A Real Trans Person
Long story short: My brother and his wife both seem cool with the trans thing. But, I know that’s nothing to go by yet, because my mother is not as cool as she had been acting. Secretly, she’s been stewing; hating this, and today, she said every transphobic thing in the world that you can think of to say to a trans person. Well, maybe not every. But most. Pretty much all that I have ever heard, and seeing as how they don’t tend to be original, there can’t be much more.
For the past few days I’ve had a sense that there was something new and frightening that I was going to learn about being trans. Last night, I almost couldn’t sleep because the prophetic tingling was so strong. What didn’t I already know about being a trans person? I have read everything. Come to all my realizations, including the one that there will be blood. I made that “joke” to a cis girl friend of mine on Yahoo Messenger last night when I was trying to describe how I felt. She thought it was pretty funny. I thought it was pretty funny, too. (Hey, I need all the laughs I can get in the middle of all this gravity.)
I thought about it though, the thing I alluded to with blood. Someday, that is really going to be me. I am going to have big scars across my chest. Not another boy in the computer screen showing his. It’s going to be my own chest I’m looking at in the mirror. Some day, it is going to happen. I am really going to give myself testosterone shots and watch myself change. Well, you say, it’s not all in my hands; fair enough. It very well might not happen, fair enough. But it won’t be for my own personal preference that this doesn’t happen.
So far, I been typing out this little blog, you know; been typing like I was really confident. Inside, I felt like I was a fake. I read blogs by other trans people, and I knew that they knew what they were talking about. They were real trans people, and they knew their shit. Myself, on the other hand? Well I just rashly made up this blog. Started posting my ideas like they are relevant and important. Got some nice comments from real trans people on the stuff I wrote. I breathed a sigh. They don’t know! I was able to sneak my way into the party and walk around like I legitimately belonged there. The real trans people had no idea that I was an impostor. Somehow, I managed to do it; managed to make myself look, in type, anyway, like a real trans boy from South Carolina who has a valid perspective to add to the pot of trans voices on the Internet, and not actually just an ugly, unpopular girl with cooties, who wonders if she could grow a beard, and how big her clit could get, and whether people could ever automatically call her sir. I passed as a real trans man! Not a single person, not even (yet, anyway,) a transphobic troll, has stopped by this blog to say, “You know what? You’re not a man. You’re really just a fucked up girl!”
How long can I keep it up? I wondered. Surely someone was going to catch me with my pants down and spy the pink panties that say “I love my vagina” all over the band. Then they would all know that I was making shit up. Oh, well. Maybe it didn’t matter that I wasn’t a real trans man. I was able to fool the other trans people. If I couldn’t be a real trans man, then maybe being a really convincing fake trans man would work okay. I’d keep philosophizing; keep hoping toward transition. If I ever got a hold of that precious synthetic testosterone, I would take it, and keep bluffing. If I ever got an appointment for that top surgery, I would go to it, and keep bluffing. No one would be able to look at me and tell the difference from me and a real trans man; so as long as I didn’t tell anybody, maybe they wouldn’t know.
Today, the realness of my transness was challenged and attacked. Baptism by fire! If it weren’t real, it would all be little flakes of ashes now, but it’s not.
Let me tell you something, kids: there is no such thing as a fake trans person. You aren’t bluffing. This is how the real trans people do it. You’re just as real as anyone else, trans or cis.
Let me tell you something else, kids: Do not trust your parents.
Let me repeat: Do not trust your parents.
I know you think you know them; they seem liberal, blah blah blah. I know you think that they love you more than they hate marginalized people. I know you think that if you only talk to them and help them understand how much you hurt, that they will hear you, and won’t do anything to make it worse.
I don’t care.
As far as your parents are concerned, everything you do is motivated toward them. If you’re “being good,” it’s to please them. If you’re “being bad,” (which you usually are,) it is to hurt them, kill them, break their hearts. Because you are one mean little fucker, you know? You do that; you sit around and think up the most sordid bullshit you can spring on your poor Mama or Daddy to see if you can score a visit to the ER for either one of them. As far as your parents are concerned, saying that you are transgender is one of the most cunning, most efficient, and most creative ways to inflict pain on them, and with the least amount of hardship on yourself, at that. I mean you could just slash their tires, but where’s the fun in that shit? Why not make your whole existence a punishment for them? And why not use the Internet that they pay for to learn about it?
And kids: do whatever you can to scrounge together the resources to get your ass out of your parents’ house as soon as you realize you are transgender. It’s better not to be there when they catch wind of everything. Even if they aren’t going to put you out in the street, you don’t know what kind of fucked up shit you might have to concede to in order to stay there. Besides, it’s just good to get your shit together, whether you are trans or not. When they say you are welcome to stay there, they don’t mean it.
And never let anyone tell you that they love you but don’t accept “it”, or that they love the sinner but hate the sin, or any other permutation on that concept. They don’t love you. How can they hate who you are and love you? They can’t. They don’t.
nix said,
January 20, 2011 at 3:32 am
i remember how powerful it was to go to my first social/support meeting and for everyone there to call me the name and pronouns i wanted, and for nobody to question that i was trans – confirming and validating that i had a right to be who i was! amazing!
i hope that your brother and his partner are supportive, especially as your mother does not seem to be.
southcarolinaboy said,
January 20, 2011 at 12:45 pm
I hope the young’nes don’t think this thing over and decide that they, too, don’t want to be supportive. I would not have worried, but after seeing the change in my mom I feel like I can’t rely on initial reactions anymore. They did not seem surprised, and I’m inclined to think they had inferred already, but who knows.
