Double life

In the world of gender variance, the propensity to lead a double life decreases with how young a person is. GenZ, for example, is far more likely to live openly in the world and express themselves as they will and indeed my own observance from running around the city only confirms it. From men with nail polish to transgender women going to work, the young are far more likely to express themselves openly and are less trying to fashion a temporary character than simply being authentic. They do not need a type of schizophrenic existence for fear of reprisal or living stealth by changing cities and names.

The irrelevance of secrecy avoids the splitting of the being into two distinct halves and when you haven't the need for concealment, it makes sense that this would seem like a foreign idea to you. After all, people today don't even give displays of gender variance a second look, and I regularly see many variations of it when riding public transit.

That this is a healthy sign is obvious as it shows that these young people are touching upon core identity much earlier in life than we did. It is also very clear that the cap is not going back on the bottle anytime soon.

I no longer have need of a double life and I have never felt better about myself with my only caveat being I wasn't able to come to this way of living much sooner.

Needless to say, I am more than elated for those who come to that place earlier in life.

Ashamed and then not

Learning you are intersex at the tender age of age 21 can be a bit of a shock...

Diagnosis

I have for the longest time known that I am transsexual (and stated so years ago in my writing) and that means we need to come to a place of resolution if we are to live in a healthy way in the world. Dressing up occasionally does not really work well for us although I tried that for many years just to take the edge of my dysphoria. The good news is that since transsexualism is graded we can come up with our own tailor made solution to achieve a balanced life.

Transsexuals are born that way and nothing will change that no matter how much you don't want to be one (and I tried very hard not to). Hence the best approach is self-acceptance and finding a workable solution (which I have) to something we typically know from very young is up with our gender.

The most important thing to understand in this process was what I could change and what I could not. How much could be self delusion and how much was part of my hard wiring. Once you do the mental homework you will come to know the formula you need to subscribe to. Language can be a powerful thing which can help talk us into or out of things but we need to look past it for a time until we are sure of a personal diagnosis.

I have never been so sure of who I am in my life although I only mention it as a postscript because absolutely nothing of my current approach will change going forward.

Absolutely nothing.

For the holidays

Jessica says it can be tough to be transgender for the holidays...

Word Salad

Yesterday a video called "Are Non-Binary People Trans?" came up on my YouTube feed and the first thought which came into my head upon seeing that title was who cares. I ended up watching a bit of it but I came going back to the idea that a term is not a road map. I read a few comments from people who were elated with the news that the content creator thought they were indeed trans but why would that matter to them.

The terminology and its meaning has been shifting as if on sand over the last few decades to the point where many seem hopelessly confused. Not surprisingly, based on the videos I have seen this confusion has helped feed into the detransition phenomenon.

Perhaps in this current environment a more pertinent question to ask yourself might be"how do I need to live my life?"

Panopticom

 

Wrap up

Helene had her presentation in Paris (which covered the topic of detransition) and asked me if I would participate in a wrap up session to discuss how it went to which I agreed.

Why still write

My old blog was erased in error but it chronicled a transgender person's journey towards self-acceptance I would have preferred stay up. That I am more pleased with this version is because the person writing is calmer. However it no longer holds relevance for many as most transitioners tend to move on and part-time gender variant people have other blogs they go to. Unsurprisingly my traffic has gone down as a result which isn't really very important to me.

I don't possess a keen interest in fashion or in chronicling every day normality and perhaps the blog will one day end but not via inadvertent erasure. What does interest me is human nature and how we attain fairness and justice in a world that seems to often prefer to operate without either.

It's never been easy

I see Maria once in a while in a cafe I sometimes go to downtown and from the get go we seemed destined to hit it off. When she sees me she sits down a few minutes before heading off to work.

This particular morning she begins talking about a deceased uncle who she says was really her aunt by saying "She was trans and dressed as a girl almost full time and was beautiful". This was back in the early 1980's when the term didn't exist.

She tells me rather matter of factly and I say nothing as she does not know my history and I don't exactly trumpet it.

"He died of AIDS" she says suddenly  switching pronouns reminding me how the topic confuses and jumbles around in people's heads even when they are completely devoid of any malice.

An androphilic transgender woman wouldn't have had it very easy back then and even today it's not always a picnic. This poor soul only made it to age 25 before passing away from a virus we largely have under control today.

Had she lived she would have been approaching her mid sixties.

Accordion to Trump

 

Learning curve

I had coffee with Natalie early this morning. She was late and looked tired from not having slept much. She manages to get four hours on a good night she tells me. This is our first time meeting one on one as I would only previously see her order and run at the same place we both frequented. This time it was at the public market.

She is so happy to talk to me she says and I am glad to oblige as I am very good one on one. I am careful with people and I determine fairly quickly what I can say to each person after reading them. It all ended very well with a mutual promise to repeat.

I kept thinking afterwards that being a transgender person living openly requires quite a learning curve because I reflect on just how much progress I have made from looking back. Last night before going to bed I looked at a handwriten journal entry from 2010 which predates my start in blogging by two years and it was almost hard to recognize the apprehensive person who wrote it.