2019

On the eve of the next decade, it seems appropriate to do a quick look back at one of the most important and defining years of my life.

Where to begin? Obviously, with the learning of my true identity and gender relation. It has been a life long process. I like to think of it as an evolutionary process of self-discovery that eventually helped me define and finding out who I am. In the Trans community there is a fitting analogy with the butterfly:

“What the butterfly symbolizes is transformation or metamorphosis.

Basically a butterfly starts life in one stage, cocoons itself and while in that cocoon transforms into the beautiful insect that breaks out of it and becomes the winged creature you see fluttering around.

In a sense the transitions of trans people are analogous.  We start our lives in our birth gender presentation and body configuration, go through a transition, and then exit the other side of our transitions as the beautiful people we always were with the gender identity and body finally matching for us to happily live our lives.“

( taken from https://transgriot.blogspot.com/2012/07/why-butterfly-to-represent-trans-people.html)”

I never knew until this year (2019) that I was a butterfly in the making. I have found clues throughout my life, some by experimenting, some by acting on behalf of the subconscious need to find myself.

Of course, in nature, the butterfly metamorphosis happens in a linear fashion, while for a Trans person may or may not.

It definitely was non-linear for me. There was a beginning through experimenting, there was a 20-year pause, there was a violent resurgence and finally a life-changing realization.

It is also impossible to know if a butterfly throughout its morphing stages goes through incredible pain to liberate and become itself. I know, for us, Transgender people, we all go through a lot of pain, with varying degrees and at different stages. My pain was more about the struggle of not knowing that I was Trans and dealing with a profound hatred for my male outer shell that was not matching my inner one leaving me with almost chronic unhappiness.

It took me all these years until 2019 to finally find a way to verbalize it, to examine all the data collected up to this point and with the help of a few friends, my therapist and my doctor to make sense of it all.

This blog was and it is part of my outing process, a process that has grown exponentially bigger and faster than I could have ever imagined. Outing for me is a liberating feeling, it is true freedom, the final acknowledgment of who I am to myself and, just as importantly, to the people that up to this point have mattered the most in my life...

In 2019, the outing has become a necessity because I need to live my life as me, as the person I truly am because I am happy inside. Yes, there have been moments of doubts and fears. There have been painful stares and comments, derisions and other cruel things towards me, but all they have done is strengthen me, make me even more proud of being a Trans...

to be continued.