“The history between us haunts from time to time, because, yes, for 40 years, I lied. I lied to be something I’m not,” says Elle Melodises*, a 77-year-old woman who began her medical gender transition just five years ago.

Melodises (who goes by Melody) met her now-wife, Grace* at age 29 and decided to marry her after three years of dating, believing it would help Melody “be a man.” For some years, it worked, Melody said, but over time, it gradually began to feel impossible for Melody to keep up appearances.

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After five or six years of being married, Melody “reverted back” to her habit of occasionally wearing
female underwear. Whenever Grace asked about it, Melody refused to discuss it. Over the next 10 years, Melody became more and more depressed. Sexual contact between them became rare and — for the last 10 years before Melody’s transition — non-existent.

Melody completely withdrew emotionally, feeling that men were supposed to be “strong” and face up to their own problems alone. But her biggest problem was her inability to perform the male part in a heterosexual relationship with her wife.

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Ever since Melody was a child, she felt like something wasn’t right. Around age 4, her aunt’s housekeeper told her, “You are not a boy. You’re a girl,” and Melody had no idea why they had said it. Nevertheless, the comment stuck with her. Around age 7, Melody put on her mother’s stockings while playing alone and thought they felt “fantastic.” And for as long as she can remember, she wanted breasts.

Melody always chose female doctors and friends throughout her life because she felt like they understood her better and made her feel more like she “belonged.” In her early 20s, she began dating a female model, but wasn’t particularly interested in having penetrative intercourse with her — instead, Melody wanted to be her. Melody also started secretly wearing pantyhose under her slacks every day at work. Privately, she wondered what was wrong with her.

“I felt better dressed, and at the same time more vulnerable because there was the chance of exposure,” Melody told LGBTQ Nation. “It was always connected with that prickling sensation of doing something prohibited, and at the same time… it felt the natural thing to do.”

Melody struggled with the idea that she might be a “transvestite.” Though she had once read a magazine article about cross-dressers but, unlike the people in the article, she didn’t feel sexually turned on from cross-dressing and didn’t want to be a man dressed as a woman.

It wasn’t until Melody had been married to Grace for 41 years, that Grace told Melody that if something didn’t change, they’d need to divorce. So Melody started therapy, wanting to understand her desire to wear female clothes.

Melody had never really thought that she might be a woman in a man’s body, until, at age 72, her wife and her therapist both suggested that she might have gender dysphoria.

“I said [to my therapist], ‘No, that doesn’t fit for me,’ at least in that session,” Melody said. “In other words, I was so deep in the closet that I didn’t even know that I was in the closet…. [But] the more [my wife, my therapist, and I] talked… not only one, but the whole continuum of light bulbs started to go on in my head.”

“For the first time, with that, I understood what my ‘freakness’ was,” Melody said, “because before I felt … like something was wrong with me. [But I realized,] ‘No, there is nothing wrong with me…. Ultimately, I’m in the wrong body. I should be in a female body.'”

It’s unclear how many people undergo gender transition in their elder years, especially since most media focuses on younger transgender people. A 2017 survey from the Williams Institute suggests that around 14% of the trans population is 65 or older, but it doesn’t mention the age at which these elders began to transition.

Some older trans people may never transition, due to increased rates of elder poverty, lack of healthcare access, and fear of discrimination from long-established relationships or elder care facilities. Others may have pre-existing health conditions that affect their eligibility, ability to heal, and aesthetic results from gender-affirming surgery, according to the Gender Confirmation Center.

While Melody didn’t experience any of these barriers, her younger, questioning years occurred during the pre-Internet age, when she had knew no other trans people. At that time, she used libraries to research cross-dressing in an attempt to understand herself, but she lacked the language and resources to comprehend her experience truly.

However, since her gender transition began just five years ago, Melody had access to more resources. She began reading books, listening to audiobook biographies of transgender women (like Janet Mock), and attending an online group for recently-transitioned elders — though she didn’t always relate to the authors’ or other group members’ experiences

Upon realizing her trans identity, Melody felt ecstatic. Grace quickly took her shopping to rid her wardrobe of its male garments and she also advised Melody on makeup, mannerisms, and the differences between flattering and unflattering clothes.

