11-23-11

Okay update time.

I quit my job last week.  Last Tuesday I woke up and started crying.  I cried for a few hours until I realized I wouldn't be able to go to work in the state I was in.  So. I called in.  I spent most of the day either crying or recovering from a crying bout.  I did a lot of thinking and decided to quit the next day.  The next day I told my manager I was quitting but I could work the day if he wanted me to.  I worked my shift and left for the last time.

I'm not sure what I'm going to do next.  Right now I'm just trying to take care of myself.  I'm working on writing some stories.  I'm thinking about going back to college.  If I could get financial aid and a part time job it might be feasible.  I might just find a new job but one that I like more than the one I just quit.  I have a little time to decide.  I can afford to wait until mid January to find a job.  Not that I want to wait that long but if it takes that long to find a job I'll be ok.  Beyond then I'm going to be in trouble.  But I'm thinking positive and knowing that it won't come to that.

3-8-11

Most of this post was written last night to be posted today.

Mood: Mostly okay. I am feeling depressed but dealing with it right now.

Added before posting: I'm feeling more tired than depressed right now.

Happenings: I want to clean my apt tonight. It's gotten kind of messy, like my living areas often do when I get depressed. I know it's messy and I want to clean it but often I just can not muster the energy to actually do it. Usually I just live with it until I get a break in my depression and end up cleaning everything in a single fit of "I must clean". I'm trying to break that cycle by forcing myself to clean tonight.

Added just before posting: I just got off work. My boss asked me to stay a little late to cover for someone who had to leave early. I'm feeling really run down so I don't think I'm going to hav it in me to clean my entire apt. I'm going to aim for getting the dishes all washed and see how I feel after that.

Media: Hopefully more Dragon Age: Origins or maybe a movie.

Writing: None.

Gilly

1-18-11

Mood: Been having a depression/anxiety episode since Friday night. Or maybe the high from getting my own place has worn off. Something like that.

What I've been doing: Friday I didn't go home and watch Lars and the Real Girl. I stayed at Hasting's and really caught up on my feeds and read a bunch of blogs. I ran into a link to a blog claiming "transgenders" bring down "transsexuals". This is such HORSESHIT. It's transphobic and, and just Fuck Them! Sorry but that's the best I can do for a coherent response to that kind of bile. I hate that it gets to me like this. Reading that stuff makes all my doubts and fears go crazy. I wish I was more self-assured. I wish I had more confidence.

Saturday I got through work in a daze and then went home.

Sunday, my day off, I stayed home most of the day. I made sweet rice and ate it while watching Despicable Me. Then I filled my tub up and relaxed in the water for a while. Later I washed my clothes. I watched Lars and the Real Girl before going to bed. It was a good day off.

Monday after work my parents were in the city so I went with them to buy groceries. It was nice to spend time with them. They bought me a dish strainer. They also had a toaster for me but it wasn't new and some sodas.

Today I did something I feel good about. My coworker asked me what my necklace meant. I said it was the symbol for transgender. She asked me what that was and after thinking for a second I said, "It's when a person's gender doesn't match their sex." Which isn't the best definition but it's not terrible. She asked a couple of more questions. In the end she thank me for telling her what it meant. I feel good that I helped inform someone and I didn't brush her off when she asked about my necklace. I've fallen into the habit of doing that lately.

Writing Progress: I worked on chapter 3.

What I've been watching: Lars and the Real Girl and Despicable Me. Will do write ups tomorrow.

Reading: Tales of Mu

Just about today

Today I was at work at 8am and got off at 5:30pm. I sliced meat, worked the main cash register and sliced more meat which means I spent most of my day standing in two spots leaning slightly forward causing my back to hurt.

I feel a little down right now. I'm not sure if it's just because I feel so tired or if I'm starting a depressive episode.

I made a small change to the text at the top of the blog. I changed bi-romantic demisexual to pan-romantic asexual. I've been giving a lot of thought to whether or not I am asexual or demisexual. Demisexual means that a person normally does not feel sexual attraction for other people except for when an emotional bond has been established with a person. Asexual means that a person does not feel sexual attraction for other people period. After much thought I realized that I really do not and have not ever felt sexually attracted to anyone. Even right now that I'm crushing hugely on this guy I don't want to have sex with him. I want to cuddle and kiss and touch but sex not at all. Now wait how can you be crushing on a guy if your not sexually attracted to him? you may ask. Well that's where the pan-romantic part comes in. I do want to form relationships with people on a level that is more than just friends but without sex that's the romantic part. I'm also very open to who I might form these relationships with that's the pan part. If you're still confused google asexual and poke around you'll probably find some answers or leave a comment. I haven't gotten a comment on a blog post in a long time so I would totally love one:).

