On a typical spring morning in 1977, something happened in my life that would take me years to understand. I was coming of age, and while I felt excited about entering the next stage of my young life, I also felt very confused. The prospect of becoming an adult answered something primal inside of me. What new secrets of life would become illuminated as I began my rite of passage to adulthood? My emotions ran high at first, but soon I sensed something was wrong. I was beginning my transformation from being a child to the young man I had been raised to be. For me, this moment of realization was nothing short of non sequitur. Everything I had ever been taught told me it was time to become a man and yet I suddenly realized deep down in my soul I desired nothing more than to become a woman. Every fiber of my being objected to the path before me. I felt as though I had been sold a ticket to take a journey, only to realize my destination was not where I thought it should be. Like a locomotive engine that had been derailed from its tracks, this first realization that I was a female made me realize I might never arrive at my desired destination. Over the next four and a half decades of my life, I would face a series of consequences resulting from being denied the opportunity to live according to my true gender identity.
First, as I have already stated, I found myself confused. My family lived on a military installation in Southern Spain when I first discovered the incongruity between my gender identity and the gender assigned to me by my parents at the time of my birth. The gender stereotypes that were omnipresent during the era in which I lived were further emphasized by the small military community in which I lived. I had always bought into the notion that the service men I grew up around were heroes for saving us from the “Red Menace” even if hindsight tells me my perceptions of world politics at that time may have been a bit skewed by circumstances. I do not wish to convey the suggestion that women who serve to protect our nation are any less notable for their sacrifice than men, but in 1977 that truth was not often acknowledged. How could I possibly grow up to be a brave soldier if I were anything other than a man? For the first time in my life, the ideals of my childhood were challenged by desires being usurped by my very soul. I wanted to be a woman. I did not know why, but I knew nonetheless.
The confusion I felt wasn’t just limited to who I would be in the years to follow. The change of life I was going through also marked the early manifestations of my sexual identity. I very much considered myself a boy, as there was no reason at that time to think anything would ever change that reality. In more practical terms, I was confused over who I was supposed to kiss. The thought of kissing a boy went against the grain of everything I had ever been taught. In fact, there were bad words to describe that sort of boy, and I certainly did not want to be thought of in those terms. To this day, I find it odd that the idea of girls kissing girls isn’t really thought of in a negative way in light of the prevailing opinion most hold concerning boys kissing boys. I do not know if my decision to kiss a girl, something that would not happen for at least another couple of years, was so much a decision of choice as it was a decision to play it safe.
The confusion of my youth continued to grow, much in the way a small snowball grows as it rolls down a hill. As I entered the latter half of my high school years, I found it more difficult to ignore the confusion I felt over my gender. I tried to be good at sports, not because of a desire to participate in such activities, but rather to try and make the feminine feelings in me disappear. My attempts to find a girlfriend, something demanded by the peer pressure of high school society, were awkward at best. What I can see in hindsight today I could not see when I was a freshman in high school. My interest in girls was simply an interest in understanding girls, not in actually pursuing a relationship with one.
My confusion took an evolutionary step brought about by something that happened in the summer after my sophomore year. A fellow male student had made some vague hints I found myself unable to ignore. I was not at all confused by the proposition before me. In fact, I understood what he had suggested with absolute clarity. In that moment, my confusion gave way to conflict. My confusion over my gender identity had been an internal struggle to that point. Now I felt myself in complete conflict. The logic in my brain screamed to refrain, but a whisper from somewhere deep in my soul silenced everything in my mind until I could only hear one single word: YES.
From that moment forward, my life was in constant conflict. Something very primal in me awoke after the incident with my classmate. I found myself very aware of my desire to answer the biological imperative that exists between males and females of most species. The only problem was that I wanted to answer that imperative as the woman I felt I was supposed to be. A disturbing trend began on that day which followed me the rest of my life. I continued to deny my femininity by over emphasizing my masculinity. I pursued any number of stereotypical male activities like bodybuilding, free form rock climbing, and even free form diving. In spite of my best efforts to embrace the stereotypes of masculinity, some men seemed to know they could make propositions to me. To make matters worse, I found myself unable to decline such invitations.
The conflict within me continued to grow as time went by. With each indiscretion, I found I was growing angry with myself. After all, I was a man, and a straight man at that. How could I possibly resolve my perceived truth with my actions? Overwhelmed, I decided to seek help. That help came in the form of a therapist. I did not disclose to the gentleman anything having to do with my gender. After all, I was still convinced I was a man. While it is true that gender identity does not necessarily relate to sexual identity, most believed otherwise in the mid-1980’s. With this misconception in mind, I chose to simply explain to the therapist how I found it difficult to refuse sexual advances from other men. After an extended conversation, the man rendered his professional opinion of my condition. I remember leaving his office with the words “sexual deviant” echoing in my mind. My will to continue one more day was crushed. The conflict I struggled with spawned within me a dark depression that I struggle with to this very day. Every part of me believed I was defective. The universe had obviously made some grand mistake when I was formed.
Depression is a powerful emotion that can compel you to behave in ways that are rarely in your best interest. My day-to-day activities became more and more risky and belligerent with the passing of time. Abusing alcohol became commonplace as I found myself preferring the numbness of inebriation over the feminine feelings I could not make go away. Like a cog in some great machine, I simply existed from day to day, repeating a pattern of existence void of any desire to amend myself. I was convinced my problem was systemic and, as such, incurable. With each passing day, the depression I felt continued to grow. Hopelessness, despair, and lethargy were all that remained within me. My health was beginning to wane. With each passing day, I found myself wanting my life to be over in the way that one wishes a boring movie to just get to the end. My depression was on the verge of giving way to something new.
I sat on my bed, tears rolling down my cheeks. The pistol in my hand seemed my only means of escape from the dark place I found myself trapped. I allowed my mind to ponder my life one last time, perhaps looking for a reason to stay a decision I had already made. I could not deny I had lived a good life in many ways. I had traveled all over the world. I had raised a family. My career had been mostly successful. However, the depression in me had birthed the only offspring the dark condition was capable of. I could not bear the thought of continuing one more day with the unresolved feelings I had been unable to rid myself of over my lifetime. I was broken and ready to be tossed to the scrapyard. Even the depression that had led me to that day seemed to take a back seat to my desire to just end my life. The sequence of events that followed me though my life was about to come to an end. With one final deep breath, I nodded my head. I had made my decision.
I cannot explain why, but I didn’t follow through with what I had intended that day. Whether my reprieve was a quirk of fate, an intervention from something otherworldly, or something in between, I cannot say. I just knew there was one possible explanation for my condition I had summarily dismissed on more than one occasion. What if everything I had ever been taught was a lie? What if the feelings of femininity I had fought against for so long were an indication I really was a woman? Over the next several months, I began to explore the topic of gender identity. I soon discovered the lessons of my youth concerning my gender were anything but facts. I quickly discovered that most of the notions of gender I had clung to for so long had been debunked by modern science quite thoroughly. The dysphoric moment I felt when I started my change of life was my soul reaching out to my mind. On December 12, 2019, I began the process of medically transitioning from a male body to a female body. Once and for all, the chain of effects caused by being denied my true gender identity came to an end.
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