The Day I Decided To Live

TRIGGER WARNING: Suicidal ideation.  

The aim of this post is not to disturb the reader, but to paint a portrait of everyday bravery and resilience.  With the rates of both suicide attempts and self harm for transgender and other non-binary folk an order of magnitude above that of the general population, I believe it is a subject that needs to be talked about, and talked about with as much love and support as can be summoned. Having said that,  I ask that if you find this topic at all disturbing, or if you become upset at any time reading this post, please stop reading it immediately and talk to someone about your feelings. Only continue reading if you are sure you feel strong enough.

Although this post does include a reference to suicidal thoughts, which I understand is not the most uplifting subject matter, it would mean a lot to me if you could do your best to read it through a positive lens.  Life is weird, farcical and often ridiculously funny, but make no mistake, this is by far the biggest challenge of my life thus far. I’m sure it’s no different for most other transgender folk. With your help though, we can all kick its arse.

Spoiler alert: I’m still here, and I’m not planning for that to change.

 

January 26th marks an anniversary of the utmost importance for me, almost certainly the second most important day of my life, close behind the day I was born. Not because Captain Arthur Phillip “took possession” of some already occupied land on this day in 1788, and certainly not because on this day in 1808, Australia experienced it’s (to date) only military coup in what would become known as The Rum Rebellion. No … it is of such importance to me because on January 26th, 2017 I made the following concomitant decisions: that I wanted to continue to live, and that in order to do so, I needed to transition from living as a male to living as a female, and that I needed to start that transition now.

I had been seeing a psychologist regularly for several months by this stage, a specialist in the field of gender and transitioning. Although he had helped me make sense of much of what was unfolding in my brain, I was still scared. Very scared. Scared of rejection. Scared of the unknown. Scared of all of the countless unknown unknowns.

On that otherwise run-of-the-mill public holiday in 2017, three of my unsuspecting friends had invited me to spend the afternoon, and possibly the night, with them at a popular local camping spot. I had been in an introspective funk for a while by this point.  Whether this had been going on for days or weeks, I don’t exactly recall. I was apparently aware that the crunchtime for some important decisions was fast approaching, but at the same time I was also still trying to get my head around what those decisions would be, and what the consequences, once the decisions were made, would be.

Once I had rendezvoused with my friends, we set out along the path to the waterfall. It was such a stunning walk along the creek through the forest. Internally, I was well aware of my surroundings being intensely beautiful, but days later, after seeing photos of me with my friends from that day, me staring off into infinity, I understood why they had been trying hard to cheer me up. Their efforts were in vain though. I was entirely devoid of mirth. I was morose. I was apparently completely uncheerupable. Ironically, I was completely unaware that in less than 30 minutes I would make a decision that would confirm for me that I knew for sure that there was beauty, love and happiness in my future.

I don’t remember particularly why, but while my friends were frolicking in the rock pools in the creek, I wandered closer to the top of the waterfall. Tears started dribbling from my eyes. I wasn’t sure why. Looking back, I’m still not entirely sure what drew me towards the edge. Maybe it was to get further away from my friends, who seemed to me at the time to be excessively, even irrationally, happy. I gazed wistfully at the horizon. I remember taking in the incredible beauty of the view, rainforest all the way to the sea. I was suddenly aware of why I had been drawn to the edge: all it would take is a handful of seconds and all of my past, present and future suffering would cease to exist. All of the suffering, all of the confusion, all of the uncertainty, all of the potential future bullying, potential assaults, misgendering, massive medical bills, incredibly invasive surgeries, potential rejection by friends and family, never  … need … actually … occur. A handful of seconds to avoid more pain and suffering than I might be able to handle. I moved closer to the edge and peered down at the rough jumble of boulders about 100m below me and stared at the boulder that I was pretty sure I would land on, if my high school physics was correct. I spent the next few minutes rationally running through the pros and cons of continuing my life. I came to the conclusion that my decision should be entirely based on the premise that I had been, on the whole, confused and/or miserable for much of my life, and that I deserved more, so much more. If I opted out now, I myself would be directly responsible for denying myself the possibility of a joyful, meaningful life. If ever there was a better time to both Choose Life and Carpe Diem I can’t imagine when that would be. I firmly decided: not here, not now, not like this.