When Melody started hormone replacement therapy, it didn’t negatively affect her aging body or other medications, but it altered her body’s fat distribution, made her skin more susceptible to bruising, and made her more inclined to “cry about stupid things,” something she saw as a positive sign of increasing emotional openness.

She eventually underwent gender-affirming surgeries and finally got breast implants (something she saw as the ultimate symbol of femininity). “When I look down and they’re here, it gives me a jolt of ecstasy,” she said.

But while Melody and Grace now live surrounded by an accepting community, Melody still struggles both with internalized transphobia and the challenges of connecting with her wife after decades of emotional distance.

“From time to time, I say to myself, ‘Whom do I try to fool now? I’m not a woman. I just pretend to be a woman,'” Meoldy said. “Genetically, I’m not a woman… [But] then you say, ‘No, it’s not true. Yes, maybe my chromosomes say otherwise, but what I feel is more important.'”

At first, Melody disliked that her deep voice gave her away as trans, and she tried to develop a more feminine voice. But after reading the biography of trans activist Jennifer Boylan, Melody realized, “Well, that is my voice, right? Okay, it’s my voice, yeah… I actually like my voice.”

She now realizes, “Being a woman is not necessarily boobs and p**sy. Yeah, it may be part of it, but the other part is your mind: what you are, how you feel, and as a result of that, maybe even what you project.”

When Melody first began her transition, she and Grace felt more emotionally close than they had in decades, and Grace thought that all their relationship struggles might finally resolve themselves. But because Melody had spent years not talking much about herself or her feelings, she now feels she’s “still in the learning phase” of overcoming her “incapability of expressing feelings.”

“We love each other. We really do,” Melody said, “but the 10 years of total emotional neglect of her on my part still haunt us.” She adds that, while Grace never complained about Melody’s transition, Grace grieved that the man she married had disappeared. The world also began seeing the couple as lesbians, which Grace never identified as.

Though Grace first struggled with this perception, she “found a little bit of solace and self-satisfaction” by calling herself pansexual, Melody said. Grace now explains to others, “It doesn’t matter what your package is — it’s the person I love, independent of everything else around it,” Melody explained.

But when Grace began telling everyone that her wife was trans, Melody asked why, feeling that it unnecessarily negated her full existence and female identity. After all, Melody didn’t introduce herself as trans to everyone she met.

Melody wanted to keep her identity a secret in this article because she’s not a U.S. citizen.

“I have a green card, and as we know, President A**hole up there puts people without any real reason away just because they fall into one of the groups he doesn’t like, and trans people are a part of that,” she said, adding that, despite her insecurity, she hasn’t experienced any direct hostility against her trans identity.

“I always joke, actually, how do they [want to tell me to] use the bathroom based on my birth-assigned gender,” she added, “How do you want to determine that? My passport, my birth certificate, my driver’s license, my Social Security, my green card all say I’m female. You want to look here [at my breasts]? Here, [at my crotch]? What else do you want to do? Genetic testing? It takes a little bit of time, and I’ll have to take a pee before that.”

Melody believes that other people take their cues from trans people, and if you feel fearlessly like trans identity is right for yourself, then others may feel the same, too.

But she acknowledges that she and Grace still have to work ahead: “The history between us haunts us from time to time, because, yes, for 40 years, I lied. I lied to be something I’m not.”

“I was a very good actor, I lied very convincingly,” she said. “I lied because I knew that that [a man] is not what I am. I couldn’t say what I am, but I knew, ‘This, I am not.’ But I felt obliged to follow a concept, a social construct of maleness, to convince others that I am male. So for me, that’s yes, it was a lie.”

“We don’t miss sex,” Melody admitted. “Physical intimacy for us is much more than sex, and much more important. When we go out and hold hands, that is more meaningful for me than sexual intercourse ever could be.”

“This year we celebrate our 45th anniversary,” she added, “And yeah, it’s very difficult for me to imagine a life without her.

“But as difficult as my trajectory has been, I am aware that Grace’s part was much more difficult,” she said. “I gained my identity, but she lost the man she married and had to find an identity she didn’t look for. All too often, the emotionally extremely taxing role of the partners of transgender people is forgotten.”

* Melodises and Grace are pseudonyms, used to protect the identities of the interviewee and her wife.

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