Trans Widows Escape Committee 3: Rise of the Trans Widows

Hi everyone. I posted on thread 1 or 2 I think, I regularly change my user name on MN as I don't want people to spot who I am. Well, like I said in my previous post on the other thread, he doesn't get the time or space to 'dress. It really frustrates him, as it's a sexual outlet for him. He just wants to wank into 'silky things after wearing it. I tell him to fuck off and do it, but he wants time and space;I say to him, it's your bloody choice then to be frustrated. I don't fancy him at all when he gets into this mode, actually it takes me a while to fancy him after this, and this thing happens on a regular basis. Perhaps that's why I don't have a satisfying sex life.

Is that a TV thing? Haven't watched TV since it blew up a fortnight after the warranty ran out. I suppose there's always netflix et al, but I increasingly just can't be arsed with the medium.

I feel more like Cassandra right now (not on this particular thread, obviously!) Speaking obvious truths, but people just can't or won't listen. I'm probably going to have to go to bed before I get sucked into a flaming row with someone who thinks I'm a paedophile-apologist because they're misunderstanding my point. The internet is definitely both a blessing and a curse.

I'd describe it as a lean-to, but I am an utter pedant.

If you fancy a bit of positive reframing: the subsequent relationship was a useful data-gathering exercise. It's allowed you to better recognise the pattern of mistakes, and means you'll be better placed to spot them and avoid them in hitherto-unknown future contexts. And you're not in it any more. Win-win, really.

(Somewhere under all this rage I suspect I may actually be an optimist. It's an unnerving realisation, for such a cynic.)

We all start off incredibly naive. Don't beat yourself up for it. Rage at the world that purposefully kept you naive for so long, and that even now pushes you to sink back into that naivete.

You're most welcome, Weezol. And thank you for reminding me that my word-vomit has value. Sometimes I wonder if I should be doing all my trauma-processing privately. It's good to have the reminder of why I'm doing it out loud.

I'm doing the face at "used to be a transvestite" - men's fetishes don't really work that way, do they?

And the fact he didn't tell you this until after you'd already made the arrangements suggests he intuitively understood how to use the sunk costs fallacy to his advantage.

I don't think it was ever a harmless hobby, no. It goes back to what I've said previously (I think on this thread?) about what it's rooted in. You can't have a healthy respect for women and view us as real human persons rather than simply bodies that exist as objects in the world, while simultaneously getting your jollies from dressing up as the pornified stereotype of women as sexual objects. The two positions just aren't compatible.

I wish I'd done the same years ago. In fact I wish I'd learnt that one is supposed to choose a partner instead of just saying "oh, okay then" when someone shows an interest. I distinctly remember, the first time I properly met the ex, thinking "okay, don't actually fancy him, but, like, arranged marriages and shit can work and there don't appear to be any other options on the not-dying-alone front, so let's give it a go and see how it works out cos it'd be really fucking rude and ungrateful not to."

This is so fucking true Tyro. I have never really been able to formulate a reason for marrying XH other than 'he wasn't as much of a shit as my previous abuser and I'm not scared if him so it'll probably be okay' and you are absolutely nailing this supposed 'choice' thing. Your words have helped me to a massive breakthrough in the last few days. Thank you so very, very much.

I feel like we should be doing sisterly fist-bumps of solidarity around about now.

Choices, though... I have so many thoughts about the concept of choice, and how it screws us all over. So much of my life has been shaped by moments in which the world says I made a choice - but the way my mind's been shaped by trauma and female socialisation and the patriarchal context means there was effectively no real choice at all. Yet I clung to the notion that I had the capacity to make rational, measured, informed decisions in these moments.

Because we have basically the same brains regardless of our sex, so we're just as capable as men of making rational decisions, and we cling to that idea because we know we're not lesser or other or subhuman - and somehow we never quite get around to realising there's a whacking great assumption in there that needs taking apart: men's assumption of their own rationality and objectivity and capacity to make a free choice.

But that's probably for another thread!

Tyrotoxicity it's hard to read your words and hear how things were for you. But it is encouraging to know you are seeing you do have choices and you are worth more. I'm not a trans widow but am de-lurking to give you a round of applause for your wisdom and for working out what will help you in moving forward.

I'm glad my words are resonating - at least one good thing comes from them spewing forth non-stop!

Tonight I managed a real-world conversation about the pushing at sexual boundaries and how it makes me feel and how earlier trauma affects all this. It's good, because it's one small step further on the path to mentally distancing myself from ex (which needs to happen; we are still too enmeshed and it does not do me any favours long term).

So that's two positive things in one day. I'm calling it a win.

Yes Tyro that's it - I had a emotionally abusive childhood with 2 narc parents and all my adult romantic relationships have been abusive. I didn't know I deserved better.

Delurking to offer my respect to you trans widows and others affected.

Also, harking back to points earlier in the thread. I have had EMDR, my psychotherapist tried it experimentally with me for anxiety disorder. It was transformative. I hope this info helps someone.

Omg @Tyrotoxicity - I'm not a trans widow but I regularly read the threads in here and have so much admiration for you all. You comment about the 'oh well, you'll do because at least I won't die alone' is so very true and even though I'm not a trans widow that resonates so much with me and the shit relationship choices I've made. I just wanted to delurk to say Thankyou for articulating this.

I'll go back to lurking again, but wanted to pop out and wish you all the strength in the world

BoudiccaMarley, welcome to the sisterhood none of us wanted to be in.

Welcome Boudicca, and may I say I am loving the mental image your username is giving me. Fierce angry woman on a chariot with spiky wheels and great big speakers blaring out reggae. That'd shit the Romans right up.

And I am glad you've realised unresolved trauma leads to terrible choices of partner. I wish I'd done the same years ago. In fact I wish I'd learnt that one is supposed to choose a partner instead of just saying "oh, okay then" when someone shows an interest. I distinctly remember, the first time I properly met the ex, thinking "okay, don't actually fancy him, but, like, arranged marriages and shit can work and there don't appear to be any other options on the not-dying-alone front, so let's give it a go and see how it works out cos it'd be really fucking rude and ungrateful not to."

Oh, how I wish I had run a bloody mile!

Other moments that would have had me running a mile if I'd had healthy boundaries instead of having being, y'know, repeatedly traumatised for two decades include: the time he said the things he was looking for in a partner were basically the ability to cook and a readiness to perform fellatio; the way he turned into a horrible racist tory whenever his dad's around; the weird codependent relationship with his previous ex (still ongoing); and the whole inability to actually live like a grown up, with personal hygiene and a job and life goals and so on.

And then I tried, so very hard, to be totally cool with the ladies' knickers things - which meant he opened up and talked about the fetish, which left me less and less comfortable, and it's only fairly recently I've come to accept this discomfort was rooted in the cognitive dissonance of trying to believe he loved me while being repeatedly confronted with the evidence that I was nothing but a prop for his sexual fantasies.

Sorry, that was a bit of a ramble. It's Friday, it's therapy day, my brain's a bit all over the place.