I Can't Escape It

     I had a dream last night and I don't think another dream has ever scared me this much before.

I had this dream that I was invited to someone's house for dinner, I didn't want to go because I was hurting too much; hurting too much inside. They kept trying to bring me inside and treat me like part of their family. And after a while of them trying unsuccessfully, they took my bike away from me and said I could only get it back after dinner.

I sat down and could barely handle it. I wanted to cry, to sob, right there at the table. I felt like hopelessness would have been a step up, as if I knew there was not a single thing on earth that could fix...me. I tried, I really tried to just be normal and calm and smile but I just barely kept tears from pouring down my face.

After about 5 minutes of everyone around me talking and greeting each other and laughter, someone brought the dinner out. I was slightly eased by the fact that the dinner meant I could leave sooner.

They brought the actual plate of food in using my bicycle to carry it and the moment they put the food on the table, I politely (as politely as I was able through tears and a forced smile), I took the handlebars of my bike, walked it out the door and started riding down the street.

As I rode, I just started sobbing, harder than I ever have before. I couldn't control the painh for another second and I fell on some grass in some yard. It must have been my place because I walked to the back yard and opened a shed door.

As I opened the door and guided my bike in, I felt like someone was following me. I imagined someone coming to steal my bike and kill me. I had that second of fear but the hopelessness and emptiness took over and I hoped I was right, I wanted someone to come and end me. I stepped out of the shed, dropped the bike behind me and waited for someone to do it. I held my hands up in the air in a "what now" pose and closed my eyes (I was crying so hard, I can still feel that emotion as I'm writing this hours later) 

When no one came to rob me, I just dropped to the ground, no energy to even stand anymore. I began loudly sobbing, moaning and screaming that I just want to be done (though I was more blunt with my words. It's actually hard to type the exact words at the moment) 

And in a heap on the ground, as I wailed in the most empty terrifying pain I had ever known, I lsot that feeling that someone was around even to hurt me. There was no one to help me or do anything about the pain, there was no one to attack me or steal from me, there was...just...no one. Anywhere.

I remember looking around and all the cars in the street nearby were in the road, abandoned with some doors still opened and there was faint music coming from someone's house and thie erie sound of win became louder even though there was no actual win blowing. It was like an empty sound filling everything.

I woke up sobbing and saying the phrase I screamed in my dream and looking around for someone to please attack me (or hug me or to someone how make it better, however that happened) My hands were clenched so hard I have a cut on the inside of my palm and I still, this very second, feel like emptiness is more painful than any physical pain.

     I'm trying so hard to hold out for some...thing, some miracle. I just...I'm running out of reasons to believe in anything anymore. Sorry this isn't more positive, but this is as honest and vulnerable as I truly am. 

     Searching for...something. Anything. 

Thanksgiving part 1: Before

     So...here we are...it's 2017, almost the end of another year. And maybe it's because I just finished netflix watching a tv show that kinda has always been ther efor me or amybe it's because things are changing or maybe it's just the most painful time of year for me...

     ...but either way, I'm sad.

I'm sad because of all of that, the anniversary of losing my uncle just passed, which is weird because it hits me every day so I thought it shouldn't hit me harder on a certain time.

     Anyway, I have been running on fumes for a while now and a day turns into a week and a week turns into 5 weeks and 2 months turn into a year and so on and so on till you realize you're 35 and not happy... and haven't been for a long time.

But each morning, I can't just not wake up or get up or go to work. I can't just sit in a corner till the house is torn down and be the ghost I feel like I am. So instead I put on a face, I smile and tell people they're better than whatever they are facing and I try to make this world a better place. I try to strike while the iron's hot even when the iron is in the back of the closet, the wire is old and unusable and the ironing board was sold years ago from under the iron's nose...so to speak.

But I try. Ohmygosh, do I try. I don't cry throughout entire days, I try to laugh through a lot of my pain. It worked when I went to funerals for my uncles so it's gotta work for when customers forget theyre talking to a human and treat me like garbage because I don't know the difference between their brand of cigarette and another that's so similar I can't tell the difference even after hearing the explanation...right?

Laughing and joking has to work when I wake up to remember that I've never ever felt anything but hatred that I was born the sex that I am and the wear and tear of pretending to be a typical male for so long has me considering anything to get out of doing that ever again even for a second.

