Trans milestones
There comes a point when you realise that transitioning is a steppingstone to something much bigger and interesting. It fades into the background, never quite complete, but also a past tense that makes you ponder the stuff you went to get through to this point. Even 23 years on there are things I am learning about myself, my womanhood, that I wish my 35 year old self had known, let alone the 17 year old who really had no clue about much when she first came out.
The first dress, the first haircut, all the wrong dresses and shoes, and oh my goodness, all the wrong things that only teenage girls really get a pass on just because they are teenage girls. The never quite growing up until the shit really does hit the fan, and then realising that adulting is not a manual but a self-fuck-around-and-find out guide. Being mugged on New Year’s Eve in the middle of Manchester and gamely flirting my way back home on the train. Then realising that even if you do manage to burn down the microwave the world will not collapse into rancour. I was an utter shambles in my twenties, but the woman I am today has much to owe her.
This is the thing about being a woman, the absolute mayhem you can cause and you somehow get to 40 and thrive. Most of my milestones were small things that required no corks. Being part of the women’s hockey team at university, being by myself in Thailand for four weeks during my surgery and recovery. Spending time in the United States realising that I will be fine no matter what is thrown at me. Hell, being intimate for the first time post-op and not being able to tell a soul on the train home, or the world in general. In the best possible way no-one cared, it was all the little things that go into who I am. All the small things that define me as a woman, the things I take pride in, the things that wound me. Things that bring a smile, and bring me to tears.
Everyone has milestones, and often for trans folks it is easy to slip into the mindset that you have to reach so many by such a point in time otherwise you are a failure. I had my operation at 26, eight years after starting my transition. I was on hormones for nearly twenty years before my chest went hello! There is no one way of being a woman, and certainly no one way of being a trans woman, despite what the media and companies may wish us to believe. Womanhood is as much about you as a person as it is defined by those around you.
My personal milestones are counted by the friends I have made along the way, the people I have loved, the places I have visited. In Paris I walk along the Saine and feel at home by the water, in Rochester memories of youth stir as the sun sets over the valley, and in London all the feelings mix as the city imbues my past and present with all the feelings. Each is a milestone, every person I meet a reflection of something in me. Being the woman I am is no more defined by the surgeries and past I have as it is by the reactions of others. This understanding of self is probably my most cherished milestone, the point after which being trans is a small aspect of who I am, rather than the overriding part of myself that defines all that I am.
I write a lot about being trans and transgender issues primarily as a part of my research and need to better understand trans experiences. This milestone in my life, the conscious choice to re-engage and thinks about trans issues, has brought up lots of things that I had left behind, often a decade ago. It is easy to see other people’s milestones and get excited for them, seeing the people they are evolving into and the joy in their lived experiences. It is also easy to slip into the mindset of in my day, which I resist fiercely, because back when I was 17 the world was a very different place and the milestones were hazy and roughly hewn.
At the heart of my experiences has been an abiding need to be honest with both myself and others, and many of my personal milestones have been due to this. For others, being able to be normative, stealth, is an essential part of their personal security and gender identity. There is no right or wrong way to be trans or cis, it is just what works for you. From hard won experience I can honestly say that being at ease with yourself is just as vital as being at ease with the world around you, for you have to live with yourself 15 to 20 hours a day. I do find a lot of joy in being me, mainly because I did the work to find what I actually like about myself, but there are also times when I really do not like who I am, and it is at that point that I try to be self-reflective and understand why. Yes, therapy can help with that, and often folks do find their own personal milestones that way. For me, it is as much a long walk and contemplation as it is finding a personal truth.
Getting your first hormones, purchasing your first gender affirming clothes, making that first save for your hockey team, seeing the Eiffel Tower for the first time, presenting your new passport to immigration, having the biggest grin as you dance with your first date. Milestones in a complex tumble of life and identity. Waking up after your surgery serene and utterly calm as you realise you are complete, that your body is just right. Then waking up every day for the next 23 years at peace with yourself without a shred of doubt or dissonance, those are all the small milestones I appreciate. There is no right way to be you, just the way you exist and find the sense of who you are. I am grateful that I have had this time as myself, the woman I am, and hopeful that others are able to find the same, no matter what milestones they hit along the way.
