Coming out post for FB

[Cindy Truheart]

I blame Imaginary Spiders for getting me thinking about this! But I thought I'd post what I have so far and see what everyone thinks. Basically, everyone who matters already knows. This is for the 400+ people on my friend's list who are going to be shocked!

All my life I’ve felt that I was different from everyone else. One of my earliest memories is of my baby doll, a boy doll that I named Baby Joey with short black hair. I loved that doll and I played with it all the time when I was very young. I remember wanting a Barbie really badly. What I got was a Ken doll and I was extremely disappointed because Ken had molded plastic for hair so it couldn’t be braided or styled at all. I remember that I had to be coaxed into playing with the Ken doll. I never understood why I couldn’t have a doll with long hair.

I remember the first time I was asked what my favorite color was. I said “Pink!” And my sister immediately told me that I couldn’t have Pink as my favorite color, it was a girl’s color and she told me to pick another. I insisted that I liked Pink! So she decided that my favorite color would be Blue because that was a proper ‘boy’ color. Faced with Blue, I began to throw a fit. She gave in on Blue and instead suggested Red. I didn’t want it at first, but she explained that Red was just a darker kind of Pink, and eventually I relented saying that Red could be my favorite color.

When I started going to school I found out that I didn’t fit in. I kept trying to go into the girl’s bathroom when I had to pee and the teachers had to get after me about it. I would be grouped with the boys, but I didn’t really fit in with them. They were rough, shoving and punching each other, they liked playing football or baseball. I didn’t like playing that way. I wanted to play on the swings, maybe play tag, or sit and talk. So I wouldn’t want to play with the boys much. But when I tried to approach the girls, they didn’t want me around most of the time. I ended up trying to fit in any way I could, which basically got me nowhere. Sometimes I could play with the boys. Sometimes the girls would let me play with them. But I never really gained acceptance with either group.

I remember the first time I learned that the teachers thought I was ‘acting out’ so that I could ‘get attention’. By this time I had guessed that something about me was freaking out the other kids. So when I learned that I was ‘acting out’ so that I could ‘get attention’, I started ‘acting out’ more and in more flamboyant ways. My thinking here was that if I got the attention that I apparently needed, I would then be able to finally relax and fit in somewhere. It didn’t work and all that I really accomplished was to get into trouble and have the school call my parents all the time.

Eventually I began to learn that acting certain ways that felt natural to me caused others to get upset. So I changed the way I acted but it didn’t change the way I felt. Kids learn fast and it didn’t take me long to get some basic skills in hiding who I was. I would watch the boys and try to act like them because that is what everyone said I should be. But I made mistakes along the way, and slowly but surely those mistakes built up until finally I was being bullied for being different. It didn’t help that I was smaller than all the boys who would physically overpower me. And the girls were quite good at using me in their head games until I finally caught on.

It got to the point that I was getting into fights on an almost daily basis. I developed a kind of ‘rage’. I would see red and nothing else. I wouldn’t remember what I had done. Afterward sometimes I would be hurt, on rare occasions others would be hurt. But I would always be terrified to the point of crying as I walked away. At this point in time, I had survived several situations where I literally believed I was going to die. Once I ‘Clothes-lined’ myself and did a complete flip when I was running away from bullies. I laid there in the dirt unable to move as darkness washed over me thinking I’d broken my neck. Another time I was suffocated until I blacked out all the while thinking that those kids were killing me and that I was dying. I started to develop a kind of paranoia. I began to keep everyone at a distance and I was hyper-aware when someone got near me. People were dangerous. And after being tricked several times I knew that even the nice ones were dangerous.

I raided the laundry almost daily and dressed in my sister’s clothes. This started early for me, it wasn’t a sex thing brought on by puberty. The first time I remember was when I was about six years old. I talked a cousin into ‘playing a joke’ on our parents where we would switch shirts and surprise them. The truth was that I just wanted to wear her pink shirt with the lace at the neck and cuffs.

I hated being called a ‘young man’. For a while whenever an adult called me that I would try to correct them, but they always either disarmed my argument or ignored my protest completely. It made me angry because nobody listened to me and nobody wanted to understand why I didn’t like being called that. But I knew that I couldn’t tell anyone the truth, they wouldn’t understand and it would only get people upset.

