Am I a Woman?
Entry posted by Emma
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Yesterday I exchanged emails with a good friend of mine, who's a cis woman, about how before/during/after transition I fretted about my gender. Although I feel very binary, a woman, I tell people that I'm a "woman of transgender experience" which, I hope conveys an understanding that I'm a woman first, but am also transgender, always and forever. Well, I tell myself that, but I still struggle.
My friend wrote: "The ways we try as women to fit a standard, and inevitably fail, because it's an unattainable standard."
That triggered me. I was delighted that she sees me as another woman, at least mentally. But it's habitual that I wonder how does she know? Is she saying that just to be kind? And more importantly, what am I, really?
I think we all wish that we can be "fixed" of our anxieties, to be rid of them. I'm learning that this just doesn't happen. We need to learn to live with them. Maybe this quote from Brene Brown's recent "Braving the Wilderness" will help:
"Stop walking through the world looking for confirmation that you don’t belong. You will always find it because you’ve made that your mission. Stop scouring people’s faces for evidence that you’re not enough. You will always find it because you’ve made that your goal. True belonging and self-worth are not goods; we don’t negotiate their value with the world. The truth about who we are lives in our hearts. Our call to courage is to protect our wild heart against constant evaluation, especially our own. No one belongs here more than you.
True belonging doesn’t require you to change who you are; it requires you to be who you are."
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