Scared to be me, but what's the worst that could happen?

I've come to realize something profound: I'm scared to be myself.

What's the worst that could happen, if I were to truly be true to myself? I don't really know the answer, but I know that the alternative is unacceptable & I just can't go on living my life like this. I have to figure out how to be comfortable with who I am. I have to take the risk that I will lose people that I love - because if I don't, I risk losing myself completely.

I grew up in an alcoholic household. My entire family were/are alcoholics. I have a lot of self-esteem issues surrounding experiences from being a child around a bunch of drunk people. I learned very early on that my feelings were insignificant and/or wrong & that it was my responsibility to take care of everyone but myself. I didn't have much time to explore my identity; it simply wasn't safe. So I created an outward persona & hid the real me deep inside. For a long time I ignored that person & continued dealing with the insanity in a dysfunctional alcoholic family. I became a workaholic in order to escape from the pain.

But eventually, I couldn't ignore it any more. Eventually, the surface began to crack & all the pent up anger, fear, hurt, shame, and resentment overflowed. The dysfunctional dynamic was continuing in the present without an end, and I simply had no more room to store all the wreckage anymore. So I did the only thing I could do: I stopped.

I stopped letting people say things to me without being accountable for them.

I stopped listening to the people trying to control my life.

I stopped participating in unhealthy conversations & relationships.

I stopped looking at myself as powerless to change my life.

I stopped replaying the old tapes.

I stopped sacrificing my happiness for the happiness of others.

I stopped living a lie.

I've been in a continual state of reevaluation of my life for a few years now. I've taken a long hard look at every nugget of my life, a process that is slow, painful, scary, and incredibly difficult. It's far from over, I have a long road ahead of me. But I can feel that I'm on to something; that there is something changing, that I'm moving towards something bigger. Could that something be healing? I sure hope so. It's been so lonely, yet I feel connected and lead. I've put in the effort, had the courage, endured the confusion and pain and uncertainty. I'm ready to be authentic. I'm ready to embrace my truth, whatever that truth happens to be. 

I'm ready to heal.

The other side of the coin: my main obstacle to transitioning

While it's on my mind, I need to bring up an important issue concerning my overall resistance to transitioning in any respect. It is the main obstacle in my way of embracing either taking testosterone ("T") or having top surgery. I am very into natural and "alternative" health (specifically Ayurveda), and I have been having a mental struggle about if the effects of either of these would alter my physiology & disrupt the nature of my body. This is a very complex topic, with so many different layers to consider & argue, but unfortunately it is one that I have not been able to find much if any information about. I'm still looking, though.

Basically, I don't want to do anything to my body that would negate the benefits or effectiveness of Ayurveda. I have no idea whether or not Ayurvedically T would be recognized as a "toxin" in my body, or that removing my breasts would cause physiological changes that would yield a net effect of "foreign" or "unnatural." That is only one way of looking at it. Another is that, potentially, I am currently in an unnatural state (explaining genderqueer or transgender state?) & doing one or both of these would cause positive effects in my body. The latter argument has a lot of strength considering several facts of my current existence, including my low energy levels & certain depressive/anxious mental features at times surrounding gender issues. I am just not certain how to figure out which is correct. It's a fascinating concept, and it is definitely something that I need to consider when exploring my gender identity issues & possible transitioning in whatever form that is right for me.

I will be writing more about this topic as I continue my journey, but I'm really tired right now so I think I better call it a night. Otherwise I might stop making sense!

Top Surgery is looking more attractive

My boobs never used to bother me - physically. They never got swollen, ached, got in the way, or felt like they had lead inside of them & someone was trying to yank it out of there when I bend over. Now they do all of those things. I don't know if it's due to getting older (I'm not that old!) or what, but it's really annoying & uncomfortable. It's making top surgery look more attractive to me, when I didn't necessarily want it before, but I don't know if physical discomfort is a good enough reason to have this kind of surgery. It probably isn't. But I don't really know if that is truly the full story behind my feelings on the subject.

