Truth, Proof, and Having Faith Anyway

On Proof and 'The Truth'

My father never lost an argument. Like any skilled artisan, significant credit goes to his tools. And, by far, his most powerful one was The Truth.

Not just any 'truth' of course. The way he saw the world was The Way, and all other ways were lies, malice and/or idiocy. His trick, though, was that he didn't outright make things up. Instead, he used something everyone had to agree had actually happened. And then he'd use what had happened to hammer his perspective home.

For instance:

When I was 3 years old, I used to sleep in the same bed as him. I was always afraid to get up to go to the bathroom, because it might wake him up and then he'd get very upset with me. So I told my mother that I was afraid to go to the bathroom. When she talked to him about this, he yelled "What am I, some kind of ogre that won't even let my own child use the bathroom?" And he used me bringing up the concern as evidence that my mother and I did not love him and thought he was a terrible person. Which led to "If I'm such a terrible person and you are all so miserable here, I will call the divorce lawyer and end this right now." So we'd plead for him to stay and try to convince him that we did love him. But he would have none of it. "NO, NO, NO. You said that you were afraid to go to the bathroom. Didn't you? Didn't you?" When you admitted that yes, he was right, you had said that, he would then (armed with that evidence and your agreement) use it to prove that you did not, in fact, love him. And since you'd already begged him to stay and agreed it was your fault, he would win. He was the victim, we were his tormentors. And he had all the evidence he needed to prove it.

What do you do with that? Well, you try to do everything perfectly [i.e. the way he wants], all the time. To show him, to prove that you really do love him. But you're a stupid kid who is cognitively incapable of doing that. So you do or say something he doesn't like, and he's right back to "YOU DID THIS BECAUSE YOU DON'T LOVE ME." And while it's clearly a logical leap, if you can't objectively prove your love, his way wins. Your father, The Adult, tells you, a child, that although you think you love him you actually don't or you wouldn't do these things. Even though you know you love him, it's obviously not a good enough love to prove it to him. You don't have any proof that makes him believe. And he has plenty of evidence that you don't love him. So not only do you inconvenience and torment him all the time, you don't even love him well enough to be able to convince him of it. That pretty much makes you a monster.

My favorite example of The Truth is how, during one fight, he badgered my mother into signing a piece of paper that actually said "I no longer love John." His sophisticated persuasive tactic to accomplish this was probably the twentieth episode of the following routine:
 "If you loved me, you wouldn't do <thing that displeased him #463>. But since you did it, you clearly don't love me. You did it, right?"
"John, I--"
"No, Mary, You. Did. It. Am I right?"
"John, that's--"
"MARY, DID YOU OR DID YOU NOT DO IT?"
<resignedly> "Yes, John. I did."
"Then it's true you don't love me. Admit it."
"John, that's not-"
"No Mary, you already admitted you did this. And since you did it, you can't possibly love me."
"John, that's not true."
"Yes, Mary. Yes it is. You already admitted that you did it."
<just to get him to stop> "Fine. Ok, John, yes. I don't love you. You win. Will you stop now?"
"No, I want it in writing."

So after more of the same for a few minutes, she signed it.

And from that point forward, every single time my father needed to prove that he was the victim in a loveless marriage to a cruel, hateful wife, he would say "No, I know you don't love me. You haven't loved me for years. I have it on paper."

That was always what arguing with my father was like. Yes, my mother did literally do something which my father was displeased with. Yes, he got her to say that she did not love him. Yes, she even signed a piece of paper that said this. The facts that he berated her until she did or that there may have been motivations other than hating him or hurting him for the initial thing that displeased him are completely ignored. If you tried to argue with him, he used what you had said like a cudgel and beat you with it. He always had proof.

When you're in an environment where your abuser is Always Right (and won't allow any other outcome), where he will threaten to leave until you take the blame and beg him to stay, where he will always yell until you acquiesce, where he always has a litany of 'concrete evidence' to justify his claims, it's almost impossible to believe that he's wrong. *Especially* when you're a child. His Truth always trumps yours.

