Trans/plant/portation

I admit it, I don’t really care for testosterone. Oh, I like the secondary sex characteristics and all, though my beard twelve years into this whole exploration of identity is still sparse and a bit laughable. But I don’t care for the skittishness that comes with taking T on a regular basis, even if it is preferable to the monthly bouts of increasingly despondent depression that I had on estrogen. I can get okay with a stable mood, especially if I’m no longer paying for a Lexapro prescription, but in all honesty I’d prefer to need neither of the sex hormone alternatives. At 45 my ovaries are still cranking out a little bit of estrogren and progesterone, and I can tell when I’ve missed a T shot the same way I can tell between shades of blue on a topology map…because that’s how gradients work to show a shift from one degree to another.

It’s been an intense few months—the final gear up for Susanne’s tenure file to be delivered to the provost was drama-filled with the kind of pettiness people often ascribe to academics. Emile and Lucas adjusted to a half-day schedule at a local preschool after only knowing life with a part-time nanny in their own home (or hers). I waded full Monty into the Affordable Care Act and Medicaid Expansion at work, trying to tie down new revenue streams for my nonprofit, even as I made slow headway on two book projects for which I supposedly dedicate ten hours a week. We made the hugely intelligent decision to stay home for the holidays so that gave us something of a breather, since holiday air travel is excruciating and expensive. Then this winter an old friend, a genuine, snarky, brilliant, generous, curmudgeon with emotional walls thicker than whatever Trump wants to put between us and Mexico, killed herself. I thought I would be better at handling her death, but I’ve been more on an emotional edge than I’d like to be. And whether I stay on top of my T shots or not, I keep thinking about her and all of the emotions that an unexpected, intentional death bring up. Thanks a lot, sex hormones, for not giving me any relief. Read More…

Here’s an old short story of mine about another lesbian bar from upstate New York. Those of you who recall My Bar may find the setting somewhat familiar. I hope you enjoy it.

8 Ball, by Everett Maroon

It’s about the size of a typical urban efficiency apartment, with a faded certificate of occupancy stuck on the wall by the front door, probably with some bouncer’s chewing gum, announcing it is fit to legally house 35 people. Thirty-five dyke pygmies, maybe, but not 35 wide-assed people. Smoke hangs next to the low ceiling, hovering around the light over the small and slanted pool table, a cheap but efficient way of adding a dramatic atmosphere to both the serious and poseur sharks who swim underneath it. Most of the patrons use pool-playing as a tried and true method of picking up dates, but this usually leads to them slamming the stick into the cue ball too hard, ricocheting the shot out of the hole and ending in a staccato set of swears as they express their “disappointment.”

My friends and I have just entered the place for the third time in five days because one of them has a new crush on a townie who usually hangs out here. Usually, however, being the relative term that it is, has not included any of these three nights, and has led directly to my frustration at winding up in this dump once again, cheap beer or no cheap beer.

The bouncer, a woman who seems to value herself based on her ability to be serious throughout all moments of the day and night, claps a meaty hand on Joselyn, the friend with the crush. “How’s it goin’, Jos,” she says, deep-throated and completely absent of any hint of a smile. She is the female version of the Michelin man, having obviously taken the name of her profession to heart. For over these three engaging encounters at My Bar, I have witnessed no fewer than six, count them six, bar fights, the resolution of each ending with her not man-handling the offenders (for that would never happen in a lesbian bar), but by bumping into them and pushing them out the door.

“Great,” says the newly named “Jos,” and we head inside. My Bar, doing its part to encourage patronage of a classically poor community, has no cover. Small rodents didn’t even bother to come inside in the dead of winter, so the owners justifiably decided against asking for any kind of entry fee. Read More…

Late last week HRC President Chad Griffin offered a keynote speech at the Southern Comfort transgender conference acknowledging his organization’s failure to support the transgender community and its history of obstructionism (see here, here, and here) against trans civil rights. I and others called it a problematic apology, because he seemed to couch his understanding of HRC’s mistakes as one of simply not knowing enough about us (which has not always been the issue), and he framed his new approach in a paternalistic way, instead of asking us what HRC should be working on or how they can help.

