20161201 I am transgender

I stand with all those who feel significant and persistent incongruity between their innate sense of gender vs. body and gender assigned at birth.

Many choose to keep this a private matter to reduce the risks of rejection, harassment, and violence. I accept the risks to promote awareness and understanding. I have the luxury of doing so because of privileges inherited (race, health), accumulated (reputation, financial), and environmental (liberal friends, family, and employers). That doesn't mean it's easy or safe for me, but it's certainly more challenging and dangerous for those of fewer privileges.

I was assigned male at birth, became aware around age 9 I felt more girl than boy, was alienated from my own body at puberty, then learned at 27 I could "fix" that (more or less). I started therapy and electrolysis at 28, started hormones and socially transitioned at 29, then confirmed body with bottom surgery at 32. This was the only medically sanctioned path to mitigate profound gender dissonance of a transgender woman two decades ago. It was an awkward, painful, tedious, and expensive process excluded by health insurance. WORTH IT.

Now at age 52 and having explored the cultural stereotypes, I still don’t quite know how to gender. For those of you who have met me, "androgynous" is an obvious (if dated) label and I am comfortable with it—but specifically, I am a non-binary woman. For me that means more female than male, though not very polarized—sometimes experiencing and expressing features typical of both, simultaneously; occasionally, not feeling either.

[Update at 56: "Nonbinary" and "genderqueer" are probably the most applicable modern labels, which I use as shorthand when necessary. However, labels point to definitions and arguments. I am not constrained by definitions, nor will I argue about who I am—so maybe let's just go with "gender mashup" and call it a day.]

Being transgender is not a disorder, and, finally, no longer classified as such in the U.S. (DSM-5). There is limited consensus on what gender is, no single cause of gender incongruity or dissonance, no wrong way to experience or express it, no universally applicable process to improve alignment, and the chosen process may have milestones but no clear conclusion. We each have our own continuing journey. To be clear: my way is a good way for me. It is not the right way or the best way; it is just what I had and have to do. Also perfectly valid:

• Being private rather than out
• Doing or not doing any particular step toward alignment, in any timing or order
• Feeling and/or expressing long-term gender variance without identifying as transgender
• Ignoring or even rejecting the notions of alignment and variance, just rocking out in your expansive glory

This journey has provided the opportunity for first-hand study of one of my favorite topics, false dichotomies. Allow me to touch on several especially relevant here:

1. Physical sex is either entirely female or entirely male. Not necessarily. Physical sex features are controlled by absurdly complex endocrine and gene expression systems which do not abide by strict categories. Every cultural criterion has exceptions, including absence/presence of penis. Some people are born with ambiguous or unusually structured reproductive organs, urinary tracts, and/or external genitalia (the latter sometimes immediately "corrected" by surgery, only to be revealed as incorrect in many cases once the person becomes aware of their innate sense of gender). Sex chromosomes come in other combinations than XX and XY—and the former doesn't guarantee all female-typical features any more than the latter guarantees all male. Secondary (post puberty) differentiations—bone and muscle size and shape, fat distribution, hair, skin, voice, etc.—are particularly inconsistent: some men are shorter, less muscular, more delicately featured, smoother, or with higher voice than some women—and vice versa.

2. Gender is either entirely female or entirely male. It's not that simple. Just as there are people with some physical features more typical of the other sex, there are those with internal gender features more typical of the other sex. Averaging those features, the innate sense of gender tends to fall on a spectrum somewhere between "entirely" female and "entirely" male—though some feel neither, or strongly of both. It isn't easy for someone to understand the experience of another with a different degree of alignment. Such gaps can cause confusion, fear, and resentment unless respect and compassion are cultivated along with education. Every gender experience is valid.

3. Presentation should be unambiguously feminine or masculine. Sorry (not sorry). While presentation is quite traditional and polarized in much of the world, just a few minutes of observation in a metropolitan Western city provides examples of women with more masculine presentation and behavior than some men, and vice versa. Also, young adults tend to be more relaxed in gender presentation (even while carefully obeying other rules of their tribes). Although this might unsettle an observer, it is not the responsibility of the observed to appear or act in a clearly gendered way for the sake of the observer. Moreover, the observer does not actually know a stranger's gender or sex, it's just speculation based on secondary physical sex features, cues of dress and manner, and probability.

4. Putting together 1-3: Women and men are entirely distinct and opposite. False. This requires that features describing women vs. men be mutually exclusive. As noted above, there are natural exceptions to any rule. The insistence for, and policing of, a sharp and uncrossable border between women and men is sometimes called oppositional sexism. At one point or another everyone is shamed—directly or by example—into more "appropriate" presentation and behavior for their designated gender, generating anxiety for all. Oppositional sexism is the basis for traditional sexism (valuing maleness and masculinity above femaleness and femininity, to oversimplify).

5. Gender is entirely made up (social constructionism) or entirely built in (gender essentialism). Neither of these models completely encompass reality. There are factors both extrinsic (the meanings, roles, and styles assigned to gender in culture) and intrinsic (deep inner sense of alignment, ambivalence, or dissonance which cannot be changed from outside). Unfortunately, it is common to dismiss analyses of these factors from the very people with the most relevant experience and awareness.

6. The only valid sexual orientations are straight and gay. How does that work since nature doesn't restrict gender or physical sex to binary values nor force them to align with each other?

Humans are gloriously messy and analog, not digital. Like anything important—gender, physical sex, and sexual orientation are complicated. Crucial details are dropped in 1 bit categorization of feminine and masculine, female and male, gay and straight. Such simplification reduces fidelity to the real world. Consider how digitized music sounds as a function of the encoding: is 1, 2, or 4 bit resolution sufficient? Even 8 bit music sounds like an old video game. Wouldn't you rather experience the world in full fidelity?

Now if you’ll excuse me, I have other binaries to bust.

Resources:

Trans Language Primer
That's Gender Dysphoria
GLAAD Transgender FAQ
Trans Journalists Association’s Style Guide
GLAAD Tips for Allies of Transgender People
Transgender Health Open Access Clinical Journal
Merriam-Webster's Short List of Gender and Identity Terms
17 Incredible Autostraddle Personal Essays by Trans Women
Whipping Girl: A Transsexual Woman on Sexism and the Scapegoating of Femininity by Julia Serano