Unintentional Learning

     I have this memory, from whenever I was in school and I walked into a lunch room. Not just one specific time but many, many times throughout many different schools and across so many stages of my life. I would walk in to a full or filling lunch room and see groups of friends sitting down; talking or laughing or showing each other something they think their friends like. Kids would walk in behind me and be called to, motioned to sit next to friends. I'd see some kids sitting down without being asked, because they didn't have to be called over or ask to sit down and I remember watching that be cool with whomever they sat by.

...then there was me...

Each second became harder, somehow, to find a place to belong. I tried so hard to just be invisible so I could survey the area without being noticed. But as I have learned, I can't will myself to be unseen. I felt the awkward pouring over me, I felt kids' eyes hitting me and I felt the panic of the fact that even though I looked out of place; like I just needed ONE person (not friend, because...what's that) to pity me and ask me to sit with them...they didn't care.

All that I just explained took seconds, maybe a minute in real time but to me every single time that happened it was longer than any clock had to show. And it wasn't the fact that I was awkward that hurt so much, it wasn't that I needed to sit or even that I had no friends (most of the time at least) It was the fact that no one cared enough for real to help me out of that misery. Even people who claimed to be 'my friend' didn't care if I was going through those torturous moments.

So I learned that I was able to make myself invisible. My superpower, right?! There were times when I would stand in a corner of a cafeteria, lean against a wall and eat my lunch and not one person would say a word to me. I wish I could say this is just a metaphor or an exaggerated example of things that happened but this has happened to me many times, in real life. And it hurt worse every time I went through it.

     If that was just a memory and I was hurt but learned from it, that's cool. But it affected me in a pretty big way. Dissecting what that did to me:

-I learned that there's no sympathy for people like that (like me) and for some time I was actually scared that I might be a sociopath because I developed the ability to just not care, like there was some switch and I found a way to turn it off.

-I learned that I don't matter to people. I heard people talk about how they could never just ignore someone when they have no friends but those were some of the same people who saw me standing there and had absolutely no emotional reaction to seeing someone on the brink of panic attacks or on the verge of giving up and they didn't even flinch. If they can't handle seeing someone in pain and don't have even an inkling of emotion when they see me...they're not the problem, I am.

-I learned to avoid groups all together or to show that I don't want to be in groups.

-I learned to hide from social situations and eventually I learned to hide from situations that hurt me the same way, even when it wasn't as bad as I thought it felt like it to me and it hurt the same as if it was the worst case scenario.

-I learned to shut down when an overwhelming amount of emotional weight hit me the way it did then.

     And these are just a few things that I unintentionally leanred from those seemingly small moments. Those teachings have bled into areas of my life that I am told regularly "You need to just stop." except there's no second part to those commands, the part that explains how to 'just stop' and I'm left learning that I'm not good enough even stronger...like a terrible truth on steroids. HULK SMASH all over me again and again.

Stress, Stress, Stress

     Stress does NOT feel pretty. I know...OBVIOUS. I'm not trying to bring some deep thought to the forefront of the world. Stress has such a hold on me that I have no idea how to even try to solve that.

When I was younger, the time I was supposed to be learning how to deal with stress and grow mentally and learn what to do in tough situations was spent escaping  a terrible family life and mental abuse to say the least.

Instead of slowly taking on more responsibilities in my teen years, I was watching my close family members self destruct and trying to keep myself out of the line of fire at times. And I also watched my immediate relatives either cut me out of their lives or leave me hanging when I needed them most.

     The good that came from that is I learned a survival instinct that I have since needed and used. The bad thing is I missed out on a good amount of valuable growth in a variety of ways; one specific way affects me every single day and hit me particularly hard today (Saturday May 12th 2018).

Scenario: I was at work and it was busy. Now for most people that's not easy but dealable. For someone who hasn't had much experience learning how to deal with the stress of doing many things at once, it was unbearable. and I failed the day hard. I was on the register and can't even count how many times multiple things were going on at once and I messed up all the things.

From the start of my day, I wasn't ready for anything. My shift leader told me...at EIGHT AM, that the assistant manager wanted to talk to me. For anyone who doesn't have anxiety in their daily life, that is the equivalent of the phrase "We need to talk..." in a relationship.

It's seriously one of the hardest things to hear and go about my day after that. And to make that even worse is my shift lead told me that at 3pm, I needed  to talk to my assistant manager. That means between 8 am and 3pm, I needed to not look like my heart was going to explode from worry about what she wanted to talk to me about.

And to make things even WORSE, at 2:30 I found out my asst manager was gonna be late so I didn't even get to talk to her. I'm still trying to stay calm and I've been out of work for hours now. I have to wait till at least Monday to find out she wants to talk to me about...I may not make it till then. If I have a heart attack, y'all know why. (That's only MOSTLY sarcasm.)

     Okay now that I got that out of my system, I'm going to try to forget about all that for at least a day. On to some more personal thoughts and what's going on in my mind. Warning, this is going to get personal and possibly TMI for some.

Saxon Sharbino is half
 of my spirit animal

Blaire White is the
other half of my spirit animal

One of the most important things to my transition is passing. I know that's superficial or shallow or something but it's true. I want to feel and be pretty, I want to have breasts and a nicer body and be looked at as feminine without looking like a guy in a dress.

