Transitions

Tell someone you are transgender, give them enough time, and I am willing to bet you will eventually be asked where you are in transition. Everyone seems to be obsessed with transition. There is an assumption that all transfolk who were assigned male at birth want to be female and that all transfolk who were assigned female at birth want to be male. There is an assumption that the end point to being transgender is to have crossed the gender binary and to once again fit neatly into one of the two boxes (of course there is also an assumed, and much focused upon, surgery that goes with that as well). These assumptions often are made from within the trans community too- not just from without. What most fail to realize, though, is that the idea of transition doesn’t apply to all transfolk. Certainly the idea of a definitive one-gender-to-the-other idea of a transition doesn’t apply to a large portion of transfolk. It doesn’t even need to be this giant, all-consuming, concerted effort that it so often is portrayed as.

“This is my secret: trans[folk] don’t ‘do’ transition. People say things like ‘When you transitioned’ and ‘when you made your change’ and they have no idea what they are talking about. Transition isn’t an active verb, but a passive one. You don’t transition, you simply stop resisting transition, you just give in. You just stop fighting. You just let the current sweep you away. Transition is a sacrifice, like an act of submission, like going to sleep, like dying. Maybe sex is like that too. Maybe everything is.” -Stacey Montgomery Scott

What if the idea of a transition simply meant that we allowed ourselves to be who we are- that we stopped pretending, stopped acting, stopped misbehaving, stopped pushing? What if the idea of transition simply meant a wardrobe change for one person, a full SRS for another person, a hormone regimen for another person, nothing for another person, a change in behavior for another person, and another person, and another person, and that all these changes were seen as equal transitions? They don’t all mean that boys become girls or that girls become boys. They idea of transition is allowed to also represent those who go from being boys to being another gender. And girls who become another gender. And the other genders are recognized. And moving and flowing between all the genders becomes easier and acknowledged and allowed. 

We in the trans community so often complain about the male and female genders/spaces being policed. How about we stop also policing the spaces for transition and the spaces for other genders? How about we let this whole gender experience just happen and end the rules and expectations for all of it?