Post by Maria on Apr 14, 2022 20:25:38 GMT
I was going to put this is the private message "How are you today" thread, but thought maybe it deserved its own space, especially as it may be of use to anyone else who checks out the site *waves to lurkers*.
For the past week or so, I've been finding that my perspective on things has maybe shifted slightly. What little fluctuation there was between feeling female and not has pretty much completely gone. And even when I see myself in the mirror, a lot more than usual I am seeing myself reflected back, rather than the person that other people see and that I pretend to be. But where that is undoubtedly positive, other things have sort of shifted to more negative in order to balance it out. Like when I do have to boymode, seeing myself in the mirror I see a woman wearing men's clothes. But then that makes it so much harder to adopt the personality of who I "should" be when wearing them. And seeing my face in the mirror and knowing how much better it looks with some makeup on, but knowing that at that particular time, that's not an option.
I think it struck hardest this afternoon. I was completely gender-appropriate, as I knew I wouldn't be going out for the rest of the day. But mid-afternoon, there was a sudden knock at the door. I peered through the blinds on the stairs and it was a mail delivery truck, trying to deliver an unexpected package. Obviously there was no way I could open the door as I was, and the length of time it would take me to switch into "boymode" to do so would have been far longer than the driver would have waited. And it just made me think, really. When I'm here and being who I am, I feel so much better for it. But to do so, I can't leave the house, or answer the door, and I have to keep all the curtains and blinds closed no matter the time of day. Even when I'm here in my safe space, I'm still hiding. And I was thinking about my mindset, and how I feel about it all. When I can do these things, I feel so much better, but at the same time it does limit what I can actually do. And when I can't, I'm almost counting down the days until I can again. It kind of feels like I'm in a weird kind of limbo, where I'm doing what I can to feel good for as much of the time as possible, and waiting for some mystical day when something miraculously changes and I can feel like that all the time. But realistically, that day will never come. It makes me think of when people talk about living life and thriving vs surviving. Right now, I'm definitely in the surviving camp. And of course that is not a position that anyone would want to be in permanently. But then I don't know that there actually is a way to not be in survival mode. The only way I can even imagine doing so would be to crawl back into my egg and hope it goes away again, but then the thought of doing that just feels orders of magnitude worse than just staying in survival mode.
I guess this is our lot in life. I realise it's not really something where there is any advice to be given. But I thought I would share, especially in the public section, so that maybe someone else might come across it feeling the same way and realise that they're not alone in feeling that way.
For the past week or so, I've been finding that my perspective on things has maybe shifted slightly. What little fluctuation there was between feeling female and not has pretty much completely gone. And even when I see myself in the mirror, a lot more than usual I am seeing myself reflected back, rather than the person that other people see and that I pretend to be. But where that is undoubtedly positive, other things have sort of shifted to more negative in order to balance it out. Like when I do have to boymode, seeing myself in the mirror I see a woman wearing men's clothes. But then that makes it so much harder to adopt the personality of who I "should" be when wearing them. And seeing my face in the mirror and knowing how much better it looks with some makeup on, but knowing that at that particular time, that's not an option.
I think it struck hardest this afternoon. I was completely gender-appropriate, as I knew I wouldn't be going out for the rest of the day. But mid-afternoon, there was a sudden knock at the door. I peered through the blinds on the stairs and it was a mail delivery truck, trying to deliver an unexpected package. Obviously there was no way I could open the door as I was, and the length of time it would take me to switch into "boymode" to do so would have been far longer than the driver would have waited. And it just made me think, really. When I'm here and being who I am, I feel so much better for it. But to do so, I can't leave the house, or answer the door, and I have to keep all the curtains and blinds closed no matter the time of day. Even when I'm here in my safe space, I'm still hiding. And I was thinking about my mindset, and how I feel about it all. When I can do these things, I feel so much better, but at the same time it does limit what I can actually do. And when I can't, I'm almost counting down the days until I can again. It kind of feels like I'm in a weird kind of limbo, where I'm doing what I can to feel good for as much of the time as possible, and waiting for some mystical day when something miraculously changes and I can feel like that all the time. But realistically, that day will never come. It makes me think of when people talk about living life and thriving vs surviving. Right now, I'm definitely in the surviving camp. And of course that is not a position that anyone would want to be in permanently. But then I don't know that there actually is a way to not be in survival mode. The only way I can even imagine doing so would be to crawl back into my egg and hope it goes away again, but then the thought of doing that just feels orders of magnitude worse than just staying in survival mode.
I guess this is our lot in life. I realise it's not really something where there is any advice to be given. But I thought I would share, especially in the public section, so that maybe someone else might come across it feeling the same way and realise that they're not alone in feeling that way.