Keikan

Looking up at the stars tonight, their ancient light refracting into thousands of colors by my tears made me realize something I hadn’t understood before.  Its funny, sometimes, what it takes to make us see clearly.  Today I woke up, checked email and tumblr, and realized that there is a woman whom I’d dearly like as a friend.  I’m not sure how it happened, or just what it is about her posts that draw me… but last night she told us all that she wondered whether she should continue… why not just wake up from this dream world… all we know…

Maybe if you had been positive, helpful, and clever, like so many other of your posts, I would never have realized that I’d become attached.  But the thought of your feed going silent has been echoing in my mind all day, like a monotone heart monitor, stinging my ears with what might be a permanent loss… oh won’t the beeps come back… won’t a post bear away the torture of wondering… is she gone?

Weeks ago, several more-elderly ladies on a chatboard talked about the friends they had lost to violence and suicide.  Beautiful trans* souls, lost to us because of the world… the reality of intolerance…  Today I have the inescapable feeling that, as I connect with my sisters around the world, it may only be time that separates me from the grief of losing someone I know.  It may not be a question of if, so much as when…  A callous observer might wonder if perusing such friendships is worthwhile.  It is.  Every moment that we can know each other, help each other, cry with each other is worth it.  If, in the years to come, we must bear the pain of laying one of our sisters down to rest, then I will gladly do it.  In a moment like that, we will know that the grief born on the wings of a spirit freed of her torment is only a fraction of the beauty and value we gained by walking, even for a short while, and even at a distance, with such a beautiful soul.

And in those friendships which we do pursue, we may find that life continues, and the joy of kinship, the peace of companionship; those things the world makes so costly for us, may in fact prevail over death.  Maybe not always… maybe not for everyone…  but for some of us.  

Keikan, I hope, and am trying to believe, that you will wonder what all the fuss is about. =)  That would be the best.  I hope and pray that  the monitor is just in between its regular, lively beeps; your beautiful heart borne to us through your tumblr posts (of all things).  You have made me realize that there are, besides yourself, several ladies that I would like to know…  I am timid, and shy, but it doesn’t matter.  And anyway, it’s Christmas; and Christmas is a time when we ought to tell the truth.  The truth is, I’d like to be your friend.  Paige and Gwen, I’d like to be your friends too… Nicole… how did I ever live without you?

There are probably many, many others, but it is you four that I would cry for, if your feeds disappeared.  I cried today for one of you… I’ve barely eaten… I feel like apologizing for how “silly” I am, taking one post from a girl I’ve not met so hard… but it isn’t silly, not in reality.  Your life means something to me, and a lot more to others. And if one stranger bears real grief at the thought of losing you, it is a real accolade to who you’ve tried to be, and succeeded.  I will remember you, (even if you’re freaked out by all this) because you’ve made my life better.  The light in your heart, and in your eyes, will endure in mine… all the more if you are happy and well this evening.

Merry Christmas, Keikan.

Christmas Dreams

The following is a short excerpt from the book of Hebrews (in the Bible):

¹³ All these people were still living by faith when they died. They did not receive the things promised; they only saw them and welcomed them from a distance, admitting that they were foreigners and strangers on earth. ¹⁴ People who say such things show that they are looking for a country of their own. ¹⁵ If they had been thinking of the country they had left, they would have had opportunity to return. ¹⁶ Instead, they were longing for a better country—a heavenly one.Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared a city for them.

I watched Avatar again last night, for the first time in a long time.  I'd forgotten just how much the story and imagery move me... and how much dysphoria is the inevitable result.  How well I relate to living in a body not my own... of wanting my love to finally hold me in her arms and say, "I see you."  Of wandering through the dream, yearning for the world as it should have been, yet is not.

The author of Hebrews probably didn't have much notion of aliens, and certainly would never have dreamed of such a thing as cinema, but the thought in the passage above is the same heart of both dreams.  There has to be something better than this...  We yearn for it... feel it... need it... some of us breath it... Our deepest dreams and longings are wrapped in cords of beauty, wonder, flight, and kinship.  To be free of these fleshly bodies, our minds loosed to live the dreams we have always had, no longer bound by the flesh which so often is mistaken for our definition.

And yet... here I am...  This is not my body, and this is not my home...  I know that I am designed for something different, for something far more perfect.  My humanity makes me want to order and construct.. to design and engineer, to break the world into pieces I can understand and control... but that is not who I really am.  But even this creation, marred as it is by our ingenuity, need, and greed, is an amazing place... it just can't be all.

It is Christmas in a few days.  For me, a Christian (one who takes it seriously), the season brings nearer a sense of wonder, fear, and immense hope which is present in Jesus' coming.  I don't know how I could survive myself, in this half-truth of a body, without the hope Christ has brought to us.  "Those who wander in darkness have seen a great light."  God with us, dreaming with us, and drawing us on, through this dream (more often a nightmare for so many) to the day when we finally awake, in the country we WERE designed for... His country... floating mountains and beautiful creatures on whose backs we soar through the clouds will be forgotten in the far-surpassing wonder of that place... and I will be free.  Free of this schism of my soul.. of the tears and aching.. of waiting, thirsting, and starving for real life, real water, and real kinship.

So this Christmas, awkwardly sitting amongst by beloved relations, still not talking about what they know about me, making merry for the superficial things, and some, for the real things Christmas is about, I will lift my eyes to something greater than my dark clouds of dysphoria, of the real pain caused by this lifelong inundation of testosterone, and dream of what may yet be...  This Christmas I will remember that Christ, too, endured a body not His own, and was killed for telling the world who He truly was, and that He did that precisely because He means yet to free us, to free me, His sister, His daughter, from the nightmare.  He entered our dream so that one day, we might finally awake, and hear, and say, "I see you."

