Moving On

This time last year I found myself  moving out on my own away from my family and my home for the first time in over a decade.  Because my finances were heavily strained between helping my family and filling in where health insurance fails trans people, I chose to rent a room with another person in order to keep my costs as low as possible.  I had a roommate and a landlord who could come and go whenever they wanted in each of the three places I've lived since then.  The majority of the time (about 9 months) I spent at my last place where I paid almost 50% extra rent in order to have a room my daughter could use when she was there.  My roommate would leave, and my daughter would use her room every other weekend.  We'd take a sleeping bag and lay it atop my roommate's bed.  It was makeshift at best, but we made it work.

Recently, I became very focused on changing our living situation.  I wanted to find a place that was nice enough that Jade would feel comfortable there, but inexpensive enough that I could afford it without needing to have a roommate and without completely compromising my ability to continue my transition.  I'd never really spent any appreciable time in my life living alone, and such a place would give me that experience I feel I missed out on in my previous life, but mainly it would let me make a home for me and my daughter.   I wanted her to want to spend time with me, and be able to keep toys and books and clothes there so it felt like home to her.  I didn't want to replace her existing home with her mom, my ex, but to make her feel that she was at home when she was with me, too.

Several weeks ago I began apartment hunting.  I did the whole process "stealth".  I made no reference to my previous gender or my past identity.  I had leasing agents give me safety suggestions as a "single woman [about to be] living alone".  I got the distinct impression everyone took me at face value, and I appreciated that.  When I found "the place", and I signed my very first formal lease ever as a woman and on my own, I felt a huge sense of accomplishment.  This week I moved into the new apartment. I'd never lived in an apartment before except for a very brief time a long while ago, and I was excited about it.  I was also overwhelmed.  Living in a furnished room for so long, and having left most of my possessions behind so my ex and my daughter would have everything they needed in my absence, I found myself without most of the basics that any home should have.  From furniture to kitchenware, I had only a handful of items, and found myself doing lots and lots of bargain shopping.  I now have most of the essentials covered, and my new place is really starting to look and feel like a home.

As I write this, Jade is in bed in her room fast asleep after a nice evening together, a warm bath, and a very animated reading of the book, "Tickle Monster".  When she saw her room for the first time, including her bed with a rainbow-colored comforter she used to have in our old place, and a desk for her computer, she squealed with joy.  She told me she didn't like the new place - she loved it.  She said it wasn't nice - it was really nice!  Tonight she really seemed to be comfortable and happy here, and that is the best outcome for which I could have hoped.

However, earlier today as I sat in my living room alone for the first time and looked around at the collection of old and new stuff, it occurred to me that there was probably another reason why I was so bent on renting a room in someone else's house all of this time.  When I really started thinking about the relative permanence implicit in my going out and buying furniture, and houseware items and such, I realized that part of my chosen living situation until this point was, on some level at least, a refusal to commit to where I was living.  I was keeping myself able to quickly and easily move back in with my ex and my daughter.  Not having a lot of "stuff", it would have been a much easier proposition to move back in with them.  By taking the steps to truly began building a home of my own, and having to amass a certain amount of basic possessions again, I'm admitting to myself that I've moved on, and I am at the start of a brand new phase of my life.  Though nothing is impossible as they say, I'm a few degrees past the "point of no return" now.  I live here now.

I'm at peace with my new life, and in certain ways it feels very right.  I'll spare you the details of my having to go through boxes of books, greeting cards, photos, and other mementos and the emotional toll that took on me.  It was rough, and I've cried a lot (again).  Still, I needed this experience of moving out on my own in order to figure out who I am as a person and as a woman, and Jade and I needed this to feel like we're living together as a family even though we don't do so together with my ex anymore.  I just had not really given much thought to some of my less obvious motives for not having done this sooner.  Financial reasons?  You bet.  However, it also allowed me to not be completely committed to my new life until now.  Had the door to my past been reopened, I could have gone back.  No, I couldn't detransition - not without serious and permanent emotional consequences.  I am sure of that.  However, I could have gone back to my family if they could have accepted me as I am.  Now, I am at a point where going back is not on the list of realistic possibilities.  In moving out on my own, living alone for the first time, and really working to make a home for Jade and me, I'm stating that, beyond unexpected tragedy, this is where I live for the foreseeable future - from now on.  I have my own place now.  Finally, I have indeed "moved on".