I used to think that having top surgery would be butchering my body, and since I have small boobs (and they used to not bother me), I didn't think I'd do it. I felt that I could live with the chest I had, even though it would create some awkwardness in certain situations depending on exactly how I chose to express my gender identity. And that is something that I still haven't quite figured out. But the problem with saying all this is that I'm not really sure if that's really the full story for me. I don't know if I convinced myself that I could "live with" my chest out of fear and/or denial of my genderqueerness and/or transgenderedness. It is quite possible, since I have to admit I do have body dysphoria. I just never translated it into specifically breast dysphoria. All I know is that I'm not 100% comfortable in the body I have, and I have always wished that I could be. The tricky thing here is that I'm not among the majority of people who want top surgery because they hate their boobs. I hate certain things about my boobs, but I don't particularly hate them as a whole and haven't had concrete dysphoric feelings about them...until now. Maybe it's easier to blame my present dysphoria on the physical symptoms I'm having, or finally admit my possibly pre-existing dysphoria because the physical symptoms give me a justifiable excuse - both of which might be cop outs. Maybe I haven't really allowed myself to acknowledge that it is okay to want my breasts removed. I really don't know at this point what my authentic feelings about this are.

I'm simply not sure yet if I want top surgery or not. It makes sense to me, but I often wonder if down the road I would regret it. It's obviously a long way off so I have time to figure this out. This is one of the reasons why I'm writing about it in order to explore my feelings. I am a bit apprehensive about putting my true feelings out there, because they scare me. I don't know what is "normal" or "not normal" and I'm frankly terrified to find out. In other words, I'm terrified of my own truth because I know deep down that my true feelings are my normal. It really doesn't matter what other people think. It matters what is right for me.

The concept that top surgery is a way to feel more comfortable in my body is something that I've only recently allowed myself to seriously consider for myself. I had (and still have) a lot of "what if" thoughts & "what would so and so think" & weird adherence to vague rules like "God gave you breasts so you were meant to have breasts" that I'm not really sure I agree with. I have watched several videos on YouTube about people who have had top surgery, and I found out today that all of them had one type of surgery called "Double Incision/Bilateral Mastectomy." I guess I had the wrong impression that was the top surgery. It's not. I found a video from transoutlaw that introduced me to another type of top surgery called "Peri-areolar." The important difference here is that with the "Double Incision/Bilateral Mastectomy" you have two large scars on your chest and the nipples/areola are reconstructed, neither of which were appealing results to me. It fed the "I can live with my chest the way it is, I guess, if that's what my alternative is." The Peri-areolar surgery - and another surgery called Keyhole - do not use the same technique; instead these surgeries (which vary slightly) use incisions directly on the areola (area around the nipple) and it is left intact. In addition, the scars are minimal & less noticeable compared to the former surgery. I was amazed at transoutlaw's results in the video because you cannot see the tell-tale chest scars (you can read about his transition on his Gender Outlaw blog). Since I'm smaller-chested, I am a potential candidate for either the Keyhole or Peri-areolar surgeries so I am going to look into them more. I am definitely more excited about top surgery with this new knowledge because the results are much more appealing to me. The thought of having a "stealth" male chest (i.e. it's not obvious I had my breasts removed due to large double scars) is amazing & opens up a whole new world for me! It's scary but enlivening at the same time.

Time will tell what is right for me. I owe it to myself to find out what that is.

** this entry was written partially on 4.6.2010 & partially on 4.7.2010 **

2010 Census: Intial excitement, eventual disdain

I, like every other American has or will, received the 2010 Census form in the mail a few weeks ago. It has sat unopened and unaddressed until two days ago. I discovered the site Queer the Census and immediately decided I was going to queer the census too, so I printed the "sticker." Then yesterday I picked up the packet, and opened it.