Having Faith Anyway

Why did he do this? Well, fundamentally, what I think my father wanted even if he didn't realize it is undeniable, everlasting proof that he was loved. Like many of us, he was hurt badly in his past (as a child) by the people who were supposed to love and protect him (his parents). Ever since, he has been so scared of being hurt again that he wants Absolute Proof of Love before taking the risk of trusting it.

In many respects, his fear is well founded. Love is trust. Love is risk. When I tell you "I love you," you can't really know how I feel or what that means. You can gather a bunch of evidence one way or another. But you can't really know. You just have to trust me. Yet when you've trusted in love in the past (especially as a child), and that love has not protected you, you are acutely aware of how risky it is to believe someone else saying "I love you." My father said "I love you" all the time. And every time, because I felt like such a terrible person since I did all these things to hurt him and convince him I didn't love him, I felt terribly guilty when he said it. Is it any wonder that I find "I love you" such a hard thing to believe myself?

It's a risk. You can gather evidence to help make it a safer risk. Still, on some level, you just have to trust the other person. You have to hold onto the belief without Absolute Proof. You have to have faith.

My father was too scared to take the risk of believing I loved him. So I thought my love wasn't good enough. That I wasn't good enough. So I have been too scared to believe I can be good enough for others, because I know so acutely well how much it hurt to try so hard and still not be good enough for my father.

And now, in my adulthood, I have internalized his voice, asking for Absolute Proof of my love. Of my worth. Of the validity of my feelings.  I am constantly demanding, constantly dissatisfied. Some evidence of my worth may temporarily quiet the voice, but it always comes back. It always wants Absolute, Eternal Proof that I Will Be Good Enough.

More and more, though, I have come to accept that there is no Absolute, Eternal Proof. I can never prove to my father that I love him. I can never prove to myself that others love me. I can never prove that everyone isn't lying to me when they say I matter to them. I can never prove that even if I've been valuable to people in the past, that I will continue to be valuable to them in the future. I can get evidence that supports these conclusions. But there's always a chance I could be wrong. Always a chance.

For most of my life, I've let this lack of proof rule me. Because there is no Absolute Proof, I've been too afraid to take the risk. I've been too afraid to have faith.

Too afraid to have faith in others, but also too afraid to have faith in myself. What if I believe and I'm wrong? What if I trust someone and they can't help me when I need them? What if I trust myself and I'm not enough? And they're hurt? And they leave? Again?

Possibilities, all. But I don't want to live my life like my father. I don't want to deny myself love, deny myself worth because I am afraid of what will happen if it goes away. I don't want to always, incessantly demand a proof neither I nor anyone else can ever give me. I have to take the risk of trusting others. Of trusting myself. I have to have faith.

Not a foolhardy faith, not a faith built upon what I want to be true. But a faith informed by my experience, by what I think I know, by what I feel. I know there are things about myself from which I can build a sense of worth. I know I have people in my life who, imperfect as they are, truly care about me and will advocate for me and won't easily let me go. I may fail. They may fail me. But I am at the point in my life where I am convinced that the pain of that failure is less than my constant fear and the loss I would feel at spending my entire life never believing in myself and those who love me. Like my father, I will never have Proof that I am and always will be loved. But unlike my father, I don't have to let an absence of Proof deny me the chance of having love at all.

What Change Is

For all my doubts and fears, I do firmly believe in this: change is possible. It can be hard, and there is always a limit to what you can and can't change. But we can change ourselves. We can change our patterns. We can even change patterns that have been entrenched in our families for decades, for generations. Change is possible.

I've believed this so devoutly for so long because I need it to be true. It's why I started blogging, actually, over a decade ago: I wanted to explore myself, understand myself so I could find a way to change and avoid the endlessly repeating patterns of destruction my father seemed trapped in all his life.

And slowly but surely, I've been changing. I have some honest-to-god friendships with people I trust not to leave me. I have some confidence in myself. I can, increasingly, not only identify my feelings but vulnerably express them to others. And, perhaps most difficult but most important, I can separate my responsibility to others from how they are responsible for their own reactions and own choices.

I have changed. So very much. I'm still changing. And today I decided to truly test it.

