Jul
13
2008
This post is difficult for me to write for a number of reasons, but I’ve never spoken about it before - and given the current theme of my posts during Pride month, I felt it was necessary to write about it. I make this post in honor and remembrance of my transgendered friends - old and new - and those who are no longer alive to share in our lives anymore. Deidre & Ashley, I love and miss you terribly, I haven’t tears enough for what each of you suffered and I will never get over not being there when you left.
I want you to imagine something for me. I want you to imagine that things don’t match up between what you know and what you are. That there is something so very wrong between who you see in the mirror and who you know you really are, enshrined in taboo and shame, that you are forced to live an unfathomable lie. Consider that whatever it is about you that you know is wrong is so overwhelming you can barely bring yourself to accept it, let alone say it out loud to another person. As my friend Jennifer says “I don’t want to say it, ’cause you know if you don’t say it it’s not real.” In your desperation, you begin to think that there is no hope you’ll ever find another person who will accept this hidden part of you, compounding the shame you carry like bricks in your heart and knowing you are powerless. You may have thoughts of suicide. You may act out in self destructive ways and turn your anger inward on yourself. You may feel so completely isolated in this private hell that you’ll try anything to numb the pain, from drugs and alcohol or being excessively mean and cruel to overcompensating for what you feel are your shortcomings - anything to not have to deal with “it”. Imagine this is a secret so overwhelming that it prevents you from ever feeling like you could be happy, like you could ever live like “normal” people do. Imagine feeling every day like there is a bomb about to go off in your life and you have nowhere to hide. Imagine having a part of your body that feels so damaged, so alien, that you have considered self mutilation just to be free from the prison it places you in. Imagine feeling like this private part of yourself that by all rights should be shared with the world is so overwhelming that you can barely breathe. Perhaps you cannot put these descriptions on yourself. Fine, have it your way. Imagine the person I’m describing is someone you know, someone whose secretive, or odd behaviour makes you question the deep sense of sadness they reek of. Maybe it’s your friend. Maybe it’s your father. Maybe it’s your child. Maybe it’s your spouse. Maybe it really just is YOU.
Now imagine me, and imagine I’m telling you to your face that there is nothing I find wrong - or ugly - or shameful about you. I know better. If nobody else, I can see through the things most “normal” people cannot get past and see what makes a whole person themselves. That’s what I chose to say to someone I love very much many years ago when I knew precious little about transgendered people. I was so honored and I felt so trusted when a dear friend of mine came out to me as transgendered because she knew somehow that I would understand and accept her if only she could find her courage and her voice to tell me. The first thing I did was asked her to tell me her name. She kind of looked at me strangely, and I told her “I know what name you were given, but I want to know YOUR name. Because from now on, you’ve got to be who you know you are. And I love you. So I’m asking you again, what is your name?” By the time I finished this, we were both crying and hugging and being as close as two people can be emotionally outside of being in romantic love. Once the reality of this all sunk in, I knew I would never be the same and I was proud of myself that I could help open that door for someone I loved. Ever since then, I make it a habit of holding doors open - literally and metaphorically.
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