On Gay Fervor

This article is a little bit different. Typically, I write letters to my mom, explaining things I struggle to explain to her in person. Today, I’m writing this letter to my father. It is in response to a conversation we had about the gay “lifestyle” being “dangerous” to my queer sibling. 

 

Dad,

For the record, the government, including the Reagan Administration, failed to respond to the AIDS epidemic in a timely manner. It took them years to mobilize and fund research for treating HIV and AIDS. The only explanation is homophobia and the Religious Right political movement blaming the victims, letting thousands and thousands die deaths they “deserved” for “choosing” an “immoral” gay “lifestyle.” The current refusal to acknowledge this only serves to further endanger the lives, mental health, and security of millions of queer people. If we cannot acknowledge and account for the mistakes of the past, we cannot prevent those mistakes from happening again.

Gay rights fervor goes way beyond an overreaction to being called a faggot once as a child. It is a response to a repeated, historical failure to value queer lives and voices, especially queers of color. Everything from the classification of any sex act that wasn’t procreative, missionary-style, and between a married man and woman as a heinous sin in sodomy laws, to the medicalization and classification of “types” of people based on their sexual acts and attractions at the turn of the 20^th century (it was first white, straight male doctors who classified “homosexuals” as a type of person around which an identity is structured, not the gay rights movement), to, from the thirties to the sixties, threatening them with the loss of their jobs and rights for simply being sexual beings, something that is integral to most human beings, something we’ve always granted to straight people.

I will not apologize for this viewpoint. It is simply an acknowledgement of the facts. Failure to acknowledge this truth is a failure to live in the world as it really is, to choose to live in an illusion, a hallucination, a false world. People simply do not make up stories like this to fuel a martyr complex. The rights of a marginalized group of people are not secured through legislation alone. It takes a conscious pivot on the part of all of society, which can never be accomplished if that society refuses to remember, perceive, listen, and understand the suffering of it’s own kin.

So fuck off.

–Austin

On Invisibility

Note: Contains discussions of anxiety and mental anguish.

 

Dear Mom,

Generally, we, as American consumers of media, think of invisibility as a super power; it’s about controlling when, where, and by whom you are seen, or not. But invisibility isn’t really a power if you’re cursed with it, forced to be it.

Obviously, I’m not speaking of true and complete, controllable invisibility here. That’s for super heroes like Violet Incredible and Miss Martian. I’m talking about a partial invisibility, one that renders your bits of your self invisible, even to you.

There’s a line of thinking in post-modernism that describes this mysterious “unseeability” curse. It goes something like this: Language (or more accurately, a lack of it) renders “real” experiences indescribable, and therefore non-existent, unreal, invisible. I can only describe the pain of a headache as a series of more concrete metaphors and similes: It feels like someone’s driving an ice pick into my skull; I feel like my brain is being squeezed; I feel like a shuttle pod landed on my head. We might be able to use less metaphorical descriptions in the world of medicine: Can you describe the pain? Is it burning, shooting, sharp, dull, aching? Medicine has given us lots of ways to talk about the very personal and private experience of pain, but not really a good way to express what that pain truly feels like. For that, we go back to using those metaphors.

Mental, emotional, psychological pain is even harder to express. John Green recently wrote a book about a young woman suffering from anxiety and invasive thoughts. His earnest hope was that he would be able to express his own psychological suffering that he has experienced as someone with OCD. As someone who does struggle and has struggled with both anxiety and intrusives, but not OCD, I feel he has captured the suffering I have felt in a way I’ve never seen anyone else do before. But in that story, the protagonist finds it extremely difficult to express her pain, even to those closest to her; all her metaphors ultimately fall short. This has been my experience: All the words in all the world don’t seem enough to show someone who hasn’t suffered like I am exactly what it feels like, why I do what I do. How do I explain why I feel like everything is crashing down around me, like it’s all too much, when I have a cushy existence in a nice apartment with no debt, a perfect partner, and infinite free time? Or how I am trapped in an existence I don’t want, an existence that is consumed by chest-tightening, paralyzing, infinite-death-spiraling anxiety? I just end up sounding selfish, self-centered, ungrateful, whiny.

