Good-bye to a Potential Girl Friend
Colleen
I met her through eHarmony.com. She actually found me. Liked my picture and found me interesting and different.
My eHarmony profile said:
The one thing I am most passionate about
I am passionate about finding and keep friends, about exploring new areas of knowledge, and creating new syntheses based on what I learn. I am a fan of psychology, economic markets, and history. My favorite activity is dinner out with an interesting person or cuddling at home with an intimate friend in front of the fireplace or just reading side by side. I like to exercise together with a mate, cook together (I am not much good), and love to talk about the new things we learn. Love to explore new places, new activities, and new fields beyond what I know about. I am most devoted to finding that person with whom I can be intimate and at peace.
The three things which I am most thankful for
All the good things I was born into
A mind easily stimulated and always curious
A heart easily touched
The one thing I wish MORE people would notice about me
How soft and tender I am beneath a serious manner
A little more about me
I am not a macho guy. In fact, I have some rather feminine qualities that have fostered my career in caring and which expresses itself in sensitivity, tenderness, a fondness for soft touching, and a love of deep intimacy.
She sent me an automated eHarmony questionnaire. I questioned her back. We started calling each other regularly on January 2, 2016 and we really connected--conversation that was fresh, intelligent, funny, nuanced, enthusiastic, and playful. She sent me cookies for my birthday at the end of January. I had a business trip that I had to make in mid-February that took me through her home town. She invited me to spend a few days as a guest before I headed back. The time was delightful. I have never hit it off so well with anyone before. She was teaching me tech tricks and new artists and shared a low of the New York Times Book Review. But I had my little secret about my gender. I had decided that I would share my gender identify with her right after this visit. Here is my first letter to her.
Hi Stephanie,
I was touched with your parting gift of Mickey Mouse. Thank you.
I had a great weekend, which was a much-needed respite from my course. You are so easy to relax with and endlessly interesting.
Now I must share with you one of my quirks. I wonder if you have had any personal experience with gender issues. In your many years it would seem you must have but they are only now becoming more common, so who knows. Anyway, I have a gender issue. I am bi-gender. What this means is that I am perfectly comfortable in the male role in which you have encountered me, but that is not the whole story. I didn’t realize this until I was 62 after all those failed marriages, where finally I recognized that no minor part of my failure must be me and some misfit for the role as I was doing it. At first I seriously considered that I might be gay, and tried a relationship with a very nice man, only to find that that didn’t fit either. In the process of asking myself the question, Who am I? over and over, I started to recognize some clues in the past and over time came to the shocking conclusion that my identity is uncommonly feminine as well. So what does that mean?—this is something that we could discuss in great detail, if there remains any interest in moving ahead with what otherwise was an exceedingly auspicious start to a relationship.
The short version of it is that I did a year of counseling about it. Started taking estrogens in August of 2012. I do have breasts. I no longer enjoy sex by penetration, but actually enjoy sex more than ever—with women. My last ex- was fully aware of my gender status and actually quite enjoyed it; with her we failed on the usual relationship issues, not the gender stuff. It is always awkward to have a direct discussion about sexuality, and even more so about gender. I am a believer that we all exist on a bigender spectrum, which happens to cluster around both poles; I lie somewhere towards the middle, now probably a little more than 50% towards the feminine side. These last few years represent the first time in my life where I have really felt attached to my body. Why didn’t I recognize it sooner?—basically because it was the 50s and there were no words or role models to learn from. It’s just who I am. I am comfortable with that, but it is obviously really awkward to try to share this side of me. So I do it this way. It just is what it is.
I am sure this is not what you had planned on as you turned your pages of eHarmony. So it is really a new question of whether you have any interest or desire to proceed on this unusual path. I would certainly have no difficulty understanding if this is just not your cup of tea, which is, in fact, what I would surmise, but you so frequently surprise me, so who knows. All I can do is ask. I do hope you’re not feeling offended or misled, but you feel what you feel. Please accept that I have tried to balance consideration for you with the same for myself, and this is what I came up with. Wherever it goes from here, I have loved the part we had so far. You’ve been a lot of fun—a scintillating bright spot in so many days.
