From personal experience: do NOT allow men to rob your space (in real life or online)

FearfulFriend · 2020-09-26T22:18:44+00:00

I'm okay. I still have to deal with his stupid BS since we have children together, but it's not nearly as bad as it was when I lived in the same house with him.

FearfulFriend · 2020-09-26T20:45:43+00:00

I'm sorry. It must be like living in the upside down.

FearfulFriend · 2020-09-24T23:47:24+00:00

Next time I'm nauseated and want to get it over with, I'll just think about Mitch McConnell's penis. Thank you for the visual!

FearfulFriend · 2020-09-24T23:46:11+00:00

"Only by taking my space was I ever going to receive it."

I wonder if this would have worked in my marriage. (My ex isn't sexually abusive but he took up a gigantic amount of purely psychological space that kept getting bigger until he squeezed me right out of the household)

FearfulFriend · 2020-09-24T23:42:04+00:00

I have a longtime, but not super-close, friend who married a TiF in 2008 and went full-on transconverted after that. I don't actually think it was her partner who radicalized her, but she was the first person I heard the "we just need to pee" line from and if that were ALL, it wouldn't be a big deal to me. But abusers tend to escalate. Which is sad because she never used to be like that.

FearfulFriend · 2020-09-24T12:06:28+00:00

Where did you find the data?

FearfulFriend · 2020-09-24T01:03:50+00:00

Her views on gender are OUTSPOKEN because she believes women menstruate?!?!?

FearfulFriend · 2020-09-24T00:57:22+00:00

Yes. I'm voting for Biden myself, but I think issues such as this one could easily sway the election to Trump.

FearfulFriend · 2020-09-24T00:54:29+00:00

I just got it in the library today! It's really long.

FearfulFriend · 2020-09-22T00:31:01+00:00

I second Gray Rock.

Also, when my baby was born, my husband and I both liked a name that was the same as someone else's in a way that would have been creepy, so we chose a different name. This dude's behavior is 1000 times creepier than ours would have been, and we chose not to be that creepy.

FearfulFriend · 2020-09-22T00:27:21+00:00

My kids LOVE spending time with other kids in person, but can't very much due to the pandemic. So: online they go. :(

FearfulFriend · 2020-09-21T02:24:08+00:00

yes, the women's march/pussy hat/transphobia thing was what peaked me. "Wait, there are people with penises telling people with vaginas what to do. Where...have I heard that before...? OMG MIND BLOWN"

FearfulFriend · 2020-09-21T01:55:10+00:00

When do you bring up gender ideology with strangers over the phone? Is it part of your job?

I must be caught in the middle age-wise, old enough to wonder how something that just got invented five minutes ago has suddenly become mandatory, but young enough that most of the people I know are going along with it. I mean I WANT everyone to be safe from violence and be treated fairly in housing/jobs/education/healthcare and not be discriminated against based on how they look, which was what I thought this was right up until Trump's inauguration brought the insanity out of the woodwork. Well! Time to go downtown wearing a pussy hat and waving around a copy of Harry Potter and seeing who gets more triggered, the conservatives or the liberals. :/

FearfulFriend · 2020-09-20T22:40:18+00:00

The friend who's mediating will, long term, side against me if negotiations break down. That is one of the reasons I was crying. She's mostly staying neutral at the moment because she's also been divorced and knows how badly it can freak a person out. But even at that, she's done me a huge favor just buying me some time, reassuring my other friend of my support and explaining that I'm too overwhelmed by other things to engage at the moment. It really is a huge favor whether it works out in the long run or not.

Anyway. The friend who's transitioning, taken as a unique individual whom I've known for a long time, likes to reinvent herself. She tends to completely take on the lifestyles and beliefs of the people she spends the most time with (in this case, it's young adults). She will completely devote herself to whatever idea/lifestyle/group she's in, then something will happen and she will break away from it and go back to "normal" for a while before reinventing herself another way. Most of the time, she retains whatever bit of the prior lifestyle she truly liked; or, sometimes, she rejects it for a while but then comes back around and re-adopts the part she truly liked. I am one of the things she always comes back to. She doesn't like when I "mother" her, which I stopped doing a long time ago anyway, but sometimes it does resemble the kind of relationship where a kid thinks something is cool until he sees his mom doing it and then nevermind. So I could totally see her going all in to the man thing and actually coming out of it sooner the more supportive of it I am. Then retaining whatever part she really liked, feeling OK about acting more assertive or whatever it is. OTOH, I've learned not to get attached to outcomes. Maybe she'll stay a man and I'll get used to the pronouns and she'll appreciate the effort and stay out of the inside of my mind. I can live with that. The worst-case scenario of being outed as gender-critical and rejected by everyone still scares me, but it's no longer the most likely scenario in my mind.

