Come back soon…Part two
I’m sitting up a little more and trying to clean my face and get the snuffles from crying out when my mom comes in.
I hurt looking at her. Well sorta looking at her if my head wasn’t hanging down so low.
She looks tired, like scared, hurt, worried and stressed out with no sleep tired.
My heart does a little hurting mewl because she doesn’t deserve that, not after everything she’s been through.
See, mom’s a breast cancer survivor.
I feel like real shit for doing this now. I mean it’s not like I can take it back either though.
She comes in and she takes my hand and she rubs her hand over mine and she is just looking there first for a few minutes before looking at me.
“Why Mike?”
“That’s why mom.”
“I don’t understand, what’s why?”
“Mike…my name it’s not who I am?’
“Michael.”
(Sniffle-sob.) “No mom never, not really?”
“So you think you’re a girl?”
“I don’t think mom…I know, I’ve always known.” (Sniffle-sob.)
She takes some tissues and she wipes at my eyes and I let her but almost turn my head away. This, this conversation and he not getting it hurts…it always has but now it’s right here out in the open and it hurts somehow all the more for that.
“Honey, don’t be like that I’m trying to understand…we all are.”
(Sniffle.) “Really?”
“Yes really, it’s just this has kind of caught all of us flatfooted.”
“I guess.” (Sniffle.)
“Guess, well it’s kind of a shock when I get a call telling me that my second oldest tried to overdose and was found in women’s clothes.”
(Sniffle —sob.) “Sorry….” It comes out as a whine.
“You should be you doing this, it hurt us young lady.”
(Sniffle-gulp.) “…………..Wha…”
“What? You’re one of those Trans people that’s in the news and stuff…I’m your mother I’m not sitting at home knitting all the time I have the internet too.”
(Sniffle.) “Sorry it’s just…”
“I’m not sure that I get it but since you’ve been here and out for so long we’ve had a good number of doctors and a couple of shrinks stop by and check in on you and us and we’ve had some interesting talks too.”
(Sniffle.) “Really?”
“Yes really…Look. I’m willing to try but you have to meet us halfways with this and actually talk to us.”
(Sniffle —sob.) I look down again. “I couldn’t…”
“Heavens why not haven’t your father and I said that you kids could tell us anything?”
(Sob!) “Yes! I’m Sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry….” I start to bawl again and she schooches over to the bed and she holds me. “I’m so sorry mommy.”
“Why did you never tell us honey we could have done so much so sooner!”
“I was scared!” (Sob.) I bury my face into her stomach and she rocks me.
“Why, what did we do to make you so afraid of us?”
(Sob.) “Nothing!...You don’t have to do anything I was just scared…”
How do you explain how it feels? How you think it’s wrong yourself, how you doubt everything and how badly it still hurts when you finally get why you’re hurting? Hi1 I’m your child that you’ve loved and cared for in a certain way all of my life only I’m not really that person that you love so much I’m someone else.
And having a dad…and all brothers…
“Well you don’t have to be scared anymore honey.”
“Mom?” (Sniffle.)
“I mean there’s a lot we have to do and go through together and you’re kind of signed in here for a good while for like evaluation but we will get through this and we will fix this.”
My mouth just went dry. “Fix?”
“No not that way Michelle, but like therapy and talking to the gender shrink they have here and that kind of fixed stuff. (Mom-sniffles) that and the dress.”
(Sniffle.) “The dress?”
“Yes, good lord honey that thing looked awful on you. You looked like your great Aunt Bess.”
(Sniffle-smile.) “I…I bought what I could in secret…I didn’t have…sorry.”
“Well we’ll have to go shopping when you’re out and after what the doctor says.”
(Sniffle.) “Okay…and mom?”
“Yes honey?”
“It’s not Michelle I know everyone thinks that’s what I want…what I feel my name is but it’s not.”
Mom leans back and she looks at me. “It isn’t?”
(Sniffle.) “No… (Sniffle.)…I always wanted to be a Jennifer… (Sniffle.)…Just like my mom…!” (Sniffle-sob.)
Mom looks at me and her eyes went wide and they shimmer and they fill and they spill over with tears and she hugs me tight and she sobs out. “Oh baby…Oh Jenny really!?”