I've not talked to my father in a few years. I have had very brief, very superficial conversations. But I've not said anything of substance to him in three years. It's been really good for me. To remove such an omnipresent source of fear and guilt, to free myself from constantly feeling responsible for him; it's been really really good. But I also felt really guilty about it. Not because I wasn't talking to him, but because I didn't tell him why, didn't at least give him a chance to respond. So finally, I felt like I'd grown enough to meet with him and talk to him.

So, today, I did.

We walked for a little awhile, easing back in, catching up. And then we sat down and I told him.

I told him that there were many reasons I'd distanced from him. The main one, though, was what happened the last time we'd really talked, three years ago, about me coming out to his parents. He felt that me telling them would kill them, and he made it clear that if I did against his wishes he would really, truly hurt me. Back then, I did what I knew: got really quiet, felt really guilty and scared, and gave up. But today, I was able to tell him that that conversation was not only terrifying but immensely hurtful because it felt like he felt as if I really wanted to hurt him and he had to do whatever it took to stop me.

He agreed with me, and said he still feels that way. He still feels like my mother, my sister, and I do want to hurt him. He said he's felt at least since we were in high school that we didn't care about him, that if he was across the street bleeding to death in a ditch we wouldn't do a thing to help him.

In the past, I would have been wracked with guilt and stayed silent. I would have felt like I couldn't do anything to change his mind, and I would have been paralyzed.

But because I've changed, I didn't do that. I knew I couldn't convince him of anything. But what I could do was tell him how I feel and then let him do with that as he would. So I told him that it hasn't felt like that just since high school. That I could remember telling him that I loved him when I was six years old and that he would still tell me "No, you don't." That I tried for years and years even as an adult, despite his furious drunken rampages, despite being called a traitor and harangued for hours during his divorce, despite being terrified of him all my life, that I had tried and tried to keep caring for him and not give up. But that when he threatened me, it became apparent that nothing I could do would ever be good enough to convince him that I cared about him. So I stopped trying.

And then, astonishingly, he said that I was right. He said that he's felt this way in all his relationships, that he can't trust anyone and that everyone wants to hurt him. It didn't really affect me that much, not at first. He's apologized before, and he's really good at saying what a "bad, terrible person" he is. I've always known he hates himself, and he's so filled with guilt and shame that it's not uncommon.

So I didn't trust it. I still don't. He's tortured and has so many years of dealing with his demons that I'm not going to jump for joy and say "Oh Daddy, I love you so!" and believe everything's going to be ok in the end. But, as we kept talking, I started to let myself listen. I let myself hear him say "It wasn't right for me to transfer my suffering to you as a child." I let myself hear "I made my own choices and it wasn't your fault." It wasn't my fault. It wasn't that I wasn't good enough to prove I loved him, it was that he was not in a place to believe that love. He decided, influenced by so many of his past experiences, to reject me. It was his choice, not a defect of mine. And he said this. Over and over. And even if it was a statement made from guilt, a statement made to convince himself he was A Good Person, a statement he will forget, a statement disconnected from his emotional core, it was also a statement I think part of him really believed.

In a movie, this might have been an epic turning point. Or it might have been vindication or a momentous event for me. But it wasn't. I keep wanting change to be A Huge Moment where things "click" and I am the optimal, self-actualized person I feel I can be. I keep wanting The Answer or The Experience which makes everything different. Yet change, as I've experienced it, has never been about Big Moments. It's a bunch of small, but significant moments. It's slow, inching growth.

Today, I grew. Instead of responding with fear, self-blame, or guilt, I responded with vulnerable honesty from a hard-earned place of compassion and self-worth. Instead of disbelieving or not trusting the affirming things someone else (my father, of all people!) said, I let myself listen to them. Instead of taking responsibility for his self-hatred, for his guilt, for his anger, I was better able to let those be his own choices and reactions and to let authentically expressing myself Be Enough. I was not in a place to do any of these things three years ago. I don't think I could have even imagined them. But today, I did.

Again, it's small. I don't know if my father will change or how our relationship will look in the future. But it feels good to put myself in a situation that used to completely overwhelm and defeat me and come out the other side intact. There is some guilt. There is some doubt. My heart is still hard with mistrust. But not as much guilt, not as much doubt, not as hard. And I think that's what change really is.

