accept. embrace. live.

I'm stressed about a lot of things, so I am going to rant about them here.  Perhaps it will help.  I don't know if it is the holidays, or one particular member of ma famille, or the fact that I am transgender on my mind every single second of every fucking day, or finances, or all of the above, or what.

The past couple days, I've been in one of those "what the fuck am I doing with my life?" stages.  I'm 39, I make a lot of money, yet am in debt up to my eyeballs because I've been supporting two households for three years, well, that, and transition.  I am either going to borrow against or liquidate my 401(k) so I can get through the next 9 months.  This isn't intended to be self-pitying... I made my bed, as they say, but I'm just frustrated.  I have the rest of my life to fix all this, but at the moment, it sucks.

A couple conversations I had with my mother this weekend are also weighing on me... two things she said that just don't give me warm fuzzies... a) "you know, of course, that I will NEVER think of you the way I think of your sister," and b) "when you have surgery, I don't even want to know about it."  Thanks, Mom.  "Is this Mrs. K******?  We're calling to tell you that your child didn't make it out of anesthesia.  What's that?  You didn't realize she was having surgery?  Whoops."  And as for point a), yeah, I'm aware.  Although I don't know what you think you are accomplishing by telling me that.  And the ironic part is, she is actually trying.  The problem is that she doesn't want to hear a peep about anything transgender or transition-related, but she purportedly wants a relationship with me.  It's early yet in the big scheme of things, but that isn't going to work long-term, you know?  So that's on my mind.

And then there's my ex-wife.  I go through periods when I feel softer towards her.  She was very upset when I picked the kids up for our Thanksgiving trip.  I felt awful and I wished things were different.  I've been thinking about her more than usual the past couple of days, and today I Googled her.  I do that once in a while.  There was some review she wrote of this fitness class she's taking.  She sounded so much like the person I fell in love with... so alive and full of energy.  I've not seen that side of her in years.  Made me wistful.  Today when she dropped the kids off for the evening, she looked beautiful, and I watched her walk away.  I thought about what it will be like for me when she is dating; what it will feel like if I ever see when I see her with someone else.  The thought is very upsetting.  I actually started crying.  I will likely always have some degree of love for her.  Of course, I need to remember the seashell.

Fortuitously, I have therapy tomorrow.  I am going to try and get my shit together this weekend, as well as some Xmas shopping done.  (ack!!  more to be stressed about)

I did have a nice moment today.  End on a positive note, right?  This morning I went to the Social Security Administration to do my name change, and an older woman, maybe 55 or so, sat down next to me and started chatting me up.  When I said I was there for a name change, she asked if I just got married.  I told her that no, I was transgender, and she got this really surprised look on her face and told me how attractive I was, and continued chatting.  So that was nice.

I know that in the larger context, I have tons to be glad about and thankful for.  I will recover financially.  My relationship with my mom will be what it will be.  My ex-wife and I will, at worst, have a cooperative relationship.  However, at the moment, I'm choosing to look at the trees, not the forest.  I'll get over it.