It’s a complicated business to unravel, transition. In short it is the period of life a trans person goes through as they change from living in the gender role they were assigned at birth to living as the gender their internal sense of self is set to. It could be from male to female, from female to male and even for some from male or female to genderqueer. It is subject to many stereotypes and misunderstandings and can be a challenge for both the trans person and the people around them.
For many cis people it can be baffling. As they have never had to be aware of their own gender as a constant presence they can wonder what all the fuss is about, wonder why you can’t achieve the same without actually transitioning. They might question why one wants to be addressed with gender appropriate pronouns, not understanding that to constantly hear ones that contradict your sense of self feels like an erasure and denial of your self and your desire to be respected as a human being. They might wonder why one wants to change habits and appearance, not seeing that their own is fundamentally gendered and that you might have been simulating old forms in order to try to deny, closet or otherwise conform to society’s expectation of you based on your body. The biggest questions by far focus on the physical aspects associated with transitioning.
The idea that transition is all about the body is very much to do with the way psychiatrists try to deal with us. Finding that there is no way to force a person to change their mind about their gender identity the medical profession instead turned to the idea of “fixing” our bodies. As the possibilities of surgery and artifical hormones increased in the twentieth century this became the norm. As a result the medical conception of us is very much rooted in physicality. Along with this came ideas of what a successful transition was and the psychiatrists produced theories and descriptions that pretty much invented the stereotypes. Not being stupid many trans people played up to these and told (and still tell) the doctors what they wanted to hear in order to gain access to assistance.
These stereotypes then are what the wider public think they know about us. They are almost all about trans women, since the doctors have shown remarkably little interest in theorising about the trans men they treat. In the public eye we are all very (read overly) feminine, we all wear dresses, we all fancy men and we all want hormones and surgery and we’ll die if we don’t get them! The strongest stereotypes revolve around the physical aspects of transition. The idea that every single transsexual wants hormones, needs sex reassignment surgery, needs them to “feel complete” is very, very strong. So strong it even permeates our own conceptions of ourselves. So exposed are we to these stereotypes of us that if you don’t fit them exactly you can end up questioning yourself and wondering if you measure up, wondering if you really are what you know you are. More, within trans culture there are strong elements that will reject other trans women if they don’t live up to the physical needs stereotype. They will deny that they too are transsexuals, that they are women. Partly this is born of fear. Fear that if the medical professions finds out that some of us don’t want surgeries then no one will be allowed access to it. I can’t blame them for that fear given the way we are generally treated by medicine even if I deplore the divisiveness and the excluding one receives if you don’t fit.
So yes you guessed it, shock horror, the stereotype fails to describe us accurately. Hands up who wasn’t expecting that? For all of those things, yes there will be some trans people for whom they are true. For every one there are trans people for whom they are not. But we are all still trans*, we are still transsexuals. Our transitions are as varied and as nuanced as we are, as humans are. How can there be a one size fits all solution for every single person? Surely that makes no sense if you stop to think about it?
So what is transition then? If it isn’t entirely about the body, or behaviour, or clothes? Perhaps if we simplify it back down to where I started, back to “the period of life a trans person goes through as they change from living in the gender role they were assigned at birth to living as the gender their internal sense of self is set to”. It’s about growing into and taking on the role one feels comfy in, learning how to express who one truly is. It’s about working out what physical aid one needs, or can achieve in order to feel comfy with one’s physicality. To me it is a process of becoming. Of growth and change, of living after spending years hiding from life. To me it is as much about that mental journey as it is anything else.
Transition is complex, I don’t feel that there can be one simple answer. For every trans person there will be a different path, a different balance and a different set of needs and options. It’s a period of life, of living, not a process or a checklist.
i can relate to what you are saying. for years i lived out the life of a mentally ill person. i was a loony and i conformed to societies expectations of me. i got treatment from hordes of shrinks. i took medication. i had therapy.
but all i wanted to be was me. and one day it struck me that it was o.k. to be me, whatever “me” happened to be at the time. and this “me” constantly changes. it can’t be fixed or defined. attempts to do that, whether it is an internal definition or the definitions from others, leads only to despair.
you just be you,mattie. just be the “you” of this moment.
Every time a cis person asks a trans person “why can’t you just be a different kind of [man/woman]?” god kills a kitten.
Please, cis people, think of the kittens. :E
*nods* I know, poor kittens.
[...] | No Comments Mattie wrote a great entry on transitioning yesterday and you can read it on her blog. (in her blog? At her blog? I am still recuperating from 14 hours of being on the [...]
Very nice post, Mattie. I am always ruefully amused by persistent contradiction I encounter. On the other hand, trans people are criticized for being walking gender stereotypes, not “real” men and women who live lives of nuance. On the other, when we don’t embody and project gender stereotypes, our need to transition is questioned. It’s a total double bind
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Thank you Luminis. I recognise exactly the contradictions you refer to. I think they relfect wider stereotypes of gender that society holds. I feel that in trans people’s lives they seem to become distilled and highlighted often ways that would be laughably ridiculous if we weren’t being held to account for them.
[...] how I wish to live my life and gender. This is my life, my body and my gender identity. There is no one size fits all way of doing it, although anyone who wants to dispute the need and right of trans people who do desire [...]