For as long as I
can remember, I have been ashamed of my gender identity. I’ve tried to write
and speak so much about that space, but in many ways it defies description. I
was not a whole person, I was not “real,” I was a shadow of myself. And even
as, in my core, I felt I knew who I “really” was, my culture and the people
composing it made it abundantly clear that such a sense of self was not only a
deviant perversion to be ashamed of but a literally impossible fantasy.
Yet as I emerged into young adulthood, I discovered that this part of myself was not something I could ignore. Although I tried to resist it, without being true to myself I found I would never be able to authentically connect to another. Through the help of a wonderful therapist, I was at least able to accept that it was possible for me to “aspire” to be female. I was still ashamed, still terrified of the potential fallout, still so incredibly afraid that I would never be considered “female enough” to count. But eventually I reached a point where transition was the only viable solution that even held the possibility of me keeping myself alive for the foreseeable future.
Yet as I emerged into young adulthood, I discovered that this part of myself was not something I could ignore. Although I tried to resist it, without being true to myself I found I would never be able to authentically connect to another. Through the help of a wonderful therapist, I was at least able to accept that it was possible for me to “aspire” to be female. I was still ashamed, still terrified of the potential fallout, still so incredibly afraid that I would never be considered “female enough” to count. But eventually I reached a point where transition was the only viable solution that even held the possibility of me keeping myself alive for the foreseeable future.
But when I
finally did start transitioning, that shame turned to guilt. If shame is “I am
bad” and guilt is “I do bad,” then I felt it was with world destroying audacity
that I dared call myself woman. I felt guilty even being in a room with someone
my identity was making uncomfortable, acutely aware of their feelings all the
time. I felt even guiltier “correcting” people about pronouns and names, which
they slipped between without even noticing. Indeed, I felt guilty for the
constant act of being myself.
However,
to my surprise I also discovered that most people would be pretty nice, if you
approached them right. If I was small, polite, apologetic, people might be
awkward or confused, but few were intentionally rude. 1 If I swallowed my hurt and made the
fears my fault, if I forgave them everything and blamed myself for the
discomfort, if my only challenge to them was my existence, people were usually
pretty decent. And it was this way that I survived. Intellectualized,
self-loathing, wracked with guilt, never vulnerable, never letting the rage and
hurt and immense alienation I felt out, I survived.
I
changed minds, too. I was the first (out) trans person most people I knew had
met. Most people didn’t know anything about trans people, even in “LGBT”
spaces, so I started doing classes to try to provide some basic information.
And many responded really well. I felt alone and afraid, but I knew they wanted
a narrative of me feeling better (in order to make my arduous transition
“worthwhile”), so that’s what I showed them. They gained knowledge, saw the me
they wanted to see, and felt good doing it.
What’s
more, I was so very well-behaved. Someone
told me that, too. A person in one of the other programs in our department,
saying “I wish the others were more like you.” When ze said it, it was like I’d
been slapped. Suddenly my restraint had become a weapon to invalidate “the
others’” hurt and “the others’” anger. I was “the good one.” The one who showed
that it was possible to be better, that they were just not trying hard enough.
They want to be angry, they want to be hurt, they want to be sensitive. Juliet isn’t, so
why do they have to be? I filed it away; I was still ok with being “nice,”
because I knew it meant people would be nice back. But I didn’t forget.
I
kept doing more presentations. I began getting invitations to go to classes. The
presentations kept going well. But I was also angry. I didn’t know how angry I
was, but I was angry. Some came out in classes, me steeling myself in
intellectualized assertion, never emotional
but so strong, so active in my comments. I was a social justicar, and I had to
comment, I always had to comment, because I didn’t trust anyone else to speak.
I was so used to commenting, so used
to confrontation-that-wasn’t-confrontation that it didn’t feel like it should
be an issue. I do this all the time, every day. I choke it down every time someone
says “LGBT” and means “gay,” every time someone talks about gay marriage as if
it’s the end all be all of queer activism, every misgendering, every misnaming,
every time someone takes for granted that someone is like them, is advocating
for them, is sympathetic to them, knows
who and what they are. I’m “brave” and “honest” all the fucking time. And
as I fell even moreso into that role, I just kept taking on more.
Just so, when my
responsibilities increased, I found I just couldn’t handle things as well. When
I got to my Trans series during Fall of last year, I started getting sick. I
had the constant stress of grad school while still pushing myself to keep on
presenting, keep on educating, keep on trying to play nice because when you’re
nice others are nice. All while I was being consumed with feelings of guilt and
shame and failure.