It does feel so good to be recognized for who you are. And hurts when you’re not.
DaisyDeadhead said,
January 20, 2011 at 5:32 pm
(((((SCboy)))))) I am so sorry this is happening, but I knew it would. I have lived here as long as you’ve been alive and I know Baptists. Meaning: they find it almost impossible to compromise. If they could, they’d be Lutherans or Episcopalians.
If they do compromise, it’s because they are forced to. They never, ever compromise when they already have the upper hand (take a look at the Tea Party), and your parents already have that upper hand with you, simply by being your parents.
You are a GOOD PERSON. You are early in transition, is all. Please go read all about Dyssonance’s early experiences, which by coincidence, I read the other night. She describes many similar emotions.
BTW, I think the feeling of not being *real* is true for many people, about all kinds of identities. I don’t feel like a ‘real’ Buddhist, since I am a Catholic. I never felt like a ‘real’ bisexual because I have been married (to men) three times. Many of us doubt various aspects of our identities that seem inauthentic unless officially “witnessed” by someone else. Other times, we rebel against those identity-markers forced on us by others, as you are now. This is the state of being human, and IT IS OKAY. Please don’t be too hard on yourself.
As I said last night, they will just have to learn to deal. I had to deal with my daughter’s choices, which were not the choices I wanted for her. My major worry was whether they were authentically her choices or just something she was going along with to be cool, fit in, find love, etc. Perhaps your parents are thinking these things too; thus, the freak-out over you finding people online who are like you. They are worried that you “don’t fit in” and are therefore looking for a place in the world where you CAN fit in. The idea that you have in fact FOUND IT, is very threatening to people who did not grow up with the internet and do not interact online with regularity. The mass media casts *THE INTERNET* as some dangerous overgrown jungle that poor dumb suburban innocents (read: girls) blunder through and are eaten alive by (non-Baptist) predators. There is not a lot you can do about that. I have discovered that online and offline are two separate worlds; people who do not have online friends do not understand how that works. (I consider that the demarcation point: having actual friends online vs. simply using the net as a tool, which most everyone does to some extent nowadays.) The idea that you might learn how to live your life from people online is considered a berserk thing to people who do not live in that world. It’s because you are speaking two different languages.
I was recently asked why I blogged if I didn’t get paid for it, and the question bugged me so much, I asked the person if they listened to music in their car? (I know she does.) Well, why, if you don’t get paid for it? *blink, blink* She thought that question was as bizarre as I considered her question. It was like two different worlds colliding. It IS. And that is also what is happening w/your parents, as well as their shock over your trans status. They do not understand the transgender-internet, which is a place you have found that explains your experience to you. To them, you go to the Bible, to the newspaper, to a textbook, etc for explanations. The whole concept that you have skipped these traditional sources of info, rocks them to their foundations… and THEN you throw in the whole transgender status, which is like lighting the proverbial powder keg.
I am just babbling, but I thought about you all day. I worry about my online son!!!–LOL. I don’t want you to experience pain in this, but it seems all trans people eventually do, certainly in THIS part of the country.
Please remember to join your pain to all of the oppressed people of the world. What would Leslie Feinberg do?
Love ya. xoxoxoxo.
Yourfriend said,
January 20, 2011 at 9:30 pm
Thank you Daisy for being there for my WONDERFUL online friend… I would probably not be here if not for him being there for ME the past year. I NEVER post on blogs but had to make an exception to thank you myself!
As to you, my friend, you are TOO AWESOME… and you know what they say about family of origin vs. family of choice… between me and Daisy, you have two Moms, how about that???
southcarolinaboy said,
January 20, 2011 at 10:48 pm
Thanks
southcarolinaboy said,
January 20, 2011 at 7:11 pm
“I have lived here as long as you’ve been alive and I know Baptists. Meaning: they find it almost impossible to compromise. If they could, they’d be Lutherans or Episcopalians.”
My mom was raised as a Baptist but I have heard her say on numerous occasion that if she went to church now, she would go to a Pentecostal one. She is a Pentecostal trapped in a Baptist body. (Sorry, I could not resist.) But yeah, the whole culture here is saturated in Baptist ideology.
“If they do compromise, it’s because they are forced to. They never, ever compromise when they already have the upper hand (take a look at the Tea Party), and your parents already have that upper hand with you, simply by being your parents.”
Very true. And as I find myself in a situation with no income and nowhere else to go for the moment, well…It is like they all say about “acceptance” around Blogdonia: acceptance is not a positive thing. Acceptance means they have no choice and are allowing you to exist because they have no choice. I used to think it was a mite hair better than tolerance, but no. Now I think they might be full-on synonyms.
As for comparing parents to the Tea Party, yeah…they do have the upper hand, *but* they talk like they are the oppressed. “Why are you doing this to me? Why are *you* hurting *me*?”
