I said goodbye to my mother

This is what I wore to have lunch with my mother one day in 2019 in Clearwater, Florida. 

I was attempting to show her that my decision to become a woman wasn't something shoddy, garish, or evil.

She had always detested my cross-dressing once she found out about it. In fact, the first time she ever saw me in women's clothes she had her friend Scottie come to hold her hands to get her through the trauma of it. She saw it as a sin.

My craving to be a woman since age eleven was really a tribute to her as an actual feminine woman. I wore some of her clothes better than her.

We ended in an argument about my gender affirmation surgery. She hated that I was now actually a WOMAN. 

My mother said, "I don't ever want to see you looking like a woman again." 

To which, I said, "Don't worry. You won't."

As it turned out, she didn't. 

She died in 2020, one year later.

Before and after 2013-2019

I usually don't put up before and after pictures of my gender affirmation surgery. 

Why? Because so many young transwomen on social media are extremely sexy in the after shots.

But, for the sake of completeness, here are the before and after shots taken in 2013 as Larry Gable before surgery, and 2019, as Lauren Gable after.

2013 is when I was diagnosed with gender dysphoria. Immediately after that photo, I moved to Los Angeles and began living as an imitation woman.

I spent four years as a woman in Burbank, raising money and losing weight.

2019 is two years after my successful gender affirmation surgery.

Learning to be a woman was easy

Gender affirmation surgery synchronized my appearance more closely with my own gender identity.

The reason I had always desired to be a woman was because my gender identity WAS female. 

Gender-affirming surgery was essential and necessary for me. It was an intimate progression that included changing clothes, names, pronouns, and behaviors to fit my gender identity. I took legal steps to change my name and gender markers on government published identity records. 

Laurence Patrick Gable became Lauren Patrice Gable.

It took me 49 years of unsuccessful manhood to take that step. My sex indicated the identity given to me at birth, based on my outward anatomy. 

However, gender relates to my own sense of my behaviors, traits, and thoughts, often relative to my sex or to other members of my society. 

My gender did not match being a male, which I why I aspired to be female from the time I was eleven years old

Logically, estrogen and other drugs caused lovely feminizing effects for me such as breast growth, a curvier body shape, and smoother skin, for which I was incredibly thankful.

I am delighted to be a woman. My satisfaction with my life, mental and physical health, as well as my social life improved after my surgical treatment. I know how incredibly lucky I am to finally BE a woman.

Lauren in a short skirt!

As a life-long crossdresser, I never wore anything sexual or suggestive because what I really wanted was to look like a NATURAL woman.

Since I WAS a woman now, I decided a short skirt would be charming just for fun. 

Writer Dorothy Parker once said, “If you wear a short enough skirt, the party will come to you. ” 

It's important to me that by my readers know that in twenty-five years of cross-dressing I never ever wore sexy clothes. 

I wanted to be a natural woman, so I wore womanly clothing but not clothing intended to attract men. I hated being male and that's one reason that all my best friends were women or gay men.

I watched Project Runway instead of sports, read fashion magazines instead of men's magazines, and loved movies with female protagonists.

I've been a woman in my soul all along. 

Now finally I have the body to match.

Being a woman: a dream which came true

For too many years I dressed as a woman because I wanted to BE one. 

My crossdressing led to two divorces and nearly cost me my life.

The ache in my heart about wanting to be female never went away. I did not know at that time that my gender identity WAS female. I just thought I was a crossdresser or, as my mother said, a sinner.

I was never any good at being male. I made love to my two wives the way a woman would have, gentle and honestly. 

I wrote for popular magazines and later edited them. But my desire to be a woman never went away.

All my close friends were women or gay men who I met in community theater.

Finally, when I was diagnosed with gender dysphoria in 2013, I moved from Florida to Burbank, California where no one knew me and began living as an imitation woman fulltime. In four years of effort, I earned the money for surgery and lost forty pounds.

When I returned to Florida for my gender affirmation surgery in 2017 at Tampa General Hospital, my friend Cindy, who has undergone her surgery in 2015, helped me heal after my operation.

When I look on YouTube or social media, the transwomen I see are all youthful and unbearably beautiful. I have been a woman all my life but was afraid to have the surgery to finish the job.

So, I am not young, beautiful or an influencer.  But boy am I glad to be a woman.

Working as a woman

My complicated writing and editing work for the Human Resources company in Tampa required the most state-of-the-art computers available.

As a man, I had been working on computers since 1988, so it was easy for me to accumulate what I needed. In fact, as a male, I had been a writer and editor for major business magazines in the late Nineties.

However, the work I did from my home office for clients these days was peculiarly difficult because HR Inc. was a group of experts trying to solve dissimilar problems for organizations or government. That means the writing was academic and problematic.

What astonished me is that some of the men in the group flirted with me when I first appeared at our weekly staff meeting in Tampa. Since I am not attractive, they must have been trapped in the past. “Insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results.” That witticism is usually attributed to Albert Einstein. Never thought I would have THAT problem.

We also had monthly weekend conferences for our clients. Obviously, I had to appear in public on those weekends, but my self-confidence was elevated since my gender affirmation surgery had been so successful.

I basked in the gratification of finally being the woman I had always aspired to be.

