From rags to riches

On Thursday, I had a good visit with my doctor, or rather with yet another medical school student and my doctor. Actually, I like meeting with the med students. I'm all in favour of more physicians with knowledge of trans health care, and I feel kind of privileged to be helping them learn. Plus, they've all been really nice.

Turns out this was not the big post-op planning session. It was good, however, to learn that my lab results were all in line, including better cholesterol numbers. Yay for All-Bran with psyllium, low-fat cheese, and more fish! My blood pressure is very good too, as good as when I was power-walking a lot. Now if only I could get back to some kind of aerobic workout!

It was a good visit, but I left kind of depressed. I think I was set up for it by discussion a few days ago about whether we remain transsexual forever and whether we are ever fully women. At the community health centre I go to, it would be rare for me not to see at least one other trans woman. And all it took was seeing one easily-clocked trans woman to send me into a funk.

Oh, how we strain against the strictures of our male bodies! So many times, they just don't cooperate with our efforts to turn them female when we're already grown. The face, the shoulders, the chest, the hands, the hips—there are so many ways our bodies can betray us.

We have a pretty fucked up condition when you think about it. An undervirilized brain in a body that develops fine along male lines is just a horrible way for nature to go wrong. And yet our personalities are in that brain that developed differently—a perfectly healthy brain, just mismatched with the rest of the body. To shake out of us the feeling that our bodies are not right, that we should be women, you would have to shake away our very selves. You would not be left with a man but rather with a shell.

So we do everything we can, or everything we can afford, to right this terrible wrong. We live as our brain tells us we must. We correct the hormone balance that our brain says was wrong. We have skilled surgeons take away the dangly mistake and give us the vagina we ought to have had and sometimes the face we need to see in the mirror and the breasts that hormones would not grant us.

And yet none of that will change the fact that we were born male-bodied. Nor will it give us ovaries and a uterus and thereby the possibility of bearing children. None of it will change the bones inside us—shoulders, ribs, hands, feet, hips. None of it will help us learn to be full-fledged women and not just girls in finery.

Yes, there are times and circumstances in which this compromise feels...grotesque. We try so hard, and this is the best we can do.

Interestingly, I never have those black thoughts for very long. Are they the reality I am denying? Or are they simply demons trying to take away my joy? Because however much those things are objectively true, or can be seen as true, they don't describe the lion's share of my experience. Am I living a delusion, or do I actually see more clearly?

Because however imperfect this woman is, whatever her flaws, she is still a woman. Life echoes that back to her again and again, day in and day out. All those medical miracles are simply to allow us to feel in our bodies the way we feel in our hearts, and to allow others to see, even if only a glimpse, our true selves.

Every day, I feel honoured to be a woman. Not that there is anything dishonorable in being a man, if that's what you ought to be. But this woman is far happier than that man could ever have been. Every day, I thank the Goddess for the privilege I have, and acknowledge my own efforts. Every day, I feel gratitude to everyone who looks at me and sees a woman, especially those who knew me otherwise. Those people owe me nothing, regardless of what my brain tells me. Yet they freely give me love and acceptance, and blessings upon them for it.

Today was my last official day at the agency where I did my counselling practicum. I had a good session with the one client I had remaining. I helped a new practicum student. Very often, the office has been quiet on Fridays, but today it was bustling. One of the former clients who spends a lot of time there was cooking spicy meat patties over rice. Another told me, not for the first time, that he wants to see me around the office. The very first client I had came for a visit, just happened to do so, unaware that it was my last day. We had a lovely reunion. I told one of the staff who had never known about my status that I was trans. Her response: so what? It didn't matter to her, but she was glad that I had trusted her. Before I left, I was handed a card full of well wishes.

Honoured. Happy. Grateful. Proud. Humble. Appreciated. Loved. What more could anyone ask for?

Beaucoup d'information

Finally, two weeks after it was mailed (nice job, Canada Post), I received the complete information packet from the Centre Métropolitain de Chirurgie Plastique. Lots of reading to do, but fortunately I'm already familiar with some of it. The timing is perfect, because tomorrow I will see my doctor, and I can bring the material to him for questions.