“BTW, I think the feeling of not being *real* is true for many people, about all kinds of identities.”
Yes, I agree. I remember on one of the big blogs, I think it was Feministe, while back, I read that a lot of women in professional jobs feel that way, like they are fakes, and not a real __________. I think a lot of these feelings of not being a real __________, (whatever is in the blank,) is because of the…I guess, misinformation about whatever a _________ is, and what criteria someone has to meet to be one. I didn’t think I met the criteria for being a trans man. Even after I knew that I did, (because there is no fixed set of criteria, like with most things,) I still had the feeling that I didn’t, because all of the lies I had gotten through the cis-media-filtered Narrative were so hard to shake.
“The mass media casts *THE INTERNET* as some dangerous overgrown jungle that poor dumb suburban innocents (read: girls) blunder through and are eaten alive by (non-Baptist) predators.”
YES. That.
Oh, and I do want to add that even though I talked about parents, plural, in the post, this last thing has been just me and my mom. I have not told my dad yet. Even my mom said he would most likely have the Internet cut off so that I couldn’t be predated anymore. Because that would make all the man-feelings go away and bring their daughter back, or something like that.
“…people who do not have online friends do not understand how that works.”
No, they really do not. And there seems to be this idea that online friends are not as authentic or meaningful to a person than Real Life friends. My Real Life friends have been few and far between, but I have so many people that mean so much to me on the Internet. One reason is that I do live in the South, where everything is conservative, and the people who I get tossed in with by geography are more likely than not going to believe in some way or another that my very existence is wrong, and that I am sinning by being me. On the Internet, I can bypass all that crap and get to people who don’t feel that way, who might actually want to befriend me, and whom I might want to befriend.
What would Leslie Feinberg do? I don’t know. Leslie would do something with more grace than I have right now. I guess while I think about it, I can reflect on hir (edited; I had slipped and typed “her” at first) recent post and appreciate my chosen family.
Thanks for the love, Online Mama.
Yourfriend said,
January 20, 2011 at 9:35 pm
HOLY CRAP I DID NOT EVEN READ YOU SAY CHOSEN FAMILY WHEN I WROTE WHAT I WROTE! LOL this is getting FREAKY… in a good way!
Oh and btw… most of MY family of origin does not understand the concept of online friends either, so you are not alone there.
Okay, back to finishing reading this blog… will talk to you tomorrow!
southcarolinaboy said,
January 20, 2011 at 10:53 pm
Hey, did you see what I posted before this? The repost from Leslie Feinberg? Ze’s the one who wrote Stone Butch Blues. Hir estraged sister is an author, too, and treating hir pretty shittily. That had been on my mind for the past while anyway.
I think chosen family is important to have, even if the family of origin comes around eventually, like Faggotboi mentioned in what he posted, kind of for the same reason I never made many Real Life friends: blood is like geography; it rather throws you in with whomever, and they may or may not want you. Chosen family always want you. If not, you wouldn’t choose each other…
DaisyDeadhead said,
January 20, 2011 at 9:13 pm
One reason is that I do live in the South, where everything is conservative, and the people who I get tossed in with by geography are more likely than not going to believe in some way or another that my very existence is wrong, and that I am sinning by being me. On the Internet, I can bypass all that crap and get to people who don’t feel that way, who might actually want to befriend me, and whom I might want to befriend.
I once read this piece in the Village Voice, in the early 90s I think, wish I could remember by whom…it was about the gay community going “nationwide” or whatever term you wish to use. All about the advent of the “big tent”–the opening up of the gay community to, literally, everyone. (Whereas before, you had to actively *seek out* the gay community, now it’s right out there as a lifestyle option and everyone knows at least one gay person.)
This guy was glad that everything was better and more open, that you could go anywhere (even the south, even Saudi Arabia) and find gay people and bars and parties relatively easily… no more creeping around and trying to find your way “by invitation only”; people advertise right online forgodsake. But he said he missed the cultural “givens” he had grown up with–the fact that you could make Judy Garland references and everyone in the room would get it. Everyone had seen the same movies. Everyone knew the same songs, jokes, books, etc. He mourned that it just wasn’t like that anymore; kids were coming in, he said, who listened to AC/DC. (LOL).
But that’s like Southern Liberal Blogdonia is right now. Another southern blogger mentioned Earth Fare, and now we are Facebook friends. Just like that. It’s a private club. And that’s like the American gay community was in the 50s-60s.
Moral of the story: There is good in everything, even a bad situation, said Buddha, or someone like him.
southcarolinaboy said,
January 20, 2011 at 11:09 pm
Yeah, I mean, I can get how it is fun to be in a “secret society.” I have felt that way about being trans/queer liberal. It is nice when your safety doesn’t rely on your invisibility, though. I mean, in AMERICA where we are supposed to have liberty, you can’t even put *liberal bumper stickers on your car* without harassment. I tell you, Daisy, that scared me when I read your post about that. Because I have always been scared to put them up, for that reason; that someone was going to do something to me or my car, and that’s just a shame when you don’t feel safe to put a bumper sticker on your car. But it shows just how little resistance it takes to upset the Right Wingers. Not very much. And that in turn, shows just how powerful we really are.
