Trans Widows Escape Committee 3: Rise of the Trans Widows

I have one child and he has two.

Then I remembered he always grocery shopped before any of us got home from work or school so no one could go with him. Does that mean you lived with other people while you were married? I guess that might have helped give you some support ??

Social worker: some are. Actually some times they leave the groups because they are ready to move on with their lives.
It seems like the ones who have the hardest time have younger children and the spouse is trying to make the divorce take as long as possible.
I know several who are in good relationships with men now or who are enjoying dating around and exploring their sexuality with heteronormative men.

I decided to go back to school and I'm really enjoying it. I do some times wish I had a companion but I have such bad luck with dating, I really don't have the desire or energy to do it anymore.
I think once the divorce is over things tend to get a lot better. Having to live with him watching the transition seems to be so damaging. I'm usually the one encouraging women to get out ASAP.

How are the women in your other support groups doing 987? Have you come across women who have moved through this to happier lives?

Sorry for the typos! I forgot you can't edit.

So I have been realizing some thing these past few weeks that I thought I would share, hoping that it helps some one else.
It's been three years and I'm still figuring out his lies and deceit. So I don't know how detailed you get, if you have questions please feel free to ask.
We had a great sex life for 4 months. Then one day he cried and said he was afraid our relationship was just about sex. We talked about it and I told him this was normal.

He asked me in the 5th month to move in together and then asked me to marry him. (Love bombing) after we moved in together, one day it was like he turned into a different person and suddenly didn't want sex, told me it felt like a chore and he was tired of being pressured. I have him his ring back but we worked it out. (Sort of)

I kept trying to figure out how you go from high libido to very low and your wants and needs and beliefs could change so much so suddenly.

Years later we are in therapy and she suggests getting get tested for low T. He immediately says "I don't want it to change my personality." We tell him that's not a thing. He is agitated and uncomfortable, a bit mad and anxious.

He gets tested and I go along to get the results because I don't trust him. She says he has the level of an 80 year old man at age 37. He looks like he wants to cry. Looks anxious. Dr writes him an Rx and he says he doesn't want it. Says it will change his personality. She tells him that's not how it works.

He takes the Rx and goes home, won't talk to me and is catatonic in the fetal position for 40 minutes. Finally he snaps out of it and says he will take it.

I told this to my therapist last week and he says "do you think he was taking testosterone blockers?" I had never thought about it but I bet he was.

It makes so much sense. So I'm going down the rabbit hole....he knew he wanted to take them and that is why he started crying about our relationship only being about sex. And then he knew if he moved in and we got engaged I would be stuck when his libido tanked.

Then I wondered how he got it up once a week and read about how trans women take cialis or viagra if they are still in tact. And I am pretty sure he was taking cialis. Just reading about what it's like, he had to be.

Then I wonder how he paid for this without me knowing about it. I remembered he told me when he was with his first wife he would go grocery shopping and take 20 bucks out at the register. Then he would save it up and get a money order and mail it to buy wigs and breasts forms and have it mailed to him at work.

Then I remembered he always grocery shopped before any of us got home from work or school so no one could go with him. At one point I was going to school and working so I signed up to get a ton of non perishables delivered to us every other week. He was so mad at me and I couldn't figure out why. He said he needed to pick out the right brand and I told him to go on amazon and make changes. I guess he was mad that he was going to lose out on a lot of opportunities to get cash out at the register.

He was already transitioning before we even got married. I married a stranger. And he seemed to be using the testosterone gel but I think he might have faked it because his libido didn't change at all. He claimed that he was at a normal level 6 months later but now I know he was probably lying about that too.

Hope everyone else out there is okay; haven't heard from some of you for a while. We're thinking of you even if life's too tough or busy to post.

@TinselAngel my friend went back through this person's FB and told me I should have a look. So it turns out said person looked like a man a few years back, then started to look more and more female. Even as a man though there was an androgynous nature.
So I don't know if this person is intersex and decided to they want to be female or if this is a detransitioner or what. When they put up pictures of themselves wearing a lot of make up with their hair done, their friends fall all over themselves with the type of compliments you would give a trans person. Not exactly "stunning and brave," but close.

What's your book idea 987?