Every development like this makes the process just a bit more real. Seeing all this information in front of me puts a huge grin on my face. It also gives me pause and makes me realize just how serious this whole thing is. I do realize it. And I still feel very, very good about it.

Just over two and a half months from now, I will be on a plane to Montreal, and a very important part of this odyssey will begin. In the meantime, life doesn't stop. Doctor appointment, Samhain, trip to San Francisco to see friends and have some fun, more tests, maybe another doctor visit or two, Yule, and my 56th birthday. And during all that, work both paid and volunteer, and all the other little things that make up my life.

I wish speedy healing for all my friends who had their genital surgery this month. Thank you and others who went before me for glimpses into your own surgical experience. My time is coming soon.

Name that blog

I can't remember when I first called this blog TransCanada. Not quite from the beginning, but close. It's a take-off on the film Transamerica, of course, and also a reference to the fact that I am Canadian. Especially since I've changed the subtitle, it doesn't even scream "transgender" or "transsexual" any more. There are a few companies called TransCanada, and there is a Trans-Canada highway and a Trans-Canada trail.

I've been thinking, however, that it might be time for a name change. This has to do with the somewhat controversial question of whether I am transsexual once I have transitioned, especially after my sex has been biologically and legally reassigned. Am I transsexual, or was I transsexual? I was certainly born transsexual. There's no question I was born with a male body, and I've lived with it more than 50 years. But once transition is complete (at least this transition—life is full of them), once I've crossed over, am I still transsexual or transgender? If I'm trans forever, then what does transition mean? If I'm still transsexual or transgender after transition, does that devalue transition?

One reason I stayed far away from all things trans for so long is that I wanted to be a woman, born a girl, with all the right parts and chromosomes and everything. And I knew I couldn't have that. I was afraid of being a freak. I was afraid of being not quite a woman. That just wasn't what I wanted.

So when I alleviated my woeful ignorance and learned that, given time, I could change my sex is every way except chromosomally, then I knew I had to do it. It was still a compromise, but not nearly as much of one as I had feared. It was much closer to the dream come true than I had dreamed it could be.

But is it less of the dream come true than I claim it to be? Some think so. Some think worse, of course, considering me to be a man until I die, but their ignorance is profound, and I ignore them. But some think I'm trans for my whole life, and that I have to deal with.

I've said before that I will never pretend to be other than I am. I will never hide my origins, even if I will be selective about those I tell. I am and shall be a woman. A woman of transsexual history, a woman with a past, whatever. But a woman now. If I am branded a trans woman forever, a woman with an asterisk, then just kill me now.

So that's why I wonder about the blog name. I purposely gave it various "trans" names in order to be obvious in search engines. Do I want to be obvious any more? The subtitle references my "late-blooming womanhood." Should the whole title go for something similar? Something more subtle than TransCanada?

I wonder as well about the future of this blog. I love to write, but I didn't start a blog until I had a subject that really engaged me, first Second Life, then my gender odyssey. In this blog, I've written non-personal entries, but not that many. It's mostly been about my own personal transition. Once I am post-op, will I have anything left to write about? It will just be my life. I find my own life interesting, but at that point I'm not sure who else will.

"The future's not ours to see," wrote lyricist Ray Evans. I guess I'll just have to wait to find out how it all unfolds. To quote another songwriter, "Life is what happens to you while you're busy making other plans."

Addendum: My Twitter friend Suvi-Tuuli did zing me good once when I said I thought of myself as a woman, not a trans woman. She said, that's a good attitude to have when you go for your prostate exam. :)

Sing a new song

I was struck again this week by ways that I've changed since having transitioned.

On Thursday, Sweetie and I went to see Gossip, a kind of punk-funk-blues band led by the amazing Beth Ditto. Poor woman was suffering from a cold, possibly the aftermath of the flu, but she was still belting out the songs. Once upon a time, I would have enjoyed part of the set and then got bored and restless. I would have preferred running off to play my own music than to sit through the whole set. But Thursday, I didn't feel that way at all. I loved the set, all the way to the end. No restlessness, no dissatisfaction.

