Stealth...

In the trans world, 'stealth' means not telling anyone that you're transgender.  So, after you've had enough done physically to possibly get away with it, you just live as a 'normal' woman and don't reveal your previous identity.


So in a conversation about period pains you'd say 'yeah, they're a bastard aren't they...' - that sort of thing.


It's not something I'd ever aspire to - if only because I don't think I'd ever be taken to be a GG (that's genetic girl, folks) by anyone over any length of time.  
I think at a glance I might get away with it even now - and with actual boobs and adams apple reduction hopefully more so - but I don't think I could ever be stealth ... which is fine as I'm an open and honest person.  Being trans is my story and my journey - I don't really want to deny it.  Although it's nice to have relationships in which it doesn't come up


This is all related to the area of 'passing' or 'blending' - basically just fitting in as a woman.  I have found that trying too hard with this just kills it - women don't go round 'trying' to be women.  Being too self-conscious draws more attention to you than anything.  


The key is being confident and feeling that you're in the right place doing the right thing - in every sense.  If you feel like 'oh god these people are going to laugh at me because I'm wearing heels' then they probably will.  Such feelings are common in the early days - as you get a bit more confident you start to feel 'of course I'm wearing high heels - so what - I'm a woman'... then eventually you progress to not thinking about it at all - and you've cracked it.  An awful lot of people won't give you funny looks then just because you don't stand out in the crowd.


All you need to think about then is 'christ these shoes are killing me - I should never have worn these for shopping' ... that's how you KNOW you're a normal woman!


I don't actually know how much I 'pass' - I suppose most people ignore me, maybe because I do have that sense of 'rightness' now.  I like to think that I appear female - I obviously do enough because I've never been particularly been challenged in a ladies loo or changing room.   Mind you, those places are easier to negotiate than you think - because people's 'rules' about them are so strong it actually doesn't really occur to them that a biological male might be in them.  Even if they do suspect - it's far too awkward for them to say anything.


Maybe (hopefully) I'm doing myself down and I do look like a woman.   I don't think anyone has ever said anything like 'wow jaye you really don't look anything like a man at all' - it would be the highest compliment if they did.


Part of relaxing about it is not to wear what you want - but without drawing undue attention, you apprentice trannies  (how patronising!).  If you feel good, you exude more confidence.  Theoretically I would 'blend' better not wearing heels (because I'm tall) - maybe also if I dressed more androgynously, seeing as that's how a lot of women do dress.  But I don't draw any less attention to myself that way - in fact I think the rule that 'women wear skirts' actually means that I get more funny looks when wearing trousers.  Or maybe I just feel different.  Actually I've almost stopped wearing trousers altogether - mostly it's leggings now if not a skirt / dress.


As you can tell - I analyse my 'performance' too much.  If fact this maybe shows I'm not quite 'there' yet - although don't we all worry about how we're doing out there to a certain extent?   Social life is a performance - according to Erving Goffman and his 'Role Playing Theory' - but I'm not going to get Sociological on your ass  (I have a degree in it, by the way - snuff, snuff).


I was going to bring the areas of voice / adams apple into this but it looks like that should be another blog - seeing as I've gone on.


So that's it.  I'll just say - if you DO feel the urge to tell me how fabulously female I look, please don't hold back...   MWAH!

Surgery Blog...

Oooh - nasty picture eh?


So, yeah, this is the biggie :   GENDER RECONSTRUCTION SURGERY or SEX REASSIGNMENT SURGERY or THE CHOP...


It's a massive deal in the male to female transgender world of course and outside of it.  People generally - trans women and everyone else - regard it as the decisive thing, the ultimate moment of 'changing sex'.


There is a support group for patients at Charing Cross Hospital Gender Identity Clinic which I joined after my first appointment.  I got bored of it though as surgery was basically the only subject - how long will we have to wait, do you have to have permanent hair removal 'down there', what about post-operative healing, does it help if you go commando, how deep are you?  five inches?


For me surgery is such a distant prospect there's very little to gain by talking about it constantly.


