When Did I Start to Transition?

Gender dysphoria never takes a break.

If my gender incongruence isn’t my primary thought at the moment, it always seems to be constantly running in the background of my thoughts. I could be walking down the street thinking about work and then a woman passes and my brain hits the brakes with one or all of the following:

“Wow she looks great; I wish I was her.”

“I wish I could wear something like that.”

“Nice shoes.”

“Great makeup.”

“I wish I had her hair.”

“What am I thinking?”

“Stop looking so hard. Don’t be the “creepy guy”.”

“Who am I kidding? I can never pass.”

“I will never be able to transition.”

I’ll have another moment of flashing, frustrated anger and then move on …again.

Constant daydreams and brutal reality smash together in a Nanosecond of thought and then the thoughts go on “pause” as you cross the street and try not to get hit by a car because your mind is so occupied or trying to restart thinking about the thousands of other things that run through your mind as you simply try to survive the day.

…But the gender thoughts never leave you alone.

They churn and swirl throughout your day in your head and no one in your life notices the smoke pouring out of your emotional furnace. You have gotten so good at hiding it all. After all you have had a lifetime of practice.

For me, for today, the random transgender thought of the day was: “When did I start to transition?” My second thought was, “Why does it matter?” Followed by, “It obviously does because the thought won’t go away so just answer the question.” To which I acknowledged to myself I WOULD just answer the damn question.

So here you are waiting as I answer it, or at least I try to.

My honest answer is, I am not sure.

Technically I had no clue I was transgender or that I was suffering from gender dysphoria until my 62th birthday when I was finally diagnosed. Until my 60 birthday I even continued to believe that I truly was the man my wife married. Until that point, I conveniently dismissed my female thoughts and feelings as minor character flaws. It wasn’t until those weaknesses finally congealed into one big one and exploded into a cacophony of panic attacks and suicidal thoughts that I finally sought help.

It took two years of stubborn machismo refusal to seek help before I did.

So, I am now going to create for you my lifetime transgender timeline to answer the question for us both as to of when I did start transitioning.

The first, was my period of transgender ignorance. For most of my life the word “transgender” did not exist. It was an undefined and socially rejected concept that the world generally ignored and therefore, for everyone in my life, including me, did not exist. Arguably my transitioning started at birth but it was so subtle that it barely had a pulse. It was a vague dream and not even close to a reality. I accepted that I had no chance of my dream coming true.

I was a guy. Suck it up. Just move on.

The second period was the “Bruce & Caitlyn Jenner” period. Transgender was now a word and an emerging concept in general society. Caitlyn coming out created a general awareness, but it continued to reject. The mere concept of being transgender was reprehensible. Her coming out still didn’t ring the gender gong in my head but she did start a series of quiet thoughts in my head. My subconscious was starting to warm up to the idea that maybe, just maybe, my childhood dream could actually come true. I stopped dreaming and I started to think.

My subconscious was kicking my transition into high gear.

The third period of my transition was the waking awareness that things were not going well in “Maleness Land”. I started to take an active interest in female elements. Far, far more than the normal cisgender male. The collision of testosterone and my female gender was blossoming into a sharpening awareness that I was suffering from a gender incongruence between my body and my soul. My rejection of the obvious rang through my head. My gender confusion and male fear rocked my core.

Hello gender dysphoria …

The fourth is the professional and internet transition period. I saw doctors, psychologists, psychiatrists and professionals that I hoped would “fix” me. Instead, they all confirmed the obvious and declared me transgender. I rejected their diagnosis and followed up with endless hours of internet searching looking for the cure and any way out.

Regardless of my desperation, there was none for me other that lifelong suffering, suicide or transition.

I officially discarded suicide as a choice.

I entered the fifth period, the one I am in now, what I call the “soft” transition period. I have been transitioning while I have been trying to not transition. I will explain. I started HRT two and a half years ago and have privately gone out as Emma in public while continuing my “Clark Kent” male stealth persona trying to convince myself I really don’t need to transition and that I can live as the man I pretend to be for the rest of my life.

Essentially, I am transitioning while I fight transitioning.

I am fighting entering the finally and sixth period, what I call the “hard” transition. It is the irreversible elements of transitioning: facial feminization, gender confirmation surgery, legal gender and name change, and the most irreversible of all, coming out to family and friends.

This is a lot to deal with in my 65th year and this brutal period is taking its toll. I don’t have an endless amount of time to decide to either live the dream of a lifetime or to simply give up and accept my lifelong reality as enough at 65.

Discovering that you are transgender late in life is a very strange hand to be dealt. It feels like most of the cards are all Jokers.

Emma Holiday

Writers note: If you have read any of my writings on Medium you will have noticed a definite theme: the incredible pain of gender dysphoria and all the difficult aspects of just being transgender.

My writing has three specific goals:

1. Writing is my therapy. I have a very limited outlet for my thoughts so I write to find a way to process the most profound experience in my life. I need to understand and I need to accept myself to move forward.

2. Being transgender, for me, is a very lonely existence and if I can share some of the things that I feel and think as I go through the process of transitioning with others who are transgender and, in some way, lessen their pain and sense of loneliness, then all of this public exposure of my personal thoughts is not a waste.

3. I write to help cisgender people understand that all trans people want is to be simply understood, accepted and treated as a normal person. We are.

Thank you for reading my work.

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