Who am/was I?

"I don't even have a concept of who I was back then."  That's something I heard in a podcast I like to listen to that's really stuck with me.  It got me thinking... who was I back in 2010?  Let's take a look and see. 

The podcast went into some more depth on this concept, so I guess I should too before I dive into 'who was I?' territory.  He gave the example that he hasn't been married for ten years.  He's just living with a woman and that their younger selves got married ten years ago.  They're not those people any more.  He wasn't complaining about his marriage, but it really got to me.  We all change over time.  It's not often we make big changes, but we do change a little here and a little there.  And those changes add up.  Like our cells reproducing and replacing themselves and that makes us a different person physically, changes in our psychology all end up making us a new person mentally.  

So.... ten years ago seemed like a good time span.  That would be 2011.  I'm going to back that up just a little bit to 2010 as that's when I started blogging and sharing myself.  That's when I started to 'find' myself.  So who was I at the beginning of that process?  

Well, sexually I thought of myself as a man.  I thought of myself as a heterosexual man who had a sexual fetish toward forced feminization.  I'd never thought about my sexual identity before that (and wouldn't consider it for several more years).  I was a man.  It was a statement, it was a fact, it was a matter of science.  The heterosexual part I HAD thought about.  I just wasn't opening myself up to all the possibilities.  I thought there was heterosexuality and homosexuality.  While I could imagine myself enjoying being with a man, my natural disposition was to be attracted to women.  I just never looked close at it before as I thought it was a binary position, and since I was obviously attracted to women, I couldn't be attracted to men and therefore was heterosexual. 

So, back then I was a heterosexual man.  I was.... artistic?  I'm still not really sure what the difference is between being artistic and being an artist but I'm fairly sure I'm on the artistic side and not the artist side.  Back then I looked more at professional status as I had previously (2 years previous?) been a professional photographer and graphic/web designer.  I cared a lot about that and while I didn't share it in many ways, it hurt that I was giving that side of me up.  I'd first picked up a camera and fell in love with the idea of being a photographer back in high school.  1989.  I went to school and worked as a photographer's assistant in Chicago for a year, then worked as a graphic designer of a web portal company for a few years.  It was a big part of who I was.  Making caps was a major breakthrough for me.  It was combining my artistic side with my fetish/sexuality side.  

So I was a heterosexual man that was artistic and making forced femme caps.  I was a student again, and hated it.  It felt like a huge step back.  I went to school for three years in a pre-optometry program, then changed and went to school for three years in a photography program.  Now, over a decade after that, I was going to school to be a registered nurse.  Sure, it made sense financially and it's not as though I was the oldest person in the class, but it just felt wrong.  It was at best my backup plan.  But there I was, going to school.  

So, I was a heterosexual man that was artistic, making forced femme caps and going to nursing school (the nursing TG tropes begged to be written!).  I was dirt fucking poor.  I had a hard time at school so I couldn't afford to spend much time working.  It didn't make a huge difference as I wasn't making much money before school.  At my best I was making about $28,000 a year while managing a huge event photography company.  It wasn't even enough to make student loan payments.  I think I'd just recently paid off my car.  I was living with my mom and she was covering all of my bills. Insurance, phone, food... everything. 

So, I was a poor, heterosexual man that was artistic, making forced femme caps, that was going to nursing school.  I was painfully shy.  I had never made a lot of friends in real life.  I had a couple close friends and the rest of my social circle was online.  Even as a kid, I always had a small circle of contacts and a lot of that had to do with my lack of confidence.  I think, if I look back at my younger self (and the me back in 2010!) I just never thought I was worthy of friendship.  When someone liked me, I had to look at them as broken or just not right in the head.  I mean obviously... they shouldn't be liking me.  It made making friends almost impossible.  

So, I was a poor, painfully shy, heterosexual man that was artistic, making forced femme caps, that was going to nursing school.    I was depressed.  Damn near suicidal.  Nothing had ever gone fully right in my life, and whenever something started to look up, something invariably brought it all down again.  Graduate High School, YAY! Gain a freshman 50 pounds and lose some really good friends.  Move up on my own to Ferris State University, YAY!  Find out that I can't make or stand by a budget to save my life and almost starve.  Start going to photography school, YAY!  Find out that everybody was right when they say photographers don't make shit for money.  Move to Chicago! At the beginning of the end of the photography business model in Chicago.  Move back home and help a friend set up a computer business.  That ends up going belly up and doesn't give me enough money to fix my broken down car.  Work for an event photography company and even make it to managing the whole thing.  Then the bottom drops out of that business followed quickly by my father dying.  Going to nursing school.... and that's where we were in 2010.  

So, I was a poor, depressed, painfully shy, heterosexual man that was artistic, making forced femme caps, that was going to nursing school.  I think that about covers it.  And wow... while I could go into a lot more detail about all of those parts, I think it would just depress me.  That guy sucked.  It wasn't his fault... but he sucked.  It's no wonder he sought out a new identity and through himself into "His Feminine Side"  Come to think of it, I think that's one of the reasons I took so long to grow past looking at myself as just a man with a feminine side, a fetish.  Caitlyn was my escape, and to add anything more onto her shoulders would be to destroy her and lead to another collapse of his life.  

I think the man that I was, was to be pitied.  I pity him.  How much good times could he have had if he'd just grown past that stage of his life faster.  But then again, would I be me if I hadn't gone through that time... gone through all those bad times?  

