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Linda & Vanessa Kaye

The Fool or The Goddess

By Linda Kaye

We receive a variety of letters from people who respond to the Couples Network. Some people write because they need help, some write because they want to help, and some write because they have something to share with us. As more and more websites open up, we get more and more requests to link to our website. Several weeks ago, I received an email from a woman named Bronwyn, who wrote about her relationship with her transgendered partner. An extraordinarily intelligent woman, obviously very secure in her own womanhood, she nonetheless had typical fears and trepidations of loving a transgendered man. As often happens, I related immediately to her and her needs.

Bronwyn studies Wicca, a form of worship that is often misunderstood as Satan worship.

Although my beliefs tend more to Christianity, I nonetheless firmly believe that every person has the right to worship as they please, and I take interest in other faiths. Bronwyn wrote about the Fool and the Goddess, when talking about herself as a woman. As near as I could gather, the Fool lives in childlike trust, whereas the Goddess finds a state of self-acceptance and rejoices in her womanhood.

I understand the Fool, for I went for many years in such a state of childlike trust. I thought that love was always enough. It isn't. It can't cure depression in others, it can't cure their perceived inadequacies and it often becomes like the wind - blowing away from you. I was involved for many years in a relationship with a person who had great difficulty in accepting responsibility for what happened in his life; it was easier to find blame in others for his own inadequacies and perceived failures. At first I was naive enough to believe that my love was strong enough to cure this. Unfortunately for the both of us, love was not enough and slowly but surely, as time passed, that love was destroyed by his inability to find peace, and my inability to "save" him. I have never felt so inadequate in myself, and I felt began to die because it was turned away so many times.

What a shame to see something die like that. In any event, I believe I lived as the Fool for too long, and it was the situations at hands that finally made me face the Goddess factor and find myself as a woman. I was not afraid, and it has been a powerful force in my life. To me the Goddess is a woman of inner strength, of self-belief and esteem. The Goddess accepts herself and all that lives inside, even the weak part. The Goddess finds peace within her and lives her life as fully as possible. She confronts stress and problems head on, using that inner strength to hold her up and guide her. Yet, she is a woman of compassion, of emotions and allows herself to weep and to grieve, when necessary. She looks for the good where at first she cannot see anything but perceived bad. She opens her mind to diversity and comes to understand her own prejudices and tries to overcome them. She is not perfect, nor ever will be, but she strives for perfection, and understands that others also are not perfect.

All of this applies very much to the wife/partner of a transgendered man. We all go through the Fool period in our lives and some never make it to the Goddess period. Each of us takes a personal journey which cannot be compared to another's journey. We may find similarities but each of us is unique, as is our journey.

The key, I think, is to concentrate in learning who you are as a woman. Secondly, we need to learn to like ourselves. We need to understand that no one person is perfect, and thus, we will never be either. Once we have reached a point where we are at peace with ourselves, it is time to work through our feelings about our transgendered partner. Our journies must be mapped out and we must know where we are headed emotionally and mentally, as women, before we can begin to explore the journeys of our transgendered partners. I guess a good but trite comparison would be the old saying, "Physician heal thyself." We must be emotionally strong and well as we face the issues within our relationships, especially those that come from the partner's transgenderism.

What I (and others) have tried to tell other women in relationships with a transgendered man is that your womanhood and your sexuality is your own, no one else's, and if you are secure as a woman, then his dressing, his adventures into femininity are a journey you can help him explore. That is how I feel. I have long accepted myself, and have taken responsibility for who I am. I no longer worry that what I feel or think might be different or "wrong" in the eyes of others - who cares - it is right for me?

To move from the Fool to the Goddess, a woman must do a lot of intense soul-searching and inner growth. It is not an easy journey and never accomplished overnight. To begin the journey is to begin to find great fulfillment in life and to understand how wonderful it can be to be a woman.


Linda and Vanessa Kaye both write for Transgender Forum on a regular basis. They also run the Couples Network , a safe place for couples to connect and learn more about living in a relationship with a transgender person. They have their own web site you may enjoy.

Linda and Vanessa have also written a book together: "Life With Vanessa" Straight talk about integrating transgenderism into a loving, caring and positive relationship.

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