MentalHealth on Marti Abernathey

59 Candles, 40 Years in Radiology, and Zero Fear of What's Next

Sun, 11 Oct 2026 12:51:10 +0100

My 59th birthday is coming up this week, and I have a lot to reflect on. Being a radiographer has given me the gift of knowing, on an everyday basis, that life can end in an instant. More than that, it’s shown me that it will end for all of us.

I’ve always half-joked that I’d like to cryogenically freeze my head. I think humans, if we don’t destroy ourselves first, will eventually be able to replicate themselves—think of it like a Dollhouse-type world. Memories are like videos stored on servers, except our servers are our brains. At some point soon, I believe we’ll figure out how that storage works and be able to transfer that data onto servers. I do think that will be possible soon—just not in my lifetime. Maybe my son’s, but not mine. I say it half-jokingly because I’ll never be able to afford it anyway; it’s massively expensive.

Over the past few weeks, I’ve been compiling a list of people from my high school who have died—people I once shared space with, 40 years ago. They had families, they had lives, and then they didn’t. Some died last year; some died in 1991. This is coming for me, and it’s coming for all of us. There’s no avoiding it.

Another gift from the career I chose is that I don’t fear death, or what comes after it (which is nothingness). Religion and the idea of an afterlife are things humans created once we became conscious, as a way to cope with our own mortality. When I say I don’t fear death, I mean I don’t fear what comes after. I certainly fear the process of dying—I’ve seen so much suffering there, in 40 years working in healthcare. But I know what comes after death: it’s the same as what came before birth. I didn’t exist then, and I won’t exist afterward in the same way. The only thing that will carry me forward is the memory of me held by the people who know and love me. But I’m no longer worried about something I can neither control nor avoid.

Between now and the end, I’m going to do as much living as possible. I’m going to try to be as present as I can, and to feel grateful in each moment.

Always Trying to Find Balance

Mon, 27 Apr 2026 07:27:21 +0100

I’ve cleaned up the design of my page to be a bit closer to what I want it to be. It’s by no means perfect, it’s a work in progress. But it’s about 75% of the way I want it to be. I’ve spent far too much time on TikTok while neglecting my writing. I like making TikToks, but video content is not all I want to do. I’m looking for more balance. For a very long time, life has gotten in the way of making content here. But I’ve realised over the years that I did a lot of the writing here as a way to not deal with other things in my life. I’ve mostly dealt with those things, but the desire to make content is still there. I still want to get into a healthy routine of writing, podcasting, and making videos here. I feel like I’m always chasing balance in my life.

I’m genuinely grateful for the life I have now. It was nice to ride up the coast of Northeastern England with my wife a few days ago.

For as long as I have left here, this is the kind of balance I want in my life. I don't feel like I'm hiding from my feelings, or putting my focus in other places to deal with things I would rather not deal with. I just feel like I'm living in the moment and finding joy at that moment.

Wed, 18 Mar 2026 19:50:32 +0100

Watching the TikTok from Victoria Derbyshire talk about puberty blockers and see the comments of cis people more worried about a child’s future ability to reproduce, while ignoring the mental health repercussions for #transgender children makes me ill.

2024 You Were Mostly Shit, But I Learned A Few Things

Wed, 01 Jan 2025 08:10:48 +0100

I don’t really like doing New Year’s resolutions, for a few reasons. A. I don’t see the new year as the beginning of something. Yes, it’s a chance to reflect, but there’s nothing “new” about the year apart from the year I’m printing on forms. B. I save resolutions for when I get depressed. Even then, it’s not really resolutions, it’s more like goal setting. When I get depressed, I feel like I don’t see a way out. Setting goals helps me to keep going even if I feel bad.

