A big trigger warning applies to this post for suicide and suicidal ideation.
The last six months have gone a lot differently than I expected them to, and I'm in a much different situation than I ever expected to be.
Quite simply, I didn't expect to still be alive.
Even typing that out feels slightly odd now, but it's true. When I finished university in June, my plan was to attend my graduation ceremony and then my birthday celebrations (my birthday being only about a week after the ceremony), and then, after that 'happy send-off'... end my life.
The past six months since not killing myself have been filled with various ups and downs. Detailing these in full would be another rambling post in itself, but to give a few examples of things that have happened:
* Landing my first job - not a graduate role, or even a permanent one, but it pays decently for now, and it's far, far better to being unemployed... not to mention studying.
* Going back to living permanently with parents who get annoyed if I even mention being attracted to guys, despite ostensibly being 'accepting'. And as for the trans issue... well...
* Having two close friends break off contact with me. For the record, I don't resent them for it in the slightest (especially because of what I'm going to describe in the next point), but there's always a layer of sadness to losing friends.
* Realising that a lot of my past behaviour has been emotionally manipulative, boundary-violating, and/or hurtful, and that when confronted with this, I have failed to address it appropriately - this was mainly brought to light to me by the aforementioned former friends.
* Also coming to the realisation that whilst I'm very much dysphoric about my male sex, that I wouldn't really be significantly less dysphoric if I was of the female sex, and that, in truth, I am dysphoric about sex characteristics in general.
The last three are the key ones. And though it's taken me a long time to reach these conclusions, it's made me realise that there are a large number of false and often harmful assumptions that I've made throughout my life. The main ones are:
* Assuming that the idea of being a 'good person' is an end goal in and of itself - it simply isn't. At all times, the focus should be on respecting the boundaries of others (without needing explanation or full understanding of these boundaries in order to do so), and to respect that other people are capable of making their own decisions about their lives. Everything else can be extrapolated from these two key rules, but if I'm not keeping them in mind on a constant basis, then any attempts I could make to not replicate former harmful behaviour are worthless. On the same principle, any boundaries of mine are worthy of respect, and I have the capability to make my own decisions about my life. Furthermore, any action I take has power to it, often more than is immediately apparent. These are things that I need to make sure I never forget.
* Assuming that 'good intentions' are enough to cancel out a bad result, or that a 'good action' is enough to cancel out a bad one. If these 'good intentions' involve breaking the above two mentioned rules, then these actions are still harmful. And again, this rests on the essentialist notion of 'good' and 'bad' as concrete and absolute - 'respect', on the other hand, is a much more flexible term, and allows for far fairer treatment of others.
* Assuming that happiness can ever be a constant state, and hoping to reach that state. Obviously certain conditions are far more conducive to happiness than others, but there are few circumstances where happiness is 100% out of reach at all times... and similar few circumstances where it's 100% in reach at all times.
* Assuming that my life is sufficiently lacking in value that what I say or do doesn't matter, or that it can be ended with no detriment to the rest of the world. All lives matter, every single one - and that inherently includes my own.
So, the important question is... where do I go from here? Obviously it's impossible to be sure, but I have several important goals to reach:
a) Finding permanent employment - this is a particularly difficult one, because job-searching is psychologically draining even in a best-case scenario. Nevertheless, I have reasonable confidence in my skills, and thus with sufficient effort (spliced with occasional respites), it is very much achievable.
b) Continue to identify harmful consistent behaviours on my part, and eradicate them. This has been happening, to an extent, for almost three years, but has been a very bumpy road.
c) Living on my own/with friends - whilst living with parents is not horrible by any means, the fact that they stifle any expression outside of strict gender norms will inherently continue to grate on me mentally. For my own health, I need to be able to break away from that.
d) Work on resolving my dysphoria as best I can - medical transition is out of the question, both because of parental influence and also because it's unlikely it would even improve my well-being. Nevertheless, there are certain alterations I still would want to be made - permanent removal of facial hair is a big one.
These are naturally just a starting point, but one thing is certain - none of my plans involve my own death, at least not in the next few decades.
A massive thank you to anyone who read through this whole thing.
