“Not only well prepared, but have the maturity to be themselves and relate on real levels while filling role of leaders. Which is sadly, an unusual ability.”

“The sex [workshop] was brilliant – people were a little awkward to start with but then it really got opened up. Having a huge range of sexual experiences and types within the group worked very well”

“Never a more honest, open discussion with other people whose bodies are similar to mine”

“I can’t thank jay and lee enough for providing this superb weekend retreat. I arrived feeling anxious and leave feeling positive and proud of myself.”

TBA Retreat...

Account from a TBAer

This year saw the very first TransBareAll retreat, a Transmen’s retreat with a different spin on anything I’ve come across before - it wasn’t based around surgery and hormones but about how we feel in, and how we use our bodies.

The retreat was the brain-child of Lee and Jay following making the Transtastic men calendar.  Jay and Lee had gone away, chewed over what other people had said and how they felt themselves and came up with the idea to make a space where transmen could be naked together and discuss their bodies from a different angle than the usual surgical discussions. They did a fair bit of exploration to find somewhere that we could rent that would be appropriate - it would obviously have to be somewhere fairly private, as well as somewhere that was happy to have us doing that sort of thing too. They eventually booked up a hostel outside Chesterfield which had 2 dorms of bunks to sleep 20 people which seemed a very good number. It was also in a rural setting, had a big main room and big kitchen. There was also a pub next door which we invaded the first night en-mass.

The group of TBAers ranged from guys who were still early in the system and hadn’t started on T yet, (or didn’t intend to), to guys years down the line who’d had phalloplasty or decided they were quite happy with the tackle they’d got thank you very much. Some guys I knew from the London meetings or from the calendar etc., some I knew from online but hadn’t met before, some I’d never come across before at all. By the end of the weekend there wasn’t a single guy there I wouldn’t call a friend.

Having got somewhat loosened up in the pub on the Friday night, we came back to the hostel and several shed our clothes that night and started discussions about it already. One guy showed off his new willy, another his new chest. I’m sure we were all having a sly (or not so sly) look at each other’s parts and comparing shapes and sizes.

The days were broken into sessions in the morning and afternoon with topics such as sex, bodies, photography and massage. I’m pretty sure we all learned something new in the sex discussion, with even the resident pervert admitting to coming across things he’d never tried before, (but I’m willing to bet he will have tried by now). The safe sex discussion descended at the end into a flavoured condom tasting. There was the inevitable ‘my GIC is worse than your GIC’ competition but I think we actually came up with a few solutions for some situations, and certainly a good place to vent a lot of pent up anger at the doctors blocking many people’s way into becomming themselves.

Of course, not everyone there got naked, or even slightly undressed, but that wasn’t actually the point of the weekend.The point was to help everyone feel that they could get naked should they wish to. And to have a peep at what your body might look like in a few years time if you hadn’t started treatment yet, something I would have jumped at if I’d had that option pre-transition. Trawling the internet for photos and these days, thanks to x-tube and the like, videos even, is one thing, but actually seeing a body in motion right in front of you is a whole different experience.

I came away from the weekend feeling tired, enlightened, better about my body and with a great feeling of kinship. I also came away with the resolve to finally get the chest revision I never got around to years ago, something which surprised me a lot. I can’t wait for the next retreat.

Finally, a huge thanks to not only Lee and Jay but to everyone else who helped make it a huge success – Rachel and Carolin who I’m sure got roped in at various points ad also in particular to DK’s wife Luisa who not only ferried many of us to and from the hostel, buut also went on a beer run for the second night. Cooking was a very organised affiar with piles of fabulous grub served up by several of the guys on the retreat. Many thanks to everyone there for making it such a memorable and enjoyable weekend. And hopefully, only the first of many.