Ethan still doesn’t understand my interrogation of my gender. We can usually talk about all sorts of things, from depression, to social inequality, to laundry. And we can talk about them in-depth, wanderingly, for hours. But gender? Not so much. I’ve stopped talking about it because, at some point, he just sort of goes, “I just don’t get why this is such a thing for you. You are what you are.” Don’t get me wrong, Ethan is hella supportive of my gender journey. He just doesn’t get it. It’s not important to him what label I use for myself. It’s plainly obvious to him that I am genderqueer, not a woman. Why do I spend so much time worrying whether I’m a butch woman or a femme genderqueer or a flippin’ android? All he knows is that my year of genderqueer exploration and discovery has made me more awesome, and made him fall more in love with me.

It is my opinion, as a professional queerer of gender, that the reason Ethan and I struggle to talk about my gender is because there are no words to describe the personal, unique, internally experience that is one’s gender. Yes, there are a myriad of words to describe gender externally: butch, woman, man, masculine, feminine, genderqueer, gender fluid, on and on and on. But none of those words have ever felt right to me, even genderqueer, which I adopted I view it as being an umbrella for “I don’t know what the heck is going on here, but it sure as shirt ain’t binary” genders. And all of these words about gender are external descriptors, in my view, not able to fully capture the internal experience of being a gender.  Words like “butch” are like “shooting pain.” What is “shooting pain,” anyway, other than a medical shorthand for a diagnosis of something nerve-related? At what point does it go from shooting to sharp? When does a woman cross that line into masculine enough to be called “butch?”

The answer is, of course, that all of these words are subjective. My definition of “butch” probably overlaps a good deal with other people’s definitions. That’s why we can use these words and have them mean something. But these overlaps are not perfectly matched; they are shaped by each individual’s experiences in the world. Maybe to some a butch woman has to look like Big Boo, with tattoos and muscles and short hair and a tough attitude, or maybe she only has to like wearing “men’s” pants.

The problem here is reading; that is, reading other people’s genders. I see Big Boo and I think “butch woman.” It helps that she routinely identifies herself as such. But when people look at me, what do they see? A lesbian. A tomboy. A butch woman. In other words, someone, despite all the signals to the contrary, they believe they can call “ma’am,” “lady,” and “dear” with certainty. Someone they still gender as a woman, if a bit of an alternative, masculine one.

But I’m not a woman. I’m just not. Because of my lack of language I can’t say much about what my gender is. But I can say what I am not: I’m not a woman. But people can’t see that. When they see me, they only have their two categories, so they shunt me into the one they think makes the most sense: almost invariably “woman,” and always invariably wrong.

This happened to Ethan too before he started his long hair in a ponytail. People would call him “miss” and then be incredibly embarrassed when he turned around and they saw his five o’clock shadow. There are only two boxes, and you’d better not get it wrong.

But what happens if you know for certain you don’t fit into one of those boxes? Forced invisibility. No one sees you. They just see a shadow of you, the thing they need to see to maintain their worldview. It’s like I’m a monster in a Lovecraft story: too horrible to be fully seen, fully comprehended, so I become a werewolf, a hound, a nasty prankster, or a man in a mask — unreal and untrue, but safe. I’m not a “me.” I am a box.

I tried to ignore this invisibility. Or rather, I tried to pretend it didn’t bother me. I used the women’s bathroom without mental complaint. I saw two pedestrians on a school crossing sign, one obviously male, one obviously female, and pretended it didn’t matter that, for all that sign said, I didn’t exist. When announcers say “ladies and gentlemen,” when academic articles discuss “women” and “men” but not anything else, in between or otherwise, when all I see on television are cis women and cis men, it’s like no one out there acknowledges me. It’s like I don’t exist.

