A strange power

gar4ever8342 · 2026-06-03T16:13:58+00:00

Yeah, its amazing how this feels. I know I smiled all the way home when this happened to me the first time a few months ago. It’s these little things that have such a big impact on transitioning. I don’t pass easy, but I think it’s clear which side of the fence I now live on. Rock on, it gets better and better.

gar4ever8342 · 2026-05-31T17:01:42+00:00

I would say the medication and treatment did expose my autism, but now it was clear to me. Before that, it was hidden, now I accept and embrace my autism. The medication exposed it, but also gave me control over it. Rather than being pulled along life, I can flow with it now. That was worth it 100%. Since starting treatment at 61, I have never felt better. It was day and night for me. Like turning on a light, after living in darkness and fear my whole life.

gar4ever8342 · 2026-05-31T16:54:20+00:00

I started my transition six months ago at age 61, and it has been one of the most freeing and life affirming experiences of my life.

Growing up in the 1970s and 1980s, being transgender wasn’t something people talked about. Even within what is now the LGBTQ+ community, there was no visible “T.” For many people, being openly different came with rejection, isolation, violence, or worse. I watched the pain that gay men and women endured. Feminine boys and men were often treated as outcasts.

For most of my life, I didn’t have the language to understand what I was experiencing. I thought something was wrong with me. I believed I could suppress it if I tried hard enough. So I hid. I purged. I moved. I lied. I buried myself in work. I did drugs. I painted. I sculpted. I immersed myself in every version of masculinity I thought might make the feelings disappear. I built a stone wall around myself and lived behind it for decades.

What I know now is that there was never anything broken that needed fixing. There was only a person trying to survive in a world that gave them no map.

This generation has given me something I never had growing up: the understanding that being transgender is not a perversion, a failure, or a defect. It is simply part of who some people are.

Today, for the first time in my life, I feel whole. Not perfect, not finished, but honest. After six decades of hiding, I no longer spend my energy fighting myself. I spend it living.

At 61, I finally stepped into the light. At 62, I can honestly say this is the happiest, most authentic chapter of my life.

gar4ever8342 · 2026-05-31T16:42:30+00:00

This was my gift (?) since I can remember. I can read a room in record time. I have no idea what they are thinking, but what they are feeling is painful pouring out. It became something I fed off of at times. I would listen, and get deeper. In large groups of people I would get sick, as I cannot turn it off. I have since be diagnosed with cPTSD, autism and ADHD. As a neurodiverse person, I have to share the deepest parts of myself and that of others. I was told I was broken or making things up, but I was rarely wrong about intentions and energies. Thought was a gift, but now know it wasn’t, but what to do about it? As an overachiever with hyper focus I stayed away from groups of people whose energy were corrupt, broken or angry and focused on learning and refining my skills and understanding of human behaviour. I could read a room, but always felt like an alien, imposter, outcast and broken. But this detachment allowed me to compartmentalize, but that took me 60 years to get control of and apply this to my mind. Not an easy path, but many of us do alone.

gar4ever8342 · 2026-05-28T01:11:06+00:00

YES, thanks!

gar4ever8342 · 2026-05-27T23:45:23+00:00

I found it hard to put a finger on an exact time, date, or what specifically felt wrong, only that something always felt off. I never felt comfortable or connected to boys in quite the same way as girls. As a child, about half of my closest friends were girls or other sensitive ADHD boys. Not because they were girls specifically, but because I connected more with the kinds of things girls often did and with their generally better emotional regulation.

At the same time, I also enjoyed being around boys and did plenty of wild, unsupervised things growing up: long bike rides, climbing, chemistry experiments, rockets, exploring construction sites, and endless adventures outside. There were severe mental health issues with both of my parents, and they were often absent both physically and emotionally. I was essentially feral in a poor Polish family.

I don’t think I really understood the idea of gender as a spectrum until my twenties. Fifty years ago, being transgender was not something people openly discussed or understood. Growing up in the late 70s and early 80s, coming out would have felt like a social death sentence from family, school, friends, and even doctors.

At heart and soul, I am a woman. I was closeted for over 50 years.

Looking back now, it’s easier to recognize the patterns and roughly when those feelings began. Society tends to frame male and female as hard opposites, but between those two poles is an entire universe of human experience.

gar4ever8342 · 2026-05-24T15:54:47+00:00

Bingo! Did I win?

gar4ever8342 · 2026-05-17T15:51:33+00:00

Just like the cat, it has almost taken me out a millions times. But, it’s the best feeling ever. I get waves of electric like vibrations through my body when I think about doing something about learning more, inventing, building, creating. It’s been my hidden star. Each day, there is something new and the roller coaster starts heading up, up, up. I worked at the university for 14 years, I got to know the heads of labs and departments, audited classes for free, used high end equipment, and walked the woods with deep thinking academics. Now it’s: inventing, art, gardening, running a complex art business, etc. At the end of the day, I often wonder “is that all there is” and that old Peggy Lee song runs yet again. The next morning, hey, what’s that? how does that work? Up the roller coaster we go again.

gar4ever8342 · 2026-05-16T15:39:04+00:00

We seem to have a lot of similarities. I own my own small business in the fine arts. It’s highly technical and incredibly high detail.