Who am I now?
Let's take the things that haven't changed.  I'm still artistic and I still make forced femme caps, just not as much.  Most of my artistic energy goes into writing now.  The caps that I make have the same visual style as what I was doing seven years ago.  A lot of what I post to the Masks blog is obscura which is just an image and a snippet of a story.  I've been trying to write my second full length story, but that's slow going.

I'm still shy, just not painfully shy.  A lot of that has to do with confidence.  I'm me, I know who I am, I like who I am, I accept who I am.  I still don't get up and announce myself and I'm never the belle of the ball, but I'm not a wallflower either.  

I'm obviously no longer going to nursing school, but that was a whole painful journey that almost ended me.  If you haven't been following along, I graduated then fell flat on my face by failing the NCLX test (the test to get the actual nursing license).  But then I got it on the second try.  Then it took for fucking ever to get a job, but then I did that too.  Been a working nurse for going on eight years now.  

 Depressed... that's a tough one.  Back then I feel I was in an actual, mental health problematic, capital D Depression.  Not much was fun and the things that WERE fun only lasted a short while.  I was having real troubles finding joy.  That's certainly not the case now.  But, I am down and possibly depressed.  I find it hard to call it a mental health issue though as we're living through a pandemic.  My job as a nurse is suddenly life threatening to me and those I love.  I've seen patients die that shouldn't be dying.  I've seen coworkers die that shouldn't be dying.  I can't give out normal healthcare because practically all we're going is dealing with COVID-19.  We're short staffed on the supervisor area and that adds a lot of administrative tasks to my plate.  And where travel will often give me that break to breathe and become myself again, travel is just out of the question now.  Even if my friends were vaccinated, I had to blow all of my annual and sick leave on quarantine.  So... yeah, I'm still depressed but it's more situational than as systemic as it was before.  

The differences.  Well, to start with the artistic stuff above, I'm not making as much 'forced' femme material.  A lot of it is forced and almost all of the overtly erotic material I make is in a forced style, but a lot of it is now willing and seeking and curious.  

I really can't call myself poor in any way.  I'm firmly middle class now.  I actually sit just about where investopedia would classify middle class in my state.  My best income before becoming a nurse was about $28,000 with health insurance and no retirement.  I now make just under $80,000 with insurance, a 401K with massive matching funds from my employer, amazing health insurance, dental, vision, paid holidays off, and more leave than most of my fellow nurses.  I bought a brand new Mustang last year, and while the payments on that are $800 a month, I'm considering buying another car for an additional $300 a month.  I.  Am.  Not.  Poor.  Anymore.  And not being poor has also helped a lot in that confidence I spoke of earlier.  It's not that money makes right... but I'm being paid a very good wage for skills and experience that I have.  Before, I considered myself good at what I did.  I was just paid poorly for it so I had no evidence of actually being good.  

There's also health to consider.  In 2010 I considered myself healthy.  I bet if I'd been tested for it, I was already diabetic then.  I also had 'bad headaches' which were likely migraines.  I was just lacking diagnoses.  Now?  Well fuck... I can barely call myself healthy.  I started insulin this year.  I not only have a doctor, I have a neurologist and an endocrinologist.  I've been to physical therapy and have had an EGD (camera down the throat).  I'm on medications for diabetes, migraines, anxiety/depression, GERD, seasonal allergies, cholesterol, and high blood pressure.  I also see a dentist on a regular basis and have lost my wisdom teeth, have more fillings than I can count, and have three crowns (soon to be four!).  

Then probably the two biggest changes.  I am no longer a man.  I'm queer.  I'm both masculine and feminine.  I'm not a man nor am I a trans woman.  Yes, I was born with a penis, but I find that as defining about myself as I do the fact that I still have my tonsils and I can wiggle my ears.  It's just a physical fact about me that has nothing to do WITH me.  And I also classify my sexuality as queer since I love both women and men.  I could make the point that I've never been with a man... but I haven't been with a woman for... uh... carry the two... subtract the decade... I haven't been with a woman for 31 years.  I have more years AFTER having sex than I had years before having sex.  The fact is that when I'm more feminine, I find myself attracted to men.  I imagine myself in the far more classic feminine role.  Being held, being protected, being loving and supportive of my man.  When I'm more masculine, I find myself attracted to women.  I imagine myself in the far more classic masculine role.  Holding, protecting, having her love and support.  I think the biggest problem holding me back from getting into a relationship isn't my shyness... it's the fact that day to day (and sometimes hour to hour) I find myself attracted to different people.  To different genders.  How could that ever be fair to a lover?  If I fell in love with a man, how would he feel when I found myself more attracted to women?  If I fell in love with a woman, how would she feel when I found myself more attracted to men?  I saw a friend post online once one of those quote image things about how you don't necessarily want sex, you just want physical intimacy.  Touching, holding, being close.  I think that's what I miss.  

So... can I imagine being that person I was back then?  I DO remember being him, but I can't put myself in his place.  I am in almost no way THAT person any longer.  He's just a memory of what I went through to get here, no more or less 'me' than the kid I was in the fourth grade.  I don't know exactly how far back I could go and still be 'me'.  I mean, it was only 2019 that I started to define myself as queer.  

So... try that yourself.  Who are you now?  Are you the same person you were ten years ago?