And SURELY laughing has to work when you are invited to a holiday gathering by the greatest friends I could possibly ask for but all I want to do is forget that it's a holiday or that families exist,
I just want to escape into tv shows about ficticious cities in Conneticut or fictional bars in Boston or New York City. It's easier to take my empty life and the pain when I'm watching the worst psychiatrist ever listening to people or watching a doctor say things to patients that I'd LOVE to say to customers at my own job.

     ...so here I am...in 2017, almost 2018...



I am trying my hardest to acknowledge the good in my life wevcen though I'm not very good at it. This is the part where I thank God for the things He's given me.

     I want to thank God for my friends, without whom I would not be where I am. I truly do thank God as much as I can for the people He put in my path. I also am very very thankful for my cousin who is a serious light in my sometimes darkness filled life.

My second Dr's visit Update

     So there I was...and by the way, picture this in an intense movie voice...I was at the Dr's and everything was going well. I was nervous but was put at ease as my Dr and I talked.

My expectation going in was that this was visit 2 of 3 and that I'd be taking some tests, that my next visit would be when I started hormones. Things seemed to be going a little quicker than that as my Dr said started talking about me taking medicine today. TODAY!

I was trying to stay calm but was internally going CRAZY! I thought, "IT'S FINALLY HAPPENING!" From the earliest memory, I have been wanting this. Needing this. Unable to cope without this. And I started to take the moment in, I started to kinda step outside my body in a metaphoical way and  really breathe in the fact that I was about to begin my journey as Layla Jade Gilmore.

It was a dream come true...or at least close to a dream come true. And no, I'm not talking about any doubt or guilt or changing of opinions, as my Dr wrote and placed her order for estrogen, she said the last thing I needed to do was get an EKG.

Once taken, she came back and told me there was something slightly off about it. Not enough to say there is any real danger but just enough for her to want me to make sure there's nothing serious. Then she said to me (paraphrasing, of course) I could go downstairs to the pharmacy and buy the hormones but she implores me to see a cardiologist before taking medicine.

So I sat there and for a brief second I thought, I could just start and not even go through any of that. She's not gonna check up on me until January and I could just skip that. Or I could start the hormones and see a cardiologist when  I'm able. (I said brief but I'm still having that thought and it's not easy to just say no)

     So here I am with a choice, I could go today and pick up my prescription or I can call a cardio Dr and add an expense to my life that will make my wallet even smaller. To put things into context, I have about $40.00 that has to last two weeks, thinking about adding a Dr cost to this will kinda make eating food nearly impossible for me. This is a very strong temptation...

BUT (there's always a but) I don't want to do anything to destroy things and for maybe the first time in my life, I actually have an affection for my life's direction. I have many memories of wanting to end things or at least memories of not caring if I make it to tomorrow so being in a position where I am excited to make it to tomorrow is new to me; I can't do something to ruin that.

I'm so exccited to see myself on the outside the way I've always envisioned myself mentally. I'm beyond enthusiastic about mastering makeup, clothing options and feeling free emotionally. I'm euphoric about the idea of liking myself, I have never felt that way ever. I've never liked myself, I've never liked my name or having to look in the mirror or anything involved with me having to deal with myself...I want to feel what it's like to like those things.

     In all this I find myself both exceeding my original expectations and disappointed by my new expectations, it was weird to go from thinking I was going to have to wait to thinking I was going to start that day to finding out that I would probably end up with the original plan; and I find myself trying not to be sad about this. It's funny how expectations can change and can change moods so quickly.

     Well, that was my Friday filled with questions and choices and decisions. Here's the side notes from the last few days in a nutshell:

   *I rode my bike across the bridge. If I ever think about doing that again...please remind me that I hate that idea...like COPMPLETELY. It was terrifying, not because I was unsafe but because my view was the water VERY far below on one side and the highway and traffic on the other side and a small path for me to ride. The visual was realy scary even though I was completely safe.

   *I admitted that my anxiety has gotten a very little bit better lately. Even though it's not cured by any means, I have been able to handle a little bit more a little bit better. That's a good sign and I'm gonna try to take on a very little bit more with baby steps.

   *Speaking of my expectations, I have learned over the last few weeks at work that I have trouble not getting frustrated when people don't live up to the standards that I set for myself. Like when people are rude or selfish in ways I behave, it makes me very impatient while dealing with them. I know that needs to change in me.

   *And lastly, I know that hockey is and has been for a long time an escape to me but I absolutely love the sport and the conversation/community it brings with it. One of my best friendsd and I have probably the best conversations through texting during
Flyers games. That connection is so important to me and it seriously helps on such a deep level to be able to talk to someone who gets it and can keep up.













