Ramblings of an Appalachian Transman

You are absolutely right my bigoted friend. We can't. I know, I know what you meant. You think that we choose to change gender. That couldn't be further from the truth though. What we do as transgender individuals is attempt to become who we really are. That takes years of hormones and multiple surgeries. We aren't trying to be something we're not, which is not something I can say for the majority of people so I can see where you'd get confused.  We can choose our style of dress, we can even choose our religious beliefs and affiliations. We can also choose to be assholes or we can choose to attempt to understand people who are different from us. I never made a choice in being a male and when my choices are making my body agree with my brain or die, I don't consider that a choice. In this instance, the body is much more malleable than the brain. The working theory is that transgender individuals such as myself receive the hormones for a baby of the opposite gen

Have you ever heard the saying, "Assume and make an ass out of you and me." I hadn't heard it until an episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. It totally makes sense though. When we assume something about someone based on a group they find themselves to be a part of it makes us an ass, and it makes an ass out of them because they have to put you in your place if they're not going to play doormat.  The biggest way to get on my bad side is to assume that just because I'm transgender that I should be offended or afraid of something. I hate when people project their fears and assumptions onto me based on something that I see to be a minor part of my identity. Not only is it minor, but it's in my past so I don't really think much about it.  Being trans has its own load of shit and that load of shit really depends on the individual. If you've met one trans person, you've met one trans person. Don't think that any one trans person speaks for all t

It hurts, and I'm confused. I scroll through Facebook. I see a lot of posts, and I see other friends with comments on their posts and interaction taking place. Then I look at what I've shared for the day and in my mind, I hear the sound of crickets. In my mind's eye, I see a room full of people, talking and smiling. I see myself attempting to interact, attempting to be seen, and attempting to feel like my friends care. I'm disappointed.  At the same time, I'm very grateful for the few who do interact. I've kept my list small because I'd rather have a few quarters than a million pennies. Maybe I need to sift through some pennies and find my quarters. I would like to have more people in my life. I don't think more people means that others will mean less to me. I think it would help me to not pressure the few that I do have to be more involved in my life.  Everyone chooses their own involvement in my life. I've got one friend in particular, whom I w

If I quit attempting to communicate, I'm fairly certain people would just forget about me. My life feels so one sided, and I don't know that I can trust my brain, but it feels like if I didn't reach out and attempt to communicate that I would just be forgotten.  With extremely few exceptions, I have to be the first to interact with friends. And even then I get the feeling that they wish I would just stop commenting on their shallow meme's. I get the feeling that everyone else is content with just sharing a meme then not having a conversation surrounding that meme.  If I didn't have online communication, I'd have hardly any communication at all. I was told by a therapist that I needed to not isolate myself. At this point, I don't feel like I'm isolating myself. I try to communicate, and I just feel like everyone wishes I would just go away. I'm annoying, with my thoughts and attempts to interact. With my songs that nobody likes but me.  I don

I awoke this morning to the devastating news that Chris Cornell, lead singer of Soundgarden committed suicide. Chris has played a role in my life since the early nineties. There are no words to describe really what I'm feeling at the moment. It's all too surreal.  Depression doesn't care who you are, how much you have in the bank, how much those around you love you. Depression is the worst thing imaginable. Depression is knowing rationally that others love and care about you, but not being able to feel their love yourself. It is a disconnect between what you know to be true and what you feel to be true. It steals your ability to appreciate things and to feel grateful. It lies to you.  We can try to explain away depression a thousand ways but all of that would be bullshit. At the end of the day, there are no reasons to be depressed. It's just depression, it is what it is and people who have never dealt with it cannot understand. It's not just feeling sad. In i

In a perfect world, I could function properly. I wouldn't have everyone around me telling me that I'm not a man, and I wouldn't have those echoes in my brain. In a perfect world, people would just accept me for who I tell them I am.  In a perfect world, people would trust each other, especially when it came to matters of their own identities. In a perfect world, we wouldn't mock each other for being who we truly are. In a perfect world, we could celebrate these things.  In a perfect world, social pressures wouldn't drive me to suicidal thoughts. In a perfect world, we would realize that everyone has their own path and people are more like cats than cattle. In a perfect world, we would see more hugging on the news than people being blown up.  In a perfect world, kids with Williams Syndrome wouldn't have to be taught to be wary of strangers. We wouldn't have to teach the life lesson of mistrusting others. In a perfect world, you wouldn't need money t