That being said, I don’t mind self-reflecting on the previous year. So with that…

Things I realised in 2024

I miss writing. I found this blogging platform Micro-blog thanks to Zoyander Street. WordPress is becoming a lot more feature rich, but at a price. I couldn’t justify spending £20 a month on blogging, but £7? Yes, please. I already have my own Mastodon instance and my own Peertube instance. With that in mind…
Again, thanks to Zoyander Street, I found a name for the practice I’ve been pointing myself to regarding social media, namely POSSE. You can’t just remove yourself from popular social media apps without impacting your reach. But you can focus on creating a space that’s your primary base. That’s what my website is.
2024 was a lot about waiting. Waiting or my bariatric surgery. I’ve been on a steady decline since needing to have my lap band removed in 2021 due to slippage. Since I had surgery in October 2024, I’m 68 pounds (ca. 31 kg) down, with about 119 pounds (ca. 54 kg) to go to get into a “healthy” range. But I’m getting there.
How old I am. So much of the things I grew up with are fading away. The biggest realisation is a funny one, in Phil Collins (but I’m guessing not for him). Collins was a constant in the music of my life. Collins is 73. He retired from music in 2022, and the recent documentary shows how frail he is.

It really set in stone how much time, even if I’m not struck away with some disease, that old age is close. There are no constants in life. I’m about 16 years younger than Collins. Yesterday I had a concert of his on YouTube pop up from 1997. I remember 1997.

The concert from the Live and Loose tour in Paris has him dancing and smiling and being the Phil Collins I remember. The Collins in the Drumeo documentary is the harbinger of what is to come. For everyone, but especially for me.

I have more years behind me, than I do in front of me. Nik, my son, is in his 30s now. He’s got his life, and he’s making the most of it. I’m very proud of the man he’s become. I don’t intend on sounding like this is the end for me (or hell, even for Phil). Even if the bells aren’t ringing for me yet, I can hear them in the distance. It reminds me to always keep myself in the moment. I’m grateful for all the wonderful moments I’ve had so far, and am ready for more.

This year I got married to my wife. She really doesn’t realise how much that she means to me. I think that’s probably more my fault than hers. It’s hard unlearning 50 years of taking care of others and letting someone in to see you and take care of you. She doesn’t think she does that, but she really does. I am truly grateful for her love. Finding Marcele was at the right time, it allowed me to be the best version of myself that I know how to be.

I feel like 2025 will bring plenty of changes to my life as well. Marcele will finally be home, and we can start building a life together. I’m sure I’ll continue to lose weight. If I lose weight at the same rate I’m losing now, I’ll be at goal in June. There’s a lot to look forward to. 2024 felt like I was running in place, waiting for surgery. Now it feels like I can do things that will improve my life. I’m hopeful for 2025.

Understanding Introspective vs. Emotionally Reactive People

Thu, 07 Nov 2024 09:48:22 +0100

I've experienced two kinds of people in my life:

introspective

adjective

Inspecting within; seeing inwardly; capable of, or exercising, inspection; self-conscious.
Similar: self-conscious

Involving the act or results of conscious knowledge of physical phenomena; -- contrasted with associational.

Examining one's own perceptions and sensory experiences; contemplative or thoughtful about oneself.

Introspectives are people like Socrates, who said "The unexamined life is not worth living". These people self-reflect constantly. They engage in reflective judgment. They analyze their beliefs for any faults. They look at losing a debate as a win for themselves by bettering their own arguments. They try to look at the world and see it as it is. They do.

What is Emotional Reactivity?

When we feel stressed, angry, or hurt, we tend to react impulsively. We are in a state of fight-or-flight and tend to react emotionally, that is, to overreact. That overreaction is emotional reactivity.

In that moment, our perceptions of the situation are altered. The emotional charge prevents us from seeing the situation for what it is. Instead, we react. At this point, there is no listening going on anymore. Our emotions and defenses are driving our behaviors.

Emotionally reactive people are ruled by emotional reasoning. Life is dictated by how they feel, rather than any kind analytical examination. They are angered when questioned, many times lashing out at those who question their beliefs. They build up their beliefs on facts that support the belief (often by using a begging the question logical fallacy). They try to mold the world into how they feel it should be. They feel.

When I meet someone displaying behaviour I don't understand, I try to evaluate which type of person they are.

Reactionaries, TERFs, and Bodily Autonomy

Mon, 12 Dec 2022 14:11:46 +0100

A couple of things have been stewing in my brain for a while, and I can't stop thinking about them.