     Thanks for reading and please feel free to leave comments or your experience if you've been through anything similar. And as always, prayers are always wemcome.

Awkward level: Expert

     Please tell me you remember Steve Urkel. You what??! You don't? Are you calling me old? Ok...yeah, I guess you have a point. Ok so Steve Urkel was a character in a 90's sit-com called Family Matters. You have probably heard the theme song from another one of your old friends (yes, we're friends now and no you can't opt out. Friends are forever)
So this show is based on a good family (the Winslows) and their wacky clumsy neighbor, a young Stephen Urkel, who is a scientist and ruins pretty much everything he touched (except when the writers needed him to do things like...be a scientist)

He comes over all the time without knocking, because neighbors in the 90's were that close, and he was madly in love with the Winslow daughter Laura. Urkel was a lovable loser and he played very well off of his counter part family, mainly the father Carl.

He would come over and the family would be working on a house of cards, slowly standing them up and clearly it took them many hours to work on. Steve would walk in and knock over a broom which would hit the chair at the table housing the elaborate card building...and can you guess what happens next?

Yup, you're right. Carl tries to stop the chair, bumps into Laura and she lands face fist into a pie (there was always a pie for someone's face to end p in) and when the crowd stopped laughing, the house of cards would topple and Urkel would give his famous line, "Ask not what you can do for..." Oh, wait...wrong quote. No, he'd say, "Did I do that?"

The reason I'm bringing all this up is to explain how I see myself a majority of my life. I am quite adept at making the worst of a mistake and creating big problems for anyone close to me at the time.
I don't mean exactly the way Urkel did, he would comically bump into something or drop something and the show would turn into a living Mouse trap game. This hits that and that knocks over a thing, which falls on [insert item that is meant to be protected]

I have had my moments like that but overall, I'm more of the person who says the worst thing at thew worst time or that person that loses or breaks the ONE thing I need at the one moment I need it most and if I were on a sit-com, there would be a moment where I look at the camera and say some silly phrase while waiting for a crowd to laugh and clap. And what makes things worse is I have times where I can see it coming, I can recognize when I'm in the middle of saying or doing something that I'm going to majorly regret. In my mind I'm screaming,

"STOP! STOP NOW! Ok. stop now...You...you didn't stop. 

Why didn't you...Oh and now you're still going?! 

Why would you still go?! What could you...oh boy...you just made it worse. 

You couldn't possibly make it...wow...you. just. made. it. worse."

I can sometimes see that I'm about to ruin things and I could do one of two things: I could keep going and hope it doesn't go as bad as it could (hint: It ALWAYS goes worse than the worst I imagined it could go) Or I could try to do the opposite or change what I'm doing at least a little. And I've heard that going with your first instinct is usually better than trying to overcompensate so I try to steer the ship out of the way of damage.

I am convinced that even when I try to do the opposite of the wrong decision, I make that choice at the wrong times...George
Costanza's theory fails me.

And as comical as some of this can be or even harmless overall, it drives me mad when I know what I'm going to say is going to be the wrong thing.

You want an example? Like from a tv show? Oh from my life? I can give you one that was hilarious afterwards and barely anyone caught it but I still remember it like it happened yesterday. And I still get embarrassed and laugh most of the time about it.

So the scene is at my church, I was in charge of the morning adult Sunday school service (not like a pastor, kinda the pre service service) I led our tiny group in songs and maybe brought up a verse or something like that.

Well the end came and in my mind I smoothly finished it by saying, "Thanks for coming and you can all circumvent to wherever you are going." then I smiled and everyone clapped and gave me a standing ovation. And then they threw roses at me and asked me to give a speech on how great it is to be me.

Now here's how it happened outside the awkward playground that is my mind. My mouth opened, words started falling weirdly out and they sounded like this, " Ok everyone, thanks for you coming. You may all circumcise to your rooms..."

You may laugh, you may make fun of me (as if me not giving you permission would stop you) but know that I will laugh harder and make fun of me harder than you ever could. I was also soooo much more embarrassed at that moment when I realized one girl heard that and had to walk out of the room quick before bursting out in laughter.

That's the kinda funny thing I refer to when I talk about saying the wrong things at the wrong times. I'm not only good at it, I'm at expert level saying/doing the wrong things at the wrong times.

I hope this made someone laugh or relate in some way...good luck to us all.