Sorry, I meant to say thats how he looked to AGPs.
Women who transition don't have a fetish. Women hardly ever have fetishes. Some female detransitioners say they did it because they were tired of sexism and feeling less than, were sexually abused as children and felt it would make them feel more powerful.
A lot of them are gender nonconforming women and get caught up in the cult telling them they must really be men.

Plus Jenner is a great example of a man who didn't give a sh** about how his wife and children felt. I gather the chickens may have come home to roost on that one.

I'm thinking about writing a book but I don't know.

Btw 987 I'm not sure we all thought Jenner glamorous, younger-looking or fashionable... Most men and women I talked to at the time thought the spectacle of a middle-aged parent doing that variously creepy, sexist, unconvincing, repellant, delusional, indulgent and sad.. but I imagine it would be the ultimate fantasy of many of the men we know all too well. It's so interesting that it's largely the transitioning men who need the attention and go overboard on the make-up and paraphernalia far beyond most natal women. The women who transition are generally far more private and understated. Suggests there's a lot more to this than gender dysphoria

@TinselAngel I feel the same way. I want to help other women who are going through it. But I have the same conflict about it. Should I just move on?

@socialworker222 Blancjatd's AGP typology included that they either work in STEM or hyper masculine fields like first responders or military. My ex is a chemist.
We have noticed a lot of other commonalities in trans widow groups like losing their virginity later than the average man, tendency to hoard, mumbling, a mother with serious mental illness like bipolar disorder.
I was surprised that my ex in laws were so ok with it but once he came out I didn't see them again.

The thing is they have internalized homophobia that they don't even admit to. They grew up with people molding them into acting straight and hearing bad gay jokes and hearing how sinful gay people are. Most likely they heard nothing about trans people because it wasn't common back then. So it feels safer to be trans. That's what I think happened with my ex.
The only person I know he has dated since we divorced looked like could be intersex or a detransitioner.

On the religion front - I'm seeing the same pattern, but in my case it's intractable and closed-minded militant atheism that acts as the "religion".

And there was sexuality pressure from parents too. Couldn't be the alpha heterosexual male like his dad. Ended up emulating his mum in behaviour. Attached sexual feelings to sexualised underwear right from the word go. External behaviour straight, internal behaviour autosexual targeted on the proxy for the parent who he always knew deep down had hurt him the most through sexual behaviour.

As for the IT career - mine couldn't do a career, because that would mean having a successful career and thus being like the dad who hurt him. But he still ran off into the heights of intellect instead of learning what empathy is.

The underlying story's always the same, isn't it?

(He's so pissed off that I figured out more than he did and can now smugly explain where he's going wrong when Einstein is nagging him in the witching hour! )

And no doubt angry at bring being used in that way. It's no different from someone cynically marrying for money or a green card... Hence the anger and betrayal. It occurred to me recently that 'getting over this' is partly about not letting my ex waste any more of my precious life. Have to be careful not to let them waste the subsequent years because we feel so betrayed and angry.

My friend's ex promptly transitioned after separating, told her his whole life including marriage and kids had been an attempt to stop the feelings. They were both heavily involved in a Christian church, both having had strongly religious families.

She was extremely angry at him rewriting their whole relationship as a sham from his point of view.

Blimey 987 were you married to my ex?! Mine had identical issues, Catholicism, continuous pressure not to be gay. But when he transitioned I assumed this was absolutely the worst thing for his parents (okay, I'll confess to momentary schadenfreude re. the difficult ex in-laws' shock and horror, sorry, I'm a cow ). I'd wondered if he was in fact gay and suspect he may be; I watch with interest to see what kind of partner he ends up with (presumably a trans woman, or a man..?? Those seem common outcomes). I assumed it would be far easier to come out as gay, even to very homophobic parents, than to Go Nuclear with this route. There really are themes here (like the IT career thing).

You have to be kidding. I can't even think of anything to say!
My ex used to say he could barely remember his childhood but then he had stories and when people in his family would say "remember when this happened" he would remember and talk about it.
I think his struct Catholic upbringing and marrying in the church really affected him. I get the impression that he was effeminate from a young age and was constantly being managed and molded so he would act more masculine.
I do wonder if he is actually gay and has so much internalized homophobia that being gay is unacceptable so he is trans instead. I guess I'll never know.