Obsessively Transgendered/Inauthentically You?
I’ve been struggling of late with a major issue – when does being transgendered (either male-to-female or female-to-male) get in the way of you being who you really are? On the surface, that statement sounds entirely odd. Those of us with GID (Gender Identity Disorder) would espouse the party line that our GID drives us to do just that – to be who we really are. But who are we really?
On one level we are people. We are just like everyone else. We hold down jobs (hopefully, though that is a very, very big issue for some of us sadly I have to say), we pay taxes, we shop (especially when it’s on sale!). Generally speaking we are no different than anyone else is. Except for how we look – or rather, how we don’t look. This weird incongruence between our inside-self and outside reality seems to vary in intensity but without a doubt this is an overwhelming theme. And that is what appears to be the main focus. Look in the mirror, get addressed on the street, or talk on the phone and be known to both yourself and to others as the gender you really are. The person you really are.
I’m totally for that and for that having GID is partly a genetic issue. But here’s where my doubts lie. What if you found that the very characteristics of you, your personality quirks, kindness traits, and general demeanor that led you on your gender journey, that led you to question the very fabric of who you are at the core of your being, what if these things started to disappear? What if instead, whilst moving steadily but slowly (or quickly – depending on your rate of working out being transgendered to some place of balance) forward you found you were less caring, less empathetic, less able to build friends, love your children or nurture those around you? What if you
found your transgendered nature had you so tied up in knots (reading, researching, learning makeup, clothes, trying to un-grip your
birth gender cues and getting a new grip on your correct gender cues) that the very traits of who you are that led you to the conclusion, and subsequent diagnosis of being transsexual – what if they disappeared?
What do you do then?
For me, this has been a truly niggling issue for the past month. Being who I am seems to be moving me away from those whom I love the most and have responsibility for the most. I do not know many women who would abandon children in a marriage, or other relationships simply to attain balance in their life. I know plenty who skip mammograms or pap smears so their kids can eat, and those who work three jobs so their kids can go to college. In my life, what I’ve found of late, is that my trans issues have been driving me not to be more open, loving, kind, embracing and nurturing. But have driven me to be more selfish, more guarded, and characteristically less of the kind of person I really admire frankly. This puzzles me as I’m out to some people, and others are on a need-to-know basis only. I’m not by nature secretive. So how did the very traits of who I am that made me start to wonder about who I am, how did my search after some answer, some peace with who I am and ultimately some balance, how did these things result in me being the opposite of who I want to be in the first place.
I don’t have any easy answers for this. I suppose they partly come down to not accepting myself, or not being even more open than I am now. Perhaps if I finally accepted my therapist suggestion of HRT & anti-androgens I’d see things differently. But surely for those of us who are trans, this has to be something we all think through – maybe must think through? For though our outside and inside image is important – indeed critical – I would wager that who we are as people is even more important.
Kudos to you, Rebecca – I don’t care who they are, or what their problem is – if someone will face their problem openly, they earn my respect.
I can’t solve your problem for you – I doubt anybody can. Other than you, that is. But for what they’re worth, here are my perspectives on the issues you raise. In the next paragraphs, when I say “you”, I don’t mean *you*, particularly – I mean anyone who faces this situation.
Gender dysphoria / gender identity disorder / pick a term you like – can destroy your life. Particularly if you don’t face up to it, or find a way to reconcile yourself to the particularities of your own gender identity. I *know* this – because that’s what happened to me. But the trap is to assume that finding a way of dealing with your gender identity will magically make everything else turn out right. Because there’s no guarantee at all that that will be the case. If the method you use to reconcile yourself with your gender identity is unpalatable to some (or all) of those close to you – there’s a problem. And if you have other issues – then making progress on the gender issues may bring those other issues even further to the foreground.
But, here’s the kicker – how will you know, unless you try to find out?