With the onset of puberty I developed a serious body image problem. I didn’t like my body, it wasn’t right. So I would wear socks up to my knees to cover the hair even in the summer. I stopped wearing anything but pants eventually, and I never took my shirt off anymore unless I was swimming. Eventually I even stopped going swimming. I stopped looking at my face in the mirror unless I absolutely had to.

Slowly the pressure of those around me to fit into the role they thought I belonged in got to me. In order to keep my sanity I began to repress my emotions and even some memories. By the time I turned eighteen I was a complete mess and at least half dead emotionally. I hadn’t been able to completely repress everything, so some things were still there in the back of my mind. I tried to figure things out on my own. I tried to ‘go my own way’. I dropped out of High School in my senior year, and again for summer school, and again the next year. I ended up living in my car, without heat, in the winter. Ultimately I couldn’t make it by myself. I couldn’t work enough jobs, save enough money, or find answers for the things in my head.

The reasons why I tried so hard to repress who I am is because I didn’t want to be so hated and such an outcast. I literally couldn’t accept the truth about myself. I ran from it, I suppressed it, I denied it, and I did my best to prove to the world that I wasn’t what I am. I hated myself. So much so that I was convinced that I didn’t deserve good things in my life, and so I would sabotage the good things in my life. And when things fell apart I used it to prove to myself that I wasn’t worthy of things like love, happiness, and acceptance. I created a bad boy image because having the world think I was a drug using criminal was better than anyone suspecting the truth. I smoked cigarettes and occasionally smoked pot, but I made it seem that I used harder drugs than that. I shoplifted. I stole all kinds of things including stereos, skateboards, cassettes, CDs, and even cars. I broke into cars, homes, and schools. It was a good thing that my juvenile record was sealed and that I didn’t get caught after I turned eighteen.

I went into the Air Force because I was slowly dying on my own trying to live out of my car. I needed a career and I had always heard that the military would ‘make a man out of you’ and ‘straighten you out’. But after Basic Training I was still a mess and couldn’t figure things out. I thought I was broken, I thought I was born wrong, and I thought that there wasn’t any way to fix me. I made the decision to repress those parts of me that didn’t fit what I was supposed to be. What I did could be described as a kind of self-hypnosis or a kind of brain-washing. I used what I had been taught to reinforce the lessons, I used pain. I would never wear shorts or short sleeved shirts, so the bruising was easy to hide. I managed to repress most of my emotions and effectively forget most of my childhood.

Over the years this repression began to cause me problems. I didn’t consciously know why, but I became an irritable person who would become angry for the slightest reasons. I would fall into foul and brooding moods for days or weeks on end and even when I was at my best I still wouldn’t be content with my life. No matter what job I worked, it was always the worst job I’d ever had. My life became a series of high points where I was happy for a short time, but was countered by a general malaise of discontent that I felt every day. I sought out various hobbies and interests but almost always dropped them immediately so that I ended up bouncing from one thing to another like a Humming Bird on Meth. I was searching for something. I just didn’t know what it was. Drinking alcohol stopped being a weekend thing and eventually became a daily habit that quickly escalated into a serious problem. Nothing made me happy for very long with two exceptions, my wife and my belly dancing, and both have suffered because of my problems over the years.

Nearly twenty years after leaving the Air Force, after having lived my life as most of you know me, I had a ‘triggering incident’. I saw something that caused a repressed memory to come back to me and it cracked the walls I had built in my mind because I finally had an answer for why I’ve always felt different. That memory triggered other memories and I began to drown in them as I LITERALLY started to have an identity crisis. Knowing that this was too much for me to deal with I sought out a Therapist to help me. Working with her we have discovered that I have been dealing with Depression, PTSD, and Social Anxiety as a result of childhood trauma.

But most importantly, I realized that I’ve also been dealing with Gender Dysphoria. This condition and the fact that I’ve only just now identified it, has been the root cause of most of the problems in my life. Modern science has determined that Gender Dysphoria is something you are born with although they have yet to determine the exact mechanism of how it happens. What it means is that my brain is LITERALLY different. Studies have shown that my brain is like the brain of a woman in many important areas. So in other words what I’m telling you is that I’m Transgender.