People in the LGBT movement have for years been wondering amongst themselves just what will happen when the infrastructure that has been set up (to funnel money into the same-sex marriage movement) doesn’t need the same focus anymore. Will the donors move their money to a new issue? Buy yachts and celebrate the institution of marriage? Fund political campaigns?

I’m not here to argue about whether HRC is anti-trans or not (I’ve certainly made my views clear), not in this post, anyway. Instead I’d like to point out that Mr. Griffin’s idea that HRC will include trans-specific protections in the next anti-discrimination omnibus bill is far, far from what transgender and transsexual and gender non-conoforming people need, as civil rights movements go. Nobody is against anti-discrimination bills, especially if they include “gender identity or expression” as part of their protected classes, but it’s too easy for LGB activists to throw that clause in there without a real understanding of what protections for trans folk would look like. Well, let me ask us to reframe these considerations, in this way:

Let’s look at the trans person’s life cycle, from cradle to grave. What might we need to support our lives and experience that cisgender people would never need?

1: Childhood—In part because trans people have been more visible in the last generation, today’s children more often understand themselves as trans and ask the people nearest them (read: their parents and teachers) for support. A public policy for supporting trans kids would do some or all of the following:

• Offer trans-supportive mental health/social work services for trans kids so they have objective partners in their process
• Offer family support through identification of a trans identity (because you know, parents don’t automatically support their trans kids or know how to) into and through transition (if that is what the youth wants)
• Educate school systems, administrations, and teachers to provide a hostility-free learning environment for trans children, including using a child’s chosen name even if that name is not their legal name
• Readily identify trans-related bullying and help trans youth find alternative paths toward a high school degree if their primary school becomes an untenable place to learn
• Ensure that after-school and extracurricular activities are trans-friendly and accessible to trans youth
• Change rules around school sports to ensure than trans children can participate in a way that comports with their gender identity or expression
• Modify existing law around custodian care so that if only one parent is supportive of a trans child, they can still help direct their care and services
• Relax rules around emancipated minor laws for older trans teenagers who may need to leave their parents’ home
• Train crisis care counselors, suicide hotline managers/call centers, and any local government-run mental health care workers in trans issues so that they are culturally competent
• Educate physicians on hormone blockers, hormone therapy for adolescents, and the medical needs of trans youth
• Change laws so that trans-related care is included in health insurance policies
• Train youth homeless shelter staff in trans issues so that they are culturally competent
• Enforce rules changes with a resource/response board to hear complaints and advocate for trans youth

Read More…

Trigger Warning: This post discusses suicide and violence toward trans people.

This week the Williams Institute at UCLA released further analysis from the National Transgender Discrimination Survey conducted a couple of years ago with the National Task Force (formerly NGLTF). The point of analysis? Transgender suicide attempts, which the survey found had occurred in forty-one percent of the more than 6,000 responses. This would mean that suicide ideation—thinking about suicide or considering suicide—would be even higher (but these data weren’t captured in the survey itself). The Williams Institute analysts, Ann Haas, Philip Rogers, and Jody Herman (a dear friend of mine), looked at other correlations in the data in order to find any drivers for suicide attempts. You can read their full analysis at the link above.

In the context of this month’s completely inappropriate article in Grantland.com, in which an aspiring sportswriter outed a trans woman and in which that outing led to her suicide, it was declared by Bill Simmons, Grantland’s Editor-in-Chief, that they should have known better than to run the article in part because trans people have “an appallingly high rate of suicide.” I would argue that these carefully analyzed data show the reverse emphasis to be true—that transpeople are exposed to repeated instances of rejection, alienation, harassment, threats, and violence, and that suicidal ideation and attempts are a direct consequence of such stress. In other words, transgender and gender non-conforming people suffer from an appallingly high rate of abuse, including invasive journalism, as it turns out.