And right now, I'm in the not there yet stage which has me impatiently waiting for the hormones I'm taking to do something more than emotionally.

Shmutzies.com

     Other life events: So recently I got in touch with a few family members I haven't seen in a very long time and that was seriously amazing! Two aunts of mine visited me, we went to my favorite diner and then took a walk around a nearby trail park and caught up with each other. My aunt Caren, who makes awesome soap and other great stuff, has been an enormous supporter of my transition and my aunt Beth is such a cool person that I wish I got to know her better years ago. I had a blast with them and am looking forward to being able to say the word family and not having it be a negative thing. 

And a few people have inspired me to try to get a story idea I have had for a long time out of my head and onto paper, so to speak. I'm working on writing a story about a young girl who eavesdrops on some pretty interesting people. I'll share more of that in the future and I'm really excited to work on it. My cousin Ryan, my aunts and a few other close friends have helped inspire me. Thanks.

Last thing:
     Travel is in my future and I could not be more excited for that!! Next year will be a big year for me for a few reasons, I'll be a little bit closer to becoming Layla and will be much mor eopen about that, I'll be seeing some new things and places and working on the book. Get ready.

A Possible Beginning to my Journey

     I remember being in preschool, there was a wall full of costumes that was about the coolest thing I ever saw...at the time at least. (Hey I was like 5, chill out.) Anyway, this wall had so many hats and scarves and dresses and fake jewelry and canes and so much more.

This wall fascinated me from the very second I learned what it was, I wanted to be anything and everything. I guess you could point to that time that formed my desire to act and write. I played with that costume wall every chance I got but there was something that I really wanted to do but never could;
I always wanted to dress up and play with the girls and enjoy dressing up Barbie dolls. I watched the girls having fun and felt jealous and sad that I couldn't be a part of that. And I understood their games and love of clothes and I felt like on some level I belonged with them.


Then I looked at what the boys were playing with and how they were playing, some of it wasn't horrible but there wasn't much that I cared about. I specifically remember playing with my best friend when we were kids and GI Joe was a big thing but I absolutely hated it! In fact, the only thing I liked at all was setting up the scenes.

I would set up a town for the GI Joes or transformers or legos for hours and get things just the way I wanted and then I'd clean up and put everything away. It was a weird dynamic I had going but it was me trying my hardest to accept me as a boy and it wasn't working but it was all I had. I had a Mickey Mouse stuffed animal that I treated like it was my kid, I took it everywhere and took care of it like it was a real baby and for a long time I didn't know why I wanted to do that so bad.

I remember seeing my friends that were boys building and digging and working on their preskool cars like they were mechanics and there I was babysitting a Mickey Mouse stuffed animal while dreaming of playing with the girls and playing with makeup.

The few times I was able to do those things, it was like I was in the right place or doing the right thing. My little sister would play with her dolls and I'd play with her, giving me a reason to dress up the dolls and match clothes and just be who I felt was the real me.

I know all kids go through phases like that but this was more than a phase and I knew it then, I didn't just put on my mom's shoes just to get attention. I knew then that I wanted to truly be a girl, like always.

That was the time it went from a boy who hated being what he was to a boy knowing he wanted to be a girl. From there it became a need that I had to bury, hide and ignore and treat like just a disgusting guilty pleasure. But I'm really starting to believe that that's when a journey began for me that might have a happier ending...


                                                                           ...I hope.

Relax? What's that?

     So you asked me about relaxation? Since you insist, I'll tell you what I do to relax. Actually I'll take a picture of my list of ways I relax.

Sounds about right Yeah, being refreshed or relaxing doesn't exist to me really. When I was a kid, I used to escape into hockey to get away from my immediate abusive and scary life. Hockey, while intense and mostly non relaxing, was a ton better than watching your family slowly kill themselves and realizing that your life is awful in just about every way. So for years, watching the Flyers, Avalanche, Ducks or any other team that wasn't Pittsburgh was my main source of relaxing.

     The only problem is...as I'm sure you said to yourself...that is NOT a form of relaxation. 

An escape? Yeah, definitely. 

A form of letting out rage or frustration? Of course. Who doesn't feel better after hitting a ball or puck as hard as they can for a few hours and beating up on anyone opposing you? Right, no one.

BUT...every aspect of my life outside of that was stressful to the highest degree and I had absolutely no way of ever feeling that refreshed life feeling. And not only did I have no 'relax' in my life but I was lying to myself about it. I convinced myself that I was okay for a long time and that stress wasn't too much for me. That was one of many lies I told myself as a kid that were slowly hurting me from the inside out. 

     So looking now at my life and I still have no way to relax, no way to calm down. Once in a while I look on eBay for some pill that fills all my relaxation needs or some DIY mixture of relaxation

1 cup Honey

1 1/4 cup vinegar

1/2 cup stress free gluten free peanut butter

2 cups water

Mix till stress dissolves and rub on eyeballs twice a day for 14 days.

I'm sure anyone reading this is shocked to find out two things: 1. that the mix I just posted is NOT good for the eyeballs and 2. nothing on eBay or any DIY site remedies stress, at least not the way I'm trying to look for. 

     I'd love to finish this with some way I've found to make things better but that's where it ends currently. I take days when I have no obligations and do absolutely nothing or very very little but that only pauses my stress levels, doesn't actually relieve any of it. 

To be continued...