A poem for my friend

So I have a friend now, as I mentioned, and she's already meant the world to me.  For all the emotion I normally have to bury for other people's sake, I now have a "secret" tunnel.  So when I saw the season's first snowflakes, falling, hidden, amidst the rain, today, I was inspired, doubly.  We two will always have to weather some storms... its what being made trans* means, in this world, at this time.  But in all storms, there are rays of hope, and help to be found.

To my friend, a woman who has been hope, and help, to me, though the storm rages on.

For My Friend

The night our life in darkness shrouds
  hiding hopes and tainting dreams.
  When dark fogs snuff the starlit gleam,
You’re the shimmer in the clouds

Troubles ours, many sorrows shared
   but burdens lessened by the sound
   of loving songs; kind words, profound.
For hope, it seems, our souls are paired.

So cold the wind may blow again,
  pouring down a grey sky’s tears.
  When life stings cold; aching cares,
You’re the snowflakes in the rain.

How it should be:

4 Month Ultrasound Appointment:

Technician: “Well, the ultrasound came out great. Do you want to know your baby’s gender?”

Excited Parents: “Yes, what are we having?”

Technician: “A baby ____, congratulations!  Of course, these things aren’t 100% accurate, so you’ll have to wait a few more months to know for sure.”

Excited Parents: “Oh, we understand!  A little surprise in life never hurt anyone!”


5 Months Later:

Doctor: “Congratulations, its a ____!  Of course, these things aren’t 100% accurate, so you’ll have to wait a few more years to know for sure.”

Exhausted Parents: “Oh, we understand!  A little surprise in life never hurt anyone!”

Because sometimes... it just hurts too much...

Feeling pretty down today... thinking about the future and wondering, "will it always be this hard?"  Probably it will.. or at least, maybe it will...  I never wanted to be such a painful person for people to know.  It's not my fault that they find me painful, and its not really their fault (at least very much) that they've been so trained and hard-wired to understand gender in binary.  Even I am wired that way.  I want to be cis- so much that it hurts... actually hurts...  I've never been able to square the trans- part of me either, to just happily exist as female + male... so it's not hard to understand that the majority can't square it either...  they've never even experienced it.

Still... it means that for the small number of people who know me (and aren't trans themselves...), I am at best, a conundrum to hopefully be glossed over, and at worse, an abominable warping of what could have been a healthy male.  In all cases, their emotional lives are hurt by my existence.

If I were a more assertive girl, maybe I'd stick it to them and say, "the world is not how you want it to be, and that isn't my fault."   What I really want is to ask, "won't you please love me?... no, not the boy..."  Today I feel like I'm dying on the inside.  I'm trying so hard to help my wife and kids, and after that, maybe family, by not overturning their world, intolerant though that world may be.  That overturning has real consequences, even if the pillars that need to be thrown down are based on the gender-binary lie.  I need my family... and they don't want me...  I can insist on being me, and lose them, or I can keep them and continue in this half life... invisible and more alone than anyone can really understand.

Even my wife has a hard time seeing the turmoil.  She complained, last night, at how good I am at bottling all the emotions... hiding them away so nobody but me can see the lightning flash, and the power of the waves...  I break down sometimes, more now than ever before, but it always comes as a surprise.  How many whips of hurtful words have cracked over my aching heart... stripes that I've silently borne, since my assailants can't understand the problem... How many time the duplicitous arguments of selfishness, vanity, and unlovingness have been applied to me, and I've not had the heart to show how equally those qualities apply to my accusers.

Shall I always just bear this? Maybe I should... my accounting is with God alone.  I don't have to be lauded as selfless, I need only actually be selfless.  I need not be lauded as loving, but only actually be loving.

So I'm a sap today, and I know that... just a girl trying to cry on her friends' shoulders.  She doesn't know what's going to happen next, and is trying to wait on God, who has always heard her cries and sobs.  I'm his handmaiden, even with these genetics... and one day, transition or no, I'll finally wake back up from this terrible dream...

New Difficulties of Being Non-op

Some of you may know that I'm avoiding an outward transition...  Plainly, I'm trying my best to do what's best for the hearts and lives of my wife and children, even if that's hard on me.

Last week I came out to my parents (-in-law) and my wife's brother.  Someone on tumblr compared the emotional side of coming-out to riding a roller-coaster during an earthquake.  Yeah... something like that...

It's not been too bad, as I said in my last post... but a lot of that is due to my family's relief that I'm not rushing into some change that they're not ready for (or accepting of, as of yet).  They're still very much in the beginning of the process.  What is transgenderism?  What does this mean?  Is he crazy?  Why does he think he's a girl?  Maybe it was his parents' fault?  We all know he had a rough childhood...  Does this mean he's made a homosexual out of our daughter?  Is their marriage valid in God's eyes?

You know, the works.  They're at the beginning, and I have much faith that they will move past some of the sillier questions soon.  They really are good people; honest, and serious about their faith, but loving more than most other things. 

But there is an emerging problem that is worrying me.  Having told them that I am, metaphorically, locked in a strange sort of tower, but for the world's sake, staying inside for the time being, they are more than willing to say, "no problem, we'll help you keep the door shut!  Just tell us how we can help.  We love you and will stand by you through this... just stay in there and hang in there!"  It's more than a little invalidating, but also, by the nature of my choice, something like inevitable.