First off is a term that describes people who don't believe in the right of individuals to make decisions about their own lives and bodies. Radical feminists (TERF or not) don't think that sex workers have that right, in much the same way that US Republican conservatives. Whether drug use, transition care, sex work, assisted suicide or abortion, the resistance to it being allowed in society is that the person doing it cannot or should not consent. They want to impose their values on the lives of people they don't know or care about. Reactionary kind of fits, but not really.

The other thing is that the resistors of bodily autonomy are rarely honest in their assessments/debates. They will use a rhetorical trick of treating a systemic issue as an individual issue and vice versa. A good example is the issue of mass shootings. The fact that cis white men commit the majority of mass shootings routinely gets treated as a "lone wolf" or as a "mentally ill" rather than it being a systemic, societally based issue.

On the other side of this trick, TERFs use individual trans people being awful that have no systemic/institutional/societal base at the root. TERFs will claim that self-identification of gender will cause harm, say this is a "valid question", and repeat it ad nauseam. But they never respond when the question is answered and that their "valid question" hasn't resulted in the systemic harm they claim in the 18 countries where it's the law (Argentina, Belgium, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Denmark, Ecuador, Iceland, Ireland, Luxembourg, Malta, New Zealand, Norway, Pakistan, Portugal, Switzerland and Uruguay).

And that's just it; the people at the centre of the question never want to answer it. Like Young Earth Creationists, they have a belief that is centred and anything that agrees with it is true; anything that counters it is false. It isn't a debate, as it is a propaganda campaign that tries to get more people to try and command other people's bodily autonomy.

Millionaire Was Misgendered, I Was Triggered (From Martine Rothblatt to Me)

Wed, 20 May 2015 02:57:09 +0100

This morning I decided to watch a Ted Talk that featured Martine Rothblatt. Martine’s life story is incredible. The Washington Post said of her:

Let’s be clear: Martine Rothblatt is just plain more of a lawyer than anybody else in this town.
The 60-year-old grandmother and CEO of United Therapeutics, the Silver Spring-based biotech she founded to help save her younger daughter’s life, banked $38 million last year. It made her the nation’s highest-paid female executive. It also made her the nation’s highest-paid transgendered person, as she had sex reassignment surgery in 1994.

She is an amazing person, living an amazing life, doing amazing things. Yet someone that is interviewing her, who is in obvious awe of her and her accomplishments, misgenders her. No amount of wealth, prestige, or accomplishment stops this from happening.

I’m well past being triggered by being misgendered, but there was a time in my life that it would literally send me into a depression. Even though I’ve learned through Schema Therapy to deal with those triggers, it still has impact. At times it still feels like the person I see isn’t the person that everyone else does. At times being visibly trans still weighs on me.

As I said before, I don’t regret transitioning, but I understand it. Even when you’re a person of extreme wealth and privilege, being visibly or openly trans is a challenge. For once, that fact is oddly comforting.

I Get Trans Regret

Tue, 06 Jan 2015 04:40:47 +0100

This morning I read an excellent post over at Crossdreamer's Tumblr blog about transition regret (also a great post by Brynn Tannehill). I'll say upfront that I don't regret transition, but I understand those who do. From the post:

"Some of the male to female regretters have clearly been caught up in some very restrictive ideas of what it means to be a woman."

and:

"I should add that this does not mean that all regretters detransition because they believe in sexist stereotypes.

Given the complexity of sex and gender, the fact that all transsexuals have been raised as the gender they were assigned at birth, the social pressure to conform and the bigotry of others, I am surprised that there are not more stories of regret. But the fact remains that no more than 1 to 4 percent regret transitioning."

I've always tried to live authentically instead of trying to emulate one side of the gender binary. I don't have cis privilege. Cisgender means not transgender, and cis-privilege or "passing privilege"

"speaks to how perceived gender/sex alignment means not having to think or address topics that those without cisgender privilege have to deal with, often on a daily basis."

I've always identified as a trans woman. I don't think of myself as non-binary necessarily, unless your idea of what a woman is very stereotypical, much like the regetters in the post. But my authenticity has come at a cost. I was never passed over for a job before transition, but now I'm on about my 30th at work. The quality of my work hasn't changed, I've never received a bad review, and I have excellent references. It doesn't take a brain surgeon to hazard a guess as to why I suddenly am not worthy of a job I have good references for and solid work history.