(Sniffle-sob!) “Yy..yes, I’ve always wanted to be like you!”
We both start crying and crying and I don’t know where the tears are coming from but it’s like I have had them stored inside of myself for so long that…maybe that’s what I was drowning in inside…all my held back and unshed tears.
And just when I think I haven’t dumped enough water out of my system I wipe my eyes. “I need to pee.”
Mom smiles and she rubs at her own face. “Here let me help, you’re still on a drip.”
I’m really shaky and I’m not sure if it’s recovery or nerves but mom helps me to the bathroom and she stays just outside the door. I go to…
It’s a mom sense thing…has to be. “Honey?”
(Snuffle.) “Yeah Mom?”
“Go ahead, sit down….”
I have fresh tears and I’m biting my lip that she somehow got it.
I sit and…that’s when I notice that I’m actually wearing panties. They’re plain and they’re cotton and they’re still kind of pretty.
“Mom…?”
“Honey, I’m your mom of course I went and got you the right underwear.”
(Snuffle.) “Thanks mom…just thanks so much…”
“Jenny…I might not get all of it and I’m going to really try and learn but bringing my daughter fresh underpants when she’s in the hospital’s a no brainer.”
I pee…wipe…flush and wash and come out opening the door and look at her. “No mom, it’s a huge deal.”
I hug her tight. “Thank you so…much.”
“You’re welcome baby.” She smiles and helps me back to bed and while I’m up I can see it’s snowing outside the window. Not hard but those big fluffy flakes I have always loved as a girl.
“It’s snowing early.”
“No honey it’s December first, we’ve had snow here this time of year before.”
“It’s pretty.”
“It is, I’ve always love it when it’d snow like this.”
“You used to call this Mr. Thomas snow.”
“I did?”
“Yeah with the lamp posts and stuff you loved when I used to read the Narnia books to you as a kid.”
I duck my head and smile…try…it’s hard; it’s still a just scary thing to actually openly talk about this stuff with her like this. “I wanted to be Lucy so much…”
She sits beside me on my bed and she links her fingers in mine.
“It must be so hard…”
I nod and stare up and out my window and try to still see the snowflakes. “It is……” I stare a little longer and I look at her. “Do you hurt mom? I mean with everything as a woman?”
She looks and me and sort of turns a little more and gives me this really serious look. “You mean?”
“Now…after the mastectomies and the operation….?” Mom had a hysterectomy done too around the same time since her family had a history of other cancer too there.
She gets a little teary and shiny eyed. “I know I’m not supposed to, that I’m supposed to happy and grateful to be here honey and I am but I just don’t feel like me at all some days…not with all of what happened…yes, it hurts.”
I nod and a few tears spill out from my eyes again. “It’s like that Mom…it’s like that all the time.” (Sob!)
…………………..and there we’re both crying all over again and this time…this time though I think my mom’s crying because she gets it.
Comments
Great Conversation
Hopefully, this story will continue to go the direction all of us want it to.
Portia
Hopefully it will:)
As with everything I do it's all on the fly.
*Great Big Hugs*
Bailey Summers
You called it....
...She gets a little teary and shiny eyed. “I know I’m not supposed to, that I’m supposed to happy and grateful to be here honey and I am but I just don’t feel like me at all some days…not with all of what happened…yes, it hurts.â€
I nod and a few tears spill out from my eyes again. “It’s like that Mom…it’s like that all the time.†(Sob!)
…………………..and there we’re both crying all over again and this time…this time though I think my mom’s crying because she gets it.
I only wish I had the strength to have this talk with my mother before she died. She knew about what I thought was crossdressing, but my therapist thinks that she might have known much more about me than even I did. And yes; I just don't feel like me at all some times and it's like that...just like that. Thank you!
Love, Andrea Lena
Wish I tried the conversation too
Hindsight, I figure my mother knew too, but neither of us dared to ask. One day it became too late. A therapist didn't come close he treated other symptoms of a scared boy.
Back then it was to venture into a no, no realm. Like in this story I didn't have sisters
JessieC
Jessica E. Connors
Jessica Connors
I'm of two minds on therapists.