I'm worried that having suffered through life as an unknown girl, that now I may have to suffer as a known, but invisible girl.  Its easy to ignore a unwanted person who is "happy" enough to stay invisible for you, after all.   Furthermore, if I'm willing to repress myself for their sake, it will be much easier for them to view me as repressing an affliction of some kind, rather than what I'm actually doing: masquerading as the boy version they're all so comfortable with.

Difficulties...

So I'll give them time.  I have hope that, at the very least, they'll start seeing me as an extremely feminine boy, even if my choices allow them to ignore the final bit.. (I'm not a boy...)  That will be worth something.  There will be a few of my more imaginative friends that might, someday, realize that we are all just souls, piloting these strange biomechs, and though many of us have appropriate markings on the exterior, such happy coincidental match-up isn't true for all of us.

We'll see where it goes.  Time isn't my enemy, for the moment.  The dysphoria is shockingly bad, sometimes, and I've cried a lot more than is probably healthy...  just afraid that giving them room to breath will leave me with precious little.

Much Love,

-Hailey-



PS  Anyone out there tonight?  I'm feeling a touch lonely...  love you all!

Coming Out is Hard Work!

Well, the tally is up to three now, not including myself and my wife.  I was able to talk to my brother-in-law across the pond yesterday, and talked to my dad-in-law about an hour ago.

So far, so good, I guess.  Everyone's made it abundantly clear that they still love me and my family, and all that.  It probably helps quite a bit that I'm not transitioning... no pronoun or name changes, etc...  That's hardest on me, obviously, but easiest on everyone else; which is whole point.

I'm exhausted though... emotional maelstrom...  It really doesn't help that this is finals week (I'm in a PhD program... first year...).  We wanted to give everyone as much time as possible before we actually see them at Christmas. I didn't want to come out on Christmas either, or somehow try to wait till afterward... I'd just be crying most of it anyway...   We're not telling anyone else, for the moment.  Everyone needs to process a bit (me included!... I'm not invisible anymore... very strange...) and we want to let the initial emotional swirl calm down a bit.  After that, we can see where we are at, and go from there.  I'm praying that I can sleep finally... we'll see, I guess.  It would certainly benefit my final exam scores next week. =)

Next Up:  Well, again, we're going to wait and see how this works out first, but, theoretically, our new friends (coworkers and.. hmm... church??? for instance) will be next.  Since we've newly arrived in this part of the country, we're building a new circle of friends already, and we want it to be one that knows what's going on... otherwise we'd just have to start again anyway. Best to do it from the ground up.  I'm sure there will be people who aren't as interested in my friendship (or my wife's), but it'll be better to know that now, than after having invested our hearts and lives.

Whew... I need a break... from life... hmm...  well, at least the worst of the anxiety is done, phone calls having been made.  I think the emotions will calm from here (with serious ups and downs, no doubt). 

(Sorry this is a pretty sporadically written post... I'm very tired, heart, mind, soul, and body.  To all the dear, beautiful girls (and guys!) in this position, past, present and future, I send my sincerest, warmest sympathies... its very hard, isn't it?)

Love,

   -Hailey-

Stress

So the anxiety and stress related to the whole, “I’m telling my family this week” thing is really making things hard.  My health isn’t doing so well (nausea, headaches, insomnia, awful dreams, the works).  Translation?  My female mind is kicking my male body’s butt!  (Is that good or bad??.. hmm…)

How I Told My Mom

First of all, let me allay one point of confusion:  My actual Mom and Dad are extremely unhelpful people and will be quite a way down the list of people to come out to.  All further references to my "Mom and Dad" in this post refer to my wife's parents, who care a great deal more about loving people, and to whom I am as endeared as any daughter (or son) to her (or his) biological parents.  I love my own parents a lot, they're just difficult, and always have been.

So yeah, I came out to my Mom last night.  My wife and I have been talking at length these last months and we've finally struck on a compromise that may work for us.  Transitioning to a female body and lifestyle is too much for her, and would be, at best, harmful to our children.  Its sad that society would be so happy to emotionally beat them for having a loving, but trans parent, but that would be the case, nonetheless.   However, as most trans folks know, living as the wrong, biologically enforced gender forever is also extremely harmful.  I feel like I'm bottling up the acid and poison of the world's hate for me and soaking my heart in it; hoping in vain that by staying secret, I'm helping someone.  But that very real hatred tears and shreds the soul, and my heart's endurance is failing...

Neither can I change to a woman, nor can I live as a man.  In one way or the other, I am neither.

My wife put it this way.  She cannot probably survive the social and familial upheaval of a transition, and could not sleep but in tears next to a fem-styled man whom she once was attracted to.  But at the same time, she cannot be the jailer for someone she loves so dearly.  She cannot bear the pain and misery of her companion's shackled life, knowing that she holds a key to her female husband's freedom.  Yet using that key will slay her.

So it seemed we were at an impasse, and that's not a place we are willing to be.  It has begun to look like we needed to start helping each other dig some other tunnel out of this cell.

What we've decided is that, first of all, I need to be out.  I cannot carry the secret between just herself and I any more than she can, because we will always have very real, legitimate, but unfortunately opposed desires.  I need to be able to tell my family and friends who I am.  We all long to be known and loved, and though in my case, being known means shocking a lot of people, it is the same basic desire of every human heart.  "Please know me. Please love me."  Not everyone will, of course, but that too is a reality that all humans face, whether they are so fortunate to be cis- or not.

