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Posted by wendy larsen
June 26, 2005
Filed in Society Girl's Personal Blogs
902 views
I have spent a lot of time around 12-Step Programs as a nurse in Chemical Dependency programs. This week, two lessons I learned there came back to me. LESSON ONE: THE SERENITY PRAYER God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change; courage to change the things I can; and wisdom to know the difference. Like my engine blowing up....what was the point of losing control over it? Better to focus on what I could change. More productive. Less damage to me. Many of us will never pass, most of us will not always pass. Learning to be as convincing as we can (what we can change) and accepting that (what we can't change) and being happy with what we have is a way to not deny us what we have been given. Seeing being TG as a gift, and not a curse, is the key. Viva la difference. Being angry over it denies ourselves what joy we can have in life, as does meeting the needs of others by not being who we are. Ultimately it damages us and them, even if they, and we, do not realize it at the time. They have to deal with reality, as do we. They need the Serenity Prayer as well. Today I talked with a good friend about going public as an advocate for transgendered folk. I hate losing privacy. It would be a big sacrifice. How much good could I do? Is it worth the price? To me, no. What about others? I asked to be shown what my purpose was in life. I have been shown a spiritual path. I have been shown who I am and that I am transgendered and it has brought peace and happiness to my life that I have never known. I have been shown a professional path and a goal of becoming a gender therapist. From somewhere I have learned to express myself, in writing, in a way that some say has value. I have so little to lose compared to others who are TG. My life was over and it was given back to me. Why? It was not to hide away, I think. A degree and becoming a Psychiatric Nurse Practitioner would give me creds. It this all part of the same path? Is this all part of what my life has been about? I see so many threads in my life heading this way, coming together. It makes sense. More than that, it feels right. I don't want to go there. I feel like crying when I think about it. But I ASKED for direction. I ASKED for purpose. Is it time to go foward based on faith instead of logic? This is a lot more scary than just being open about being TG. I'm tired and this is a lot to cope with. Yet faith has brought me here, and here is not bad. I have been given much. Can I help to change the lives of others and do I have the courage if I can? I'm scared, but courage is not about not being scared...it is about being scared and doing it anyway. Ok, ok, I know what those of you who are familiar with 12 step programs are saying. One day at a time. I have a lot to think about. Do I flinch from my chance to be what I have always wanted to be because the task is not what I expected. If I can't face this, will I be ready to follow the Spirit Trail and cross the log over the river into the spirit world when I die? Isn't that what I am here to learn? For the second time in my life I have no way to find an answer except to pray for it. The last time I found Wendy and peace. It's a good bet, even logically................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................. LESSON TWO: When we counsel addicts on how to stay clean, we encourage them to avoid places and people associated with their substance abuse. A study was done that showed that even handling the tools of abuse set off the old responses. We know that the brain builds "superhighways" that it prefers to drive down to following new, smaller pathways. We crave familiarity, We will choose familiarity even if it hurts. Familiar is "safe" and in many situations this can be a lifesaver and an energy saver, different is "dangerous" and "scary" even if better for us in every other way. This week I had an old contact. One from when I felt bad about myself, depressed, suicidal, hopeless....they triggered the old responses...I had a bad couple days, the worst since finding TW and Wendy. Last time it took me years to get beyond this bad place. This time it took a few days. I have built a bypass around the "city" I used to live in. The drive is more pleasant and I got off the old highway and onto the new bypass........................................................................The lesson here, of course, was that being close to my former bad habits triggered a "craving" for the old, familiar ways. This is why doubt of our TG nature overwhelms us at times. This is why we can vaccilate back and forth between our femme and homme sides and wonder why. We live in a dual-world that puts incredible stress on us. Many of us have problems remembering our name at times. Email disasters are common mistakes caused by this duality we deal with. It is only human to have our minds fight for a familiar environment that does not change when the phone rings, there is a knock at the door, or we get up on Monday and try to remember what we should wear today. .......................What I am trying to say here is that we are responding normally when we have doubts in our gender/sexuality identifications. Not only are we NOT in a box, but on a spectrum in these aspects of our Self, we also have to face the psychostressors caused by our often dual-role life and exposure to long-term familiar inputs that cause pressures on us to use the onramp to the old superhighway....the way we can start to commute to work on a Saturday when we are driving absentmindedly down the same road we drive Monday to Friday. It is disturbing, but it can be less so when we accept that it is our "normality" and not our "difference" that causes us to experience gender/sexuality pressures....................................................................................................................................................................................................................Learn to Live Ouside The Box!..............and stop beating yourself up for being human. A very special human.........remember, a varied gene pool is good for a species. You are good for humanity.