My initial reaction was "Wow, these questions are kind of personal." So instead of blindly filling it out, I decided to do more research about it. I found several public service announcements touting the fact that gay marriage and/or same sex partnerships were allowed to check the "married" box, and that transgender people were allowed to check either "male" or "female" based on their gender identity (that's nice for binary identified transgender people but still doesn't leave room for "either," "both," "neither," "other," etc.). I was pretty excited about that, since these issues have been long standing equal rights struggles. But there was something that bothered me about it. Something didn't quite make sense. As I thought about it, I began to realize that the Census Bureau was allowing people to check boxes that were not otherwise legally recognized. If I were to check that I was married and male, say on my taxes, that would be lying in terms of legality. Surely there would be serious ramifications for doing so. So why isn't that the case with the census? Why are they encouraging going against other legal impediments to our true identities? They make it sound like they are being inclusive, and their goal is to make "everyone count." But there are still problems with their logic. If they are really trying to get an accurate read on what types of people make up our country & communities within, then wouldn't an empty, fillable box be much more useful? I would still not feel counted by the available census answers because they nor my "legal" answers adequately account for my true identity at this time. This illustrates my general disdain for social labels that simply don't fit people into tidy little boxes no matter how hard you try to stuff them in.

Then there is the issue of privacy. Why do they need this kind of information from me? They claim that it is confidential. Yeah, right. I don't buy that for one second. Privacy is becoming more and more obsolete these days. But it also says, "YOUR RESPONSE IS REQUIRED BY LAW" (the caps were their idea, not mine). Is it? I know that the constitution allows for an "enumeration," or head count, but I'm not so sure that "by law" I am required to answer the other 9 questions.

I haven't decided yet how I'm going to handle this.

Hairy legs...

I am very self conscious about my hairy legs - that is, if I were to go out in public with shorts on. I stopped shaving a few years ago. I hated shaving & my hair kept growing back thicker & I'd have these bumps on my legs. I decided that it wasn't worth it anymore, as shaving never made me feel good about myself. It was strictly a behavior I'd always done & feared not doing due to social pressure. That eventually became not a good enough reason to do it.

So, since I've been shaving since my teen years (after my mother put me in the bathroom with a razor and some shaving cream and told me to shave my legs because "it was time" and "this is what all girls HAVE to do"), my leg hair is pretty dark and more coarse. I hate that part of it. I really wish I had never shaved my legs in the first place. I used to hear kids my age make fun of girls that didn't shave their legs - but they were always girly girls that were more European or "hippie-ish" (I hate the word hippie, by the way - at least the negative connotation it has these days. I'm simply using it for lack of another word) so in my eyes they could get away with it. I somehow knew that if I didn't shave my legs, I'd be in for a tremendous amount of teasing and/or bullying for breaking yet another gender role. I was already pushing the limits, so I just didn't challenge this one.

My legs are pretty white, so white legs with dark hair doesn't equal inconspicuous. I'm sure there's a bit of self-consciousness mixed in there...but I do know that even today not shaving your legs is not widely accepted/acceptable and therefore makes me feel uncomfortable. It's something that I need to get over though. I no longer want to go without wearing shorts, especially with another summer coming up. So I'm sort of using my hairy legs to challenge myself to go a step further & not care what anyone else thinks of my hairy legs. I figure if I can conquer this, I can conquer other rigid gender roles & start to become comfortable with myself & my gender expression.

So this weekend I went to the state parks Saturday & Sunday, and on Saturday I wore shorts - hairy legs & all. It was fantastic! It felt so good to feel the wind blow on my bare legs (poor sticks haven't seen real daylight for an extended amount of time; they only get exposed on my private porch during my smoke breaks when I'm wearing shorts). I was pretty self-conscious about it at the park but I had to laugh at myself because I had a touch of paranoia, thinking everyone in the picnic area or who walked past our table was staring at my legs. But obviously, it was uneventful. Nobody ran up to me pointing and laughing and I accomplished the first step. I'm pretty proud of myself.

I'm sure I'll look back on this someday and wonder why it was an issue at all, but right now this is a big body image issue for me. It's an important step towards self-acceptance and it's a pretty powerful one since it causes me quite a bit of anxiety. For a long time I avoided swimming & wearing shorts - two things I used to do all the time - simply because I didn't want to shave my legs or go out in public with hairy legs. I don't want to continue to miss out on things that I enjoy just because of fear & shame. And just because of hair in the "wrong" place.

