Families

I follow several of the girl's blogs who are going through transition pains with their families and friends and work and I know how difficult it can be when we spend emotional time maintaining cover of our 'family secrets'. I thought I was doing a good job of hiding my secrets until last summer when my daughter reconnected and we had a good long heart to heart talk about what she knew and saw concerning the family dynamics and stresses of my cross dressing adventures; which turned out to be more public than I ever realized. I chose to bury my head in the preverbal sand box.

What my daughter taught me is that older children make up their own minds, while younger children pick up the attitudes of parents, sometimes. Some children see that us as just another adult.

My own relationship with my mother was of compassion for me after I told her that I was going to change and become another daughter, she said that she would always love me, and I will remember that always.

The difficulties of my coming out to my family also happened when we were noticing the beginning of her declining mental health. It seemed that I would have to re-introduce 'Sarah' to her when Kay and I dropped in for a visit. She still could recognize us up until 4 or 5 months ago. Kay and I have been really involved with PFLAG and Integrity and visiting friends in the hospital and helping out people.

We had tried to drop in on Mother last week, but she seemed not to be at home, and so we left. Yesterday we visited a friend in the hospital because she had broken her ankle and we decided to check in on Mother again. We found her at home and learned that my sister who lives across the street had moved in with her to keep a closer eye on her and make sure she ate and took her medicine when she was suppose to and not overmedicate herself.

After only a few minutes, we realized that Mother mental acuity had really declined and she didn't recognize either of us. Her conversations tidbits centered around her father and that she was retired and was getting the retirement money from my father's military service. She didn't know us and thought we were from a church or some other place who visited the elderly. I was really hurt that my sister had not warned us as to mother declining mental health or that she had moved in with her.

She most certainly didn't know who "Sarah" was, I could also say that she wouldn't know that person that was her son. I realized that it would have been upsetting to her if I insisted that the woman sitting across from her was her new daughter much less than try to make her understand that I had been her son. So when we visit with her, and I intend to do so on a more frequent basis, we will be the two church ladies who come to visit and make pleasant conversation.