This semester, I
broke. Like a toxic waste barrel filling up to the brim with poison, it started
spilling out more and more. I started doing too much, saying too much, feeling
too much responsibility and pressure in far too many places and trying to do it
all. It felt great to be so busy, to be doing so many things, but when I
stopped I found myself aching. I started being more vulnerable in my classes,
sobbing in confrontations or when trying to express how thoroughly I felt I
wasn’t doing enough. At first this was welcome, but it kept escalating. I was just too much. I was dominating, I was
audibly impatient with sighs and eyerolls, I didn’t trust anyone to do anything
because no one ever seemed to do the things or say the things unless I did and
how could I trust otherwise now? I was so used
to it all. And when I started imploding as a therapist, taking on too much and
having it be too much for my clients (failing where it really hurt)… I started
falling apart.
Suicide, my
constant fallback, became a persistent thought. That's nothing new. But what really concerned me was when I seriously considered dropping
out of the program. Mind you, being a psychotherapist as Juliet is literally what I have wanted more than
anything else in my life. And because I didn’t feel I could do it
adequately, I’d rather drop out, fade into obscurity, and wither away than
keep on failing so much all the time. Then I started doing my Trans series for
the Spring semester. And I got the flu. And my voice left. And I kept pushing,
kept going because I wanted to do good so
very very badly.
And the harder I
pushed, the more the toxins kept spilling over the brim and splashing on
others. I realized that I couldn’t keep this up. Something had to give. And
that something was the source of all the relentless pressure, of that constant
grinding pressure to “do more:” the guilt.
But that’s the
thing, right? The guilt’s adaptive.
It’s a way of turning all that pain and anger inward, of making me “the good
one.” And now that I’m challenging it? I have a hell of a lot of pain and a
hell of a lot of anger that I honestly don’t know what to do with.
Surprisingly
enough, that anger crystallized in our intergroup dialogue. 2 We’d been having
“success,” creating an environment where the Christians (dominant group) felt
safe enough to openly grapple with the ways their beliefs about the
superiority/universal Truth of their religion conflicted with their desires to
be loving, accepting people. I’d probably been too involved as a
facilitator-participant, but it was still non-blaming, non-confrontational. We
had an intense session about Christian superiority and attitudes towards LGBT
folks, but it was challenging in a productive way.
And then we
started processing it. When we were processing it, the Christians owned that
they were struggling with divergent values, and I really appreciated that. I
appreciated their honesty and openness about grappling with “Christian
supremacy.” They started talking about how they were “growing” and that this
was “part of a process of change” and who could ask for anything more? Wasn’t
this the goal of the intergroup dialogues, to have the dominant group ask
themselves hard questions about their privilege and role in oppression of
others? Weren’t they actively and honestly engaging in it? I mean, it would be
unreasonable to honestly expect them to change their minds then and there.
That’s a long, difficult process. They were trying, they really really were.
But then they
started to accept that “process.” Their views were evolving and they just needed
to be patient with that growth. And while that’s, like, exactly right because you can’t rush that shit, they’re only human,
these things are deep-seated… it really, really bothered me. It really, really
bothered me because it really hit me in that moment that I was literally waiting on
them to give me the rights they already have. Was I supposed to be ok with
that? Really, really ok with that? Was I supposed to say “Thank you, oh
open-minded Christians, for considering
granting me access to the privileges you already have!” That’s what this entire
process has been about, right? Right?
That’s certainly
the political reality. Nothing in this country happens without the Christians’
permission. They’re 70% of the population: they control every position of
government power in the country. I
literally have to wait on them to
decide to grant me my rights, rights they already have and take for granted.
And it’s not
just “Christians,” as a group. Christians are 70% of the population, but cis
people are 99%. This very dynamic of waiting on people to grant me rights they
already have is what I’m engaged in constantly, all the time. It was only in
that moment that I realized it.
And you know
what? That fucking sucks. That infuriates me. And it infuriates me all the more
that I have to swallow that infuriation. That I have to choke down every
incessant microaggression, every feeling of discomfort, every single comment (countless every single day) and I have to smile and calmly, politely say
something which still makes me feel like the bad guy. Or I could not say
anything, and sit there in my shame and hurt and discomfort because I don’t want to be the bad guy again. Or, I can cry. And while I cry, I can try to validate their fears
because I don’t want to be attacking, don’t want to make them feel like they make me feel all the fucking time, but I
can put my vulnerability on display so they can get a glimpse as to what this
shit is really like and when I’m done
they can say “oh. You’re really brave.” The courageous audacity of me being
myself.
