The Beginning of the End... (Becoming a Statistic)

I did that thing that I do, again, didn't I?
Make one post then leave you hanging for months...
I know, and I'm sorry, but what can I really do about it otherwise?

So, hello again!
This post has actually been a bit of a long time coming, but that makes it no more easy to sit here and type it all out for public scrutiny.
But first, a little, or not so little re-cap on me.

Okay, so over the years I have cultivated a modest following here.
That's mainly been through my identity as a crossdresser or transvestite (don't really care which one you choose, it makes no odds to me) and sharing my own tips, tricks and personal opinions around dressing up like a lass.
Regular readers, or really, anyone with the capability to read my other entries (hint hint), will know that over the last 18-20 months, my blog content has been changing, coinciding with my own changes in how I perceive myself and my gender.
Who the hell am I then?

Well I am certain I am not a man.
Ever since I was in my early teens, I have battled with low mood, seeking reprieve through alcohol and drugs, hobbies and distraction of any sort that could 'take me away'.
Then in 2012, after a particularly low spell, I saw a doctor who diagnosed depression. The only times the depression lifted were via the above escapes or when I was presenting as a woman. So I began to dress more and more to help me feel better.

 I've always felt better when dressed. From childish sneaking around with my mum's clothes, to later years with my own clothes, and recently more complete feminine presentation with wigs, nails, shoes etc etc. Regardless of the extent to which I dressed, there was always one constant - Satisfaction, Joy, Elation. I felt happier when presenting as a woman. And I never read any more into it than "I dress to feel better".
Perhaps foolishly, I never really examined why I felt better that way.

While I was able to quell my dissatisfaction with life for short spells in the privacy of my own home, I would always end up having to go back to guy mode because that was my life, and never the twain would meet. (Or if they did, it was through small, calculated and considered measures to maintain secrecy and safety.) Very few people ever knew about my issues with gender conformity, and that's the way it stayed for some time.
As time progressed, with myself and my wife both satisfied that my gender non-conformity was safely pigeon holed as transvestism, my fiance became my wife. And we began to plan the standard Man, Woman, kid and cats kind of life. But something was wrong. Something in me. And I didn't know it. Maybe I just didn't want to.
I won't go into full detail because it's been discussed here previously and it won't do me any favours to re-hash it.

Long and short of it is that in September of 2016, I told my wife and some members of our family that;

 I think it's more likely that I am transgender than transvestite. That I am increasingly unhappy living as a man, that I identify more with clothes/items/behaviours that society deems to be feminine. That I do not feel comfortable with my body, for a list of reasons as long as I am tall.
 I concluded the 'issue' was only escalating and needed help dealing with it, I went to my doctor and asked for a referral to a GIC (Gender Identity Clinic) and she did so with the utmost professionalism and compassion and I'm now more than half way along the 18 month wait.
It was at this time that my wife and I began going through harder times. We both knew that if I continued down this path of latent self discovery, then our relationship could not survive - My wife ,while a proud advocate for same sex marriage, did not sign up for a same sex marriage herself. We decided it would be best for me to present as Samantha more, just around the home, to get better acquainted with the idea of living as a woman as opposed to just doing it in spare time, to see if the hat fitted.

I also reminded my wife that she had been promising to go on a night out with me, presenting as a woman, for over 2 years at this point, so we agreed that we would do this too.
(If the last two lines feel shoe-horned in, hold on a few minutes, and it won't do)

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Now if you're a regular reader, you will know that all of the above is only prelude to what I'm actually here to moan about today. If you're not a regular reader - then subscribe. And read all my other blogs, comment on them, '+1' them and share them. (Hint-Hint)
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So, skip forward about, oh,11 months or so...
We still haven't done the night out and we had both been quite low (but I'm not revealing the intimate details of our relationship here - it's not even necessary for the story). I was at my wit's end with stress in work and coming home to different stress over an uncertain future.
As respite, we planned a short break away, camping (following this trip, I am now certain I don't like camping. Actually, not that's not true, I would rather set fire to my tent and sleep in the car... that is to say I hate camping) in the last week in August '17 before Leeds First Friday (LFF) on the 1st of September.
At last, something to look forward to for both of us! As I said, camping was utter guff. I don't need to say much more than "cold appendages and walking 1/4 mile to go to the toilet are not my idea of a good time".
But the Friday came mercifully quickly.

Myself and Marissa in Bar Fiber

With another couple (close friends of ours, who had known about my issues for the past year), we headed over to LFF to paint Briggate red (pink, blue and white would also suffice).

Despite initial nerves, which I expertly quashed with a healthy dosing of Prosecco and Jack & Coke, I had what we northerners refer to as "A Fucking Belter" which, loosely translated means, "a highly agreeable period of mirth augmented by the consumption of alcohol". (LOL!)

Myself and my wife in Smokehouse

I mean, who wouldn't do with a new dress, new hair, fresh nails and better quality makeup than they're used to?

I was happy. I was drunk and I was happy. My wife by my side and friends to support me.
I was happy. Elated.

Until the next day.

After seeing to our hangovers with eggs, toast and coffee, we made the trek, back over the Pennines, past that mad bugger in the white house in the middle of the M62 motorway, dropped our friends off, then made our own way home.
Got indoors, cup of coffee, Netflix on, chill out, and then allow the rest of my hangover to depart.

Just as the theme music for Rick & Morty kicked in, my wife began to cry. 
I hated it when she cried. 
More so when tears and wailing made her incapable of telling me why she was so upset. I'd always felt so helpless and wounded seeing her cry. I just held her and waited for the storm to pass. I thought I knew what was coming. I thought this would all be okay in a day or two. But I was wrong.
After what seemed like forever, the sobbing eased and she managed to start,
"I haven't seen you as happy as you were last night, in years..."

This was the truth I could not argue with it. As a rule, I don't like clubs, and we were in some very crowded, loud bars and clubs. And it didn't phase me. I was actually enjoying myself. It felt right. And not even 'right - for a night out', I just mean Right. Correct. Appropriate...
"...And I can't carry on being the reason that you don't get to be that happy all the time..."
My hangover was gone now. Sobriety. 
Or was it? 
I felt sick, but not the hangover kind...
No, that was likely my heart turning to dust and making an attempt to leave my chest via my mouth.
I couldn't speak. At first through shock and slow, dullard-like realisation of what was being said to me. Was my wife asking for a divorce?
I still couldn't speak. Only now it was because with the remnants of my heart now feeling like they were in my gaping, dry mouth, tears forming little streams on my cheeks, runny nose making it harder to breathe calmly, I couldn't manage more than a hyperventilated, 

"Please, no, don't do this to me"
That is, at least what I think I attempted to say. I have no idea how it actually sounded as the collective volume of fluids in my head had begun a simultaneous evacuation of my facial glands and sinuses.
I can only imagine that it didn't look pretty.
She continued...
"Listen. You aren't happy as a man. I can see it, but you keep denying it to me. But I can't be happy with you as a woman. I'm not lesbian any more than you are a man. I love you, but this has to happen to give us both the chance to actually be happy..."
I was froze. Dumbfounded. This is everything I was afraid of, happening right then and there. It was at that moment I decided that after 5 years of vaping, I was a smoker again. 
She would later tell me that she had been hiding tears from me for months, taking herself away from me to let it out so that I wouldn't see. All because she didn't want me to feel bad. 

We still loved eachother, but my wife was asking for a divorce. 

And nothing I did or said that day, or any day after, could persuade her to reconsider...
This was the end of a 12 year period in both of our lives. It was the beginning of the end.

That's when time stood still....

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