I know plenty of truly wonderful trans women that are in the same position as me. They struggle at work. They struggle to find companionship. They just fucking struggle. Truth be told, as much as people talk about cherishing diversity, those who succeed and are held up as successful live within the binary.

I don't regret transition, but I understand why some do. Cis people can make transgender people's lives pretty awful. Kelsie at the Huffington Post nails it:

"There is a de-facto hierarchy under the umbrella, whereby those who identify with a binary gender have become the primary focus of our outreach and advocacy and therefore fare better than those who not. I am not going to dissect the past 20 years or so of activism or discuss the reasons why. It does not matter why this has happened, the numbers gathered by NCTE shows that this just simply cannot continue to be left unchecked. While the data on trans binary individuals shows unacceptable incidence of harassment, assault, attempted suicide, joblessness, homelessness and murder, the data for non-binary transgender respondents in the NCTE study shows HIGHER rates when compared to those with a binary trans identity. Often staggeringly so."

Because I didn't win the biology wheel of cis-fortune, I'm living a hard life. It's an authentic life that I cherish. I've come to know and value myself in a way few people do, but I'm always aware of the cost of being me.

Suicide, Leelah Alcorn, and Living Openly Trans*

Fri, 02 Jan 2015 12:37:57 +0100

I’ve kept quiet much for the last few months because I’ve been mourning a loss, the equal I can only compare losing my father at age 11. I’m not going to share the particulars of this loss because it doesn’t really matter in the context of this post, and secondly because it’s extremely personal. But emotionally I’ve been hampered a bit in just getting by day to day. I’m just trying to work out a plan for my future and try to do all the things people do when they’re mourning a huge loss. Trying to move on when you don’t really want to.

The holidays haven’t made it any easier. My circle of friends in Madison, Wisconsin is small. This is the first Christmas without my partner. I’ve just been putting my head down, going to work, and trying to make it through.

And then I read the suicide note of a trans teen, Leelah Acorn. Her parents tried Jesusing the the trans out of her to the point she killed herself. Some cis-gender (not trans*) people (especially those people that can’t bring themselves to call trans women, women but feel the need to call them “penised individuals") have suggested that it’s irresponsible to post Leelah’s suicide note.

This is thorny territory for me personally. When I read it, it did trigger me. I’ve been pretty much staying away from social media the last few days because of her suicide. In her suicide note she said:

"I have decided I’ve had enough. I’m never going to transition successfully, even when I move out. I’m never going to be happy with the way I look or sound. I’m never going to have enough friends to satisfy me. I’m never going to have enough love to satisfy me. I’m never going to find a man who loves me. I’m never going to be happy. Either I live the rest of my life as a lonely man who wishes he were a woman or I live my life as a lonelier woman who hates herself. There’s no winning. There’s no way out. I’m sad enough already, I don’t need my life to get any worse. People say “it gets better” but that isn’t true in my case. It gets worse. Each day I get worse."

That part of her note pierced through me like a knife. I understand her pain, because I feel like I am the embodiment of the comments of her future. I'm a visibly trans woman that struggles every day. As I said to a friend after this story broke:

"I'm not clinically depressed or having suicidal ideation. I'm currently mourning a loss and been having dysphoria related issues lately. Basically I'm the person she said she didn't want to live to be. That was a huge punch to the gut."

and

"I'm not saying it for hugs or attention (but thanks for the love), but that it's just hard. Especially what she said about it not getting better. If you don't have cis-privilege, life is fucking hard being openly trans."

But I don't think it's irresponsible to publish her note. I think it's wise and compassionate to warn people with "trigger warnings". But for someone that routinely fights for the right to exclude trans women from "female only" spaces without one shred of evidence that trans women are a threat (regardless of their genital status), I find Ditum's words to be both disingenuous and oppressive.

Irresponsible? That would be the Philadelphia Gay News publishing a story about an underage child’s genitals. Irresponsible would be the Statesman asking a TERF who openly mocks trans women to write a piece on a trans child’s suicide.

The answer to transphobia that leads to suicide isn’t more transphobia. The answer to transphobia isn’t silence. Not talking about it isn’t going to make it go away. Trans reparative therapy isn’t going to suddenly go away on its own. It needs to be talked about and people need to know how awful and destructive it is.

