And sometimes it just hurts

February 24, 2007 in Gender by Rebecca | 2 comments

Sometimes the pain of Gender Dysphoria just…hurts

The feeling of inside loneliness is so extreme you can’t even think sometimes. You feel like you simply aren’t there. It’s like your watching yourself move. You just wish that this strange background noise would go away and that you were just “here” or “present” again. Every attempt to cope comes with a bagfull of complications that makes the word “choice” almost absurd ; the trans-persons choices to cope are all pyrrhic.

Worse perhaps, your pain gets reflected onto your partner. Your partner; your damn best friend, becomes collateral damage. They start to hurt like someone abducted you and there was no note left behind. Just a cruel emptiness. The concept of the transgender person “still being there, just look on the inside of us” is simply not true. We aren’t there for them and we can’t even hardly be there for ourselves many times. Our partner’s feelings of helplessness to rescue us without destroying themselves makes their lives as nearly as unlivable as the transgender person’s becomes. Our partners just wish we were present again. They just wish we were here again.

Wish You Were Here

So, so you think you can tell Heaven from Hell,
blue skies from pain.

Can you tell a green field from a cold steel rail? A smile from a veil?
Do you think you can tell?

And did they get you trade your heroes for ghosts?
Hot ashes for trees? Hot air for a cool breeze?
Cold comfort for change? And did you exchange
a walk on part in the war for a lead role in a cage?

How I wish, how I wish you were here.
We’re just two lost souls swimming in a fish bowl,
year after year,
running over the same old ground. What have we found?
The same old fears,
wish you were here.

(pink floyd, “wishing you were here”, 1975)
(Wishing You Were Here music video, Pink Floyd Live)

  1. Kel’s avatar

    Kel on February 25, 2007 at 8:50 pm

    Shine on, Beck! ;)

  2. Rebecca’s avatar

    Rebecca on February 25, 2007 at 10:55 pm

    Thanks for the encouragement Kel, I needed that, *hugz*

    On another level, my post reflects on a post I read at bettoi.com titled, “Someday…”, Tue 6 Feb 2007, where Betty had noted how someday trans people will realize that they don’t exist in a void. That what’s happening to them is also reflected on the ones around them as well. And it’s important for trans-people to recognize that. You and I have even emailed back and forth on that topic of being overly selfish vs using at least some of that energy to have empathy to those around us effected by our being trans.

    Oh and for those coffee clatchers at the Cafe’s general interest, Kel and I are playing off a Pink Floyd theme of songs in our conversation here :) Oh and a little Pink Floyd trivia, “Shine on You Crazy Diamond” was mixed at Abbey Road Studios (can anyone name what other band used Abbey Road?)