One just for fun! WARNING, CRUDE JOKES AHEAD!

OK, I'm normally too vain to do something like this, but for fun I'm ready to take one for the girls!
First, I saw Li'l Lori D put up hers, then I saw Jamiegotagun, and a couple others. So here is kooky Marie's morning mug shot on her way to glamor. Maybe we can have a competition, wuddayathink? If this doesn't turn back the trannie-chasers, I don't know what will, lol!
Speaking of, one day I was talking on the phone to my brother who lives in Oregon. He was telling me about his car troubles and he says, "The trannie went out in my car...". Sometimes lightning strikes between the 2 lonely neurons in my head; it did this time and I instantly piped up, "That's okay, I go out in my car all the time!" Now that's funny right there, I don't care who you are, lol. Oh come on, laugh!
OK, what do you call two crossdressers wrapped in aluminum foil?
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A TV dinner, bwaahhhh!

Empathy and guilt

http://www.amazon.com/Head-Over-Heels-Cross-Dressers-Transsexuals/dp/0789030950
This is a book recommendation, mostly meant for those TG's who are married. It's something I wish I had read long before my marriage disintegrated. The link is to the Amazon web site, but you can possibly shop for the book cheaper.
The empathy many of us have, by nature, I think is a reflection of our feminine selves. This same empathy may lead to guilt within ourselves for the position we put our wives into by pursuing transition or crossdressing. For myself, I blindly felt I understood my wife's position. After reading this book I found that there were facets to a woman's upbringing that I hadn't even considered, which were impacted by my crossdressing and transition. Despite our feminine natures, since we were not raised as women we cannot possibly see all of the ways this may be affecting our wives.
The guilt we feel is understandable, but if you wish to have true empathy with your wife, I think you must understand her position better. This book may help you do so. I must also remind you all that an experienced counselor can be invaluable at a time like this. We may believe we have control of the situation we are in with our family, and we want to solve 'the problem' by ourselves. I believe this is a naive, 'throw on the toolbelt' attitude, possibly something we have ingrained as a result of our male upbringing. What your wife needs more is for you to understand her position. A counselor can provide an objective viewpoint that will help you understand each other better. I must stress that an EXPERIENCED counselor is imperitive, particularly one who has experience with gender and sexuality issues; but any competent unbiased counselor should be helpful.
While not impossible, it still isn't a statistically likely outcome that your marriage will be saved and you'll grow old together as women. Sometimes we may be trying to fix our marriage not because of our love for our wife, but because of the guilt we feel for having caused it's dissolution. We don't want it to be 'our fault'. While GID may be the cause of your marriage not being retrievable, the GID is not your fault. You must also look honestly inside yourself to see what end outcome your transition will have on you and your wife's sexuality. All the love in the world will not change the fact your wife married and wants to live with a man. But if you and your wife have the true desire to live, love, and grow old together as women, I hope this advice helps.
Two years later, if I knew I could do it with peace of mind, I can say I would still have given up transition to have kept my family. That wasn't an option, but I do wish I had found outside help for us both.

Marie's Milk Chocolate Philosophy

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sUEvtEYfsd0
OK, the pic and the video are besides the point, lol! Poor wittle bunnies!!
By way of definition, 'cisgendered' is the term one can use to describe a person who has a homogenous gender identity and biological gender. I'm not big on labels, but it will help simplify what I am about to explain.
One of the things you may have the hardest time getting across to others, as a TS, is how our sexual orientation is completely seperate from our psychological gender. Another thing that is hard to get a cisgendered person to understand, is how our psychological gender can be seperate from our physical gender.
"Marie's Milk Chocolate Philosophy" is something I came up with to help explain this.
As a child, what is the first type of chocolate you ever encountered? Most people will readily pipe up with 'milk chocolate'. Between Halloween, Easter, and Christmas, one can hardly escape first being exposed to chocolate in this form. Yeah, there'll always be some wise-ass who says "Cocoa"! But most would agree that milk chocolate is what we first came across.
So after we encountered milk-chocolate, as far as we were concerned in our unexperienced child mind, that was 'chocolate'. If someone at that point tried to tell you that what you thought was 'chocolate' was actually a mix of two things, and not really just chocolate at all, you might not believe them. You might not even care, since you enjoyed milk-chocolate so much. You may have even avoided other forms of chocolate, writing them off as 'not real chocolate'. After all, we as people tend to consider as alien anything that is challenging to our current understanding of something.
But as time went on, we were able to see and experience chocolate, and milk, in all their various and wonderful forms. Dutch chocolate, white chocolate, dark chocolate, sweet and semi-sweet chocolate! White milk, chocolate milk, goats milk, frozen milk, half-and-half! We had visual and tactile proof that 'chocolate' was indeed two things completely seperate from one another. We also realized the great variety of these two things and found the value and validity in each of their different forms. Some of us may have even found that we preferred other types of chocolate over milk chocolate!
Yet without those visual and tactile things to help us understand, it is very difficult for us as people to give validity to the seperation of something we consider so elemental and indivisible.
I think most of you can run with that from here......whadda ya think?