Because you know
what would happen if I don’t do those things? If, instead, I honestly and
without reserve express how hurt and angry I am at having to put up with this
shit all the time, every day? I will be all the more alone. One more angry
tranny, angry feminazi, angry queer, angry man in a dress who if I was just
“logical and reasonable” like I used to be before I transitioned (or so I have literally been told) I might
actually be able to get shit accomplished and have people listen and wait
patiently for them to let me have some of the things they never question not
having.
So when one of
the Christians in the class says “I mean, we’re fundamentally all broken just
in different ways. So how can I judge your [queerness] when I’m just as
sinful?” I don’t stand up and scream “If you want to see yourself as sinful and
broken I will be sad for you but give you the space to self-determine for
yourself. Just don’t fucking craft an entire culture, government, and society
undergirded by the assumption that I and
everyone else are broken and
inherently, irreparably damaged because of your
beliefs.” Because saying that would be cruel and make her feel terrible. 3 Hell,
it’s not even her fault: she didn’t make the system, she just benefits from it.
But even if I did that, it wouldn’t be a teaspoon compared to the constant
ramifications for myself and all of us who suffer because of that system (and
others like it) I’d describe.
I don’t say it,
though. I know who has the power and ability to make changes in this country. A
self-identified queer student asked me after a presentation how I responded to
folks who wanted to be allies, saying “I get pissed off when straight people
want to be good liberals by being allies because I don’t fucking want or need
their approval.” And I said, “I do need cis people. Perhaps LGB folks have a
critical mass in our culture and the wind at their backs, but I still can’t
even get my birth certificate to say ‘female.’ Only cis people can make it so I
can do that.”
So yeah, there’s
a realist inside of me. I want to go all Malcolm X and turn my guilt into
anger, consistently and accurately putting the blame of my oppression where it
belongs. I want to embrace “self-defense” and respond with the anger and pain I
feel when people say hurtful things, not attacking them but simply returning the pain they make me feel.
Malcolm X feels so good when you’re
an oppressed person. But Martin Luther King Jr. got results from the dominant
group. He sacrificed himself and his followers, persistently and consistently,
putting his suffering on display while turning the other loving cheek. But he did
get results.
So that’s where
I’ve been and where I’m at. I am angry, I am discouraged, and I am honestly
burnt out. But I am also learning what I need to do to keep doing this work. I
have to stop fighting this anger and turning it into guilt. It is not my fault
that my identity makes others uncomfortable. It is not fault that my body does
not meet cisgender ideals of beauty or validity, and I am not required to hate
myself for not meeting them. It is not my responsibility to make cisgender
people accept me, understand me, or feel comfortable about me. I may choose to
do those things, but I have no obligation to. And when I choke back my anger
because it is more “effective” to respond with the patience and kindness I am
expected to have an infinite supply of, I can choose to do it. But I don’t have
to.
I want to be a
loving, patient person, but to do that I need to love myself too. And loving
myself means accepting that I am not responsible for creating or ending my own
oppression. Loving myself means acknowledging my anger and sharing it with
others, because my hurt is not just my
problem but our problem. Loving
myself means, if I choose, to not feel guilty for telling you that you benefit
from systems of socially constructed oppression centered around identity and it
hurts me. Just as loving you means
challenging myself to acknowledge and destroy those same systems I benefit from
that hurt you.
So
I’m not giving up on this work. I’m not giving up on dialogue. But if I am to
keep doing it, I simply must do it differently. I have to be kinder to myself.
I have to be more validating to myself, even when those feelings may be
difficult for myself and, worst of all, other people. I have to be better about
acknowledging shared responsibility for hurt instead of making it all my own. I
have to find a way to love myself. Because if there’s one thing I’ve learned in
my life, it’s that loving myself is the only way I’ll ever be able to truly
love others.
1. Being white, being middle class, and passing well helped.↩
2. For those who don’t know, this semester I participated in an “intergroup dialogue” (IGD) as a cofacilitator-participant. The idea in IGDs is to identify dominant/oppressed social identity categories and create “dialogue” groups with half dominant members, half oppressed members to explore privilege, raise consciousness, form relationships, and ultimately empower individuals to pursue social change. So there are IGDs on race with half White, half non-White, on sexuality with half heterosexual half LGBQ, etc. I was in the “religion/spirituality” group composed of Christians and non-Christians as the non-Christian participant-facilitator. This is partially a reflection upon that dialogue as well as a reflection on my evolution as a social justice advocate and trans woman.↩
3. It would also be an abuse of power in the context of IGDs, but I think the feeling is applicable for contexts where I'm not in a "facilitator" role as well as a "participant" role. It just so happens I realized it here.↩
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