Secondly, we are going to explore how I might start a slow process of presenting in an androgenous way.  I thank all the "metrosexual" style folks for opening some doors for more feminine looks for men.  I also thank the courage of the gay community for forcing the issue of looks on the world: it seems they may have bought me an opportunity.

We're still working through the beginning details, and for her sake, we are going to be extremely slow and self-evaluating in the whole deal.  I'm growing out my hair, and finally (FINALLY!) going to be able to shave off all the rest.  I'll use girl deodorant and all those fun things that nobody will notice anyway.  That's the start, but its all still invisible to all but ourselves.  Next will be a very slow (spelled: budget) change in my wardrobe.  Not sure how to go here, but again, looking for close-fitting, sometimes mens' styles that help me look and feel more girly, without crossing too many social boundaries.  Lastly, we're talking about a very subtle makeup routine.  Just masking and brightening, the stuff actors do, and maybe the faintest of eye makeup.  Who knows where all we'll end up, as dysphoria may pop up in places I don't expect, but we're going to work on it together.   There will be some things that will cause her a great deal more anxiety than others, so we will avoid them (earrings may be on this list, sadly...).  The main hope is that we'll strike on a look that I feel good about (especially in my daily routine, which will feel GREAT), that will make some people pause and wonder.  I hope that I'll be asked if I'm gay, occasionally, because that will mean that enough of my real self is shining through as to be recognized.

So we'll see how it goes.

Back to my Mom though.   My wife decided that there was no point in forestalling the first step, as she'd just get more and more anxious as days ticked by.  So I called last night.  I hoped that both of them would be around.  Certainly they deserve to be able to grapple with it together.  But my Dad is on a business trip at the moment.  I talked briefly to my wife, and she said, just do it.  So I did.

"What do you know about transgenderism?..."

The first thirty minutes were very good.  She was shocked, naturally, and had a huge surge of compassion; wondering how I'd managed to survive it all, etc...  I talked about my childhood, and the science of it (brain differentiation and all).  Her mind started catching up with her emotions at some point, however, and one by one, her defense mechanisms whirred into action.  How wonderfully attentive to distress our minds are!  Thankfully, even after another hour, her opposition was not as bad as it could be.  She naturally feels threatened by me telling other people, and would rather a very VERY small circle ever know (like, herself, her husband, and that's it).  There is a real concern that her other daughter, my wife's sister (mostly because of her husband) would deny our family, or at the very least, myself, any access to our niece and nephews.  Can't have me corrupting their sons, after all.  I hear it's contagious...  So yes, joking aside, she's concerned, as she should be, that my "problem" will hurt the family... and it probably will...

She finished by desperately asking that I don't talk to my Dad immediately.  She seems to know something about his likely reaction...  He is a very respectable man, by the way, in whom I have the highest regard.  Religious, and extremely loving, which tends to go hand in hand with those who actually live as Jesus suggested, rather than just hammering on those who don't.  Part of what has made him such a great person is his dedication to his family, and willingness to tough it out for anyone under who has found themselves sheltered by his arm, related or not.  A man's job is to take care of his family, no matter what the cost, and no matter what his wayward heart my tell or ask of him. (Can you see where this is going?)  Furthermore, he respects me, and will absolutely tell me the truth, if I am going to hurt myself or other people.  He was the only one who was tough enough to keep me in college, for instance.  So his advice is going to sting an awful lot, I'm afraid.  Partly because he, like most others, will not see me clearly for quite some time, and partly because I myself have already told myself those things.  I know what my responsibilities are, and I will keep my promises to my wife and children.  I suffer excessively in knowing that I have not been strong enough to keep this all locked up inside.  I wish I could just bear it, but my life has shown me that I cannot.

In humility, I have to admit that I cannot maintain my role as a man by myself anymore.  I hope that I'm a girl who's made out of strong stuff; courage and resolve, patience in affliction, and all those qualities I so admire in my heroines and role models...  So he will be right. I "should" have been strong enough to deal with it all... but I am not (and that is not how God made me, it seems).

So we will see.  I hope that our imminent trip down to see them (in a few weeks) will help alleviate some of their fears.   I am as I have always been; my personality is authentic.  I hope that seeing me play with the kids and talk and love as I always have will help them see that I am neither a freak, nor psychologically deranged.  Lots of hopes...

Finally, a very positive note that has made me smile.  Why end on a downer, after all?  My mother-in-law, having heard my story, started thinking out loud.  "So many pieces are starting to make sense."  I asked her what kinds of things were coming to mind.  "Well, there are quite a few... but for instance, you've always had a way of flowing into the room, like when you are coming to get the kids, and so many of your mannerisms are so very soft and gentle... I've always noticed that about you"

=)  See, I really am buried inside this XY flesh somewhere!  I didn't know that I could be "flowing" in anything... always been sort of clumsy, I thought.  Well done, female brain!

Terrible Hope

I knew it was coming; much like a runway knows, inevitably, that the jetliner will touch down.  The shock and weight of its arrival still hurts terribly, anticipation notwithstanding.

Just another airplane for the tarmac, and just another holiday for me.  Thanksgiving has arrived in the U.S., and I find myself clawing and scraping to climb out of this well of tears.  I wonder, "will it just go on forever?"

I finally watched Lana Wachowski's speech.  So many people have said that her story "could have been mine."  Something about her goofy, beautiful words capture so well the struggle we face; certainly the struggle I face.  My own story is somewhat different in the details, but so similar in the essence.  I cried and laugh (and am crying now, as I type) as she carries me through my own inexplicable life.