It's opening up a whole new world for me, and once I get the hang of it I just might start to enjoy displaying more gender-bending behaviors in public. If anything, it can be a source of amusement from all the gawking I'll cause - just for being me!

Suppressed

I have felt suppressed for as long as I can remember. Thinking back to when I was in high school, I remember having the feeling that I was watching other people live their lives & could never really understand what was stopping me from doing the same. I read about other transgender people who had an awareness at a younger age that it was gender related. I never really made that connection. I guess it's because I never conceived that it was possible to change genders, or that there were people who were in between. It always felt distinctly like the problem was with me and that I was defective in some way. All the cues in my experience pointed to that. Perhaps if I had been exposed to a different perspective, some more open-mindedness...that would have given me some options. But that's not how it was for me. People in my life pointed out the gender bending behaviors I had but not once did any of them think to address them in a way that would validate my experience as something real and normal. Maybe they just didn't understand the issues & the options, either. But I don't like giving excuses for negligence, no matter how innocent it may be. I feel like the adults in my life as a child failed me - in more ways than one.

Maybe if I didn't grow up in an alcoholic household/family things would have been different for me too. Maybe I would have had more energy & awareness about who I was. Instead, my energy was focused on survival. I was constantly hypervigilant about other people's actions, trying to figure out when I was safe & when I was in danger - especially with my mom. It was exhausting, but I didn't know any other way. I thought it was "normal," even though it made me miserable. When I questioned it, my mom would throw tantrums & threaten me & freak out while telling me that she wasn't an alcoholic, didn't need help, and that I was never, ever to talk to anybody about it because that would be betraying the family. It scared the hell out of me because that meant I had nobody to turn to. I was petrified of my "secret," and even the people I dared to tell didn't do a damn thing about it. I was stuck, and so it was that my feelings - about gender or otherwise - became unimportant.

I was robbed of the right to develop my own individuality & explore who I was. This is a normal childhood experience, but my mother viewed anything outside of her box as wrong or unimportant. I felt that she viewed me as an inconvenience, and she had very little patience when it came to my needs. I ended up becoming very good at minimizing my own needs in order to avoid provoking her as much as possible. But it didn't really do any good, since her behavior & her opinions changed on a daily basis. I often wonder how different my life would have been had I understood the concept that a child is supposed to explore & develop their own identity, independent of their parents. Or better yet - if my mother had understood that and nurtured that for me. After all, she was the adult. But my point is that my home environment discouraged individuality. So it was that much harder for me to come to the realization that at the most basic level my identity as a distinct human being apart from anyone else including my mother was an important & necessary part of my development, and that growing up in the dysfunctional family severely damaged my ability to develop this in a healthy way. I grieve for that loss.

I think that's what caused me to feel suppressed: my natural, instinctual urges to develop my unique identity was suppressed & therefore my social experiences gravitated towards being an observer because I was never taught that it was okay to be myself. Rather, I constantly received subtle messages to the contrary. My mom would pick out things about my behavior to ridicule, often in front of her friends while they were drinking, and when I would get upset she would laugh & tell me that she was joking and that I was too sensitive. She never apologized or realized how damaging that would be to a child. It taught me to suppress as much of myself as possible in order to avoid shame & humiliation & hurt. The problem for me was that it was quite unclear what exactly about myself was the "bad" part, and I was confused. I basically withdrew the "real me" and developed a persona that hid that person deep inside, so that I could survive in the environment. I guess subconsciously I understood that I had no choice but to be an observer since it was not safe to expose my true self to the world in order for me to become the observed. It is a constant source of anguish for me when I think about how much I missed out on because of this.