But yes, there is good in this bad situation. I have always thought it was beautiful how oppressed people manage to make networks and find proud identities *as a response* to oppression. Doesn’t make oppression right, but people find their way to rightness anyway.
Before You Tell Your Parents You’re Transgender… | Transfaggotry said,
January 20, 2011 at 9:44 pm
[...] just read this post by SouthCarolinaBoy, and sadly, I think his advice to trans kids to not trust their parents and to [...]
Faggot Boi said,
January 20, 2011 at 10:22 pm
It sucks that your mom is reacting in this way. And that you’re stuck living in the same house as her. Could you go stay with a friend or even another family member for a week or so? You could tell them you’re having some disagreements with your mom – you don’t need to say what it’s about.
Your mom isn’t doing a good job loving you right now, but other things you’ve written suggest that she does actually love you. Maybe she just needs to flail about and say some really hurtful things for a while before she can get back to loving you the right way.
southcarolinaboy said,
January 20, 2011 at 10:59 pm
I don’t need to find other living arrangements. If I do, I will try to rustle up someone. I know; I even felt kind of bad posting that “they don’t really love you,” because, I mean, probably she does. But yes, it will take some coming around. I think one of the reasons why she started freaking out is because, if her child is “one of those people”, then…yeah. That means, “SEX CHANGE”! And that means “mutilation”, and etc, etc. I have not discussed top surgery with her, she just expressed how freaked out she is about me “saying” I’m a man, and that “The only thing that could make it worse is if she wanted to cut her breasts off! That’s the only thing that could make it worse!” Hmmm…so, yeah. And she realizes that I’m not going to use the female name that she picked out forever and ever. And she realizes that she didn’t actually have a daughter, *if I’m right.* As long as I am fucked up in my head, then that means her daughter was/is real. I think in her heart of hearts, she knows that I am right, and it scares her. But yeah, I did feel very unloved yesterday, by her, anyway, and I wrote that…
Faggot Boi said,
January 20, 2011 at 11:16 pm
Yes, the tricky thing about parents is that they feel a sense of ownership over our names and our bodies. I guess it’s as if you told her that you wanted to change HER name or cut off HER breasts. I know it doesn’t make sense, and I don’t know how one argues with it, but I guess this is how parents think.
southcarolinaboy said,
January 20, 2011 at 11:51 pm
There’s this idea that parents do have ownership over their children’s bodies/identities. Just tonight on the “news” (HLN; I put “news” in quotes, because, yeah, they are about like any other network,) there was the story of a girl who was 23 years old, and found out from the INTERNET that her “parents” had actually “stolen” her from her biological parents when she was a few days old in the hospital. The news people kept referring to her baby self as “it,” and rather than say she was kidnapped from the hospital, (which is the word we use when that action is done to a human being,) they used “stolen.” From her parents. Our media can’t even present the story of the treatment of a human being as an object to be stolen/traded/acquired without buying into the idea that a human being can be stolen/traded/acquired. Yeah, that really bothers me.
I think parents have a sense of security if they feel that their children are “theirs”, that they can control what media the child consumes, what lessons they learn, what morals they put stock in, and that the adult person who results will be their work, and their vision. Then when they see that that’s not how it is at all; that their offspring is actually a separate person with a consciousness/personality/opinions/feelings, it’s like they’ve been duped or taken. “Everything was all a lie!” my mother said yesterday. Yes, in a way. It all was.
Faggot Boi said,
January 21, 2011 at 12:04 am
An older friend of mine, when she came out to her mother as a lesbian, said the mother asked, in all seriousness, if that meant she was a lesbian too. My friend had to keep repeating, “No, mom, this isn’t about you. It’s me. This has nothing to do with you.”
southcarolinaboy said,
January 21, 2011 at 12:16 am
Oh wow. You know, that is interesting, because yesterday, while we were still talking in civil tones, (before all hell broke loose,) she was telling me how she has been told she is masculine/feels like a man/feels like a gay man. I think she’s examining herself for like…I don’t know, some kind of evidence that what I have came from her, since she had me. I don’t know. That is what your friend sounds like. “If she has it, then do i have it, too?” Like it’s hereditary. Which isn’t really that far out, but you know. I hear a lot of talk that T in the mother’s body when a “female” fetus’s body has already formed might be responsible for a male gender identity. So, I don’t know if the thing is, “What did I do wrong?” Because, even I guess to mothers, they feel like whatever the results are, it’s their “fault”, either because of improper raising, or something within their bodies that made the children turn out “wrong.” Oh wow. Okay. Now I feel kind of sorry for my mother and will keep this in mind. But I am staying on my guard, be ye assured.
