Gophering Around

Shit this got me out here cryin in the club

I hope it isn’t totally out of order for me to post here, as a man I don’t want to take up your spaces so I’ll try and keep this as short as possible. Tw genital mention

I have full permission from my partner to post this and she’s read it all. There is a misconception that the only men a straight trans women can get with, is a chaser. It is very sad that many of you feel that way, and I’m sorry for how men treat you, but that’s not how it has to be. I met my girlfriend when I was 15. She was living as a boy then and was 13. I used to push her around when we played football at school. I thought she was one of the lads. Time goes on, I was never that close to her and we lost touch. Next thing is I meet her again on a fine art course. I didn’t recognise her at all and with her name change and generic surname I never made the connection. I developed quite the crush, we would go on dates and I’d sort of play them off as just hanging out with a friend. I was so giddy around her and I was terrified to tell her I liked her. One day we were going to the movies and I told myself ‘today is the day I ask her to be my girlfriend, and try to kiss her’ We ended up skipping the movie to go on a walk in the local forest. I held her hand and she squeezed mine - my heart was beating so damn fast. We finally kissed and it was like fireworks. I told her I liked her but she cut me off. She told me to stop talking because she needs to tell me something. Now in my mind I’m panicking thinking she’s in a relationship, but she says ‘l used to be a boy. I was at school with you, please don’t be mad I’m so sorry I didn’t tell you ‘and then to my absolute horror she said ‘please don’t hurt me’ She genuinely thought that there was a danger of me attacking her after finding out. This broke my fucking heart. I had my moment of being like wtf - mainly because I’d known this girl for almost 10 years and hadn’t pieced the 2 people together - but then we kissed again, and then again and again and we kissed so much my face hurt by the end. That was 5 years ago and boy this has been a learning curve. I’ve only ever dated cis women before. I am 100% straight and I had to unlearn some internalized shit for maybe a day or so, until I thought what the fuck does it matter who she used to be? Damn I used to be a baby, people change. But I love her the way she is now. I love her smile I love her eyes I love her body her curves her hands her hair and you know what? I love her penis too. I love it because it’s hers. and it gives her pleasure, and there isn’t anything wrong with it. I don’t have a fetish. I just fell in love with a woman and that means I fell in love with the whole package. I’m planning to propose to her on new years eve. I want to spend the rest of my life with her. I want to raise kids with her and I want her to lose all of these insecurities. Just because you can’t carry them, doesn’t mean you won’t be the mother of my children. There is hope, you’re not broken or unlovable or nothing but a kink. You’re a powerful woman.

The second post is titled “Update from the cis guy that proposed.“ It reads:

Hey ladies. I’ve been asked by a few of you to share an update. Here is my previous post: https://www.reddit.com/r/MtF/comments/e95hgx/to_all_of_you_ladies_from_a_cis_man/?utm_medium=android_app&utm_source=share

And here is your official soppy post warning - beware…

Soooo on exactly 00:00 new years (ok I was probably out by a couple minutes but I did try to time it) I proposed to my beautiful girlfriend (who also happens to be trans, hence why I’m posting on here) and she said YES

I don’t know if I can fully articulate how happy I am. I wanted to keep it lowkey and between the 2 of us so she didn’t feel any pressure, so I cooked her favourite meal ever (I would have liked to cook something fancy and elegant but honestly she would much rather eat spaghetti bolognese with garlic bread and then a loaded ice cream sundae for dessert ANY day of the week) we ate, played board games and did a competition to see who could make the best vehicle out of old egg cartons and toilet roll tubes. Then we decided to make cupcakes which were fucking vile because we forgot to add the sugar of all things. Not typical romantic evening but I felt all the love and when I dropped down on one knee she just wept. I didn’t even know I had a yes at first because she was crying so much. I actually got really scared I’d freaked her out so I stood up and hugged her and said I’m sorry and she finally told me yes yes yes and explained that she was crying because it was always beyond her wildest dreams as a youngster that she would ever be able to be a wife. This is not something I can relate to, but I think I do understand, as best as i can as a cis man. We literally just held each other for a bit before we both realized she hadn’t seen the ring yet! I’m not a wealthy guy at all so I was afraid she would be disappointed in my grandmothers wedding ring as her engagement ring (I will buy her a new ring for the wedding) but I did want her to have it as my grandmother always told me she wanted my future wife to wear it. Luck was on my side though people because the ring made her cry all over again, happy tears, because she said it made her feel like the fairytale she told herself as a child has finally come true. I think there maybe was something affirming about the fact that this ring was left from my grandma for me to give to the woman I want to spend my life with.

