I would think many TG’s would agree with me that “fear” is part of our lives. Sure, if we dig deep enough, we can find horror stories of transgendered individuals being treated awful or even killed. But that is not the fear I am referring to. Instead I am talking about the fear of the unknown and how in my opinion, some TG’s allow it consume their lives.

A recent GS article said “More than one person called to remind me to be careful. Especially being out in the countryside in the heart of Dixieland.” My psychologist once said to me “Marsha, of all places to be transgender, the buckle of the Bible Belt.” I want to know what does either of those have to do with anything? I live in Dixie, I live in the Bible Belt. So?

I am transsexual. Six years ago it began to consume my life to the point I sought a gender therapist. Five and a half years ago I started HRT. Four years ago this week I came to Trannyweb, now Gender Society. And two years ago next week I went fulltime. Oh, so I was saying “So?” Living in Dixie, living in the Bible Belt, didn’t and couldn’t change any of what I have been through. I had to live my life and so I did.

I titled this “Being a victim of fear” for a reason. Being transgender may not be a choice, but how we live our lives brings up many choices. Possibly the biggest choice you have is whether or not you will just live your life, or will you allow your fears of the unknown shape all your decisions?

In the beginning I feared losing my wife and family. Next I feared losing my business which I would need to take care of my family. I feared not passing and embarrassing my wife. As time went on, I found that those things were only baseless fears. So here I am living in Dixie, the Bible Belt, and in my opinion, I have successfully transitioned. I don’t live in fear of anything, my life is mine to direct.

I think some TG’s allow fear to consume them to the point they are victims. Instead of going on with life, they are waiting for something. Maybe it is laws to protect us or somehow make people accept us, maybe hoping a church will say we are ok, maybe a major medical discovery to explain why it is we are like we are. So? I do believe being TG is a choice. A choice between living your life the way you want, or being a victim and waiting for someone else to tell you how to live your life. The choice is yours.

Hugs,
Marsha

Marsha,
Well said!!!

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"and my needs entwined, like ribbons of light...and I came through the doorway, some where... in the night"

hiya marsha,

It's that old self confidence thing again, having someone in your life telling you, you look fab, your just being yourself,your not doing anything wrong.dont wear that wear this, is a luxury not many girls have the blessing of. I spent many years locked away, but also was lucky enough to meet someone who showed me the way to self confidence that i may enjoy my life as a woman to the full.
So i would say that its not fear that plauges our lives but embarrassment. Get rid of the shame enter the dame and enjoy!!!!
Be thinking of you up to my knees in christmass shopping, cant think of a better way of getting out of it either, do they do christmass in thiland guess not lol
love and hugs to you both x sabini xoxo

You raise some good points Sabini. Confidence is the biggest thing in our lives that allows us to succeed. I think having confidence allows you to put those fears behind you so you can live a fruitful life. Becoming a victim of your fears causes you to isolate yourself. That puts you into a situation where you don't have people around you to give you that confidence boost as you described. Sure my wife has been a major confidence booster in my life, but it doesn't stop there. I literally have hundreds of people in my life, with dozens that I see on a regular basis, expressing caring remarks from time to time.

As for Christmas in Thailand, my thoughts are Christmas is going to come about 16 days early for me this year. But from what I hear about the shops, shopping is way up there on my list of things to do in Thailand. And I won't have to worry about the stores being closed Christmas day, lol.

Hugs,
Marsha

I have been a victim of fear. But I don't like to call it that. To call myself a victim of fear would be to give too much power to fear. Because the thing about fear is that when you turn and face it, it disappears like a mirage. So I would say that I allowed fear to control me. Because that adds me myself as someone culpable in the delay of my coming out. I also think there are many levels of fear. There is an everyday kind of fear and then there are darker types of fear that wait for us to be weak enough so that they can feed on our weakness and personal pain.

I think that time is also the friend of fear. You start to look at the preponderance of time that you have let slip away and it becomes one more reason for you not to move forward. Don't get me wrong, anything can become a reason not to move forward, but time is a powerful one. It can allow us to say things like, "I'm 37!! I'll never pass!! It's too late!! I won't feminize completely!!" Those were actually MY words when I first started. By the same token, anything can also be used as motivation and a positive thing. If I was without fear and had the confidence I have now, I would have said "Well, I've wasted enough time. I need to get started!! How exciting this will be!!"

There are, of course, darker fears. I face some of these fears now. Some of them seem more real than others. Fears like "I'm going to be alone." Gawd, it makes me feel a shiver just thinking about that. I think it's a rather common fear for us. So I just try to be myself and hope that I am attractive to someone out there. But the confidence that continues to build in me tells me not to dwell on that. So I go out to a lesbian bar to meet new people and my next fear sets in. "I'm going to be attacked." I had banished about 95% of this fear when I was actually attacked outside of a Philadelphia nightclub. As I was being hit in the knee with a crowbar, the punk assaulting me continually referred to me as a "dyke." I had only been scared of being attacked for being trans. It didn't even enter my mind to be wary of being attacked for my sexual orientation. I'm bi, but I don't think he really would have made a distinction between the two.

I also frequently think about moving to a new city and going stealth. That opens up a whole new bag of worries about people being curious about me and uncovering damaging information about me. I'd be personally more embarrassed about them finding my police record, but I'm sure anyone that nosy would be much more interested with my transsexual medical history.

I think that we face fear on a regular basis as much or more than nearly every group you can think of. We need to have mental toughness. We need to know ourselves, our strengths and weaknesses and we need to embrace all of what intrinsically makes us who we are. If we are afraid of any part of who we are, THAT is the piece of ourselves that will hurt us.

When it comes down to it, we need to embrace ourselves with our whole hearts. When we accept ourselves, others will naturally be drawn to us. Inner peace is very attractive.