As for my friend who admitted to me that he too questions gender ideology, yeah, I realize it would be pretty cool to know people IRL who don't even have to really be GC but have just not totally swallowed QT. Maybe there are more people in my life who are afraid to question out loud.

FearfulFriend · 2020-09-20T19:25:49+00:00

Having a few days to process has been vital--I appreciate everyone here and the two people IRL as well (the mutual friend who mediated between us and the friend from another social circle who privately admitted to me that he doesn't understand gender identity either).

I think separating my friendship from my views on gender, sex, and society in general is important. She's a unique person, not a representative of women with gender dysphoria. And we have a long friendship with an established pattern of interactions. Given my knowledge of her, I think there's a solid 50/50 chance she will desist. The more supportive I am of her transition, the more likely she will lose interest in it. On the other hand, if I support her transition and she doesn't lose interest and desist, it will still help both of us feel connected, and I don't actually have to change my general views just because of her. I think it's going to be okay. I hope. At least I haven't cried in 24 hours and that's something.

FearfulFriend · 2020-09-20T19:19:03+00:00

It's been less than a week since I found out and we haven't really talked since then. Our other friend brokered a deal where we get to still care about each other without talking until things calm down.

FearfulFriend · 2020-09-20T19:04:34+00:00

Yikes, I clicked on this thinking "I am in the same situation!" and oh wow no, I am definitely not in the same situation. I'm so sorry. This man is toxic and you should try to keep your distance from him, even if you need to do it by being boring enough that he loses interest. Abusers can be sweet and nice sometimes; it's how they get in.

FearfulFriend · 2020-09-20T01:46:45+00:00

I'm not going to read the screed right now, because I am in an emotionally fragile state (username checks out) but I appreciate your finding it.

I really don't understand why people can't agree to disagree on gender and remain friends. I've seen Christians and atheists, Republicans and Democrats, nerds and gangsters, etc. find common ground and manage to get along with each other. I feel like George Orwell didn't quite see this issue coming!

FearfulFriend · 2020-09-19T23:56:58+00:00

My closest co-worker is a conservative with a liberal streak and I am a liberal with a conservative streak and both of us sometimes do a deep-dive into our respective communities and then report back to each other. I haven't talked about gender with any of my other colleagues. I have a hard time imagining that older librarians who have spent lifetimes fighting for free speech would suddenly stop on a dime. I hope younger librarians will take up the mantle. Right now I think the bigger issues are about things like bathrooms and story hours, not censorship of materials. I live in a conservative place, though, so nothing is boiling where I am right now.

FearfulFriend · 2020-09-19T22:42:00+00:00

I did break down and talk to one friend from a different, but equally liberal, social circle. He's male, but he's one of the not-so-bad ones. He admitted that he also struggles with gender identity beliefs. I realized it would help a lot if I knew more people IRL who would just admit that they struggle with it. They don't have to be fully GC, just have some concerns.

FearfulFriend · 2020-09-19T22:32:44+00:00

Very good!

FearfulFriend · 2020-09-19T22:30:05+00:00

I think just not giving them is the best option most of the time, like you did.

FearfulFriend · 2020-09-19T22:28:53+00:00

I read this book. It was sad. There's a scene where the kid has a fight with her father because he doesn't want her to stay the night with a male friend. "I bet if I had been born with a penis, you would let me stay!" like this is a valid argument. Then the kid feels bad because her dad has spent a lot of money paying for her sex change. But then the kid wants more than anything else in the world for her dad to accept her as a boy. It was just super sad. If this is how kids really feel, it must be hellish for all involved.

FearfulFriend · 2020-09-19T22:26:53+00:00

Am a librarian, will fight for free speech until the day that I die.

FearfulFriend · 2020-09-19T00:42:29+00:00

One way I could potentially see it playing out is that we compromise by me using her new name and pronouns and her not expecting me to make any other changes in our relationship besides that. Then, we just see how it goes. That's probably the best-case scenario and it will be difficult, but doable. I'm also considering going neutral on hot-button social issues and focusing on less controversial things like literacy programs or malaria prevention or something like that where I can still be helpful without feeling like a lightning rod.

FearfulFriend · 2020-09-19T00:37:19+00:00

Like most people of both sexes, she already likes a combination of traditionally masculine and traditionally feminine things. I think she feels like being seen as a man will make her feel better about herself. And I mean, it might work. But, as I said above, she spends a lot of time with much-younger friends and she tends to be influenced by people she spends time with.

