A Transgender Journey - In Transition 9
By Leela Ginelle
Do you ever feel like a sex object? I do, lately. For ten years before my transition began, I felt “shut down” sexually. I don’t think a person can really sexually shut down, though.
To me the libido seems a priori, before the fact. No matter what I’m doing, it’s running. What was I doing, then? I was hating sex. I didn’t want to have sex the way I thought I supposed to, and I didn’t want to be sexual the way I thought I had to. I’m trans, and I thought sex wasn’t.
I’m enjoying sex now, and being sexual as myself, and it’s unfamiliar. I see myself in the mirror, and I get turned on. I like my hair, my clothes, and my makeup. I think it’s a hot look.
Then I walk outside and feel afraid. If I think I’m sexy, who else does? Men? I hope not. I’m not attracted to them, and wouldn’t want to fight them off. Women? That would be flattering, but I’m seeing someone exclusively.
Am I seeking attention? It’s what some people say about women who dress femininely. Why would they dress that way, the question goes, if they weren’t seeking attention? If I am, whose attention am I seeking? Mine.
For ten years I didn’t see myself, or I didn’t see the feminine side of myself. Now that it’s out again, I fear it will go away. Where would it go, though? The last time it went away, it was because I decided there wasn’t a place for it in the world. Now I’m learning there is.
This whole process for me has been about guidance. I’ve trusted something larger than myself, and it’s helped me let my gender out. Part of me fears what would happen if the guidance went away. Would I hide my gender again?
I can’t answer the question, because to me the two are synonymous. If I consider my gender spiritual, though, then why do I see myself as a sex object? It may be because I see femininity as sexual. I try consciously not to use the words “masculine” and “feminine,” but when I feel sexual, the word feminine comes up.
It’s not all of my sexuality that triggers this, though. It’s the part that long to be desired. I feel it, and I feel vulnerable, and then I feel scared. It’s like I’ve dropped a mask. People can see me, and I think they’ll know what I’ve always felt: that I’m unlovable.
How did I think I’d hidden that? By making myself undesirable. I underate, I dressed drably, and I hid my sexuality. With that part of myself out of view, I believed I was invisible. I always feared it leaked out in other ways, though. My habits, my driving, and my solitude, I believed, showed people who I was.
I didn’t want anyone to get too close to me. I rationed myself out, for fear of being discovered. Now I’m on display in front of everyone, though, and I project rejection on to them constantly. I don’t know where some of the thoughts come from. They’re full of vicious trans- and homophobia. I hope that they’re temporary, but I fear they’ll only get worse.
When I see men, I believe they consider me gay. When I see women, I think they consider me a pervert, and all because of the look that I like. Where’s the dissonance coming from? My transition.
When I see “men,” I see what I think I’m leaving behind, “masculinity.” When I see “women,” I see what I believe is my future, “femininity.” I look at the world and see my “future” and “past,” and think both despise me. I want half, the men, to ignore me, and the other half, the women, to desire me, but keep a respectful distance.
Is this a phase? If so, the phase would seem to be believing I left one place and am heading to another, and that one was awful and the other will be marvelous. Hating sex did has its awful parts, but it wasn’t my entire life. Likewise, changing my body is something I desire, but it’s not a panacea; life will still be life.
If I’m being honest, I’m ambivalent about changing my body. Part of me desires it, and part dreads it. The orchiectomy I plan to have, will be painful and scary. The estrogen pills I want will cause me to look differently than I do now, and different than nearly everyone around me.
How do I go ahead in the face of all this fear? I just live each day. When this began, hormones and surgery seemed like a daydream. The ideas of real physical pain and change were so remote, they seemed nonexistent. Today, each is closer, and I’m processing them.
The future, when I’ll be more “feminine,” is an illusion I turn to because it bypasses all the real discomfort I’m facing. The catch is that it projects that discomfort onto the world. The world has its own problems, though, it doesn’t need mine.
If I didn’t think of the future, though, there’d be nothing to write about, or to look forward to. For ten years, when I hated sex and creativity, I worked at not writing, and attempted to look forward to nothing. I thought doing so made me “good.” Now I think not doing so makes me me.
Leela Ginelle is a journalist and the author of “The Gender Cycle: Three Plays.” Please visit zer blog at www.leelaginelle.com.