She says:

“Trans lives matter. We know that transgender people are at particular risk of suicidal thoughts. So why are people endorsing and sharing material that, if it has any effect at all, is likely to be the catalyst for a trans youth to attempt suicide?”

Ditum’s pity feels a lot like the pity trans people get from Focus on the Family. She knows that trans people are at particularly at risk for suicidal thoughts, but never seems to ask why. I’m suffering every day as a visibly trans person, and it’s not because I’m mentally ill or because I’m diagnosed with any sort of depression. It’s because being visibly trans in this world IS A HARD LIFE. It’s because there are people that other us, disrespect us, and objectify us on a daily (and sometimes hourly) basis.

The answer isn’t silence, it’s education. The answer isn’t fear mongering, mis-gendering, or “gender nerd snark”, it’s treating trans people with respect and human dignity. It boils down to just letting trans people live their lives authentically without being attacked for who they are. Ditum and folks like her aren’t part of the answer, they’re part of the problem.

Thoughts on Suicide, Living, and Dying

Thu, 09 Oct 2014 08:43:55 +0100

My mind has been in a million different places today. I read this thoughtful post by a doctor about a patient that committed suicide. I saw this today on dying with dignity:

[www.youtube.com/watch](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yPfe3rCcUeQ)

I come at this from the perspective of a medical professional that has seen death and dying up close and personal for almost thirty years. I come at this from the place of a person with a history of persona trauma and loss. I come at this from the perspective of an atheist. I come at this from the perspective of someone that researches the deaths of trans people across the world for the Remembering our Dead/Transgender Day of Remembrance project. I come at this from having partners who struggle with mental illness. From each one of these perspectives, I see life and death up close. I often see conflicting messages when seeing the suffering, the pain, and the joy of living.

When I saw Brittney's story and I read the doctor's words about the suicide of a 50-year-old man with a history of depression, I saw a similar story. I saw a story of two people dealing with a life-threatening illness. I saw a story of two people taking control of their life, destiny, and pain.

I think about every person I've ever treated as a medical professional that was at their life's end. So many times, what I end up seeing is suffering. Needless suffering. Terminally ill patients with families that just can't let go of their loved ones. I've had to perform scans on those patients. Patients who cried during the procedures cried out that they just wanted to die. They are the patients who have feeding tubes. The patients who have lived years, sometimes a quarter of a century, living in a bed. I've gone home, just put my face in my hands, and cried because of those patients. From that perspective, I'm like close to 80% of doctors that would avoid chemotherapy for aggressive forms of cancer that have little hope of a cure. I understand the rational choice not to suffer needlessly and have control over your life up until the end of it. I'm an atheist, but the needless suffering I've seen has made me see it as a kind of "hell on earth." I don't want that for myself.

From my trauma, I can understand losing hope. 12 years ago, I lost the ability to see my daughter and be a part of her life because of who I am. For almost 6 years, I suffered from situational depression because of this. Most recently, I'm about 6 months out from ending a relationship. I mourn that.

Being visibly trans isn't the easiest path in life, either. At times it weighs on my life like a heavy anchor. It limits my job choices, income, and many other aspects of my life. Parts of my trans life history have been so damaging, so brutal, and honestly... so unnecessary. When news broke of Kate von Roeder's very public suicide, I commented at the time that I think anyone that's visibly trans can understand why she took her own life. I looked at her letter and can honestly say that I understand why she did it. Some may say that makes me unstable or depressed, but I think of the words of comedian Marc Maron:

"If somebody comes up to you and says 'you might be clinically depressed', you should probably say 'thank you! That means I'm awake.' Is there any indication I shouldn't be depressed? Are you living on the same planet as I am? Do you ever think that depression might be the reasonable human response to the crap we're going through as a species?"

I'm not saying I want to kill myself. I've thought about it, and every time I do it comes back to the same question:

"Do I want to relieve myself of pain, more than I want to live?"

The answer to that question has been a consistent no. As complex as life is right now and unsure of my future, I still find joy and wonder in life. I still want more. I still want to be here and see how this all plays out. Doing the TDoR list, I see (sometimes graphically so) trans women losing their life because they are trans. The pain I feel from my life experience is tempered with the knowledge that my privilege (class, race, geography) allows me not to feel as much pain as many others do.