Then last night, we attended a benefit performance for an organization called Education Without Borders, which helps schools in South Africa. The show was called Woza Afrika—Tribute to Miriam Makeba. Miriam Makeba, called "Mama Afrika," was a wonderful singer, often in her native Xhosa language, as well as a civil rights activist, who died almost a year ago. The program began with a series of dance pieces by girls from the Pro Arte Centre for Dance, with various accompaniment. One especially moving piece was set to a Vancouver Island native story about how the black Orca and the white Osprey fell in love and produced offspring with the typical black and white colouring of orcas. Don't ask me why it was so evocative. It just was, and we both felt it. After an interval, the Universal Gospel Choir sang several songs, African and others, sometimes with an amazing soloist named Jane Mortifee.

Was that me who said she loved the dance performances? Sweetie has always loved dance, but I have never been particularly moved by it. At least I hadn't been. But I thoroughly enjoyed the dance last night. I even "got it." First musical theatre, now dance. Where will it end?

This is why I say that it is not always possible to reassure those dismayed by my transition that I am the same person inside. In some ways, yes, of course I am, but transition has changed me profoundly. And how could it not? I am a free human being now. I see with different eyes, and feel with a liberated body. Barriers I put up for protection have crumbled.

I love that I resonate with new things. It's like finding notes on the scale that I didn't even know existed.

Fear and longing

On Monday night, my sinuses were hurting, not quite enough to make me get up and take drugs, but enough that I was having trouble falling asleep. And when I'm sick, sometimes I have bad thoughts. Untrustworthy thoughts that nonetheless intrude for a bit.

I had the first anxiety I've had about my upcoming surgical procedure. Not about the procedure itself. That couldn't be in better hands. And not about having the procedure. I want a vagina more and more every day. No, the anxiety was about my own part in the recovery. There are a lot of things to do. It's not easy "babysitting a vagina," as my therapist puts it.

Sometimes I still have fear of new things. Fear of not doing things right. Fear of not being good enough. Fear is really one of the worst things in the world. It can paralyze you. It can twist your thoughts in all kinds of harmful ways. It can push you toward bad choices, including the ultimate bad choice.

Thank the Goddess for my friend and fellow blogger Jillian. She had her surgery at the clinic in Montreal, where I will also go, and she has blogged about the whole thing—amazingly, even only a few hours after the procedure was over! I found her A Day in the Life entry especially comforting. There it is in black and white: what my day will be like once the packing is removed and I start to do my own maintenance. It's not such a big deal after all. I can handle that.

Jillian is one of five women I know, either personally or via blogs and such, who either have had or are having their genital surgery this month. It's funny to read statements about how many trans people opt not to have surgery. You can't prove that by my friends. Five in one month!

So now I'm a little weepy not from anxiety but from wanting this so badly. I feel more incongruous every day. If my date weren't coming up soon, I probably wouldn't even think about incongruity, because in most of my life I don't dwell on it. But when I think about surgery, then the need becomes more pressing.

I have plenty to do between now and January. It's just that some days it's difficult to stay calm and focused. And yet I have to. Life doesn't stop just because I have vagina envy.

The hormone shift

I got very interesting comments on my entry to the blog chain "What does it mean to be a woman?" One of the cool things is that the woman who started the blog chain is a woman-born-female-bodied, and naturally other entries in the blog chain are also from women-born-female-bodied. Since most of the blogs I read are written by trans women or trans men, it was nice to get a new perspective.

One woman-born-female-bodied who wrote a comment to me calls herself Flartus, and she writes a blog called Flartopia. I really appreciated her take on what it means to be a woman, because unlike several of the other writers, she is not a mother, and she is also a lesbian. In her comment, she asked me how it was to shift from male-normal hormones to female-normal, since she has only ever known female-normal.

