JP details his life as a trans man and how he has been perceived at home, at school, and at the various jobs that he has held. JP also discusses the joy he feels after his recent top surgery.
“I feel so blessed and am loving all the new sensations of my chest: in the beautiful weather, from a gentle gust of wind, to the warmth of the sun, to the fluttering of my shirt and to the warmth radiating off my own body. As a whole, my body has never felt so warm from the inside. I feel like I’m radiating heat off my own body and chest. And my scars are testament to my strength and will in my journey. I am proud of– of my scars. I love them. It’s a truly blissful feeling.”
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Transcript
Interview conducted by John Keller
Manalapan, New Jersey
May 12, 2018
Transcription by Chrissy Briskin
Annotations by Michael Nazzaro
0:00
Great, this is John Keller with coLAB Arts and the Rutgers Oral History Archive. It is May 12, 2018, and we are at the Monmouth County Library in Manalapan. Is that what town we’re in?
Uh, I believe so. Yeah.
Yes. And today we are interviewing–
JP [Redacted]
Great, so JP we’ll just kind of start from the beginning. Where were you born?
It’s a little bit complicated. I’ll fast forward a little bit ahead. When I was three I was taken in by my dad and he legally adopted me and stuff. His wife at the time– they both took me in so that’s kind of my “origin” origin. It was pretty normal. It was a little bit hard because my mom, you know, I was a whoops baby. My dad’s like “She can’t afford to take care of him and I’m going to take responsibility and help my kid,” you know. So my dad really stepped up. He did a really good thing for me, and when I was two or three he went through all the processes and the courts and he got full custody of me. I’m sure my mom was relieved, ‘cause she knew, like, I was safe and I had somebody to take care of me. From there, pretty quickly I started questioning my gender identity. I was assigned female at birth and maybe around three– four, right when I started talking because I didn’t talk for a little while, I just said, “I’m a boy, I’m a boy.” Like, literally didn’t think anything of it. Kids don’t know any better. They don’t know what you are saying is different, or strange, or unusual. So literally my dad or his wife would be like, “How’s my girl?” And I’d be like, “You know I’m a boy, right?” And it was just a constant thing. My dad never thought much of it. My dad’s very lax and aloof, but not in a bad way. He’s just kind of like, “You do your thing and I respect it,” but my step-mom, his wife, she wasn’t really cool with it. And when I was little we grew up right next to one of her best friend’s houses, and I would hang out with her kids, ‘cause they were my age and she had a boy and a girl. And we played a lot and got along well with the kids, but even to her I used to call her. Am I able to use names or will those be changed as well in the tape?
Mm-hmm, Mm-hmm.
Oh, ok. So [name] was the mom, and she had two kids. But even to [name] I used to say, “I’m a boy, you know that right?” You know, it’s like, hey, it’s me, I’m a boy. It was hard because, very early on– my dad never did anything bad about it but my step-mom and [name] actually started bullying me about it. Like, I remember being a four-year-old little kid and seeing these two grown women kind of like laugh behind my back or like, “You’re a boy? Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, ok.” You know, just being sarcastic with me. And I started feeling weird about it. Like, why are they making me feel bad about it? I didn’t understand why I felt bad about what they were doing because I was so small but, like, it was kind of like a thing where I was getting a weird vibe from when I was saying it. Maybe I shouldn’t be saying it? I think that one of the last few times I remember saying it, and I was four or five and I was saying it consistently all the time, and what happened was, my little cousin, he was like a year younger than me, so I was like four or five and he was like three or four. We were walking down the stairwell and he fell down the stairs, and somehow in the process of falling his pants fell down and I was already at the bottom of the steps and I was just kind of like, wait, what the hell? Because I was a kid and I didn’t know any better and I remember I was only with [name] (the mom) at the time and she literally grabbed me by the shoulder and pulled me to her really quickly, and she got right into my face and she yelled at me, “That’s what a boy looks like if you want to be one so bad.” And she, like, shoved me and I was just like, whoa, I'm doing something wrong here. There is something going on and I am doing something wrong—I shouldn’t say this anymore. So I stopped saying it out loud. I never stopped thinking it, but I stopped saying it and it was really scary for me because I had these grown women making fun of me and yelling in my face saying “You’re not a boy,” or saying that I’m weird. And giggling behind my back and I was confused because I didn’t know any better, so I’m like something is wrong here. And I guess it’s me. So I stopped saying it, but I remember being like pre-school– first grade– the boys bathroom and the girls bathroom are always right next to each other and I’m like, I don’t know which one to go into. I want to go into the boys, but I’m going to get yelled at, so I guess I’m have to go in here. I remember being a little kid– almost all of my friends were boys. I didn’t really get along with the girls. They wanted to play with the dolls and the little food toys. I wanted to play on the swings or whatever– play stuff they had with the boys. I was a rough kid. I wouldn’t say I was mean, but I was a stubborn kid. I remember there were a couple kids where we would play, but we would fight- play kind-of-thing and they were always boys. I remember there was this barrel thing, I think the kid’s name was [name]. I’m not even sure if that was actually his name, but I pushed him off, like, I want a turn. And I’m pretty sure he shoved me back. But that’s just how I wanted to play. I didn’t want to play with the dolls. I wanted to play with the baseball bats. I wanted to play with the boys and wrestle, and I remember playing with this little dungeon toy thing. That was like the coolest thing in the world all the way up until early elementary school. I went to Catholic school for a couple years and you get to wear the little jumper dress. I always saw the boys and I’m like, I really want to wear that nice blue shirt, that nice blue, collared shirt and the little tie. Why do I have to wear this? And I just kind of accepted it, because I always remembered, in the back of my head, “Well I can’t because I don’t want to get yelled at again and everybody’s going to think I’m weird,” which was hard for me. But all the way through growing up, I always hung out with the guys; my best friends were guys. I got a little older, like, playing sports and stuff. I was mostly on girls teams because most of them are segregated like that. But all the kids on my street happened to be boys, and that was really lucky for me, so me and the kids would run around the woods. We’d grab a bunch of sticks and have light saber battles. I was literally a little boy growing up. I grew up playing Battlefront. To this day that was my favorite game on the old PlayStation 2. I still have it, I still play it on occasion. And we would play for hours. o I really was like a little boy in personality. It’s just that I was a “little girl,” it was interesting, ya know?
8:01
So you mentioned that you were raised by your dad and his wife. Do you have any siblings?
Not on my dad’s side, I don’t have any. My mom, I didn’t know anything about her until I was over eighteen, because my dad was concerned for, like, custody issues, but my moms got like a couple kids now, like three or four. She’s remarried and everything but, unfortunately, I’m kind of like a skeleton in her closet, I believe. When I reached out to her and she’s kind of like, “I don’t know what you’re talking about, I didn’t have a kid in [year],” and I’m not upset about it, I accept it. I have a lot of respect for my mom and what she went through and I understand, so it doesn’t really bother me at all. It would be nice to have a relationship, but I accept that she doesn’t want one. So it’s nothing that really upsets me. I accepted it. I grew up that way. I grew up without her, so it’s not a big deal to me.
But you grew up– so then you had other cousins you said that you were kind of growing up with?
Yeah, not like biological cousins. but my step-mom’s best friend– they were like friends forever and they wanted to raise their kids together, so I grew up with them. We actually moved away when I was about six or seven so I didn’t see them that much anymore.
Have you always been in this part of New Jersey?
Close, within the area. Usually– I think I grew up in Middlesex and then I moved out to [town] when I was a little older.
9:36
Great, so when you started going to school and you started kind of noticing what other things you were interested in, were you– were there any particular subject areas that you were interested in at school when you were a kid?
Like classes?
Yeah.
Oh yeah, my favorite class was always PE. Like, I loved– I was really talented in sports and physically. I was an eight-year-old doing twenty push-ups. I used to wrestle my dad all the time. It was my favorite thing to do. My dad– he says to this day he let me win, but I could literally push him off the bed if we were wrestling. He wasn’t letting me win [laughter]. But I was a really athletic kid. I could throw a ball at four or five. I was really good at catching. Even at recess, all the boys wanted to play kickball and they didn’t want to let me play because I was a “girl.” I’m like put me on one of your teams, pick me last, I don’t care, let me play. I’ll show you, in a couple weeks you’re going to fight over me, and it did happen. I wasn’t the best player, but I was really good. I wasn’t picked last and I got to play with the boys and I was pretty good. It took a long time to do that, though. In PE I was always good, the PE teacher used me for demonstrations and stuff. I was pretty talented. In school, the actual subjects were a lot harder for me because I had a couple learning disabilities and stuff, so it was hard for me to focus in math. It was like, I don’t know what these numbers mean, like, what the hell is a fraction, ya know? [laughter] And I was really bad at those classes. I actually had a really hard time in school. My dad could tell you he got phone calls from teachers, like, “Your kid is kind of a dumbass. I don’t think your kid is going to graduate high school,” and my dad has literally got phone calls like that in the fourth grade.
And how did he respond to them?
Huh?
How would he respond to them?
He probably just said, “Well, teach my kid the best you can.” My dad was– he was always good with me. He was like, “Listen, you know you need to get your crap together and study. Like, what do you need, do you need to stay after school? Do you need a tutor or something?” My dad, he really did try to help me. My dad was a working man, so he came home late at night, seven, eight o’clock, and it was harder for him. He couldn’t help me with my homework.
12:22
What does your dad do?
