An overdue update (Life after abuse update)

Something that was talked a lot about in many of my blogs has been my mental health and the progress I have been making. I am pleased to say that my mental health has only gotten better and I am a far healthier person compared to even myself from less than 2 years ago. I still struggle with issues involving PTSD, depression, and a few other mental health issues, but ultimately they've become more manageable compared to how they were in the past. I do occasionally deal with episodes of PSTD triggers that take their toll on me but rarely knock me down for too long. The worst episodes often involve nightmares either of events I went through or nightmares with connections to traumatic memories. These sometimes ruin my morning for a few hours before I work through them with a conversation with my wife or a trusted friend. Some triggers are just mundane things, like scenes from movies or shows that are similar to things I went through in my life. In most cases, my wife takes the time to help me talk through these episodes and then does what she can to make sure the triggers are managed. The last trigger is the fact that I still haven't fully recovered from the massive finical losses created by my abusers. Much of the stuff that was stolen from me was decades old, like the first set of Pokémon cards, or extremely rare video games like Rule of Rose. A lot of assets that could have been sold and helped during times of need aren't there and that has continued to be a minor problem for us. There's also just been the money that was taken and how long it took to recover, which luckily we were able to recover before Covid. Still, Covid did end up hitting us pretty hard and it still hurts that it could have been less of a hit if my money situation didn't take such a massive blow. These things still pop up from time to time but they have been slowly becoming easier to deal with. PTSD episodes can be talked through and I have resources to help me deal with those. Money is a hassle but it's replaceable and eventually, we will get to that point where it won't be such an issue. Life has been progressively getting better despite some small issues here and there. Those problems haven't stopped me from enjoying life or healing from my past because I've learned that it's going to take time and effort to heal. I am still actively doing things to better myself, like reaching out to friends from my past and reconnecting with them or making plans for the future, things that make life better.

I asked recently, "How did you accomplish finding happiness?" It took me a little bit to find the answer but I eventually gave my answer. I found happiness through accessing losses and accepting that my happiness couldn't happen without taking action first. The simple reality is that the path to moving forward requires accepting that losses were needed to happen along the way. Accept that you are going to need to do some pretty hard tasks like cutting out toxic people, leaving toxic environments, and even learning to live on your own or as an individual. These actions were needed in process of finding my own growth and path in life. It's a simple fact that you aren't going to grow if you continue to allow yourself to be dragged down and don't start cutting your losses. Being in a relationship where you aren't happy is only hurting yourself. Being in the same environment where you were being abused or are toxic is only continuing the cycle of self-abuse, you need to leave. Constantly depending on others for your own happiness or constantly being in relationships isn't healthy, you need to take time to find yourself. These are just some things I had to learn to start moving forward and finding my own happiness in life. These are things I don't think people really consider when it comes to becoming happy. People stick with toxic relationships, drinking themselves to death because they hate the people they are with but are too afraid to leave them, People stay in a toxic environment because they've become convinced that leaving is impossible and a result continue this cycle of self-abuse, refusing to believe that they can be their own change. People continue to either stay in a dead relationship or just bounce from partner to partner, so afraid of being alone because they've become convinced that they will never find happiness without a partner. It's these constant cycles of self-abuse that people put themselves through and a cycle I was once part of for a very long time. I had to learn how to start breaking those cycles and how important it was to refuse to allow myself to stay knocked down. I had massive setbacks and a lot of struggles that I had to get through, but I learned to reach out and ask for help when I needed it. I learned to get help to leave my old apartment and with better people. I was able to learn how to be more independent and self-reliant, which helped me accomplish so many of my goals, like starting HRT (hormone replacement therapy,) or going to college. I stopped hurting myself by realizing what factors were hurting me and either putting a stop to them or changing my direction. Simply put, refusing to continue a cycle of abuse and taking proactive efforts in bettering my life is what I did to accomplish finding happiness in my life. There is the added note that taking time to find myself did help me find healthier relationships, including starting my relationship with my wife. It's these changes coupled with the better relationships that I worked on that helped me start living a happier life.