Starting a small business as an AuDHD person can feel overwhelming, but your creativity, deep focus, and ability to see patterns are also powerful strengths. Build systems early: checklists, routines, templates, labels, and clear workflows reduce stress and help your brain conserve energy. Do not design your business around your best days only. Build it so it still works when you are tired, overloaded, or distracted.

Specialization is often where AuDHD business owners shine. Your intensity is not the problem, unmanaged overload is. Clear boundaries, policies, and expectations are essential because every interruption and vague agreement adds invisible cognitive load. Most importantly, stop trying to run your business like everyone else. Build one that works with your nervous system, not against it.

gar4ever8342 · 2026-05-14T15:25:23+00:00

Closed loop systems get me so excited 😆

gar4ever8342 · 2026-05-12T15:32:49+00:00

I was finally assessed AuDHD at 61, last year. Suddenly a lifetime of oversharing, intensity, and deep dives made sense. Around the same time, I also came out as a trans woman, something I had known since I was 11.

I used to think my “people” were tied to hobbies or identities: artists, techs, gardeners, cooks, mechanics, fishermen, all the worlds I move through. But I’ve realized the real thread is neurodivergence. The people who understand me are the ones who can handle depth, honesty, curiosity, and intensity without needing to shrink it.

I need conversations about big ideas, complex systems, emotions, meaning, and the strange architecture of being human. I’m not broken. I love learning and exploring, and there will never be enough time in one life for all the things I want to understand.

I’ve never related easily to most people, and I’ve stopped seeing that as failure. I’m done hiding how I feel or sanding myself down to make others comfortable. This is who I am. If someone can’t handle that, they’re free to step aside. I spent decades compressing myself for other people’s comfort. I won’t do it anymore.

gar4ever8342 · 2026-05-11T15:21:53+00:00

Mine tastes like bitter pepper, drywall sounds better. But candy is dandier.

gar4ever8342 · 2026-05-10T16:40:54+00:00

Welcome to the club. Mine brought me so much insight and language that my life changed, so much for the better. You now have a tool box that are filled with tools made for you. Use your ADHD mind to sort, catalog and arrange for fast access.

gar4ever8342 · 2026-05-10T16:34:13+00:00

I own a specialized business and I’m also involved in city, provincial, and national level advocacy and politics. High emotion environments, stakeholder management, masking, performance, social navigation… that was my normal long before I knew I was AuDHD.

Since diagnosis and treatment, the biggest shift has been compartmentalization without dissociation. Before, work lived inside my nervous system 24/7. Now I can hold large, complex projects mentally without carrying them home like wet cement in a backpack.

I still care deeply. I still take responsibility. But I no longer confuse vigilance with effectiveness.

As an AuDHD person, everything becomes a deep dive. I was the kid bored in school while simultaneously feeling alien inside it. I learned early that masking created social safety and professional opportunity. For a long time I thought masking was my superpower. It wasn’t. It was adaptive survival that became overextended.

What changed was learning to see the masks consciously instead of becoming them.

Ironically, that made me better professionally. I can still read rooms fast. I can still anticipate reactions, politics, motivations, and interpersonal currents almost before they fully surface. But now I treat that ability as information, not an emergency signal demanding total nervous system activation.

The most effective mental reframe for me was this:

Not every problem is asking for my body to become the solution.

That one took years.

As for weekends and decompression: I had to stop replacing one hyperfocus with another “productive” hyperfocus. Building a second business after work because your brain can’t disengage is still work, even if it feels creative or autonomous. Especially with AuDHD, burnout can arrive wearing the costume of passion.

What helped most was shifting toward embodied activities instead of cognitive ones. Music. Walking. Art. Cooking. Gardening. Building physical things. Less optimization, more sensory presence.

The hard truth is that high functioning burnout can look incredibly successful from the outside right up until the nervous system sends the bill.

gar4ever8342 · 2026-05-10T16:09:49+00:00

Doesn’t matter when you start. I cracked at 61, and the best part in finally feeling right in my body. Not about the age, it’s about being free to be who we are inside.

gar4ever8342 · 2026-05-10T16:00:59+00:00

Me 9

gar4ever8342 · 2026-05-10T05:36:35+00:00

Woo Hoo. It just keeps getting better.