He worked for UPS and stuff. Somewhere corporate and he had a bit of a commute. He was always fairly well balanced. He is a little bit of a workaholic, I’ll admit, but over weekends he would wake up in the morning and that was my day. He was like, “What do you want to do today? Like, do you want to go to the park?” We used to go to church on Sundays, because my dad raised me a little bit more religiously. So we’d go to church on Sunday and we’d always go out to a diner. My dad would take me out somewhere to play, ‘cause I loved sports. Me and my dad would roll out a soccer ball in the park, and he’d be goalie and I’d be making shots, and I loved being goalie too, so my dad would be making shots on me so we switched. But with school it was a little bit harder because I was a little bit more on my own. And I’m going to be honest, I wasn’t the best student in the world so, like, some of my teachers had it, like, up to here with me. I did try, and what really helped was getting IEPs where teachers gave you a little extra help. They’re like, “Listen, this kid’s got some learning issues.” There were a lot of teachers who were like, “This kid’s dumb as a brick,” but then there were teachers who were like, “This kid just needs a little extra help. He’s a good kid.” I was always eager to please my teachers, like, I was never disrespectful to my teachers. I always said, “Hello, good morning,” I liked all my teachers. I wasn’t as good at a lot of the work, particularly English. I think the highest grade I got on a spelling test was like a twenty percent. It was pretty bad. But, like, I did try, I did like science. I always like science. Even as a little kid, I used to watch nature documentaries, space documentaries; I was fascinated by science. We would do an experiment where, like, mix colors, see them contrast, or we would do this thing with the little volcano with the baking powder, those were my favorite classes. I was a very kinesthetic learner, where you learn by doing, and science definitely met the mark. I was really talented in that.
So when you were in elementary school you went to a Catholic school?
In second grade I left and went to public school.
Was there a reason for the change?
I think part of it was because we were moving—it was a further drive—but the second part of it was the nuns. I just didn’t like the nuns. The nuns were very hard on us. I remember talking to my one teacher who was a nun in second grade. I think my first grade teacher– she wasn’t a nun and she was really nice to me, but my second grade teacher was a nun and she was so mean to us, and I just couldn’t understand the work. I’m like, I don’t know what I’m doing and she always yelled at us. I didn’t like it, I wasn’t happy there. So my dad was like, “We’ll try a different school. We’re moving, we’ll try a new place,” and he really helped me out there and I ended up really enjoying public school.
15:36
What did you enjoy about it?
There was a lot more kids, there were a lot of after school programs. Usually in, like, elementary school they’d be like, “Come join baseball, come join the scouts, come join like soccer.” They had all these recreational clubs after school that you could just sign up for.
And then, so– did you have a circle of friends when you were in school?
I’d say some of my best friends were my neighbors. Mostly the kids in my class. I got along with everybody, but I was the kid in class if I didn’t get something, or understand the question, I was going to be getting up to mischief. I’m not going to lie. I’m rather mischievous at times.
How so?
I’d do something stupid. I’d start building something with a bunch of pencils and my erasers or, like, I’d have a friend in class and I would fling something at them, like a paper clip or something. Just being silly, just being goofy. So a lot of the kids at school were either really into their studies, and just didn’t tolerate my nonsense, and the kids who were a little bit more like me. Most of them were like “You’re cool, but you’re a girl. I guess you’re cool for a girl.” It was a little bit harder for me to make more consistent friends. I had a lot of people that I got along with really well but, like, the people I really hung out with were the kids around my neighborhood, and I think part of that was just ‘cause, like, when you're a kid, if you want to hang out with somebody after school, you need a ride and my dad was working all the time, so I couldn’t get rides and it was just harder. But the kids in my neighborhood, they were always around and just rang the doorbell. When I was like, “Let’s go chase the ice cream truck or run through sprinklers, or let’s go play some Battlefront, or shenanigans.” You know, we had a good time.
Did you ever– at this time, how old were you around?
I’m talking like elementary.
17:55
And then were you continuing to express to people that, you know, how you saw yourself or how you identified?
I didn’t tell anybody really at that point. It was always kind of a wish I had but it was unsaid. Like, being four and being yelled at like that at such a– you know when you’re– little things stick with you like that. It kind of stuck with me, well, like, I can’t say it. Even my head. it was more like a, “I guess I’m just a tomboy.” I would tell people, “I’m a tomboy.” It was hard. If I had an opportunity to pretend to be a boy even if it was just in my head. ‘Cause I’d want to wear a baseball jersey or a soccer jersey– just wear my soccer uniform outside ‘cause it was cool and I would wear that. And I literally looked like a little boy with long hair and that was ok for me, ‘cause, like, in my head, I felt like I was a boy in a way. And I remember– a couple times actually on Halloween– my favorite thing was to wear a mask and I usually got the boy costumes or something scary. I think one year I was the ghoul with the bloody face, you know what I mean? So I had the mask over me and my hair was covered; you wouldn’t know that I was a girl. Most of the girls were princesses and stuff, so, like, I remember I was at a costume party– this was elementary age too. It was a big costume party, a huge block party, it was the whole neighborhood, not just my street. And I was playing with a bunch of kids but I wouldn’t take my mask off because they thought I’m a boy. I told them I’m a boy. And literally I’m just like, “Yeah I’m a boy.” I tried talking in a deep voice and they're like, “Well, what’s your name?” I’m like, “My name is death,” or something stupid, and one kid grabbed my hood ‘cause he wanted to see who I was and he saw my long curly hair and he’s like, “It’s a girl,” and I think I ran away. I was like shit, I was out. I’m like, I don’t want to play anymore. So, it was just, it was harder. I was like shit, I had a good time when they thought I was a boy. Then some kid just ripped my hoodie off and saw my hair and literally I was around a huge group of kids, ‘cause they were all trying to figure out who I was and I was like, “Can’t we just play?”
Did anything kind of change or remain consistent as you moved into middle school?
Middle school was harder ‘cause that’s when puberty comes around, and I remember being in family health in fifth grade. I was interested because it was science, but it didn’t hit me that, like, this is applicable to me. You learn about a black hole, but when in my life am I going to see a black hole? It was something that was just– it was abstract and that's what that class felt like to me. I was always curious– what are they talking about in the other room. Mr. B and all the other boys and I know they are talking about boys changing, ‘cause their voices are going to get deeper, why can’t I go in that room? I never said anything, it was just something I thought; it was all internalized at that age. So– and then with puberty I was really hard, ‘cause I feel like that’s when I started taking actions instead of just, you know, internalizing in my head and pretending in a way. ‘Cause when I was a little kid and just playing with the other boys I felt like I was just another boy. There was nothing about it. To me at age seven, what’s the difference between boys and girls? Some people have long hair and some people have short hair. I was just a boy with long hair in my head but, like, at puberty, I was just like, “Whoa, whoa, wait a minute. What’s going on here?” Like how– um, what am I able to talk about and not talk about?
22:27
You can talk about whatever you want.
Like, with body hair stuff, I was just kind of like cool. I remember showing my friends, “Dude, look! I got an armpit hair.” I was stupid twelve-year-old. Then I noticed my chest start to change and I was like shit, what’s happening. There’s actually a couple of little short stories that were really pivotal for me. This is one of those stories where I’m like, “What’s happening, I don’t like this. This is making me uncomfortable. I don’t want this change.” I think it really hit me how devastating it was to me. I was always the little athlete, wearing the soccer jerseys and stuff, and when I was about twelve the World Cup came around, I think it was 2006 or 2008, and my favorite team was Germany. I was always rooted for Germany. There weren’t any teams that I didn’t like, honestly, but Germany is one of the best teams in my opinion. And me and my friends who were super into soccer– everybody was getting jerseys for the big game. If I’m not mistaken, Germany made it really far, they won, or at very least they placed, I don’t really remember the details but I’m like I need to get this fancy new Germany jersey for the World Cup, support my team, because that's what we would do. I’d go over to my friend’s house, we’d find a soccer net, and we’d play World Cup. I don't know if you know that game, but you would have one person in goal, l and you’d be in a line, and you’d pick a team and then you’d make a shot. And if you made the shot, you’d stay in the World Cup, but if you missed, you got knocked out of the World Cup, so it was kind of like Knock Out, but soccer. I always picked Germany as long as nobody else picked it, but I was like I need to get a Germany jersey. So I ask my dad, because the World Cup is in summer and my birthday is in July. So I’m like, “Hey Dad, can I get an early birthday gift this year? I really, really want a Germany jersey.” And he’s like, “You know, why don’t you just wait for your birthday?” And I’m like, “Dad, the Cup is on now, can I just get an early present? This will just be, like, my only present and we can just have cake for my birthday.” And I think when my dad said it was like a forty dollar jersey or something like that– and I think when my dad said, “Let’s open up your piggy bank. Let’s see how much you have.” And I think I put in half and he put in half or something. And he’s like, “Alright, we’ll get it this weekend.” I was so excited, I couldn’t wait to get this jersey. I was so excited for the World Cup and to support my team, and that weekend we went out to the store and we bought the jersey. I ran straight to where I knew where it was in the store. My favorite color is red and it happened to be a red Germany jersey, and I went through the thing where all of them were hung up on the hangars. I found my size, I ripped it right off the hangar and straight to the cashier. I had a big grin on my face: this big, goofy grin. I think the cashier was really nice, she was like, “Oh you’re excited for the World Cup?” And I’m like, “Yeah I’m so excited, I’m getting my jersey, I am psyched for the games.” Literally, like I put in my twenty dollars, my dad put in his twenty dollars, and we went home, and the first thing I did as soon as we got home I ripped off the tag, went right up into my room and I took off my shirt and put on the jersey and I was so excited. I looked at my arms and this was so cool. I saw the embroidered Germany thing. I looked in the mirror to see how it looked and my big, goofy grin turned upside down. I was like this doesn’t fit me anymore. This doesn’t fit me right because my chest had changed. I was like, what the hell? This doesn’t fit me like it fits my friends. I couldn’t wear my jersey. I took it off. I just wanted to put on a hoodie or a sweater. I started wearing really baggy clothes in middle school. I remember seeing my friends a little while later and they were like, “Didn’t you get that jersey?” I’m like, “Oh, I wore it the other day and I got a stain on it, so it’s in the wash.” So I started making up bs. My dad asked, “Where’s your jersey that you were so excited for?” And I’m like, “It got a rip in it or something, like, I need to get it patched up.” Like, I just made something up so I didn’t have to wear it and I was so upset ‘cause I really wanted to but I couldn’t anymore because my body had changed. It literally didn’t fit me right. It didn’t fit me like it fit my friends. And I was so devastated. And I remember being a preteen and, like, what do I do now? And I remember me and my friends, we were a little young, we were little shits. We’d be out on our bikes– towards middle school we were more like bad and rebellious; we’d grab some toilet paper and some eggs and hop on our bikes late at night. Like, all my friends would be wearing a t-shirt and I’d wear this thick jacket, like, I still wanted to be one of the boys and it was really hard for me. Like, all through high school I wore heavier clothes. I even remember I had one teacher, it was kind of ironic, she was nagging one girl for wearing clothing that was too short and too revealing, and she would look at me like, “Why don’t you wear like a nice t-shirt or something? You’re so fit, you’re so athletic, and all you wear is hoodies.” And I thought to myself, I don’t wear it because I don’t like my chest. And I literally told her, “Oh, I don’t know.” And it was really hard to go through that, and it was even harder because I thought I didn’t have the choice. I had never heard the word transgender at that point. I love my dad to death, but the only experiences I’ve had with trans people– like, my dad’s come a long way, like, my dad accepts me now and whatnot.