Yes, everyone puts everyone in a box. Yes, no one can fully be seen for who they are by anyone else. But imagine that something as fundamental and essential to you as breathing did not have words to describe it. Like you had a feeling in your arm your whole life. You knew that feeling was there, and you assumed everyone else did too. But then when you try to ask about it, explore that feeling, everyone looked at you like you were crazy. And you found out that the words used to describe feelings in your arm — pain, pressure, heat, cold — did not adequately describe the feeling. You try to tell people, “It’s like there’s always a needle there, but it doesn’t hurt, it just feels hard, but like, also soft, you know?” And of course they couldn’t know. They could guess, if they tried. But without adequate words, it would be immensely difficult to get your point across. And most people wouldn’t bother. They’d try to put the feeling in a box: “It’s just your muscle,” “Everyone feels weird stuff in their body sometimes,” “You’re just imagining it.” And then, if you insisted, they’d try to put you in a box: “Stop making up stories,” “You’re just looking for attention,” “You’re crazy.”

All I’m trying to say here is that words are inadequate, people and their selves and feelings are more complicated and mysterious than language can express, and mystery and unknowns scare the crap out of people, so they pretend those mysteries and unknowns don’t exist. And all this renders people like me, with different and therefore inexpressible kinds of experiences and feelings, invisible.

So when I find the courage to correct someone’s binary reading of me, that’s like drawing a border around that invisible part of myself. When I see a representation of myself in media (shout out to Mal Blum, and Stevonnie!), I sketch in some texture. When I wear what I’m comfortable in and eschew dresses and high heels, when I get my hair cut short, when I get rid of my shaver, when I change my name, I color-in with brilliance.

I love you, mom.

Love,

Austin

 

P.S.: This post was inspired in part by Riki Wilchin’s book, Queer Theory, Gender Theory, and an as-yet unreleased song by the lovely and relatable Mal Blum.

On Your Response

Dear Mom,

You responded to my letter last weekend. It was an email, short-ish and sweet. It wasn’t a desperate email, a despairing email, nor a disparaging email. Much that I had feared wasn’t contained in its digital text. You were supportive, you said you didn’t mean to force me to be a certain way, you promised to try to respect my wishes. You even asked questions about how you can do better. Wow.

And behind the whole of your response was a desire to get to know me, to be closer to me. I don’t want to jump to conclusions. I don’t want to get my hopes up too high. But I’ve missed you mom. I needed the space of the last few years to grow on my own, apart from your expectations, and what I thought were your expectations. But now, I’d like to try to be close to you again. We will see how you do in person next month, when Ethan and I visit you for Christmas. I’m looking forward to it.

I love you, mom.

Love,

Austin

 

On Our Thanksgiving Meal

Dear Mom,

How was your Thanksgiving? What did you and the rest of the family have for dinner? Did dad make something special? Did Jo? Did you have anyone else over too?

Ethan and I had Thanksgiving a day late this year due to some turnip troubles. I guess we forgot to buy the ingredients for the vegetarian mushroom gravy, so we had to wait until Friday evening to have our feast. But it was definitely worth the wait.

The lentil nut roast was in the oven for more than an hour. Celery, onions, carrots, parsley, walnuts, hazelnuts and mushrooms, all chopped finely and mixed together and pressed into a pan. The mashed potatoes were vegan: almond milk, vegan butter, salt, and of course, potatoes. We didn’t bother peeling those potatoes. Now that I have to do my own peeling, the brown skin no longer takes away from the sublime experience that is mashed potatoes. The mushroom gravy, hard-won and delicious: home made mushroom broth, leftover fried mushrooms, celery, turnips, and a rutabaga (they only had two turnips at the store), all blended together. So good. The cranberry relish was your recipe, with the bits of orange in it. And to make the meal “healthful,” we had steamed green beans. It was a lovely feast for two, especially with seconds (and thirds) of mashed potatoes, despite happening a little later than expected.

I hope your Thanksgiving went well, mom. I love you.

