January 16th, 2012 / No Comments » / by AllyN
What describes a good night out for the gender diverse community? If I was to choose for myself it would be cabaret – a night out sharing a laugh and a dance all while being entertained intermittently by the talent on offer. Cabaret appeals to the curious with diverse delights which often challenge us and entertain us and sometimes shock us. It has hardly surprising that cabaret has a history of gender crossing acts and nuances that entice and challenge mainstream attitudes. Cabaret is many things, and I love it!
But is it a good night out for all? A diverse range of performers brings with it those who will love it and those who won’t. In many ways the presentation of gender diversity in cabaret style shows is not for gender diverse audiences themselves, whether it be drag or other – a show that shocks and challenges a cisgendered audience teeters on the edge of political correctness and can often fail to excite a a potentially dismayed gender diverse audience.
It is not difficult to understand that many trans people just want to be treated normally and would prefer a regular night out, rather than be the spectacle often gawked at by cis attitudes and presentations of gender diversity. A safe space, among friends and supporters who know the causal relationship between stereotyping gender diversity and transphobia. A good environment, accessible but also providing some degree of privacy and intimacy – but what then? Drink, dance the night away?
I think this sense of regularity is served by tea and coffee, for catching up and purging the mainstream garb that can stack the pressure and intimidate us in our daily lives, because life goes on. We need a break from people trying to understand the varying degrees of gender diversity, and spend some time with people who have those experience, who can validate and support you, whether it is talking frankly about sex, or showing compassion for the hardships that many transitioning people have in common. It’s just nice to know you don’t have to take it all on yourself.
Back to having more fun… There has to be a balance though between good entertainment and a safe and intimate night out – because I want both. I don’t want to end up drinking myself to the brink of consciousness, because there is so much more to a good night out than that, a good night out means making a connection with friends old and new and feeling like you are taking something with you at the end of the night. That’s why I like the idea of cabaret, you get to know performers, enjoy their shows and talk about them with friends, but the best thing is, you don’t have to think about your own troubles while the stage is alive.
Finding the right performance, the right format is the key, to entertain a diverse group of people, who are brought together not because of their similarities, but because of their rebellion and distance from cisgender and cissexual norms. It is going to take talent, let’s face it, but I am sure if you look for it, you will find it. Meanwhile the search is always on for a safe, intimate, accessible environment to call our own. Let me know if you are thinking of somewhere.
Posted in: #hackgender, Articles, Community
January 7th, 2012 / No Comments » / by AllyN
It’s a new year, and I am still determined to see a regular night out for trans and genderqueer people establish itself in Perth. The first night happened at Bar 138 in late August with mixed success. We had between 30 and 40 people with a strong representation of trans and genderqueer people. This time we want to do better than that, with more performers and more involvement from the community.
I’m looking at making this event late February or early March to get the year off to a good start. This is just a call out to gauge people’s interest and to get feedback from the first event so the second event will be better. I’m still trying to find the best venue to host #hackgender. The support from Bar138 was great, but perhaps it is a bit too central for people’s liking.
To help with the setting up of this event, could you please answer the following poll to make this event something you think you and everyone can enjoy. Please support.
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Posted in: #hackgender, Articles
January 4th, 2012 / No Comments » / by AllyN
I’m not there – most of the time. I’ve been across the other side of the country in Sydney, being a kind of tourist, but also escaping the all to familiar Christmas disappointment that comes with the gathering of family and friends. I haven’t lost my family so such, but friends have come and gone and the distance always seems to grow. This year I put geographical distance between myself and Christmas.
This is the trans issue, the sexuality issue, the social issue, the stigma of the misfit that returns awkwardly to the fold for the ailing traditions that hold the super weak familial bonds together. Like a pariah, or a prodigal child stumbling upon life as it is happening, as per usual – as if the elephant in the room had a place setting of its own at Christmas dinner. No, not this year.