29:10
I think I remember one experience with trans people and to me it didn’t even make sense. I was seven or eight years old, and I think we were on vacation somewhere, and we were walking along this sidewalk. On the opposite side of the street from us there were apparently these trans women or drag queens or something like that. And literally, I vaguely remember this but I remember it enough, where I was like, “Those women are pretty tall,” and I didn’t think anything of it. I was just like those people are pretty tall. My dad tapped my shoulder and was like, “Hey, hey those are men.” I was like, “What?” I was like, “No they’re not, they’re women. What are you talking about?” And I remember that to this day, because that was, like, my first experience with what I believed to be trans people or at the very least drag queens. I don’t know because I didn’t talk to them or anything. But I literally thought they were women and it was weird. I was kind of, like, curious I was like, men can dress up as women? But my dad was like– made it sound bad, so I’m like I guess I shouldn’t do that, but I never heard of a woman dressing as a man. So I was just kind of– it was a little Easter egg in a movie, where it was, like, not foreshadowing necessarily but it was kind of like this going to become a big deal in your life, but you have no idea yet. Like, little me knew where my life would go from there and, like, what all that meant– that would have been a huge deal, but I was just confused. I was like, “huh?” So, that was– puberty was pretty tough. I went through a lot with it. My expression really, really just changed because, at puberty, girls start wearing fancier clothes. Instead of just wearing a t shirt with a flower on it, now they’re wearing like lace stuff and fancy neck and, like, to this day, I don’t know what the clothes’ name were– what the clothes’ names were. There’s, like, a crop top or, like, a V-neck, like, I don’t know what these things are. These girls would be wearing all these fancy clothes, and I’m like, “No, I’m not wearing that,” and I actually had a lot of conflict with my step-mom over that because, even when I was little, she wanted me to wear dresses and stuff and I’m like, “No, I’m not wearing that and I don’t care.” Like, my expression just ‘cause– even at a funeral once– this was a big deal to me. I was with [name]. She took me out shopping ‘cause we had to go to a funeral at my step-mom’s family, and my step-mom was out doing whatever she needed to do, and [name] took me and the other kids to get fancy clothes. She was trying to find me a black dress– a dress and I’m like, “No, I’m going to pick.” I was like eleven or twelve and she was like, “Whatever, I’m going to stop arguing with you.” So I grabbed a pair of black pants and I grabbed a black collared shirt and I put it on in the dressing room and she’s like, “Well, let me see.” So I opened the door, and she literally looked at me and she’s like, “You look like a boy, you look like a guy.” And she like yelled at me in a bad way, though, and I’m just like, “Well I don’t know what to tell you, but this is what I want to wear.” And she bought it for me reluctantly. I didn’t have an answer for her. I couldn’t tell her why I wanted to wear that, I just wanted to wear that, but I didn’t want to wear a dress. Screw that. Even in middle school– one thing I used to do, because I’m like, I don’t really know what to wear ‘cause I was worried about wearing heavier clothes because of my chest. I either wear sweatpants or I’m wearing jeans, and I started stealing a lot of my dad’s clothes which were way too big on me. ‘Cause I was little for a middle schooler, but I’d wear my dad’s cargo shorts, and the pants were like this wide on me, and the kids were like, “What the hell are you wearing?” And I’m like, “I don’t know what to tell you. I like these. They’re cool cargo pants, they’re camouflage, which is neat, and my nice little hoodie.” I didn’t think to myself, “I’m wearing a hoodie because I want to hide my chest.” That’s what I needed to wear and I didn’t think twice about it. Actually, I had a handful of kids that used to tease me a lot, they’re like, “Are you some kind of dyke?” And I didn’t even know what that word was, and I’m just like, “What?” I’ve had kids say, “Dude, are you a boy? Are you like a transvestite or something? I’m convinced that you’re not actually a girl. think you’re a boy.” And I never heard that before. I had this one serious incident in middle school. It went all the way up to the principal. I’m pretty sure the kid ended up getting suspended, ‘cause for me, like, I didn’t really care what the other kids thought. I was always really independent, you know, I didn’t really give a shit what other people say. I’m going to do what makes me happy, because I had my friends group and they accepted me for who I was, like, yeah, I’d get teased, but it was like a friendship tease. I had this one friend who called me “shemale” as, like, a joke and I’d call him an asshole and I’d shove him as a joke. He’s like, “shemale,” and I’m like, “screw you.” You know? It didn’t bother me because he was my friend, like, it did a little bit, but if it got too far, I’d be like, “Dude, you went too far, like, shut the hell up.” Kids on the bus would make fun of me and I’m just like, “What the hell, what’s wrong with you guys?” And, like, the one kid, he’s like, “No you need to prove to me you’re a girl.” This is how it got too far. We argued a lot on the bus and this one day he’s like, “Prove it. Prove that you’re a girl.” And I’m like, “What the hell do you need me to prove to you? How do you want me to prove this?” And he’s like, “I don’t know, take off your pants or some shit.” I’m like, “I’m not doing that,” and he’s like, “Well you’re a boy because you can’t prove you’re a girl.” And I’m just like, “What the hell?” So, like, thank God his stop came or my stop came, but the bus driver overheard it and wrote us both up for fighting because we were yelling at each other. And the principal called me in and she’s like, “What happened?” And I’m like, “He’s like making fun of me ‘cause I look like a boy, and he’s saying I’m not really a girl and he’s telling me to prove it.” As far as I know he got suspended and I was just like what the hell? I didn’t even understand why it happened. It was just like what the hell is happening? Like what the frick? So, like, I definitely got teased a lot for my appearance. I wasn’t, like, a popular kid. In a way I was a lone wolf, but I got along with people, ya know? So I just kind of did my own thing, caused my mischief. Like, I had my gang, like, my little street crew of, like, thirteen– fourteen year old boys, like, myself included. We thought we were punks, but we were just little shits [laughter]. We’re like the baddest kids in school. Look I wrote the F word on the desk. Haw, haw, haw, I’m so bad [laughter] .We were just stupid kids, but we had our good times and my friends really helped me through that a lot of that.
