Trans Widows escape committee

[TinselAngel]

This is a second attempt to start a thread for women who have been, or are still in unhappy relationships with Trans partners.

Having got out of a marriage to a man who transitioned shortly after we split, it would be good to be able to support others in a similar situation.

I know there's a few of you out there?

it was leave, or die where I was

Hobgoblin this so resonated for me (actually so has a lot else of what you have said). I'm about fifteen years further away "out" of things than you are, but I can still remember that moment of realising that I seriously would die, if I didn't get out. Not because he would kill me but because I would end up acting on the suicidal thoughts that by then were my internal wallpaper. So much so that I'd almost stopped noticing them, if that makes sense? I was almost sleepwalking into it, until that jolt.

I just felt so entirely emptied of "self". You know that Shon Faye "enjoy your erasure" quote? That's what happened to me (minus the enjoying bit, obviously). Over the dozen or so years my ex and I were together every single bit of my identity got sort of leached away. You can't be allowed to be attractive because his legs must be "better" than yours. You can't be allowed to have clothes you like because he wants the same, and if they don't come in his size you can't have them. And if you (in the early days) buy them anyway then he'll wear them which tears/stretches/ruins them. You can't have women friends because if you come home and say you didn't spend the whole time talking about clothes and make up then you're a failure as a woman. On and on, drip and drip, boil frog, boil.

I can still remember one night (and this was some years before I did finally get out) sitting crying for hours in the shower because I was there naked, and if was naked then I was nothing because "woman" was all about makeup and clothes and everything except bodies, especially not my body.

I am so lucky: we didn't have children, so when I finally ran I was able to run and run and run.

I also competely understand what you have said about not being able to talk about it. This is the most I have said about it in nearly two decades and I only feel able to do it in a doubly anonymous way (in that I have changed my mumsnet username for this post). It's not "shame" exactly (though I completely understand why you have used that word, it's about the cloest word there is). But talking about it brings back that terrified emptied out person that I was. (Still am in many ways).

Someone earlier in the thread asked if they could quote/use, anonymously, things people say here for a speech/article; that is OK by me.

@anonymoustranswidowoneofmany

I had given up completely. I was bed bound for 5yrs. I had to learn to walk again, use stairs, everything. I had just "stopped".

But now (although I'm not 100%) I'm better than I was in 2015 when I left the relationship & 2016 when I left the marital home. I've surpassed everything he "thought" I wouldn't. And that gives me the strength. The fact it's p*ssing HIM off! As he watches.

I used to dye my hair red - was going to again, but he now wears a red wig. A friend of mine has commented saying "he's trying to BE you".... that weirded me out so much. Erase me, replace me.

I want to say, "Shave your head, sweetheart". Which would sure as anything suit you well and would SO fuck up the takeover/erasure he's attempting.

But: it would still be "reactive" instead of "proactive", if you see what I mean.. So: do what YOU want.

I am a fine one to talk; here I am nearly 20 years later still suffering the aftershocks.

@anonymoustranswidowoneofmany

I've got blonde to put on (it's medium ash blond - I'm too old for anything lighter! I only wanted to cover my grey!)

Do I know you over on Twitter?

Not in this context, no. As I say, I reallyy do not talk about this stuff, anywhere.

@anonymoustranswidowoneofmany
Well, if ya ever need an ear, 😈Hobgoblin😈is my screen name (but not my @) haha

Just to say that I'm in awe of the courage and the raw truth you all display. You are amazing women.

I've had very difficult painful experiences in my life - totally different - but I know that through dealing with terrible things we learn wisdom, we are better equipped for the future, to support others and take care of ourselves. I guess what I'm saying is that not even pain is necessarily wasted.

As Carly Simon says "There's more room in a broken heart."

The replacing you....

This is exactly the same as my experience. It's not flattering, it is entirely creepy that STBXH is wearing carbon copies of my clothes. My jewellery. My hair.

If I dare to complain, then I'm the bad because I don't "own" this style. Of course I don't own that shade of green and the black which is about 90% of my wardrobe. Or those Chelsea boots which I have 5 pairs of. He's allowed to copy, but out of respect, should he?

He has no sense of boundaries. Of appropriate behaviour.

I've mentioned a few times when he bought wigs which matched my hair, I told him that made me uncomfortable. He did the usual script lie first (they were the only wigs available on the internet) then minimise, (I was unreasonable to think I owned my hair style. Lots of women have that hair, I was being petty.) followed by the inevitable "if you don't get with the programme I will be forced to kill myself."