I've written about this in the past, but not for a long time, and not really thoroughly, so I will give it a try now. Two caveats. First, this is only about my own experience. I can't speak for any other trans woman. Second, and more importantly, I can't necessarily separate the effects of social and psychological transition from those of hormonal transition. Some things might be a result of one or the other. For instance, I felt very much better when I came to terms with being transsexual and with knowing that I was going to transition, even though it was months before I took my first hormone pill. Many effects are probably a result of both, and I don't want to ascribe to hormones alone what is really the result of the total change.

Given those caveats, one thing that I think I can safely ascribe to the change in hormone balance is the cessation of what some have described as noise in their head. I had never known that being constantly bombarded by thoughts, bits of songs, and ideas, all moving very fast, was not normal. I was more or less used to it. It was annoying sometimes, because it made it difficult to do some things, like put thoughts to paper (or disk) before they flew away, but I thought that was just the way things were. One of the reasons I used to use a particular form of self medication was because it slowed my thoughts down to the point where I could actually know what they were. I really did do some good writing and other good work while under the influence.

But the change in that "normalcy" was one of the first things I noticed after starting estrogen. And it was such a relief. I was calmer. I had so much more clarity. I had an easier time writing. I could actually have some quiet time in my head. I didn't have a constant, confused dialogue going on.

This isn't what happens for anyone on estrogen. It was just a sign that estrogen was a good fit with my brain, that my body and brain really were mismatched. With more estrogen and much less testosterone, my brain worked better. It worked before, but suboptimally in many ways. I imagine something similar happens for female-to-male transsexuals when they start using testosterone, because their mismatch is the opposite of mine.

Another change that I think is more hormones than not is the difference in how I relate to my body. In a way that's hard to explain, my muscles feel better to me now. I have much less tension in my body. I feel more connected to it. I feel as though I move through space more gracefully than I used to, although that might just be part of the behavioural liberation that goes along with social transition. I feel more sensation in my softer skin, and I enjoy all kinds of touching more than I used to.

I think this is related to one of the more subjective differences I sense: I feel right. I feel right in my own skin. I feel that this is normal. No longer do I have the constant thought that something just isn't right with me, that there's something I'm missing. I'm not missing it any longer. I think this is really an effect of the entire transition, but I do think there is a strong hormonal component.

I've seen people downplay the effects of hormones. They tend to place more emphasis on the social and psychological aspects of transition, the liberation that comes from living a new life. And I would never downplay any of that. I know someone who has transitioned without any hormone change, thanks to National Health Service delays, and she is better off than she was. But our bodies are suffused with chemicals. That's how they work. We can change the chemical makeup of our bodies by various actions, thoughts, and techniques, but we can't change everything. Hormones are highly influential on how our bodies work, and sex hormones no less than others. Sex hormones don't just influence our physicality. They influence how we think and feel. How could they not? We are not disembodied spirits! We are very much flesh and blood creatures.

One thing I will add is that my hormone levels are not quite female normal, even for a virtual teenage girl (my estrogen is higher than it would be for a woman my age). I take medroxyprogesterone acetate, a progestin, every day. I do not cycle estrogen and progesterone as happens naturally for most post-pubescent, pre-menopausal women-born-female-bodied. Some trans women do, but I don't know any trans health care providers who recommend it. So I have a constant level of progesterone along with a constant level of estrogen.

I hope this was a good answer to the question! And I'll take any essentialist lumps that come my way.

Who's that girl?

Part of the requirement for my practicum and thus for my counselling certificate was to participate in five seminars at school. Last night was my final one. I had to present a case to the class, which is the kind of thing counsellors do at clinical meetings. Seminar participants, and the facilitator, act as colleagues. When you're finished with the presentation, they usually ask questions and sometimes make treatment suggestions.

Normally we have tables arranged around the room so that we can all face each other. Last night, the room was too small to do much to change its configuration, so we didn't bother. Some did their presentations from their seats, but I decided I didn't want people behind me to be listening to the back of my head.

So when it was my turn, I stood up, handed a copy of my presentation to the facilitator, and stayed in front of the room. I started out with one leg on an empty table and one on the floor, but soon I was just sitting on the table. I gave my presentation. I wasn't nervous, even being in front of the room. I felt very confident. I made sure to make eye contact with people in various parts of the room. I got a good mark.