37:05
I just didn’t really care. Boys were going to be assholes and, you know, if somebody wants to be my friend, they got to be my friend ‘cause they like me for me. I’m not changing. I had a couple of girlfriends, you know, just friends who happened to be girls, and they were like, “Why don’t you wear makeup?” And I’m like, “I don’t know, I don’t want to wear makeup.” And they’re like, “Let’s dress you up.” And no matter what they said—no matter what kind of convincing they had—they couldn't get me into makeup [laughter]. Like, nope. So it was pretty hard. I just– ‘cause it was so internalized. It was always in my head. I didn’t know– and my expression– ‘cause I started to go through like puberty, it’s like the world forked in half. If you’re a boy you went this way and if you’re a girl you went that way. I was going this way, but I wanted to go that way. Literally, like, I remember the boys’ voices cracked and I’m like why can’t my voice do that? Like, ‘cause boys are idiots, myself included, I’m not excluding myself from that. We’d be, like, in class and a boy would make his voice crack and everybody thought it was the funniest thing in the world. I tried to do it and they’re like, “You can’t crack your voice ‘cause you’re a girl.” And I’m like devastated. Why can’t I crack my voice? That’s not fair. What’s ironic is that my voice actually does crack a little bit. In a way, I think I almost taught it to crack, but in another way I think it’s just kind of my natural voice. I couldn’t do it in middle school and it’s just like damn, this sucks. I can’t do it. And it was interesting because my expression went more and more male and I don’t know why. I couldn’t tell you what I was doing or why I was doing it, I just needed to do it. Instead of shopping in the girls section, I was shopping in the boys section. Even as a kid, I would buy boys’ basketball shorts and a handful of boys’ T-shirts. My step-mom would be mad as hell at me every time. She’d be like, “Why are you in that section?” And I’m like, “I don’t know, I just want to, like, get this t-shirt. It’s cooler. It has a friggin’ T-Rex on it.” As I got older I never wanted to go into the girls section ‘cause they could get me into the girls section and they’d be like, “Let’s just go to the athletic girls.” I could tolerate when I was younger, but as I got older, like the teenage girls, the clothes changed too. They became, like, I don’t know how to describe it– skinny jeans, tight shirts. I’m like, “No, no I’m not wearing that.” I remember when I was like eleven or twelve this weird thing happened to me. Me and my dad, we were shopping for clothes and stuff, and he was like, “Do you need to get more underwear or something?” And I’m like, “Yeah, I guess I do.” So we were in the girls section and he was like, “Well, I don’t know what kind to get you.” And he was kind of uncomfortable, and he’s like, “I don’t know what kind to get, just pick one.” Then I was looking and it was like something came over me. I describe it like I got possessed for a minute, where, like, without even thinking, I had it up to here with looking at all these girls’ underwear with all these flowers and crap on them, like, no. And something came over me: without the expression on my face, without even knowing what I was doing, I walked over to the boys section and found my size and grabbed boxer shorts. This was the first time I ever wore boxers. I grabbed them and put them in the cart and I said nothing. My dad kind of looked at me, looked at the cart, looked at me and was just like, “Okay, let’s go.” ‘Cause my dad’s not a confrontational guy, he’s just like, “Okay.” So it was like something came over me, like, I literally couldn’t do it anymore. Like, I literally couldn’t and I just bought the boxer shorts. I only dared wear them at home ‘cause I was already getting teased a lot for looking like a boy in high school. In middle school even too. God forbid I start to wear boxers and somebody sees, I’m gonna really get it. But the first thing I did when I came home from school was, like, change out of my clothes—which were like neutral at best—and put on my boxer shorts. I was just curious with the expression ‘cause, like, a lot of the guys in high school, they had the boxers that went here– their jeans were down and their underwear was showing. So I’d go in my bathroom and pull my pants like half way down so my boxers were showing and I’m like, “Yeah, why can’t I do this everywhere.”
41:57
And, like, weekends I would do that, but there was once or twice I ran into somebody and I was in my boy form, which is what I considered it to myself, and I’m like, “Shit, fuck, like pulling my hood, let me hide.” God forbid they start talking to me. It was hard. I actually remember one time, I was probably in middle school, maybe early high school, and I was in my boy form on the weekend. Like, I had my boxer shorts on, I had big ass leather jacket, I’m pretty sure I was wearing my dad’s jacket, that’s how big I needed it to be because, like, my chest. I didn’t know what binding was, and I didn’t even know why I needed to bind my chest, I just needed to. I had this big-ass jacket on, I had these long-ass pants, I’m pretty sure they were my dad’s too. I stole all my dad’s clothing, so I had to wear a belt and we were at Best Buy or something. Again, I was thirteen, maybe fourteen, and I didn’t know why I was doing it but I had to use the bathroom, and I go to the women’s room, and this woman is walking next to me towards the women’s room and she kind of like slipped in before me. I was just walking behind her, and she turns around and she’s like, “You can’t come in here,” and I’m like, “What?” And she literally pushed me in my chest and shoved me. “You can’t come in here! The boy’s room is there!” And I’m like, “What are you talking about, I’m just trying to use the bathroom.” ‘Cause, like, I never thought about going in the men’s room because I wasn’t supposed to do that. I need to go in the women’s room. I was just confused, I was shocked, and I was like, why is this woman yelling at me and shoving me, and I tried to go in one more time. And I’m like I don’t know what this woman is on but she is trying to kick me out of the bathroom. And so I tried to walk in again, and she grabs my shirt and shoves me really hard and is like, “Get out!” I remember leaving and going in one of the aisles by the electronics and I just sat down kind of, like, where I could see the bathroom door. I waited for her to leave before I went in. And I was, like, scared. I was like why in the hell is this adult harassing me now? I was so confused. I’m like, man, what’s everybody’s problem. I don’t know, I was really lost. ‘Cause I didn’t know what trans was and I didn’t think to Google. I wish I was a boy or something like that. I didn’t know what was wrong with me in a way. I‘m just trying to get through the day. I need to wear longer, bigger shirts and I like to wear jeans and cargo shorts, and I’m like, why is everybody giving me such a hard time. It didn’t make sense to me. Even my step mom would bully me about it. It was really hard.
44:57
So was this kind of moving into high school or was this kind of–
Between middle school and high school because once I started puberty I was going this way even though I didn’t want to, and I was doing everything in my power to go closer that way. Even though I didn’t know it. That was kind of, like, middle school, high school, post-puberty. One thing that was interesting, ‘cause I recently had top surgery, which I was super relieved and happy about, one thing I noticed– one day when I was recovering, I wrote it in a journal because I like to journal a lot. I was walking outside on a nice day like today and it was so warm out. It was one of the first days I was outside in nothing but a t-shirt and I wrote in my journal. I remember being in middle school and high school and I hated the summer, I absolutely loathed it. It was hot, it was sticky, it was gross. I hated it. I love winter. I love the cold, I love hoodies, I like walking around inside the mall and video games. And now after surgery I’m remembering that, when I was a little kid, summer was my favorite season. I could just take my bike anywhere in town, like, go downtown, ride it, and get ice cream with some friends. Chase down the ice cream truck, go swimming, and I forgot how much I love summer. I literally started to hate summer after puberty, but, like, now after top surgery it kind of like hit me. I remembered it after I forgot it for a long time. I was just like holy shit, I used to love summer. After puberty, winter was my favorite thing in the world because I could wear a hoodie and not be hot. I didn't know why winter was my favorite season for so long, for mostly that. I remember I’m just like summer rocks. I’m so glad I can enjoy the summer again, ‘cause, like, I didn’t like it anymore after puberty. I’m so looking forward to summer, my first summer post-surgery. I can’t wait to go out back to the beach, get back into surfing. I’m so psyched.
So was high school a different kind of experience versus middle school
Not really. It was very similar just, like, my high school was bigger than my middle school. That’s pretty much it.
And then, you mentioned having surgery. You mention at one point not even knowing what trans was.
Yeah
47:50
What was the learning curve, or what was the process?
That’s a great question. When I came into college. That was really where I learned so much about the LGBT community as a whole. In high school we had an LGBT club, but it was really sad and pathetic. The teacher who ran it was the weirdest teacher in the school. Not even that because she was LGBT. I didn’t even know if she was LGBT, she might not have been LGBT, she was just weird. She was a weird person, like in a bad way, like creepy weird. She did weird, awkward things. I don’t know how to describe it. She would burp in the middle of class and start laughing. I’m not talking about a little burp by accident, I’m talking like a belch and I’m like, “What is wrong with you?” But– so, like, I had one friend in high school and she said she was bi, and I’m like “What is that?” She explained it to me, and I’m like, “Okay, that’s cool, I still love you, you’re still my friend.” I didn’t think anymore about it, I was just really accepting. I always had crushes on girls and stuff, but I’m like I’m supposed to like guys, so I’m just going to like a guy. I thought it was the same kind of thing as like I can’t be a boy because, I don’t know, just ‘cause, so let me try liking a guy. So I tried dating one of my guy friends, and he was really sweet, but I didn’t feel anything for him. He was just like my friend I happened to be dating. In college I talked to one of my friends about it, freshman year, pretty early in the year. She was very out and proud as a lesbian. She had a girlfriend, rainbows all over her room. She was a really good friend. I told her one day, “I think I have a crush on this one girl in my class.” She’s like, “Are you gay?” And I’m like, “What’s that?” And she’s like, “Do you like women?” And I’m like, “Yeah,” and she’s like, “Then you’re gay.” I’m like, “Oh.” She’s like, “Let me take you to the LGBT Club at Kean. We’re going to take good care of you.” And I’m like, “Okay.” And she brought to the club and I knew what gay was to a point but I didn’t really know. Like, I knew it was a man and a man, and a woman and a woman, but I didn’t really know a woman and a woman could be together, I just knew about man and a man. And she brought me to this club and there were like thirty people sitting in this big room, and I looked at her and I was like, “Is this all the gay people in the state? [Laughter] Am I lucky enough that all the gay people happen to congregate at Kean for a weekly meeting.” She slapped me upside the head and was like, “No numbnuts, this is the gay people at Kean.” I’m like, “What?! I thought there were like ten couples of gay people in the state. Like, how many gay people are there?” She’s like, “Where did you go to high school? Did you go to high school in Missouri or something?” And I’m like, “I don’t frickin’ know! I was never educated on this.” So I sat down and I learned about Lesbian, Gay, Bi, Transgender. We mostly talked about gay and lesbian stuff because everybody in the club was gay or lesbian or bi. And there was nobody who was trans, so that was something that was still unknown to me for a long time.