It is also the vegan issue, the queer issue, the me issue. I don’t want to celebrate your Christmas of lies and distortions, I’d rather do things the way I have learnt to do them, my own way. And this year it meant flying across the country to Sydney. And what did I do? I sat down to a traditional Christmas festival steeped in more folklore and tradition than I had ever experienced before. It was my partner’s family – but at least it wasn’t my own miserable season of misgiving.
Why do I hate Christmas? Because Christmas hates me, ever since Santa wasn’t real, which is always. It’s a bloody, religious, hetero-normative, family oriented, commercialised, capitalist farce that invades my personal space and morality once a year. I won’t eat the animals you slaughter for it, I won’t worship the deity that was born for it, I won’t hide my sexuality for it, I won’t pretend like I havn’t been rejected by my family in the past, or that I didn’t reject them, I won’t pretend like I am buying into the propaganda I can’t afford – And I won’t pretend that it doesn’t make the people around me crazy.
But with all that being said, I had a traditional vegetarian feast on Christmas Eve, and gave more presents than ever before and everything was different this year, because I was with another family, with their own traditions and it was lovely to be invited into them. In other words, it was a most refreshing change not be bitter at Christmas.
Posted in: Articles
December 7th, 2011 / No Comments » / by AllyN
When you are ooh so over the binary sex pretense.
Ever felt like you’re just not getting what you want sexually out of television romance? Whether it is because it is poorly written or poorly directed or you’re just a little bit peeved by the Ken and Barbie Dolls making out like they just can’t wait to have their fifth baby (or abortion) ? Romance exists in many places for many different types of people who form diverse relationships, but what about my sweet transgendered heart? Who is looking after that? It certainly isn’t Hollywood and its dull line up of exploding cliches and cisgendered love stories. We do not even have transgendered actors to take on transgendered roles such as the lead in TransAmerica, but I am told Felicity Huffman did a good job.
There is of course the sweet and sickening addiction and longing for the cissexual privilege of falling love, stripping down in under 10 seconds (20 if you’re a romantic) and starting to simulate the act of making babies, or ‘fucking’ as they call it. It is probably never quite that simple for a trans person, that fantasy and many others are fascinations which deprive many of us of realistic sexual role models – especially in romantic leads… So I wonder, why can’t I have what ze’s having?
If you thought the female orgasm was surrounded in mystery and mystique, then you will no doubt be bamboozled by what it might be that turns a trans or genderqueer person on. With so little research done on the subject, I guess our ons and offs appear to default to the gender binary – man sex and woman sex, simulating cissexuality – biologically speaking, there are places that feel good and places that don not.. right? Well I think if your expecting a cis-like sexual experience, you are going to go unfulfilled.
There are many trans and gender queer people who would surprise you with an addictive and rich machismo and obsessive mystique, beyond your expectations of role playing and taken to a whole new level of reality and creativity, after all are we not breaking down those boundaries and obstacles established by a world dominated by cissexual and cisgendered expectations?
Can people of this day and age really imagine the world beyond their crutches, to the tantric world that puts a myriad of questions to ‘normal’ experiences, exploring and ending the depravity of rule based sexual encounters and opening up postmodern experiences and new representations of identity? It is possible, but still some people prefer their coffee, to this particular cup of tea.
Maybe there are orgasms out there waiting to be discovered that are not distributed by binary sex alone? Explore the non-physical, the spiritual essence which does not default to the simple architecture of physical sex. Feed us dark chocolate… or erm.. stuffed
mushrooms – You don’t have to feel closed in by the elephant in the room (its name is Stampy, and will love to talk about
themselves and experiences, as long you are sincere).
Breaking through… The delicate and precise reinvention of sex, a careful arrangement of safety, sensuality and sexuality – but of course if you really want to find out for yourselves, you might have to ask us just what it is, that ze is having.