I used to be able to stand up in front of a crowd, so this isn't entirely new. But that was usually when I was behind a microphone and a guitar, or playing a part on stage. This ease with making a presentation, with presenting myself, is new. It's hard for me to believe just how comfortable I am with myself now. Who the heck is that girl? Is this really me? I'm still getting used to these wonderful changes!

On a related note, something struck me last Friday as I was filing something away between sessions. I like myself! It was really just a little thing, but it felt profound. I used to think that I liked myself before, but I was always my own worst critic. It was a very qualified liking that mostly involved thinking that I'd like myself better if that or that were different. And so I never really did accept myself the way I was. Now I do. There are still things I want to change, but I have a basic acceptance that I never used to have.

What does it mean to be a woman?

Liz, author of Eternal Lizdom, posted an entry called "What Does It Mean To Be a Woman" and invited some friends to write their own versions. She also threw open the floor to others to add their own takes on the subject, so being the fierce woman I am, I couldn't resist.

I'm audacious. You can't transition without some amount of audacity. But after 54 years of (usually) being perceived as a man and not quite two years of being perceived as a woman, I think it's prudent to tread carefully when it comes to the question of what it means to be a woman. I'm just beginning to find out.

I can't relate it to having children, even as a father. I've never had children (that I know of), and I've never reared children. In fact, I've had very little extended contact with children until this past summer, when I had a wonderful opportunity to work with a group of girls on a musical adventure.

I certainly can't relate it to having grown up as a girl. That option wasn't afforded to me. No first period, no first being kissed (as opposed to planting one), and a rather different concept of losing virginity.

So how can I, a mere trans egg, have anything to say about being a woman?

Well, one thing trans women (and trans men) find out very quickly is the difference in how others treat us. We are in the unique position of having lived on both sides of what is still substantially a binary. I've experienced the deference of being allowed on the bus or off the elevator first. I'm fortunate in not being in a situation where that different treatment is negative. I am respected at work for my knowledge and skills, and that hasn't changed as I have changed. But there are so many little ways during the day that I keep seeing that it's a different world for women than it is for men.

As a trans woman, I can also express what a huge difference there is being an estrogen-based life form rather than a testosterone-based life form. See, XX isn't really so scientific. Occasionally the H-Y antigen is expressed on the X-chromosome, so XX can be male, and occasionally it is not expressed on the Y-chromosome, so XY can be female. So it's not so much XX as the normal result of XX, which is naturally high levels of female sex hormones and lower levels of male sex hormones. I've caused that to happen through the wonders of prescription pharmaceuticals. And I can't overestimate how different that makes me feel, in my brain and in my body. Sex hormones are fundamental to our physical and mental state, and mine are now female normal. Hormonally, I am all woman.

I have the social, hormonal, and some (very little) physical womanhood, but it's still three months before I have the remaining physical womanhood. I can't yet speak about how that is going to be, only that I get more excited about it the closer it gets. Because some women have penises, but most women have vaginas, and in three months so will I.

After that, what it means to be a woman is all in the vague realm of how I feel, and thus difficult to express. One thing that strikes me is how much more important women's issues are to me, not because I think they ought to be, but because I feel them in my gut. I was always a compassionate, caring person (when I wasn't being a selfish bastard), and if anything I am now more compassionate and caring toward all people, but there is something about women that activates me emotionally. Women being raped, women being brutalized, women being treated like chattel. Women making great strides, women being empowered, women winning battles. Those things all hit me at a visceral level now. Maybe it's the hormones. Maybe it's the life I live. Most likely it is both.

A woman is someone who feels a fundamental connection to other women.

There really is a sisterhood, and I've been allowed into it. Not by all women, of course, but by those who know me. I imagine there's a brotherhood as well, but if there is, I was never a part of it. But I am part of this wonderful sisterhood. Apparently, it's not based on chromosomes or having children or even on having female normal hormone levels. It seems to be based on the shared experience of living our lives as women, especially in a society in which that makes our lives different than the lives of men. I didn't grow up a girl, but I've been growing up as a woman for nearly two years, and I've learned a huge amount during that time. That lets me into the club, and believe me, that's not a privilege I take for granted. It's precious to me, and I cherish each woman who welcomes me as a woman.