51:20
Until this one boy, his name was [name], he’s a trans guy and he went to my school. I didn’t meet him for a long time, but one of my friends was friends with him, and she was like, “Oh, I know this trans guy.” I’m like, “What?” And she’s like, “A trans guy.” And I’m like, “What’s that? What do you mean? He’s a guy, what does the trans part mean?” And she’s like, “No stupid, trans guy means he’s transgender. He’s transitioning from female to male.” And I was like, “That’s a thing?” And she’s like, “Yeah.” And I’m like, “I need to meet this person.” So I finally run into him and he’s a very shy and quiet kid, but he’s really nice. So one night I’m just, like, sitting outside the dorms and I knew what he looked like, but I didn’t know him. And he walked by us one day and I’m like, “Hey, [name]!” And he’s like, “What’s up?” And I’m like, “My name’s,” and I said my name at the time, and I’m like, “I’m friends with [name] and she’s your roommate or your friend,” I don’t remember how she knew him. He’s like, “Okay that’s cool.” And I was like, “I hope you’re having a good day,” and we talked, and I ran into him a couple more times. He is a very quiet guy, kind of into himself and it wasn’t like a budding friendship. If I ran into him I said, “Hi,” and I always wished him a happy day. And I think one time we talked about trans issues. And he was like, “I don’t have many friends ‘cause I’m trans.” I told him, “I don’t care that you’re trans, I think you’re a really cool dude.” He was like, “Thanks man, I appreciate that, not a lot of people are like that.” And I started questioning myself, like, shit, maybe I’m trans too or something. But I didn’t even say it to him. It was really hard to accept that about myself. I wasn’t ready.
53:16
A little while later, I started dating my girlfriend at the time. We broke up since, but I was really happy with her at the beginning. I was really happy. I was dating a nice girl, she was pretty, I was happy, I really liked her and things were well. But I was learning more and more about the LGBT community, and I started looking up stuff online and I came across a couple of channels by trans YouTubers and I was like holy crap. This is me! This is me! And I’d go through these phases where I would watch every video I could between binding and packing and surgery and stuff. Then I’d go through a phase where I would shut my computer closed and be like I can’t do this, this isn’t me. This is wrong. I can’t do this, this isn’t right and I would shut it off. I can’t do this, but I would always come back. I ‘d want to watch the video again. I remember that dude, he had a wicked cool mustache and the beard, and I can’t remember his name, and let me see if I can find him again. And I’d look it up again. Finally after a long time– ‘cause I had it in my head that my gender is different and I knew it was different at this point. I just didn’t know how to tell people, even I didn’t really accept it myself yet. It was kind of like a thing where I was like, I wish I could, but I can’t. Finally after a really, really long time I started telling a couple people. The first person I told was my girlfriend and that, unfortunately, went really bad. The thing about my ex-girlfriend, bless her heart, she’s not a bad person, but she’s got a bad temper. So she would flip out about something then be totally fine with it, kind of thing. So I came out to her, and at the time I still kind of questioned myself, I was still kind of afraid. So I did a baby step and said I was gender fluid. I kind of feel like a guy sometimes, but I’m okay with being a girl other times. I explained that to her. She took it as I’m transitioning tomorrow and she started freaking out and yelling at me, “I’m losing my girlfriend, I’m getting a boyfriend. You’re going to cut off your boobs and sew on a dick.” She was crying and screaming and I’m like, oh fuck. I was like ah crap. [Laughter] Now I done it, now I done it. And I was just like this is bad. And we were sitting in one of our cars before we went inside and she had to leave and go for a walk. And I was just sitting there smoking my cigarette like whelp, crap. And she came back and she was like, “I’m going to try.” And that felt fake to me. Like, I never really got the full vibe that she fully accepted me, I was kind of like she said she was going to try. At that point, I just wanted her to call me “he” sometimes. Just say “my boyfriend” at times. Even if it was just me and her. Just acknowledge the boy in me.
56:51
I started coming out to a couple other friends and my one friend. Their name is [name] and they are the head of the LGBT community at my school at the time. I came out to them and I told them, like, listen, “I’m gender fluid.” My girlfriend was with me, and I’m really questioning my gender, and I don’t know what to do. And they ask, “Do you want to be a boy?” And I really, really wanted to say yes, but my girlfriend was right there so I’m like, “I think I’m ok with being gender fluid,” but I really wanted to say, “No I want to just be a boy.” And I started questioning it more and more and wishing I could be a guy. One thing I noticed that was interesting looking back, I know this is completely off topic, but one thing I remember is that I always used to do little things to make me feel like a boy. Whether it was hanging out with my guy friends at school and be like I’m one of the boys. Or, I would play my video games, and you know how they ask you to enter your name? I would pick random boy names. I’d be like Jayden or Maxwell or Jonathan, just to have a boy name. At the very least in this video game, everybody thinks I’m a boy. It kind of came back to that again in college where I would play video games, I’d just start putting in a boy name. I think I joined an LGBT chat online and I picked a boy name, I’m like, “Hey guys I’m just a queer guy,” like, I don’t know what I’m doing. But I joined the chat and it was cool to interact with people and be seen as a boy. What really made me start to look into transition was when I was about to graduate. I was maybe a semester or two away from graduation. I really, really know I want to be a boy. I really, really know I would like to transition. I really would.
59:16
Can we pause for a second?
Yeah.
[First clip ends]
0:00
Great. John Keller continuing with JP’s oral history interview and this is part two. Great, so you were saying where you had a moment that was toward the end of college.
Yeah, it was maybe like a semester or two away, maybe a little bit more, maybe a year perhaps. I studied education because that was– I always enjoyed Phys Ed, actually really enjoyed the science part of Health, and I enjoyed working with kids. With a lot of what I went through in school, having a lot of teachers label me as bad or stupid– I literally had teachers call my dad saying I wasn’t going to graduate or I was going to end up in prison. I really wanted to pursue education because I have this firm belief that every kid needs somebody to believe in them. I happen to just by chance end up in a preschool class working with children or something like that in high school and I loved them. I think I’m going to pursue education because, if it wasn’t for that, I probably would have just joined the military and called it a day. So I’m like I’m going to study education and I was so excited about it, ‘cause I found something I’m really passionate about, I think I’m really good at it. I have a lot to learn, but I’m eager. So it’s what I came to school for, that’s what I was learning. I was happy, but it reached a point where, like, student teaching and stuff and with transition related– I thought to myself, well I can be trans or I can be a teacher. I can’t be both. I thought to myself I picked teaching, it means more to me. I thought I could choose. What really pushed me over the edge was my last semester ‘cause I had all this in my head. It was starting to boil over towards the end of my college career. And then student teaching– where you go to school every single day and work with the kids and the kids are calling you “miss this, miss that,” and I had already cut my hair at that point. So one thing I did a lot was wear a pink shirt just so that everybody knows the teacher’s not a guy. It became so hard for me. I enjoyed what I was doing a lot. I enjoyed working with the kids. The lesson plans, they’re kind of annoying to make, but it’s not that hard for me. I can bang out a week’s worth of lessons in an hour or two depending on the unit.
2:46
[Second clip ends]
0:00
Sorry, you were talking about lesson plans and how you enjoyed student teaching.
I really enjoyed the work I was doing, but I just got more and more unhappy with myself. I’d come home and hate myself. And I wasn’t wearing a binder or anything at that point. It got to the point, and I remember doing this every single morning, where I would wear a baggy shirt to sleep to help with my chest and I didn’t know why. Well at that point I kind of knew why. But it was something I needed to do and I accepted that I needed to do it. I couldn’t look at myself in the mirror getting dressed in the morning completely in my clothes that was feminine ‘cause I needed to look like a female teacher, ‘cause I didn’t want to get yelled at by another teacher. Just discrimination stuff. ‘Cause in one of my student teaching experiences, before I even accepted myself as trans– because I did four, five student teaching experiences, something like that– I mentioned to one of my co-ops that I had a girlfriend and he was like, “Don’t you ever say that here! Don’t you ever say that here!” And I was like, crap, school is not the place to be an LGBT person I guess. And it got to the point where I’d be getting ready in the morning and I would do my hair before I put my clothes on because they were so feminine, and I couldn’t look at myself in the mirror because they were so feminine. I couldn’t look at myself in the mirror with the feminine clothes. I’d get home and rip them right off and back to my boxer shorts at night and just not dealing with it, and I was becoming more unhappy. I was feeling really miserable. I liked what I was doing, but I didn’t like myself kind of thing. I remembered thinking, “I can be trans or I can be a teacher, but I don’t think I could choose to be trans.” I need to do something or I’m going to be unhappy for the rest of my life because I thought when I was questioning I could be trans or I could be a teacher. A few years back from student teaching I thought I can either transition when I retire or just live my life as female and when I die ask the big man upstairs if I could come back to Earth for round two as a guy. That’s what I thought to myself.
2:35
I need to do something so I really got back into the YouTube videos again. I dove back in and I need to do something now or I’m never going to be happy in my entire life. I’m going to be miserable. I’m going to hate myself. It’s really bad. I’m not in a good place. The only thing I like is work. So, by the time I graduated I had bought my first binder– my first packer? I dove right in. I thought to myself, if I don’t have the choice but to be trans, I can at least have both. Teaching and trans. I reached out and found a therapist in my area. I was able to go back to my school and get a clinical training therapist where she was in grad school or something like that. Even though I didn’t do gender counseling. She was able to help me a lot. Really help me accept myself finally. We talked a lot about my childhood and being yelled at for saying, “I’m a boy, I’m a boy.” We talked a lot about what I went through as a kid, being yelled at for saying I’m a boy and being teased a lot and dressing like a boy. I talked to her about that a lot, and she really helped accept myself and I picked a name. At the time I went by Seth. ‘Cause that was easier for me because it was close to my legal name. I went by it for a long time, I liked binding and I was so happy the first time I got my first binder. The first thing I did was put on a soccer jersey because I hadn’t worn a soccer jersey in years. To this day I’m not sure what I did with that Germany jersey. I’m pretty sure I threw it away or gave it away ‘cause I couldn’t wear it anymore. I’m like why keep it if I can’t wear it. I was really upset about it. Little did I know I would be getting a binder. Little did I know I’d be getting top surgery and could have worn it still. So I’m really bummed that that jersey is gone.
