[Blog/Commentary] [USA] Ask Matt: A Question for the Questioning

[Stephanie Stevens]

Matt Kailey, USA


Ask Matt: A Question for the Questioning

May 20, 2013 by Matt Kailey


A reader writes: “Asking this question on behalf of all the
questioning folks out there: If you’re comfortable sharing, what all
have you identified as on your gender journey? And what times (if any)
were particularly tough/confusing?”

Questioning gender can be very difficult, although it’s not as hard, I
would think, as it was way back when, when there was just one model or
“blueprint” to choose from, and everyone was expected to go down a
prescribed path – if they fit the established criteria.

At least now, there are different options and alternatives available,
and information is out there for almost everyone in almost every
situation. But that comes with its own set of problems.

I can’t say that I personally was ever questioning my gender – at
least not in the sense that we talk about it today – because I was
sure for over forty years that I was a girl/woman. I didn’t think that
was what I was supposed to be, but I thought that was the way it was
and that there was nothing I could do about it. I didn’t know that
there was anyone else like me, and I didn’t know that what I was
experiencing had a label and was an actual identified “thing.”

Once I discovered that, there was again very little questioning
involved, because I knew what I was going to do – transition and live
as a man. I would say that my questioning came in after I started
transition and found that I wasn’t really fitting what I considered to
be the “standard man” mode. That’s when, thanks to my therapist, I
adopted the permanent label of trans man, and I have not changed that
since.

So my gender identity went from girl to woman to man (for a very brief
time) to trans man. And that is where it has stayed. And the most
confusing time for me was as I said above – when I didn’t really feel
like I fit as a “man,” and I wasn’t sure what that meant or where I
could go from there.

But I had a lot of models to look at, because I knew, when I found out
what “transgender” was, that I would transition, I had learned to use
the Internet by then, and I was able to see lots of guys who might
have identified as men or who might have identified as trans men, but
who were out and visible and who I could relate to.

Even though growing up as a girl and woman was tough for me in many
ways, it wasn’t the same as living an entire life of really
questioning my gender. It wasn’t the same as having a bunch of paths
out there that could be available to me and trying to decide which one
fit me and which one to choose. That is almost more difficult, in some
ways, than what I went through, which was not knowing that there were
any paths at all.

I think it’s also easier if you are very certain of your path. There
are many people out there who absolutely know that they have gender
“issues,” and they absolutely know how they are going to resolve them.
They are going to follow a blueprint of some sort. It might not be the
exact one prescribed by the medical and psychiatric communities, or it
might. But whether it is a traditional path or one given a few
personal tweaks, it is a definite path, nonetheless.

While having a lot of choices and a lot of paths to explore might
sound like a very positive thing, psychologists have determined that
the more choices we have (in almost anything in life), the more
unhappy we become. People tend to be happier when their choices are
limited.

So while I think that the whole exploration thing is essential for
many people, and that no one should be forced into a specific
blueprint or road map that is not right for them or feel pressured to
make any decisions if they are not sure, questioning and
self-exploration can have its own difficulties.

That doesn’t mean you shouldn’t continue to question. You should
question as long as you still have a question in your mind. You have
to learn to adjust to the ambiguity and uncertainty, possibly seeing
it on the road before you for a long time to come, and I think that
would be very difficult –but, at the same time, very liberating, if
you approach it that way. If you approach it as a challenge, not a
problem, it will be much more fun, educational, and self-fulfilling.

The most important thing, in my opinion, is to take your time as you
are figuring out the answers to your questions. Take all the time that
you need, whether it be forty days or forty years. One good thing
about questioning is that you get to set your own timetable, and you
don’t know how long that timetable should take, because you don’t know
what’s at the end of it. So just keep exploring.

That was my long answer to a short question that was really addressed
to the readers, not to me. So readers who are, or ever were,
questioning, the questions are: “What all have you identified as on
your gender journey? And what times (if any) were particularly
tough/confusing?”


http://tranifesto.com/2013/05/20/ask-matt-a-question-for-the-questioning/