able to look around now at other men and imagine.

It’s a double edged sword, you have a man that loves you and you love him, you feel overjoyed because you never thought growing up that that would be remotely possible for you. You learn to despise yourself and you’re taught that no-one will ever love you but then someone does, and now it seems that others might too.

And there’s so much out there to touch and taste and feel and experience, and your teen years when you should have been able to, they’re gone. People expect that exploration from a teen (these days) not from a woman in her twenties (you).

It’s an interesting position to experience and get your head around, and learn to control and overcome.