5:18
But one of the first things I did was put on a soccer jersey and it finally fit right. It finally came full circle. I can wear a soccer jersey again. I can wear whatever I want again. I’m not going to wear a hoodie in the summer and hate the summer. I can wear a t-shirt in the summer again. I was so happy. I had my binder and I started coming out to my friends. I made a new Facebook page. I was really starting the process of coming out. At this point– I had already broken up with my girlfriend a while back, so I was solo at that point. I didn’t have to worry about my girlfriend’s approval or anything like that. I was just doing me. I started going to conferences and stuff, and I started meeting a lot more trans people, and I started accepting myself more and more ‘cause so many people had stories like mine. As a kid you’re like what the hell, but as an adult you look back and it’s like, ah, you just didn’t know what it was you were going through. You’re struggling so much, but you didn’t have the way to articulate what you were going through. So I started living as male in society and my hair was already cut so I didn’t have any issues with that and I was really happy. I didn’t have work yet but I looked at it as a year to work on myself. I went through my counseling, I started meeting up with trans people. I started looking into different groups, that was how I found The Pride Center.
7:04
I was really happy, I just needed to make my career work and that’s still where I’m struggling to be honest. That’s still really hard for me. I think I’m still working on myself a bit. Even though I want T [testosterone], I don’t think I’m ready for it. I just need to work through more; it’s a little bit hard. I have this mental roadblock with T, ‘cause, like, I do want my voice to drop, I don’t have an issue with facial hair, like, I’d love to experiment with it and see what looks good on me. The muscle mass and gain: all that would be really cool. There’s nothing I don’t want from testosterone, I just have a mental block because, what’s hard about T is, you put that needle in your leg– to take the medication or if you do the gel or the patch or something. You don’t know what changes you’re going to have, to what degree, and that’s really hard for me to understand and accept. ‘Cause change is hard. Even good change is hard. So I’ve always had it in my head, I’m probably going to get top surgery first. And then I broke my rib. I was binding so much, so often, I didn’t get X-Rays, so I’m not one hundred percent sure if it broke, but I started getting really bad pain in my back and it hurt so bad I couldn’t walk. It hurt excruciating. I have a very high pain tolerance, but every single day I was wearing my binder– and we were in the food store one day and it just– it was hurting all week and I just couldn’t take it anymore and we were in the food store. Me and my dad and his new girlfriend– ‘cause him and my ex step mom broke up and now my dad’s got a new girlfriend now. My dad’s girlfriend, she’s like, “What’s wrong, are you ok?” I’m like, “Yeah, my back just hurts so bad.” We just went straight home, ‘cause his girlfriend was like really concerned for me. So we iced it and threw on icy hot. She’s really sweet, she takes good care of you, if you have a cold, she’s going to run at you with noodle soup. [Laughter] She’s a really sweet person and she’s really concerned, and I realized it was my binder very quickly that was hurting me, and I’m like I need to look into top surgery because I am ready for top surgery. I just didn’t know if I could financially do it. The thing about top surgery that was easier for me to accept than testosterone is I can control so much. I can tell my surgeon, I want this. I want my scars this shape, I want this placed there I want that placed there. Step by step go through every single week of recovery: first week you’re going with the drains, then you’re going with the drains pulled out, then you put gauze on the drain sites. Then by week three you shouldn’t have to cover your grafts anymore. Everything is very predictable, you know, everything. So I talked to my insurance. I spent days at a time looking for surgeons who took my insurance and talking to insurance to get approval and so–
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0:00
Where did we leave off?
Well, you were talking about your– where you are right now with the idea of testosterone.
Top surgery was a lot more simple for me. I did have to change counselors, ‘cause the one I was with at the time, she basically– ‘cause she was in school couldn’t write letters of recommendation. So I found a different counselor and this was just before I had my rib injury from the binder. I talked with her about T and I was like, “I don’t know and I need to work out getting T.” She was like, “It takes me about three months to write a letter for T so that’s good timing.” I asked her, “What about top surgery?” She was like, “It’s probably the same amount of time, I’m a little more reserved with that.” I’m like, “Alright, fine.” The week I broke my rib or did whatever I did to my rib, I came and I’m like, “I need a letter for top surgery,” and she was like, “What?” And I was like, “Listen, I can’t do the binding anymore, I’m sick of it, it’s hot, I always have to worry about the binder.” With working, I had a couple of part time jobs, even when I was able to land [a part time gig] back in my school, just in the office, but they respected me as trans because I had come out and they used my preferred name which was really cool. I was really grateful for, but it was so hard to do an eight hour day at work and then drive to and from work in my frickin’ binder. It was awful. I described it as the best, worst thing in the world. So it took a really really long time to get a letter from her. In my opinion, I feel like she was really gatekeeping me. Where it was like, “I don’t know what else to tell you besides I need a letter.” I had already picked a surgeon, I had talked to insurance, I had all the requirements minus the letter.
2:11
Because my dad was changing work, the insurance was changing, and so I needed to get in very, very quickly. I talked to her and I’m like, “Listen what do you need from me?” And she literally said, verbatim, something like– she literally said, “I’m not convinced enough to write a letter for you for top surgery.” She used the word convinced and I’m just like, “What do I have to prove to you? What do I have to say to validate myself?” So finally I was able to talk to her supervisor. I talked to her about it and within a couple meetings she was finally able to get me the letter, but it was such a headache and I was so stressed out because I was like, I don’t know if I’m going to be able to get top surgery in time and if I don’t get it with insurance, I don’t know when I’m going to be able to afford it, ‘cause if I don’t go through insurance, I don’t have six to ten grand just to throw like that. I need insurance to cover it. There’s no way. And, like, I talked to my doctor to see if I could schedule the consult, ‘cause I didn’t have the letter yet, and she needed the letter even for the consult, which was so hard. When I finally got the letter I was so relieved, but literally every step of the way for top surgery was so hard ‘cause, like, now I need to schedule a consult, but it was, like, months later. But I got a lucky break because somebody at the office called me when somebody else cancelled. She was like, “Can you come in tomorrow?” I was like, “You guys are in Massachusetts, but yeah, let’s do it.” I’m gonna take off work. I’m gonna do whatever I need to do to and I’m gonna be there. And I was like, “What time,” and she was like, “Noon.” Thank God it was in the afternoon, because if it was in the morning, I would have been screwed.
4:03
I went in for the consults. What’s the beauty of top surgery to me is, like, literally it’s changing one thing and it’s very predictable. My surgeon spent an hour with me talking about exactly what I wanted. I do get a little bit of medical anxiety so she gave me a lot of relief from my medical anxiety. I’m like I need to do this now, not even just financially, but I’m like I don’t know what I’m going to do if I can’t bind this summer. I’m going to have to go back to my hoodies again. But now I know I’m trans. It’s almost easier when you don’t know because you’re just trying to get by and you don’t really know what you’re doing or why you’re doing it. But then you come out you could be wearing a binder, one of the best binders in the world, and still not be completely flat. So, like, I was so concerned that I wouldn’t be able to get top surgery and what I would do if I couldn’t get top surgery. And I had to wear a binder again with my bad rib, or if I couldn’t bind. Thank God this was over the winter time so I could wear my hoodies and I could wear my leather jacket. I literally had like four or five T-shirts on and a hoodie and my jacket just to get by because that’s what I needed to do.
5:40
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0:00
Thankfully I was able to squeeze into that consult and get everything all set up, and I finally had my surgery in January and I was so scared, but I was so relieved. I know I needed to do this. I don’t know why. Most people do hormones before surgery, but surgery seems so much easier to me. The only thing that’s more drastic about surgery is ‘cause it’s surgery. It’s not, like, just a medication you take. While the change is significant in my life, and impactful on my life, it wasn’t the most significant change in the world, ‘cause, like, between top surgery and binder, the difference is pretty trivial. Now I can walk around shirtless which is something I adore, but it’s like you don’t have to worry about binding or anything like that. It’s just one change where T is so many changes and so many unpredictable changes and to the degree things change. So it’s been really challenging for me.
1:13
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0:00
It’s hard for me and I feel I get a bit of stick for not being ready for T, while I do want it, but I’m not ready. I’ve since changed counselors ‘cause I couldn’t rebuild trust with the one I was with, the one who gate kept me. So I switched and now I feel like I am actually having the opposite problem. She seems a little bit pushy. I tell her– I’m like I have a lot of social dysphoria, ‘cause I’m [a man, in my twenties] but at best I pass as like a fourteen year old boy. Cool, you see me as male, which is great, I love it, but I’m not fourteen. I get a lot of social dysphoria with that, like, with working. It’s like, ”Wait a minute, don’t you have to be eighteen to work here, but you look like you’re like thirteen.” You see people trying to put the pieces together and it’s awkward, and you get concerned ‘cause I’ve been confronted and bullied so many times about my expression and my identity. It’s really, really hard and it scares me to be honest. It’s pretty scary. So I definitely do want T, and that’s what I told my new therapist, but she’s like, “Well if you’re in society, why don’t you just take the T?” And I’m like, “I don’t know what my mental roadblock is. It’s not that I’m less trans, I need to work through this but it’s hard.” Even though I want T, it’s so hard.