*hugs*

Zoey

Lucy and Zoey, you both get it. Fear exists out in the real world and you can either let it consume your thinking, or you can face those fears and move on. A transitioning TS might lose their family, friends, and job when they come out, but if they don't transition they often become torn over the life they are living versus what they feel they should be living. Along the same lines is going to the trouble of transitioning, but becoming a recluse and virtually isolating yourself from society. There will always be those who don't like us, chances are there were people we knew in our lives before transitioning that didn't like us. Is there any difference? Not really, but we tend to treat it as if it were.

I started this thread because of the tone of some recent articles I have read here and elsewhere. I just sensed too much emphasis on the what ifs and how people seemed consumed by them. It is as if they expect to be pounced on the moment they walk out the door. Another thing is it seems as if gals are trying to talk themselves out of whatever it is they want to do, transition, dress, whatever, by throwing up road blocks with excuses to justify why they don't do something. Those often come in the form of comments like "You had it easy because your family accepted it." or "You don't know how my parents are." Simply put, I had to tell my family at some point, I had the same fears of losing them as everyone else has. So I told them and in my case things worked out for the best. Then I moved on.

I'm glad gals like Doanna, Sabina, Lucy and Zoey commented on this thread. I hope gals in the early stages of discovering what is the best course for them read this and see that we all have fears, and if we face them rather than hide from them, our lives only get better.

Hugs,
Marsha

This is such a good thread and something that everyone deals with.

After all the struggles I had in getting to where I am today I realise that I am a much stronger and determined person. I now understand that I have the strength to do things and that fear is something that, although acknowledged, I no longer allow to control my life. It’s a really positive feeling and I feel so much better and sure of myself now. Life is no longer a long list of problems but instead a long list of opportunities.

I could never have imagined how well life was going to turn out so I can appreciate how unrealistic it all might seem. Hopefully, someone will find encouragement in my words and take their first steps to overcome their fears.

All my love
Penny
x

Absolutely Cris

I think Karen sums it up perfectly, It's easy to dismiss this "fear" as a lack of self confidence, but when you know how bad the alternative can be, then to stay hidden, I can assure you, is infinitely preferable to risking losing what you have.

Becca

Too true for sure. Karen, you have my good vibes, dear. You are one brave chica in my book.

Z

Instead of going on with life, they are waiting for something. Maybe it is laws to protect us or somehow make people accept us, maybe hoping a church will say we are ok, maybe a major medical discovery to explain why it is we are like we are…”

What I read into this, and in fact the whole gist of the opening post, is that it’s about what makes TG’s stay “in the closet”. Speaking from experience, I wasn’t waiting for laws to be changed or medical discoveries to be made, (and certainly not the approval of a church!) and I don’t think any of these are what's stopping people from coming out either.
Perhaps I feared what people might think of me, or that I would be ridiculed in the street, or that my parents might:
a) disown me [my dad]
b) be terribly upset [my mum]
I think it was fear of the unknown. Transitioning is in some ways a “leap of faith”, but if you know it’s right for you, you come to realise that you will be better off regardless. As it happens, my dad still refuses to see me (though that was forced upon him at a recent family funeral), but my mum was never terribly upset, just a little worried about all the things that I’d worried about that had prevented me for years from coming out sooner.
It was suggested to me (by my dad amongst others) that it would be better to move to a city where I wasn’t known, rather than stay in this small(ish) town where loads of people know me and gossip is a local pastime. Bad advice I believe; you are better off staying where you have an established network of friends rather than being all alone in a new place, no friends, no job, and embarking upon transition amidst all this.
So if you live in the Bible Belt, or a small town full of gossips and rednecks, you may well be better just staying put. People not knowing you will not help at all, and it certainly won’t help your acceptance from those that do know you.
For me, the fear was outweighed by the increasing impossibility of living as male. You muddle on for years, trying to be who everyone thinks you are, trying to do what you think you are supposed to do, never happy with the compromise. The fear of the unknown and the potential problems (all imagined) kept me muddling on, but the impossibility of it all tipped the balance, and I realised I just had to transition or live out my days in this semi-misery; making do, trying to be happy, never really content. Don’t get me wrong, I have never been a miserable person, but I was never truly content, never happy in my own skin.
Before I came out I was terrified of people discovering my secret. I dressed in private at home, if anyone came round I’d hide, thinking my chest was about to explode. I’d be shaking like a leaf long after they’d given up knocking on my doors and windows. The fear of people finding me out was the biggest fear of all.
So you actually tell people, and that’s one fear you no longer have. Before I told anyone, I’d started going out to TG friendly places, and that made me lose the fear of being ridiculed. There were one or two comments in the street in the early days, but they never bothered me at all, in some ways I was actually proud to be recognised as TG. I certainly didn’t feel like crawling into a hole.
The fear that Marsha speaks of, is I think the fear of the unknown. You hear so many saying, “I can’t come out… it’s impossible at the moment… I would never be accepted where I live…”
You can, it’s not impossible, it doesn’t matter where you live. These are not the reasons people don’t come out sooner; the reason lies within themselves.
Marsha says that the choice is yours, and I agree. I no longer have the fear. My catch phrase here used to be:
“It’s there if you want it”.
xx
ps I don’t think you will be able to evade Christmas, even in Thailand!

It is fear right now that is deciding just who I am.
I am afraid that my family & friends will hate me, dis-own me or just just tell me to go away.
I'm afraid I would lose my job, than lose my home without the money to pay the bills.
I am afraid of public reaction.
It sounds stupid to be afraid of losing a life I hate but it's the only life I have.
It wasn't easy to get this life after being on drugs for so long & living on the streets. I had no home, no job, & no future.
So yes the idea that I might lose what I have scares the sh#t out of me.