imbolc I

First year I celebrate it, my appropriative faux-syncretist Imbolc appropriately was exactly as not expected, which is to be expected. There was some drama which I am still unpacking, with issues colliding where I suppose everyone involved had hoped for synergy rather than malergy. I was nowhere near as graceful as I would like to have been, but think I did not do significant damage at least.

As for damage sustained, much more was gained than lost. At Imbolc is the Goddess in her Maiden state, naïvely receiving, adoring, fully open to being hurt and disappointed, and certainly not wise yet. So she makes mistakes and she hurts and she is hurt, and it is only through these experiences that she can come to understand her dynamics and learn to go beyond them when desired.

I’ll say that whether justified or not, at this point it would be counter-productive of me to not feel all I can feel. I must wallow in every cascade, every implication. Already I discovered new things, including facets of emotion I was not aware were there. It does not matter if they are desirable or not. I must stop censoring, and only after I have done that can I do other, more complex processing; how else will I be able to unlock emotion more generally? Two avatars of Chaos have both demonstrated this to me in words and action; both have hurt me in similar ways and I have love for them both.

All such aside, a dear friend suggested to me strategies for motion and increased body awareness. I took her up on some – for the first time today I was jogging (all right, briskly walking) to the Babylon Main Station, trying along the way to stay aware primarily of my body. It was exactly as hard as expected and I often lapsed, but I did sense the interconnectness much better while in motion (contra to body scanning lying down). Most interesting, and valuable going forward, was that there exists some extent of (controllable) hip sideways motion when moving. Not only can I sense this but also control it, and I could try to habitualize its increase.

Arriving at the station, this day I was all right out of bed without makeup, no shaving (but no stubble is visible since some time now), in old pre-transition bulky black exercise clothes. This too very much an emotional and social experiment which will be repeated. I was not really gendered either way, so I can’t assess it, but from mirrors, I think that if anyone reads me as male, it will be as a tall pre-teen effeminate boy. It probably confuses, and some fraction also probably saw a woman as they passed me. Since otherwise I never go out without makeup this may be a useful recurring experiment.

Did not take a sports bra on in the hope of feeling jiggling; I did not. But the body scanning approach while running seems like something I could slowly get better at, and I could also do it standing or walking.

We move.

combo breaker

Ultimately it doesn’t matter why someone is not interested in a particular type of connection. If there is an incompatibility, it means we would have needed to be two different people for a different outcome to be possible. However the incompatibility is understood or described also does not matter. The outcome is what matters, for this aspect in and of itself. There are plenty of valuable aspects of friendship I can experience with a lot of people, which is beautiful and valuable and necessary.

Meanwhile even if I do not perceive myself as flawed for an incompatibility, it reveals what is lacking in my life. And it remains that I must be allowed to be sad for that which is lacking. The fact that for so long I did not is what messed me up. So I’ll be as sad as I want. And I’ll go for all things that help me get closer to where I need.

cpt hook

So, learning things. I’m actually sad over things I decided many years ago I was not allowed to feel sad over, jeez Louise, who would have guessed? I needed “high hopes, low expectations” and mindfulness in relationships, and it has its uses, but all of me inside is needing to weep over all the times that still hurt, the breakups, the fadings out, the phases in relationships where I slowly got used to not receive any attention or focus, where I got used to being an afterthought or a complement. I can do that but I have to do more also.

I was happy – celebratorily so – at the milestone at finally having cried pre-sleep such that I have to blow my nose over and over again until I actually can sleep. Every teenage girl needs to pass this important milestone and I consider it an important step, a sign that I’ve actually grown. At some point, I will be Psycho Girlfriend, and I long for that day too.

On another level, when it storms, my past inclination has been to try to – usually with no success, but never mind that – seek hookups or escalations of play or whatever. Because validation. The thought of that now is… weird. So I want the perception of being alive and of things being meaningful that good sex brings. But unless everything relationally is Just Right, I don’t really feel that?

That’s sort of new. Thinking back at the last times I was with someone, I felt it interesting because of discovery and exploration and closeness and bonding and love. Not wanting to get off, and not wanting to seek sex in order to get off. After some time of intimacy, I can find myself warming up somehow and wanting to get off? Is this how other girls stereotypically function too? We want to be brought to sensory states and climaxes but we don’t have that wish saliently until we’ve already been at it for some time based in emotional connectivity and more conventional sensuality? Is this that whole foreplay idea?