FearfulFriend · 2020-09-19T00:34:50+00:00

She has been wanting to be a man since we met in the nineties so I think the feelings themselves will last, but I don't know how she'll take to the real-life transition process and what that's like. It's honestly not that part that bothers me, it's that I don't know how to defend my mental boundaries in a way that isn't hurtful to her. I will say that she hangs out with much younger people quite a bit though and she does tend to be influenced by the people she hangs out with.

Thanks for offering to talk. It helps.

FearfulFriend · 2020-09-19T00:30:54+00:00

It's okay, I understand sometimes trolls come onto forums and post out of nowhere to get people riled up, and my initial post probably was overly dramatic, although overly dramatic is how I've been feeling. But I'm not hurt by you or anything.

I don't see her as a savior figure--she helped me greatly but there were also other people who helped me greatly, not JUST her.

I don't know how to give all the details without giving too much information, but word is already starting to spread that I am not 100% happy for "him," and I'm worried that I'll be branded a bigot and that she AND another close, mutual friend will cancel me. I'm a little less worried than I was when I first posted, because I talked to the other friend and she's keeping a cool head and offering to run interference until we both calm down. But only a little less worried, because it could still end badly.

And I mean, I'm not opposed to her transitioning per se, since she's old enough to know her own mind and heck, maybe it IS the right decision for her. It's more that I can't be like, oh rainbows and glitter YAY!! and I'm never going to believe she is actually male the same as a person who was born that way.

The way this connects with my divorce is that I loved my husband deeply and he rejected me and this has left me feeling too fragile to survive any more rejections.

I have a therapist but I haven't talked to her in a couple of months, because of some insurance headaches. Plus what if my therapist thinks I'm a terrible person for not being rainbows and glitter yay?

My first child came so fast that I didn't feel the transition, but the second one, I said something like "I'm not sure how much longer I can do this" and the midwives told me "It's almost over," but it actually wasn't almost over and I got kind of mad, but then I got kind of excited when they got out a bulb aspirator like they actually expected there was going to be a baby pretty soon. BOTH times I remember a sense of pressure releasing, followed by a blank spot in my memory, followed by being handed the baby. It would be pretty cool to release some pressure now!

FearfulFriend · 2020-09-18T11:54:43+00:00

She's actually the one who physically got me out of the bad marital situation (my husband was emotionally abusive, not physically, but I still felt unsafe and needed help getting out) and took care of my child for me while I was dealing with the immediate fallout. And it was she who said the thing that made me realize I needed to STAY out of the marriage once I got out initially. Which was a big thing that she did for me that I am grateful for because the way that she said it was a way that was unique to her--you know? You have a lot of friends and you love them all but this one friend connects with you in a unique way that makes you understand things? She is that friend.

FearfulFriend · 2020-09-18T11:49:42+00:00

She's bi-leaning-towards-straight. (She likes both but she likes men more)

FearfulFriend · 2020-09-18T02:00:56+00:00

Thanks.

FearfulFriend · 2020-09-18T01:51:26+00:00

It's not just cause of that, there are other things too, but this has triggered some other things and it's hard to talk to people IRL about the other things without also talking about this, and I'm afraid to talk about this to anyone IRL, even my counselor.

FearfulFriend · 2020-09-18T01:50:11+00:00

Hurting her by not responding in a way that will be useful. Her hurting herself by getting into this and not getting out of it what she wants. Other people rejecting me for my not responding in the way everyone else is responding.

FearfulFriend · 2020-09-18T01:49:10+00:00

I just got divorced and can't handle going through another one. I'm sorry, I know this isn't anyone else's problem. I just need to talk to someone.

FearfulFriend · 2020-09-18T01:32:52+00:00

I like a lot of the other things she posts, but this stuff makes me cringe, hard. The thing is that one day it is going to come back to bite her when she finally does say something that the brigaders don't like.

FearfulFriend · 2020-09-18T01:26:39+00:00

Biden, because I'm not a one-issue voter and I'm still angry about the Access Hollywood tapes. But I'm not pleased.

FearfulFriend · 2020-09-18T01:23:01+00:00

So, she has always wanted to be a guy. We've been friends since we were teenagers and this part is not new. She also has a much-younger sister who's sucked into the tumblrverse whom she spends a lot of time with. I'm unclear as to how she made the leap from wanting to be a guy to actually deciding she is a guy.

FearfulFriend · 2020-09-18T01:07:55+00:00

It's not a troll post. I'm just worried about giving too much specific information and doxxing myself.

FearfulFriend · 2020-09-18T01:06:22+00:00

Okay, I'm in my EARLY forties, and I'm still working, tending to children, cooking meals, and cleaning the house, just, while crying.

FearfulFriend