Hmm I'm feeling a little better now that I've written this. A little blog therapy maybe.

Till next time,

Gilly

Sorry I've been away

Almost two months since I last posted here. I've had a bit of trouble with the internet at my house so I'm only online when I'm at a hotspot. I've been doing ok. I got a new job a few weeks ago and got my first paycheck friday. I'm back at the deli I worked at two years ago, which I quit shortly before starting this blog. I wish I could say that I only went back because I had no other options but that's not true. After I got fired from the cookie store I let myself wallow in my depression. I coddled myself rather than force myself to look for a job. The best I could manage was one day visiting three businesses and filling out two applications. One day out of about forty.

But that is mostly behind me now. I'm still feeling depressed but a little less I think. I've been writing more for the project I started with my friend at the cookie store. I've also been working on a couple of other stories which may or may not be good, it is still to early to know for sure and I am working on them only in private so I have no feedback but I am hopeful.

My battery is running low so I'm going to stop here but I'm going to try to write a couple of blog posts tonight and put them up some time soon. Till then Bye.
Oh yeah here's a pic of me that I just took:

I Got Fired

I don't feel like typing up the whole story so I'll just say I let my temper get the best of me and I did something I wish I hadn't and now I'm without a job.

I was fired yesterday by my regional manager. I feel a little numb about the whole thing that is when I'm not feeling hopeless about the future. This job was my life. I Don't know what I'm going to do now. The people I worked with are like family and now I've been thrust out of the home we created at work. I may be romanticizing just a little. I've only been there for two years but I can't imagine working anywhere else.

I'm ok moneywise for a couple of weeks maybe up to a month if I'm very careful with what I spend money on. I'm thinking of taking that time to try my hand at writing for money again.

The event that got me fired happened Saturday. I was suspended for a week during which the regional manager came down and decided to fire me. Early in the week my sister told our manager(she works at the same store I did) that it may have been the hormones I was taking that caused me to lose my temper the way I did. She also told her that I use the name Gillian online. I was a little worried that this might create some tension between us until my sister told me that my manager had said I might be happier if I expressed some more femininity and that I would make a beautiful woman. So now we're closer than we were but now I'm not working with her and I feel so sad.

This too shall pass. One door close and another opens. I'm going to fine. I promise.

Gilly

Recently I had a bit of a revelation. As you may know I am the assistant manager at my job. What you may not know is that I don't always feel like I've earned it. I sometime feel like everything I'm doing is wrong. That I'm failing in every aspect of my job. I can look around and 'see' that I'm doing my job just fine and the store is not failing because of me but I still 'feel' it. So I put as much effort as I can into the store because not doing so make me feel like a failure. Everything that goes wrong feels like someone telling me I'm doing a bad job, whether or not it's something I can control.

I've learned to deal with these feelings and thoughts. Somedays are worse than others. Somedays I feel fine. Others I cry in the bathroom.

The other day was a bad day. First there was an email about a customer complaint. Then another customer came to the store about a cake we had messed up. And then another one called about another cake we had messed up. None of these complaints were my fault but I still felt like I was being told I sucked at doing my job. I tried very hard not to break down. But I couldn't not break down so I went to the bathroom and had myself a cry. Afterward I felt better for having letting it out.

I bought a book called The Depression Handbook. I thought it might help and if I had bought it five years ago it might have been of some help. Today I'm beyond that book in dealing with my depression. Every tip and trick and all helpful advice that fills it are things I've taught myself over the past few years. On one hand I feel good that I am managing my depression fairly well. On the other hand I'm like, "Is this as good as it gets? Am I going to feel like this till I die?" I wanted to see that the path goes on and instead I got a map to where I am now. When I was done reading the book I threw it across the room. Not a very mature response I know but it was how I felt at the time. I wish I had had some sort of realization about where I was headed, some sort of positive message to end on but I didn't.

I'm just typing sweet nothings to any who read this to let you know I'm still alive.

Someone got fired

No not me. Someone else. At my work. We've been short a few times in the last couple of weeks. Big even amounts. Thursday we were short. When I asked the woman, who I didn't want to think was doing what I thought she was doing, if anything had happened on the short register, she lied to me. I didn't know it was a lie but I felt it. I told me manager what I suspected. She looked over the security footage and found her stealing. So she was fired.