For me then, getting off once I do want it, that is an issue. I can, with toys. I mostly can’t be seen naked, not even with other pre-op girl I am in love with, though I may be able to learn to. But coming is cumbersome, and cleaning up cum is something awful and I hate it. I really hope SRS will fix this part for me, will fix my parts while keeping them sensate.

So where does that leave me? I want to do hookups because emotion and symbolism and decadence and outlets. But I can’t easily because getting and staying in the mood is hard, without chemistry and with dysphoria, very difficult. And in the end, when I want to be stimulated, it’s a ridiculous and unsatisfactory hassle.

Perhaps once I’ve fixed my anatomy I’ll go out and have people fuck me, I’ll probably try it. May not assuage the need for connection and chemistry though. So how do I get what I need, except in relationships? Good question.

segmented

Before the holidays I felt a similar Earthiness to these days. I thought that was from starting progesterone, but apparently it is not so simplistic. This may be a hint of my actually having a cycle of my own, independent of dosages. If that holds, then in about 6 weeks I should have another Earth phase, with an intervening busybody Air/Fire phase.

balefire

CW: Not rational, overreacting.

I’m unlovable, useless, impossible to want. I’m too odd, too pretentious, too different, too messed up by dissociation and hypochondria and body issues, too theoretical, too skewed. I’m fat and ugly, aged, caught in androgynous limbo; my voice keeps going too deep. I’m clumsy, I can’t even remember people’s triggers or boundaries, I’m not empathetic enough, not caring enough, not sharp enough to be able to interact with anyone so that I will not hurt them, except possibly by being so focused that I myself can’t stay present as a subjective being.

I’m too selfish, too needy, too clingy. I know too little, I am too forgetful, lazy, undisciplined, I am not smart enough, I don’t feel passionately enough to be interesting, I am almost entirely fake, not authentic, not genuine, useless, uninteresting. I don’t have enough of genuine life or genuine interests or projects for anyone to want to participate in.

Well, more accurately, people sometimes want to try me. I can be a curiosity, a safe game for a night when someone first comes out of a period of celibacy, perhaps. But once anyone tries once, a few times perhaps even, no-one can hold any passion for me. I’m like a corpse that perhaps can entertain a little through dissociated touching and D&D-style fantasy narrating, or who can use a sex toy clumsily, but that won’t last. None can hold passion for me, for what is there to be passionate about? So people fade away and leave me behind.

Or perhaps I am scary? Too weird, too cold, not empathetic enough, too odd, elitist, weird.

What can I do? Well, I can build my own self. I can do the things I should to succeed career-wise, scientifically. Even if I am no genius, at least I can do that, maybe sometime even making a difference. I can be a good friend, I can help and support my friends, entertain them sometime, with no need for reciprocity, though my friends do indeed reciprocate.

I can do some about this disgusting body. I must continue strictly to lose weight, for if I do, my shoulders will slim a little more, by belly will diminish, and my tiny hips and breasts will look a little more feminine by comparison. I can get into shape, because then if I am fit then I will seem healthy, despite my increasing age, and that is something people like. If I like moving in my body, learn more motorics and grace, then I may become actually attractive to some.

I could fix more body things. Bottom surgery is all for me, not to look a certain way to others, but I could reduce forehead some, lower hairline, maybe change cheeks. Weight loss will help there too, as will giving hormones more time. That might make me look a little better.

I will fix my voice, I will somehow get around the laziness and lack of focus and discipline that keeps me from being able to maintain it. I will train, I will focus, I will maintain. I can sound more so that I like myself, and then perhaps others will catch on.

I can learn style. I can learn to tidy up and keep a clean home, not living in a pigsty. That would make me more impressive, and would make it easier for others to stay near me, to want to share some of my everyday life with me.

Getting in better shape should involve sleeping properly also, because then my brain may start functioning better too so I will be able to offer interesting conversation at least. If I can do that then I won’t continually bore or trigger people like I do. I will be able to keep my stupid shit together better, and maybe that will make me more likable.

What else is there? Get more control of my life so I have more freedom to follow the rhythm of others, again letting me become less uninteresting.

Perhaps.

I am a useless needy wreck in real need of therapy and to stop being stupid and passive-aggressive.

And it is very very real that I am loved, I have loving partners who would come to me when I need it, with whom I share crucial sides of myself, with whom I share passions specific to each relationship, whom I would burn continents to save, relative to whom nothing can be more important. They do love me. I cherish this. I treasure this.

