your posts make me scared of going out to see other trans people
The purpose of my blog is more to be a kind-of journal than anything else. I used to keep a pen-and-paper journal, but it didn't achieve anything for me, because I really struggle to acknowledge when bad things have happened to me. I would write down that someone e.g. yelled slurs at me in the street, and it wouldn't help, because I would still believe that I deserved it, or that everyone experiences that and I'm pathetic for being upset by it.
I've written before on here about the CSA I experienced, and how it has resulted in me being unable to treat my own feelings as important. I've found that posting about this stuff on here is really helpful, because people will say "wow, that sucks," or, "omg I hope you're ok," or, "this happened to me too, it's awful," and that feedback is so valuable in helping me to understand that the things that have happened to me are objectively bad. I've made more progress in my mental health in the last month (thats how long I've been posting here) than I did in the last 10 years!
I will also say that my life is probably not that usual relative to the average person on here. I don't live in the US or Canada and I don't live in a big city. I live in a moderately-sized European town with a fairly small queer community and a very small trans community. I go to irl queer events several times per week, and frequently I am the only transfem person or even only trans person there at all. Sometimes these events are like 80% cis gay men! (I know some cities are big enough to have a "trans book club" or "trans climbing club". Not mine! It's often hard to even get double digit attendees at a generic "trans social" here!) And I get a lot of microaggressions in these spaces which is not really surprising tbh.
The only reason I keep going is that I know for a fact that like 90% of transfems in my town are totally disconnected from community. What often happens is they go to one irl queer event, have a bad time because of the demographics, and never go back. I need to connect them to the (tiny) local transfem community in that window of time. I also organise and run events myself, that means I have to put up with a lot of shit and deal with a lot of (often hostile) people that the people attending those events don't have to. What I'm trying to say is that I often put myself in situations that I know will result in microaggressions (and sometimes macroaggressions), and I don't think it is neccesarily representative of what the average transfem in my town experiences.
In spite of all the issues, I typically have a really good time at irl trans events. I strongly recommend going if you have trans events near you. I'm not sure I could say the same about generic queer events, but that may be a feature of the smallness of the community where I live rather than a general property. If there is even one other transfem at an event I attend, there's like a 95% chance I will have a good time there.
As I said above, from my POV this blog functions as a kind of therapy, and the kind of therapy I personally need is the kind where I can learn to acknowledge when I have been wronged (because that's what I struggle with). That's why I post about bad things that happen to me but not good things that happen to me. For balance, here's some good (trans-related) things that happened to me only yesterday:
I had a plant swap with a trans man I'm friends with. I got some cool plants I've never grown before, and so did he.
I went for coffee with a trans woman and a trans man who I've organised stuff with before, we planned some new stuff for the future.
The cafe was really nice, the staff were really friendly, and they even gave us free pastries.
A couple of transmascs I know asked for help running their events because there has been feedback about occasional transmisogynistic microaggressions at them and they feel out of their depth.
A really great trans man I know (who I havent seen for a few months) invited me to hang out with him later in the week.
And nothing bad happened to me yesterday at all!
prguitarman
gummygunk
dailybridgerton
kianamaiart
pixelskylines
germansingergirl
2087