Part of me wants to be proud that I 'solved the mystery.' Part of me wishes I had stayed silent. Part of me wishes I wasn't quite so clever. The woman who was fired was my friend. (And you out there who wants to say if she had been my friend she wouldn't have stolen from the store, well you can just hush up cause sometimes people do things that don't seem very friendlike but still are friends.) But the larger part of me knows that I did what I had to do. As my manager said, "This is why you're the assistant manager." I looked out for the store's best interest. I did my job. I still feel lousy.

checking in

So it's been a bit since I posted. Actuclly it's been a bit since I've been able to finish a post but anyway something happened today that I wanted to relate.

So I'm at work and I'm rolling out cookie cakes for the first time in like forever when I hear someone call out "Ma'am, how much are these?" I look up cause even through I'm nowhere near the front counter I know they are talking to me and when I look up I see that they are looking back at me. I step out from behind the rolling table and walf over to the counter and tell the teenage girl who was calling me the price of what she was pointing to. Her jaw drops and she begins saying, "I'm so sorry I called you ma'am," and variations of such for a couple of minutes. I found her utter horror at her 'mistake' to be quite amusing but did my best to get her to understand that it wasn't a big deal.

But is it a big deal? Gender is 'serious business' for most people. Calling a guy a girl can lead to yelling or even physical violence. I feel like I'm in a state of flux. I can abide being called sir because I haven't made my stand, yet. I do prefer ma'am through. I wonder what the girl would have said if I had said I preferred to be called ma'am?

This brings to mind another incident from a few days ago. A man and his young daughter were watching me make pretzels. As he watch me he was talking to his daughter telling her that I knew what I was doing and to watch me. Throughout all of it he referred to me as she. When I then had to serve him he slipped in a questioning, "sir?" To which I just smiled. Before he walked away he made one more comment to his daughter in which he again called me she.

Right now that seems to be my lot in life. To pass some of the time but only when I'm not talking to the person. I could be upset about this but really I'm not, cause even this is more than I thought I could even have. I've been on this journey for sometime now. Stuck in a holding pattern waiting for the skies to clear. I think it's time to brave to storm.

Enough metaphor for now what do I mean by this? I mean that I'm within a stones throw of telling my boss and everyone at work and in my life that I don't want to hear his name anymore. That I want to be called by my name and referred to as she. I want to say to customers I prefer ma'am. I want to live openly as myself.

I want this so bad but I have to choose it for myself. No one is going to give it to me. I have to take it.

***

Oh yeah and that guy called me at work again. I was busy at the time told him I was and when he asked if I would call later I said I didn't know and hung up. I talked to my sister about his first call and she agreed that him asking me to come over to his house seemed sleazy.

Thoughts on coming out

I've been thinking a little bit about what it would mean for me to come out as transgender at work. I started thinking about this when I reread a post I made several months ago in which I stated:

I've said before many times that I need to come out at work. I think I'm going to stop saying it cause it doesn't matter. [..] This is not to say that I won't come out at some point but I'm not thinking of it as something I have to do but as something I will do when the time is right for me.

Reading later posts I can see that I didn't stick to this bold idea but thanks to me having written it down it has a new lease on life. I have decided that I don't need to come out at work right now. I've also decided that I don't need to hide anymore. I've taken little steps toward not hiding like wearing my transgender symbol necklace and using pink hair ties.

Today I took a bigger step. Today the new manager asked me what my necklace meant. I've been asked before and most times I have changed the subject or said it was personal. Today I answered her question by simply saying, "It's the symbol for transgender." I hesitated but spoke clearly and without shame. I even showed her how it incorporates the symbols for female and male while adding a combined one. And nothing bad happened.

Maybe I'm being melodramatic or just a drama queen but really I expected some sort of reaction from the universe. I just took a big step toward living a more open life and nothing bad happened to make me hide in the closet. Maybe the world doesn't revolve around me and the sun rises and sets with me there to watch it and a watched pot will boil but in twice the time and maybe the world isn't such a scary place after all.

work woes update

Ok so I'm feeling a little better. While I still don't like how Employee X was treated and I will be watching the new manager for more asshatness, I am not planning to quit right away. A couple of employee's came to me today and said they were not planning on quiting, which made me feel less abandoned. Another employee told me that she admires me for keeping at my job even though it has been really stressful on me and for not taking that stress out on anyone else. It really made me feel better knowing that someone had noticed the work I had been putting in to the store.

So I have decided to stick it out for a little while longer at least.

work woes

So Wensday the new manager started working at my store. She and employee X for one reason or another did not like each other. New Manager(NM) didn't like EX's work ethic and EX didn't like some new person telling her what to do. (I realize NM is the manager and she is in charge but she is still an unknown quantity the everyone). So when NM made the schedule for next week she cut EX's hour from 35 to 4 which prompted EX to quit.