I'm glad I'm here, and I'm glad I'm alive right now. Though my pain may last, I acknowledge that it will lessen over time. That there will be a day sometime in the future when I'll yearn for today, for more time, for one more chance at living, but tomorrow won't come. I'm hopeful I'll have a choice of when and if enough is enough when the answer to the question above is that the pain is too much. Personal autonomy/agency is a gift that many people don't receive.

Looking In the Rear View, Giving Thanks

Fri, 26 Nov 2010 11:41:35 +0100

Tonight is an anniversary for me as well as Thanksgiving. Thanksgiving 2003 was one of the lowest points in my life. I had recently moved to Washington DC and had a one bedroom apartment that was baren. It had a bed (from the previous owner), a small kitchen table, and that was all for furniture. The previous year had seen me lose visitation to both my son and my daughter because I was trans. I was in a new city with very few friends. I had no one that I considered close enough to spend Thanksgiving day with. So I filled my day with laundry and prepped for my daily trans talk show. Somewhere in the middle of that I had a breakdown. I was crying, depressed, and really didn’t want to live anymore. Life without my children was something I could barely tolerate. The only thing that kept me alive was the memory of how I felt about my dad killing himself (he drank himself to death when I was 11). I thought my kids would rather have a transsexual father that they didn’t see than a dead one. In the pain of that moment I tried to find something to be thankful for. That day I wrote one of my first blog posts on Blogger.com. I said:

Thankful Kids, today is Thanksgiving, and by all rights, I have very little to be thankful for. I dont see you anymore, and I speak to you rarely. One thing I am thankful for is your existance. I hope someday that you can understand how hurt I am, and how much I do love you. I am a piece of trash that some want to throw away and act as if I don't exist. I am, and will always be, your Dad.

I made it through that day and continued to struggle with depression and daily existence. But life did slowly get better (2004, 2008). Like a coronary artery bypass, the scars from my past won't ever disappear. But I have healed.

Many things were the same today as they were on that day in 2003. I was alone, I didn’t have my kids with me, and I spent the day trying to avoid “Thanksgiving”. But it’s no 2003. I have so much to be grateful for. I have a wonderful life here in Madison. I have people here I consider family, an amazing job with fantastic coworkers, and an amazing son back in Indianapolis that is following his dream.

I am thankful every day for the people in my life. And I’m grateful that you are here to read this. I am blessed.

All That I've Let In, I'm Blessed Beyond Belief

Thu, 10 Dec 2009 09:45:50 +0100

I’ve always found great joy in music, but there are few songs that impact me to such an extent that I cry the first time I hear them. Tonight I heard the following song did: All That We Let In - Indigo Girls

“Dust in our eyes our own boots kicked up Heartsick we nursed along the way we picked up You may not see it when it’s sticking to your skin But we’re better off for all that we let in

Lost friends and loved ones much too young So much promises and work left undone When all that guards us is a single center line And the brutal crossing over when it’s time

Oooooooo (I don’t know where it all begins) Oooooooo (And I don’t know where it all will end) Oooooooo (We’re better off for all that we let in)

One day those toughies will be withered up and bent The father son the holy warriors and the president With glory days of put up dukes for all the world to see Beaten into submission in the name of the free

We’re in a nevolution I have heard it said Everyone’s so busy now but do we move ahead The planets hurting and atoms splitting And a sweater for your love you sit there knitting

Oooooooo (I don’t know where it all begins) Oooooooo (And I don’t know where it all will end) Oooooooo (We’re better off for all that we let in)

See those crosses on the side of the road Tied with ribbons in the medium They make me grateful I can go this far Lay me down and never wake me up again

Kim writes a poem and she sticks it on my truck We don’t believe in war and we don’t believe in luck The birds were calling to her what were they saying As the gate blew open the tops of the trees were swaying

I’ve passed the cemetery walk my dog down there I read the names in stone and say a silent prayer When I get home you’re cooking supper on the stove And the greatest gift of life is to know love

