With my sister leaving tomorrow and my class ending in a week and a half, it's increasingly becoming apparent that I have nothing left to hide from: I have to start physically/socially/emotionally transitioning. Up to this point, I have flirted with it, acting coy by making eyes and playing footsie underneath the table. But now I have to start getting serious. I have to make resolutions of presentation, dedicate significant amounts of time to voice work, and, then, I have to start coming out to all the people I don't want to come out to.
Although I'm fearing the difficult, the time, the intangibility of the presentation aspects, I am relishing the chance. I mean, that's what this is: it's the presentation (to others and myself) as female. It's what I want, more than almost anything else. And although it will be quite difficult and take a lot of time in so many regards, it is what I need to become any semblance of happy.
The coming out, though, is not what I'm relishing. At PFLAG (Parents and Friends of Lesbians and Gays), one of the gay men who helps run it always says during introductions that his goal is to foster a world where children don't have to come out to their parents. This is possible by normalizing LGBT identities and prompting parents to embrace such possibilities so that a child naturally develops into their own instead of ever feeling like they have to hide and eventually "come out." Unfortunately, that's not the case today.
Now, I'm fairly fortunate, as far as these things go. My immediate family has been tolerant, often varying degrees of helpful, in regards to my transition. I have not been berated, cast out, attempted to be convinced otherwise (much), etc. I've told quite a few friends and a few professors, and I have yet to have a negative experience. Some are more supportive than others, but I think it's something of a shock that takes everyone time to get used to.
It's interesting, too, how you find that "coming out" is not just an LGBT issue; it's a secret that puts you at risk/makes you vulnerable once known. I hadn't really thought about this too much, but I was talking to a friend who has cerebral palsy and she was mentioning how she had to decide when to tell people and how to educate them. She said some people don't believe, many people never think of disability when making requests/making assumptions about others, and others are just plain ignorant about it and how to handle it entirely. She will tell them, and they will treat her differently, not know what to say, detach because they feel awkward, responsible, helpless, confused. And when she said this, it sounded exactly like coming out as LGBT. And the more I talk to people, I realize that you have to come out about so much. You do it if you're suffering from depression, suffering from abuse, suffering from addiction. You do it if you're pregnant, getting married (or divorced), even dating (or breaking up with) someone. You do it and sometimes it goes fine and sometimes it's too real and people react in all kinds of different, often hurtful and nonsupportive, ways.
Last night, for instance, I was talking to a friend who had a condition (I forget the name) that caused her to experience extreme pain during vaginal intercourse. It was tearing her relationship apart, fundamentally altering her life, causing immense distress, and she'd only told about five people. She had a hard time finding anyone to relate to, since she hadn't been sexually assaulted/abused and wasn't older, the demographics it normally affects. And she said it would undeniably affect all the relationships she would be in. She felt asexual and was worried that she'd never really find someone who would understand, much less feel that it wasn't a make-or-break issue. And so much of that resonated with my experience as trans, from the social divisions to the secrecy to the fears about acceptance.
Of course, it's different, too. Her issue is not something that will get her sent to hell, her issue is not something she has no choice but to come out about, her issue is not going to be stamped on her birth certificate and found in every background check anyone conducts. By my issue doesn't preclude me from sex, doesn't prevent orgasm (although it does mitigate it, even with sexual-reassignment-surgery), and isn't quite so esoteric. The similarities are striking, in both experience and reactions.
Reactions are the second half of the coming out equation. It's one of the things I want to conduct outreach on, how to handle someone coming out to you in whatever way they do. How to extend meaningful support, how to listen, how to help even when you can't really help. But even though you can't make the pain go away, you would be surprised (although, honestly, you probably wouldn't be since you've likely been there) how far some support can go.
And, indeed, that "support" is an interesting concept. For instance, one of my friends who reads this blog but who I haven't explicitly talked to this with made it a point to tell me he was supporting me, didn't fully understand (but hell, who can?), and that he wanted to be up front about these things. To me, that meant a lot: he was assertive in his support, not just passively tolerant, and that makes such a huge difference.
My father, on the other hand, is and pretty much always has been passive in his support. Indeed, for as long as I can remember, he has never had a problem telling me he loved me or that he was proud of me. What he's had a problem with is actually making either of those mean anything outside of empty words. Certainly, he likes the idea of being proud and loving. But his love is usually limited to vague platitudes of "I hope everything works out for you" and some material support. His pride is limited to those specific things that he wishes he could do/did (for instance, me writing for the paper and perhaps not drinking) but holds little regard for me as an individually competent and respectable person.