Thanks for what we have had. Do let me know if you’d like to explore any more.
She responded very quickly, which I found reassuring:
Dear C,
My immediate reaction is “this is certainly what I expected”.
Though, I kind of had no expectations, so I can’t really be much more
eloquent.
Your information certainly deserves
a lot of discussion, and as we do that I’d appreciate a straightforward
reply from you on what you might want with me. That will give me
perspective on how we could move onward and I can reply in context.
Like
you, I emerge from a traditional baby-boomer culture, but have little
direct/long term experience with the multitudes of bi’s and pan’s and
trans-es that we celebrate these days. And also I wouldn’t say that I
have observed you in any gender-specific role so far—rather Colin
as person, not Colin as gender-anything. So what might you construe as
masculine-gender situations we’ve had, so that I can get a feel for
what you find masculine, and what you find feminine? That would be
helpful.
I do have lesbian friends, gay
friends,bisexual friends,no trans friends that I’m aware of, and I
accept them each as the individuals they are. We have so many many
descriptors that have emerged over the years that perhaps we are all
simply individuals with, as you put it “quirks” that might not
necessitate labeling but rather acceptance.
This
does explain a couple of behaviors I observed both in your photos and
in your body language this weekend—which by the way was nice, and
comfortable, and interesting, and definitely worth more together
time—and I liked it.
Hoping to hear back from you with what you might want from me, and why me and what you feel we might be.
Hope that chaos in your new home isn’t too enervating.
Hugs, Stephanie
But then I heard very little. The ease and frequent quick responses all stopped. I tried to expand on my explanation.
Hi Stephanie,
Such a nice, kind, tolerant response. You
continue to surprise me in such a nice way. I am so glad to have that
disclosure out of the way. The truth is that I don't know what effect to
expect from it; I just know that it needed to be done in case it was a
deal-breaker. My hope is that we could go on as we did before. Certainly
feel free to ask any questions that come up along the way. I am pleased
that you just experienced me as 'C' and not as any particular
gender. The bottom line is that I am just me, still trying to figure it
out, and do not have any profound pronouncements on what is masculine or
feminine. For me, my work role is entirely masculine, and my success in
this career has certainly been enhanced for it; I will continue
comfortably in this until I retire. I suppose after that I'll be a
little more androgynous. For me feminine connotes qualities of softness,
tenderness, listening and sharing, more spontaneity and playfulness,
also more flare in both presentation and conversation. As a guy I am
pretty serious, quiet, reserved, and a good listener, but don't tend to
have a lot to say. That's one of the major things that has been
different with you is that with you I can and do talk and enjoy it. I
have never really felt such natural compatibility in conversation and
shared playfulness.
To try to answer your
question of what I might want from you I can say this. My purpose in
going on Match.com and eHarmony was to find a mate. I am absolutely in
no hurry, but I wanted to be active and mixing with people. What I most
immediately hoped for was the ease of conversation and shared interests
that we so quickly developed. Given the circumstances and distance and
current term of commitment here, the further development of a
relationship seemed likely to be slow, which was fine. It's a bonus
that I got to meet you already. I can't say I expect any particular
course of events, just continued contact at a distance and an effort to
see each other in person whenever we could. It feels a little different
to me after the disclosure but, thanks to your reaction, not much. For
me it is a very difficult process to go through the disclosure event--it
triggers in a big way the basic human fear that as soon as one reveals
oneself fully it will result in embarrassment and/or rejection. It kept
me awake for a few nights preparing for the disclosure and the tension
persisted through the day, but has now about 80-85% dissipated and
continues to fade. Psychologically, I just want to feel 'normal' again
knowing full well that there is no such thing as 'normal'. But it feels
good to have shared this part of myself and to still be in touch with
you. You are only the second person to whom I have disclosed; the others
are my ex-, my former therapist, and my twin brother, who is supportive
but doesn't understand. Trained as a psychologist, he has an
unfortunate Freudian take on gender disorders, which I think is
incorrect, but it doesn't get in the way of our staying close. Here (in
Omaha, Univ. of Nebraska) I have signed up for a transgender
specialist to manage the hormones, which previously I had been doing
myself. There were absolutely no transgender resources in South Dakota.