I'm not going to be erased or replaced by that moron. FFS.

@birdbandit

It's horrible when you finally REALISE what he's doing. I didn't see it until it was pointed out by a friend (who knew all about the ex while I was married and has been a rock since) he was the one who said matter of factly "you don't see it do you? He's trying to become you".... that's where I started seeing EVERYTHING. The gaslighting (lying, then blaming ME for the lies, looking through his emails and blaming ME for finding emails to women!)

It was then that I started fighting. Told ex I will be dying my hair red.... but I've bought the blonde 😉
I change my "style" often (I told him I liked LindyBop dresses before I left) low and behold, he's got lindybop dresses now 🙄🙄🙄 I'm usually in jeans and vest top, but every so often I'll change to shirts, which he refers to me looking like a dyke (like that's the worst insult ever!!) he doesn't like it that I no longer sing off the same hymn sheet.

Yes the blaming me, when our son found his gross whisper app, luckily son didn't read/open, it was all my fault, I shouldn't be "stalking" him.

I'm fighting back too. I continue to wear "my" clothes, but I do it better than he does. That gives me satisfaction.

I have also changed up my style. More dresses. It did defeat me for a while, after the wigs I cut off all my hair, it was as short as a school boy. It has grown back now and I have "femmed up". Old me didn't bother with a hairdryer, now I sometimes do. And I don't have a combover.

I have wondered if the Kardashian's ultra femme appearance is a reaction to their father appropriating and approximating their femaleness. They have taken his behaviour as a challenge and are doing his imagination of what they should be, better than he ever could.

I've not gone down the Kardashian's style route mind, I'm much more capable than he is of choosing and creating my own style.

Outing, but I'm graduate trained in the design/textile industry. It is rank arrogance of STBXH to assume he can defeat me, erase me, replace me through bloody clothing.

Ewwwwwww I'm really creeped out that they have literally tried to become you

@RandomMess

Oh. It's a whole lot worse! I won't mention s*x!! For the last 3-4yrs of our marriage- he didn't touch me - told me when I touched him it "made him feel uncomfortable"... so that's nice to know after 14yrs of marriage!
He also once admitted he didn't care if I left, we had a blazing row, I told him it felt like all the years we'd been together, it felt like it didn't bother him if I'd left. He straight up said "I didn't, until now" (that particular argument!) soooo that's where I started thinking hard....

Hobgoblin my STBXH came up with a "genius" solution to his not wanting to shag me, a list of folk (friends who would NEVER go there) he was happy for me to have sex with!

It was I think two days later he said that he wanted to be involved, dress up, make us tea.

But I must remember this is all about him magnanimously finding a solution for me....

But of course, that's an aside. it's all really about undefinable inner feelings, and after all women have kinks too, and none of this is related to his getting an erection from crossdressing or his muffed up views on gendered sexual roles....

@birdbandit
OMG. Dressed as a French maid by any chance??? Yep. Had that one.

Hobgoblin

YES!!!

Oh my goodness, is there a manual circulated? Or are they so short of imagination that their fantasies have to be a recreation of what someone has already scripted.

It is ridiculous. Baffling.

Mine never wanted to copy my style or become me. See, I am already middle aged, and he's just a wee little girl... of 48...

Yep, that's even more creepy.

Mine didn't want to be me either. I'm not glamorous enough.

I was a "young bride" (I was 19 when we married, he was 31)

I'm not old, I just dress like a normal woman, not like a teenager who has been given the keys to the dressing up box.

Firstly, all my love to all of you going through this

A thought struck me yesterday. A dear friend of mine is about to issue divorce papers as she discovered her husband has been having an affair and this is the final thing she needed to break free. He is an out-and-out narcissist, coercive and financial control, incredibly vain, jealous of the baby, yadda yadda. The usual stuff; she's escaping before he turns his violent outbursts on her. But she showed me pictures of the other woman, and I had to scoop my jaw off the floor and make sure I wasn't looking at their wedding pictures or something. This girl is identical to my friend pre-pregnancy, right down to the make up, clothes, hair etc. Just younger and no post-pregancy weight. It's downright creepy.

It lead me to wondering, given what many of you have described - are these replacements part of the same mental pathway? Replace the woman with a near-clone, or go even further and become the woman entirely? Obviously it doesn't cover all cases, but I wondered if there was a subset of narcissistic behaviour where total possession is the driver...

@TinselAngel

Sorry, didn't mean to imply you were older x

I'm 40 but I've bloody aged thanks to all this!