Discovering Myself in Paradise: A Trip to Honolulu

Late Friday night, I was invited with some other Counseling Psychologists to an informal party in the division's Presidential Hotel Suite. My exhaustion told me to say no, but I decided that going would be a good exercise in spontaneity. When I arrived, I found maybe two dozen people chatting in the beautiful rooms, perched atop the hotel overlooking the churning darkness of the ocean against the Waikiki Beach. I could not bring myself to join in their conversations; the small talk far too draining for this point in the night. So I gravitated towards the balcony and stared off into infinity.

It was beautiful. And haunting. Throughout my trip, it was the ocean's vastness and solemn, persistent rhythm that arrested me. How large it was, stretching towards the horizon as if literally the edge of the earth. It made me feel so small, so full with wonder. In the night, the black waves had the feeling of an endless army throwing itself against a stolid foe; a war of attrition that slowly but surely the waves would win, even if it took millions upon millions of softly violent iterations.

I was afraid of the height, afraid to stand at the edge and look over the railing. I was wryly amused at this fear, given the countless number of times I've given so much careful thought to killing myself. And it occurred to me, in that moment, how easy it would be. All I need do was quickly put one leg over the other to escape the rail, and I would crash lifelessly below. I considered it. I thought of the risk to those I might land upon, thought of the grizzly scene everyone would see. Thought of how many others might be dead and dying in the vast hotel hives of the city. How impactful to some and yet ultimately small my death would be in the scope of the thing; a curiosity, a grotesque, maybe a trauma for a small few. How ironic it would be, to dive at a party of Psychologists trained in mitigating distress. Would someone see me in the 2 seconds of my movement, yell "No!," throw a "no suicide" contract like a shuriken to strike me on the spot, wonder for the rest of their lives what they could have done to stop me?

Then I looked again at the sprawling ocean. And in its movement and its immensity, I found some solace. Drawing upon its beauty, I asked myself "What are the voices saying, those small piercing cries that push you towards this task?" They are screaming "YOU ARE NOT ENOUGH. YOU ARE WASTE. YOU HAVE NO VALUE. YOU OFFER NOTHING." And I sat with their sharp sounds. And as I sat, I felt a kindness bubble from inside me. It flowed through me and in the soft insistence of the waves, it overcame the voices. Softly, truly, I whispered "I *do* have value." I began to cry. And I decided, at least for the moment, to live. To live, and so deciding, to step away from my thoughts and go about the joyous task of absorbing the beauty of the moment. The waves crashed on, and so did I.

***

Hawai'i was lonely. I met no other trans women at the conference (out, at least). Five or six trans men, but no trans women. Indeed, one trans man who had long been active in APA was heartened that I, as a trans woman, existed. "We've been waiting four years for a trans woman to show up." And veiled behind that assertion lie a million questions as to why there aren't other trans women. What barriers have kept my sisters away? What forces have crushed them as they've approached? Likely, I assume, the same ones that weigh upon me now.

I am the only one of me in every space. In some ways, I know, this is true of all of us. But I feel it poignantly. No space was explicitly welcoming of me; few knew of the unique challenges trans women encounter in the world. There were many good intentions, of course; when I came out, most people were pleasantly surprised. It was clear that many were more than willing for spaces to be better (if someone else would do the work). Yet I think part of me hoped for more, hoped that even more of the work would have already been done. It does feel good to feel special and unique, to have one's very existence spur change. But it is lonely all the same.

I hoped for more on a smaller scale, too. There were some women who I tried to flirt with, but it was faltering, platonic. I think one has to believe one is desirable to create that dialectic of desire, and neither I nor my culture believe that of me. Even on a broader interpersonal level, everyone else seemed to know someone else, to have come with family or friends; most did not seem as if they really wanted to make new friends. They were there to network, to get professional contacts, to have fun with those they already knew. Our needs were different; I did not fit in the spaces they provided. I realized that perhaps I am unusual, to be so often alone. I felt no small amount of envy for their intimacies, for their companionships. As with most everywhere else, here too I felt alien.

***

On Saturday, I woke up sick. I had tried to do too much, and my body was rebelling. I insisted on going to some conference activities, but by midday I gave in and returned to my hotel room to sleep. I let myself feel my exhaustion, and it flooded into me, the force draining me even as the release nourished. I woke off and on, eventually deciding to forgo my planned evening activities in the hope of rebuilding myself.

