First family get together

Okay, so not first first, but the first since I've taken the decision to stop trying to force myself into being a kind of feminine that I am not. It was a family meal out to celebrate my aunt and uncle's ruby wedding anniversary. The meal was in a nice seperate bit in their local pub. Boyfriend wasn't due to go with me since someone had to look after the dog.

*Pain detail warning*
I decided that since I have to wear smart trousers 5 days a week and since it was in a pub I decided to wear jeans but with a smartish jumper. I showed it to boyfriend the morning I left full of determination. I went and stayed overnight at my mum's before getting a lift with them to the other side of the country where my aunt and uncle live. We booked into our hotel and I showered and changed for the evening. Boyfriend had said that the outfit made me look more male but it wasn't until I looked into the full length mirror that it really hit me. I got nervous. Texted girlfriend. Worried some more. Wondered what I was letting myself in for. My sister is so judgemental and always comments on what I wear.

We got to the pub. I got a hug from my aunt. My cousin's husband and I chatted lots. My sister didn't make a single comment. It was a lovely meal and I didn't feel judged at all.

The next day there was a get together at their house. Again I hung out with some of the blokes in my family, some of the older generation, and with the younger generation. I got roundly ignored by my sister but for once it felt like it was because we had nothing in common rather than because she was judging me.

It was the first time for a very very very long time that I got through a family get together without feeling hurt and upset. I actually got to enjoy myself. Being myself made me feel less tense and more relaxed. I'm not out to my family, and I didn't want to out myself as anything but a tomboy this weekend (it was my aunt and uncle's weekend). I think it went fine. My sister did upset me a couple of days later, but on a completely different point. I'm generally under so much stress at the moment that I've actually been unwell from it. Monday I was going to drive home via my grandmother's but I woke up with a migraine. I was actually worried about being able to drive home safely (longest drive i'd had to do in my own car thus far). I rested and took painkillers. I waited for my head to clear enough to dash home. I wasn't going to stop and I was right to do so - by the time I was within 10 miles of home my brain was going again. If I'd tried to stop at my grandmother's I'd have run the risk of being dangerous for my drive home. I love my grandmother but I know she wouldn't want me to put myself at risk to visit her. My sister? Upon hearing that I didn't visit her reacted like I had gone round there and kicked her. Thanks to the current hormone levels and to my stress - that causes tears. My sister doesn't know me, doesn't know what I'm going through and so I am clinging to that fact to try and let go of her hurtful comments. Shame she had to go and spoil what has otherwise been a great week with regards to my family.

a strange kind of dysphoria

I have had gender dysphoria since I was a child. I'm not saying that I have always known that I was trans, because I haven't. But that dysphoria from my childhood was buried down deep. I mean it was always there but it because buried so deep it was distorted by the time it rose to the surface again. In more recent years, where I have been conscious of my proper gender, it has been more obvious and much much more concious. A conscious dislike of my own body, of the expectations on me, and an intense dislike of how I can't make the right clothes look right on my body.

Today, probably increased by the feelings of loneliness, there's been more of a subconscious reaction and more of a realisation of it.

I've been depressed and stressed in recent months. Really really stressed. A conversation with my mother last weekend made me realise that there's a whole of just normal day to day stress that I carry, let alone all the stuff that's triggered in the last couple of months. Thinking about it now it makes a whole lot of sense that I get bogged down by all this easier than dave - I carry more to begin with. Well today I've been realising just how much subscious stress being trans gives me. I'm beginning to realise that I just am not equiped to be able to heal myself and deal with all the stress that I do. So I have another step that I have to make - I have to set myself up some time. I need to follow up on the help with the stress en mass and for the trans stuff seperately.

Along with all this I had another memory from childhood rear its head. When I was late pre-teens and early teens, and a couple of weeks of dysphoria in my teens, I used to fear that the only thing I found attractive in other men was the things that I wanted for myself. So there you have it - another form to my dysphoria. Things I see, things I want, and yet . . . are out of reach.

Medical transition is not right for me right now, but by gods I need it in my future. I'm camp as a camp thing, but I would really like to be just another camp bi man rather than a slightly odd dykey woman. It is growing from a want to a need. Stress stress stress stress stress.

Okay, back to little thoughts - umm . . .