There have been other changes to my life that have been helping make my life happier, mostly some personal changes to how I see and identify myself. One of the minor changes but still important to me is how I identify myself, which is as a genderfluid femboy/tomboy (mostly femboy though.) Is this an important change? To me, it is because of the growth required to get back to this point in my life and get back on track to being happier in my body again. A lot of the reasons why I identified as a "woman" weren't based on my own needs but due to the abuse and social pressures I was dealing with. I was struggling to get accepted by people who I believed cared about me and it was easier to get accepted if I just gave into an alternative. I either was a woman or I was a man, I am not a man and thus I had to fall into the "woman" category. This wasn't so bad and it's not like I dislike this idea, it's still part of who I am as a whole. What I have been dealing with is the fact that I don't always want to present as feminine and in fact, I enjoy doing things like playing with gender expression through things like chest binding, mixing styles, and other aspects of my gender expression, I have always been genderfluid. Yet, I never really got support from people I thought would support me, like the trans community or previous partners (except my ex-GF, who was supportive and still is a supportive friend,) so I struggled with finding acceptance for myself. In the trans community, many viewed someone like me as "problematic" or a "transtrender" (someone who is trans for attention,) because being intersex and wanting to play with my gender identity/expression is not ok. It's apparently "harmful" for someone like me to think about doing something like presenting myself as anything other than female. I was also being pushed to want different surgeries and felt as though not have top or bottom dysphoria, which is often seen as a big problem for the community. This became a serious problem for me, especially when I was just trying to find support from this community in a time of need. This led to a lot of identity issues as I was more conflicted about what I wanted in life verse what I was expected to want in life. It's only recently after leaving a lot of trans support groups and going to non-binary support groups did I realize I wasn't alone. I met more people like me and started finding more confidence in my identity. It also helped that my friend group started growing and bringing in more supportive and understanding friends. I've since started talking to trans people who helped me realize both of our similarities and differences, without judgment. Cis friends who started helping me question a lot of what I was doing to help me rethink a lot of choices I thought I was making for myself. I realized that many of my struggles were connected to PSTD and loneliness. I literally only identified as a woman because my abuser wouldn't accept me if I didn't. And when I reached for help because I struggling to be accepted and feeling alone, the people I reached out to only tried to mold me in their image. I wasn't a woman because I wanted to be, but because it was means of surviving a darker time in my life. Aryia, her friend, and my friends help me piece a lot of this together, Aryia even being the one who noticed that my changes over the years didn't add up. She noted that when we met my motivations to get on HRT were completely different from most trans people.
I am happier now with my body than I had ever been before HRT. I do love having hips and curves, I love having breasts, and I love how these features play into my gender identity/expression. My motivations aren't the same as most trans tolks, but they are still about living a happier in my body and living life the way I want to live in. This was why it was so concerning for my wife when we started living together and she noticed that things didn't add up until recently. Now that we've worked on bringing myself back to a better state of being, things have been feeling a lot happier for us. This is to say she longer feels that sense of anxiety that I was clearly struggling with, which is a relief. In short, I am genderfluid, primarily a femboy or tomboy, my pronouns are now any pronouns with a lean towards he/they

This turned out to be a pretty long ramble but a lot happened in the three years that we've been venturing free from abuse. A lot more good came from this freedom and experiences I once never thought possible in my life. I never thought I would have started HRT, I didn't think I would have traveled across the country to see my family again, and I didn't even think I would have legally changed my name. I never once thought in my life I would have gotten married, let alone to my best friend. My life has changed so much that even some of the pain I've had to go through doesn't supersede the accomplishments and experiences I've been part of. When I walked out of my apartment door on the evening of February 17th of 2018, I had no idea what the world had for me but I am so proud of myself for walking out that door and into my new life. I do not doubt that I wouldn't be here today if I didn't make that choice to walk into my new life and leave my past behind. Looking back on the walls of text I've created, I am so proud of who I am today and the progress that has been made. It really only took walking out of one door to change the path of my life for the better.