Yourfriend said,
January 21, 2011 at 8:26 pm
Hello, folks! I agree with what you all say so much… my father just cannot stand the person I am because it is SO not what he wants/ needs and that is more important to him than what *I* want or need. Just like the person who came out and her mother said oh does that make me a lesbian too, ANYTHING that I EVER talk about with my father becomes about him. It is frustrating and exhausting, and it is hard to always remember, but HE is the one with the problem. You and I and everyone else on this most FABULOUS blog; we know who and what we are. We are not responsible for how our parents feel about it. As I have told you before, we did not ASK to be brought into this world, but now that we are here, it is only US; WE; that have the right to determine who and what we are. You know I like your Mom as I have talked with her before, but it does make me very sad that she would say shit like that to you. I do wonder if in the next few days she will come to you and apologize, and say she wants to try to get it. Once again as I have said to you, I still don’t understand the “having to get it” but then again I am not a parent. I have been talking to you for over a year now and have been witness to your awakening and I still occasionally screw up the pronouns, so I can’t really begrduge her for having some sense of disappointment that, like you said, the “daughter” that she had, and all of the baggage that comes with that, ie. being the mother of the bride, mother of the mother, that kind of stuff, she probably grew up surrounded by that kind of stuff and then had this wonderful baby girl, or so she thought, and now all of a sudden that is not true… I can see being surprised by it, but as much as she loves you, and I think we all agree that she loves you a whole lot, she needs to more than “accept” you for what you are, and hopefully soon she will get there. I think that the past few months of you and her talking about all of this may have been a “practice” for her… anyone else here agree with that?
All in all, however, you are you, and *I* for one am honored to know you, and to walk beside you (if only over the net) as you continue to become who you are. Heck, I am 47 and I am still learning more about myself. So, until we email or talk again, I am so glad that I know you, and I thank you for being YOU… half my age and then some, but FAR FAR FAR wiser than I will ever be…
Good night,
Yourfriend
southcarolinaboy said,
January 22, 2011 at 12:52 am
Yes, everything is about the parents. It just doesn’t occur to most of them that their children might do things for their own reasons, or to suit their own needs, and it really has nothing to do with them.
Before she loves me as a boy she will have to get to know me.
Thanks for listening through all this.
Yourfriend said,
January 22, 2011 at 7:27 pm
It is my honor. Besides, you have listened to my nonsense for over a year now!
Meanwhile, is there a new post you wrote today that I am too puter illiterate to find? Oy…
Skewed reality « South Carolina Boy said,
January 28, 2011 at 4:52 pm
[...] man’s body, that is what set her off the other day, and started the argument that I spent the last two posts complaining [...]
Schala said,
February 2, 2011 at 7:24 pm
Had issues with my mom too, when I transitioned socially – rather than when I came out.
I came out to her at 22½, while living with her. Took measures to see docs, and a psychiatrist, which didn’t give much anything. Then about a year later, at 23½, I managed to get hormones, and had a friend from Wisconsin (I’m in Canada) send me some clothes to “start” with (given I had none). At 22½, I would tell my mom more or less everything I learned about trans stuff I thought was relevant. She seemed detached and only hearing half of it. I’d quiz her later and she’d “not remember”.
Between the two times, we drifted apart, even before I was to transition socially. But then my two youngest brothers would visit me and my other brother (I lived with him then). They’d report what they saw, and she panicked.
OMG, I was going to present as female, all hell would break loose.
Only then did she even manage to understand what it was really about. That I was serious about transitioning. And I also felt the “Maybe I’m not real” feeling early on.
Early on, she was fine with having coffee or me coming over to her place for talk. But then we didn’t see each other for 3 whole months (before I transitioned again). I see her by chance when going to the mall with someone. We talk some and talk about catching up and having some coffee or something soon enough. Then, a few days later, she hears from my brothers and sends me an email saying she’d “rather not see me in the foreseeable future”.
I replied to this email by calling her prejudice for what it was, repeatedly. I don’t dance around words, but I was pretty tactful given how maternal rejection can feel. She replied, I replied…and then nothing for a few days. I send another reply as an ultimatum: You agree to meet me and have some talk, see me as I am (now socially transitioned), or I cut you off from my life, forever.
We met, in a park outside, in early Spring. We talked a lot.
A month later I got evicted from my apartment for non-payment (something about my brother not wanting to pay rent, because of issues with the janitor who wouldn’t fix the floor problem, and even accused us). I got into an emergency homeless shelter, my stuff got put in my brother’s workplace’s 2nd floor, temporarily (while he himself lived there temporarily).
I stayed there a month, tried to find an apartment to lease, and had no success (presumably not only trans discrimination – I was inexperienced at apartment-hunting too). My mother eventually took me back after I told her I was getting shit over there for being trans (staff was semi-ok, some residents were awful – I did my best to be elsewhere most of the day).
I lived with her afterwards for over 2 years, she learned to accept me for who I am, and even explain to her boyfriends that nothing was wrong with me (though she tended to out me to random people too, in her excitement – with old videos and pictures of me-as-male).
Now we’re in good terms even if we don’t live together anymore. I moved out to live with my boyfriend (and still do). We have coffee sometimes when she comes over, we went for Christmas to her place last December (me and my three brothers, and the best friend of one of my brothers). We keep in touch over MSN about once a week (I’m not much of a phone person).
My brothers had not much of a problem with it.
The oldest (2 years younger than me) has found it pretty weird, but accepted it extremely readily when he figured it was making me suicidal not to transition. He feared my suicide more than anything else, somehow.
The second youngest (9 years younger) has accepted it almost without question, but mostly stopped growing his hair long (something I did in my late teens, early 20s, and he had been imitating me) and cut it shorter.