Those are the best answers I can come up with. I can't give as complete an answer as a woman-born-female-bodied can. But I can give the answer of someone who has lived in both worlds.

One hundred days of gratitude

Today is Thanksgiving Day in Canada. It's also only 100 days until a highly skilled surgeon modifies my anatomy and gives me what I have always dreamed of. The little boy looking at himself in the mirror with his genitals tucked between his legs won't have to tuck and dream any more. She'll be too busy dilating!

Being thankful is not something I do only on Thanksgiving. I still thank the Goddess every night for the day I just had, the good, the bad, all of it. So I will be expressing thanks for the next hundred days and beyond.

I have so much to be thankful for in general. I have the most wonderful spouse in the world. Familial relationships are not without problems, but I am still grateful for my family. I am very thankful for my friends, near and far. I am thankful for my job, a job I am actually liking now and which pays me well, and for the people with whom I work. I am thankful for the career I am starting to build and for the satisfaction I get from listening to people and, I hope, helping them. I am thankful for the soft, plump, affectionate kitty with whom we share our house. I am grateful for our house, for good neighbours, and for the wonderful area in which we live. That's not even the end of the list, but I'll wrap it up by saying that I am very, very grateful for the life I now have.

Happy Thanksgiving to my Canadian readers! And thank you to all of you who read my outpourings and for all the feedback and points of view that you have given me over the years. You have made a difference to me.

Hey, baby

Sweetie and I were sitting in a bus shelter, waiting for the bus to come on a cool but sunny afternoon. Two guys on Harleys stopped at the light, looked back toward us, and asked how we were doing. I didn't get a great look at them, but they weren't "biker" types, just guys. I smiled. Sweetie probably ignored them.

It was such an odd coincidence, because I woke up today wishing I had some male attention. I don't know why I was thinking that. Maybe it's because my remote male friend with whom I IM and text a lot has been unable to get online much lately. Maybe it's because I recently read blog entries from Suzanne and Rebecca about getting male attention and more, and I hear about it from my friend Breanna quite often. Maybe it was just a mood.

After the biker guy thing, I asked Sweetie if she ever missed male attention. She said no. She wondered why I would want any. But here's the thing. I know I look good, and about 15 years younger than my chronological age, and I have nice hair (especially when I've just washed it and blown it dry, as I had today). I get compliments from women, especially when I dress well, and frankly those are more meaningful to me than anything a guy might say or indicate by his behaviour. Sweetie tells me when I look pretty, and that's the most meaningful compliment of all. It doesn't really take much to get a guy's attention, and a guy paying attention to me would be a pretty shallow feeling. But I can't help it. I want that shallow feeling! Somehow, it's a particular kind of validation of how I look that other women can't give me.

I think I know what it is, and it's not new. I've written about it before, yet somehow I forget. When I was a guy, I was not asexual as many trans women were. I did my share, maybe more than my share, of paying attention to women. So now, maybe more than most, I want to be the recipient of the kind of thing I used to dole out. Shallow, meaningless, but enjoyable nonetheless. It's more of that object-of-desire stuff.

I'm not nearly as young as Suzanne or Rebecca. I can't get attention with my body as many women can. And I have to admit that I don't put myself in the kinds of situations where I'm likely to get male attention. Even though I look younger than I am, I'm a little past the club scene. I'm not out to compete with 20- and 30-something women for the attention of 20- and 30-something men. Even a cougar has to know her limits!

And then, I work from home. I do my practicum at a place staffed entirely by women. Most of my friends are women. The straight men I know are married. The other men I know are gay, and sometimes married as well. Much of the time, I live in queer female space, and I quite like it. My relationships with women really are the most meaningful to me.

So unless I want to find a way to spend more time in places where men more-or-less my age also spend time, I guess I'm just going to have to get over this and be happy with the occasional drive-by shouting.