1:38
Even good changes are hard. Like top surgery. It was one of the best things I’ve ever done in my life. It was probably quite easily one of the hardest things I’ve ever done in my life. The physical recovery, the physical pain, I had a complication that required a second surgery, unfortunately. I had a hematoma that started to bleed so I needed a second surgery to fix that up and, you know, just doctors are so uneducated. There was an incident after my second surgery to fix the bleed. I remember waking up in the surgery recovery room, and this was late at night, and it was basically empty. ‘Cause the hematoma happened like that, I needed surgery like that. So I woke up and I was looking around wondering where the nurses were. I was in this huge empty room and I see across from me this long table and the nurses were talking and giggling and I didn’t understand what they were saying. I’m like, “Huh, am I okay, like what’s going on?” There were no nurses by me, my dad and [name] weren’t around, and I think I fell back asleep or something and I woke up to two nurses in front of me and they were asking me basic questions, like “What’s your name? What happened?”, just stuff to make sure I was with it. “What month are we in?” And then one of the nurses looked at me and she’s like, “So why did you have surgery?” And I’m like, “Because I had a hematoma,” and she’s like, “No, why did you have the first surgery?” And I’m like, “gender confirmation,” and that’s what I said the whole time because my original doctor was up in Massachusetts and I had the hematoma back in Jersey so I had to go to the ER in Jersey. So I just said gender confirmation for my surgery and she’s like, “Oh, ok,” but she’s like, “but why did you get it?” And I’m like, “‘Cause I needed it.” She’s like, “Well do you want bottom surgery?” Mind you, I’m literally coming out of anesthesia so I’m, like, not with it completely. And I’m like wait what? Am I hallucinating? I think I looked at her and was like, “What?” She’s like, “You know, do you want bottom surgery, do you want a dick?” I’m just like, oh my God, but in my high state of being under anesthesia I said something stupid like, “I haven’t been doing very well in the gamble of not having complications, and bottom surgery tends to have a lot of complications.” [laughter] I said something stupid like that, but that wasn’t good enough for her and she asked me again or asked me a little different, and she’s like, “Don’t you want a dick?”, or something like that, and I’m just like, and it finally clicked in my head, this is wrong, this shouldn’t be happening. And I looked at her and I’m like, “Why are you asking me this? What does this have to do with what’s happening right now?” And she’s like, “You’re right I’m sorry.” And I actually put in a complaint for her. This one HR lady– as soon as I said gender confirmation, this lady showed up out of nowhere and she’s like, “Hi, I’m with HR, public relations,” something related to patients and discrimination I don’t remember her title. She came to visit me like a day or two after my operation, ‘cause I was still in the hospital, and she’s like, “Oh, how have you been treated here?” And I’m like, “Nobody knows my name, nobody knows my pronouns,” and I told her about the nurse who was asking really invasive questions as I was drugged from surgery which was really really bad. I’m laughing about it because I have a dark sense of humor, but it’s really really bad. That shouldn’t have happened at all.
5:40
I feel like I’ve almost went polar opposite. Like, before transition I was happy with my work and career but I hated myself, but now that I’m transitioning, I’m loving myself so much more. I’m so much more confident, I’m so much more happier. I’m very, very relieved. But in the working world is so much more challenging for me. ‘Cause schools tend to be very conservative. I don’t even know if I’ll ever be able to teach ‘cause I’m trans and for no other reason than that. So it’s like, I know I could make it work, and I know a big portion of my struggle is just my age, like, you just finished school and you’re finding your way in the real world, but it’s hard. It’s even harder as a trans person. I’m really seeing that in a lot of places. I’ve had job interviews where I’ve been denied for no other reason than I’m trans. I got interviewed at this one preschool and I’m like, “Listen I go by this name, please just call me this name.” At the time I was still going by Seth before I changed to JP, and I’m like, “Please just call me Seth and use he/him pronouns.” She looked at me like I had four eyes and she was just like, “Okay, just come this way.” I’m like, “Alright.” It was a working interview so she brings me a class of preschoolers and before I could say anything, she’s like, “Well class, we have a guest speaker today, her name is Miss Blahblahblah,” and I’m like [slapping sound and laughter]. I’m like are you serious? And how am I going to explain to fifteen preschoolers that my name actually isn’t Miss Blahblahblah, it’s Mr. JP. And, of course, I didn’t get a phone call back. I was supposed to get a phone call whether I got the job or not. I never got a phone call back, I never heard from them again. I called them a couple times, and I was like, “Where’s Miss Soandso who interviewed me?” I can’t even remember her name and they were like, “Oh she’s out right now, she’ll give you a call in a couple of days.” I’m like that’s fine. So a couple of days pass and I call again and I remember speaking with this one girl who answered the phone and she’s like, “Oh, Soandso, she’s in, let me go get her. “ I’m like cool, I got lucky I ran into her. She comes back and she’s like, “I’m sorry, she had something pop up, she had to go take care of something.” I’m like alright, I see. I get it. I just stopped calling. Never heard from them again.
8:25
Even recently– I went on a job interview, maybe three or four days ago, and he said he’d either call me the same day or on Saturday. I still haven’t gotten a call yet. I still have hopes, he seemed like a really, really nice guy, but in your head, after that happens so many times, you kind of lose, you kind of become more pessimistic almost. I’m very pessimistic about the probability of landing a job at this point. It’s really hard for me. I’m like, is he going to call me back? I hope so, he seemed like a nice guy, I’d like to believe he would, but I still haven’t had anything. Today he was supposed to call me, and I’ve got nothing. So that’s hard. It’s been really a challenge now navigating the world as a trans person. I never got a break when I still was– I never really like presented as female, I just kind of presented as myself, I just went by female pronouns and my female name ‘cause I didn’t know any better. People gave me a hard time. Now that I’m transitioning to be who I am, I’m so much happier with myself but I still get so much stick from people. It’s really, really challenging.
9:49
That’s why I like projects like this ‘cause you can get an inside look into what people go through every day. People make some stupid comment in this Facebook video with a trans person. They’re like, “I identify as an Apache attack helicopter,” or something stupid, but they don’t think twice about the inside of trans people’s lives or what they go through everyday, even, like, what they go through as children. Who would want to see a four-year-old getting screamed at just for saying how they feel and that’s what I went through. At four-years-old being screamed at and made fun of by two grown women. Being teased just for how you dress. I’m not terribly bothered by the kid bullies but what really bothered me were the adults. At the time I was a child and I was like kids are going to be asses because kids are assholes. But an adult making fun of me? Family members? My own stepmom used to bully me every single day for what I wore. It’s terrible. Not getting a job just because I identify this way. You know, just waking up from surgery being asked if I wanted bottom surgery. What does that have to do with what’s going on right now. What does me being trans have to do with me being a teacher? What does me being trans have to do with you treating me like a human being or respecting my name and respecting my pronouns and not asking such invasive questions? It’s hard and that’s, like, the only con to coming out. Everything else has been amazing. I’m so grateful everyday for having had top surgery. I’m grateful everyday to be myself. I can look in the mirror now and smile. I’ll sleep with my shirt off and look down at my chest and smile for the first time in forever. It's amazing. I feel great. I can wear my cargo pants and not think twice. I love my hair, experimenting with my hair, styling it. I’m still finding my way and it’s hard to learn something so different. Like when I start T, like learning the art of shaving. But it’s not gonna be a bad thing for me, it will be a new learning experience for me. The bad thing is, now I love myself and I accept myself, but not too many people in the world accept me. I definitely think it’s changing. I think it’s gotten a million times better, it really has, but it’s not there yet. But every little thing we can do makes it better.
12:59
One question I wanted to ask was, what made you choose to go to Massachusetts?
It was a combination of things. I chose the surgeon for a number of reasons. The first one was all of her results were very similar, so it was very predictable in terms of what I liked, and I happen to like scars that go very straight and she was able to deliver that for me no problem. My scars are completely straight and a lot of surgeons have a curved approach or even a diagonal, and just my personal preference, do I want to wear green, or red, or blue today and I chose blue. So it’s just my preference for that. Her style is very straight scars, she’s a very good surgeon in terms of talent. The complication I believe truly had nothing to do with her. It’s just that one percent probability that something did happen after surgery, it happened to happen. I don’t think it’s the surgeon’s fault for one second. Her skill is very good, everything is pristine. The grafts are perfect. That’s the thing I’m most impressed with. You would never know that they were grafts. It’s really, really awesome. I think I was getting dressed today or yesterday– I was getting dressed, I put on my shirt and brushed my teeth in the mirror and I looked at my chest and I looked at how they’re healing and I was like, I can’t believe my nipples were off my body and reattached at one point. ‘Cause you would never know, which is really cool. I’m sorry if you’re squeamish. She does amazing work and she’s really, really nice. And she does allow for some preference in it. I’ve heard of– I joined a Facebook group and a couple other groups where people talk about what surgeon they want to go to and at the Philly Trans Conference, I’m not sure if you’re aware of that, I went there and talked to a bunch of people about surgery and I ran into people who went to the surgeon that I went to and everybody had a really great experience with her. Top surgery is very complicated. It’s not unheard of to need a revision here or there, but I truly believe– I don’t think– I won’t need a revision. I’m still a little swollen, because I’m just a couple months post op, but it’s been going down so much. It used to be this swollen, now it’s that swollen. Plus she took my insurance. She’s one of the few who takes insurance. So it was worth it. It wasn’t a horrible drive up to where she is, it was maybe four hours, five hours, maybe, depending on traffic. It was just perfect. Everything was perfect. I liked her style, what’s that called? Bedside manner? I liked her bedside manner. I liked that you could kind of like customize to a point. She would ask me, “What shape do you want your scars? What size do you want? Do you want average cis-male nipple size? Do you want the areola separate from the nipple, or this or that?” She’s really good with keeping up with preferences and, again, financially it worked for me. I think out of pocket I only had to pay for the consults and some blood work. That’s pretty much it. I already met the deductible when I had surgery. It happened to work out perfectly.