So
I hope to be the same C that you knew predisclosure, and I am
hoping that we will continue to get a chance to know each other better
and to share the little snippets of life that we experience. We will
just have to wait and see how it plays out. I am the type to feel
confident that it will work out the way that it should.
It
might help if I share how I see you. I hope not to offend in any way
since my experience of you has been so unabashedly positive. First of
all, you are a very independent and take-charge kind of person, not only
a survivor, but a winner at the game at work definitely, and in life, I
wonder how much of a loss you experience it to be alone at this stage
of your life, but you seem so completely comfortable in your skin and
what to do with yourself--you're busy and have a happy, smiling, funny
presentation. You have wonderful poise and confidence. Your conversation
(and your mind) is so sharp, so nuanced, so vastly accomplished. If I
were the type to get intimidated, this would be a good situation to be,
but I just admire your talents and knowledge, which have enriched a part
of my life. You have obviously seen and done a lot, so very little
seems to faze you. You have the interpersonal energy of a 35-year-old
and look almost as young, and, as I told you, I feel like a precocious
15-year-old going on 100. What is striking about our interactions is how
energetic they are and how benignly wise we seem. I suppose one of the
chief differences in our styles is that you are worldly, want to be out
in the world, as many parts of it as you can reach, while I am more
content as a homebody with a small world (hence Red Cloud). But I adapt
well and have never lived in a place that I just hated as a place. Only
west Philadelphia for medical school came close. Otherwise I have made
pretty happy homes wherever I have been. I certainly see
low-cost-of-living places as more sensible and desirable than places
like Santa Rosa (which in my opinion has no necessary reason for its
existence). I am characteristically more quiet and reserved and thus
like being with lively partners.
I see that you
have sent me an image of our very first interactions as well as link to
your bathroom artist, which I definitely will check out. I so loved
your bathroom wall reading, and they are so you.
Tuesday
and Wednesday here were busy days--had to run into Omaha and pick up
the dog, then spent the afternoon getting my NE driver's license and NE
car registration, which was really a beautifully simple process, all
done in a single room in city hall (DMV comes every 2nd Tuesday). Then I
had clean up to do (my son did not leave too bad a mess) and some
shopping since he ate everything that was edible. Wednesday started
with his IEP (individudal education plan) meeting at 7:30 a.m. He's
started off roughly; has a tendency to treat teachers as though they
were his peers and he has balked at doing a lot of the class
assignments; they say that he has improved over the 3 weeks and he does
give evidence at times that he can actually do the work. They are going
to do some formal testing and I will plan to have him see a doctor with
the though of giving ADHD medication another try; he's willing. Socially
he is doing great, but his gang is perceived as smoker, and alcohol and
drug users, which I haven't seen but for which I have to continue to be
on guard.
If you're going to be around, I will
plan to call you tomorrow night around 8 or 8:30 pm. If you are going
to be out, I'll just try again on Saturday.
Fondly,
C
The next message:
C,
I realized with your sharing that I had paid almost no attention
to gender, gender identity,etc over the years, though whatever folks
decided they wanted to be or become I just accepted people for
themselves, since those choices had little effect on me. Amazing what
I'd not thought about, I find...even with only Wikipedia as a source.
This is a much slower area of learning than my usual reading. I have a
whole series of topics and questions, not about the general, but the
specifics of your decisions and their effects.
I'm not dragging my feet, and don't want to be ignorant as we talk/ explore!
It's been a fine day here today... And I paid the price last night for over-napping Sunday. How's your life???
Hugs,
Stephanie
and my response...
