Counselwoman

Last Friday, at the place where I am doing my supervised practice counselling, I had my first client. I figured I'd be at least a little nervous. I wasn't. The session went well. Yesterday, I had two clients, the one from last week and another who had not been able to make it the previous Friday. Both sessions went very well. Listening, paraphrasing, empathizing, reflecting emotion, and the other tools we're trained to use feel so natural to me. It's as though I had been meant to do this all my life, but I discovered it only recently.

Hmmm, does that sound familiar?

You might think that my discovery of both an instinct and a love for empathic listening and the full realization of my gender needs would be separate issues. And perhaps they are. I have always been somewhat empathic, and compassionate toward those in need of help. My beloved would bring it to my attention in the past. Maybe I would have discovered counselling anyway, at some point.

But I think discovering counselling and gender enlightenment are probably linked.

Almost three years ago, I discovered Second Life, created my female avatar, and began living a virtual life as a woman. It was in that virtual life that friends began to come to me to tell me their troubles, mostly about love. If I had had a male avatar, I might not have had the female friends I did. They might not have come to me to talk. I might not have been nearly as good a listener. I might not have wanted to listen.

You see, being Veronique the avatar changed me, even before I came to the full realization of my gender issues. Changed me for the better, I think. She, and Second Life, roused a dormant imagination, and awakened me to new possibilities. She allowed parts of me that had lain hidden to come forth. And you know what happened not long after.

Back in the non-virtual world, it was already a somewhat different me who took the prerequisite basic counselling course in the winter of 2007. It was a me whose carefully constructed reality was beginning to break down. It was a me who was thinking about a lot of things, especially but not only gender-related, and who was considering how some of those new possibilities might become realities. The very fact that I began to work toward a certificate in counselling indicated that I was not the person I had thought I was.

Maybe counselling and transition have simply gone along in parallel to each other. Maybe the fact that my desire to be a counsellor and my gender awakening took place more or less simultaneously is a coincidence. But I can't help but think that the two are intertwined. Male me would not have wanted to be a counsellor. Male me would not have been as well suited. Maybe I just needed to grow and change in certain ways, but maybe I needed to grow and change in specifically gender-related ways. In order to be a counsellor, hopefully a good one, certainly one who loves the work, maybe I had to transition, or at least acknowledge who I really was.

I don't take everything I feel as gospel truth. I haven't checked my brain at the door or drunk any Kool-Aid™ recently. But when I start to cry while writing something, as is happening now, that tends to make me think that I'm onto something, that something has struck a chord. This is not about a declaration of Truth but rather the knowledge—OK, real strong feeling—that something is right for me. The main reason my transition is going so well for me strikes me as being the same reason I love doing my new (unpaid at this point) job—there is such a strong emotional connection. I love being a woman because that comes straight from my gut. Same for why I love counselling.

I still have a lot to learn about being a counsellor, and about being a woman. But when I'm learning about things I love, then learning is a pleasure.