There is an argument that surgery is actually a form of mutilation performed by a society which cannot tolerate a discrepancy between gender identity (what gender you feel yourself to be) and physical sex.


Actually there is no intolerance in the law - the gender recognition act (2004) means that you can be legally female in every respect without having had any physical treatment and without intending to.  


But there is a great expectation from people that you will be having surgery and they feel rather uncomfortable about seeing you as a woman unless they are reassured on that point.  True.


If you were unsure about surgery or didn't intend on having it at all, you would be well advised to tell people you definitely want it - if you want to guarantee their understanding and support.


Then again, some people say 'oh my god you're not going to do that are you?' - but they tend to be people who aren't that comfortable seeing you as female anyway.  People who want to see you as female and are happy to do so, often feel more 'at home' with it if your penis has definitely been sentenced to death...


So, that's them - what about me?


I used to be OK with my 'genital status' - but as I've grown to feel more, and indeed fully, female I've felt a stronger and stronger urge to get rid.  


The women on the surgery fan club site I spoke about earlier (I don't want to have a go at my own 'kind' here, I say this in a nice way) are I would suggest not taking surgery seriously enough if they use words like 'excited' about it.


Also, I feel some of them think that post-op people will treat them differently and they will feel totally different - and that men will be more interested in them.


I am wary about all that.  Even with a vagina neatly in place, I think most hetero men would have a problem with 'dating' a transwoman, unless they've got a thing about it.  Men with a thing about it is a whole different blog topic.  Tempting but dangerous...


So, surgery can have projected onto it a whole raft of expectations.  I think you should be realistic about it, that's all.


For me I am scared of it but I want to feel normal.  You know, if you've never felt normal in your life, it's very addictive when you find a way to feel it - you want more and more normal.  Don't give me that horseshit about there being no such thing as normal - it may be a nice truism but being a freak that people laugh at is no fucking fun at all.  Being 'normal' seems pretty good to me.


Another issue is how much discomfort I am in living the way I do live.  You can use your imagination - there's only one place for it all to go - that's right - I spend most of my time with the unwanted bits basically crushed.


Being normal, you see, looking normal.  It changes your perspective on discomfort.  To be able to wear clothes without worrying about it and not have all that problem is very tempting.


And on the flip side of feeling yourself to be totally female comes a complete rejection of those parts - you can hardly bear to touch them - certainly you wouldn't be able to stand anyone else touching them.  Sometimes I literally feel like I've got a weird object in my knickers.  It just doesn't seem to be part of me.  Not anymore.


So, yes, long blog this but I'm getting round to say... I DO want surgery, but I treat it with respect and I'm realistic about what might happen.


I might have my last orgasm before it - possibly I won't be able to afterwards (quite a lot of genetic women have the same problem after all).  I suppose I might die - although that is obviously a risk with any surgery.  There are all kinds of ways it might not work out.


It's a risk.  But if I'm going to spin that wheel I need to know everything about it first.


At the moment, as I say, it's a far distant thing.  First must come gender recognition certificate  (hopefully this summer) then hormone treatment (hopefully this year) and adams apple surgery  (tracheal shave - ooooh)...


I'd like to be sorted surgically and in every other way by the time I'm 40.  That may well not happen - the waiting list for surgery is immense.  There may also be a problem with me being underweight - or some other problem I can't imagine yet.


This isn't like having a tooth out you know...


I know I will have great support - I know Becca is behind me and I think my family and friends will be too.  I think I can do it.  With a bit of morphine.


Long before that the nasty bits will have become shrivelled and atrophied because of hormone treatment.... the fact that I view this prospect with delight must mean I am in some sense ready.


Ready to start waiting...   a very patient patient.

SHE !!!!

Obviously the most important word in the English language for me right now is 'she' - and its sister 'her'.


Getting people to call you by the correct third person singular personal pronoun is one fuck of a difficult business.  I've been working on it for nearly two years now and in some areas I've made great progress... not so much in others.


You have to work on people at different speeds and in different ways.  Work has been pretty easy because its a formal environment and you can, pretty much, expect people to address you correctly.  This is something I've learned - the more formal the situation the easier it is.  Fascinatingly, it's during moments at work when we're laughing and joking about that people slip and call me 'he' - it wouldn't happen during a meeting for example.


