Dear Diary

It's 2:33 am and it's boxing day. It's not my best Christmas if I'm honest. It was nice to chat to Jemma. It felt normal. 

I have this feeling lately. I am awake in the middle of the night feeling utterly isolated. The thing that makes me feel isolated is. I'm not sure how to explain it. I have to step back a bit first. Over the past few weeks and months I've been doing physio rehab. While I am wearing these compression shorts, which hide the sensation of me having balls, i feel more masculine. I have decided not to question it within the binaries of a fixed notion of masculinity and femininity. It makes me feel masculine when I don't feel like I have balls and when I wear floral and sweet scented perfume while doing running cardio, it makes me feel really good. So good that I am capable of running and tolerating pain in a much unprecedented way. Proof is in the pudding and the fact is on Christmas day in spite of 2-3 days eating I have had the lowest bodyfat I've had since about March. It's really surprising and I don't understand it. I should declare in transparency that my weight has gone up the past few days and that's reasonable. It's the bodyfat that surprises me.

I feel a part of me fully expressed and fulfilled. This masculine, rage, intellectual, autistic, plalnning and somewhat emotive side of me. But in fulfilling that side of me I realise I don't have an outlet for other aspects of me. The part of me that loves, the part of me that yearns, the part of me that desires, lusts, feels joy. the part of me that laughs, the part of me that wants to wear a blouse, the part of me that maybe wants to wear a pencil skirt or express gender fluidity. The part of me that *maybe* has she/her pronouns. The part of me I feel must remain hidden for my sake of embarrassment. It's a square I can't circle. 

Anyway let's try to summarise this Christmas. The trade unionist told me I need to write an apology to my boss or I could lose my job. I am feeling unwell a lot at work. There's a lot of transphobia going on in society at large and it's eating away at me. I'm going through this gender expression journey that feels like a door opening but what's going on at work and society is like the doors are closing. 

Anyway I better do ABC PLease, not done it in a while:

A: Accumulate positive experiences: I wentn out socially a few days last week, I went out of london for once, I spent time with family. i've done really well on this

B: Build mastery in activities that make you feel confident: There's Running, there's pro-social relationships

C: Cope ahead: I think I could do more of this, I feel this is a weak point but I have anticipated some events and wrote some plans for upcoming days. I'm firming up plans for January and the rest of 2024

P: Physical illness prevention: I'm not sure. I can run well

L:  Low vulnerability to diseases: I'm mentally unwell

E: Exercise regularly: I didn't do any running on Christmas day or will I do so on Boxing Day but I'm hoping to use the Gym when it's open tomorrow beffore 2pm closing

A: Avoid mood altering drugs: I had a box of ferrero rocher and a couple of desserts, I drank a bit. But really, A bit.

S: Sleep healthy: I'm up at 3am, not really doing well

E: Eat healthy: I will check the weighing scales later. I am hoping tomorrow I'll get back to it. I have a 2500kcal surplus I need to burn off. I'm possibly confident I can do it?