I don’t know where I’m at right now. I’m a bit sad which often finds me here. I’m in that place where I wish I was a girl. What a stupid notion sometimes I think to myself. What a weird desire to have had strongly throughout life and when it churned on in the background–a faint hum maybe–it still smelled. It’s like the way you get used to a smell–the frequency of life in the wrong sex. Sometimes you don’t know where the smell is coming from, your dysphoria is not obvious yet to you. One day you find your depression–a heaping pile of it all in one place, you kept putting air fresheners from above or other places where the smell snuck in. No wonder it didn’t help. You changed your brain chemistry. The brain is missing this chemical so we’ll add it back in. Still starving in the male tank. Like a suitable amount of oxygen to sustain life but not to provide all the proper nutrients. Something to fill the need but not the purpose.
You don’t innately understand the other fish tank syndrome I’m experiencing. It’s not quite like a “grass is greener on the other side” no I want the good and the bad. The coping mechanisms develop things like working from the inside out and basically learning how to levitate. Deny the outside world and live only on the inside. “Dress to impress” becomes a void where you look in the mirror ever unable to satisfy the eyes gazing back. But one time in womens’ clothing, nail polish, and for once in life everything starts to resonate. You wonder if the disconnect and balloon-like feeling you’ve felt all your life could be caused by the gender dysphoria. Incredible you think, you’ve hated make up and the vanity in self-appearance and yet here you are liking something you can do to appearance.
You start to look back. Things like “I don’t like clothes” ends up becoming “I don’t like mens’ clothes.” And it’s weird. I’m somewhat normal? Average? Maybe never because I’m transgender. The reality of the being before would always follow me. Not the worst thing. The worst is society’s reaction to it. I’m a real person. So are they.
I was always soft, slow to pull the trigger on something I thought might hurt someone else. I was not perfect. I would stray while joking with friends. I would cling to religion when spirituality (and perhaps my calling) would call me to love. We should stop thinking about the lines and think about the hands and feelings.
I know mom, I know you say I’ve never exhibited female behavior. The truth is I’ve been indoctrinated, fully submerged in a subculture of being a man my whole life. There’s research regarding the submersion of gender identity as a culture. It’s huge. Gender roles are more than roles. Gender roles are culture.
The prayers are forever yours, eye of beholder. Truth is in your reach should you reach. Doors are to be knocked upon. May you be braver tomorrow to seek.