What strikes me hardest, is the response of her brother and parents.  How I long to be loved as a daughter and protected as a sister. (more crying). Her success has given me more hope than I thought I could have, and that hope has crushed me.  How can I hide and secretly cry when I have this hope... that I could be loved as the daughter I am. (still crying...) The beautiful people I call family, might, some day, call me beautiful too, or defend me when someone points out that I'm not (Y-chromosomes have that effect).

Maybe it's just as well that we won't see our family this year for Thanksgiving.  A move to a new state has isolated us painfully, but even so, I don't know that I could bear to be there in my shirt and slacks, crying my eyes out on the front porch and not being able to tell anyone why.

And of course, if it were only me in the world, and them, then I would throw the dice and see if I could be as fortunate as Lana.  But my wife may not survive such a change, and she is everything to me.  She was cheerfully cooking until a moment ago, and to see her downcast face, hugging me as I cry, trying not to cry as she reads my draft... Crushing hope indeed.  From here, it looks as though we will always pain each other, one way or the other, in this struggle.  There is nothing wrong with either of us, and in all other aspects, we fit perfectly... but in this, it is so hard to hope with any certainty.  I love those blue eyes, and the perfect smile.  I cannot live without her, and I cannot live without me... at least it feels that way today.

Day of Remembrance, and a Poem

There was a vigil on campus last night.   It was late for me, and I wasn't sure if I should stay; leaving all the dinner and bedtime work to my lovely wife.  I remembered later in the afternoon that I was already scheduled for a late-ish meeting... anyway, 5:00 turned to 6:00, and then to 6:30.  The vigil, and with it, a first (terrifying) (lovely) chance to finally meet more people like me was only half an hour off.  My wife was amenable and the kids seemed to be behaving, so I decided to go.

What an absolutely beautiful group of people.  "Spectrum" is a word that gets used a lot... and it fit us, gathered there, mixed and matched, remembering our brothers and sisters and friends.

We read through the death reports of about thirty transgender murder victims.  Some had names and ages, some only had the date when their body was found.  Some were beaten with rocks and concrete slabs, many were stabbed, most were shot. One was let out of a car, only to be run down and left dying in the street.

We had a hard time reading those reports.  Many were unclear about which gender, if any, the victim claimed.  Was the name their own, or the one on their birth certificate?  When it said "he was...," was it really one of our sisters, or truly a brother?  We tried our best.

So we remembered them, named, identified or no, and hoped and prayed together that next year, the list would be shorter.

Rest peacefully, beautiful ones.





Afterward, we all had a chance to write or draw our thoughts onto a paper quilt, of sorts.  I ended up writing a poem...  I felt bad, afterward, that I had rather written about myself, than about those we remembered... but anyway, I suppose my emotions are not unique, and in speaking for myself, perhaps I can speak for others who haven't found their voice.


In a dark world, and cold
  must I walk with burden great.
No peace or rest, yet hope to hold
  'gainst creeping doubt, and looming hate.

Spirit hold me, I your daughter
  through this lifelong plight, till life's begun
in Your great court and healing water
  when finally, down, I lay your son.

Choices and Chocolate

My wife and I have been talking a lot about our possible courses of actions.  (Crying more than talking, sometimes.)  There is a lot of future ahead of us, which, being a team, we want very much to work together toward the best version of it.  But right smack in the way of our view, is my femininity.  We both want to plan and dream; raise our kids, be great parents, build memories, serve our community and world... but there I am, with a giant question-mark casting its long shadow.

We both feel that we are in each other's way.  She doesn't know how to approach life with a female partner (and all the ugly family dimensions that would bring).  I don't know how to approach life as a man, even with the decades of experience.  I feel so tired of the charade.  So both of us feel like we cannot succeed in doing the thing we'd like for each other.  I'd love to bottle it all up and not let that hammer fall on her.   She'd love to press the "Freedom" button and not keep me locked in the emotional wasteland... but neither of us feel like we are able... neither of us feel like we could manage...

So here we are, our own best friend's biggest hurdle.  Neither of us have any doubt that we will weather whatever storm fate throws our way, and suggestions of giving up on each other invokes a similarly fierce defence mechanism in us both:  we will never let go of each other.. it's what makes us "us."

So here we are, clinging to each other, heart and soul as we plummet into the unknown.

Maybe, at the end of the day, it pays to just sit down with a big bar of chocolate.  How else do you get by, sometimes?  I don't have a feminine figure to worry about, after all...  though now that I think of it, my wife can't eat chocolate... allergy and all... just can't win tonight. ;)

Much Love,

Hailey

A Crying Day

Its just one of those days.  I've been on the verge of tears since I woke up.  I always hope that the weeks and months of melancholy will be punctuated by weeks and months of peace, but this latest bout  is worse than it's been before.  My wife is watching me closely, wondering if an explosion is immanent; some horrifying break with all she's known and cherished... and of course, that is precisely what I can be... a very loving, caring, possibly ticking bomb.  We just don't know.

In the mean time, I want to cry, and can't, because of my Y-chromosome...  It's just not socially acceptable, even tolerable...  and I couldn't tell anyone what the matter was anyway.  Will it pass soon? I pray it will, but I don't know precisely where His plan for me actually lies, so I know not how to hope, except that I can hope in Him in a general way...  Isaiah 40 records the prophet asking, "why do you say your way is hidden from the Lord?  Why do you say the Lord has disregarded you?" (paraphrase).  But He, like so many of you, know how hard the emotions can be.

Sometimes a girl just needs to cry... even if she's a boy.