I talked to NM about EX and asked why not just fire her if she didn't want her working there. NM's answer was that she didn't want to deal with having to write her up and then fire her. She would rather make EX quit than fire her.

Later we were again talking about EX and NM brought up how she had seen EX basicly doing nothing while on the clock. I then said NM should have written her up then and if she had ignored that then she should have been fired. NM said that she didn't want to be the bad guy.

NM doesn't want to be the bad guy but manipulating someone into quiting seems to me to be a bad guy move.

Several people have told me that they're looking for new jobs. I feel like everything I worked for the past few months to keep the store running is for nothing if we fall apart. I feel betrayed by my coworkers. I don't know what to do. I don't want to have to find a new job. I don't want to work some place that I feel dread going to everyday.

NM wants to run the store by the book. She's told me repeataly that she needs me. I wonder what will happen if she want to enforce the male dress code that includes short hair and no earings on me. Will I quit? Will I submit?

I feel so confused.

I'm still here for what it's worth.

I've wanted to post a couple of time in the past week or so but my posts keep getting derailed by the fact that I have been feeling more depressed than usual. So I figure I'd write a little about that.

I am depressed. It's easy to type but so hard to say. I've only said it once in passing to someone. If I were to tell more people part of me would feel like I was just fishing for sympathy.

What makes it harder is that I am functional in day to day life and I actually excel at my job. But I don't feel happy most of the time. At work I sometime begin to feel like everything is wrong that I'm doing a terrible job and the store will soon begin to fall apart. I KNOW that none of that is true but I still feel it. I have to remind myself that everything is fine that I'm doing the best job that I can and the store is running fine. I have to do this almost constantly some days.

To be a little random here is a pic of my cat Pia. It took me almost fifteen minutes to get a pic in which she wasn't just a blur.

New hire/transgender issues

I'm back online after being cut off from my digital world due to a damaged phone jack. I've had a new one installed in a place where it is much less likely to be damaged. I'm still using my Wii to post but I have gotten a usb keyboard to type with.

The last couple of weeks were spent training the manager and assistant manager for the new pretzel store my company is opening in the next few weeks. I had a great time mainly due to the two to them being great people to work with and to teach.

This week I am again training someone but not for another store. This guy is not the first person that has been hired for my store but he is the first that I have personally hired. I've work with him before at a previous job so I wasn't just hiring blindly from an aplication. I've had one day with him so far and I think he's going to work out great.

I'm feeling more depressed lately about not coming out at work and in general life. Yesterday a man asked me what Gil was short for. He was ofcourse refering to my name tag. I hesitated and he went on to suggest some possible names, "Gillian, Gilligan, 'Jillian'" and a couple more female names. I was mildly stunned and was vague and didn't confirm anything.

I hesitated becaue I didn't want to say 'his' name(I've stated thinking of it as his name rather then my name, which is probably not a very mentally healthy thing to do). I cringe inside when my coworkers call me by his name. This is rare as they all call me Gil or Gilly, which I know is short for his name but it's also short for the name I've chosen for myself, Gillian.

My new hire saw my transgender symbol necklace and asked about it. I was able to deflect his question and change the subject but part of me wishes I didn't have to. I wish I could make this big issue a nonissue. I could by coming out. However (I've said it before and I may say it a hundred more times before I stop believing it), I'm afraid I'll lose everything. I'm afraid that my life is a card house and my coming out would be like a gust wind scattering it into disarray.

Work Update and a small story

School has started. How do I know this? I know this because the mall is like a ghost town. Which means sales are way down which means we've had to scale back our employee's hours a lot. In fact the past two night's I have worked the pretzel shop alone for the last few hours. It's not too bad cause the pretzel shop is connected to the cookie store so I can call across for help if I need it.

The cookie store has also been hit by the return of school. Tonight there were only three of us from 6pm, when I sent the other girl working on my side home, to close (about 9:30pm).

It's likely that we will lose a few employees due to cutting back their hours. My own job is secure as is my pay since I'm working for a set salary.

Storytime: So I was up front at my counter when a couple walked by. I said hello and smiled. They said hello back and said they were just looking and walked past toward the cookie counter. There was no one else nearby so I walked into the back room to get a clean towel. My manager was walking back to the front and as he exited the back he called back to me that I had costumers. I hurried back and heard him say, "Gilly will be right back." I saw it was the couple that had just walked by. The woman then said something to the effect of, "Oh that's ok he..She was just here." I walked up while she was saying this and was standing in front of her when she made the correction. I said nothing about being called 'she.' I think I caught my manager give me a look for not saying anything, out of the corner of my eye.

