Dearest Taylor,
In your May 3rd posting, you said:
"I have never had to transtion my masculine Gender, it is just how I have always been. As a Post Op trans male of sorts, this would not apply to me and a lot of others I know. Regardless of intersex status, or Ambiguos Biological Identities, or the absense of any physically observible conflicting sex traits, if the gender is firm, there is no transition taking place in regard to ones Gender Identity. Therefore this term cannot and does not apply to all people with variant identities as claimed."
I must say, I do differ somewhat with this assertion in a few regards. I will give several examples.
If one should have to, has to, and in any way, in any given moment of one's life, does make any specific choice, or "change", in any way, no matter how insignificant, such as having any sort of surgery as an essential, elective, or at very least, highly desired course of action, the physical presence of radical physiological change has been undeniably accomplished.
These moments, in themselves, and during the time(s) that this/these procedure(s) are actually taking place, is in fact, what some could at very least, loosely consider to be a "transitional process".
Not only this, speaking for myself, the entire process, or any part thereof, of in any way, radically changing my relationship(s) to the world around myself any way, in regards to "gender" "self-expression", in almost every way, has required some sort of "label". The word, "transition", can refer to every single aspect of our lives in every single moment. Time is running, cells are changing, we are physically aging, even if not spiritually, mentally, or emotionally.
We can and do and feel sometimes that we must, against all odds and to the back against the wall of all risks, including our very lives, make specific and conscious choices to express ourselves in any number of ways, that may even require us to change any number of ways in which we would have most "naturally" expressed ourselves, unless repressed due to say, fear of being both physically beaten and emotionally and mentally beaten down by any other person for doing no more than simply attempting to naturally express onself, for example.
In what I personally relate to as a more "unconditionally" UNEDITED form(s), (and for whatever individual reason or circumstance, which no one else should reserve the right to judge, - yeah - if only...) and may have not done so in the past, at any given moment, due to just such judgement and persecution of simple freedom of individual free will of self-expression. This change in and of itself would or could be considered "transitional". Any specific CHOICE to "correct" or "restore" "self-congruency", in any manner, especially in any noticeable physical or phsyiological manner - would be considered, by most, a transitional process.
If you were blessed to the extent that none of these daily living "transitional" issues that arise for many people, myself included, some very deeply painful, difficult, challenging, life-threatening, overwhelming - in many ways...
then this, for you, was and still is, obviously truly good for you, and obviously less full of strife and loss and conflicts which many of us will unavoidably have to, or had to, already face in one way or another.
For me, it's not a question of whether or not the "identity is firm" as you put it, it's just a matter of me finally and fearlessly personally going about whatever process(es) and challenges and learning experiences that i will encounter as a direct result of no longer being anything but myself as I would most like to be and express myself more than anything else in my life - finally being more/most comfortable in my own skin, than ever before, and so palpably so,
that most people that have known me are shocked at the difference - still the same person in many ways, but now - more CLEAR and more PRESENT in many ways, than ever before - for example, and it shows, as it were...
For me, i dont consider this the correction of a horrible biological mistake, as i know that some do. For me, I now feel more than ever, as if this was just the next "step" in my own personal evolvement as a person and a human being. If I had been "ready " to take this course of action in my life, at an earlier time, I would have done so, but events and experiences and an overwhelming flood of repressed memories, feelings, and "most natural self-expressions" in every form, simply flooded the circuits, and at a particular moment in my life that i had never arrived at exactly before and in exactly that manner -
Therefore - I was literally overcome, with what in many ways, at the very least, I would have to consider a hugely, beautifully, painfully beautiful, beautifully painful, and amazing and challenging transformational process, and therefore, "transitional" in that it does, over a period of time, at least for me, change all recognizable forms of the past "me", as others percieved it, from one specific recognizable form to another one altogether.
All of life is a gigantic transitional process, from one moment to the next, and our perception of time is meaningless if we accept that everything in the known universe exists only as it is at that particular moment, and therefore happens only once ever, in every single time and only in every single moment. In other words, every single moment is it's own universal singularity, and the entire equation changes in every single milli-milli-milli-milli second, down to the very last atomic particle, and so on... is in a constant state of "transition", if you will...
On the human scale, we perceive time by recording it's passage, and in days, events, experiences, and moments we call "memories", and what we consider as "passed", "past", or "recorded history". This is the "transitional" makeup of part of the very nature of the process(es) that we all use (differently per individual of course, even if only in minute and almost indectectable ways) of storing them in a specific sequential order, and "labeled" so that they can be referred to in context of other events and experiences that were also subjectively occurring to us/in our lives. Measure of "intensity" and "depth" of affect on the individual person varies greatly of course, and even then, this is only as good as individual and therefore entirely subjective perception, as it's almost.... (exceptions include being what some may refer to as "psychic" phenomena, but even then, it is still not that individuals' direct personal experience) ....impossible to literally stand in someone else's shoes, as it were.
In any case, just thought i'd throw my 2 cents into the fray - Could all be useless mutterings and ramblings.....
Hope you are doing as well as you can, always.
Most sincerely and respectfully yours,
ChefAnnagirl