Loving Haters

I wonder how many people, if asked, would think of me as something of a contradiction.  Not only am I a girl with a Y chromosome (p < 0.05...), but I am also a very sincere Christian. To be sure, there are a lot of Christians who believe all sorts of things, even those who find their own, personal theology to follow... but I think you would find, if you delved a bit, that I really am fairly centric in the greater distribution of Christian beliefs... and yet, I am not against transgenderism.  

I understand the hang-ups... believe me; I've grown up cherishing every word of the Scriptures, and know which ones might be talking about me... and I understand the way my brothers and sisters see things...  What makes me so sad is how the community I love, to which I will always belong, tends to fall into old, worn-out, hatred on issues like this.  It really doesn't bother me so much that many men and women around the world who would gladly have me serve in their ministries would also choke and yell "repent" if they understood my "psychology."  The fact is, I love my community.  I love them.  I want to serve them, and in all of that, serve my King.  He's a lot nicer they are, and very worth serving.

But here I am, loving the very people who hate me the most.  I support the Church, even though it, by and large, would not support me.  I hope, someday, that I might have a role to play there.  If I navigate this whole, non-transition thing, I would be as much a contradiction to them (doing what they want on the outside, but refusing to on the inside) as I am to those who have been hated by Christians.

For the behavior of my community, I am very, very, sorry.  I do not excuse their hatred for you and me, or anyone else.  It is very easy to judge other people when you've been convicted as to the waywardness of your own heart.  It's the wrong response, but one that we are all very good at... I've done that myself, on other issues, so I can't really blame them for doing it too... I just don't hate them back, I guess... and hopefully, maybe, some day it won't be so bad...

Thanks for reading, and much love!

-Hailey-

PS:  So if you have questions, by the way, especially theological ones, or "how could God..." sorts of things, I think you'll find me a fairly neutral source.  I have not been through seminary or anything, but I've spent a lot of time and energy on the topics; more of an educated layman than an expert;  but conversations with laymen are sometimes more helpful than lectures from experts. =)   I'd like to think that I can do some good in defusing some of the tension, even if it's only one-sided for now. (The Church will take some time...)

In the Pressure Cooker

I'm not really that phenomenal a chef, so when I run into something that makes tasty food without much requirement for skill and experience, I definitely take note.  One such masterpiece of modern engineering, is apparently, our pressure cooker.

The thing about pressure cookers is that they keep, well, everything, locked up inside.  All the heat, all the steam, all the food, is trapped inside, and things not only heat up, but get squeezed quite exceptionally by the pressure.  Apparently, water boils somewhere past 400F inside that pot.  The results, after a few minutes, are quite delicious, and I highly recommend you try one.

But food isn't the only thing in the pressure cooker, it would seem.  I'm not sure when the analogy struck me, but I feel very similar to my carrots last night.  There is an often-overwhelming pressure to present myself as the square-bodied, rough-chinned girl that I am.  How I would love to go on those fascinating hormones, and let my body work its way into a slightly better, slightly curvier, (and hopefully less stubbly) shape.

But all that pressure has a lid on it.  A tight, intentionally pressure-proof lid built out of the last 30-some years of my life.  The painful knowledge of the consequences of opening that lid are blisteringly clear.  In a very similar, though much less humorous way, coming out (especially given my family and friends), would mirror very well the explosion of steam and carrots which might have painted my kitchen a soggy, steamy orange, had I removed the lid.

I'm not sure the carrots would have been so happy to be "free" when they had been splattered, heart and soul, across the appliances.  How similar I feel, knowing just how similarly splattered myself, and my darling wife would be in the analogous life of "freedom."

So again, back to the same old, lidded life I come.  Unwilling to blow the lid, barely able to survive the internal pressure and temperature, but knowing that somehow, I must.


Much Love,

-Hailey-

From a Parent's Eyes

I really liked this article by the parent of a transgender child.  It's short, and leaves a lot to be said, but I think it captures a lot of the reality.  Anger, sympathy, frustration, love...

I am of course, the only me there is, regardless of what is on the outside. But then, even I view people so strongly through the lens of gender... I relate to men differently than I do to women (I don't really understand the men...), and so does everyone else.  Changing over is hard on people, isn't it.   I don't think our minds are really well adapted to it... it's certainly been hard on my own, and I'm very sympathetic of myself. =)

http://www.chicagotribune.com/site/newspaper/opinion/ct-perspec-1012-transgender-20121012,0,2914538.story?page=1


and while I'm at it, lets add this one too. Very different.  How I can relate... though my personality as a kid was very different... the same stuff, just on the inside.

http://www.lgbtqnation.com/2012/09/mother-of-trangender-child-shares-her-familys-journey/

A Date with Dysphoria

Sometimes it just gets bad. I have no idea why some days, weeks, even months are easy and why, suddenly, the next one isn't. That's the way it goes, I guess. They call it "gender dysphoria," a word my Kindle doesn't even know apparently... that terrifying emotional tsunami that threatens to drag your whole life into the depths.

I don't know if my particular cloud of gender schism is any harder than it is for others... its hard though... very hard. Maybe I'm just easily overwhelmed by it. But whether the drowning girl is a good swimmer or not is hardly the point, is it? The simple fact is, she needs help!

So that's my question. As a non-transitioner, I've got the unlikely task of needing to find things that will help ease the emotional pressure, but without fueling it in the long run.

All my girl-wishes are no good; painted nails, earrings, shaved legs... they're all very visible, at least to my LW, and more importantly, they are things I identify with my female self... and that would make me want it even more... can't allieviate the tension by adding yet more torque to the lever, after all...

