Trans struggles & support at Christmas

I'm taking a break from talking about things back at the very start of my transition for this post. I started writing this one with the aim of putting it up before Christmas as a way to say good luck to everyone over the holidays, but as usual I got distracted by all the plans and being between various houses etc so I've started again and it's now more of a "I hope everything went well for everyone" type of post along with how things have been for me over the past week instead.

Christmas 2011, my first ever "Son" card

Christmas can be a difficult and upsetting time for a lot of people, a large percentage of those being part of the LGBTQ community, though obviously I'm personally going to be focusing on trans individuals. This time of year most of us are forced into stressful family gatherings, which often results in being referred to by our old names and being constantly misgendered. This is usually also combined with invasive and intimate questions, along with transphobic remarks sometimes intensified by large quantities of alcohol. Many of us are forced "back into the closet" while certain members of the family are visiting, and we just have to go along with it to try and keep everyone else happy. Some decide by themselves to stay quiet so as not to make a horrible situation any worse for ourselves, or we are told by close family members that we must not disclose our gender identity to other members of the family, whether that be because it makes them uncomfortable or because they're worried about what other family members will say. Or maybe, we just haven't managed to work up the courage to tell anyone yet and continue to suffer in silence.

Christmas 2012

If there are family members that know and are supportive, being surrounded by extended family that don't know, or are unsupportive can often change the way they act around you. This really sucks, especially if for example you have a usually supportive parent, that uses your preferred name and pronouns, but now because your Aunt & Uncle or whoever else, who are either unsupportive or haven't been told about your transition yet are visiting, said parent now reverts back to using your old name and the wrong pronouns. Some may say "it's just for a few days, just ignore it and don't let it get to you", it's really not that easy,

We spend every day trying to convince the world around us of who we are, and hoping we get read as our preferred gender, any support we can get means so much, and losing some of that support, even for a few days can have a massive impact on mental health. It may just be a few days, but those days can feel like an eternity, especially when everyone around you is having an amazing time together and all you can think about is how crap you feel that you can't even be yourself around your own family. That every time someone calls you by your old name or pronouns you just want to scream at the top of your voice that that's not who you are, but instead you sit there quietly and smile, saying thank you for the strongly gendered gifts that you'll never use so that you don't seem ungrateful.

December 2015

However, in contrast to this, some trans people are confident enough to stand up and correct people when they're wrongly addressed. It is never okay to misgender someone, but we also need to remember that not everyone will adjust straight away, slip ups do happen so we need to cut people some slack sometimes, especially since it's often not done in a malicious way. For example my step mum has 4 sons plus me, and she so often goes through everyone's names before calling us the correct name, it's rather amusing. Depending on your age, your family have been calling you by your old name and pronouns for so many years, so it's usually just a habit that will only get easier with time.

My Mum took about 4 years to properly adjust, it's only now at almost 5 years since coming out that it seems to be becoming normality for her. I got fairly lucky in the grand scheme of things, she could have never come round the idea and not accepted me at all which unfortunately is the case with some families. I now get cards with "Adam" written in, which makes me so happy to read. For a few years I had cards that just had no name in them, which was better than them having my old name. With my Step Mum and my Dad I got correct name and pronouns in cards straight away, and the first year I was spending Christmas as Adam, they bought me the "Son's 1st Christmas" card that you can see pictured up at the start of this post, which I was thrilled with (even though it doesn't look like it in the photo!)

