Dear Watergirl:
Hi:
Full Disclosure: I am not a religious person and do not recognize any deity, though there is much about life I don't understand and I have to deal with that daily, moment to moment.
You have raised a truly great and perplexing question that our community all to often is asked to answer: Are you as a creation of life a mistake? I'm going to respond with a bit rigor here, because I'm loath to entertain emotional pleadings of one sort or another that have little or no basis in fact.
Here's a true fact: There's absolutely no evidence that you or anyone else's creation was a mistake and we don't need to invoke god to have the discussion. Rather, you and all of the life are created via a set processes and inputs that occur having a certain level of repeatability and uncertainty. It is intellectually and morally abhorrent to assign correctness or mistakenness to the natural process of procreation in this context. It's far more honest to accept that some procreation outcomes occur more often than others and each outcome brings with it a set of unique circumstances even given the law of large numbers. Humanity has written volumes on this subject and yet we still struggle to separate fact from belief.
So it seems as a species we are not well suited to handle uncertainty, and thus, we have created many belief systems and explanation's to account for our discomfort from uncertainty. One aspect of these attempts to deal with uncertainty has been to give us a belief system that incorporates the existence of a supreme, omnipotent being. This particular aspect of the human beliefs typically involves surrendering critical thinking at some point in order to create a perceived order to our lives and purposes therein that currently escapes our abilities to reason and know. This surrender is often referred to as faith, and much of life and its creating seems to occur without any untoward consequences because of these beliefs. All in all, faith serves us well enough until of course it doesn't, and even just a quick review of history will verify that.
It is not surprising then that whenever a set of circumstances occurs out of the inherent uncertainty and lack of knowledge associated with creation and life itself, e.g. being a transgender person, many try to justify the veracity of their belief system with questions, answers and actions that aren't grounded in fact, rather in faith. This occurs for two fundamental reasons: 1) Attempting to maintain the belief system, and/or 2) Attempting to leverage the dissonance that the belief system is confronted with for some ulterior outcome. In either case it would be easy to make these people wrong, but I look in the mirror too often to seriously entertain that thought.
I deeply respect any and all people who hold religious and spiritual beliefs, even envy them at times; however, when a discussion such as the one here is viewed from the perspective noted above, then dealing with the uncertainties of creation and life become far more manageable . . . or at the least understandable, including the necessity to accept that sometimes we just don't know and aren't going to ever know. If this frightens and/or angers you, I am deeply sorry and offer hope and freedom from them by following a path of living that is largely based upon critical thinking, which doesn't require you to give up religion or faith. To the extent you embrace them try to understand where the line is drawn that you have to suspend critical thinking.
Fortunately, in your case we do know, and what we know leaves no doubt for the veracity and existence of you as a person that is whole and complete. You may stretch the current social boundaries here and there of society, but without a doubt the reality in time and space is that you are as you are and not a mistake. Any discussion that your creation was a mistake or some untoward physical or mental happenstance is pure balderdash. There is simply no credible evidence whatsoever that you as a trans-person are less than in some way or another, i.e. in a way that each and everyone of us aren't also subject to as a result of being a created through a series of a processes and inputs with a built in degree of uncertainty.
BOTTOM LINE: You are not a mistake. You are, however, a unique individual with a rare set of characteristics that makes you a unique and profoundly interesting creation. I say that also makes you beautiful, but then I'm just as committed to my beliefs as everyone else - what counts is what you think.
What you and society does about this is largely in your hands to judge, embrace and share as suits your desires, the results of which await your hand to guide your life to its fullest and most beautiful existence. Therefore, it seems ridiculous to suggest that the grandeur and complexity of who and what you are should be otherwise assigned the misleading and debilitating context of mistake, either by association or through your own self-degradation.
My dearest fellow human being and friend, you are everything you can be and in so doing become more precious and desirable.
Peace,
Rachel