If you can picture Ewan McGregor striding towards the camera across Waterloo Bridge at the end of Trainspotting, that was now me, except I was clumsily rockhopping up the creek, avoiding pockets of shrubbery, slipping on wet, mossy rocks and several times almost ending up fully clothed in rock pools. I carefully avoided eye contact with my friends as I quickly strode past them so that I could have a few quiet contemplative moments in  nature nowhere at all near the waterfall’s edge. I went home to my own bed that night. By morning, my funk had lifted. Proverbial and actual suns had risen giving life to another day.

Memories of that day came flooding back to me when I read Mila Madison’s piece on Transgender Universe a fortnight ago. I had forgotten the exact date, so I wasn’t aware at the time of the upcoming anniversary, though I’m pretty sure I will never forget how the afternoon unfolded and it’s bearing on the rest of my life.

If you felt sad or upset when reading this post, please please please talk to someone about it without delay. You should talk to someone that understands you, whether that be a friend or a relative. If you can’t think of anybody to talk to right now, please call Beyond Blue or Lifeline and talk to them about it.

 

My Own Little Library!

I’ve been building a collection of inspiring and educational resources related to being transgender and transitioning on my journey around the interwebs. If you would like to read or watch the things that have caught my eyes and ears, you can do so via my Resources page. I try to regularly add new items to it.

One of my favourites so far is Lana Wachowski’s acceptance speech for the Human Rights Campaign Visibility Award in 2012. Lana was born as Larry and went on to direct, screenwrite for and/or produce many successful films, including The Matrix trilogy, with her then brother Andy. Lana commenced her transition privately in the early 2000s and her brother, who had also been hiding his transgender nature, publicly announced in 2016 that his transition to Lilly had commenced.

It is really hard to explain how it feels and what it means to be transgender, especially later on in life, when the relevant thoughts and feelings and their connections to your experiences, have been deep frozen in ice by your well-meaning “just doing it to protect you” sub-conscious. I often search for words that would enlighten and clarify, and because my ice is melting, they are coming easier than before, but there are still many times when I just can’t find any remotely relevant words. Lana’s words come easily. They enlighten and clarify. I’m going to let them tell some of my stories by proxy.

Sex Hormones I

Much of what I remembered about human sex hormones from school was that testosterone gave men muscles and encouraged them to be emotional surface-dwellers, and that oestrogen gave women boobs and induced periodic mood changes. As it turns out, it’s a lot more complicated than that. Who knew!?

When I finally admitted to myself in July 2016 that I was transgender, I acknowledged that the concept of transitioning, having breached my conscious defences, would almost certainly soon come rushing at me. I started researching sex hormones, amongst many other topics, to be better prepared.

I found oases of material on the internet, ranging from the atrociously bad to the eye-openingly relevant. I found almost countless personal anecdotes, both written stories, and even more Youtube videos. Many of the personal anecdotes were useful in providing me with a human perspective, yet many others were published by people seemingly driven to say something, yet apparently unaware of exactly what they needed to say.

Having gotten my head around the basics of how starting a course of female sex hormones would affect me, I needed to understand the scientific perspective: what exactly would happen to my mind and body? How quickly would it happen? What would be the extent of the changes (or more specifically, how big would my boobs get)?

I discovered an acronym commonly used in the American transgender community that succinctly answers most of those questions: YMMV (Your Mileage May Vary). Essentially, the extent of any effect on any one particular body is not pre-determined, and therefore cannot be predicted. The ultimate effects depend on a range of factors: your age at the beginning of your transition, your genetics etc. The end results vary in the same way that they do for a cisgender girl entering puberty.

Thankfully several stand-out gems were to be found amongst the detritus. This document jointly published by Vancouver Coastal Health and the Canadian Rainbow Health Coalition is one of the most useful that I have found to date.

At the same time as I was spending hours weekly reading and watching and reading and watching, I was also crossing procedural bridges. I have lost count of the number of GP and specialist medical appointments that I have attended over the past 18 months in relation to my transition, but my rough count over the year from September 2016 to August 2017 is at least several dozen.

Thankfully my GP, who I now literally entrust my life to, had referred me to an excellent psychologist for an assessment. That meant spending many hours with him in late 2016, telling my story as best I could, and answering many, many questions about how I saw myself and how I interacted with others. After the final session in my initial series of appointments, my psychologist wrote a report that was sent to my GP. I wasn’t permitted to see the report, but at my follow-up GP appointment in January 2017, I was asked by him if I was ready to start talking about hormones. I smiled a huge smile of relief, and exhaled as if I had never exhaled before. I may have even shed a tear or two.