Given these data, I feel compelled to trace out some of the narratives and rhetoric around transition and about the trans community that lend to this sense of disrespect, vulnerability, and hopelessness. Read More…

This summer I am thrilled to get some feedback on my novel-in-progress at Lambda Literary Foundation’s Emerging Writers Workshop. I sent them the first twenty-five pages of the manuscript about four gender non-conforming people from different moments in time. It’s non-genre, it’s not a humor book, and it’s not a memoir. It’s a stretch for me, and an exciting project, but then again, I came up with it in my own head, so hopefully I’d have some interest in my own damn work. I should also add that it needs a ton of work — in this first draft I was messing around with point-of-view and tense, trying to figure out where the tone of the book intersected with the narration. But here’s the first chapter, in case anyone is interested:

Alex, Baltimore, 2004

Enough moisture collects at my temples that it streaks down the sides of my face, but I can’t stop running or break form to wipe my head. I tell myself that tomorrow I’ll remember my bandana. Now I’m four miles from home and have one more to go before it’s time to turn around. The sun has hit that angry angle after daybreak and I squint to block it out even a little. I’ve probably got about 90 minutes left before my shift at the pier. For the sake of predictability I take the same route six days a week: out the back door of my crappy apartment at the edge of a mostly empty commercial district, past sloping colonial-era pavers and a junkyard, down toward the revitalized harbor, then back again. As far and as fast as I can run, and even though it’s always quiet behind me when I turn around, I always have the sense I’m being chased.

Nobody can find out I wasn’t born male.

To keep my secret, I stay as thin as I can. Hence the hellacious running routine. Jogging hates me, and the feeling is mutual. Read More…

1. Hey, did you see that article in the newspaper about that transgendered couple?
2. Hey, do you know the transsexual couple in the paper today?
3. Oh my God, was that you in the paper today about being trans?
4. Hey, there’s a high school student/college student/totally grown adult who is starting to transition. Could you talk to them? I mean, I haven’t talked to them yet to find out if they’d like you to do that, but you know, could you do that?
5. I’m a great ally, but I’m not really out about being an ally. So please don’t go telling people I think it’s okay to be trans, all right?
6. That’s a nice idea and all, but you know this isn’t DC, right?
7. You sure talk about being trans a lot. Like, aren’t you happy just being a man?
8. You might have a hard time finding a job here, because you’re overqualified. You know, that happens to men.
9. What was your old name?
10. Do you know the pregnant man?
11. Hey, did you hear the pregnant man is getting divorced?
12. Did you make that baby with Susanne?
13. Does it bother you that your baby isn’t related to you?
14. Why do all trans men have such crazy facial hair?
15. Do you mourn the old you?
16. Do you ever think about going back to being a woman?
17. I was just wondering, do you have phantom breast sensations?
18. Hey, do you know <<INSERT FAMOUS TRANS PERSON’S NAME HERE>>?
19. Does it feel weird to take your shirt off in the pool?
20. I understand how hard it is to find a doctor in town. My mom had <<INSERT DISEASE HERE>> and she had to drive to Seattle to find a specialist.
21. Is it like, totally weird living in a small town?
22. Are you interested in giving the newspaper an interview about being trans in Walla Walla?

Responses tomorrow.

Arizona, the state that brought us a ban on Ethnic Studies and some of the most extreme anti-immigrant laws in the nation, now has crafted a bill that would make using the “wrong” restroom–read, one that does not comport with the letter on one’s birth certificate–a misdemeanor, punishable by a multi-thousand dollar fine and up to six months in jail. The language in the bill reads almost opposite as the non-discriminatory language found in jursidictions around the country that protect trans-identified and gender nonconforming people from harassment when accessing public facilities:

All entities covered under the Act, as amended, shall allow individuals the right to use gender-specific restrooms and other gender-specific facilities such as dressing rooms, homeless shelters, and group homes that are consistent with their gender identity or expression (Washington, DC Office of Human Rights, District of Columbia Municipal Regulations (DCMR) entitled “Compliance Rules and Regulations Regarding Gender Identity or Expression.” Title 4, Chapter 8, amended October 26, 2006)

Instead, Arizona’s proposed language requires people to use the bathroom that comports with the sex marker on their birth certificate. This is troubling for many reasons, including in no particular order:

1. Arizona has no legislative control over other states’ departments of vital statistics, the organizations that generally are in charge of granting and validating birth and death certificates. Some states, like New Jersey, grant new birth certificates with a letter of sex-reassignment surgery, while others only amend previously created birth certificates. It’s unclear if this proposed law would “accept” such amendments over the original certificate. And then some states, like Ohio, never amend or re-release birth certificates for any reason. So any trans individual from Ohio needing to urinate in Arizona should what, cross the state line first? Ask a kind neighbor for use of their private bathroom? Read More…

I wrote this for an FTM group over on LiveJournal, and thought I should repost it here.

