1,300th post

Do you know something? This happens to be1300th post here at The Dorm which is quite a milestone (not a Millstone) in its history.

 Indeed it almost never really got started between pressures from my career and having an early version of a blogging tool that was used for more mainstream "big" posts  and if you really want to know the truth, actually I'd of much sooner just had this one cos it's everything about me.

When I say everything, I mean starting with having this very much childlike (but not childish) little girl side that has never gone away , enjoying the simpler things of life like dolls, teddies, engaging in children's games and interests.

It's taken me to different places, meeting some remarkable people who share the same side mixed in with their more groan up side all trying to balance both sides of themselves and sometimes with having partners too.

It's also the only blog that deals with an important side of my life quite openly, that I am transgendered and how that taps into issues from my own childhood, having an inner girl child and has lead to me presenting as that female both at home and increasingly in the presence of others, something that has helped me an awful lot.

Our community, the alg community, has supported in its own way, me in all of this.
In this blog I do talk from time to time about things such as music, books and anime which have been great interests of mine for a while but in a different way, more from how they tie into my past and the child within me which sometimes by accident has occurred elsewhere as ultimately I can only be me wherever I may post.

To mark the occasion of this 1,300th post we've taken a break as I was editing iD tags for some music files that were messed up before loading in the micro sd card. We all know that stuff often needs sorting.

The countdown before CatMas continues next week.

Are we still standing?

It really didn't matter how you got to be you, any background story you might of had and how far along that road you've travelled these years you changed and yet other bits of you remain.

And really that's a-okay as nature is really just the same when you think about it.

If something just isn't fitting in right you can change that but you certainly don't need to change everything or create a whole new persona.

Tomboy Jo

There's an age-old adage, "There's more than one way to skin a cat" and that is very true when it comes into many aspects connected with age regression and the life that goes with it so I usually counsel an acceptance that there's no one magically right way to go about it.
This is especially true on the little/middle girl side where sometimes it might seem we're all frilly dresses with lashings of lace but there was a girl, very famous one who was a heroine of mine who went a whole 180 degrees the other way

 "George" from the Famous Five series actually was Georgina a girl who was very much a Tomboy, taking the lead and liking to wear less feminine girls attire to the point she did wear schoolboys shorts (although most modern versions remove this essential aspect of the storylines).

You could say she was rebelling about gender roles  and what was seen as suitable attire for girls and actually there is a fair bit of her in me that does wear shorts that aren't super pink and with curvy piping outside of my love of dresses.

I do wear the above navy tailored 'boys' shorts with my girls attire as that girl which is at times more practical and yet also does tie in with liking to present as a middle/little

This Saturday for instance I wore them with my Hello Kitty long sleeve t shirt and white frilly ankle socks outdoors walking as it was fairly warm for time of year which is pretty Tomboy.

 

 

Of course that doesn't mean I cannot and do not have pretty dollies I can play with, dressing them up and creating super girls adventures that I and they feature.

Indeed we might have that most occassions especially social ones you have me in pretty skirts and dresses with matching accessories, it's just that it isn't like that all the time.
 

Our Gender Identity is real...

Peoples sense of identity is important to them and many of us have multiple senses of them such as national or region affiliation,social class especially in this country where you seldom escape elements for long as good as moves toward meritocracy have been in the last sixty or so years have been and the improvements with being able be more open around your sexuality even in last fifteen years have been immense.

We are still struggling with respect for an individuals right to have their sense of gender identity respected both within families and also in the institutions of the state.

We all have the right to be as we are.

What is a Girl?

I noticed more by accident the other week, something I talked about several years back was being discussed at a site with links back here so thought I'd write something about about it here a few years on.

Being a girl is...being how her feels in you, as it comes out of your own feelings as expressed by you in dress, interests and play.

In so far as being an adult little girl goes, it doesn't matter if you're in a relationship or not, if you have a sexual side in your life or the extent to which you are able to let this side of your life out at home or around your local area.

