Things that make you go hmmmm…

Life is full of coming out moments, and some coming outs are in stages and some are required to be repeated many times to many different people, and groups and it can be exhausting and it can make you go hmmm, maybe I should just have a great big sign on my forehead or something.

But, I think in fact these moments are important. They are important for us in knowing ourselves, and allowing ourselves to be known. Sure, it can be frustrating, it can be annoying, it can be scary and downright frightening but it is what it is.

This, though, is not what I want to talk about, and why I started that way, I am not 100% sure, perhaps it gives a starting point, a point at which this thing that I am going to talk about started to shift and change and started to make me go hmmm.

Reflection. Specifically, my reflection, that image that stares back at me from the mirror when I look at it. Transition has impacted it in physical ways, there is no denying that, when I look at images from a few months ago, I can see that there are definite physical changes to my face. But here’s the thing, and it’s a big thing!

Actually it’s a massive humongous thing. A thing that I never ever believed could be a thing. But it is a thing. And it’s kind of joyous.

I don’t hate the reflection that looks back at me anymore. It’s not ugly, disgusting, horrible and something I cringe as soon as I see it.

This is truly a remarkable thing. before coming out, before beginning transition and most certainly before commencing medical transition, it was always the case that I could only see myself, in terms of physical features as ugly and unattractive.

I suppose that over the years of living a life of pretence in the wrong gender, not suppose, but in fact, from time to time I was told I was attractive or cute. I could never ever believe it though. It was a compliment I couldn’t accept. No matter how much I thought I wanted to accept it I couldn’t because what I saw was only ever ugliness personified staring back at me.

It all stands to reason, I think, that I felt that way, that I percieved myself that way. It makes sense, that whilst living in a pretence, no matter how well I had myself fooled about that across my life that, there were always kind of bubbling up things that came out. My self perception of my physical features is one of them.

A fundamental change happened when I came out though. Suddenly, I didn’t see an ugly person staring back at me. I say suddenly, and it was suddenly, because there really was a sudden change that coincided with the moment of accepting myself that my gender was not what I had been pretending it had been.

It was nuanced though. It started, I suppose with, hmmm, that’s not so hideous after all, gradually it has morphed into a sense of looking in the mirror and seeing an image that I find pleasing. It’s not been instant, but it has been profound.

Interestingly, as that has changed and progressed, my ability to accept compliments about my appearance has too. It’s been like a parallel journey of acceptance. And this seems to run parallel with my growth in confidence as a woman, my strength in maintaining that I am a woman, my confidence in expressing being a woman, choosing how I express that, choosing how my femininity is shown, to both myself and the wider world.

Coming out is an act of courage, confidence, pride and acceptance of self. It is full of preconceptions that we lay on ourselves, it is full of scenarios we imagine that range from the wonderful to the terrible. I think though, well, for me anyway, it was a must do thing.

Living stealth, that was never going to be an option for me, as my self-image, and I have spoken of external physical stuff today, but it was just as much internal, was so fragile, so piled high with negativity, that to not come out would have eventually destroyed me. It nearly did so many times. It manifest in so many negative ways, many directed at myself, and many, I am ashamed to say, at those I loved.

Transition has played a massive role in my emerging and improving positive self image. It has from a number of perspectives, through experience, medications, self-understanding and acceptance, wrought a change within me, that has made me a better person.

It has made it possible for me to look into a mirror, to walk past a shop window and see my reflection, to try on an outfit in a dressing room and look in the mirror and, not just, not hate what I see, but to in fact like what I see.

Thanks to coming out, thanks to transition, thanks to acceptance, I have been able to move through self-hatred and begin to discover self-love.

Coming out as trans is a thing that makes me go hmmm.