I transitioned nearly eight years ago. Well, more accurately, I started my transition a little less than eight years ago. I’m pretty sure I’ll never stop transitioning, because I keep coming on things that I’d been socialized female for, most recently, body changes as one ages.

In the beginning it was really rough. I had so much self doubt, I was in an emotionally volatile relationship, a ton of stress at work, and the overwhelming fear that I was about to ruin my life. So here are the things that I wish I knew at the time. That said, everybody’s transition is different, so this is by no means a set of instructions. But for me I wish I knew:

1. Nobody gets to tell you you’re doing it wrong. I mean, they may tell you you’re not a “real” transsexual but that’s their issue. Fine to ask for opinions and advice from people — the more conversations you have, the more you will see the range of gender expression, decisionmaking around medical, legal & social transition, and the more lessons from others you’ll get exposed to. But please, don’t let the voice of inauthenticity stay in your head, because it has this way of never admitting it’s wrong. If you want to take it slow, go low- or no-hormones, or go as fast as you safely can, that is your decision. Read More…

I’ve known, abstractly at least, that I’ve wanted to go snorkeling since I stood waist-high in the crystal clear water of Puerto Rico, way back in 1983. Seeing tropical fish up close, in their own environment, was captivating to newly minted teenager me. But we didn’t have much time on the island during that vacation, and didn’t get around to snorkeling.

I told myself that I was too clumsy for something that would require breathing a different way, plus hand-flipper coordination. I’d probably concuss myself on a reef, get into an altercation with an eel, or worse. I satisfied myself with episodes of Blue Planet and short-lived glances at tiny tiger fish in local mall aquariums. But by the time we booked our trip to the big island of Hawaii, I’d promised myself to strap on a mask and fins and check out a nearby coral reef.

And now I’m addicted to snorkeling. That didn’t take long.

Water fills up my ear canals and then all I can hear is the sound of my own breathing through the snorkel tube. Other than the taste of briny water on my tongue, I stop noticing all of my senses but my sight. There’s a bright yellow angel fish, nipping plankton off of the coral ridge. A dark black, blue striped fish darts in front of me, followed by a school of them. A silvery fish that looks like a living dagger hovers near the surface, as if she can’t wait to evolve to a land-walking biology. Sea urchins that range from dark purple to bright pink nestle in the pockets of the reef, and now I can’t imagine eating one cut in half.

A school of tiger fish off in the distance, eating in such a frenzy that they generate the only cloudy portion of water I see around me. If it looked like the water was overcrowded with other snorkelers before I headed into the pool, I now have lost myself in solitude and mind-numbing beauty. And where I’m generally clumsy on the surface, I feel almost masterful under the water’s edge, able to spin and turn and control my trajectory. Read More…

Recommended reading.

I finished Sassafras Lowrey’s debut novel Roving Pack last weekend and was struck when page after page of the protagonist’s diary managed to pull and push me with each bit of hys life experience. I’m at once familiar with being gender non-conforming in an urban space in the early aughts, and apart from the young genderqueer community Lowrey describes. This is a book, after all, located in a particular place (mostly Portland, Oregon) and time (late 2002 onward), and about a group of folks two trans generations younger than me. I know the situations the protagonist Click talks about–abusive and absent parents, inconsistently disbursed resources, a peer group that sometimes causes deep heartache, and living on the margins through gray markets and under-the-table agreements. I know these experiences, yes, but I’ve spent years trying to forget those struggles, so reading the universe through Click’s eyes is painful if not also somehow validating. It’s difficult to make it through late adolescence without the additional struggles Click and hyr friends have on their backs. Read More…