 

Admiration at my new shape

When I put on my bra this morning, I looked in admiration at the feminine shape I am in after all those years of being in the wrong body, and I admit I cried with joy.

I have my own breasts and soft skin. and the curves of my body are still a magnificent pleasure for me. 

I can simply wake up in the morning and BE a woman. My wish for decades.

Now, I have my wish and it still startles me so. I enjoy being a woman more than regular women do because it took me so long to realize my dream.

I adore being female and it makes me proud and unafraid no matter how I got here. Gender affirmation saved my life and made it better.

Okay. I will admit it: 

I love the breasts that now belong to me thanks to the surgeons at Tampa General Hospital and my pharmacist. 

One of the greatest gratifications of being a woman are my breasts. Stealing a glance at the mirror at night became an unblemished pleasure.

These days, I'm just relishing the other pleasing things my body is capable of. 

I could have danced all night

I bought this dress for a church party, but I wore it to go dancing at our 2019 conference at the Don Cesar Resort Hotel in St. Petersburg Beach and it revealed one of my talents that almost no one knew I had.

As the evening activities began, I was simply happy to BE a pretty woman in a nice dress, bare legs, and heels.

What charmed me is that one of my gay friends, who had hired the band for the night, knew that I was a good dancer and he kept me busy dancing with him through the night. 

What a delight. Dancing with a handsome man. Rumba. Cha-Cha. Mambo. Waltz.

I noticed that my boss, Laurie Lykins, seemed a bit jealous of me that night. She danced not at all. Although she seemed to be drinking quite a bit.

One of the most WONDERFUL EVENINGS I have had in a long time.

Dancing as a woman.

People listen to a woman

As a male crossdresser for 25 years, I often dreamed of wearing a pretty dress and with bare legs and cute high-heeled shoes and standing in front of a conference room filled with people and having them listen to me as a woman.

This is the outfit I wore for our afternoon work sessions at the Don CeSar Resort Hotel in St. Petersburg Beach. It was the annual Human Resources Inc. conference in 2019.

I was one of several speakers addressing our efforts to computerize HR work at small businesses.

Only a transwoman can know the distinct gratification of standing in front of a crowd in an attractive dress, with bare legs and high-heeled shoes and having people listen to her. It was such a wonderful feeling. 

Now, I stood in front of a couple hundred people looking like the woman I was, and I felt overjoyed. 

Another dream had come true.

Being a woman in public in Florida

Oh, my. The exhilaration I felt in 2019, passing totally as a female in all conditions since my gender affirmation surgery had been so successful. 

I looked just like the unremarkable women I met as I appeared in public around the Tampa Bay area, shopping for groceries and paying my bills.

I was concerned that my mother could not accept me as a woman, because I was now a much more genuine and self-assured woman than I had ever been as a man.

When people say they “feel like a woman” this is a mild generalization because transgender women cannot accurately describe exactly what it is that makes them a woman. 

Being a woman is not a “feeling." 

Being a woman is a fact.

Gender is a fact, not a feeling. 

Keep in mind, having breasts and other female attributes aren't feelings. They are facts.

It is an identity.  You can’t explain why you are yourself; you just know you are.

So, I don't just FEEL like a woman. 

I simply AM a woman.

I love the ways in which I am female

Being a woman today means being strong enough to overcome adversity and discrimination; it means being confident in my identity as a female.

I have learned to be affectionate and nurturing towards others while also caring for myself. 

I know that gentleness and being considerate are fundamental to being the best woman I can be.

However, one basic need of a woman is the need for safety and security. That is what subconsciously drives me. 

I know how many transwomen have been murdered just for existing, especially here in Florida.

Which is why I have two locks on my front door and seldom go out at night.

So proud to be a woman

"No country can ever truly flourish if it stifles the potential of its women and deprives itself of the contributions of half of its citizens." -Michelle Obama

"I can promise you that women working together -linked, informed and educated- can bring peace and prosperity to this forsaken planet." -Isabel Allende

One of my gay friends at my Unitarian Universalist church gave me a birthday card in 2019 with this inside:

"You have the most beautiful heart and soul, Lauren. Hearing your voice brings me so much joy. The way you care for the people in your life inspires me. Your intelligence and passion are attractive. I love you, Lauren."

Each moment on this earth is a gift and as a woman I enjoy it. I am thankful for the present moment, it's all that you are guaranteed.

I am so much better a woman than I ever was as a man. It saddens me that I spent so many years as a male. All my friends were women and I married two of them, but I was not enough of a man to sustain our marriages.

The ache in my heart from wanting to be a woman colored every day of my life. 

If I had known about gender affirmation surgery back then, I'd have done it immediately.

Instead, I wasted my life as a man for 49 years. 

That's why I am so proud to finally be the woman I had always wanted to be.

Making my home prettier

Because I only had enough money for an inexpensive apartment in St. Petersburg, Florida, I put pictures and posters on the walls to make it look prettier.

I've had female traits all my life. Now that my body absolutely looks like my soul, I did as much as I could to make things appealing. 

I looked at myself in the mirror and felt a wave of gratification. I finally had the body I desired. Seeing my soft skin, my own breasts, and my bare legs, I was filled with delighted satisfaction.

For so many decades, I had not heard of gender dysphoria, so it did not dawn on me that I was female trapped in a male body.

But now, I am a woman. 

And glad to be female.