Still, the sort of passion that so many other people do experience in their everyday lives, that is beyond me. I am not the kind of person that makes anyone want to prioritize me like that. I will always be less important than various other things, because there is nothing in me that could make me important to others in a way that would inspire romantic devotion.

I should dissociate and get to work. But I don’t want to. I need to stay in pain if I am to be able to heal.

line becomes a circle

Laser day, woke, went out without makeup, no time for estrogen before. My face and form and voice are flawed and this felt like weighted sadness. Receiving support made me safe to feel this sadness, love and music came my way and I listened and opened, and thereby could feel it more clearly.

The interesting part: I know I could step into “this has to get done, I feel nothing” dissociation and ride outside the body core in the enactment of tasks. I wouldn’t express sadness then or appear to feel it, might not even notice it.

I’m trying to stay now if I can. Because I’m thinking that perhaps I need to stay in sadness, even court sadness, if I am to be able to also stay to feel happy emotions at a greater amplitude than I can now. I think at this point I must learn not to dissociate and I think this is what I also am attempting.

ogre battle

No, cisgender woman in FB group who comments in response to me to ask what I mean by misgendering, I will not explain it to you. Not when you likely are asking in bad faith and hoping to open a can of worms. Not when you seem to have all the indications of being either conservative, a TERF, or both.

More generally, my policy of not needing to debate or comment when it’s not necessary seems to be good. Usually applies only to men but there will be women also I must ignore, apparently.

And I will not debate my identity. It is not up for question.

flox

My body is in that state of fuzzy tiredness I associate with inflammation. There was a little lack of sleep, there is fasting, there was not coffee yet. But more to the point this feels like a post-fear forced resting state.

An interpersonal exchange might, just might, no jinxing, be going exactly where I had hoped it will. I feel like it might take a lifetime to explore her, it reminds me of jetlags, of being newly arrived somewhere and whelmed.

Time to do magic.

tiphareth IV

These are days of force going up and down. All in all I am so blessed. There is so much to challenge, but I feel the world unfold. Life is adventure.

I must learn the saran wrap technique, must try it. My estradiol levels were not tested after I started gel, so I worry perhaps I misapply and my levels may be too low? Next check is scheduled for March. But there is no fear – I no longer masculinize, so even delays in my change are only temporary setbacks.

With too many crucial and important things at once I must learn to force relaxation. It is so hard. I must set evenings when I do nothing, not even emotional labor, not even quick email answers. Certainly not late chatting. I must set days when I do nothing productive, only go see new parts of Babylon, or try to write more intense words than these. I must set days when I work on forgotten projects only, or long-term projects only, despite any urgency, days when I just read. I must start placing these into my calendar, schedule nothing conflicting then, and adhere to them.

I know this is truth and that I can do it. Nothing stops me. It is still difficult. But nothing stops me. I am alive now. I know it is what I need, so I must do it.

Similarly, I must do what is needed for health. It seems documents will not be an issue, so after the consultation in April I can decide on surgery – if, and when, and where. And if as I now am leaning to, and I will go to Chettawut in Bangkok, and if I have the funding ready, then perhaps I have no reason to delay. I’m trying to get used to the really scary thought of doing it in December. Maybe one of my partners can join. I can’t assume they will, so will keep that open, for whomever can. And thereafter, after the first month, will I spend one in my country of origin? Or will I stay in Babylon, receving guests?

It scares immensely. It must and I must process it even more before April, so I will be ready to decide then.

I fear somehow having a heart condition. I don’t think I do, but I must minimize the risk so I am not denied. So this year is the strict deadline for perfection, isn’t it? What should I do?

I should attempt to make real – again, I can, I just have to dare schedule it – so that I sleep closer to eight than six hours each night.

I should attempt to reach fully where I want to be with the fasting, and keep diligent with probiotics and vitamins. I need to minimize risk for blood clotting, optimize blood circulation. So I should also begin cardio exercise. This is even harder in terms of finding time. I cannot become sick. So I must dress warmly, from now on.

That effort with voice, that must continue.

I relax into these preparations. Certainly there is also here a factor of having a complex goal and vast ordeal being something which empowers me. After surgery, which will mine be correspondoingly? Asides from all my other goals? I will find one, certainly.

Emotionally, I learn to be ebb and flow. I write heart-baring words and then brood over whether to send them.

The sun is shining today in terrible glory.