Love,

Austin

On the Upcoming Holiday

Dear Mom,

Thanksgiving’s coming up, huh? I guess you’ll be visiting your side of the family –  my aunts, uncles, cousins, and cousins’ kids – today, having a delightful and well-organized (if not entirely relaxing) Thanksgiving potluck meal. Sadly, I’ll be missing it again this year. Whose job is it to “do” the turkey? What are you, dad and Jo going to be bringing? Is Jo even going? Who will be there? Will it be at Uncle Barris’ house, like it was when I still went? Or will it be somewhere else?

I miss those family meals –cozy heat emanating from the fireplace and the furnace in the basement; the long, plastic-covered tables; putting up all the folding chairs and setting the places; the loud and boisterous laugh and talking of everyone; the kids of my cousins playing entertainingly; and of course, the delicious and masterfully-prepared, if not exactly healthful, food: creamed corn, your homemade orange-cranberry relish – passed down from your mom — turkey, ham, buttered green beans, rolls with pats of yellow butter, seconds, thirds, fourths. . .

I’ve missed being with my extended family since I moved here – I haven’t seen them since my wedding in 2012. I guess that’s the main reason I’ll be visiting for Christmas this year, to see them again – along with a slightly impish desire on my part to show off my full self (or as much of it as I can manage) to our very conservative and . . . sheltered relatives. I hope to break down a couple of mental boxes, simply being there wearing a binder and tie, with short-short hair and sideburns, and crossing my legs “like a man,” all while clearly being happy and in a still-too-cute-to-stomach relationship with a man, Ethan. Not a lesbian, not straight, not a woman. . . Whaaaaaat?

Don’t worry mom, I won’t be antagonistic. I’ll just be me.

And I’m looking forward to it.

 

I love you, mom.

Love, Austin

On The Letter

Dear Mom,

Well, I’ve done it. I’ve sent you the letter – the letter stating, clearly and explicitly, my identity as genderqueer, my views on gender and sex, and my boundaries. You’ve probably gotten that pencil-on-lined-paper letter by now, though I haven’t heard anything from you. Maybe you’re waiting to read it until you can do it all at once; that what I would do if I got a three-page-long, hand-written letter from someone I cared about.

Part of me is pretty worried about what you’ll say, what you’ll do after you’re finished. Will you be angry, sad, depressed, ambivalent? Will you call me, crying, forcing me to deal with your sadness and pain at my message? Will you write me a response instead? Which would I prefer? Will you even be able to finish reading?

I’ve thought about best and worst-case scenarios, though I’m not even sure what those will look like. Is the best-case scenario you trying to understand, calling me, and wanting to talk at length about my identity? Or is that the worst-case scenario? Do I really want to you to try to understand? Or would that mean getting my hopes up again – my hopes that you will love me, all of me, and really be my mom – only to have those hopes dashed like sea water against sharp rocks? Would I prefer you to pretend the revelation and clarification never happened, follow my wishes, and ignore my non-conforming gender entirely? Is it better or worse for you to ignore this central aspect of my identity? Do I want to be the whole Austin in my interactions with you, or do I want to simply get through them, do my duty, and live my most fulfilling life outside my relationship with you? I don’t know.

I try to let that part of me that wriggles and writhes with anxiety at your possible reactions out for air occasionally – let it speak its peace, and then carefully address its concerns. After all, the ball is in your court now; there’s nothing I can do but wait. Worrying will not help me be more prepared to respond to you. And anyway, I did not write this letter for you, mom. I wrote it for me: to express, to explain, to set boundaries, to speak my truth. What you do with that truth is up to you, and my work here is done.

I love you, mom.

Love, Austin

On White Poppies

Dear Mom,

This week, I’ve been wearing a felt White Poppy that I made out of felt, magnets, and embroidery floss. It’s a small piece, about 3-4 inches in diameter, with four large, white petals, a green leaf sticking out of one side, and a center of knotted-up black floss. The two magnets at the back affix it to my clothes without putting holes in them.