As evening approached, I went downstairs to check my email and get a sandwich. I decided that eating in the hotel would be a waste, so I ate on the beach. The sun was already outside my view, setting someplace else, but I always enjoy the vibrant pinks of dusk. I sat on a small wall, watching the people and the waves, eating. As I sat, I acknowledged that I hadn't physically touched the Pacific since my arrival, hadn't felt those waters since a high school trip to San Diego more than a decade ago. I realized it might be now or never. So I put down my things, took off my socks and shoes, rolled up my jeans, and started walking.

Surrounded by tourists, I felt cushioned and safe. I appreciated the feel of the sand on my feet, the ocean lapping in and out, tasting the land before retreating. I liked the way the waves softly buried my feet in sand, briefly taking hold of me. I liked how impermanent my footprints were. How impermanent everything was. How small I felt. And yet, how cohesive too. I was alone and yet surrounded by people, alien and yet organic. I thought of how I had felt so little in my 27 years, thought of my recurring fear of a life lived without feeling alive.

But the same force that prompted me to touch the ocean sprang to life, saying "If not now, when?" I was in a beautiful space, dipping my feet in infinity, safe and secure and tasked with nothing but the necessary mechanics of existence. Why not live now?

So I did. I practiced letting go of my thoughts and seeing the ocean. I smiled at children playing in the surf. I let myself feel a fierce, gracious joy. I let myself live.

Not only did I live, I embraced myself. Certainly, I found myself envying the couples on the beach, walking hand in hand, and I wanted that. I wanted it so very much. I wanted to share my experiences, to find meaning in the presence of others. I acknowledged these thoughts, and they felt true. But beyond wishing was the now, and the now was that I was with me. I could share the beauty with myself, I could converse with myself, I could tease and play and love myself. I could spend a lifetime waiting for another to unlock my heart or I could open it myself. So I did.

When I finally returned to my hotel room, I sat on my balcony for a long while, overlooking Honolulu. In the past, it would have been madness for me to simply sit and be, but now I cultivated the feeling. I loved the city. I loved myself. I playfully chided myself that 24 hours before, I had seriously been considering denying myself this moment, denying myself all future moments. And when I blew the city a kiss goodnight, it was like the end of a loveletter to it and all and me.

***

On Monday, I ate alone at a small vegan restaurant and then walked to downtown Honolulu. I passed numerous parks, and the trash and the homeless people in them seemed a metaphor for a paradise still scarred by colonialism and inequity. Closer to the Capitol, the parks became cleaner. Eventually, I reached 'Iolani Palace, "the only royal palace in the United States used as an official residence by a reigning monarch."

I didn't go inside the Palace. But just being on the grounds and visiting its statues of Queen Liliuokalani and Kamehameha the Great had a solemn, resilient power that nourished me. The lawn had large trees interspersed, and I sat underneath one for awhile. I felt breezes warm and cool, watched the tourists take their pictures, stared up into the sky through leafy filters. There was nowhere to go, nothing to be but here and myself.

Like the Saturday evening balcony, the calm was new for me. It was not "relaxed," not exactly. It was connected. With the space, but also with myself.

I have spent my whole life hating myself. Wishing I was different, wishing I was more, thinking of all the things I should be doing that I have not will not can not. But on the beach, on the balconies, at the palace, I let go of my regret and resentment, set aside my anxiety, and I let myself live. I felt strong and I felt beautiful and I let myself live.

***

I'll write more in a few weeks about the changes I've made in the past year. Hawaii was not so much the answer as it was a catalyst for processes that have been in motion for many years. And it is an ongoing process. There is an ebb and flow, still; I felt the terror return anew the moment I reentered work on Wednesday. As the stress of the new school year builds, I will retreat into more anxiety and be enveloped in more fear.

But more than ever, I will have the strength to set those feelings aside. A quiet confidence is growing inside me, a fierce joy spreads its leaves. I am maturing into the vision of myself I saw when transition was more a question for the future not a description of the past. I am becoming that tall, willowy woman with the strong sad eyes and small fierce smile, who is passionate and compassionate, wryly playful and empathetic, driven by a vision of a world that includes, affirms, and empowers everyone. I am, as I have been doing for the past four years, becoming myself. And the more of her I discover, the more of her I love.