Today my true self has fought itself to the surface and is screaming to get out. I can no longer suppress it, and I've come to realize over that I don't have to suppress it. Over the last 5-6 years of my life, I've slowly broken down the shell of the false persona & really dug into the core of who I am. I've done some intense soul searching & assessing of the dominating rules in my consciousness. I've decided that I no longer want to subscribe to much of what those rules are. I am still exploring how to rewrite those rules & erase or heal from the damage that has been done from the old rules. It's been a long, painful & lonely process...but I still have hope that I will be able to overcome the traumas of my past & use those experiences to make me a stronger person. The process of shedding the lessons I've been taught that have held me captive emotionally, mentally & spiritually and replacing them with new & healthy philosophies will lay the foundation that has been missing to develop a healthy & strong identity. It is only then that I have a chance to find happiness. That process IS happiness.

I will not be suppressed anymore!

How I feel about transitioning

Seriously burdened with gender issues. Not that this is a new thing. But it's starting to dominate my thinking. I'm making some attempts to act on these thoughts by creating this blog & actually using my YouTube account (no videos yet but adding subscriptions & favorites so far) instead of just trolling as usual. I think that's progress. At least it'll get me out of my head more & maybe I can start to figure out who I am and how I feel about my gender & my identity.

Every day I feel a bit differently about it. Somedays, I really want to take testosterone. Other days, I want to stay just the way I am. Lately, I've actually started thinking about top surgery, but that's just because my breasts have been getting really sore during my cycles. I still can't imagine actually going through with that. At no point have I ever wanted bottom surgery.

But taking testosterone creates a whole set of issues for me. Like - I don't want facial hair. I want the muscles, the deeper voice, changes in facial structure, fat redistribution & loss, loss of periods (that would be fantastic), increased strength - and what I'm really intrigued about is the possibility that it might mellow me out a bit and might help my circulation & make me to feel warmer (I have incredibly cold hands & feet and it's really uncomfortable).

The biggest problem for me is that I'm not interested in doing anything if it's only to blend in socially or conform to a societal stereotype. That this really important to me, because I completely disagree with that action. So things like packing would be completely that - only for looks & not for me. I would HATE packing. Top surgery is kinda along those lines for me too - but I refuse to bind. I'm not willing to damage my body or risk complications just for looks. Plus, it's really uncomfortable. Right now I go braless almost 100% of the time. My boobs are small, and I don't particularly mind then except for the recent soreness & when I need to wear a bra during sports - but that kind of conflicts with my desire to have a male body in terms of muscle (chest/abs)....but I can figure all that out before it becomes necessary. It's not like I have the $$ or the clearance for that surgery anyway...

So I'm joining the local online transmen group & going to see where that goes. I'm really isolated socially and just like I don't feel like I fit in with lesbians, I don't feel like I fit in with the hardcore FTMs who are all about packing & looking like a man. I read another person who thought they identified as male but NOT as a man, and I feel like that accurately describes me...but then again I also feel like I identify as neither...or better yet "just me." But at least I can have the luxury of feeling out this group in the comfort of being online and anonymous instead of having to start out face to face. If that were the case I would probably never go...

Unless, of course - they weren't intimidating. I think if I found other people who identified less extreme like I do (i.e. genderqueer, gender variant, gender neutral, neither, or just me) I would be a whole lot more comfortable. At least at first. I don't like the thought of FTMs who have transitioned judging me because I haven't and am not 100% sure that I will. Maybe I'm just too sensitive about it, but some of the FTM YouTube videos I've seen make me nervous about it. I get that kind of scrutiny from the general population every single day: "Is that a boy or a girl?" - "Sir...oh I mean ma'am..." - etc. I don't want to have to deal with the other side of the spectrum, and still feel judged. The only value in getting involved in the transgender community is for the community & the support. Otherwise, what's the point? But like I said, I'm putting myself out there & I'm going to keep an open mind. After all, I have to give people a chance. I don't want to be the judgmental one.

My journey isn't starting now, as this has been a lifelong struggle for me. It's just moved from the subconscious to the conscious and now to action, and this is the point that I am finally allowing myself to explore freely. It's a new beginning. I am excited about what I will learn about myself & hopeful that I just might be able to find happiness after all...