Transitioning at a Mature Age — Musings On The Beginning Of My Story

I was born in the 69th year of my life and began puberty in my 70th. Transitioning is hard. Transitioning during a pandemic is harder. Transitioning at a mature age is harder still… But continuing to live as a fraud is the hardest of all. There is an old Chinese curse: “May you lead an interesting life.” Mine has been exceptionally interesting — full of heartache, dashed dreams and betrayals by those closest to me. But the silver lining is that interesting also means out of the ordinary — and mine has been anything but ordinary. Counterintuitively, it has on many levels been blessed.

At the moment I am an ugly duckling, no longer the man I once appeared to be, but hardly the girl I know I am — to outward appearances anyway. One of the fascinating things about my evolution is how new and raw my emotions have become. As Yogi Berra once said, it’s déjà vu all over again. It has been over 50 years since I went through puberty as a boy, and the memory of those times has faded for the most part; I don’t remember it as a dramatic transformation into adulthood. Rather it was more like one of the road signs on a long car trip, something to mark progress to the destination, but otherwise rather unremarkable. But of one thing I am certain, becoming a woman from the girl I currently am is far more rewarding and natural. I am truly at peace for the first time in a long time. I have found my way home. There is a connectedness with the universe and all the creatures in it that I have only glimpsed in the past…