Since I started back with my original therapist, we’ve been deep-diving into things, and lately it’s been with my parents. Mostly my father. There’s been new things this year that he’s done, and I’ve also had realizations that we are likely approaching some level of cognitive decline with him. He seems to be having “senior moments” as he calls them more frequently. So I do understand that I need to adjust my own expectations. Change in the direction I’d like to see is highly unlikely now. Change in a way that oculd be hurtful is more likely.
I’m not sure if it’s therapy and me learning to accept and love myself that has changed my perspective and/or made me more aware, or if he has become more obvious with rejecting who I actually am. In his mind, he was getting this perfect little girl who would love him for the rest of his life. She would wear the most beautiful dresses, be super feminine, and most of all ALWAYS love her Daddy. She would marry a man just like him in this huge, fairytale wedding, have perfect little genius kids just like him, and the whole family would admire and dote on old Pops for the rest of his life. Blech.
That’s not me, for starters. That was never me and could never be me.
I came out with a lot of attitude and the knowledge that I was a boy. I could feel it. Everything I wanted to do, wear, be was wrapped up in my being a boy. And he hated it that so much. He had my younger brother, so he needed me to be that precious girl. He tried to force it on me. I remember many a school clothes shopping trip with him passing ugly dresses over the top of the fitting room door which were always greeted with a look of disdain on my part. “No, I don’t want that.” We had a brawl with I was 11, with him shoving me into a dress no matter how much I kicked and punched him. We were both exhausted after the 20 minute production. I remember this day as a huge turning point for me. I already knew I couldn’t trust him to get my back but now he was actively protesting my autonomy and desires as an almost teen. This was when I pulled away completely.
Naturally he won’t try to put me into dresses or grow my hair long or anything like that now. But I see the disdain in his eyes when he sees my fade haircut and my masculine clothes. That’s all I’ve worn for years, all I wore back when I was in college, and all I’ve ever wanted to wear. He knows nothing about who I really am, what I am planning to do, and the fact that nedt year this dreaded name he gave me will be no more. I will officially be the person I KNOW I always have been, not the person he tried to craft me into being. Not the person he turned into an empty shell because I had no idea who I was after the years of brainwashing and invalidation.
I unfriended someone who has been on my radar for awhile now. He’s always posting super transphobic comments, usually about trans women in athletics. And yesterday he was over the top for me. He’s not a close enough friend that he’s worth engaging on this, although I have known him for almost 14 years. He was just another guy in the Air Force that I was stationed with and deployed with repeatedly over the years. He always seemed like a fun, happy go lucky guy until the last few years.
Anyway, he got married and has two very small children now. And he’s 100% convinced that he can make them understand that there are only two genders that cannot be changed, being gay is a lifestyle, and all that kind of stuff. Good luck bro. You can’t make your children into what they’re not. That brand of authoritative parenting isn’t going to teach your kid anything. You are going to dictate what is acceptable in your family/home and on the very small chance that your child doesn’t fit your defined boundaries, you will be communicating to them for their entire childhood that they are not welcome in your family. You will be showing them that they aren’t what you wanted. And you will break them. I am hopeful that they will be exactly what he wants them to be. I would never wish my life on anyone. Being trans isn’t a trend for me. It isn’t a cakewalk or a way to get attention. It’s something that I painfully avoided to my own detriment for decades because I didn’t want it to be true. I would rather hide it and sneak off to world where only supportive people I told knew and no one else could ever find out and hurt me with their rejection.
I never wanted this for myself and I definitely don’t want any child to have to endure what I have been through and what I am facing. This isn’t fun at all. It’s freeing at times, but that freedom comes with a massive amount of fear of bodily harm, political persecution, and a possible rejection from people I love and don’t want to hurt or upset in any way. Becoming who I was always meant to be means risking all of that, so no, I definitely would never wish this on anyone else ever, even the children of a former friend who thinks that people like me are just suffering from mental illness and need conversion therapy. Or that we are a disgusting abomination. I do happen to believe in karma, but I wouldn’t wish this torture on his children even if he deserves to witness the experience of this firsthand.
Back to my father. He doesn’t deserve anything bad either, but he deserves what I’m doing next, which is no more grand gestures to earn his love and praise. No special gifts, special attention, nothing. I realized this the other night, as I was considering buying him tickets to The Rolling Stones. It would be a tricky gift mostly because my mother hates crowds and Atlanta, so she wouldn’t want to go with him. It’s just the sort of thing that would set her off. I’m not sure either of them should be in that setting at their age anyway. But as I was thinking through this little fantasy of buying him tickets, I realized the part I kept replaying was him very happily opening up this amazing gift and being overcome with gratitude and praise for me.
Whoa.
I sat with that thought for a minute and then looked backwards through time. So many instances of me finding what was the absolute perfect gift and him barely registering a “meh” on the scale of thankfulness. And yet I tried over and over again. Spending more and more money, working harder and harder for that praise I was desperately searching for from him. To finally be seen as that son I always knew I was to him. The son that understood him and wanted him to be happy instead of the daughter who was nothing but a constant disappointment.
That day is never coming.
And I found myself tearing up and crying a little bit. Nothing too big because I have been on this road for awhile and so much of that processing is already done. I have felt that I can’t trust him emotionally for most of my life now. I have felt this cold disappointment from his direction since I was a small child. But realizing that I cannot gift him anything that will earn me what I need from him hit me hard enough to make tears flow.
I clicked away from the concert ticket website. “Never again,” I muttered to my wife. I get it now. I get what I’ve been doing. I see that constant disappointment that I continue to set myself up for with him. I can’t control his disappointment, but I can control my actions. And I am tired of it. I am tired of the effort wasted on someone who determined long ago that I wasn’t what he wanted. I am tired of feeling like I can somehow make this right for him and be enough to get his praise. I get to choose where my efforts go and they are going into me and what makes me happy. My efforts go into my wife and children and other family members who love me unconditionally. My energy will be spent in ways that are productive for me and my own future.
HIs praise now, even if I could get it, will never be enough for the little boy inside me who was forced to raise himself after decades of invalidation. That little boy was waiting for me to see him and honor him. That wounded part of me that never felt like I was enough can now rise up because I see the awesomeness in that person. I see the magnetism, the force they are, and the way they love unconditionally. I am in a part of my journey where real change has started and I can actually see the pieces of the real me come together finally. The little boy inside is in charge now. The shell I became to hide the pain inside me from the ignored doesn’t even exist. When I hear people say my given name, it feels like they’re calling someone else. I respond now because I cognitively understand that they think they are calling for me. But it’s no longer my instinct to respond. That’s not me anymore.
The person I am now is enough because it is the complete version of me. Not many people know this version, but the ones that do, they understand that they are privileged to know all of me. This handful of people are enough for me. I know others will be supportive once they find out too, but what matters the most to me is knowing that I support myself. I am showing up for myself for the first time ever. That means not allowing “friends” with hurtful beliefs in my world and not playing the grand gesture game with my father. No one else needs to validate me anymore. I feel validated just living as my complete self.
Leave a Reply