Oooooooo (I don’t know where it all begins) Oooooooo (And I don’t know where it all will end) Oooooooo (We’re better off for all that we let in)”

I heard this song right after hearing “No Day, But Today” from the Rent Soundtrack. It just reinforces to me the truth I’ve found here. I feel at home. I feel at home in my skin, and I feel at home in terms of location. Every single second of my life is a gift I treasure. I can’t believe how many times I wanted to die. Even at its worst, life is so full, so rich, and so worth living. I try to express this to the people I love and it never seems that I can ever explain it in a way that fully encapsulates how much I love them and my life here. But I’m no fool, I know that no matter how much I want to stay in this space, in this place forever, time moves on. All I can do is try to be as present as much of the time as possible. Sooner or later I will be taken away from them or they will be taken away from me. That’s just how life is. But right now it’s beautiful and I’m grateful.

The Pressure to Date is Off

Fri, 04 Dec 2009 18:12:04 +0100

For many years I thought I needed someone else to make me whole. Someone to "complete me." I've tried many ways to find that completeness, but sometimes the cliché is the truth. The easy truth is sometimes the hardest to actualize/realize/deal with.

Ultimately I realized that I never needed anything outside my own acceptance, my own love, and my own respect. Do I want those things from other people? Yes. Do I need them to be complete? Hardly.

But saying that doesn't mean I want to be alone. It means I can be, and that's ok. I had a recent bout of loneliness that came over me quickly and pressed down on me like an imploding house. But even in that, the above realization was always with me. I'm at a point in my life where my needs and wants are clearly defined. It helps to know the difference, especially when I get lonely. Filling that void in my life is a want, not a need. That is such a relief/weight lifted, I can't even explain it enough for one to understand the gravity it implies.

LJ Reprise - Life At This Moment

Sun, 10 Feb 2008 14:43:27 +0100

I was searching for an old post on my LiveJournal that I wanted to share with my cousin, and I started reading old posts. I read this old post and almost cried. I wrote a post called “I live, I die” on March 10th, 2004. This is an excerpt:

"I am feeling very lethargic. I think it's the meds I am on. Ive had some pretty horrid thoughts lately. I wont follow through with it though. My father slowly killed himself and died when I was 11. I refuse to do the same to my kids, so I my life is a living hell. I don't want to live, I don't want to die. So I exist."

That is exactly how I felt then. In August of 2000 I got divorced from my wife of 7 years and went into a very dark place. I stayed in that place pretty much for the next four or five years. The divorce was brutal on me. I had never felt such pain in my life. The only thing I can even closely compare it with was the death of my father.

When I wrote that paragraph above in my LJ, I hadn’t seen my children in two years. I had gotten so depressed I saw a therapist through work and they put me on Lexapro. WRONG THING TO DO FOR ME. We lived on the 29th floor of a high rise apartment and I started having fantasies about taking a nose dive off the balcony. I knew it was the meds. I stopped taking them, and those feelings stopped. But i still felt trapped in a life I hated, not wanting to live, but not wanting to die either.

I started writing my journal out of my own sense of fear, loneliness, and most of all, raw, emotionally crippling, gut clenching pain. I don’t think anyone wishes pain on themselves, but that pain did give birth to of my greatest gift, my writing. Nietzsche once said “You need chaos in your soul to give birth to a dancing star.” I truly believe that.

I look back on those entries and it feels like I’m reading entries from another person. My world is so different now. I feel totally different about my life, my outlook, and my hopes and dreams. I can be alone, and be ok. I’m happy to be alive. Being joyful rocks.

Oldfields-Lilly House & Gardens

Tue, 08 Jun 2004 03:55:26 +0100

Last October 17th was my 36th birthday, and it’s a long story…but that day I was felt very depressed. I had just met supersarah5 and she knew how shitty I was feeling on my birthday…so we went out to Oldfields-Lilly House & Gardens . While I had been to the Indianapolis Museum of Art with Deborah, I hadn’t ever been to the Lilly House. It is on the same acreage, but since it is wooded and the house is secluded, I never saw it. On that day with Sarah, the gardens and the elegant beauty of the landscaping filled my heart and calmed my mind. (While Sarah and I aren’t as close as we were then, I will always cherish that day. Thanks Sarah!)