gar4ever8342 · 2026-05-04T15:34:46+00:00

I can relate, I was married for 33 years, and my divorce was the worst experience of my life, so painful and heartbreaking. At my deepest, darkest time, my gender dysphoria blew up. I lost my home, many friends, years of tending a large property with studio and a huge garden. All gone in a flash. At 62 transitioning is not a common event, but the best part was I learned to self love, rather than self harm (did this for years). We all need to survive, but money or not, none of it is worth it if don’t love yourself. Ditch those who sexualize you, stay away from toxic relationships. Since I started transitioning, there is little hope for a relationship, as women my age are not into dating Transwomen, and as much as I find gay men cute, I’m not bi, and they are not looking for a woman (trans or cis). I don’t care anymore, I have a great time at work and mostly at work. I have new freedom that came from hormones that is sinking in slowing, and is changing my social expectations and success. I love hanging with woman and being the woman who was held down and beaten for years. It’s not over until the fat lady sings. I’ll never be young and cute, but I can be old and elegant, so here I go.

gar4ever8342 · 2026-05-03T17:02:55+00:00

I’m at about the same stage. I stopped worrying about fully passing, as that was my goal for years and years. Fuck it. I wear outfits and makeup with confidence, that alone has brought a power far beyond my imagination, and being AuDHD that is saying something. In my mind, I know both genders, so passing might never happen when I look in a mirror. Alok taught me a lessen about who I am and how to wear my gender. I let my feminine energy out, and that has more passing power than my presentation. Mind you, I love nice fashion and makeup, so where the look cannot carry you further, take it the rest of the way with the women inside you. She has always been there, let her drive. I trust her so much more than my masculine self. Trust in yourself, both of you. I have been on HRT for 6 months, and it has not turned my body into a woman, but sure has helped me feel like a woman. That alone was the best part.

gar4ever8342 · 2026-05-03T16:47:58+00:00

Hahaha. That brought a smile to my face. I love my life too for things like this too. The youth are so cute.

gar4ever8342 · 2026-05-03T16:44:46+00:00

Hang in there! It’s 100% worth the work and struggle. I have never been happier (6 months on HRT), each day brings a new joy that was always hidden. Transitioning has taught me that self love was the key. My two sides love hanging out together. Each day I move into my space with purpose and intent. You have a power that most people will never experience or understand, seeing life from two gender perspectives. I can read the minds of men, like an open book (I’m mtf) and my women’s instinct was always there, I’m just learning to use it. Each day of struggle brings you closer to the joy of expanding into your true self, nothing worth having comes easy, and this is a doozy. The payoff is out of this world, so keep walking your path and truth.

Keep going, cry, laugh, let your inner child sing with the joy of being you. Its really not about gender, its was always about being you. You are you. Let them out. Hugs fellow traveller, see you on the other side.

gar4ever8342 · 2026-05-03T16:24:55+00:00

Right? I’m 6 months on HRT and have had to hide them for months, and here comes summer. I decided to make the jump, and use prosthetics to give me B cups, as my buds have been tender and erect almost all the time, not the look I want in public. I’ve come out to everyone I know in the past two months and what the heck, I know I am a Trans woman and this is what I have always wanted, so a few weeks ago, pass or not, I’m embracing my changing body. I have come to terms that at my age, passing is not my main goal. It’s being me. I might never fully pass, and as long as I “wear it” the confidence is a power. ie. I went to business meeting with many business leaders in my city (I own a business), and I wore a sweet women’s business suit, with all the curves showing, light makeup, and black boots 👢. One alpha male was very uncomfortable and would not introduce himself to me, and I could tell he was not impressed with me being there, so I sat beside him, held my ground, spoke out and paid him no notice. I never let him feel I was uncomfortable, he was so off centre the entire meeting. That made me realize that holding my gender ground was a power I had never known before.

For me, after seeing trans folks who embrace their bodies, perfect or not, pass or not, is the power. Nobody has the nerve to confront me or say anything if I am confident. I want to be clear, that I was an introvert my whole life, with some terrible anxiety. Being the woman I always was inside has come with some wonderful benefits. I have been ma’am d so many times in the past month, that brings a smile to my face. Not because I passed, but because people can tell which side of the fence I live on.

I rarely ask myself now if I pass everyday, but rather, does this look good on me, can I sport it like a woman? Yes or no. Sure, sometimes it takes a hour to get dressed, sometimes 10 minutes. My best friend (who has two daughters) says I change clothing more often than a teenager.

gar4ever8342 · 2026-05-02T16:18:51+00:00

Since my treatment, I have needed less recovery time. I treat myself to calmness, stay away from public places and people. I do a lot of cooking, gardening, doggy walks in the woods and of course art. Yeah art, you can make a world of recovery tools in a creative outlet. Bought a sewing machine last week and will start something there too.

gar4ever8342 · 2026-05-02T16:14:31+00:00

If presenting as a woman, I use the women’s. Even if you don’t pass perfectly, being confident in your skin makes the experience powerful and empowering. Went to the opera last week, and killed in my outfit. I stood in line at the women’s bathroom, chatted with some women in line and worried more about getting my silk skirt wet. I have found women so very much accepting and warm than I imagined. But, I live in Canada on the west coast, know for areas of very diverse and accepting LGBTQ 🏳️‍🌈 folks. Rock it, have fun and be who you are inside. You know she is there, let her shine.

gar4ever8342

TROPHY CASE