TransActual
They will never understand the sense of grief I have for the body I should have been born with, the childhood I should have had, the adolescence I should have had. That life in my mid-20s that I’m doing over again in my mid-30s. That first operation that I needed because my body changed in puberty in ways it shouldn’t have.
I’ve known some online forms to literally only give 2 options for gender. It’s paralysing. Hovering over those two alien concepts. It’s almost worse when they add a third, ‘prefer not to say’ choice. As though anyone who doesn’t fit neatly into one of the binary options should be embarrassed about it; as if it’s something we must want to hide. No, I DON’T ‘prefer not to say’; I prefer to have my enbyness recognised.
Any change in the law would affect everyone, not just trans people. What about women who have facial hair due to polycystic ovary syndrome? What about women who don’t conform to stereotypes of what a woman “should” look like? These stereotypes, by the way, often have racist undertones. They’re stereotypes of what a white “woman” should look like. Lots of women already experience issues from other women when they use the toilets, but a change in the law could see them being excluded from public toilets along with trans people.
by Calley Zanelf Having grown up not identifying with the gender I was assigned at birth I, like so many other trans folk, endured daily struggles that I just […]
Most of the trans people I know are not primarily trans, by that I mean they are much more, they are truly multi-dimensional people. They are primarily fathers, mothers, musicians, engineers, writers, academics, etc. who just happen to be trans. Many of us will proclaim that it is the least interesting thing about us, it is just something we had to go through in order to be who we are, to reconcile our identities with our bodies. If you like, it is something we have done rather than something we are.