I'm OK

Lori made me do it, but all of us who are enjoying the relative serenity in our lives to do so are doing it. Our blog look back at the road we've travelled recently, or perhaps at the whole year's worth.
That photo says it, right there. My attitude at the moment for all the dissapointments and misfortunes I've seen. And it's set to the song, from Styx, 'I'm OK'. Screw it, I'm moving on! To everyone and everything that's been in my way, a great big rasberry to it all.
Lori also reminded me of the real reason I started this entry. To all of you who've shared of yourselves here, bless you! I am richer for it, we all have enjoyed the benefit of each other's experience and counsel. And, Lori again (bless you girl), I agree. Pouring out my story has been cathartic for me, but my real hope in being here has been that someone else, in any small way, could find help, solace, anything at all that helped them 'keep moving on'.
We've all been travelling a similar road, each of us at a different point on the way. For those who are at the rockiest points, please stick with us. We were there too, so we can say; if you just 'keep moving on', you'll have to pass beyond those rocky ways eventually, and you'll find yourself kicking stones out of your way, walking a smoother path.
Love, hope, and serenity to you all. When that person you've been searching for is suddenly peering back at you, in any small way, you might even be startled to find she's just who you thought she was. Just sing with me......Iiiiiiiiii'm Okaaaay!

Please see this movie!

I have to ask everyone with the least interest in anything transgendered, to see this movie, Beautiful Boxer. This is by far the best movie with a transgender subject line I have ever seen.
It's the story of a Muay-Thai kickboxer, Nong-Toom, who makes her transition while still competing in kickboxing. It's a foreign movie with subtitles, but it's one of those that will make you forget you are reading subtitles.
There is one error in the movie caused by the Thai-English subtitle translation; she is referred to as being a transvestite, though she is transexual.
Most MTF TS's have a similar story, but her story so closely parallels mine! I strongly identify with her experience, with the chief parallel having been my military service. Her realization of self and childhood experiences are very similar to mine. Even outside of the transgender subject matter, it is a fabulous movie. MUST SEE!

She's baaaaack!

Good heavens, time does fly!
It's been an exciting year, I must say. Notable events since my last blog entry included attending the 2007 Fetish and Fantasy Ball in Las Vegas, NV. I also traveled to the Pacific Northwest to visit family, we had a mini-reunion there. My roommate Stacey has moved out and found her own place, and I've been found by a very special man who is becomming a major part of my life.
I'll fill in on these events in seperate entries, but there is a picture of me and my friend Edie at the '07 Ball. Can you guess what our characters were?

Pages

Good heavens, so much for the blog lag time! It's been quite a busy past few months, to say the least.
HRT is going well, no unexpected bad side effects. Good one's include breast development, decreased body hair and ejaculate; spontaneous erections are a thing of the past. My friends tell me my features are softening, of course that is hard for me to tell; I see my mug every day! The tape measure tells a story too. It's strange, my bust measurement this month has gone down an inch, even though I have visibly larger breasts; my chest measurement increased an inch. And a whopping 2 inches increase on my posterior! Do these make my butt look too big, LOL!?
After a period of fighting and arguing all the time, my roommate and I are getting along better, that is a huge blessing. I'm Felix and she is Oscar, if that tells you anything. She was also without work for the month of March, the money strain made things very difficult.
My divorce was final in March, I cried all the way home from the courthouse. A page turns, and bursts into flames, lost to me forever. I know I am fortunate we are still amicable, I kept my house, and I have access to my son. But my family was the most important thing to me; if I could do it with peace of mind, I would take it all back in an instant.
Also in March, my legal name change was completed; as far as the State of Arizona is concerned, I am Marie J Aponte, single white female!!!
Was March an important month? I guess!
Take care friends!
Marie