“You should only make it into the paper twice in your life. When you are born and when you die.” – Unsolicited Advice from Co-Worker reflecting on the evils of social media

I grew up in a world where my social network knew few geographical limits. We hear a lot about the dangers and down side of social media. Smart phones are the latest to be accused of rotting the brains of the next generation but, it wasn’t that long ago that Elvis was sure to corrupt all. Those hips. Civilization made it through rock n’ roll and television. At one time the video games that were going to be the end of intelligence were constrained to characters that were all of 16 pixels tall.

The world keeps spinning. We evolve and regress. Sometimes the catalyst for both (progression and regression) is the same. A technology that connects us with things we are interested in and people we care about can facilitate ascent – inspire a better version of ourselves. It can also isolate us until we believe that everyone thinks the way we do. Perceived popularity of an idea overrides accuracy and is nursed from seedling to bearing fruit in a humid green house, opaque to the outside world.

Gender Identity. It is intrinsically tied to how I feel about my body. Bodies, especially AFAB (assigned female at birth) are not to be talked about in mixed company. Notably the parts of our body that are most closely aligned with concepts of gender. So it seems that gender identity should be an entirely private matter.

But…my ability to live a life that is congruent with my identity relies on the participation of others. My pronouns were only wrong to begin with because society got it wrong.

So how do I balance between inherently private and necessarily public? Do I tell everyone? Only my very closest friends and family? Somewhere in between. How much do I share? I have a right to privacy. I have a desire for and commitment to transparency and authenticity. I would rather cast my net too far – invite folks along who have no right whatsoever to my truth than to exclude someone who may benefit from knowing, from witnessing.

I am not a religious person. I believe people are inherently good. That much of what ails us can be healed by a sense of belonging. Keeping much of my identity and journey private would be a fine choice.

There are moments in my life that seem to echo indefinitely. One of those moments was reading the Spoon River Anthology by Edgar Lee Masters.

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The earth keeps some vibration going
There in your heart, and that is you.
And if the people find you can fiddle,
Why, fiddle you must, for all your life.

-Edgar Lee Masters, Fiddler Jones, Spoon River Anthology

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To me these four lines summarize the essence of humanity. We are these vibrations. And sharing these vibrations – that is the point.

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Facebook Post, December 17, 2018

I always knew there was something misunderstood about me. By others, yes. But mostly by me. There was something that felt untrue, unseen, unknown but ever present, ever isolating. Every time I looked in the mirror I was disappointed. Not for lack of self-esteem but for that ever present feeling. Every time someone said my name, or spoke of me…something was wrong.

When I was in New Orleans a few months ago, the server brought me my debit card and slowly read my name such that I could see the degree to which my name was completely changing this person’s perception of me. “Jess…i…ca?” And I finally was able to name a piece of that ever present feeling, “dysphoria”. I finally acknowledged that people discovering my legal name made me feel erased and that separate-ness that followed – that was the isolation. The realization that there was something about myself that was so unseen I couldn’t exist.

I decided I deserved a name that allowed me to be myself and proclaimed I would legally change my name.

The funny thing about self-discovery and validation of feelings is their tendency to unravel more than we expect. It felt like I bought myself a present, only to get it home and be unable to assemble it. Where did all these pieces come from? Why are the instructions so lacking in essential information?! The pieces were scattered across the living room. I couldn’t get them back in the box because the packaging was designed by some engineering genius. And perhaps because the pieces were only ever meant to come out of the box.

With all these pieces scattered about, I realized I needed to decide if I could put this all together, once and for all. My family deserved to not have my pieces all scattered about. And though it was hard to admit it, I deserved it too.

There were a lot of hard questions I had to ask myself and worse still I had to answer them. What do you really want? What is really possible? What is that dissonance, that anxiety, that depression really about?

I have lived a fairly gender non-conforming existence and I have worked to embrace that. I have told myself that exclusively wearing men’s clothing for all of my adult life was enough. But this was never true.

I had heard that people who are transgender knew from a very young age. I thought that meant that I couldn’t be trans. But it occurred to me that I have always known. I never named this knowing. I didn’t ever let myself fully grasp it. I never fully asked myself the question so that I could claim I didn’t know.

But the fact remains. I am transgender. I have decided to transition to male. I am changing my legal name. I am claiming my identity.

I have never been more relieved.

Thank you all for your love and support and the role you have played so far in my journey.

– Jesse
He/him/his