Most of you out there probably don’t REALLY know what Transgender means so allow me to explain. I was born a girl, just understand that for now. So when you think of me, think of me as female. I was never male. I was never a boy. I was never a man. In your memories of me, try to see me as a girl/woman who was PRETENDING to be a boy/man. It was an accident of my birth which caused me to be falsely labeled as a male. I have never been male, I’m a GIRL. My favorite color is pink. I like decorating, dancing, and fashion. I get almost as much enjoyment watching shows like “Say Yes to the Dress”, “Rehab Addict”, “The View”, and “Big Easy Brides” as I do watching “Walking Dead”. I like having long nails and getting a mani/pedi at the salon. And if that isn’t enough for you, I’ll tell you all about my favorite online stores where I swear I could spend a year’s salary on just clothing alone!

Okay, so I said earlier that this isn’t a sex thing right? No? Well let me say it again, THIS IS NOT A SEX THING. This has nothing to do with sex or sexuality and has everything to do with GENDER. It’s the reason why I was having an identity crisis. Gender is part of the core of who you are as a person, most people don’t think about it, it’s just who they are. With me, I’d built so many walls up that when they broke I couldn’t differentiate the fabrication (the bad boy) from the real me. I had spent much of my childhood and teen years creating a lie so that I could hide myself from the world and those who wanted to hurt me because I was different. My therapist was necessary for me to learn the tools to reform the foundation of my identity. It’s like having four pillars that hold up a large building and then having one crumble suddenly, the whole structure is in danger of collapse. I was in a serious crisis that could have landed me in all kinds of bad situations and completely ruin my life, if I didn’t just give up and end it.

So, it’s taken me a while, but I’ve finally come to understand some things about myself. I knew who I was when I was three years old. And in the beginning, I didn’t know that there was anything different between me and my sisters, but I knew that I wasn’t like my brother, he was different just like my Dad. I thought I was the same as my sisters, I remember that distinctly. It took YEARS before I gave up the fight to get people to recognize I was a girl, not a boy. But early on, I learned to hide who I was because it caused people distress, and I didn’t want to cause problems. I was a good kid.

To anyone who knows what to look for, the signs of who I was inside were there. Such as when I took Home Economics instead of Shop, or how I would watch my sisters put on their makeup and fix their hair while being hit with the Aqua Net overspray and I didn’t care. But as they say, hindsight is twenty-twenty. And back then people weren’t as aware of what Transgender means or that it was something you could be born with. People were falsely told that gender was something children learned and that a child could be taught to be a boy or a girl. Science has since proven that kind of thinking to not only be wrong, but it is dangerous to the mental health of the child. I would be the example of that.

My Gender Dysphoria isn’t a mental illness, its how I was born. I was given mental illness by others in my life who didn’t understand who I was and wouldn’t let me be myself. The American Psychiatric Association has removed “Disorder” from Gender Identity Disorder on its list of mental illness. That means that they no longer recognize Gender Dysphoria as a mental illness, but because modern science can’t explain how it happens, it’s in a “grey area” of neither here nor there. So, think of it like a “hot potato” that has been tossed back and forth between the medical profession and the psychiatric profession over the past one hundred years or so. They have slowly been getting closer and closer to the truth. Now, they are VERY close to the truth but they just can’t nail it yet. However, they are sure that it isn’t a mental illness, so the medical profession lost this one because as I said before, I was BORN this way.

Because of the things that have happened to me, I’ve had a skewed vision of the world and of relationships. It’s taken me a lot of time and effort to realize this and to understand what happened to me so that I could begin to heal. But these scars remain, and I will always be fighting the fear that was instilled in me when I was a child simply because I was being dressed to look like a boy, but I thought and acted like a girl. As things have progressed in this modern world, it’s getting better for Transgender youth. But it wasn’t that way for me. So please keep in mind that the things I deal with, sometimes on a daily basis, are very real. Social Anxiety means that I have problems being around people, especially crowds, and especially kids. It also means that I have trust issues and that I’m always afraid of being betrayed. PTSD means that, given the right situation or stimulus, I will suddenly become afraid for my life and that could cause me to shutdown or could actually cause me to become aggressive and attack. It’s a “fight or flight” response and if I can’t get away fast enough, we have a problem. I’ve made A LOT of progress in healing this damage and resisting the urge to act inappropriately, but it’s still there and I still have to be vigilant.

Alright, so let me throw some facts at you. Transgender people are estimated to be less than one percent of the human population. But we are the most hated minority. Of the hate violence homicides in 2013, 72% were transgender women. Not one of those murders was prosecuted as a hate crime despite clear evidence that it should be. Transgender people are seven times more likely to experience physical violence in encounters with law enforcement. And transgender women are 1.8 times more likely to experience a sexual assault. Our attempted suicide rate is over forty percent which is to say that nearly half of all Transgender people try to kill themselves. And all of this is just the data that is being reported, it’s suspected that things are much worse since many Transgender people don’t report assaults or attempted suicides because we don’t feel that society cares about us.

