I Didn’t Ask For This

I didn’t ask for this.

I didn’t ask to be born transgender. Yes, Born. I was born this way, despite what the GOP wants you to believe. There WAS one choice in the matter: to Live or to Die. To live as the woman I was born to be, or to blow my head off. I still debate the wisdom of the path I chose.

I didn’t ask for this.

Four years ago this past week, I was thrown out of the house where I lived with my wife and daughter because I am Trans. I maybe see my daughter, now nine, once a week. She travels overseas at least once a year with her mother and her family. I am not invited. My nephews and niece think I ‘hate them” because they haven’t seen me in years. No one has told them the Truth — they don’t know about me. My daughter doesn’t know the Truth about why I moved out. Wouldn’t want to offend anyone.

I didn’t ask for this.

In less than two weeks, I will be 51 years old. I never thought I’d see 30. I desperately wanted to die on my 50th. I’m almost 51, and I have done NOTHING with my life. I can’t even support myself.

I didn’t ask for this.

I’m sitting in front of my computer in my one bedroom apartment that I share with my bestie. We can barely afford it. We both work retail, because we can’t find anything else. I apply to jobs every day. No answer. No one hires a trans woman who doesn’t “pass.” I will never retire. I’ll probably be scheduled to work on the day of my funeral.

I didn’t ask for this.

I am a proud two-time Penn State graduate (Bachelors and Masters in Education.) I am Proud of my school. This year ALONE, Penn Staters raised $10,045,478.44 for pediatric cancer research (adding to the $137 million already raised.) Today (as I write this) our football team won. Yay Nittany Lions! However, if I support my school or my team, I am called a “pedophile,” a “pedophile enabler,” or a “pedophile apologist.” Hint: I had NOTHING to do with it, and was as horrified as anyone when I heard the news.

I didn’t ask for this.

I worked to elect Clinton. (Both of them in fact.) I saw Trump as a catastrophe waiting to happen. Was I right? No — what is happening is FAR worse than I could’ve imagined. There are Nazis and Klansmen walking the streets of towns with the law looking the other way. The only people who stopped them are being demonized for doing so. Antifa? Too violent? As a student of history, I know of many other anti-fascist organizations through American history: The 82nd Airborne, The 101st Airborne, The Big Red One, Third Army, U.S. Rangers. They knew how to deal with Nazis — they shot them on sight. Now, the Nazis have approval from the occupant of the White House. And Antifa has been declared a terrorist group.

I didn’t ask for this.

Climate change has been called a lie, a scam — all kinds of things. Meanwhile, the polar icecaps are melting away, and we have “storms of the century” two or three times a year it seems. Harvey isn’t even gone, and there’s a Category FIVE hurricane heading toward Florida. Houston is under five feet of water! Oh wait — that’s what they get for not passing the transgender bathroom ban. Sound ridiculous? People have said it!

I didn’t ask for this.

My dreams are haunted by screams of the dying. And when they aren’t, I am always trying to get somewhere, but I always end up further away.

I didn’t ask for this.

I dedicated my life to serving others. I was a volunteer paramedic. I am a teacher. An activist. And for this I’m called a “snowflake” and far worse. I really want to make this world a better place — a place that my daughter can thrive and prosper. Exactly what I haven’t done.

I didn’t ask for this.

I didn’t ask to be born. I didn’t ask to be born transgender. Yet here I am. Still alive. Breathing. Writing. Writhing. Whining. Wanting.

Wishing.

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Tags: featured, Identity, passing, Transgender

Category: Transgender Body & Soul