Wearing a Red Poppy is a common practice in the UK, as well other states that were formerly part of the British Empire, for the two weeks preceding Remembrance Day (what we call Veteran’s Day). Some people wear Red Poppies in the US too, but it is much less ubiquitous here. Typically these simple paper Red Poppies (also called Remembrance Poppies) are bought from the Royal British Legion, which fund raises for British Army Veterans. They represent the remembrance, honor, and support for the troops, specifically those who participated in World War I, but also all those who have served after.

Some in the UK, instead of wearing Remembrance Poppies, wear White Poppies as a symbol of pacifism. The White Poppy sends a message of support for the troops and for veterans, with the added hope for the end of all wars, and concurrently, the rejection of war as a legitimate means of solving conflicts. Such a stance often provokes backlash in the UK, which Philosophy Tube (who put me on to wearing the White Poppy in the first place) sees as a result of the UK’s (and other Western, Neo-Liberal nations) glorification of war. In fact, in “In Flander’s Fields,” the poem that originated the tradition of wearing Remembrance Poppies to honor veterans, the fallen soldiers entreat the living to carry on the conflict.

For myself, I am grateful to all of those who have fought in the wars of this nation, because of what they have sacrificed, what they have left behind, and what they continue to do. But I also want to qualify that that support and gratitude does not mean I think that war, fighting, soldiers, blood, and death are legitimate ways to solve conflicts between nations. Perhaps a radical notion, but one I stand by nonetheless.

 

I love you, mom. Happy Veteran’s Day.

 

Love,

Austin

On The Hair Cut

Dear Mom,

I finally got my hair cut today. (*Sigh of relief*)

I’ve been wanting to do that for weeks; it got too long to put up in my typical “Adam Lambert Faux-Hawk” style last month, so I’ve been doing the “cute queer with enormous glasses and a mussed rag top” look since then, with the occasional foray into Dark Green Handmade Slouchy Hat Land.

But no longer! Today, my hair has returned to its chosen home: The United Republic of Hot Butch Rock Star.

I went to my regular hair expert, Cookie of Topper’s Salon, and told her: “The usual, but with longer side-burns.” I’m always impressed with how she always remembers exactly how she did my hair last time, even if it’s been several months since I was in there last. I know that’s part of her job, but I’m still awed.

We’ve been iterating on this haircut for about two years now, and I think we finally got it juuuuust right: About two-and-a-half inches on top, number two shave on the sides and back, with my sideburns left at about an inch’s length, and the top styled into the signature “Hershey’s Kiss” look. Walking out of Topper’s, with my black vegan-leather jacket over a light grey hoodie, tie-and-sweater combo, finally able to wear my binder again (after some stomach issues this whole week), and sporting my trusty backpack – all of those items, those cultural symbols, commingle with the finally-perfect haircut. And it feels pretty great, I will admit.

I love you, mom.

 

Love,

Austin

A Letter to My Mother

Normally, I use this space to write prospective letters to my mom, letters I do not plan on showing her. I do this to give myself an outlet for the things I would like to say to her but feel I cannot say, for various reasons.

This post is different.

This is a letter I have actually written to my mother. I will copy it’s text by hand onto notebook paper and send it to her. 

Some of this may sound familiar; I have used some of the theoretical letters from this blog to help inform this one. Keeping this blog, writing these letters, has helped me find and shape the words I write to someone I love, but with whom I have a difficult and complicated relationship.

 

Dear Mom,

My heart has been heavy with things unsaid since I last spoke to you about my gender. I feel that I did not fully express myself to you, and that there are a few things that need clarification. I am not telling you any of this because I need or expect your acceptance of this important and central part of me. I simply need to be able to speak my truth to you for my own sake, my own soul, my own mental health, so that you will have the best opportunity to understand.

Let me start again from the beginning: I am genderqueer. By saying this, by identifying this way, I am planting my flag in a number of particular philosophical claims.