Case in point, he, my sister, and I went out to dinner tonight as a good-bye sort of thing before she moved. On the way back, he asked her what she was doing for Thanksgiving, she replied possibly staying in Boston, and he tried to think of all these different ways for her to get back to Tennessee. He spent a significant amount of time on it and said that he "just wanted her to feel wanted and supported." Thinking of Thanksgiving and his parents, I was thinking that I would pretty much have to come out either then or a bit before then because, at a certain point, there's really no hiding my transition. Even if I don't grow largely noticeable breasts, even if my hair is androgynous enough, my voice will likely (hopefully) get stuck in female mode and it will be uncomfortable, if not impossible, to sustain use of it as male. I won't have the option of hiding, past a certain point.
He asked why I was quiet and subdued, and I said, "I was just thinking that I'll have to come out to [his parents, my grandparents] and I don't know when or how." And he was immediately silent for a few minutes [my sister mentioned something about a dog]. A few minutes later, he said [roughly], "If that's why you're going up to see them next weekend with me, I don't want to go. I just can't handle it right now. I need you to help me out here." Now, I never said anything about coming out next week. And he is in a somewhat tenuous position at work, saying "I realize you're making some hard choices, but I just can't handle that now."
Now, as I've said, he hasn't shunned me. He hasn't berated me or tried to convince me to stop. He has questioned how fast I've moved and whether I've thought it all through and feels very uncomfortable speaking of it, but part of that's just his fundamental lack of trust and respect for me and part of that's just him getting used to the idea [My mother may not be the most discerning of readers, but she does her best to at least do research]. But you don't win an award for not simply being a brute or a jackass to people who are different. You don't get to consider yourself an ally or a supportive person if the extent of your support is "I am tolerant of your choices, but let's talk about how this affects me." And, in my mind, you don't get to say you love me if your love is nothing but crass materialism and the word itself.
This is just an example, of course. If my father really was in a particularly trying part of his life, I might have some sympathy. But he has always been like this. He has always been depressed over his job, over his relationships, over something. I have never known him happy, never known him in a "good place." And hell, we're all in various struggles. But he always holds this up as an excuse for why he can't do more than say "I love you." If you've ever wondered why I hate gifts so much, it's because he will make such a huge deal out of needing to buy me something [despite my wishes] on my birthday, needing to get my mother or his mother flowers, needing to demonstrate his affection through some material form. And yet, when it actually comes to him making compromises, risking anything socially or emotionally, listening to others, even trying to avoid hurting them, he puts himself and his perennial excuses first. It's why he can tell us he loves us one day and then, the next night without a qualm, line us up and yell at the top of his lungs as my nine-year-old sister's screaming and crying her eyes out that he demands we tell him whether he and my mother should get a divorce. And even when she pleads, "Nononononono" he continues, a bear-like interrogator, "Tell me. Tell me. Should we get a divorce. Tell me."
It sounds so petty when I write it. In and of itself, it's not much either. But it's part of the pattern of his life where he must have an image of himself as a supportive, proud, and loving father [everything his father wasn't], but he never internalizes any of the responsibilities that go along with that role. I have pretty good ideas of why he's like that, and he has undoubtedly been hurt. But I know people who have been hurt in the same ways and to similar extents, and that doesn't stop them from making me feel like their love means active support.
By my definition, buying me a gift I don't want on my birthday isn't love. Saying, "what you're doing is going to be hard as hell, and I'm going to stand beside you, risk myself alongside you, and defend you against it all" is. When I say I love somebody, it's not empty. It means that I will fight for them. I will risk myself for them. I will inconvenience myself, I will place my smaller concerns [when they are smaller, which is almost always] aside to help them in their time of need, and I will do what I can to help them be safe and happy. I may need to be asked, for I am wary of being presumptuous in attempts to help them where they don't wish me to help. But damn it, if I love you and you ask me, I will be there.
I'm still learning how to do that. I'm still gaining a sense of self-efficacy where I think I can actually help others, that I'm actually valuable enough to make my help significant. And I make mistakes. But at the core, my idea of love is an idea in action, an emotion made manifest. If you need me, I want to be there, emotionally, physically, mentally, whatever. I won't be perfect in that, but I will do my damnedest to try. And I know I am so fortunate to have many people do the same.
I love my father. And that's why I keep going back to him, even after I was free, after the divorce, after he called me a traitor, told me I didn't love him, made me feel terrified to go see him and be alone with him and he was so angry, so so angry, and I wilt under his anger like a flower on fire, a rabbit before a bear. I loved him, and I did not give up on him [insomuch as I felt I could do anything for him], and I kept risking myself for him. And although I know better, it hurts anyway.
Thank you, and I hope you all know who you are, for making "love" more than just a word.