So why am I bothering to tell you these facts? Because more people need to know the struggles of Transgender people, our story needs to get out there. It’s difficult enough as it is for us to decide to stop living the lies and to start living an authentic life. We are met with hate just walking down the street. Parents shield their children from us as if we would attack them, politicians make laws that discriminate against us, and even other members of the LGBTQ community hate and discriminate against us. This all comes from ignorance. By telling you all this, by the simple fact that you know me and know my character, I hope to help educate more people about our situation. And it is my greatest hope that you will join the growing tide of voices which support equal rights for Transgender people and the LGBTQ community as a whole.

I am not wrong. I am not broken. I am Transgender. And I AM A WOMAN.

[~Nova~]

I like the last paragraph.

I think all the other fluff is just nice fluff but unnecessary to coming out.  That's just me tho, I'm blunt and to the point. I never came out on FB, I just closed my male account and opened Nova's. I started fresh by refriending those that I wanted in my circle. I couldn't handle the negative, so I just kept it small at first.

Good luck and I hope you get all positive comments.

[tracy_j]

Personally I prefer to go 'low profile' these days. I have tried explaining things and really not got far at all as people tend to listen with a natural bias precondioned by lifelong social pressure. It would be interesting to know if a comprehensive written statement changes things. For myself, I have had two identities. Not really totally intentional but just the way it happened. In general the people I know well are aware of both. As time progresses these identities are converging!

[MarcieMarie12]

I kept mine to a small 1 paragraph saying this was coming,and BTW I have a new facebook page. Friend me there if you still want to be friends. There were some (those that I had not heard from in years or I knew were transphobic and out of my life anyway that did not get that message though.

 

[Jani]

I don't think you need or want to go into that amount of detail.  Save it for one-on-one's with close friends and family.  They don't need to know all this history, just that you're happy.  Remember that of the 400+ people you list, not all of them are close, some are probably acquaintances.  

As for the actual verbiage, I would start (I have something important to say...) then state you are transgender, specially a transgender female.  I'd mention how long you've known (I've known forever/xx years but decided recently to do something about it, for me...).  Mention that your wife supports you (others will want to know about this).  Tell them they can ask you questions if they want to know more.  Tell them you're looking for their understanding and support, and acceptance if they see it in their hearts.

I tend to defer to providing only what's needed, at the time, when divulging personal information.  It's not happened to me but I've seen others open up and later have it used against them.  Not cool.  

Best of luck with this coming out party.

Jani

[Khoriilya]

I have two Facebook accounts.  One for my "male" side and one that people know I am transgender.  One day I will get brace enough to come out on my male account and direct people to add me to my Celest account if they still want to talk to me.

[Cindy Truheart]

1 hour ago, Jani423 said:

I tend to defer to providing only what's needed, at the time, when divulging personal information.  It's not happened to me but I've seen others open up and later have it used against them.  Not cool. 

I hadn't thought of that, thanks for the advice!

[Guest Kaylee]

When I came out on FB, I made sure to cover a few important things. First, I reminded everyone what kind of person I am. The things we did together over the years. I explained  that I’ve kept a secret for a very long time, how it affected me with anger depression, and thoughts of suicide, and then blurted it out. “I’m Transgender”. I followed that with understanding their shock, that it's a change and will take time to process, explained that I knew from age 3, and why I chose to come out now. I invited them to ask questions if they wanted (almost no one did), and I closed with this…

 

“If you are reading this, you’ve likely known me a long time. Everything we did together, every moment we shared is still there. You’ve known me, but only part of me. I am the same person as always, with a much bigger personality… and I am the happiest I’ve ever been in my life.”

 

I thought it very important to let people know that I am the same person, and I am happy. A few friends never transferred over to the new profile. Some did, then left. And Yes, I did lose a few friends after decades of friendship, even one a full year after I told him. (it happens :\ )

 

Write what you think they “need” to know. The message can get lost in lots of details.

 

Good luck hon.

Kaylee

[Guest]

That was a beautiful story, a lot of it resonated with me as well. And on my first coming out letters, It was also suggested that I be be less specific. LOL

I hope you don't mind, but I'd like to copy that and remove the really personal stuff and leave the statistical and general info.