Stephanie, i quite understand. It is, in fact all quite complicated, and
all so individual specific. There are just no reasonable generalizations
to be made. I never thought about any of this stuff head on until age
62, when I clearly had an issue. So you roll out your questions or
musings in whatever order or over whatever time frame is good for you I
don't think anything time-sensitive is hanging on it. One of the best
introductory and very readable books out there on this issue has the
rather terrible title 'My Husband Betty', which sounds like it would be
trashy. It's written by Helen Boyd and her stuff is very good and I
think right on as far as the core issues. Her situation is a little more
extreme as her husband is teetering on the brink of the whole
sex-change thing, for which she never bargained. Both her and husband
'Betty' are very like able people, and she is a very good, astute, and
thoughtful writer.
It was a pretty ordinary day today as we begin
the new regime (no more tests to study for). First, my son did get up and
go to school. Around 10:30 he called saying he had a migraine; I told
him to hold on and I would be right over with his migraine medication.
He did make it through the rest of the day, even the extra hour of study
hall he now has to do regularly due to poor grades. A success of sorts.
Today
was dedicated to the kind of day that I want to have Monday's and
Tuesday's become--day trading days. I have my large screen Dell laptop
dedicated completely to the trading resources I need. The available
tools are better than ever--but they don't work well on a Mac. I
currently have 3 positions on---all represent stocks in a solid uptrend,
which have just gotten past a hurdle, and have been just sitting there
without significant price change for a couple of days. This is regarded
as forming a 'base' before continuing on along the existing trend. In
fact, these stocks have established a strong pattern despite very choppy
markets, which is a good thing. They did not, however, make a move
today and I am sitting tight overnight or at least until either the
trend breaks down or they make their move. If 2 out of the 3 do well,
I'll be quite happy. I'll keep you posted.
I got my yoga in
today (and yesterday) for the first time since Rapid City. I am planning
for it and my HeartMath to be part of my regular routine. I got a
couple of errands done around noon, which is a slow hour for stocks.
After
market close at 3 pm here, I started reading 'Carol', which is well
written and observed, but still nothing has happened between Carol and
Therese after more than 100 pages.
With the stock market closing at 3 I find I have a little too much time on my hands. I'll be ready for work to start.
I
go see an accountant for my taxes on Wednesday. I was planning to do
TurboTax, which I did last year, but the short sale for the marital home
2 exes ago just closed in February and I don't know home to handle that
and am not prepared to trust TurboTax even if they could make it appear
to be simple. It looks like I will owe about $10 K this year all
because of IRA withdrawals to pay alimony (lump sum) to my most recent
ex-. That will use up a good chunk of my signing bonus, but glad it's
there.
Tonight my plan is to catch Rachael Maddow and Larry
O'Brien so I can sort out the recent political news, which I am seeing
as a Likely Hilary v Trump affair. As much as I like Bernie, he scares
me; with his Socialist credentials he just might give Trump a chance.
Oh, I fear there may be some scary nights ahead.
Take care and have a great morrow. Shall we talk upon the next sunset?
Hugs,
C
The next message read:
Don't worry too much, if trump wins and the market crashes perhaps
between us we can still claim your birthright in Ireland and raise
sheep. This is indeed scary.
I'd observe that
at least 20 or 30 of my friends..all women about my age and situation
are much like me..heterosexual cisgender women who likely display strong
attitudes, aptitudes, and communication , confidence and competence
patterns that many might think more stereotypically masculine.
Some
of that has been career-driven, some family dynamic, but all of us
have also had mutually satisfying heterosexual relationships that
reinforced our value both as individuals and our bodies' desirability.
Without
betraying your confidence, I've begun talking about gender, behavior,
sexual preference, etc with a couple of them trying to figure the
catalysts for making a hormone-based body change rather than just going
with the accepted fact that we are all mixtures of male and female
gender mannerisms, attitudes, expression and the like and celebrating
our individuality. You haven't mentioned it, but I'm thinking that
you're maybe also be going for a complete gender reassignment after
you're less job-constrained...or are you?
