Atypical Transgender Late Bloomer

first draft published Sept 10, 2018 " You'll always have Hope! ", I've been told, but I don't believe it. More specifically, I don't see a reason to believe it. Which got me to thinking: what does Hope mean? Wiki says: Hope is an optimistic state of mind that is based on an expectation of positive outcomes with respect to events and circumstances in one's life or the world at large. As a verb, its definitions include: "expect with confidence" and "to cherish a desire with anticipation". Hope is a positive expectation of the future. Hope is faith in future good outcomes. Hope is no small matter; research indicates the presence of hope can affect medical outcomes; a recent Presidential campaign choose Hope as an organizing theme. Hope. It's what makes a Subaru, a Subaru. Wait... Well, what is the opposite of Hope? dejection, hopelessness and despair; perhaps fatalism. Is hope a force that displaces despair? Does that...

I think a very good "first rule" is: first, do no harm . When I write here, I don't want to lead others into a worse place, so I try to self-censor some things. But the issue of HOPE keeps coming up. People will say, There's always Hope, and they seem to believe they're helping you when they say it. I say: hope is an abstraction that intends to communicate a good feeling without any change or evidence. Hope is a belief; hope is a fantasy with a significant population invested in it. There's a too-often used phrase: "hope and prayers", and they are similar things. They both ask you to accept the permanent presence of an invisible notion. I wonder, instead of Hope isn't it more honest to say: Maybe ? Maybe you'll get better. Maybe the suffering will stop, although you know our Buddhist friends position suffering as part of life. Maybe you'll be less of a load to those around you. Further: maybe you won't get better, but maybe...