That elusive balance

Last night, on my way home from my counselling practicum, I stopped by a friend's house. She is one of the women I met this summer through the project we all did, and she and I worked closely together. I've stayed in touch with many of the other women, especially thanks to Facebook, but more so this woman, who I hope is becoming a friend.

We just sat around and talked about a bunch of stuff while she was sipping tea, trying to feel better from a cold. At one point, we were talking about drinking. I can't remember what the opening was, but I mentioned that I used to have a problem before I found a way to be happy. That's pretty much how I put it. Later, we were talking about dogs, and I mentioned the sweet French Bulldog that belongs to my electrologist, which she brings to her office. I didn't identify the dog's owner.

I heard myself editing while I spoke. Later, I felt bad for having done so. This is a woman who in all probability knows I'm trans. This is someone with whom I should be able to speak openly and not have it be a big deal. But I'm still searching for the balance between always talking about it (the early days) and avoiding it entirely.

I wrote to her later to explain and to come clean. While I no longer have a desire to talk about being trans, unless someone asks, neither do I want to be editing my conversation. I don't want to pretend, and I don't want to hide. No more closets! So I explained why I had been less than candid and told her I didn't want to do that any more. And I filled in the blanks that earlier had fallen victim to the mental blue pencil.

None of the women I met last summer, including this woman, has ever asked me about gender. I have been accepted without question. I know that at least some of them know I'm trans, and yet I have been reluctant to bring up the subject in any way. I wrote to my friend that "to be honest, I love at least the illusion that no one knows. When you've thought all your life that you should have been born female, you can't help but wish you hadn't had to get there by unusual means."

I'm still struggling with that. I'm not ashamed of who and what I am. But I'm mostly proud of what I've done to overcome it. Not live with it. Not embrace it. Overcome it. I see no more to be proud of in having been born transsexual than in any other birth defect that you're not ashamed of but that you are happy to put behind you if you can.

When I'm with people I trust, however, the conversation editing has to stop. Yet it's hard to trust. Hard to trust that something won't come back on you, that you won't be made to pay for your candor, even if that payment is only to be treated differently. But I do have to trust some people. And stop thinking there's some kind of stigma in not having been born female-bodied.

I got a really great reply to my message, which made me cry a little and smile a lot. And made me grateful this Thanksgiving weekend for all the wonderful people in my life.

A time to be born

To everything (turn, turn, turn)
There is a season (turn, turn, turn)
And a time to every purpose under heaven

From the Book of Ecclesiates, adapted by Pete Seeger

I've been associating with a group of feminists working for equal rights, most of whom are trans women. Young trans women. Really young. I am decidedly the "mom" of the group, but it wouldn't be much of a stretch at least in one case for me to be the grandmom (a teenage pregnancy in each generation and you're there).

Hanging out with these women makes me conscious of something I'm sure I've said or written before: that I wish I'd transitioned when I was their age. But let's look at what that would have meant.

The youngest in the feminist group are in their early 20s. When I was in my early 20s, that was the mid-1970s. Anyone who transitioned then was still a pioneer, and the way was difficult. I turned 30 in 1984. Even by that time, it was still the rare, and brave, person who transitioned. I was neither courageous nor possessed of a pioneer spirit.

There was much more information and much more knowledge about transsexuality by the time I turned 40, so maybe that's the first time I could realistically say that I wish I had transitioned. But I was not ready personally. One thing I observe about the young feminists is that they have a certain level of maturity even at their age that took me much longer to achieve. I think that maturity is required for transition at whatever age, which is why I didn't make the leap until I was in my 50s. Like many members of my generation, I didn't want to grow up, and although there were fun aspects to that, and it's good to hold onto a youthful spirit, it also had serious drawbacks when it came to figuring out my life.