First, I am stating that gender and sex are not the same thing. Sex is the bits (gentitals) you are born with, most commonly divided into vulva and vagina = female and penis and testicles = male; it is also your hormones and chromosomes. All of sex is biologically, physically located, and most of it can be altered through various means. Based on what I know about you, your sex is female.

Gender, on the other hand, is more nebulous – a feeling, an identity, a set of behaviors, attitudes, perspectives, performances, and stylistic cues like clothes, hairstyle, body language, voice, and so on. Typically, we associate biological females with femininity and womanhood, and biological males with masculinity and manhood. Thus, we get the “It’s a girl!” or “It’s a boy!” announcements when a baby is born – their genitals are presumed to match their gender identity. People who identify with the gender they were assigned at birth are called “cisgender,” and “ciswoman” or “cisman” more specifically. At this point, in our culture, most people tend to fall into this cisgender category.

This leads nicely into the second statement I make by claiming the identity “genderqueer:” gender is socially constructed. This simply means that gender is not innate and it is not tied to biology. Rather, gender is a category that a society creates. Society agrees upon the boundaries of the various genders it recognizes. The fact that gender is socially constructed is demonstrated by the way that gendered expectations change over time and across cultures. For example, before the 1940’s pink was considered a more appropriate color for boys than for girls, since it was seen as robust and strong. On the other hand, blue was seen as being a more appropriate color for girls, since it was considered dainty and soft. Now, of course, those understandings have completely switched.

The idea that gender is socially constructed does not render gender irrelevant or unimportant, nor does it mean that gendered categories do not share any similarities over time or across cultures. Gender is still extremely important, for the simple fact that it is constructed by humans: people care quite a lot about which gender a person is for the purposes of categorizing them and then interacting with them. And there are many gendered expectations that have persisted for long periods of time and between cultures: women and females are typically associated with passivity, fertility, and taking up less space, whereas men and males are typically associated with action, aggression, and taking up a lot of space. But of course, there are so many variations and exceptions within these categories that there is no way to pin down exactly what a “woman” is or a “man” is. Many people, smart people, have tried and failed.

The third claim I am making is that gender is not a binary – that is, that there are more than two opposed genders (woman and man). You already know a little about this with Jae and their genderfluidity. They move between genders. Genderqueer and genderfluid individuals fall under the greater category of “non-binary,” which is a term for genders that are between, neither, both, or entirely outside of the categories of “women” and “men.” We don’t hear about them in the U.S. often, but there are several cultures across the world which acknowledge and celebrate genders between or transcending the categories of “woman” and “man.”

For myself, my gender is released from the category of “woman” to be something more “in between” – at the crossroads of the masculine and the feminine – the best of both worlds. It is a space that I love to inhabit, a space that encompasses my full self. I strive to be active, intelligent, strong, and full of agency, while also being empathetic, cooperative, and loving. Obviously you don’t have to be a man to be intelligent, and you don’t have to be a woman to be loving. But as women and men, people are still bound by society to certain roles and expectations. Genderqueer for me, is, among other things, a way to free myself from the baggage of other people’s expectations that I will portray feminine attributes, and the corresponding ways they treat me.

There are some specific, practical things that I need you to understand about my genderqueerness. First, I am not a woman, I am not “still” a woman, just because I still have female bits. Technically, that means I am not your daughter. But I am still your kin, your offspring, your beloved child, and you are still my beloved mother.

Second, I need you to stop sending me heavily feminine-gendered symbols: pink flowers and bicycles, calling me “lady” or “pretty,” and so on. I like receiving notes from you; I still display the card with the Weymouth painting. It makes me feel good to know that you are thinking of me. But when you send me cards and notes that are so heavily gendered as womanly – that is, as something I am not – I feel hurt because it comes across to me that you don’t accept my authentic, genuine gender.

I am not just a “more masculine woman.” I am not a tomboy. Saying that I am would reject the claims I have made above about gender. Also, my experience of encompassing both genders isn’t simply a universal feeling that everyone has. It is common for people to feel that they don’t fit perfectly into their assigned gender, since no one is perfectly masculine or perfectly feminine. But that common experience does not erase my own experience of being “in the middle” or transcending “man” and “woman.” What I am and who I am goes beyond just “not quite fitting” into the category of “woman.”