Ok I don’t want to bore you all to death with the ins and outs but I haven’t stopped smiling since she said yes. The fiancee (I love saying that, so exciting) has been obsessively wedding planning which is mighty convenient for me considering I have no clue on how to organize a wedding. It’s like the child in her has come out to play and its very endearing. She missed out on all the typical girly activities as a child so she’s making up for lost time. She ALREADY has a scrapbook for the wedding and she’s already browsing dresses!

I’m sorry for being all cliche and cringey. I know its insufferable to many and I do understand. I just feel drunk in love, and i did want to update and not leave people hanging! Other than my mother, my family does not know she is trans, because frankly it’s none of their business and my fiancee hasn’t wanted to open up to them about that part of her life. She confided in my mother because my mother knows a transgender boy and so it came up in conversation. As far as the rest of my family are concerned, it’s totally irrelevant to them and they will only ever know if she chooses to tell them. So I was wondering if incorporating rainbows anywhere in the theme at all would be too obviously lgbt pride themed? Or can I get away with some rainbow tokens and such just as a discreet acknowledgement of how far she’s come? Obviously I don’t want people to think of this wedding as anything other than what it is, a straight marriage between a man and a woman, so are rainbows risky? I’m just so damn proud of her and want to show that in some way. I was thinking of wearing rainbow cufflinks or something? Anyway sorry for the damn essay but I hope the new year goes well for you lovely ladies and sorry for being a cringe lord. I just can’t believe I’ve found my queen

in MtF by takeurmedsbro

Third is another post, which reads:

Also:

They are literally particle accelerators that you point at your face.

And for eighty years, Americans' favorite thing to do was turn them on and stare at them for hours.

If you overcharge them, they emit gamma radiation.

Servicing them is like disarming a bomb -- their capacitors are enormous and are usually charged to hundreds or thousands of volts, and most of them have no bleed system that drains that charge, meaning that they can still be dangerous months or years after the last time they were powered up. A discharge can not only electrocute you, it can cause tools to melt or explode.

Back when, I worked at a small whitebox pc manufacturer. One day, a service tech brought back an older, gigantic (30 inch or so) AutoCAD monitor from a service call. The customer said "Made me feel nauseous"

So, we put it on the bench and fired it up. You immediately felt the hair on your body stand up, and my co worker put his hand up close to turn the power off, and his hand and forearm started spasming - I yanked the power cord from the wall as the tingle I was feeling began to feel hot.

IF CRT MONITORS GET TOO MUCH POWER THEY SHOOT OUT FUCKING X-RAYS

as for the capacitors, which are the thing that really tend to scare people who work with CRTs, the voltage produced by the flyback transformer is indeed in the range of 20-30KV, and the CRT itself acts as a capacitor, storing that charge. specifically, if you touch the anode, you’ll get zapped, and it’ll hurt. you might accidentally break something in the system you’re working on when you jump away. the whole experience will suck, and it likely won’t kill you, so you can go on to brag about the time you got shocked working on a CRT (i still tell people about the time i accidentally got too hands on with a powered imac analog board).

it will not, however, make your tools explode. in fact, the usual way of discharging a CRT when you’re going to be working on it is to take a long, rubber handled flathead screwdriver, attach an insulated wire to it via an alligator clip, ground the other end of the wire, and then shove the screwdriver up underneath the anode cap. additionally, most newer CRTs (think late 70s or newer) do in fact have a bleeder resistor built in. it’s good practice to discharge anyway when you’re going to be working near the anode, because the bleeder resistor can fail, and really cheap TVs might have omitted the bleeder altogether to save a few cents, but a lot of systems have them.

in that story above about the CAD monitor, it’s possible there was an issue with the shielding, though that’s unlikely unless the tube was improperly replaced or other service was performed wherein the technician messed up the shielding. that’s a very rare instance and even then i’d expect the reported nausea to be more from the monitor refresh rate than any radiation emissions.

by the way, just for this post, i went and held my geiger counter up against a powered CRT and it registered only background radiation.