Our
world has come closer to legitimizing almost any conceivable flavor,
variety, combination of physiological, relationship, social, and
behavioral choices. For me acceptance is essential. Perhaps some of it
is explainable; then again maybe just a mystery.
Hugs, Stephanie
Then there was a pause in messages. It turned out that I missed one or more of her emails. When I realized this I tried to repair things:
Hi Stephanie,
I hope we can get past this confusion.
After your message tonight I went searching for missed messages from you
and found two. Don't know how they got past my inbox. One of them did
address the gender issues, which is one I had been kind of waiting for.
Without it, I have been at a loss of what for what to say. So let me
take a shot at responding to the missed messages. You ask the core
question, which is certainly the most salient issue that Helen Boyd
raises and faces. Where am I going with all this? Would you believe I
don't quite know. I do not believe that I am heading towards sex
reassignment. I'd never be a convincing total woman, either inside or
out. In fact, I like the bi-gender role, being either to do either part
and switch back and forth. In my experience it is all partner-specific. I
evolve like a flower in the direction of the most light. What my
partner wants and supports are the parts of me that blossom. As I said,
my last partner was fine with the dual gender roles and liked to explore
them. We went out both ways--about 85% of the time as male &
female, and 15% of the time as more androgynous or more rarely even as
feminine.
What is most important to me is how
we relate and communicate. The way we got started was the easiest, most
graceful and fun communication I had experiences in more than 20 years.
It was just fun. I felt like I had to tell you something about my gender
peculiarity but wasn't sure exactly what. You can't guess at what
anyone will want to know.
For me the driver
from the beginning was my body. Since puberty I just didn't like having
the main characteristics of a male body. I have always hated body hair.
And, while some of my awkwardness with women may be due to having
attended an all-boys high school and having zero dating experience, it
was also me. I just wasn't interested and I knew I wasn't interested,
and there wasn't anyone I could talk to about it. I was raised to raise a
family as both a Catholic and family duty, and I wanted that just fine.
My sequential failures were a terrible and rather prolonged shock, but
it wasn't until after the third wife that I concluded that some major
part must be due to me. It's one thing to realize that one is screwing
up, but quite another to have any sense of how to set it right. This
whole transgender/bigender thing has no script. It's trite but everyone
who identifies under any part of that rubric is just so unique. There
are no two stories the same. When one meets someone new, you want to
assume that some large part of the other person's story is familiar and
understandable, but with me it is not quite.
I
am an extremely tactile person and very color and texture sensitive and
responsive. Ordinary male clothing does nothing for me and never did. So
in a sense I always preferred a more female style of dressing and could
live in a middle world using bright shirts and sweaters and was never
too conspicuous in this way.
As
far as sex goes, I was a very late bloomer--first experience with
another at age 27, and all hetero-relationship attempts prior to
marriage were rather abysmal failures. How I met my first wife was
specifically to seek therapy for understanding my persistent pattern of
failed relationships with women. It was quite unfortunate for me that
this woman decided to pursue a relationship with me. My gut told me I
was in no way ready for such a relationship, but she could use the
language of therapy to reassure me that I was working on my issues the
whole time. Sigh. It led to rather a mess. My next relationship was more
about wanting a family and she had two beautiful boys, Sam and Ben,
aged 3 and 4 when we met, and I thought I could have an instant family,
later to discover that she was borderline. My third wife was a manager
for a Fortune 500 company, had an engineering degree, was attractive,
bright, poised, assertive, and initially very responsive. I never saw or
anticipated the tortured soul that lurked underneath nor could ever
have predicted (or even acknowledge as I had the evidence in front of me
over the years) how badly it evolved. Then to be trapped into it by the
children. Such lost time. In all of these relationships the sex was
never good. It took me long periods to get relaxed enough to respond
sexually and then I found the experience largely unfulfilling. Male sex
is so into performance, and dealing with the related anxiety, and it's
over in a nanosecond, which I hated. I never felt fulfilled or satisfied
after orgasm. I kept wondering where the good feelings went. There's
got to be more to it than that.