They're very good for being objective on very common things we all suffer through but get deeper and they get flavored by a lot of personal biases despite the actual findings out there....Jenny never had the courage, just the situation has given her no where to run to, so she's having to face things.
*Great Big Hugs*
Bailey Summers
To talk before it's too late one way or another.
That's a really big thing for so many people especially with the way that so many of us really want to have the support and love of our families over we love them so much we so often ache for just the same.
I was really hoping that the way that Jennifer found a description would fit how it feels living with GID.
*Great Big Huge Hugs*
Bailey Summers
"It's like that Mom... it's like that all the time."
finding the right words for the hurt is hard, but she did pretty good.
Looks like the family is gonna be on board, that makes it easier
I was thinking about how to put the analogy for it.
And Jennifer pretty much wrote me the line herself.
*Great Big Angel Hugs*
Bailey Summers
And another 2 dozen Handkerchiefs
"2 down and onto kitty Carlisle" whatever that means, something Da always said to me. Just seemed to fit
Goddess Bless you
Love Desiree
Kitty Carlisle
I can answer that part, I think.
It's from a fifties/sixties television show called To Tell the Truth, where a panel of four celebrities try to determine which of three people onstage is the "real John Smith" (or whoever) by asking them questions. When the questioning was done, they'd each be called upon in turn to choose "number one, number two or number three" by writing down the number on a card and then explaining how they reached their conclusion.
Kitty Carlisle was one of the permanent panelists. (Tom Poston and Polly Bergen were two others; the fourth wasn't as constant, I think.) Anyway, host Bud Collyer would keep things moving with comments like the one you mention; obviously in that particular case Kitty was the third panelist called upon to respond.
Eric
Thanks Desiree, It was one of those good little moments.
And it showed a lot of consideration and some ahead thinking on the mom's part.
*Blessed Hugs*
Bailey Summers
Thanks Bailey
It's so nice to read of a mom being so supportive of her Tdaughter, especially after just finding out.
Much of your writing is like a load of big soft blankets that I can just flop into and damp all the pain.
Hugs and Bright Blessings,
Renee
You're really welcome Renee:)
It's a really good thing that this part has touched so many so far.
*Great Big Hugs*
Bailey Summers
Dayam, Bailey.
The first chapter made me cry because it was so sweet.
And now this chapter made me cry because of the depths of the pain coming out... it was so visceral.
What's in store next?
(Please don't feel you have to up the ante by having someone accidentally run over a puppy!!)
Xx
Amy
PS
I copied some of the paragraphs into my diary for safekeeping... because they are so ... right in how they describe how I feel.
xx
Amy
Wow...Amy thank you so much.
That's an amazing compliment. Thank you so much honey:)
*Great Big Hugs*
Bailey Summers
A serious mistake
I just made a serious mistake. I have a meeting with a customer in less than 20 minutes and I just read this. That was a huge mistake! Now I'm sitting here with my eyes all puffy, sniffling, and tears running down my face.
I should have known better than to read this Bailey- you do this to me every time! I can't even begin to express how this made me feel - except to say that I was almost there so many times in my youth, only my parents wouldn't have understood like Jennifer's mother. And the whole Jennifer thing - just wow! That's all I can say.
Dallas
D. Eden
Dum Vivimus, Vivamus
Thanks Dallas, sorry about the heart tugs and tears.
It was a pretty emotional part of the story and it definitely seems to have struck a chord or two with the people reading this. I hope the next one is well recieved as much.
*Great Big Hugs*
Bailey Summers
good thing she's on the drip
otherwise she be dehydrated by now for sure. the first time I gave plasma back in 79, I was so white they ran a whole bag through my arm, afterwards I could not get to the head fast enough. I think mom's onboard for sure.
great chapter, thanks
There's times when you can't turn the tears off.
And bottled up for so long sometimes when they get going you can't stop them.
*Hugs and Howls*
Bailey Summers
I hoped it would happen...
Thanks Mom, Bailey, you make it a conversation that happens. Jenny wasn't going there before the suicide failed. I hung myself, ran away (not far)and hated I was never caught.
This story goes where I haven't seen another story go... If there is one I would read that too.
