Hi there,
I'm Clive
Let me see, let me see, let me see...
I'm 26, tall, dark and stringy, lactose intolerant, GSOH, cruel to children and animals, hate long walks on the beach and have been 'out' to my family, and eventually friends, as an androgynous lesbian since the age of about 14. However, I've known since early childhood that I don't feel like a girl, and have recently begun to admit to myself that I am almost certainly transgender.
There have been some setbacks in my realisation - from the age of 16 to about 22, I made some steps towards dressing and presenting as the gender that I most identified with (including wearing only men's clothes for extended periods of time, and successfully passing much of the time with strangers or new acquaintances). However, this led to some conflict with my Mum, who is incredibly caring and understanding, and my closest friend in the world, but at the time had some difficulty coming to terms with my gender issues. This was, partly, I think, out of fear that I and the family would encounter prejudice - I come from a very small Industrial North Eastern town which hasn't quite, perhaps, made as much progress as larger more cosmopolitan areas as regards LGBT issues. At the time, too, she and my Dad were, bless them, holding down full-time jobs as well as raising three pubescents (including myself) who were all experiencing wildly different and turbulent adolescences, and I think my difficulties may have stacked up amongst their others as rather stressful and unmanageable just then.
From age 22 to several months ago, I made a concerted attempt to conform to my biological gender. I began to wear women's clothes, for the first time as an adult, to wear makeup, and to achieve some level of 'femininity.' Some of the time this seemed easier - it made things less complicated, superficially, with my acquaintances, and the people around me. My Mum, who has always had a maternal tendency to think of me as beautiful, was pleased - occasionally thrilled, in fact, when I ceded to wear eye makeup in conjunction with a tastefully-cut dress. I experienced very little prejudice and in fact a great deal of fascination and some titillation from friends and workmates at the idea that I was a 'lipstick lesbian', and I began to settle into a pattern in life.
INTERLUDE: This is getting a bit introspective, so I thought a short interlude was in order. Here's a poem I wrote:
The curtains in my room
Hang like the fringe over the forehead of my first love -
She worked in Fenwicks underwear department.
Control top pants half price.
Now my curtains are closed.
Seafood paella for tea again.
Ah well.
Back to the narrative:
I was, however, deeply unhappy. I knew that I was compromising, but thought somehow that I could ride it out - that I could live like that and still function and experience fun and pleasure and excitement and fulfillment in the way I wanted to. After all, life is all about compromise, in some respects - we have to find a way to do what makes us happy without hurting or upsetting the people who mean the most to us, or causing so much disruption that, in the end, it makes life more difficult.
All of this has happened in tandem with a lot of terribly embarrassing and debilitating mental health issues which I never quite connected, perhaps wrongly, to my gender confusion.
I've recently realized I was wrong. Not about the fact that we have to make compromises, but about what exactly those compromises should be. I think it's too big a compromise to feel physically uncomfortable every day, when I get dressed, when I go out, when I go to work, when I go to the pub after work, when I try to form relationships. To feel like people have made a terrible mistake every time they call me 'Miss' or 'Flower,' or 'Her.' There has to be some way that I can feel good about myself, in my body, with my gender identity, without everything coming crashing down around me.
So I've started to tentatively make steps in the direction I want...
I've explained to my Mum, though, that I'm having serious difficulties with my gender identity. She astonished me by going all Alan Bennett on my ass and saying, 'Really? Good, Dear. Don't get surgery, though. They carved your Grandmother up like a Christmas turkey during her hysterectomy.' Good grief, I said, I thought you'd be far more upset and panic-stricken. When she asked me why, I reminded her of the trouble we'd had when I was younger. She only vaguely remembered it. It had clearly (understandably) made a far bigger impression on me than on her - she'd thought, I realized at once, that this was a symptom of my adolescence, and that if she helped me through it, it would pass. And of course I'd confirmed all of her beliefs when I gave in and began to act like a woman. Now that I could tell her, in the cold light of adulthood, how I feel about this, she is completely supportive. And amazingly open-minded.
INTERLUDE:
I feel like I should offer you more information about myself than the story of my gender. Let me see. I like Peter Cook and Dudley Moore. I've written three pieces of fanmail to Philip Glensiter, and one to Stephen Fry. Lately I've been watching so much 'House: MD' that when I went to the doctor's for my medication review I was surprised and slightly disappointed that he didn't insult me.
Back to the narrative:
I'm in two minds.
Part of me feels as though I've lost a lot of valuable time. If I'd just been more stubborn and angry and brave and impertinent I might've been a lot further down the road now than I am.
I might, though, have damaged my relationship with my Mum, who cares incredibly about me, in a way that I would've regretted for the rest of my life. By waiting until she was - coincidentally or not - in a place to deal with this - seems to have been incredibly beneficial.
And the experience I've had attempting to live as a woman isn't in the least bit useless. It's made me a wiser and stronger person.
Having said that, I'm now thinking seriously about beginning to live as a man.
I haven't got as far, yet, as seriously considering hormones or surgery. But I am again dressing and presenting as male, and am passing a significant amount of the time (albeit, probably, as a gangly 14-year-old boy
) I'm joining online communities. I'm discussing my gender issues with the therapist I've been referred to regarding my mental health difficulties, and she seems to find it very relevant. I am happier than I've been in a long time.
Still very much in an 'in between' place, but a much better one, in many respects, than I was this time last year.
Still as infuriatingly verbose, though.