I like being called she. It feels right. Usually people who call me she "correct" themselves and apologize even though I don't say anything. I'm up in air as to why she corrected herself from he to she. Was it based on my appearance? Did being called Gilly trip her pronoun flag? Did she miss hear Gilly as Lilly? In the end it doesn't really matter but it does makes me wonder.

And then there is the matter of my boss. I've not told him that I'm transgender or that I'm planing on transitioning. I think he might suspect something but he respects personal boundaries and won't say anything unless it effects my job in some way. So ultimately no real change there for now.

Random update

Yesterday something strange but pleasant happened. One of my employees referred to me as she repeatably during the day. It was strange because she hasn't done it before and I'm not out to her as trans but for some reason yesterday she kept saying she. This felt nice even if she did correct herself about half the time. It was kind like a preview of what's to come.

In other news I have decided to move out of the apartment I share with my sister and her kids in Sept. This will give me a month to get everything in order. I've made the decision but haven't told my sister yet. I haven't even told her about my raise yet. I don't know why I haven't.

I told my parents the other day about how I was now working on a salary. They weren't very excited. They expressed concerns that the company might ask me to work a lot of extra hours. I will have to work a minimum of 45 hours a week but I've already been working those kinds of hours so thats not a problem. I think they might be worried that I'm settling for a 'lesser' job. In other words, they think I should be doing something more important.

At one point in my life I might have agreed with them. Lately I've been asking myself, "Are you happy doing the work you are doing?" and the answer is yes. I am happy here doing the work that I do. I know that in the grand scheme of things running a pretzel shop is not very important. But we serve a purpose in the day to day lives of those that come to the mall and those that work in the mall. Until cheap robot workers can be made to take over mundane jobs, like making pretzels, leaving the human race to gaze intently at their navels all day, someone has to do it. And I don't see why it shouldn't be me.

The Hardest Part Is Saying The First Word

I said a few posts ago that I wasn't going to worry about coming out at work until I was ready but now I'm feeling that I may need to tell my manager and regional manager soon. They made me a salaried employee. To offer something like that to someone who has been with a company for less that a year is a big deal. It's a big deal to me at least. They could easily have just given me a modest raise like I was expecting. I was looking for table scraps and they threw me a steak.

I don't feel it's my duty to tell them but I feel like I don't want to rock the boat too much when I do transition. I wasn't worried about that before cause as much as I liked the job and wanted to keep it and as many times as I've been told I am a good and valuable employee, I thought I could always find another job. Now I feel like a valued employee and don't want to lose this job.

---

My boss asked me what I was going to do with all the money I'm going to be making. I said I didn't know but I do. As he asked me the numbers began dancing in my head sorting themselves into neat piles.

One pile for living expenses.
One pile for savings.
One pile for electrolysis.
One pile for HRT.
One pile for doctor visits.
And one pile for whatever I want.

But I couldn't tell him about the electrolysis or HRT so I just lied like I always do when something like this comes up. I want to stop lying.

ZOMG!!!

I'm a salaried assistant manager! Woot!

I was expecting a raise due to minimum wage increasing to just a little less than what I was already making. My manager has been telling me that I would be getting a raise but at my last job I heard similar promises about getting a raise that took most of a year to bear fruit. So I was a little bit skeptical hearing that I would be getting a raise sometime after the pretzel store opened. I prepared myself for weeks if not months of being told that it would be coming. So I was somewhat surprised when my manager told me our regional manager was thinking about offering me a salaried position. I was completely floored when he called my into the office a few hours latter and told me they were offering me a salaried position that would pay not quite twice what I'm making now. I've heard of being speechless but never really experienced it till today. For several minutes I could not form words.

On being called ma'am

Recently I've noticed a slight increase in the number of times I'm called ma'am. I've even been called lady twice in the last few days. My friend Gillian would say it's all about energy and I would have to agreed.

I've been feeling more and more comfortable just being me. Letting go of the act I put on to be normal. Of course I'm not really a very good actress so mostly I'm just quiet. At least I used to be. I'm feeling more at ease letting myself act like I want to act instead of how I think I should act.

I've said before many times that I need to come out at work. I think I'm going to stop saying it cause it doesn't matter. The people I work with won't care and I've decided that if the higher ups don't like it they can just fire me and I'll find a new job. This is not to say that I won't come out at some point but I'm not thinking of it as something I have to do but as something I will do when the time is right for me.

We're open for business!

We started late after having some problems with a mixer and the ovens but at 4pm we were rolling pretzels and by 4:30pm we were selling them to the line of people that didn't stop for two hours. I feel happy.

Sleep now cause tomorrow is going to be a long and busy day.