Why am I trans ... a common question trans people get asked.
It’s amazing the number of people who’ll try and argue other people out of being trans, as if no one has ever tried before. Sometimes those doing the arguing are motivated by concern, and sometime annoyance, confusion or outrage. Their “arguments” are presented as rational undoings of our supposedly broken reasoning, as though being trans is a riddle which can be solved with the correct interpretation.
Perhaps even stranger are those people who present no arguments at all but wonder, gently, if we’ve considered just …. not being trans. Just, maybe avoiding it until it goes away. It often comes down to the split between words and deeds, the question “well why do you have anything to do about it?” I have heard that a lot when I first mention that I want to medically transition.
Underlying all of this is the idea that being trans is something unfortunate, impossible to understand and better to ignore. Something you could probably change, if you put your mind to it or grow out of, if you just see sense. That can turn so easily from “Why do you have to do this” to “Why are you like this in the first place”.
I don’t have a quick and easiy answer why I am trans, no more than I can say why I am naturally good at technology. I don’t have to know every why of who I am to know the truth of my existence, and know that I can only find happiness by embracing the truth. It doesn’t make sense for me to try and reduce an enormous spectrum of human experiences to an on/off diagnostic, rather than following the more complicated and rewarding journey of investigating the totality of the human animal. But I am tempted to find a simple answer, when other people are so quick to provide their own reasons – blueprints as to how I should change.
The most common explanations for my transness given to me by other people?
Naturally both resolutions and the explanations fall far short of reality. I work for a radio station, I’d rather people listen to be on there than hear transphobic insults in the street, and its far easier to appear cool with the latest haircut than through coming out as trans.
I can not help who I am, I was born in the wrong body, had to pretend I was a man for 45 years. That’s probably more than ½ of my time on this small ball of rock that we call home. The way I look at it that’s more than ½ of my life that I have basically wasted trying to please everyone else. I an not doing it any more, I want to be happy, I am not happier than any time in my life with myself apart from the Gender Dysphoria.
This is why I fight for rights for younger generations of my fellow transgender people. So they don’t waste so much time being someone they are not.
Perhaps even stranger are those people who present no arguments at all but wonder, gently, if we’ve considered just …. not being trans. Just, maybe avoiding it until it goes away. It often comes down to the split between words and deeds, the question “well why do you have anything to do about it?” I have heard that a lot when I first mention that I want to medically transition.
Underlying all of this is the idea that being trans is something unfortunate, impossible to understand and better to ignore. Something you could probably change, if you put your mind to it or grow out of, if you just see sense. That can turn so easily from “Why do you have to do this” to “Why are you like this in the first place”.
I don’t have a quick and easiy answer why I am trans, no more than I can say why I am naturally good at technology. I don’t have to know every why of who I am to know the truth of my existence, and know that I can only find happiness by embracing the truth. It doesn’t make sense for me to try and reduce an enormous spectrum of human experiences to an on/off diagnostic, rather than following the more complicated and rewarding journey of investigating the totality of the human animal. But I am tempted to find a simple answer, when other people are so quick to provide their own reasons – blueprints as to how I should change.
The most common explanations for my transness given to me by other people?
- That I am a freak of nature
- I am desperate for attention
- That I am mentally ill
- That I hate nature, and want to go against it as some kind of rebellion
- That I hate men
- That I have unresolved issues with my parents
- That I am scared to be a femm man
- Because being trans is cool
Naturally both resolutions and the explanations fall far short of reality. I work for a radio station, I’d rather people listen to be on there than hear transphobic insults in the street, and its far easier to appear cool with the latest haircut than through coming out as trans.
I can not help who I am, I was born in the wrong body, had to pretend I was a man for 45 years. That’s probably more than ½ of my time on this small ball of rock that we call home. The way I look at it that’s more than ½ of my life that I have basically wasted trying to please everyone else. I an not doing it any more, I want to be happy, I am not happier than any time in my life with myself apart from the Gender Dysphoria.
This is why I fight for rights for younger generations of my fellow transgender people. So they don’t waste so much time being someone they are not.
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