The third and youngest (11 years younger) took much time to understand all of it. He got the pronouns fast because of the second brother (whom he lived with), but the concept took a while to swallow. After maybe 2 years transitioned, he got it, and have had no problem since (it’s been 4 years).
Schala said,
February 2, 2011 at 7:36 pm
Btw, about the long hair.
At 16, I had chin length hair.
At 17, I had buzzcut 1 inch hair.
At 18, I had 6 inch long (so almost chin length).
At 19, I had 12 inch long, so more than ponytail length (though always kept down anyways).
At 20, I had 18 inch long, “bra-strap”.
At 21, I had 24 inch long, mid-back.
At 22, I had 30 inch long, lower back.
At 23, I had 36 inch long, tailbone length, and terminal length (doesn’t grow more).
At 28, it’s still at 36 inch long.
Said brother had hair at bra-strap length when he cut it.
I didn’t grow my hair long because it was ‘acceptably feminine’ (especially as I started growing it years before transitioning – and it was already at its current length when I did). I did so because I always loved long hair and admired it. I also really regretted cutting it at 17 for someone. I vowed to not cut it for anyone else.
Now I love the “cape on my shoulders and neck” feel that long hair kept down has.
southcarolinaboy said,
February 2, 2011 at 9:33 pm
Thanks for sharing your family experience. That part about your oldest brother fearing your suicide more than anything else is especially touching. It seems so hard for cis people to understand that it does get that bad. They don’t really understand how it is to not be able to just dress the way they say you should and deal with it. After all, they do it, and don’t have a problem with it! I’m glad your brother recognized enough to see how bad it was to not transition.
Kind of sad your other brother decided to quit emulating your long hair when you came out, though. It’s amazing how trans people’s identities threaten the gender identities of cis people around us.
Glad your mother came around. I’m not sure what the deal is with moms and outing people, but I can tell from what you say and some other accounts I’ve read, that moms think they control the flow of information.
Long hair rocks, and I possibly might grow mine out someday when I have the other male gender cues to spare.
I worried about the feeling of fakeness in the beginning, especially, but then I realized that I had no way of knowing what transness is like for other people, and maybe this was part of it. It also felt, at times, like I was “making it up”, and that bothered me till I realized that also might be part of it…going into the wilderness.
I really appreciate your comments and that you took the time to write.
Schala said,
February 2, 2011 at 10:28 pm
I didn’t have the cues for maleness before (at least, not enough), save you know, lacking breasts.
I had massive teenage acne, but that’s something more neutral. More oily skin texture – but that’s expected with acne. I’m pretty sure this (and especially this lasting from 16 to 24 – when I took estrogen and T blockers) is about my body rejecting testosterone.
I was judged as very androgynous, the kind that can pass as one or the other with the flicker of a switch. Even now, when judged as female, I could very easily change perception by just how I dress – without letting my facial hair grow at all (as little as it is).
Pre-transition, I was asked by an adult “are you a boy or a girl?”, as I was wearing a winter coat (my lack of breasts was thus invisible). I reacted like a deer caught in headlights, I certainly wasn’t expecting that (maybe people *thought* it, but they certainly didn’t voice it).
Now, how I passed as a male, albeit a poor impression masculinity wise (mainly due to body language), was with oversized clothing. Simple enough. Make breasts invisible enough (down to A cup or less) and wear t-shirts that go down to your knees and feel like a bag (Medium men’s adult, when Extra Small could fit if it existed). Wear running shoes one size too big, for everything but formal events, bowling, golf etc. You can even go up to 2 sizes too big without losing your shoes or feeling uncomfortable if running.
I used to wear size 9 men’s (same as 10.5 women’s), now I wear size 8 women’s. That’s 2.5 sizes smaller. My feet didn’t shrink. My closest in age brother wears size 13 shoes, but I bet his feet size is like, 11 (which is still considered big).
I had 36 inch long hair, and was sometimes called a hippy (once in my face). My father called my hair “girly” pre-transition, and I’ve been teased about it sometimes – but no one would call me female then. It might cause employment issues, depending on the domain – it’s better accepted in tech industries and warehouse type work.
If you can have visible stubble, it certainly helps. My voice is only androgynous. It barely dropped at 16. Went from a low soprano to a high tenor/low alto. So on the phone, people can’t tell, half assume male, half assume female – and most know voice on the phone can be misleading (my grandfather sounds more feminine than me on the phone).
In person, well, my body language combined with clothing read as female (even if it’s also made for men, like t-shirts, pants – tighter the better) always gets me called with female pronouns. I never needed to tuck, and back when passing as a male, didn’t need to pack (I’m not well endowed there, but I also never showed it, never took showers in PE, and always avoided communal showers hereafter).
Now, here is a description of me physically:
5’6″ ½ (168.5 cm)
back then pre-transition, and until last year: 105-110 lbs
back then pre-transition:
Hips: 31.5 inch
Waist: 26 inch
Bust: 31.5 inch
Before I gained weight, so last year (same weight):
Hips: 32 inch
Waist: 25.5 inch
Bust: 33 inch
Muscle mass overall: not active back then, and not active last year, meaning little beyond what’s necessary for daily life (no heavy lifting, no running for long).