There is no easy answer. But there is always hope. And I know that, too – because that’s all I had left when I finally faced up to the reality that if I didn’t proceed with transition, I would not be able to go on. Faced with that choice, it was a no-brainer for me – in a sense, whoever I became, as a transitioning trans person, would still have the potential that a corpse does not.
I was lucky – *am* lucky – because many of the other problems I faced just melted away as I proceeded. They were symptomatic of my gender issues. I also managed to find some new ones to replace them with… but, hey, life would be boring without a few challenges!
I completely understand the point of view that says that dealing with the minutiae of transition can seem incredibly selfish to others – and maybe it is. But so is suicide. The flip-side is that *if* you deal with your gender issues, and *if* any other issues you have are symptomatic, then who knows how much more of a balanced, rounded, caring, generous, loving person you might become? And if that happened – would the people who might have though of transition as selfish still hold that view? Would you?
Bottom line – you don’t know for sure – you *can’t* know for sure – what will happen if you begin to transition… if you begin hormone therapy… if you open up to more of those people who are currently unaware of your situation.
To put it bluntly, you don’t know how much *more* of a person, with all those qualities you aspire to, you might actually become, if some of that doubt was cconverted to action.
“Nobody said it was easy” – ain’t *that* the truth. I hope you don’t think I’m talking out of turn.
Hi Koan – I’m sorry it took me a bit to reply, I’ve been thinking through what you wrote and where I’m at. No, I didn’t’ think you were talking out of turn at all. I appreciate your input, your perspective and your passion.
I think you are right about GID being one of those things that can destroy your life unless addressed. I spent time this past weekend with my gender therapist and spouse discussing much of where I’m at, and where we are at. We didn’t come to any conclusions. We just know we love each other and that our loss would be very hard on both of us and our children. It doesn’t mean loss is inevitable of course, but since my coming out it has been a very rough four years for us both in trying to work through our relationship and what this all means for both of us. In some sense we’ve grown alot closer actually, which is a nice result (and something I’d always wished for).
Your post above hit a continual theme in my life, that loss might blossom into life (a’ la a grain of wheat falling to the ground first before it sprouts). But we don’t know. We never *will* know for sure really. What I am going to do is prayerfully sit with this for a bit and see how I feel. I know that to some that will sound passive or neutral, rather than taking decisive action, but, I’ve found that just “sitting” with some things for a time works for me to be able to digest them and sort through.
Please forgive me if this sounds completely naive, as I am not familiar with the issues. I followed a link here from a google e-mail notifying me of a link back to my site.
I’m wondering, do you have to be one or the other? Is it possible that some people might be happier being somewhere in between, or something altogether unique, or alternating between the two depending on how they feel at a particular time?
Hi Drew!
Thanks for visting Beck’s Cafe and thank you for your questions and comments; we welcome them! Gender Identity Disorder or Gender Dysphoria is a uninvited dilemma for many of us. You might hear the term Transgender as well. That’s the common umbrella term covering the condition of imbalance between a person’s body and brain with their gender expression and gender feelings. Transgender is a spectrum from those who identify as crossdressers to those who identify transexual. Equal numbers of Male-to-Female as Female-to-Male transgender people have been estimated in the general population.
To answer your question directly, the answer is, “maybe”. Those who have less intense gender dysphoria generally find they can alternate between their two gender expressions of themselves, masculine and feminine, to obtain balance. Those who identify transexual have an intensely dysphoric disconnect between their physical bodies and their brains and often find physical transition is the only way for them to find some peace within themselves. Some do try to find, as you mentioned, some place in the middle not identifying either male or female. Those that do sometimes refer to themselves using the term genderqueer or andrgenous. A friend of mine said to me once, “You know Becki, it’s cheaper and healthier to address our issues and accept ourselves than it is it to go on Prozac” Amen Sis!
Finally, thank you Drew for putting up such factual information on exercise and weight loss on your site, http://baye.com/ If any of our coffee swilling readers want to lose some pounds or just become healthier, please do yourselves a favor and visit baye.com, you’ll learn alot!
~*Becki*~