It's because calling someone by a term in relation to their gender happens instinctively and immediately - it's not something you feel the need (usually) to think about.  So, people make a 'gender assignation' when they see someone and they stick with it.  It's very hard to change it because you don't usually have to.  You don't actually have the linguistic equipment to deal with it.


Some people fudge the issue and say stuff like :   'jaye is coming over to show us jaye's bunch of flowers' or something - so they don't say 'she' or 'he'...   or sometimes they just mumble it and make a sound like 'shmehe'.


It's pretty funny really.


My boss said something enlightening - that when she called me 'she' at first she felt like she was insulting me.  That's interesting - because it would normally be very insulting to (seriously) call someone you perceive to be male 'she'.  But people have got to trust us transwomen when she say 'yes we are transitioning and not only do we prefer to be called 'she' we HATE being called 'he'.   


Girls and boys - wouldn't you hate it too?   To be called the opposite of what you are all the time?   That's insulting and hurtful - although people rarely mean to do it, which is the really vexing thing for everyone concerned.


Let me put it like this.  It's like you've been in prison for years and only been called your prison number - '923458' say.  Then you get out of prison and really look forward to everyone calling you by your real name.  But everywhere you go everyone still calls you '923458'...   you see what I mean?  A reminder that you're still a prisoner.


I have to be more active about it and that's what I'm going to do.  I am going to try really hard to correct people.  It's hard and embarrassing believe me - so much easier to just let it go.... but I can't live the rest of my life being called 'he' and 'him' all the time.  It's just wrong.


So, be warned world :   SHE must be obeyed !!

Happy Blog

I know I seem to whine a lot so you probably think 'Christ, what's the point of this gender transition thing if all it does is make her so miserable?!'


No!  Believe me I am happy most of the time these days - sometimes frighteningly so.  I have dips and bad days... and sometimes I get frustrated because I could be 100% happy but then some arsehole does something less than perfect and I'm forced to be only 78.2%.  And sometimes I get frustrated with waiting for transition things to happen.


But!  I am joyful, really.  


All women will know the feeling of pulling a dress over their head in a changing room, loving how it looks and thinking 'yes, it fits - I'm going to buy it!'


Imagine that feeling if you thought such a thing could never happen - imagine if you thought you were cursed to be a boy forever but you really didn't want to be.  I tell you - it's pure, glittering joy when that dress fits and you feel fab in it.  Pure glittering joy.


You can't imagine the simple joy I feel just taking my tights off and seeing them crumpled up on the floor - I think 'yes!  MY tights!'...  I look at the bottom of my shoes when I take them off and I can see bits of grit on them and I think 'yes!  my shoes!  With scuffs from the street because I wore them today!'


Standing at the makeup counter... trying on shoes... buying a new handbag and throwing the old one in the bin...


Handbags!   I never had one - I never thought I could have one...  now I love my handbag, I have it with me always.  It's a joy to feel it on the crook of my arm - it's my dream to have a handbag... and my dream has come true.


Today I said to someone that I would love to go to their wedding party and I said I'll have to buy a new frock.  Me... going into a shop and buying a new frock... not horrible boy clothes but a gorgeous DRESS!!


I had to be an usher at a friend's wedding a couple of years ago - the last wedding of my life I attended as a male - I had to go to have a suit fitted and wear a suit and horrible cufflinks and boy shite.  It makes me feel sick.  It made me feel sick - it was one of the things that meant I had to change.


I had to let it happen - I had to change - couldn't stay all my life down at heel - looking out of the window - staying out of the sun...


Does all this sound cheesy?   Over the top?   Well it's only that I have sunk to the lowest low and now I breathe clean air and walk the mountain path and brush cool, damp fern leaves across my hand...  I am free.  I am Jaye.  I am happy.

Bullies...

I've always been bullied.  What do I want you to say?  Poor Jaye?  


Not for the bullying that happened to me when I was a kid - that just seems distant, almost as if it happened to someone else.  I'm not sure I expected anything else, so at least I wasn't disappointed. 


