Sean McBride this is a very different experience to mine, or at least it seems. While you have changed, you are also very much the same amazing person you always were.

Nothing is permanent, the life you were part of
giving me taught me this, and just because the father you once were is not exactly the person you are now, does not mean that father is gone, merely that he exists in a time that has passed.

You did a tremendous job as a father, without you I would not be the person I am, and now you do a tremendous job of being Joanie, and I wouldn't have it, or you any other way.

I have often wondered if I would feel differently had your transition come while I was in high school and had to endure the things kids might have said, but what ifs aren't worth much energy.

I love you!
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I say I "knew" when I was 4; Knew I was female. What if it was true that the male role models were so bad, that I never wanted to be like them? What if mothers, sisters,and females were much more preferable? Could that have meant that if good males had been in my life, I'd have wanted to be one? The brother that just died was a murderer and a rapist. Why would I want to be like him? My other brothers were distant, unaffectionate, and mean, often making fun of me. In turn I was mean to my own brother, five years younger. How can I look back and possibly regret the past enough? My step father, who could perhaps have molded me, was incredibly abusive and molesting.

As an adult, I was never masculine enough and was often told so and pointedly. People being ignorant often thought I was gay, something unpardonable for a man with a wife, three children and a dog. Working in a place with 1000 employees in a 7 acre manufacturing plant, I'd hear comments that I was gay, so I'd go to the phone, call the wife, and at noon, she would show up with the children, leave the dog home, and and set two giant Pizzas on the table along with some pop and we'd eat lunch. No one would say I was gay for a while.

Then came the day that a counsellor said that I had GID. Just what the hell does a family man, married for 21 years, with three children a hot wife and a dog, a church, and good friends, and a great job do with that? Why I fought it off, it could not be right. I had never been attracted to a male. Looking back, perhaps my own hatred of males and being abused simply overshadowed the fact that I was gay ???

I was in denial so deep that I did not actually know the truth. I planned to kill myself when the youngest got married.

Somehow that didn't happen. Instead I became a woman, and to get revenge on the church that hurt me, I became Muslim. Yes, none of you who know how little sense that made need to say anything.

My son, who is now 49, has never accepted it, even after 12 years. He used to call me up every few months and passive aggressively vent his anger. The psychological community used to tell me that he and the girls would eventually adjust, and if they didn't, the psych folk could label it an adjustment disorder. Finally after his being particularly nasty, I told him that I never wanted to hear from him again. It's been more than 6 months and he hurts me less, but I do not know that he hurts any less. I haven't heard from the girls, 47 and 31, but once in that time.

I'm caught in a dilemma now. I would kill myself to end it all, but I have friends now and not a few. How can one end one's own suffering if it causes others to suffer? So here we are, living the best lives we can, being as kind to others as we know how, and telling ourselves that our own desire to make it hurt less should be supplanted by the need to help others suffer less.

You thought I would have an answer didn't you? I'm sorry.