Skip to main content

18 January - seeing a lot of negativity

I don't think there has been any more bad news than usual, or maybe I'm just more sensitive to it because I'm on the cusp of doing something, but everywhere I look lately I'm seeing negative and anti-trans news. 

Social media is always a double-edged sword.  It has been a great way to connect with other trans folk and find community, but it also exposes me to what the haters are saying.  Not directly, but where I see people commenting on posts from influential anti-trans people, or protesting about new laws being introduced in their countries or states to remove the rights of trans people.  This has an impact on me.  I live a nice sheltered life where everyone I come into contact with on a regular basis would be opposed to all kinds of prejudice.  Seeing these posts shows me the rest of the world where prejudice and hate are the norm.  

In the UK, trans issues are mainstream news.  The recent passing of a liberalisation of trans rights in Scotland created much controversy, but now the UK government has blocked it becoming law, whilst seeking to remove some of the rights of trans people coming to the UK.  Whilst the legislative battles probably have more to do with a power struggle between London and Edinburgh and showing who is in charge, it is still being portrayed in the news as being about protecting women-only spaces from dangerous men.  

All of this feeds my own doubts.  This hardly feels like the best time or environment in which to be coming out as trans.  

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

27 May 26 - does my brain actually have a “girl mode”?

As I keep reflecting on my night out as Nicola last week there are a lot of questions and ideas that are swirling around in my head.  One is, whether my brain has a “girl mode”, because I felt so different and behaved in ways that were unfamiliar to me.  The really distinct difference in how I felt this time was that I didn’t feel like I was a man in a dress at all, I just felt like me. I remember thinking that this is what it is like to be “inhabiting womanhood”. Evidently I have ridiculously pretentious notions after a few drinks, but it was what I was feeling. This is what it is like to actually be a woman. Less pretentious.  An odd thing, but one which does make me wonder if my brain has some kind of “switch”, is that I looked at women differently. I am exclusively attracted to women and I am attracted to boobs and bums as much as the next man (cringe at associating with being a man). I know it is impolite to stare at a woman’s chest, and I make a conscious effort no...

21 May 2026 - a night out

Having a night on my own in London, I wanted to go out presenting female and get some more “real life experience”.  I had drinks and dinner with some colleagues early evening and to be honest had already had too much wine before I went out later by myself. This probably helped my confidence, although not my coordination with nail polish and mascara, which were a bit slapdash to say the least.  I remember last year getting in a lift in the hotel in a dress ready to go out, and being self conscious of people staring at me. This time, didn’t give it a thought. Likewise going into the underground and being on the train with other people. I didn’t notice if anyone looked at me and nor did I care. I was just me being me and wearing a skirt didn’t feel like a Thing, I wasn’t conscious of my clothes at all.  Similarly walking through a busy Soho to the bar, I just felt like I normally do walking around town.  Got to She Soho. Amazingly the bouncer asked me for ID. I’m 51...

31 Dec 25 - reflecting on the past year

I could see 2025 as a failure.  After all, I started the year with the intention to begin my transition. I still haven’t started.  I made initial contact with the endocrinologist clinic about feminising hormone therapy, but then didn’t progress that at all as soon as I encountered the blood test hurdle.  Here at the beginning of 2026, I am no closer to living as a woman than I was at the beginning of 2025. I have not come out to anyone, I don’t have a hormone prescription, my body is still male, my presentation is still full time male, everyone still knows me only as my male name.  Has the longing to be a woman gone away because I haven’t done anything about it? No. Obviously.  Although I have not begun transitioning, I have achieved a couple of things this year.  One is that I survived my wife catching me out and finding a pair of knickers that I had forgotten to hide. It was awful, and she was terribly upset, but I got through it and that is somethi...