I am also not just going through a phase. I may someday stop wearing binders, ties, and collared shirts, and I may identify as a different gender. Everybody changes throughout their lives, even things as fundamental as gender can change too. But that will not change the validity and importance of who and what I am today. This is who I am today, and that is enough.

This is the happiest I have ever been in my life. I feel comfortable, normal, safe, secure, and confident in myself and in my life like never before. My feet are on the solid foundation of self-understanding. I am finally learning who I am, I am finally starting to trust my intellect and my emotions as having valid things to say. My emotions tell me how things are going with me – I do my best to listen to them, even the negative ones. I don’t push them away, afraid of what I might find out about myself. And I am smart, really smart. I have worked and continue to work hard to learn skills of critical thinking and analysis. I take apart ideas to see what makes them tick. I use the ideas and techniques that have proved valuable, useful, beneficial, helpful to improve myself and by extension, the world around me. My relationships with other people are becoming better and better. I am so happy to be learning and experiencing so much.

I know it doesn’t seem like all of this has to do with gender. But imagine you were told all your life you were a boy, by everyone around you, and not just your parents. You were dressed in blue, given trucks to play with, and told never to cry and to “act like a man.” When you got older, everyone expected you to be a father and a breadwinner. How would you feel?

I can’t answer that question for you, but I can answer for me – I would feel utterly and fundamentally confused. I would feel like I was going crazy, because the whole rest of the world couldn’t be wrong, could it? I would push myself to fit into the category that was forced upon me, denying my own self, my thoughts, my desires, my feelings, repressing them, afraid of what they would tell me. I would be a ship without an anchor, a castle built on the sand, a vapor in the wind. I would not be able to say anything with confidence, because if I could be so wrong about something so fundamental to my identity as my gender, how could I really understand anything? And none of this would be explicit – I wouldn’t literally think these thoughts. A lot of it would happen behind the scenes. I would repress desires so I didn’t even know I had them anymore, but they would still be there. I would feel like a constant outsider, afraid of letting others in, in case they found out how broken I was, but not knowing that was what I feared. I would seek validation from everyone and everything, performing people-pleasing to everyone to feel like I was good, valuable. I would suffer from anxiety and depression for a long time. And it would take a lot of hard work and self-reflection to begin to claw my way out again.

I’m not saying that claiming “genderqueer” has fixed all my problems. But it has given me a solid foundation, a strong framework from which to start working on myself.  I am not perfect; I still have a long way to go in managing my anxiety and depression, becoming more courageous, setting boundaries, acknowledging and feeling myself as valid, caring for others, and so much more. But now, I have solid, nutritious earth to plant my roots in so I can grow, and grow, and grow.

I know that this is a lot for you to grasp. I love you. And I hope you can love me enough to try to understand, to see me for my true, authentic self, to know me and accept me. All of me.

Love, your kin,

Austin*

 

 

*I am not using my chosen name in the letter I will send to my mother. I am using the nickname based on my birth name. I decided it would be too complicated to have the name conversation with my mom while also trying to set the above boundaries.

On This Week’s Depression

Dear Mom,

I haven’t been feeling well the few days. I’m not sick, not physically. There is no cough or congested sinuses or nauseated stomach. I am depressed, and it’s a doozy. As in, full-on hopelessness, why bother’s, and I’m too whiny and selfish to function. Some other ugly stuff I won’t even mention here.

There are lots of things I could point to and say, “That contributed to my depression:” I’ve started to feel like I am no longer working towards a college degree for myself, but rather so Ethan can follow his freelancing dreams; that idea has put a lot more pressure on me, even as I realize that I’m not sure I want to go to the local state university after I graduate from community college, so I feel like I’m floundering with no plan at all; I haven’t been getting enough sleep (Stranger Things 2 just came out); I have a cold sore (which somehow always knocks me down for the count); I haven’t been meditating (I was sick and then I was busy); a friend of mine whom I admire, respect, and look up to is burning himself out in the same way I was a year or two ago, and I over-empathize with his struggle for perfection, taking his burden upon myself (I’m not so good with emotional boundaries yet).