Sunday morning, I got the itch to go back out to the grounds. Armed with my camera, I walked around….

This was from the back of the house. The top of the garage is like a backyard... You can see the White River and the canal from there. The view is awesome....

I walked through the gardens…

And the flowers…omg

And of course I ended up touring the house…

(I loved seeing my reflection, for two reasons. One, my shape has really changed. You can see the curves of my hips and thighs. Secondly, I cut a smaller reflection. I�m not anywhere near my goal but it's nice to see I'm getting close.)

This was the very last image I took…..

If you want to see all my pics I took see them in my gallery. I loved the house so much that I am going to volunteer to work there a couple shifts a week. All in all, the little field trip rejuvenated me and has put me in a better frame of mind.

Running Away... A Lesson Learned

Wed, 15 Jan 2003 09:17:33 +0100

As a young boy not quite eight years old, I set off to run away from home. My mother had made me eat cole slaw and forbid me to watch my favorite superhero, Wonder Woman. I had had enough, so I started packing. I found my mom’s curler carrier. It was one of those hard brown leather cases with the mirror attached to the top. With my mom’s curler box emptied of all her plastic curlers, I replaced them with all my Star Wars action figures, my Evil Kenevil and Fonzie dolls, and a few other prized possessions. I fixed a PB&J sandwich, and then hit the door running.

I was so upset with my mother for forcing me to eat that nasty slaw. As I walked towards the drainage ditch, it hit me. Who would feed me? Where would I sleep? How would I get to school? I sat at the ditch and ate my PB&J and contemplated my future. I realized, even as a small child, that I was running from problems that weren’t as large as the ones I was running to.

That episode happened 27 years ago. That boy at the drainage ditch isn’t quiet a boy anymore. He isn’t even a man. That boy is a woman, or at least she is on her way.

I had to go through an alcoholic father and his death at age 11, two divorces and custody battles and a long internal battle accepting my transsexuality. My second ex-wife, Lynn, denied my visitation when it was clear that I was transitioning and wasn’t going to hide it.

Last year it became apparent that I wasn’t going to be allowed to see my kids. I sank further and further into a horrid depression. I didn’t leave the house for weeks. One Sunday, I put my resume on Monster.com and came home to 15 calls from recruiters. One call was from the DC area. The recruiter connected me to a job not far from DC in Fredericksburg, VA. In an all too familiar scenario, I packed a suitcase and flew to DC to interview.

The interview went great, and I rushed a move. I threw my sound equipment, computers and my clothes in my rented 2002 Mustang and drove away from Indiana feeling free. The company paid for everything, and finally my life seemed to be leveling out again…or so I thought. The $4,000 sign on bonus turned out to be $2,600 after taxes. My recruiter forced me into buying a car from them. Unfortunately, it wouldn’t pass Maryland inspection, and I was somehow coned into a lemon. So goes my second attempt to runaway.

Again, my world was beginning to unravel. The only difference was I was 600 miles from my kids and I left any support network that I had, back in Indiana. Waves and waves of questions hit me. How would I work things out from 600 miles away? Why did I move so quickly? Did I leave people that love me to run away from the greatest pain in my life? There’s no drainage ditch close to my apartment, and I no longer eat PB&J’s, but the questions hit me just as hard.

My life is different, but not any better. Running away to Washington DC hasn’t solved any of my problems. Like that little boy standing at the drainage ditch, I have realized I need to go back and face my problems…not run from them. No one else is going to solve my problems for me. If I don’t, no one will. My heart hurt so badly at the trauma of my divorce and the ensuing drama that began once my transition was announced. Sticking my head in the sand isn’t going to get me any closer to transitioning fully, having FFS or SRS, or gaining closure to this part of my life.

As a child, I swallowed my pride, and walked back into the house and learned to live under my moms rule. As an adult, im moving back to Indiana to deal with the issues I buried when I left. Lynn has agreed to working on a resolution to seeing the kids, but that can only go forward if I move back. I have made contacts within the t-community in Indiana and hope to help them lobby local politicians for trans-inclusive legislation. I will continue to do my radio show “The T-Party” and write. The difference from before the move will be in my outlook and attitude. Some lessons really are worth learning twice.