Hair texture: Wavy and “a girl’s dream hair” according to my step-mom. Thicker than average per strand, and in amount. 2.5 inch ponytail.
Face: Feminine cheekbones, feminine browbone, masculine chin, androgynous jaw. Feminine nose (small, up-turned). No hair loss. Minimal facial hair in spread and growth speed (typical of a 12 years old). That didn’t change with transition.
Generally: Thin build (with small bone structure), long-limbs, long-fingers.
Now, if I could pass as male with this, anyone can. I’m amazed how I even could. Ah, and well, the attitude matters a lot. More than everything else. You need to have a non-apologizing “I’m in my right” attitude towards being seen this way. You project self-assuredness, which is both attractive and makes people keep their doubts to themselves.
That’s also how I’m seen as female effortlessly. I don’t apologize for it like I did in my early days of transition. I demand respect instead of beg for it now.
Funny how I became assertive by transitioning to female – when assertiveness is considered masculine.
“I’m glad your brother recognized enough to see how bad it was to not transition.”
He did more than that. He threatened everyone who ever came to our place (we lived together at the time) that if they even looked at me wrong, he would kill them. And he has the body and history to back the claim (well, he never killed anyone, but he did beat people up a lot).
He’s 5’9″, 170 lbs, and 0 fat (40 bust / 34 waist / 34 hips), meaning all muscle, mainly because he works in a physical job and likes to work 60+ hours a week. My other two brothers don’t look anything like that, as much as they might want. My boyfriend says I idolize my brother too much.
So, when people came or lived at our place, they smiled in front of me, even if they wanted to punch a hole in the wall because of something else. It was sort of funny seeing how intimidating he could be, and doing it for me.
“Kind of sad your other brother decided to quit emulating your long hair when you came out, though. It’s amazing how trans people’s identities threaten the gender identities of cis people around us. ”
He justified it otherwisely, but it was clear that he stopped idolizing me at this point, if only on expression. I’m still The One Who Taught Him Everything About Videogames (he’s 9 years younger, and I played before he was born). And he’s also more interested than the other brothers, so they’re no fun to him compared to me. We both worked as videogame testers at the same place, me referring him a month after I was hired.
He fell to peer pressure partly, and scared of what following in my footsteps could entail. But he grew it relatively long (still shorter than then) afterwards.
“Glad your mother came around. I’m not sure what the deal is with moms and outing people, but I can tell from what you say and some other accounts I’ve read, that moms think they control the flow of information. ”
Yeah, I think they’re a bit too excited once they become accepting. But that passes also. Eventually they come to a “This is my daughter” without explanation, I hope. It’s certainly weird to meet relatives you haven’t met in 10+ years, who never even *knew* you transitioned.
“I worried about the feeling of fakeness in the beginning, especially, but then I realized that I had no way of knowing what transness is like for other people, and maybe this was part of it.”
I talked a lot to another trans woman about her doubts. We even met in person once, at a LGBT camp of sort (4 day workshop thing, at a summer camp, but in winter). We were 6 trans people there, out of 40ish people. I think 3 trans women and 3 trans men. She eventually figured it out for herself. I’m happy I was able to help her choose a definitive name.
“It also felt, at times, like I was “making it up”, and that bothered me till I realized that also might be part of it…going into the wilderness. ”
Having our own narratives is all part of being unique individuals. I figured I was female at 8 years old, and I remember vividly trying to find where was I operated, a scar, an indication, while taking a bath, that I had been modified down there by aliens at birth. I figured something was really wrong. Turns out I have no scar, and the alien hypothesis is improbable, but I was right that something was wrong, about the body itself (rather than the social role alone).
southcarolinaboy said,
February 2, 2011 at 11:14 pm
“…albeit a poor impression masculinity wise (mainly due to body language)”
I certainly need to work on my body language. I don’t even know if a lot of my femininity is learned/innate, and sometimes I get a bit tired trying to sort it out and assign a cause to it. I do know I tend to be too apologetic and accommodating in my body language/behavior/speech, and it does not help me get read as male.
“Now, if I could pass as male with this, anyone can. I’m amazed how I even could. Ah, and well, the attitude matters a lot. More than everything else. You need to have a non-apologizing “I’m in my right” attitude towards being seen this way. You project self-assuredness, which is both attractive and makes people keep their doubts to themselves.”
This is the biggest tip I’ve heard when it comes to presenting a certain way, that if you believe it, then other people will more or less agree with you. There’s a very interesting thing I’ve been meaning to write about (along with so many other things,) about how, when I called myself “butch,” I got ma’amed *more* than I ever did being a disheveled, yet explicitly female “girl”. BUT when I started calling myself a man, and thinking about myself as such…all hair, clothing, visible breasts…everything else the same, the ma’am’s dropped off considerably; women would replace it with “dear,” or some other potentially androgynous word, and I started occasionally getting sirred and he’d. I couldn’t believe it. with my body, I never thought I would hear those words without hormones/surgery. but as soon as I started dressing and believing in myself, people started to see me here and there.
“Funny how I became assertive by transitioning to female – when assertiveness is considered masculine.”