None of this is anyone’s fault, including mine. It is easy to say, “Well, if I had just gotten my sleep schedule back on track, if I had just meditated last week, If I had just…” Yes, I’m more likely to become depressed when I let these healthful practices lag. Yes, I can do better. But sometimes, life just gets in the way, circumstances are beyond my control. And I can’t always predict when depression will hit. It’s best not to dwell on what I could have done and just take care of myself.

A few years ago, when this would happen, I would try to push myself through it for a while, insisting I keep up with the (often ridiculous) schedule I had placed myself on. When I would inevitably fail and spend a whole day watching Netflix and playing video games, I would internally berate and flagellate myself for not working, for procrastinating, for being lazy. That would only make the depression worse and worse. The funk-cycle would last for weeks. In fact, for five to seven years, I forgot what it was like not to be depressed.

This week, based on self-learning and advice from my therapist and from Ethan, I just let myself be depressed. I got up just in time to make it to school on time. I attended my classes and came straight home. I did a little homework (just enough to keep up). Wednesday and Thursday I just played video games and binge watched Orange is the New Black and Stranger Things 2 from the time I got home to the time I went to bed, gorging myself on white cheddar popcorn and cheese crackers. I ignored as many of my chores as possible. And I did my best not to feel bad about any of it.

You may see this and think, “Not exactly the most healthful practices.” But this is what I need to do to survive my depression. I must listen to my body, give myself a serotonin and dopamine bump where I can find it, and above all, not feel guilty for taking care of myself.

I also engaged in some more traditionally healthful activities: I’ve been getting more sleep. Today, I had a large, balanced breakfast with protein and fruit. I’m working on getting some homework done, but I’m not pressuring myself to make it my best work. I did laundry, put the dishes away, and tidied up the apartment. Tonight, Ethan and I might actually make a real meal for dinner!

Treating my depression is more about providing myself with support for when I am depressed, and not about avoiding depression. For example, I try to regularly meditate so I can notice my thoughts, and therefore notice when I’m becoming depressed. This time around, I could notice that I was becoming depressed and adjust my schedule and expectations for myself accordingly. I could talk to Ethan about what was making me feel anxious – and thereby causing the depression – a little at a time. Meditation also helps me to be more present in my body, so I can just do what I need to do – like staring off into the distance, covering my face with my hands when I have a headache, or eating an entire bag of popcorn – when I need to do it. I can’t tell you how nice it is to just let myself lay in bed and snuggle the dog when I’m feeling depressed and that is literally all I want to do. It doesn’t make the depression disappear, but it does soften it, as I give into what my body and brain are telling me I need above all: rest.

One of the other life-infrastructures I have built that helps me when I’m depressed is, perhaps unintuitively, getting rid of stuff. You see, because we have fewer objects, we have fewer things to put away and clean up. It is a lot harder to keep a home from feeling like it’s going to a pig sty in a handbasket (not to mention annoying other family members!) if there’s a lot of stuff coating every surface. A few dishes on the counter, a bag on the table and a messy couch begin to feel overwhelming. I have had and taken the time and energy to pare down our stuff to a graceful minimum. Now, when I’m depressed, it is a lot easier to let a few things, like bags, dishes, and messes, go for a few hours or days, until I can and feel like dealing with them.

I’m hoping that I will be able to get all my homework done today, and still have enough time to relax (perhaps take a bath or a nap?) before Ethan gets home. I have a few more things to do. But I’m trying to take my time, and give myself some space. I’m not at 100% yet. But I’m getting there.

It’s funny how nice depression can be for me, when I’m not forcing myself to do more than I can, when I just take the time to be.

I love you mom. Have a good weekend.

 

Love,

Austin