Thanks for allowing us to read it.  

[Guest]

With regard to your anger, I'm very glad to hear that I'm not alone on that. I also have a point of no-return and I hate myself after losing my temper, it scares me. Luckily I've gotten much better at controlling it these days.  

[Briana]

Hi Cindy,  boy you shared a lot of info.  Bless you cause I'm sure some it was painful to write & share.  Honestly, like others have mentioned I don't think I'd do that on FB.  I really like the approach that Marcie took.  I also think Jani made a good point; most times it's best to provide only the basics or only what's needed.  You truly don't ever know how someone in the future may use what you've put out there. 

[Guest]

19 minutes ago, Briana said:

  You truly don't ever know how someone in the future may use what you've put out there. 

Yeah........   That's true.......

[Cindy Truheart]

8 hours ago, Fiona said:

That was a beautiful story, a lot of it resonated with me as well. And on my first coming out letters, It was also suggested that I be be less specific. LOL

I hope you don't mind, but I'd like to copy that and remove the really personal stuff and leave the statistical and general info.

Thanks for allowing us to read it.  

Sure you can copy it, I don't mind!

[Cindy Truheart]

Thanks for the responses everyone, you've all given me a lot to think about. One of my lifelong dreams has been to become a writer, so I do have the tendency to give more details than needed. But I also have a reason for it in this case. The way I figure it, a good portion of the people I'm friends with on FB are probably not going to hang around. I've already been whittling things down by getting rid of any crazy-ultra-conservative types. So I'm not expecting to be attacked or anything like that and I have no problems using the ban feature. But I want to try and get people to understand us more. I want to get more people to be advocates for us. But I think I am giving too much information and probably pushing too hard for people to understand. That can put people off just as much as getting in their faces. So I'm going to go at it again and see if I can get it better in the rewrite. Anyone willing to see the next draft?

[Cindy Truheart]

8 hours ago, Fiona said:

With regard to your anger, I'm very glad to hear that I'm not alone on that. I also have a point of no-return and I hate myself after losing my temper, it scares me. Luckily I've gotten much better at controlling it these days.  

The military gave me some control, martial arts gave me some more. But it's been a "white-knuckling it" kind of control. Now that I've begun to understand where it comes from, control has gotten easier and I'm not ready to lose it for minor things. It's liberating actually, it's like I had a ball of rage in me that would ignite at any second and now its been surgically removed.

[Briana]

13 hours ago, Cindy Truheart said:

It's liberating actually, it's like I had a ball of rage in me that would ignite at any second and now its been surgically removed.

That's awesome!  And it can truly be liberating.  You start to wonder why you ever got mad over the things you got mad over.

As for FB, while I think your thought on writing and sharing your story to help others understand is wonderful, I think you have to remember it's FB.  Attention spans & privacy issues are two things to really keep in mind.  I think most people don't read much past a few lines on FB before they start to skim to get to the point.  You put a lot of time, though, and effort into what you wrote.  Think of trying to read that all on a phone sized screen, or even a smaller tablet device. 

My thought would be to go the "short and to the point" route as others have suggested.  I think that works well for FB attention spans & formats.  If you want to share more, explain more, create a personal website and share the link in the FB post.  Those that want to read more can hop over to that.  You can get a simple 'fill in the blanks' easy to create and maintain web page for less than $50-60/year.  Usually way less.

As for privacy, my concern would be how someone that is really a 'hater' would use the info.  i.e. Someone from work or someone that knows where you work that like to stir the pot.  Some people can be really devious...really evil, right?  I know we can't live our lives worrying about that kind of thing all the time.  However, with your pending move and transfer, you may want to think through cons of doing it - sharing lots of details, and how to mitigate any cons if needed.

[Cindy Truheart]

5 hours ago, Briana said:

As for privacy, my concern would be how someone that is really a 'hater' would use the info.  i.e. Someone from work or someone that knows where you work that like to stir the pot.  Some people can be really devious...really evil, right?  I know we can't live our lives worrying about that kind of thing all the time.  However, with your pending move and transfer, you may want to think through cons of doing it - sharing lots of details, and how to mitigate any cons if needed.

I don't have anyone on my friends list from work. Honestly, I'm pretty sure all of them voted for Trump, so I don't want to have anything to do with them outside of the job anyway! But I get what you mean, I'm writing something different instead. I'll post it when it's done!