Posted in: Articles
Tags: dating, genderqueer, sex, television, transgender
December 2nd, 2011 / No Comments » / by AllyN
Almost everyone who seriously dabbles with shifting along the gender spectrum would be seeing or have seen a professional. That professional is there to analyze and interpret your behaviour, reactions and progress while offering advice and counselling. For psychiatrists and their transgender patients, the go to resource for diagnosis and treatment is the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM IV) currently in its fourth revision since it was first published in 1952. The pathologization of gender variant, transgender and transsexual identities has its roots in this book under the category Gender Identity Disorder, in other words it is classified as a sickness.
I am not going to get into the details of what is in the DSM IV, but rather explore why it is important not to depend heavily on psychiatric advices and interpretations derived from this pathological classification of gender variance. It should make your hairs tingle that in order to proceed with your life, in most cases you must consent to this interpretation and agree to ongoing associated medical costs to be treated as a patient, traditionally a sick person. The treatment often desired is transition to some degree, which is really the final diagnosis and only exists as a last resort to medical professionals. Trans people are never encouraged by their doctors to transition, they are discouraged.
The reason a psychiatrist discourages treatment is because they are liable like all professionals and so will take the fewest risks. You will seldom receive empathy from this process, because it is scrutinized and rejected as deviant behaviour by mainstream opinion and all subsequent appointments are based on professional opinion rather than the personal feelings or inclinations of the gender diverse person, however innate they might be. While the first decision to transition is yours, the final decision is theirs.
There is a general opinion in the trans community that not all doctors are created equal when it comes to gender identity disorder and the treatment of transgender patients. Some are better than others and the choices can be from a far too narrow band of specialists you might have been referred to without really having any idea of their competance or history. They are the ones who hold the key to your future and it is why they are described as ‘gatekeepers’ along with every other professional along this pathological process, including the government who in most countries and regions do not support or enable gender variant lives.
So what can you do about it? Set yourself free from the negativity of the psychiatric process and don’t wait for professionals to stumble upon an outdated and sometimes offensively brutal diagnosis and treatment from the DSM. Live like there isn’t anyone stopping you from being who you want to be, the devil is in the details, so don’t focus too much on the contract you have made with him/her/hir – eventually the laws will change and the way transgender people are treated will change, as long as we protest.
Demand the respect you deserve and find equality and friendship among people who aren’t blinded by prejudice and preconceptions. The life you want is out there and I doubt psychiatry is a part of that vision, but rather a social necessity grafted into it like some kind of mad social experiment. If it is up to other people to tell you who you are, then we are not living in a free world. You have to be that person who explains to his/her/hir peers who you are, what you are about and how you will proceed with your life.
Get out there and build your own support network, connect with advocates for trans rights (which now exist in most major cities), go out and do what you want to do, be who you want to be, don’t wait on something or someone who is only vested professionally and not personally, you are far better off having the support of friends (and family). There are options available which require minimal contact with psychiatrists and although for the time being, they can be difficult or hazardous paths, they are still there. You will more than likely still need to proceed with your psychiatrist to get what you want, but if you can live without the shadow of diagnostic medicine over your head, you will change your world for the better. Respect your psychiatrist, but don’t depend on them.
Posted in: Articles, Megalomedia
Tags: autonomy, DSM IV, gender, psychiatry, transgender
November 22nd, 2011 / No Comments » / by AllyN
Everyone is entitled to an opinion. Television is one of the few places which gives the impression of freedom of speech, but in reality it recruits profitable ideas for resale and branding. When it comes to trans and genderqueer representation on television, any publicity is good publicity because it raises awareness. That being said, trailblazing roles for minorities and the oppressed classes are often found to be rather stereotyped because it has to satisfy the demands of the audience and not empower those groups. For example, mainstream audiences would feel very uncomfortable if they had to put up with the radical politics that comes being an oppressed minority.
It has been seen over and over in Hollywood and popular television, characters that represent oppressed groups are fun loving and good natured. Examples of sterotypes in the past include, the loveable tramp (who’s really an alcoholic), the kind people of colour (who are employed by rich white people and don’t want to loose their livelihoods), the extremist muslims (who are really the nicest people). It takes time before content is produced that people of those groups might actually respect. It isn’t nice thinking about television history, because it is so fucking distasteful. While this is going on, heroic efforts are made by traditionally mainstream types (whos look and character vary from nation to nation) who reinforce the status quo. No tragedy here, just good business.