[Take a look at the two graphics that I attach to illustrate my point; in my life this has been quite the truth.]
So
when I left I decided to allow me to be more me, whatever that meant. I
think I mentioned that my next relationship after that was with a gay
man since I was beginning to suspect that I might be gay. He was a big,
redneck with a tender soul, and it was actually a very nice relationship
for about a year. I had a comfortable, tender place to go when I wasn't
on call in a small town in California. Over time, however, I realized that I was not
coming from or living in the same mental/emotional space that he was. I
found I developed tender feelings towards him that were essentially
feminine and gradually wanted to express them. He chose not to go to far
with that; he wanted a male; and I can't blame a gay guy for wanting a
male partner. So when that broke up I went into therapy for a year to
explore these feelings and that's when I came to identify as existing
somewhere in the transgender category. I was unusual in that I did not
feel any need to repudiate or regret in any way my experiences as a
male, other than my miserable marriages. I wanted a hairless body and
had some laser treatments done to remove chest and abdominal hair and
lighten the beard a little. As I was growing up I had always been able
to get some sensual pleasure from my nipples, and in the course of my
third marriage, when we had sex, my favorite part was having her touch
or lick my nipples. It was really quite amazing. So my experience with
hormones started with several personal objectives: I wanted to decrease
body hair growth, I wanted the softened mood and calm, the enhanced
emotional sensitivity and expressivity that I had read about, and I
thought I would be happy to have some breast development. I started with
an extremely low dose and went very slowly, but I found that each of my
objectives were being realized and further that I felt more myself and
more comfortable in my skin and my body. So I continued. You may or may
not relate to this, but having breast tissue is an amazing and
exquisite physical sensation that I wouldn't trade away at this point. I
could be perfectly happy being a male in every other way, but I would
want to keep the breasts and continue as hairless as possible.
The
other thing I had to face in here somewhere around this time was my own
sexual orientation. For the majority of my life I had been heterosexual
in orientation, just without any results worth writing home about. I
have had bisexual experiences now, so there is not any particular
experience that I would automatically exclude, but as I started
accepting myself as bigender, I realized that my preference remained for
women, which makes me something akin to a lesbian. This is all very
strange stuff.
So since then, as I continue to
look for a partner, I have to go through this drama--first finding
someone I hit it off with, then meeting in the traditional roles, and
then sharing that I have this other side. I have only done it
twice--once with my last wife, and with you. So I don't have enough
experience to see any trends or preferred path, etc. It's just a matter
of playing it by the seat of my pants. What I have concluded from Helen
Boyd and the other people I have read is that, if a gender-different
person is going to pursue a relationship, then the full disclosure and
honesty up front is the only chance for success. Failure may be more
common, but it is the only alternative. I am pretty content in my own
skin now, and what happens, happens, and what doesn't, doesn't, and the
universe remains ok.
Please understand that I
was not avoiding either this discussion, which I actually was looking
forward to since putting it into words helps integration and acceptance,
nor avoiding your messages. Heaven forbid! I don't know how they got
missed, but truly they did.
I would look
forward to continuing our conversations and discussions no matter where
you end up with the gender issues. Anywhere is ok; you don't owe me
anything. Certainly feel free to ask about anything.
I still enjoy you so I hope we might continue at least as pen pals and who knows.
Please don't feel slighted. That was never intended.
Tomorrow I will respond to your other missed email, which is worthy of a full response in its own right.
I just hope I can avoid missing any other messages.
Take care. Good night, And hugs!
C
It seems the repair failed. I have only received a few, short, cryptic messages which seems to indicate that she is happy to hear from me but has nothing much to say. On my side, I feel that I cannot really be myself, so I find it difficult to find anything to say. So it is on its way to dying out. A lovely interlude. Such potential. Such a sad, conventional ending.
[The attached descriptions of sex.]