My girlfriend's birthday this December

I just wanted to quickly mention something awesome that happened this Christmas. I got to see my cousins, the twins who I've mentioned in previous posts, for first time in 5 years since I came out. They're now 13, and so grown up. It really sucks that I missed out on the last 5 years of seeing them, thankfully with social media now I've been able to see photos, and in the last year I haves spoken to the girl ("S") on facebook and snapchat but I hadn't had any contact with the boy ("T"). When they both walked into my Mum's house with my Aunt and Uncle "S" and I hugged straight away, and I felt so happy, then when "T" and I came face to face (literally now he is actually the same height as me!) we had an awkward moment of about to hug, then stopped, and weren't sure whether to shake hands like the rest of the men seem to do in that side of my family, but we didn't do anything, just smiled and said Hello, which was odd. I'm still trying to get use to this whole hand shaking thing with the males in my family. I think it's more difficult because with my step brothers and that side of the family everyone hugs, and all my male friends hug eachother so it's a bit of a shock when confronted with a handshake from my Uncles now. I might do a post about that kind of stuff at some point.
But yeah it was brilliant to see my cousins again, and "S" even wrote a post on facebook afterwards about how happy she was to see me which made me really emotional, I can't wait to see them again. I meant to take a photo with them before I left but had to leave in a bit of a rush to catch my train home and forgot. Will remember next time!

Festive beardness

I'm just going to round this up a bit now by saying, I really hope that everyone managed to make it through the festivities and family gatherings with as little hassle as possible, this post could go on for pages and pages but I hope I haven't rambled too much. I really am thankful for my family support and I have spent a lot of time over the last few weeks thinking about those of you who aren't fortunate enough to have a supportive and accepting family environment. I hope that you know that anyone disrespecting and misgendering you does not invalidate your identity at all. You know who you are, and you're awesome, don't let anyone else make you feel differently. If your family aren't supportive and you don't feel like they'll ever come round to respecting you, I hope that you get to spend time with your friends and chosen family. Some times that's just something we need to do, make our own family. The LGBTQ community can be such a supportive and loving thing to be part of, I know that you will be able to find someone to spend time with and comfort you not just at this time of year but always.

And if you're reading this as a friend/family member of a trans person, please do what you can to support them, even just one extra person using the correct name and pronouns can have a positive domino effect on those around you, and something as simple as giving them a card with their preferred name in could completely make their Christmas! Good luck everyone, and Happy Holidays!

Here's me this Christmas, my girlfriend gave me a festive beard of glitter and baubles!

Coming out - Part 3 (hundreds of people at work!)

I was working as a gymnastic coach at the time all this was going on, because I needed a job when I dropped out of uni, and thankfully my old team mate who now owned the gym said I could work there with her. I was so nervous about telling her because this was going to be the real start of making my transition known to people, and it was going to be a lot of people. 

I worked with hundreds of gymnasts from aged 4 up to teenagers, plus we were going to need to tell all their parents as well. Also adding extra nerves to the whole situation was the fact that I trained at this gym from 18 months old to 17 years, so anyone who'd been around in the last 15 years or so had a fair idea who I was, plus I competed for 10 years and was pretty well known to all the other clubs in Cornwall as well with it being such a small county. So yeah, I was about to go from just a few close friends and family knowing to suddenly hundreds of people of all ages. Pretty terrifying, but I had to get it over with.

I had absolutely no idea how my boss/friend was going to react, I'd known her since I was about 5 and she was 7, we spent most of our childhood training and competing together, and now I was about to say something that was also going to somewhat affect her business. I asked if I could have a word with her some time pretty soon without the other coaches around so we arranged that. I again can't really remember how I said things exactly, I explained that the reason I left uni was because I was going to transition, and that I was now using male pronouns and going by the name Adam. 

I remember her not being very surprised, and just quite matter of fact about it. She was just like, right okay then, yeah cool. She was happy for me. She asked how I wanted to tell the other coaches and gymnasts etc. I said I wasn't sure. We had a chat about it, and decided that we'd have a little meeting with the other coaches, and she'd say it for me. So I think about a week later that's what we did, and it went really well, everyone was very supportive. For gymnasts and parents, we decided to compose a letter, and give it to them after classes. I will insert the letter below, but in brief it just stated who I was, and what was going to be changing. We also said that I'd be happy to answer any questions, and that the parents are free to tell their kids as much or as little about it as they wish.