What we are seeing on television with gender diverse people is a revolution, but it is just getting started. The controversy of trans people in television relates not to the issues that trans people have, but rather the issues the rest of the world has with them for being different. People are making an effort, that’s why we are seeing real trans people on TV, but at the same time I think that these people are very much censored and contributing to marketable television. When I see trans people on television, all I see are other people’s problems prescribed to us via stereotypes without challenging those pre-existing perceptions to actually change people’s minds.
Instead we see people re-inforcing them because they are our strongest root in mainstream society. We need to use stereotypes as points of reference in order to gain a foothold and an opinion in popular thought. The concessions that cisgender people make towards transgender people is through their own prejudice, reducing negative feelings and emerging as someone who has overcome their personal fears or failed miserably. This still doesn’t have anything to do with actual trans people.
If trans people were tell the real story, there would be talk of gatekeepers, discrimination, and oppression from an empire of privileged cisgender people who behave like stormtroopers of an evil empire. If the truth was told, then we’d talk about the other medications we have to take (probably because we are trans) anti-depressants and other medications that treat the mental conditions that arise from years of mistreatment and misunderstanding. We’d talk about sexuality, we’d be gay, we’d be bi, we’d be straight, we’d be asexual, polysexual and pansexual. We’d be activists, gender terrorists, politicians, bloggers, screaming and kicking out against oppression. We’d not obsess on our status as men and women but rather as something else, autonomous from and brilliantly aroused by gender. We are not cisgender wannabees.
And yet any publicity is good publicity, and stereotypes abound us for the time being, not because we are stereotypes, but that’s all that television companies and producers are buying at the moment. There are lots of interesting videos and people out there on youtube who make such elegant cases for trans representation and carry through to those who subscribe to them, an unaltered voice of solidarity and strength to the trans community and yet our public identity is based on the following sentiments -
- cliches such as putting on makeup, reverse camera shots into mirrors, before and after photos, surgery, shots in the operating theatre, transwomen in skimpy clothes, transmen in baggy pants, our chests and our genitals.
- personal things such when and why you don’t identify as cisgender, the person’s birth name, where they lived, history of violence and sexual assault, sexual history, marriage history.
- Gender affirmation – praising existing gender identities namely men and women as awesome and not challenging the validity of those ideas which feminism has been doing for years.
- One track conversation – Everything on television about trans people is about trans people doing little else than being trans. That’s just uninteresting and very offensive to the interesting people who might be in your studio who have friends of all shapes and sizes most probably, for whom being trans is not a burden but a rather small and unobstrusive part of their life.
In the history of television and its presentation of transgender people and characters, I do not feel that any of them have been sufficiently developed for me to identify with them and leads to ‘misnouning’ a person as ‘a transgender’ and not ‘a person’ and so there is a tendency for trans people to ‘other’ the people they see on television because it is soft hitting, soft core controversy that only really tweaks a cisgender mainstream audience.
Posted in: Articles
Tags: diversity, gender, genderqueer, oppression, representation, television, transgender
November 22nd, 2011 / No Comments » / by AllyN
*disclaimer: this is not about the people in the show, but the format of the show itself and the presentation of information.
*rants may be offensive
If you don’t know what I am talking about you can watch it on Youtube here.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cts4nFWHvDs&feature=player_embedded
So seven trannies get together for a retreat. I personally wouldn’t use that word, but ‘My Transsexual Summer’ doesn’t mind so much. None of these people seem to be the medicated activist type I have come to know in my own experiences with trans folk. It presumes that its seven contestants are on a magical gender slide, trying to find a position they feel most comfortable with themselves, and that self obsession is the imperative of a transsexual life. I think most people who go through puberty could relate to this time of change, sure it’s a difficult time, but eventually you adjust and move on, but it doesn’t look like our seven friends want to get over it, they just want to go on (wank) about it, but maybe that’s a British thing and not a trans thing.
