TranStorm Post #3: Childhood
As stated in my previous posts, the goal of TranStorm is to become a centralized highway of information and referrals for the Transgender Community. My desire to build TranStorm stems from my own frustration as I blundered blindly through my own transition. That is why, in addition to the goals I have named previously, it is not so much my goal but my hope that TranStorm will serve as the vehicle for my own story, which while itâs still in many ways still being written, I hope that these writings will speak volumes to whomever finds their way to TranStorm, and my story leaves them with a better understanding of what it means to be Transgender.
So, without further ado; here is the first entry of my story. The events, conversations, and timeframes will be told as truthfully as I can recall them, with certain events being altered to streamline the narrative. It is my hope in doing so I can package this story in a way that is easy to understand, while capturing their energy and spirit.
I was born on June 7th, 1991 in Augsburg, Bavaria, an ancient city of the Bavaria region in Germany. My father was touring in the U.S. Army while my mother brought me up as a housewife. When my father was discharged from the military we emigrated back to the United States in 1995, traveling while my father looked for work. It was during this time that both my younger brother and sister were born, completing our medium sized family. From what I can remember in the echoes of early memories I have left we moved around a lot. We lived in Alabama and then moved to Utah, before finally settling down in Michigan, where I spent my childhood, teenage and university years, before I left Michigan on my own journey.
Like many transgender girls, I knew that I didnât quite fit the mold that boys or even most children were expected to fill, something that the American Public School System was eager to single out in an attempt to correct. You might be thinking that youâve heard this story before: stories of boys that wanted to play with, dress like, and talk like the other girls in their school, who brought barbies to Show and Tell, and who knew with all their hearts that they were meant to be a girl.
Like I said, I didnât quite fit that mold. From what I remember, I remember having a hard time grasping social norms and feelings. I remember being enrolled in counseling and being forced to learn socialization skills. It was during these times all the way up into the 4th Grade, I was always being told over and over by my parents and teachers 2 things:Â
The first of which was that I suffered low self esteem.
The second was that I had trouble focusing.
When I would look back on these memories as an adult, my insides still burn with anger, intermingled with a touch of derision. I have many memories of people telling me these were the things that were wrong with me, but none of any adult ever explaining to me what these actually meant.Â
But Iâll spare you the details of those dealings.Â
The first time I ever heard about being transgender, was when I saw a documentary on Transgender people when I was 9 years old. I remember gazing transfixed at the screen and internalizing it:
You mean...you donât have to be the gender you were born with if you donât want to? I remember feeling not just surprised, but excited at the idea of changing genders.
I started to have dreams of waking up as a girl, and since then, the idea of a boy becoming a girl would fascinate me.
I remember watching reruns of cartoons that featured some form of gender transformation: The Fairly OddParentsâ âThe Boy Who Would Be Queenâ being one of my favorites. It was all I could do to cope with finding that a vital piece of the human puzzle was missing for me. At the age of 11, I remember finally saying under my breath, that dangerous forbidden desire I had cultivated so frighteningly fast:
I need to be a girl.