(no subject)
I am well. I am sorting things out.
I want people (including myself) to understand.
What does it feel like to figure out you're transgendered?
Answer # 23
There are times when I forget what my body looks like, and I'm surprised when I open my mouth and hear this baritone voice. Looking in the mirror is also a shock - who is that? Other times, I look in the mirror when the lighting is right, and could swear that I just look like a butch girl, but then I shake my head, it goes away, and the shock is back. Weird huh?
That said, the feeling changes every week.
#24
Lately? Imagine an episode of Columbo. Peter Falk tracks down and catches the murderer, who has been trying to confound the rumpled detective for the last eighty-eight minutes. And now, they can both relax. He doesn't have to run anymore; he doesn't have to chase. Thank God, it's over.
But it's not over; not quite time to relax.
Neither metaphorical nor suicidal:
I've had a couple of times times when I didn't care if I lived or died. One was in Europe where I was sick and in a great deal of dsicomfort with a fair amount of pain, and although I knew it would pass, whether I lived or died just didn't matter at that time. Another time was during the student election, when I was running myself ragged, but I was kicking ass and, although it was farcical, I was running the best campaign that SFU has ever seen, and I realized that if I keeled over right then, it would be okay.
Now I am having a lot of moments like this. I have accomplished something great, I have sorted out my gender issues, solved a tremendous riddle, slashed the knot in half. So that's good, and it comes with a feeling of release. But it also comes with a new, seemingly (perhaps, in some cases, actually) insurmountable, sets of problems. Looking out over a high bridge or from a window, precipitous heights no longer scare me. And so I think if I pause when crossing the street; if the truck driver doesn't see me; doesn't stop; would that actually be that bad? My friends and family would miss me. That would be terrible. But would that actually be such a pain in the ass for me?
Please understand that I don't actually want to kill myself. I want this phase of things to be over. Or at least I want to take a rest. I want to fall asleep, or be put in cryo-stasis, and wake up in a month or thirty to see that things have been resolved, or at least not gone untended. Confer: the2005 farcical election: I was exhausted, but the end was not coming soon enough, so I was both pleased and looking for a way out, and acknowledged that death wouldn't actually be bad right then. Gender then: as long as I'm conscious and alive, the problem remains. So I can't rest - I've tried to rest, tried not to care, or to trick myself out of what I want, even for a morning, but that doesn't cut it. There is no rest for the weary.
It's clear that I need a better way of dealing with this. I'm hoping that tangible on the medical front will prove a relief. Still, I'd rather be able to provide my own relief, independent of outside factors.
A lot of this has to do with last year:
Last year scared me, and I've been overcompensating. I was unemployed with a few hobbies, and a lot of frustration at how my plans to fix my life weren't playing out. Now I've done full time student with calculus homework, part-time job, sporadic volunteering with three groups, illustrating, and, of course, transition. Too much.
Yeah, this is definitely playing in to the need for a rest. Good to sort that out.
So. As an alternative to cryo-stasis: cut the job; take easier/fewer classes.
Anyone want to go hit a mountain cabin for a week?
G'night.