But there must be something. I've been thinking of taking up painting, for instance. I really like a lot of the Japanese styles, old and new. I figure nobody would really notice anything amiss if I started painting lotus blossoms and cranes. I'm a plant lover already. But the point is, of course, to paint in all my favorite pinks and purples... colors I'm only currently allowed in dress shirts and vintage tees. The aesthetic sense appeals to that side of me too.

But what else? What do non-transitioning types do when it gets bad? I'm in this one for the long run, so it'd be great to have as many tricks up my sleeves ad possible.

The Tie is a Lie

On the outside, I'm pretty put-together most days.  I usually blame my traditional mid-west upbringing for my habit of wearing business attire even when nobody else does.  I wonder why I feel like I have to be so polished?  I wonder if anyone has ever stopped to wonder if I'm actually hiding the disheveled wreck that is sometimes so dominant behind my collar and smile?  Probably not.  I guess I wouldn't really want to be able to see everyone else's woes either... a very depressing way to see people, I suppose. God must have a very heavy heart...

Still...  it's something of an obsession...well, maybe not an obsession so much as a nervous habit.  Is it that I think looking put together on the outside will help me feel put together on the inside?  Maybe it does...

Birthdays...

Well, it's happened again.  After a year of no perceptible change in my age, suddenly, this morning, I've advanced an entire year.  It's OK though, since I'm still averaging to one year per year, even if it all happens today. =)

I'm not sure what I think about birthdays.  My family and friends are all very nice to me, and they do a lot to make me feel appreciated.  I wonder how many of them would still do that if they knew me better... it's just a silly thought, really.  Birthday accolades are not what makes a person valuable, after all, but rather the value that sometimes elicits well-wishes.

I think the part of birthdays that bothers me most is knowing that I will just continue to grow a little more "old-man-ish" each year.  More stubble, more hair, more of the wrong angles and missing curves.  Although now that I think about it, I will eventually start losing hair instead... hmm...

Certainly I'm nothing like old now, but a forty-year old man version of me sounds a bit more sad than the young-thirty version I've got right now.  There's not really anything to be done, of course, beyond resigning myself to it once again this year.

I'm really not morose or anything, and in fact, am having a very good day.  I'm a strong believer in having good days, even if there's stuff going on inside.  Can't let it beat us, right?  So here's to another great year, with or without the extra X!


Much Love,

Hailey

Non-Transitioning

There are a lot of reasons for a choice like transitioning from one body to another. Each story is filled with it's own mix of stresses, wishes, and road-blocks... and at the end of all the soul-searching, many people make the leap. For me though, there continues to be a difference.

It doesn't matter how many times I ask myself the questions, or how many ways I try to write the outcomes... once all is said and done, and as hard as it is to come to the same conclusion again and again, I still think the right decision for me is to continue living my life as it has always been. It hurts, often unbearably, but the pain still adds up to less than the cost of transitioning.

For clarity, I ought to say that by non-transitioning, I mean that I am not living in any way as the female that I believe (I think) I am. My XY body is as convincing as the next, and through the three decades of my life, I've become quite skilled at playing the role. I don't have any girl clothes or makeup, and as far as anyone has ever known, I'm a well-adjusted man.

Well Adjusted. How many times have I heard people speak of me that way. It is sadly ironic, tragic even, how bad we are at summing people up from their appearances. Probably the better way of labeling me would be, “...considering the life-long emotional turmoil and fear that she has had to live with, Hailey is not too badly adjusted...” Its like being surprised that a smashed car still drives... sort of...

But nobody sees the battered car with its shattered windows... They see “well-adjusted” me; the XY Boy, on the outside. I wish it weren't that way... I cry and pray and wish... but what can I ask, that people can see my soul instead of my body? It can't be.

Still, the question remains, why is it that I'm not transitioning?

Love is the answer. I am not alone. If I were, it would not matter what I looked like, after all. But I am with people. I am married, and have three children, and a really wonderful set of family and friends. Furthermore, and more importantly, I am a very convinced Christian. (Please bear with me here... I know a lot of Christians have some pretty negative things to say about transitioning... I am not one of them.)

My wife has known for several years, and she's been phenomenally graceful. It is very hard on her too, harder than I can bear, some times. She loves me as a man..., the man she's always known and always sees. I know there are some partnerships out there where permission with acceptance is possible, but that comes down to how each of us is wired. That story is not our story. My wife loves me to death, but she is terrified of what it would be like to live with me in an XX-styled body. I will not subject her, purposefully, to shame and fear. The peace I might otherwise gain from finally being outwardly congruent with my own self-image would be completely lost by the turmoil I would create. The net gain would be emotional rejection... and I am one who has borne enough of that in my life already...

She is not the only reason though. It is possible that some day, she will be happy enough with it all that for her own sake, not much would be lost. But even if that were the case, my children are in another category. I am not sure what kind of life a kid would be forced to live if their dad couldn't be called dad anymore. I can certainly imagine how I might have reacted to a similar change in my own parents. Shame is a terribly destructive force in human hearts. I love my kids like nothing else in the world. The thought of the probable shame they would bear each day of their lives; at any mention of coming home, meeting parents, asking after family... even getting a family Christmas photo... The alienation would be unbearable for me, and the life-long uncertainty and loss of that parental relationship would be a sad loss for them. Certainly it is possible that they would grow up with a more understanding world-view than the world at large, but that does not necessarily translate into the same relationship they can have with good-old “Dad.” A caveat, of course, is if I were to live as a sullen, depressed sort of Dad... which would be worse probably, than a happy second...mother???, but I'm not really like that.