I think it seems ironic because of the “values” we grow up with. It makes sense to me because if you’re a woman, then your courage and confidence are female. Going in the other direction from female to male, I struggled at first with, “Do I feel more confident as a man because of my internalized sexism?” One of the biggest things that first made me feel trans when I started changing all my clothes was that I realized that any time I had to be brave or confident, the place I reached into was male. It was no wonder that I felt incompetent and useless as a female, since I wasn’t one, and I eventually got over the feeling that I felt that way because of internalized misogyny.
“He justified it otherwisely, but it was clear that he stopped idolizing me at this point, if only on expression. I’m still The One Who Taught Him Everything About Videogames (he’s 9 years younger, and I played before he was born). And he’s also more interested than the other brothers, so they’re no fun to him compared to me. We both worked as videogame testers at the same place, me referring him a month after I was hired.
He fell to peer pressure partly, and scared of what following in my footsteps could entail. But he grew it relatively long (still shorter than then) afterwards.”
Yeah, I think that some cis people have a genuine fear that if they look closely enough they might find something in themselves that they don’t want to find. I don’t think they even have to be trans-but-don’t-know-it-yet themselves to feel that way. I can see how it would be scary when they realize that they can’t rely on their bodies as “proof” that they are what they experience themselves to be; that gender identity comes from some place else, even for them. Peer pressure, of course there’s that.
“It’s certainly weird to meet relatives you haven’t met in 10+ years, who never even *knew* you transitioned.”
That will probably be most of my relatives after I transition. I have my immediate family, then one grandmother still living, and my stepgrandfather. grandstepfather? Her husband. Anyway, my immediate family and I are not especially close to any of the extended family except my one grandmother; we just see them around in town from time to time. So, yeah…I’m sure they won’t know much of anything.
“Having our own narratives is all part of being unique individuals. I figured I was female at 8 years old, and I remember vividly trying to find where was I operated, a scar, an indication, while taking a bath, that I had been modified down there by aliens at birth. I figured something was really wrong. Turns out I have no scar, and the alien hypothesis is improbable, but I was right that something was wrong, about the body itself (rather than the social role alone).”
I think having an explanation for eight year old, even if you abandon it in adulthood, is a positive thing. Not having an explanation can be scary for children. I’ve thought about that recently because of the thread on Matt Kailey’s blog about coming out to children.
By this point I don’t get why I am still amazed at how much we know when we are children. Working off the dominant paradigm that children come into the world without any knowledge, even self-knowledge, and have to be taught everything really did a number on me, I guess. Makes more sense that we are who we are and have to be rigorously trained out of it, and even then, it doesn’t take very well…
Schala said,
February 2, 2011 at 11:30 pm
To me it was especially important to have a narrative that explained how *the body* was wrong, because I didn’t think the role should matter at all. Sure, I got persecuted for not being masculine and for having feminine body language – but I didn’t think a role change would improve things if the body then didn’t feel like home.
I have this when I was 8, and how testosterone induced heavy depression on me, as well as how it “didn’t take” as much as it did for my brothers (or most males), even given completely average T levels.
I have those arguments to counter the oft-cited notions that trans women transition “because they like pink/dresses/taking care of babies” and “want to express those things without reprisal”. Cited both by conservatives and many radical feminists.
As for what is cited for trans men. Something about wanting to succeed in business. And specifically from feminists, something about male privilege.
What is missing from those notions is that someone’s body configuration matters to them. The hormones they produce and course through their system matter to well-being and comfortability.
Of course, being correctly referred to matters too, definitely. But that’s more about respect than about roles.
southcarolinaboy said,
February 2, 2011 at 11:49 pm
“What is missing from those notions is that someone’s body configuration matters to them. The hormones they produce and course through their system matter to well-being and comfortability.”
It’s another situation where, because it’s an experience that cis people don’t have, they usually deny it exists, and that sometimes, the body simply needs changing, and would so in any universe, under any social conditions.
“As for what is cited for trans men. Something about wanting to succeed in business. And specifically from feminists, something about male privilege.”
I can see how a trans man gets male privilege, (if he has passing privilege) in anonymous situations where all anyone sees is his presentation. But when going for jobs and he has to present identification that could still have an F, or even a legal female name still, I seriously doubt he would have an advantage over a cis woman with similar information on her driver’s license, but with a gender presentation to “match.”
“Of course, being correctly referred to matters too, definitely. But that’s more about respect than about roles.”
What gets me is how after someone knows that a person wants to be gendered a certain way, they still try to use excuses like, “But s/he looks so much like a wo/man!” as a reason why they won’t.
Schala said,
February 3, 2011 at 12:13 pm
Have you heard of Alexis Comte? A French-speaking Quebec trans man, who spoke on TV a couple times in 2009, about trans stuff.
I met him in person, since we lived in the same town, in 2006. He’s the second trans person I saw in person. The first directly came to a place I went to regularly, as a social worker, and told me about the then-program to get surgery financed (which was crap) for Quebec province (thankfully, now it’s changed), since she had been in it for years, without being approved for hormones, let alone surgery.
southcarolinaboy said,
February 3, 2011 at 1:16 pm
I haven’t heard of him but I will look him up.
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