Then of course there are those people who have trans identified since very young and took on cis gender affirming roles to suppress that identity. This is very sad, but also funny because just as you can imagine queer bullying comes from closeted queers, you could imagine excessive gender stereotypes are more likely to be trans identifying. So perhaps if you see a truck driving, rugby playing wife beating alcoholic, hold on to your boots, they might be about to transplain all their problems away. It’s sick and sad, but it can be unfair on other people if you get married have children, then do a 180 and say oops. It is established here is it is a shit world for trans people, but the show focuses on the sentiment ‘I’m so happy now’.
The other thing is the desperate environment they’ve created. Every conversation is about being transgender/transsexual (trans). As most trans people know, these conversations are awkward at best and provides maybe a few sentences at best. Also it often descends in a trans pissing contest (I identified as trans when I was 8, no 5! Well I actually identified as trans in the womb, but I couldn’t tell my mum. I’m actually intersex). These details really are personal and unimportant unless you are attempting to dissolve deep psychological issues with a professional. I think everyone has their story, but I prefer the story one of my ex’s gave me relating to their trans experience.
“I want to be a shemale, having tits and a cock it’s hot, and I’d totally like to fuck everything”
It seems so honest and vital and yet this attitude is invalid because why? Because we are a pathological people, gender diversity is still not welcomed, we are urged toward heteronormative behaviour. The sentiment “I love being a woman” and “I love being a man” seems to validate cisgender identities without creating anything new and distinctly trans, which I think would derive naturally from our unique experiences.
Also none of these people are interesting, the people on the show are entirely bland. I blame the domineering gayness of it all, the music, the accommodation, they are so evidently out of their element. Dancing and acting up to stereotypes that make me think their hormones are providing them narcotic effects. Shiny happy people. The reality is much worse – I’d prefer something a little more Big Brother style where privately they confess horrible experiences and their loathing for one another. For example imagine someone was honest on that show.
“I only came on this show for the money. I hate having to work in one gender and live in another because it is the only way I can survive. You know why I don’t date? I’m terrified that people will misinterpret my body and my friendships will fall apart. I actually hate being trans, it is real inconvenience and all those people who are not trans, I’m so envious I worship their image. I’m so susceptible to trashpop magazines, I want to look like Kylie. Make up is expensive, hormones are expensive, my entire fucking life is expensive, if I was rich I wouldn’t give a fuck about trans rights, I’d just get a million surgeries and pretend I’m not trans. You know, I’m not really ashamed of who I am, I’m a survivor, I’m so much stronger than most people, sure I don’t have their problems, but I’ve got my own and that gives me the right to tell you to fuck off and deal with the fact that you’re different to me.”
So for trannies, pack a dildo, sip a glass of wine, ham it up for the cameras and don’t forget to pretend like you’re happy because EVERYTHING IS FINE, I can’t emphasise that enough. No it’s not fine and it doesn’t have anything to do with the fact that when I look into the mirror I see myself putting the philospher’s stone into my pocket (hate myself), it instead has to do with the fact that we constantly deny people their identity by telling them how to be themselves, a woman looks like this, a man looks like this, behaves like this, etc and it is infuriating because there are generations of trans people growing up hating their childhoods, their experiences because if they don’t, it’s confusing for doctors, YOU’VE GOT TO HATE YOUR BODY, YOURSELF AND EVERYTHING ABOUT WHO YOU WERE and yet so many people maintain that they don’t change in the transition.