Being either transgendered or gender fluid/variant and of any and no sexuality does not make a  difference  to being and your ability to let the adult little girl you feel out so long as ...you feel Her in you.

There is no one model you have to confirm to.

You may prefer to dress more like a younger child or 'Baby' , a young child which may be dresses, dungerees or shorts or more Middlish looking Tween or young teen.

You might do more party or school type attire if that's you (I like sitting behind a desk in school attire doing exercises) depending on circumstances such as the ability to spend time with a few others.

You may have a Caregiver in your life. 

It really doesn't matter as little girl you is...You.

Some people do find their younger side may have a different gender presentation to their "Big" which may seem odd (and kinda threw me a few years back to be honest) but actually it's okay.

If that's you then please come presenting as that  Little Girl for the period - a little consistency during play helps - bring something with you and you know we'll share teddies, dollies and play even if your "Big" presents as male.

Those of us who aren't super frilly won't kill you if your presentation  goes out that way.
The only thing we aren't so keen on is people who take being a female, especially a little girl and project an overriding sexual side to it (We appreciate Adults often have a sexual side but that stay's in the bedroom and never at little girl playtime!).

It was my experiences elsewhere with "sissies" who tended to push a very full on sexual side linking femininity with subservience, ritual humiliation, who also by clearly linking being a girl as an insult, insulted our sense of being,  co-opting part of our identity for that whole "humiliated as a girl" thing rather than them being a girl if frankly they rather liked it even in short doses or enjoying their maleness if that was them, that troubled me.

Totality of indentity (a kind of essay)

After last week's entry which seemed to flow better than I anticipated, I sat down thinking a bit about about the follow up.

Some people write research papers, lecture and even publish lengthy books about things like Identity in all it's different forms and I purposely say forms because we're all different and from my point of view you can see it  as a Venn diagram  with it's overlapping elements.

For some people what can lead to an exploration of their own persona  can be a person they have a close nurturing relationship with in childhood or for some even into adulthood although for me it was more that I had that already but without the space to be me.

No doubt if I had the  space I'd been more like her as whenever I draw myself that was it and 'drawing in class' brought some of this stuff back to me recently and the crazy but true happening that upon seeing the  white frilly socks, Mommy bought me a pair and  a lolipop I could suck in her presence no less!

We cannot ignore something that a few people feel uncomfortable about which is I'm less "girl in a boys body" but in reality a sissy who has been like this from childhood and who wanted very much to dress in a uber feminine way with no wish to be actual girl.

 Part of identity for me certainly includes an interest in ideas, people and what one could call the arts being brought up where we belonged to a book club, went to the theatre and thanks to the record club had from an early age records of favourite ballet and other classical music.

I still have a number of the books in a bookshelf.

That was one and funny enough I could say the minute I saw the cover that I had it when I was younger as the smaller ones were a special offer you got and many were 'gifted' my way.
Another one I bought used when I was around 13 from a Country Fair was this

That rather formal portrait is of the late conductor Herbert von Karajan and this record was from 1954 in a performance I'd never really forgotten being played on my stereo phonograph even though the record was mono and I was able to get a cd with this on it a short while back.

For reasons best known to themselves my folks got me war toys but in time learned to buy me more girls stuffies and let me have artificial flowers in my bedroom.

Personally I wanted dollies to dress up and play with - ideally with girls - as I felt better that way but there you go 

One of the great things about this life is the extent to which you can rediscover play, feeling free to play more on the notion of what it is you'd rather be doing rather than any gender based restrictions by parents, play groups or schools that for some of us were issues at the time.

For me it helps deal with certain more specific to me issues such as my learning disabilities that can and does make deal with adult responsibilities very frustrating when you struggle with the means because I can focus more around things I can do, enjoying them. 

And so being disabled too for me is also a big part of my identity (I'm not with one, I has one in my whole being) too having had it from birth.

So this identity thing is pretty important for us personally although I don't feel people should put up rigid barriers between themselves  based purely upon that, focusing more on what we have in common.