I remember it was decided that I would be the kid at school who would grow up to be gay.  Ha ha - close, bitches, but no cigar.


It wasn't physical bullying - just being generally unpopular and called names and stuff.  Skinny kid.  Bit of a weird haircut.  Religious (I am from a religious family).  You can imagine.


The skinny one makes me laugh now, as I'm STILL skinny and the people who made fun of me are probably fighting the middle aged flab!  


You could say 'poor jaye' for the bullying that happens to me now I suppose. 
I think I'd actually prefer that to what most people do say which is 'just ignore them, they're idiots.'



It's not that easy I'm afraid.  Who has the confidence to say 'ha - I am so intelligent and look at these idiots laughing at me' ?  Come on now - aren't you more likely to think - 'oh my god, what if they're right?'


I mean, girls, when you go out wearing something new or with a new haircut or a different makeup look you might imagine how awful it would be if someone laughed at you.  Well what if people really did laugh at you, all the time!  And did comedy vomiting acting when you walked past?


Ignoring them isn't going to cut it.


I think it's better to understand why they might be doing it.  Having thought about it, I think it's a group thing (obviously - no one laughs at me when they're on their own) and it's a way of gaining status in the group, by attacking a vulnerable outsider.


It's also a way of communicating to the group 'I'm not weird, I'm not different - not like that person.  Look how normal I am, look how well I fit in'.


Crucially, I think bullies of all sorts believe their victims are asking for it.  This mentality is subtly revealed when people say to me 'well you are going to get this jaye...'


What they're really saying is :  ' well if you will go around dressed like that people are going to laugh at you...'


Dressed like what?   As a female.  Which is what I ...er... am.


No doubt in fifties America they would have said to 'negroes' :  'well if you're going to go around being black people are going to pick on you.  People don't like blacks after all...'


Is that so different?   It's not acceptable.  My phrase for it is :


I may have to EXPECT it - but that doesn't mean I have to ACCEPT it.


I think maybe the best thing to say to me is, after all, poor jaye.  But then let me listen to your shitty problems and I'll say 'poor you' back. I think that's all we need.

Random Observations...

These lessons you have learnt, jaye.  Heed them well and they will see you round town - you will survive - you will not cry - you will be joyful and at peace...


Ommm...ting!


...listen to your MP3 player and you will not hear what people say about you... you will be deaf to the screeching laughter of teenagers...you will not hear them say you are a man...


Ommm...ting!


...you are safe in bookshops, properties owned by the National Trust, at work (mostly), in better class supermarkets (mostly), in H&M and M&S.  You are not safe in places where teenagers congregate, you are not safe in pubs where drunk hetero men gather, you are not safe on buses... you are NOT safe in Hoo.  Where you live....


Ommm...ting!


...you are safer wearing a skirt or a dress... you are less safe wearing jeans... you are safer wearing makeup... you are safer with your hair down because it can hide your face... you are safe in the ladies loo... though you might not feel it, you have always been safe there.  But you fear you might be challenged - you have to summon your courage to push that door...


Ommm...ting!


...to try on clothes : approach the shop assistant confidently, brim over with confidence, don't try too hard, just look supremely breezy and confident.. Stride, jaye, stride.  You have never been turned away but you fear you might be....you have heard them whisper 'man'... they have summoned their friend to see you leave the changing room...


Ommm...ting!


...if someone in a shop calls you 'Sir' correct them at once.  You have never done this jaye, you have to start.  Correct everybody.  Know they are wrong.


Ommm...ting!


...you don't have to look good to be female.  You can - but you don't have to.  You can wear no makeup, you can not shave off the untreated facial hair, you can wear jeans - you are under no obligation to look a certain way to have an identity.  But if you fuck around with it you will be less safe...


Ommm...ting!


...walk past teenagers slowly.  Avoid the temptation to scurry past.  If you walk past slowly that will shout 'tranny' at your back.  They will say loudly 'THAT'S A MAN, THAT'S A MAN'...  that is the worst that will happen.  It will hurt but you'll live.  Know they are wrong.


Ommm...ting!