As Tilda Swinton and Virginia Woolfe put it in Orlando – Same person, different sex. You will take your problems with you, transitioning doesn’t solve your problems. The show makes out like the only thing that is different about these people is that they are trans, when in fact that would make them abnormal. Imagine if cisgender people walked around all day talking about being cis, and how they felt comfortable in their body today, it would be awkward. The trans community really needs heroes, champions who’s claim to fame is not that they are a test subject in these social and scientific laboratories, but actually kick ass… and there are plenty of them, but they don’t make it to popular media as often as those who have ‘always known they were a (gender noun) because they used to (stereotyped gender behaviour)’.
Posted in: Articles
Tags: gender, genderqueer, review, television, transition, transsexual
November 19th, 2011 / No Comments » / by AllyN
This happens every year. Every year people of diverse gender are victims of hate crimes for little reason other than being transgender. Many of these victims are young transwomen of colour, sadly showing that there are real gaps in the transgender support structure that exposes these young people to violence. In Australia, just last year there were actions after the death in custody of Veronica Baxter, a young indigenous women who committed suicide in an Australia prison after being arrested and kept in an all male prison, denied hormones and other important medication. For everyone who is trans, it means walking a fine line between safety and frivolity and on the 20th of November 2011, we once again take it all on board, as we remember the abused, the raped, the murdered and the suicides.
The people we remember on TDOR are just the tip of a slowly melting iceberg. While there are more people finding integration and adapting to life as we know it, there is still high incidences of dangerous and socially subversive behaviour from gender diverse people, who are just looking to survive the rejection and oppression handed down to them on a daily basis. I’m talking about alcoholism, drug use and sex work. Many people can thrive on this culture, finding it validating and exciting, but in my opinion it puts these people at risk of violent crimes. For some it is career to have sex for money, but too many are forced to do it in order to survive. I tip my hat to those who have successfully made a living out of having sex, but I also wish there were a greater number of alternatives and an active program that engaged transgender young people.
Now, it isn’t all bad. Things get better after all. More and more transgender support groups and social groups are springing up all the time, and if you have not yet found one that suits you, then you might have to persevere a little longer, look a little harder, but don’t give up, having a network of support is perhaps the most important thing you could do to help you progress in your transgender life.
One such group that has sprung up in Perth, is WA Trans, Unity, Support, Pride (W.A.T.S.U.P). They are having a picnic and a candle light vigil to remember those who we lost since the last time we remembered the victims of transgender hate. It is happening on the river, culminating in a symbolic throwing of native flowers into the water. More details here:
https://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=235113999882303
Posted in: Articles, Megalomedia
Tags: activism, genderqueer, international, Perth, TDOR, transgender, W.A.T.U.P
November 10th, 2011 / No Comments » / by AllyN
Whatever life choice you have made, checking in with yourself is probably a good idea, to figure everything out, the good, the bad, the worse and the delirium. There are many things to consider when doing a self diagnostic so how you go about it may vary to my own method, but here it goes.
Question 1. Are you safe and is it ongoing? Yes, I am safe, in my home, my outlook, my friendships and work. I don’t deliberately provoke danger or invite risk, but that’s because I like feeling safe and I am surrounded by people who are encouraging and supportive, even if those numbers get a bit thin sometimes.
Question 2. How are you pursuing your personal goals? There are lots of fragments of my person, and so I suppose I am hoping that they all come together at some point and then I can move on with my life. It’s a terribly neurotic state of being if you have to wait for external factors to fall into place in order to achieve personal goals, like surgery – but then again, I’m hardly in a rush to put biological synthesis ahead of a healthy social life. I am eating well, sleeping better and in an exciting relationship, all compass needles are pointing north and I feel like I am on track.
Question 3. What obstacles persist and can you resolve them? Obstacles, ack! As always money is of the least importance to my outlook, but most important to my intentions. Everyone needs money, because everyone believes in the authority it holds, and yes you need cash to negotiate the finer things in your transgender lives, but give me peace any day. It seems to be the irony, that money could buy me peace of mind (indirectly). Other obstacles… self image, when will I finally realise that if I can’t continue to use food as emotional coping mechanism. Actions for resolving obstacles: More active on work ideas to earn an ethical income, and trying a gluten free diet (why not?). White flour is the devil.
