I've still been running since that race but I haven't run many races. I've had time to ponder who I am and who I want to be.
Just after my birthday last year I legally changed my name and gender marker.
I guess I should fill in some background. I was teased quite a bit when I was a kid. Other kids called me a f*g. For years I thought I might be gay but that didn't seem to fit. I took a navy scholarship to go to college. That was in the days before "Don't Ask, Don't Tell". In those days, they asked. Even being seen at a place frequented by LGBTQ people was cause to be kicked out and they could come after you for scholarship money. I was afraid something would come up during the SBI for my TS clearance. But I made it through my required active duty time. I got married and seemed to be living as an almost normal heterosexual cisgender male. But deep down I knew I was different.
Back in the '00s I subscribed to Running Times and Ruuners World. In May 2005 Runners World published an article about a transgender runner. I read the article. And I read it again. And I read it again, and again. It was the first time I had ever read anything about a transgender person that wasn't sensationalist ridicule. As I read it over and over, I knew I identified with that runner, Janet Furman Bowman. https://www.runnersworld.com/runners-stories/a20797285/running-after-transition-janet-furman-bowmans-story/
I slowly learned more about gender. One weekend in 2012 I discovered transgender women documenting their transition on YouTube. As I watched those courageous young women, I cried. And I fully admitted to myself that I was transgender.
But I knew I was too old, too big, and too bald to be a runner. How could I possibly present myself to the public as a woman? Not only could I never pass, but how could I put my family through this? I was sure I would lose my job.
So I locked myself in the closet. I quit running races.
In 2016 a friend from the high school cross country team I was on in California announced on facebook that she had transitioned. And again I read that post over and over and over. This person I knew, who was just as old as me, actually went through with what I was afraid to do.
She was hurt. She was resentful that I hid from her.
I started seeing a therapist. I started going to transgender group meetings. I knew I was trans. For over five years I knew was trans. But I came to realize that I couldn't live in the closet any longer.
I came out to my daughters in October 2017. A month later I started hormone replacement therapy.
I started living a sort of double life. I couldn't risk losing my job so I presented male at work each day. I was sure I would be fired if the nuke plant discovered who I was. My wife was afraid I'd lose my job. She was afraid someone she knew or someone I knew would see me. I could go to therapy or group in Houston but I had to present as male south of Beltway 8.
After about a month on HRT, running started to become a little uncomfortable. After about two months I needed to wear a sports bra to go running. But being so old already, no one at work noticed anything. The summer of 2018 slowed me down quite a bit. And when the cooler weather of autumn arrived, I found I was much much slower than I should be. Suppressing testosterone and taking supplemental estrogen have profound effects on your body. Muscle strength changes, blood content changes. Blood labs with male normals were flagged red - red blood cell count, hemoglobin, hematacrit were all below the normal band for males. Most runs were at least a minute per mile slower than expected for the temperature conditions.
In January 2019, I was six months away from being eligible for early retirement. I planned on retiring when I turned 60 that year. And once retired I could live full time as myself.
But one afternoon in January I received a meeting notice for an urgent meeting that day. I opened the attachment for the meeting and it was titled Transgender Talking Points. How did they find out about me!?! Why are they having a meeting about me without even talking to me first!?!
But the attachment said the work group had already been informed and that the person was working with HR. Someone else at the power plant is trans!
At the time, my supervisor was very conservative. But the meeting seemed to go OK. It was very strange attending a meeting that I had so often imagined would be about me.
With the path blazed before me, I decided to transition at work. I starting talking with HR. At the end of May 2019 I filed legal papers to change my name and gender marker. I took several days off work and on June 19th, I came to work as Katherine.
I had been on HRT over 18 months but I don't think anyone at work ever suspected that I was transitioning.
