Bouncing back quickly

Hi there!

If you read my post from earlier in the week you’ll know that I felt that I needed to come out to my wife and start to transition but didn’t manage to find the courage and then began a familiar cycle of feeling crushed and hopeless, followed by denial and unaccepting my feelings about my gender and trying to get on with life as a male. 

If you didn’t read my post, well basically that happened. 

What is good is that I am familiar with my own patterns of feelings and behaviour now and I recognise them for what they are, merely brain processes to protect me from taking risks with perceived danger. And I also know that I’ll be back, the feelings are temporary and sooner or later I’ll start feeling that I need to be a girl.

So I settled in for my next few weeks of denial and being a man and ignoring any of that ‘trans nonsense’. 

Except this time, it hasn’t taken weeks. It’s been a few days and my feelings are back and strong already. Not only that, I’m starting to see alternative ways that I could approach the initial conversation with my wife that feel less scary and with a greater (although still small!) chance of a positive outcome. 

Why is it different this time?

I’m not sure I can identify a reason or any trigger. Maybe it’s that I am closer to taking action because my feelings are stronger now I have full acceptance so despite set backs I bounce back quicker? Or it’s momentum? Or that I have just had enough of inaction? 

Whatever it is, I’m surprised by where I’m at and how I’m feeling but I am not unhappy about this. It’s a good thing. 

A small thought breakthrough 

Having said that I don’t think anything is different, there was a small breakthrough and realisation in my own thinking this week that perhaps made a difference. 

On a trans forum that I am part of, someone in a similar situation said how sad she was feeling about the prospect of ruining the lives of her family by revealing her secret, which of course struck a chord with me because that’s what I fear too. It’s probably what all non-single trans people fear most I guess? 

I posted to her that there is an implied assumption in that fear that being trans is a Bad Thing such that it will ruin everyone’s lives, but it really isn’t. 

And then I had this lightbulb moment of “hold on, that is literally what you’re doing! You’re paralysed by fear of coming out to your family because if they know you’re trans only bad things are possible!” 

I recently saw a comedy drama on tv which had a touching scene where the main character came out as gay to his mother and was very fearful of her reaction and I was thinking “why would she be unhappy with the news, he’s only sharing his sexuality, he’s not telling her anything bad”. But that’s exactly the way I’m feeling about coming out as transgender.

Although I’ve heard the term “internalised transphobia” many times, I’ve never really got it before. But this is what it means isn’t it?  I’ve absorbed so much of the anti-trans sentiment from the world around me that I assume that being trans is so bad that sharing my transness with anyone will make them hate me. 

If I think about this now, this feeling goes right back the my beginnings. I became aware that I wished I was a girl back in the eighties. We didn’t really have transphobia as such back then because being transgender was unheard of, but we had homophobia in a big way. Since I didn’t know any better, I guess I felt wanting to be a girl would be perceived as “gay” and therefore homophobic abuse would result. So I instinctively knew I had to hide my identity. 

I was in my late teens before I really discovered that there was such a thing as transitioning with a tv documentary called A Change of Sex. This was a revelation to me and I instantly knew that I wanted that, but it was also a deeply miserable film, showing the subject suffering all manner of hardship, rejection, discrimination and being treated by the healthcare providers as if she were mentally ill and their trying to block her every step. So I both discovered what I needed and multiple reasons why I shouldn’t and must hide it in one step. 

And that has been how I’ve lived my life for the following three decades. Feeling ashamed and that I have to hide who I really am or face transphobia and hate from everyone I know and everyone I meet. 

Social media is a double edged sword I think. It has helped me by finding others who share my experiences and to whom I can relate, but also reinforces my internalised transphobia fears every time I read about someone being rejected by their wife, being harassed, arguing with transphobes for their right to just be. I sometimes find it easier to feel positive about the possible future if I stay away from content that plays to my fears, particularly as I am aware of how my brain works and that I overweight negative inputs into my internal narrative and how this holds me back. 

I’m in danger of talking myself back down into a sad state, so let’s bring it back to the little breakthrough that I had. If I understand what is happening I can challenge and overcome it.

All of my fears around consequences of coming out are linked to anticipated reactions of those around me, which in turn comes from the assumption given to me by internalised transphobia.

So what if people react positively to the news? 

People might like me more as a woman!

None of my relationships with anyone I know is based on my manliness and masculinity after all.  I’m a feminine guy, and presumably people who like me, do so because I behave with more feminine than masculine tendencies so going the full-femme doesn’t destroy that, it expands it.  

Add in to the mix that my feeling able to be more of myself will make me a happier and better person to be around, and there are reasons to believe that my coming out isn’t going to precipitate the end of days, but might actually be a good thing.