Someone I Love Is Transgender
The graphic was sent to me this morning. Simple, beautiful, and I posted it immediately. On this Trans Day of Visibility, it is impossible to overstate how deep to me is the meaning in these few words.
Not because today is TDOV — a day when transgender and nonbinary people are highlighted in this world.
Not because someone saw it and sent it to my inbox. Make no mistake, friends who do these things and make their ally-ship so open are cherished.
Rather, it is the candor of the statement that catches my heart. It is simple. It is declarative. And for me, it is a dare. I dare anyone to come for me because of it. I dare anyone to espouse their personal bile and bigotry, to spew their ignorance and oogies. I dare anyone to tell me I am wrong.
I am unashamed, I am unabashed. I am the very vocal, proud and protective mother of a transgender human being.
He, like his siblings, is the air I breathe. His existence is part of how I exist. And his gender is simply one piece of a very complex young man.
Like all of us. None of us are simply ONE THING. We are physical attributes, personality traits, likes, dislikes, quirks, talents, hopes and dreams. Yet because he is something not universally shared or understood, he is reduced to ONE THING. He is mocked. He is scorned. He is threatened. He is caricatured. His very existence is suspect, his very existence, to some, should not even be.
Think about that for a moment. As a parent, look at your child and imagine society wishing him/her/they harm, or worse, extinction, simply for being who they are. I had zero control over being 5'2" with green eyes. I just am. He has zero control over being transgender. He just is. He did not set out to be. He did not fall down some internet rabbit hole and become gender radicalized. He did not choose a supremely difficult path through life out of boredom.
He transitioned to save his life. To finally live his life.
Like so many decent parents of trans kids, I have often used the word “brave” in describing him. The reality is, most transgender people dislike the adjective being applied to them. Being your true, authentic self should not be an act of bravery. Coming out and declaring who you are is an act of self love, of literal survival. The bravery aspect exists because in doing so they must deal with a society that reviles them.
My child wakes up each day knowing how so many in this world view him. He knows how many bills are currently winding their way through legislatures targeting him. He knows that an act as simple as grocery shopping could get him hurt. Yet he grocery shops anyway. He is forced by society to be brave in order to simply exist. He doesn’t want to have to be brave. He simply has no choice.
As his mother, there is not a day that goes by when I do not worry about him. People often check in and ask me about that, assuming that since we are four+ years down the road that somehow the worst is behind us. Hardly. I look at the road we have walked with him thus far and while it has not been perfectly smooth, we have walked it together, walked it with love, walked it with support. But the worst actually resides ahead of us. Because we don’t know what will happen.
Arkansas just made it possible for medical persons to deny services to members of the LGBTQIA based on the make believe choices of the provider. Yes, make believe. Whatever your chosen religion, and yes, YOU CHOOSE TO PARTICIPATE, you believe yours is right and others are wrong. Yours is sacrosanct and others are bullshit. The reality is they are all manmade opiates for the masses. Which is fine until you start hiding behind yours to deny the humanity of others.
That is what laws like the one in Arkansas do. They strip the humanity from people like my son, instead allowing doctors to paint them with whatever wrongheaded, lie laden, meme generated, Facebook group make believe suits them. It allows bigotry to hide behind religion (although the two booty call regularly), and allows my son to be placed in jeopardy. These bills also target trans youth — wanting to completely deny them gender affirming care like reversible puberty blockers and hormone therapy. These bills, if passed, are literal death knells for a segment of society which already has a 41% suicide attempt rate.
Between bills and laws like this and the number of hospitals in this country that are affiliated with religions like Catholicism, my heart is forever held hostage by the “what ifs” — What if he is in an accident? What if he needs emergency care? That his life depends on who responds to the scene, who cuts his shirt off and sees his top surgery scars, who cuts his pants off and sees what they don’t expect to see. That his life could end because someone’s personal biases, bigotry, hate, and ignorance take precedence over ‘First do no harm’?
That is the worst. That is what keeps me up at night, That is what can leave me breathless if I think too much about it.
My son is not a threat to you, to your child, to their sports team. My son played on a woman’s college soccer team. After he had come out to us. Yes, we knew he was transgender and he went back to school and completed another season, another full year of school under the radar. Presenting as a female did not make him less transgender. And being a trans man did not suddenly make him more or less of a soccer player.
But it makes good press with which Republicans can scare their fact challenged constituency. Like Target bathrooms were, sports are now the new frontier in trans panic. And it is as pathetic as it is unfounded. My son played with girls, some of whom were physically bigger than many of the players on the men’s team. Should they have been disqualified? Of course not.
My son is honestly not some big mystery. He is not a ghoul, a fiend, a monster. He is not a pedophile, nor is he a pervert. He’s a human being. A pretty ordinary one. And if you didn’t know, you wouldn’t know. His voice is deep. His face is whiskered. His hair, like millions of other guys out there.
Is that the part that scares you? (You being the bigger you, not specifically YOU — I trust if you are reading this YOU are a decent person.) That you might meet a transgender person and have no idea? Or worse, GASP!, like them?!?!? I promise you, no trans person is attempting a ruse with you. Use the word ‘passing’ if you like, but the reality is they are simply just being themselves. You know, like you. And honestly, so what if you can tell? So what if someone is early in their transition? They, too, are simply being themselves. They are not setting out to be a threat to you — the reality is that you are a far greater threat to them.
My son wants to be happy. Pretty simple. He wants to wake up, have friends, take care of his pets, do his classwork, draw commissions for his followers, watch the latest season of Hell’s Kitchen, Facetime me to show me what his new kitten is up to, make a smoothie, go to Target, scroll Zillow, play Subnautica, plan for his future. Nowhere on his personal To Do list will you find terrorize a public bathroom, threaten another human being, deny someone their humanity.
He just wants to go from sunup to sundown safely. Again, like you. And perhaps this is what bothers you, too. He is far more like you than you care to acknowledge. Because should you open your eyes to just how much you have in common, how ordinary is his life, how he doesn’t want more than you, just the same as you — then you would be left with a bunch of bullshit that you have chosen to cling to instead of opening your eyes, your brain, your heart.
On this Transgender Day of Visibility, think about that. Think about how you wish to be treated by society, by your employer, as you navigate this life. Then take a moment and apply that to my son. Let your hate, fear, and willful ignorance wash away and maybe, just maybe, you will begin to see the humanity in everyone.
Someone I love is transgender. His name is Toby and he is my extraordinarily ordinary hero.