...living any other way is not an option.  Living any other way would be bad for you and the people you love.  Living any other way is not.  An.  Option.


Ommm..........

What's it like being me?

The character Johnny in Mike Leigh's excellent film 'Naked' asks a character the question :  'what's it like being you?'


Good question.  What's it like being you?  Being me is like being marmite - I polarise opinion.  And I'm delicious spread thinly on toast.


I don't do anything to polarise opinion, I think it's a transgender thing.  There are people who genuinely don't seem to give a flying one way or the other, but then there are a lot of other people who are either rabidly for or rabidly against my cause.


Some people offer me support which bewilders me in its depth and feeling - I am awestruck by the love some people (well, other women in the main) pour out to me even though they don't necessarily know me very well.


I think it's because I seem to be honest to them, because I am revealing something intimate about myself just by living.  So they feel they know me - which is wonderful.   Also I think a lot of women are sympathetic to the trans cause because, well, being a woman gets looked down on by a lot of men doesn't it, and here in front of them is a person who seems to be male and wishes with all 'his' heart to be a female.  I wonder?


And they just believe in me I suppose.  They believe that I am ultimately a girl - practically speaking, because the inability to live as a male means that I have to be female.  At least ipso facto.  And they use their imagination to see what it must be like to be a female who appears to be male - and they feel...well... sorry for me.


Then there's being brave.  I probably seem brave.  Although being trans doesn't really require bravery - it's more that a trans woman has to be brave, she hasn't got any choice.  So is that really brave at all? 


I don't think it makes sense to most people that I feel less embarrassed and scared when I am presenting myself as a female because that's what feels right inside - even though people may be staring and laughing at me.  You know?


Anyway - on the other side of course are the people who take against me.  They think I want attention - they are confusing WANTING attention with GETTING attention.  I get it, but I don't necessarily want it.  I like attention like 'hey jaye I love your earrings' - but don't we all like that?


I don't like attention like 'YOU FUCKING QUEER!'   -  I think I could get attention in easier ways.


I think some people who take against me think I'm mad.  Going through a phase, in crisis.  They say things like 'you weren't like this before'.  They can't see the turmoil I was in - because it was hidden.  They couldn't see the panic attacks and the drinking and the rage, the smashing up the furniture and trembling with terror.  They just saw Jason and he seemed to be alright.  Whereas Jaye has problems everyone can see.  But they're smaller problems.


Some people are scared.  I can see the fear in their eyes.  Some people I think resent the fact that they don't know how to address me at first - having to think 'is this a man or a woman?' is an extra effort and an embarrassment and they get pissed off.


Well, surely if a 'male' is dressed in a female way and 'presents' themselves as a female  (not just clothes but walk, voice, demeanor) it would be best to err on the side of caution and say 'she' and 'her' or 'madam' or whatever.  I would hardly go out of my way to obviously look female because I want people to call me 'Sir' - now would I?


Unfortunately we have no polite way in our culture to say 'are you a male or a female?'  - that question is just rude.  In the future maybe it will have to not be.  I would rather be politely asked if I am trans than be called 'Sir'.


Then some people, at work for example, didn't like me using the ladies loo.  
I just wish they would talk to me about it instead of using the disabled loo - which some of them do because of me.


It's daft aint it?  Once you're in the cubicle what difference does it make?  I'm hardly going to lift the seat up and stand there weeing - I could anatomically do it but I'd rather piss myself!!   Seriously, I couldn't actually wee standing up anymore than any other woman  (although I understand some can, actually).


Also - at which point would it be acceptable for me to use the ladies loo?  If the objection is me being attached to a willie  (which is not anything to do with me) - then when would it be OK for me to not use the gents?   After genital reconstruction surgery - so probably in about ten years time??!   Till then I have to use the GENTS toilet?   Wouldn't that be cruel and embarrassing for the men as much as anything?


When I get my gender recognition certificate?  But I have to live 'in role' for two years first - and women tend to use the ladies loo don't they?!


So... rather long blog... issues... issues.   But if you're interested you've probably got a feel for what it is like being me.  Now - what's it like being you?