Transgender Inclusion

 

My Fave Girls. Liz on left, daughter on right
from the Jessie Hart Archives 

I actually survived my second "Seder" Jewish ritual service and dinner in fairly good shape. The one my wife Liz and I were invited to last year proved to be very uncomfortable due to my back's reactions to very uncomfortable chairs. This year I was greeted by my son in law to my own comfortable chair which ended up fitting perfectly with the table we ate at. I was so relieved. 

I also was happy my trans grandchild was the "moderator" and led the lengthy service which was partly in Jewish. Since lately I seem to struggle with English, speaking nay Jewish was certainly out of my reach. 

It turned out,  my grandchild who is re-enrolling in The Ohio State University this Spring seems to be coming out of their shell quite a bit and was there with their partner, whose name I promptly screwed up when we arrived. So much for making a good second impression. Which has been normally the story of my life. Open mouth, insert foot. 

Being included so totally in their rituals of the Jewish Faith has always been amazing to me. In fact, years ago at my oldest grandson's Bar Mitzfah  I was asked to get up in front of many people in his temple and have a part in the service. I was still early into my Mtf gender transition and was petrified but was able to come through it all unscathed.  I am not a real expert but the Jewish Temple my daughter and family belong to are Reform Jews and not the stricter Orthodox Jews which is possibly why I was welcomed and included with open arms.

For the day, as I wrote about briefly yesterday, since I was never allowed to even think about wearing a pretty, bight colored dress like the girls and women were allowed to wear,  I resorted to wearing my own bright colored clothes. What I attempted to do was wear as much as I could of the clothes and accessories my wife Liz has made for me over the years. She knitted me a pink and blue sleeveless sweater vest which I wore over a white camisole top and my bright patterned leggings. Then I added the earrings and hand beaded trans hair beret she made me. As I said yesterday, she is very talented and has her own shops on the Etsy craft platform under "Liz T Deigns" if you would like to visit it. 

Outside of being able to wear what I wanted to relieve myself of past anxieties, the best time I had was when my transgender grandchild made a special effort to sit down with Liz and I and discuss their advanced Physic's course she was taking soon at OSU when classes resume. They (chosen pronouns) most certainly didn't  get any of my genetics from me in the math or science area's of academia. I can barely add or subtract on a good day. I wish I could say I understood all they were talking about but I didn't. I was better suited in understanding the history behind the "Seder" ritual and how in it's own way intersects with all the problems going on today in the Middle East. 

 As I thought of all of sadness in the world and discrimination against the transgender population, my fondest hope is I can leave some sort of a legacy on how you can lead a successful life as a trans person. Being included in such an inviting ritual such as a "Seder" was a start.

It's Easter Weekend

 

Hand Beaded Trans Beret from
LizT Designs on Etsy

This weekend features the special observance days of several major religions around the world. As I was raised in a semi-serious religious home, we didn't do much for the Easter Christian religious observance. Of course I remember quite vividly how much I disliked  dressing up in the male restricting clothes such as a tie which I hated so much. I would have rather worn one of the pretty bright colored dresses all the girls my age were able to wear. At the time, the earth seemed to be tilted unfairly in the girls direction. 

Today, in a sense, I get just a bit of revenge on my past. My wife and I are attending a Jewish observance that we were invited to at my daughter's mother in law's house. Appetizers will be served before the formal observance which was well attended last year by mostly friends of my two out of three grandkids. Unfortunately, my grandchild who is transgender probably won't be there today because they live with their partner in Virginia which is quite the trip from Ohio. 

For the day, I have decided to brighten my wardrobe up for the Spring weather we are finally now beginning to see. I am wearing a sleeveless very light sweater top Liz handmade for me paired with my patterned bright colored leggings. I even went all out and put in my long unused earrings which again Liz made for me. Plus to spotlight my transgender status in this time of uncertainty, I am wearing the trans hand beaded hair beret which again was made by Liz. If you are catching a theme right now, you are right. Liz is very talented. 

So, in my own way to get even with the mean old days when I wasn't allowed to wear anything bright colored to Easter observations. I am going light and bright.  The only drawback is if I am going to be warm enough. I have decided to throw caution to the wind and wear my bright sleeveless outfit to the Jewish observation of "Seder". While I am not Jewish, my daughter is and it will be good to see her. 

Whatever what religion you may happen to have an Easter observance with this weekend, I hope you have a good one. 

Which Closet was It?

Restroom Photo from the
Jessie Hart 
Collection

 Is your perception of the gender closet you lived in (or live in) masculine or feminine?  Until I really began to think about it, I always thought my closet was built by my false masculine self to keep my stronger feminine inner being well hidden. I'm sure most of you faced the same problems as your old male became very proficient at laying new bricks in your closet as fast as your girl was trying to find ways to escape.

Because my girl self was the one in the closet, I considered it a feminine enclosure. I even went as far as remodeled a room in the house we were restoring as my makeover room. As I remember, I painted it a pastel shade, bought a used vanity and mirror and then decorated the walls with vintage pictures of beautiful film stars such as Marilyn Monroe. For some reason which will now be never known, my deceased wife went along with my idea of having a room my girl could call her own. Maybe she thought giving in and letting me decorate my own room would help alleviate my gender stress for awhile by allowing me to express myself.

The problem became was when (of course) just having a room for my clothes and makeup just wasn't enough.  No matter how nice it was, my new closet could not replace the allure of getting out in the world and finding out if I could exist in the world as a transgender woman. For the longest time I was able to stay in and interact with my wife or the mirror before I could stand it no longer and had to open the door of my cage and see the world for the first time. All went well when we set up new boundaries for awhile when we got together and decided once a week I was allowed to go out, rent a motel room out of town and dress as a woman. From there I could go out and explore my new exciting world. Sadly, for the sake of our relationship, none of what I was doing really helped. The more I was out of my feminine closet, the more I wanted to do. Essentially,  I was beginning to live my lifetime dream. The process felt so natural I never wanted to go back and rebuild a male closet to live in. 

In a very short span of time due to my new expanding life, my old life became shambles when I started to seize every opportunity I had to dress up and head out the door. What I was doing was breaking our agreement in regards to my gender expression and putting extra unwanted strain on our relationship. However, the more I was able to spend time out of my old male closet, the ripping and tearing of my overall life became unbearable.  In other words, the more I tried to live a portion of my life in each of the two main gender binaries all the time  the worse life became. Which eventually led me to a suicide attempt. It turned out to be just the latest in a string of incredibly self destructive events I attempted before her death from a sudden heart attack. 

I was so fortunate I was able to have a happy ending of sorts when I finally was able to escape all the negativity as well as my gender closet. In the end, it didn't matter if my cage was masculine or feminine. Only that I was able to escape all the problems which came from within the closet and live my truth as a full time transgender woman.