We discussed how people would be about calling me by my new name, and decided that a good idea would be to use AJ instead of Adam, as it 's gender neutral so would be less of an impact maybe. Especially since I was obviously pre any medical treatment at that time so still looked fairly female, and definitely sounded it. Thankfully my boss being the confident loud type, was great for telling people for me when I was too nervous. Like when we told all the squad gymnasts that I knew really well as a lot of them had started back when I was still training, she just said at the beginning of a session one evening with them all sitting on the crash mats by the trampoline and said right, from now on, * birth name * will be called AJ, and we'll be calling him “he”. An that was about it really, most of them were just like okay whatever, a couple of the older ones were a bit inquisitive, but no one really asked anything. With the letters to the parents, I had no bad reactions at all, which I was really surprised about. I even had a few dads say nice things like “well done, good for you”.

It was a strange experience. It went so much better than I expected it to. People don't give kids enough credit when it comes to telling them things about gender and sexuality. It's still a massively taboo subject, and people say oh no we can't tell the children! They won't understand, it'll upset them, it'll confuse them. But kids are the most open minded, they're better to tell than adults, and they're so accepting. Especially if they're younger and haven't seen or been told anything that would make them think this isn't a normal thing in life. 

For example, another coach's child was also a gymnast that I taught, and I knew her pretty well, she was 4 years old at the time, and the coach basically just said, * birth name * is a boy now, he always felt he was a boy even though he wasn't born as one, but he's turning into a boy now and we call him AJ. And this 4 year old was just like yeah okay. And called me AJ straight away. Kids are so opened minded, I don't see why people have such an issue with telling them things like this. For example I wasn't allowed to see my cousins for about 5 years because my Aunt and Uncle didn't want to tell them. But I'll cover that in another post.

I think this would be a good place to quickly mention why I chose “John” as my middle name. Basically most of the people I knew on trans groups etc said they chose their middle name in honour of their Dad or Granddad, or another male role model. I didn't want to use my Dad or Granddads names, I mean I love them both, but just didn't feel their names fitted me. So my closest male role model growing up was my old gymnastics coach, John. I had known him (and his wife Pat, our other coach) since I was 18 months old, I probably spent more time with them than I did with my family throughout my childhood. I use to train 5 sometimes 6 days a week, I pretty much lived there, so I spent a lot of time with them. He's an amazing man, and was always so caring, he had such a big impact on my life. So with this, along with the fact that it would also work well as a nickname (AJ) I chose John.  

Here is the contents of the letter we sent out to the parents:

"Dear Parent/Guardian,

I am writing to you and all other parents/guardians of gymnasts currently coached by *birth name*.

*Name* has been an assistant coach with the Academy since the beginning of this year, and I have known *Name* as a fellow gymnast for some fifteen years when we were both members of *previous gym club name*.

In recent days *Name* has told me that she will be undergoing medical transition for gender reassignment. Clearly this is a very personal decision that has taken a lot of consideration on her part.

Therefore as from now *Name* has assumed the male gender and the name Adam, to be shortened to AJ. 

AJ has been very open with explaining his decision, and following a staff meeting last friday all of the coaches have expressed their support for AJ in helping him through this process.

I am ofcourse conscious as is AJ as to how his decision may be perceived, and how gymnasts may respond. However in reality the only difference of which gymnasts will be aware us the change of name.

If however a gymnast questions the change of name, the Academy will simply state that there has been this change of name without comment upon the issue of gender. Parents/guardians will however be advised if questions are asked so that they can respond to these with their child as they deem appropriate.

The Academy's intent is to maintain a safe and comfortable child friends environment, in which your child can participate in gymnastics, and there is no reason why the above should affect this. 

If you have any concerns, please contact me and I will arrange to meet with you. Although AJ himself is willing to discuss issues openly with parents/guardians, I would prefer in respect of his privacy that concerns are addressed through me in the first instance.

Yours sincerely,

*coach/boss' name*"

As always, here's me today. I wrote this on my way up to my volunteer day at the Gender Clinic. 09/12/16