You know, I'm just falling in love with each of you here! I'm all teary for the second time tonight reading your posts, Maggie & Kai, and all of those who have responded.
My spouse has gotten a very similar reaction when she came out to her parents, and I have been feeling all these emotions about their reaction on behalf of my spouse. I want so badly for them to understand and fully support her, and I feel so protective of her about it, I have to be careful. We think it's probably best if I don't get into it much with them anymore, and let the communication happen between my spouse and them directly. But I am on the search for trying to find resources of information that might help them understand. I'm excited to check out the book that Mattia mentioned! Her parents (mom in particular) have the same objections about she didn't "act like a girl" when she was really little, so she couldn't "have a girl brain," and it must be something else. It is so frustrating to me that they don't really listen so they might understand, but I know it is a process, I keep telling myself.
I think chapters 5 & 6 of Julia Serano's "Whipping Girl" book might address some of this type of objection for them, along with several other things that I think might help like this page:
http://www.transsexual.org/Roles.htmland recently, this comment that I thought was really well-worded, by a trans woman on a website:
"I didn't *want* to be anything, I am exactly what I was born to be. I had a medical need to take estrogen as my brain was constantly telling me something was wrong because it had mostly testosterone instead. Now that I've fixed my hormones, I am at peace.
It's a common misconception that being transgender has to do with wanting to be seen as this, or thinking their traits match society's role better for that. It has nothing to do with any of this. There are lots of different combinations of chromosomes, not just two. There are lots of different hormone balances, not just two. Yet we divide the world into male/female because those are the most common configurations. Intersex people exist and they, along with trans people such as myself are naturally-created, have been around all throughout history, and are perfectly healthy, good people.
Society creates the definitions of male/female. It's based on commonality, not the full range of human possibility. It's not a social issue, but a medical one.
I was born with a body that would be identified as male, and was therefore raised to act like a man. But hormonally-speaking, my brain developed to expect a female body."
What I want to tell her parents, is that whether or not she played with dolls, or is "stereotypical" anything, the dysphoria that she experiences where her brain expects her body to be female, is not something new, is innate to her, is very real, is typical of many others born this way, and trying to live contrary to that is unbelievably distressing and nothing less than the crushing weight of feeling she can not be her true self. To refuse to understand this, hear what she is really saying, is to tell her you would prefer her to be inauthentic and play a role that causes her pain, than to truly know your own child more fully for who they are. If only people could see her for who she is when she is allowed to be herself! She is beautiful and amazing, because of the happiness that shines from her heart. I wish all parents and family of trans individuals could know the pure happiness in their loved one that comes from being supported and allowed to be theirselves. If they grasped that, there is no way they could not want that for their loved one, not know that it is right.
Maybe that is one of the keys, bringing them back to how it makes you feel when you are allowed to be yourself, and when you are not allowed. Because ultimately, how can they argue with that? It is not a debate then over whether or not you have a "girl or boy brain," because they can always try to argue and invalidate that. But how can they argue with how you feel, and your happiness or misery? Make it clear it is not about whether they or anyone else thinks you have a "girl or a boy brain," but about how you feel about yourself, and how you can live and feel right.
I'm sorry, I think I'm letting my thoughts about my own situation leak all over the screen here, instead of staying focused on responding to you. All these intense thoughts and feelings have just been so bottled up, that to find a place where others get it, where people are going through the same things...well, I think I am starved for that human connection of talking to people who are supportive and understand. Thank you so much, each of you, for being awesome, and brave, and warm... for being incredible and being here to be family for each other. Like I said, I'm falling in love with you people! You've each stolen a very special place in my heart. ((Hugs))