Small Steps

Change is hard. It requires a lot more practice than I'd like to think. But that doesn't mean it's impossible.

I had another electrolysis appointment today in Dallas. I've kind of liked going to Dallas; it's given me an excuse to leave Knoxville and, for a person who's so rarely traveled, it's been a good way to practice going out into the world alone.

But it's been expensive. The actual cost isn't a huge problem; one of the (few) benefits of going to the University of Tennessee is that I ended up leaving college with a fair amount more than I entered (I had a full ride and my grandparents/mother let me keep the money they'd been saving for me; plus I worked part time pretty consistently. And I'm fortunate enough to come from a middle class family so I had my mom's insurance and phone plan through college.). But much of the reason I still have the money is that I've felt so guilty spending it.

Transition related costs are pretty justifiable for me; the permanency makes it seem more like an investment. But it's still terribly discouraging to spend so many thousands of dollars and weeks of my life painfully getting facial hair removed that the vast majority of cis women never have to think about. And even if it is an investment, it's still solely spent on *me*.... ugh.

That guilt hit me square in my already beaten face today when the electrolysis tech said "8-10" more treatments. I guess I'd hoped my lazer treatments would mitigate some of the time, and they have in terms of intensity (5hr treatments vs. 16hrs). But 8-10 more is not only really expensive, it's also pretty much impossible for me to do with school (the hair grows in cycle so I'm supposed to return every 7-8 weeks).

Given the five hours of electrified needles and not having eaten today, this left me thoroughly discouraged.

I tried scanning Dallas for a grocery store so I could get some fucking bananas, but the closest I could come was a Wal-Mart which had paltry fare. I bought a bag of animal crackers, drove back to my hotel, and cried.

I felt so thoroughly hopeless and deficient. It was as if the integrity of my existence was fractured; I felt so weak and inadequate in handling the simple tasks of human existence it was as if I was just going to shatter at any moment. Simply because things that should be so easy felt so so hard.

A few hours after sitting in the dark in my hotel room, I set out to get a veggie sub because I would be damned if I didn't eat something that had some remote nutritious value. But I overestimated my ability to memorize the directions and, since I had no smart phone, I ended up going the wrong way.

It confirmed all my horrible suspicions. I'm already settling for fast food instead of something approximating what Real People Eat and I can't even navigate simple areas of Dallas to find it. I end up near a suburb with a lovely trail, but I'm so tired and hungry I can only think about how lost and pathetic I am.

This is the thing about change. I can write strong, emphatic posts about anger and resilience that seems to imply I am determined to do things differently. But fundamentally, part of me still feels as if I'm flawed on an essential level. And even as my brain tells me that this is fatigue, that this is hunger, that this is those fucking electrified needles, that this is isolation and loneliness and fear, that I am more than this, my heart feels familiar fissures forming and I despair.

That's the pattern: get discouraged, succumb to the stultifying embrace of my inadequacy, give up hope.

But for whatever reason, I don't give up. I don't even know why. But I keep going, keep persevering, and somehow I find the damn thing. And, as pathetic as it is, I feel like it's a little victory.

And I realize that my lost detour is actually a blessing. I drive back to the trail and eat my sandwich staring up at the Texas sky, smiling at bicyclists and watching the water fowl of the little cove as the sun sets in tranquility. And when I walk closer to the water, two beautiful White Herons fly out from around the corner and perch upon a tree. So I stand for a few minutes, watching them, and feeling as if I'm uncovering some beautiful part of myself.

If I had written down my directions like a Real Competent Adult, I would have driven to Subway, gotten a sandwich, and driven back to my hotel to eat alone in my small dark room away from the world. Instead, I had an opportunity to make mistakes, prove resilient, and turn those mistakes into joyful little detours.

It wasn't a "fireworks in the sky," "lifechanging epiphany" moment. But it was a moment, however small, where a younger me would have repeated an old, destructive pattern. Instead, I had something new. Something small, something modest, but something different. A small step, but in the right direction nonetheless. It felt like change.