So do I really mean that I wish I had transitioned when I was young? Kind of, but not really. What I really wish is to be young now. If you're born transsexual, I think it's finally time when that's not a terrible thing any more. It's never easy to be transsexual or to transition, but doing so now is so much better than it was 20 or 30 years ago, maybe even 10 years ago. Transsexuals are everywhere on the news, in entertainment, even in politics and government. We still have a long way to go, but the chances of having a successful transition are so much higher now than they used to be.

So I envy those young women. They won't break the heart of a life partner. They won't confuse their children. They might still be shunned by their parents, but it's not unlikely that their parents will be accepting, if not at first then eventually. Most of all, they will live most of their lives in the sex they should have been born into. That's wonderful!

However, it's not that my life was so horrible. There is little in my life that I would want to give up. Despite my extended immaturity, I've had some amazing experiences along the way. As a trans woman with decades of being perceived as male (most of the time), I know things my young companions never will. In some ways, I really am the mom of the group.

Ah, to be young again. But wherever you are, that's where you're at. I was dealt a particular hand. For a long time, I didn't play my cards very well. Now I've finally figured out the game. It might not be the hand I really want, but now I realize it's a good hand. I will play it skilfully—with the wisdom of age, perhaps!

Touching base

I saw my therapist yesterday for the first time in almost three months. I didn't have any pressing issues, but it's a little over three and a half months before genital surgery, and I did have some things to talk about, so I thought it was a good time for a visit. Besides, my therapist is a really smart, insightful person, and an hour with her is a good hour.

I dressed a bit fashionista yesterday. I was just in the mood, and I thought I was going to go shopping after my session. The outfit was built upward from the cute ankle boots again, and it ended up being pretty much the same outfit as I wore to the potluck a couple of weeks ago, plus a scarf. I wish my photographer hadn't been so busy! Anyway, my therapist doesn't usually say anything about appearance, but right away she complimented me on the outfit and how good I looked. It was a good start!

We seguéd from that into my disappointment with my lack of physical development, and how the lack of development makes transition seem a little less real. She reminded me that pretty much all women, maybe even all humans, have some issue with their bodies. We talked about the possibility of breast implants. She said that implants often make a big difference to how small-breasted women feel about their bodies. I'm still not there, but never say never.

I told her I was excited about genital surgery and not nervous, at least not at this point. When the aftercare seems heinous to me, I remind myself that several friends and others I know have gone through it successfully, so I'm sure I can too. I told her that I was going to back off on facial surgery at the same time that wasn't specifically age-related. So I will leave my nose alone for now, but get an eyelid lift. I'll have to find out what is possible now that I'm taking rhinoplasty off the table. The reason I decided not to go into any kind of facial feminization surgery at this time is that I have not consulted with my (or any) surgeon about it, and I don't think one meeting a few days before surgery is enough. Hopefully during that meeting I can get at least some idea of what he thinks I might need.

We talked about my mom, of course, especially since that breach is a lot more painful for me than I often realize. I told her about Lori's blog entry and the good advice at the end that we can't demand or even ask for acceptance, only wait, and continue to love no matter what. She thought it best not even to hope, but I can't help hoping.

I told my therapist how wonderful my camp experience had been this summer and how great it was to be connected to so many cool and creative women. I talked about breakthroughs and how I seem to have got past the surprise at being accepted. I'll never take it for granted, but it's just part of life now. I also told her about my association with the feminist group made up mostly of trans women, all young. She was glad that I was hanging out with them.

I mentioned my internalized transphobia, but we didn't really get into that, and I think that's OK. I identified it, and confronted it, and I think the situation is improving. I'm still more interested in being a "normal woman" than in being out and proud, but I won't shy away either from my own past or from associating with other trans people. I feel pretty relaxed about it all at this point. I also feel pretty feminine, and my therapist said that she no longer sees any of the typically masculine behaviours that I once had. I love that kind of feedback.

We didn't get into my shifting sexual orientation. I didn't put it down on my list! Maybe that suggests that I'm OK with that, for now anyway.

I'm OK with most things these days, and that's a relief. I'm sure there will still be drama, but I don't look for it, and I think much of it is behind me. Still, I'm sure I'll see my therapist at least once more before surgery. Maybe next time I'll bring coffee and cakes!