Question 4. Breaking point, what takes you to the edge? I am still infuriated by the crappy world we live, not that it is particularly crappy to me at the moment, but the crappy way most people treat other people I despise. That is to say nothing of how crappy humans are generally to other species. I think it is sad, that every day I abide by the rule of the fearsome, the powerful who are dare I say, weak in mind and spirit, and yet short term solutions are impossible. I resist, I support, I empower a better world and life for so many.
Question 5. Did any of these things happen to you today -
a. kiss - yes
b. hug - yes
c. sex - no
d. gender consent - yes
e. positive feelings about sexuality - yes
f. freedom from biology - yes
g. safer space - yes
h. positive media - yes
i. IRL connect with friends - yes
j. Online connect with friends - yes
k. Felt comfortable in your clothes - yes
l. smiled at someone - yes
m. flirted with someone - yes
n. Happy with the state of your house - maybe
o. Finished study/work load - yes
p. Read something interesting - yes
q. Felt empowered - yes
r. Achieved a goal - yes
s. Made a new goal - yes
t. Laughed - yes
u. Danced - no
v. Went out with friends - yes
w. Bought new clothes - no
x. Ate well - yes
y. Felt happy - yes
z. Would totally do it all again tomorrow - yes
So there you have it. I’m positively ecstatic! I’ve checked myself out, I think I am doing ok, as long as I don’t let the things I can’t have right now dominate my thinking. I’ve been living my life for a while now, I feel like I am getting better at it! Keep working at it, an improvement as the best success you can have and if you’re slipping, maybe you should ask a friend for support and advice. Hope you’re doing well.
Posted in: Articles, Megalomedia
Tags: gender, gender diversity, genderqueer, Queer, quiz, Trans, transgender
November 2nd, 2011 / No Comments » / by AllyN
Noone is perfect. If it at first you don’t succeed, you can pick yourself up and try again, but if you fail the second or third time, then you might as well take a break from constructive thinking and realize you’ve got some frustration to vent. Often people turn to food, alcohol or other substances to cope and deal with the pressure of trying for success and if you’re lucky you can channel that energy creatively and even artistically.
But not everyone is so lucky. I like to blog about it, write about it, seperate myself from the issues I am facing, and sometimes I like to binge on caffeine and snack food. There seem to be a lot of things that we can potentially fail at, or feel let down by – messing up your diet, facing oppression from the community, not dressing, skipping hormones, not wearing makeup, staying silent and letting other people have too much influence over your life, etc. I think we can expect mishaps, now we’ve got to think about what we are going to do about it.
It is ok to get mad, angry and self destructive and quite often there isn’t a rational way to combat a lot of the negative emotions you will be feeling, you’ve just got to realize that it doesn’t happen all the time and no matter how self destructive you might get, it’s just this moment and it isn’t going to ruin everything. You might feel like you’re really doing it tough, even failing at the goals you’ve set, but honestly there are just so many obstacles on the transgendered path, you are likely to fail more times than you succeed – soon enough though, you’ll figure out there is no right and wrong way, you’re just learning about yourself, who you are and what your limits are.
Try not to lose sight of the bigger picture, because it is one you’ve been painting most of your life. Don’t fall into the trap of making any big decisions or wishfully thought out promises, because you while you might be trying to talk yourself out of disappointment, you’re also making rules about who you are going to be, but that person, the person who you are becoming, will speak for itself.
Posted in: Articles
Tags: coping, emotions, gender identity, genderqueer, obstacles, Queer, stress
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What describes a good night out for the gender diverse community? If I was to choose for myself it would be cabaret – a night out sharing a laugh and a dance all while being entertained intermittently by the talent on offer. Cabaret appeals to the curious with diverse delights which often challenge us and entertain us and sometimes shock us. It has hardly surprising that cabaret has a history of gender crossing acts and nuances that entice and challenge mainstream attitudes. Cabaret is many things, and I love it!