I appreciate the breath you cover bailey.
Hugs, JessieC Early Christmas present oh thanks ^_^
Jessica E. Connors
Jessica Connors
Even if it's the same ground, it was done differently.
I want to try and find these new ways and takes on old stories. There's a lot of things that need to be said and written.
*Great Big Huge Hugs*
Bailey Summers
Oh Bailey...
OMG, this hits so close to home... The desperation for acceptance, all the anxiety and confusion of a life not understood; the internal and external pressure to conform with an existence alien to my own soul leading to an intolerable existence that made extreme alternatives seem not just possible but even palatable in comparison. This chapter brought an ache to the pit of my stomach.
I love the reference to Jenny drowning in her own unshed tears. Releasing those poisons is sometimes the only way to keep from sinking.
Thank you for another great chapter, Bailey. I'm looking forward to where you take this story next.
*Teary hugs*
Jen
Thanks Jen, it makes the hard writing worth it.
There are things we need to be told, to hear and see in some of these stories. I know they hold things tight and close, sometimes closer than is good for us. We need the person there beside us sometimes.
*Great Big Hugs*
Bailey Summers
You DID warn us
so I can't complain that I was blind-sided. Extreme tissue alert, indeed!
"…it’s like that all the time.†Ow.
As a teenager, I could relate to that. Black is much too bright a word to describe the depressions that I would slide into. Thankfully, they rarely lasted more than a few hours, and never more than a day or two. If they had, my casual thoughts of ending it all would have likely turned into reality.
Later, I realized it was a chemical thing, related to my post-puberty adjustment to the increased hormones rushing through my body. And later still, I realized that at least in part it was a reaction to hormones that weren't quite right for me. But then, what is right for someone who tests psychologically midway between male and female, and whose body will never pass for androgynous, let alone female?
Mostly, I do okay nowadays. But once in a while. Ow. You do good 'ow', Bailey. Really good ow. And I much prefer tears over your stories to ones for whatever might have been in life.
Keep your sweet stories coming. Thank you.
SuZie
I was hoping it was an "Ow." people got SuZie.
I'm very glad that it does seem to have been a very apt comparison that people are getting.
But you're right sometimes the Black moods can mug you like an attacker out of the dark.
*Great Big Hugs*
Bailey Summers
That is such a mom line
That is such a mom line. :-)
Well, more tears. It certainly warranted the extreme tissue alert. The way you reflect back the impact of the attempted suicide to the main character has a real emotional kick to what was an already emotive topic.
Well done again Bailey.
"Life moves pretty fast. If you don't stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it."
I was actually trying for that:)
I wanted a sort of subjectual back and forth and adding in the underpinning conversation between mom and daughter. Like with her mom bringing her panties.
I'm really glad that you're enjoying it.
*Great Big Hugs*
Bailey Summers
Oh wow, Mother/Daughter...
Moment long over do! Yes, I get it too! Jennifer, nice name. Being just like Mommy, priceless! Loving Hugs, Talia
Sometimes you want to be like Mom.
Or at least that's Mike's dream of their real self. We all get parts of our identity from those around us.
*Great Big Hugs*
Bailey Summers
Gosh Bailey!!!
Do you have stock in Kleenex?? At least they are happy tears!!
Jenny is very lucky and she is going to be alright!! Her mom is
trying and that alone makes a big difference!! Jenny will have a
difficult time (we all do who go through this!!) but she will have
a strong support base!!! I am so glad I started reading this story
Bailey!! Thanks!!!!
HUGS,
Pamela
Tissue Alert
When Bailey tags something with that, it's never wise to ignore it.
I've learned the hard way.
I made a very good decision
about going green Handkerchiefs from her we bought 16 dozen(four dozen each) of theseRibbon Corner Handkerchiefs
They have been very nice and treat our skin so very nice.
Goddess Bless you
Love Desiree
Thanks Pamela.
Trying is so, so important. We can fight through so much with just someone in our corners. Just one person saying it's okay I still care is huge.
*Great Big Hugs*
Bailey Summers
...
you did it again, with the name... *sniff sniff*
Upon my liar's chair
Full of broken thoughts
I cannot repair