Well the years passed by and I practiced in secret, not really getting any better because to say my mothers makeup bag was small was an understatement. However, her shoes fit me back then and I loved her high heels. Her clothes, however, were not good for an aspiring young teenage girl! But I made do, what else could I do?
Me, "Hi Mother and Father, for Christmas I would like that gorgeous red crushed velvet dress and high heels, some nice underwear to match and a good selection of makeup please, oh and can I just pop down to the hairdressers...:)".
Them, "Of course dear you'll look lovely in that, I'm so glad you came out to us, how much more pleasurable it is living with you since you did."
Hmmmm? Yeah right! I don't think so! Anyway I think half the arguments during my teenage years were because I was totally frustrated and confused with it all, having no one to talk to or confide in. You see i liked to dress as a girl but I wasn't attracted to boys, so I wasn't gay. But if I dressed as a girl I had to be gay...right?
I'd seen drag queens on TV, I'd watched all those morning talk shows and bad American shows where they'd come on and turn out to be having an affair with a married man or their sisters boyfriend or be having a sex change and not telling their wives!!!?????!!!. (Okay, okay, I know that's very naive, but I was young and information wasn't as easy to get hold of back then. Opinions were definitely different back then as well!) How was I to know that there was a completely different world out there and television was full of cr*p?
I guess back then I didn't get the difference between gender identity and sexuality.
Confused? I was f***ing freaked out. But more than that I was pretty close to the edge. Family life was bad, my parent were arguing with me all the time (probably my fault totally...sorry Mum and Dad!), hormones were ripping through my body and making what was already a confused youngster even more confused. I mean how can a boy who likes to dress as a girl go out with a real girl and have a relationship! There was no hope (okay so I know different now but back then...whoaa!)
Looking back on it I don't know why I got so low but I did. I've never talked to anyone about it before so you're kind of privileged. I thought about suicide, and by thought I mean I got hold of everything I needed and sat there looking and deciding, I mean I had nothing to lose and nothing to live for...except my brother. You see even to this day I think it was him who stopped me. Maybe I was looking for an excuse not to do it but I think I simply found a reason to live. I loved him deeply (and still do) and I knew that I couldn't leave him. He would have been too young to understand and we were so close.
So to start with I lived from day to day and then week to week and then I realised that I enjoyed life again. Oh I still argued with my parents, I still had my dressing to sort out but something had changed, maybe I had changed, I think I'd grown up. By now I was about 17, I'd had a couple of girlfriends, nothing serious but that was all to change.
(Just before you go on I'd just like to say that if you are this low please, please talk to someone. I know in the UK there are the Samaritans, maybe there is something similar near you? Talking to someone is not the absolute redemption but it is a first step. You cannot believe how good it is to talk to someone understanding. There are also so many Transgendered groups now that can be accessed via the internet. Please just give it a chance. Just search around and you'll soon find someone near yourself and most of all remember that you are worth so much more.)
Anyway on with the story...I met a girl at work (part time during my A-levels- that's the work not the girl!) and fell madly in love. My dressing stopped and I thought "whoopeee I'm cured, all I needed was a beautiful girl who will love me".
Okay stop laughing over there at the back. You know that that is wrong because why would I be writing this if that was how it finished?
I stopped dressing for about 9 months till the feeling came back again. Never really strongly but still there. I guess I stopped mainly because I spent every moment I could with her. Our relationship was great, maybe even marriage material, but I passed my A-levels and got accepted to University. We naively thought that we would stay together. That we were strong enough. Alas that wasn't to be. I don't regret the relationship I'm in now one bit but I do regret the way that one finished. I'm not going to go into it now but just to say sorry to her. She was great and I really hope her life went well. I wonder how she would have coped with all this?