It pains me deeply to think that my kids will never really know me, but at the same time, I remember that no child really ever knows their parents completely. No matter what they're like, they'll always be “mom and dad,” in some way or another. They don't need to love me and care about me as deeply and dearly as I do of them. Even if I had been an XX girl and borne them myself, that would still be true.

Lastly, my faith applies here. I love Jesus, and He has been more dear to me than any other person I have known. I believe His words about how we should live, and know absolutely that the best parts of my life are a result of me giving up bits of myself to live more like He does. It has always been better for me to love others than to love myself, and so it is in this case. If ever I decide that my own plight is more important than the lives of those ones who love me most, I will have lost an awful lot more of myself getting to that point than I could ever gain by transitioning. I would rather be a loving XY girl than a selfish XX girl, because, after all, it is what is inward that drives us, not what is outward. I like who I am, even in this body, so I cannot sacrifice who I am on the inside to become just another body on the outside.

Finally, I will also die, one day, and on that day, I will shed all these burdens and see the One I love. It will take a while... a long long while... but at the end of it, I think I'll finally be His girl, if we even care about our gender when we are with Him. No one else who is there will care either, which is an awful lot different than the people who are here. So non-transitioning is not forever... real life is forever, and we will not be broken when we are truly alive.

So there's my story... without all the history leading up to it. Certainly if I had been born 15 years later, with all the treatments they have now for pre-teens, and if I had been part of a very different (tolerant) family, I would have transitioned.  But we can all tell "what if" stories, and they've never gotten any of us anywhere.  Besides, I would not, even now, go back if I could.  To lose the life I've had with my wife, and to never have met these three children... it would not be worth it.  The dysphoria is aweful... and it will always be that way... but it will always be worth it, and my soul can be still, knowing that He made me with a purpose, and bears the pain along with me, knowing, in His great wisdom, what will have been gained by the long sacrifice.  

(please comment if you have any thoughts, I'd love to hear from you!)


(Later Edit)
PS: A little more on this topic: http://haileygirlme.blogspot.com/2012/11/in-pressure-cooker.html
PPS: And a little more, changing the plan a bit http://haileygirlme.blogspot.com/2012/11/how-i-told-my-mom.html

My Story - Who I am Today

Who Am I?

Who am I...  I'm a boy, and I'm a girl, and a lot of times, I'm not convinced I'm either one. Sometimes I wonder what it means if a person can't answer such a straight-forward question about themselves... but that is where I live: in the space between 1 and 2, in a world where there are no decimals.

Sometimes I hate being a girl just as much as I hate being a boy. The amount of stress and heartache it causes, the endless volume of emotion spent on seeking impossible answers, and worse, the dark cloud of UNKNOWN that hangs over my only confidant, my beautiful wife, takes its viscous toll on both of us. But if there's one thing you can't sacrifice on the alter of contented living, it's your self. This is not something I can give up, whether I would or not.

In the midst of it all, however, there are still a few things that are more certain than is my gender.  I love God, fully and completely.  My whole life is His.  That love, second to His own, defines me and carries me through all the storms of life.  He has been my dearest friend. Next, I love my wife and my three beautiful children much more than I love myself. I could never choose to help myself by hurting them; it's just not in my nature. These five loves; God, wife, two daughters, and son, define me more deeply, and more meaningfully, than my outward appearances and societal roles. Love is why we live, I think. So those things I am sure about; and all else comes second to those sureties.

Day to Day

If you like, you can think of me as a pretty thirty-something with a thing for long, sleeveless dresses, flowers in my braids, and a shy smile. That's me in my mind's eye... the dream of a wish that no fountain or faerie can grant.  But in cloud castles, we can all be beautiful... As I write these thoughts, as this anonymous digital persona, it is this young lady is who I am trying to be, or maybe its better to say, it is from her eyes that I am trying to express myself.

If you met me on the street, the person you wouldn't probably notice, is a thirty-something man in business attire... average and boring enough not to affect anyone's day, or attract any particular attention.  It's simple enough to say, yet painfully difficult to live with.  Guys aren't supposed to cry either, even if a shy, mild-hearted girl is lost underneath all that social acceptability.  So there I am, as plainly and vaguely, yet as honestly, as I can express.

A first time...

I've heard that there's a first time for everything.  For me, this is a first time...

I am a gender variant.

Some people would call me a transgender girl, that is, a girl who was born with a boy's body and genetics.  Others probably say that I have a gender identity disorder, pointing at that elusive mismatch between what I "am" and what I "feel like I am."  Of course, the list goes on from there...

It is very hard not to be able to answer the question, "who am I?"  I know some girls in my position are confident that their biological gender is just an artifact of their inherited genes, and that they are girls, through and through... or at least once you get beneath the skin.  I'd like to be as confident as that, but I'm not.  All I really know is that I have always played the role I've received from my genes and society, but never wanted that role.

I hope that I can, by writing here in this magical, anonymous, digital space, make a little headway in knowing myself, and ultimately, to live peacefully and honestly.  I hope that I meet sympathetic people whom I can learn a little from, or maybe just vent with.  And I think, hopes are good to have.

So bear with me as I find words to express the tangle of emotion and memory.  If anything, I'll try to be as honest as I can, primarily with myself.  I think my final hope is that my life, and my honesty, might help someone else, somewhere.

Thank's for reading,

Hailey