16:41
And how’s everything with your family?
It took awhile for my dad. It’s interesting because I have no contact whatsoever with my dad’s ex wife. I chose not to. There’s just too much bad blood between me and her. She’s just very mean to me a lot. We never got along, and she’s– it just wasn’t meant to be. I’m glad she divorced my dad so I have no contact with her. She doesn’t know I’m trans or anything like that, I don’t want her to know. I don’t think that’s going to be an issue. She moved a fair ways away, so I don’t think that’s going to be a problem. My dad’s been really good with it. Coming out to him and his girlfriend as gay, he just said, “Okay, I don’t care as long as she’s nice to you.” Then coming out to him as trans was a little more confusing for him. I feel like when you come out to a parent as gay they don’t have to change anything. It’s just like you have a girlfriend instead of a boyfriend or vice versa depending on somebody's gender. But for coming out as trans I needed him to call me a different name, I needed him to refer to me as he and him as male pronouns. I actually came out to my dad over the phone. I didn’t know how to have that conversation face to face and he was just kind of like, “Okay, okay, that’s fine, okay.” The problem is, well, he’s like, “I know you’re trans,” it was in the beginning– it was a lot to ask from him to call me a different name and use he and him pronouns. He went through this strange phase, thank God it’s over, he went through this strange phase– ‘cause my dad used to call me a nickname that was somewhat gender neutral, kind of not, but it could hypothetically be a male name. And he’d be like, “Yo, what’s up kiddo?” or “How you doin’ pal?”, and my dad, after coming out to him and trying to explain to him, “No I want you to call me JP,” (at the time I went by Seth) “I want you to call me Seth and use he/him pronouns.” He went through this really annoying phase where he would call me by my full name which was very, very female, and we would be in public and I’d be dressed like this, and he’d be like, “How’s my daughter?” Or we’d be at the food store and they’d be like, “Oh are you and your son grabbing this?” And he’d be like, “Actually, she’s my daughter.” And I’d be like, “Oh my God,” ‘cause it was really embarrassing and it could even be dangerous. I even told my dad at one point like ,”Listen dad, don’t say she, or daughter, you don’t have to call me he or son, but just don’t out me as a she ‘cause I do not look like a she. It could be dangerous.” I explained that to him in more detail and he got it, he went neutral, he still messed up at times, but the one who actually really got it was his girlfriend. I think from the start, she’s like ,”You want me to call you Seth?” and I’m like, “Yes, please”, and she’s like, “Okay honey.” I’m like, “Alright.” And she was pretty good with it. She made mistakes, but, like, mistaken speech not like in, “I’m not going to call you he because I don’t want to, I’m going to call you she because I forgot.” Like genuinely forgot but then she’d correct herself.
I feel like with my dad it was monkey see, monkey do, where with her being really consistent with it, he picked up on it. Fortunately, my dad got out of that phase, but my dad had a really big problem with my name, he’s like, “I do not like the name Seth. I can deal with calling you he and him, calling you my son, but I hate the name Seth, you need a new name.” So it was with my dad and his girlfriend and we came up with the name JP. It’s initials after my dad’s oldest brother, my uncle Jean-Paul. That’s how we came up with my name. We went through a whole list and my dad picked some pretty terrible names, thank God I didn’t pick any of those. It took him time. They still make mistakes, they still do things wrong, and there are times where I’m like I need to educate them on a lot of things because– particularly his girlfriend. My dad just kind of gets it and my dad is very– ‘cause my dad’s a very simple person, “Okay, I’m calling you JP and he, I don’t care where we are.” So my dad, he’s pretty much stuck with it, but with his girlfriend we’d be at Starbucks or something and we’d like place an order and I start saying my name, “J-“ and she’d be like, “Oh it’s, Blahblahblah,” and I’d be like,” That’s your name” and she’d be like, “Huh?” And I’d be like,”[name] do not say my name in public anywhere, it’s dangerous for me.” And it gets pretty bad, ‘cause, you know, there are a couple places where you need ID or something like that. We were at this one store, Sam’s Club, and you need ID, and my dad– I think he was out somewhere or something and we didn’t have the card on us and they’re like, “You’re over eighteen, just sign up for a card,” and I’m like, “No, I’m not signing up for a card,” ‘cause, like, I didn’t want to do my name and stuff like that, and she’s like, “What’s the problem?” And she walks right up to the lady and she’s like, “Oh yeah, we’d like to sign up for a card,” and she couldn’t sign up for one and I had to do it, and I’m like, “I’m not signing up for a card, I’m walking away,” and she’s like, “Oh yeah, her name is Blahblahblah.” I’m just like, “I’m leaving, I’m leaving,” I grabbed her and I’m like, “We’re leaving,” and she’s like, “Why, what’s wrong?” I’m like, “Do not say my name like that, you can’t do that, that’s dangerous,” she’s like, “Oh.” We’d be at Starbucks or something and she’d be like, “Oh I thought you had to give them your legal name.” I’m like, “They’re writing it on a cup. [laughter] It’s fine [name] you can tell them my preferred name,” and if I can help it I’m going to avoid places where I need to give my ID, like, I’m not making an account with Sam’s Club because I have to give them my legal name. I’m like, “I’m not doing that, I’ll just wait for my dad to come home and we’ll use his card,” and she’s like, “Okay, I get it.” The same thing with– what was it that happened that she messed up my name on? It slipped my mind, but I’ve had that a couple of times where she’s like– oh yeah, with buying alcohol. On the weekend me and my dad will have a couple beers and watch the game. On occasion my dad will go somewhere first and he’s like, “an you pick up the beer?”, and I’m like, “Actually can you?” He’s like, “You just want me to buy you your beer,” and I’m like, “No dad I’ll give you the money for the beer, I don’t want to give them my ID,” and he doesn’t get that. He doesn’t get the ID thing. So it’s kind of like a thing he doesn’t understand. Even with the top surgery, my dad’s been amazing all through it, my dad’s like, “Your problem is the medical bills and all that. You deal with the insurance, you deal with whatever medical bills are left over. That’s your responsibility, but to stay at Massachusetts and whatnot, I’ll cover the hotel, I’ll drive you, I’ll take care of you.” I’m so grateful to my dad for that. Don’t get me wrong, while I’m so so grateful to him for that and I genuinely know he cares, my dad doesn’t necessarily understand the why. Why it was so necessary for me to have surgery. I feel like he accepts I know what’s best for me and he’s going to help me. That’s definitely really, really great.
25:03
Is there anything else?
I’m trying to think if I had any really important stories. Where’s my phone? There. I usually journal a lot on trans things and I was just curious to see real quick if I had anything. I also journaled a story I wanted to make sure I shared. I think I shared all the really big ones. I shared the one from when I was really little, the soccer jersey, ‘cause for me it’s like– ‘cause I journal a lot, I have chapters that are really, really big to me, pivotal moments almost, so, like, the soccer jersey story was a real pivotal moment for me. Way back when I was four saying I was a boy, that was a pivotal moment for me, and the first time I bought a pair of boxers and got possessed, as I said, that was– there’s like a handful of pivotal moments. Like the time I mentioned all these before already, but at the costume party and pretended to be a boy or– like, I’m trying to think if there’s any others. I can’t think of any other really, really big pivotal moments besides having top surgery but that’s a very transitional pivotal moment. It’s a journey, I’m still on that journey. I’m still young, if I start T this year great, if I don’t, it’s ok, it’s just part of my journey and I’m going to find my way. I’m going to find a job somewhere and it’ll just be more of a right job because I’m not going to work somewhere where they don’t accept me. I find a place where they’re like, “Okay JP, we got you, we’ll take care of you, and you do your work and you do what you’re supposed to, we got you.” And that’s all I’m looking for. So I know I’ll find that place, sometimes it takes time. For some people, unfortunately, it’s harder than others.
I don’t have any questions not yet left. And that’s good, we’ll stop the recorder here.
Yeah.
What time is it? It’s just about 5:30
ADDED IN AFTER INTERVIEW
JP: I want to include a journal from only a couple weeks into my recovery from top surgery. While still very much sore and healing at the time, I was so happy and relieved, and believe the journal not only illustrates how much I was affected by top dysphoria even before knowing I was trans, but it also illustrates the amazing, liberating and just overall positive affect taking this step in physically transitioning has had in my life.
JOURNAL ENTRY
I knew top surgery was right for me, and I knew how freeing it would be. There’s so much to be grateful for and so much positive feelings. There’s one feeling I didn’t even realized I lost and only just got back.
Sitting out in the sun brings me back to my childhood. I was always outside, always. I’d splash in the sprinklers, and the sun warmed me from the cold water. Laying in the soft, tall, green grass was such a delicate and precious feeling.
It’s like, after top surgery, those precious feelings are returning. I have a renewed sense of joy, wander, and child-like bliss of simply being outside in nothing but a t-shirt.
After puberty, I felt a loss of being outside, and I have memories of "I cant play anymore I feel weighed down by my growing chest." I began unknowingly trying to bind my chest and prevent it from growing with the logic of if, I wear a couple sports bras and bathing suits for the duration of puberty, I could prevent them from growing [just] as compression reduces the swelling of a twisted ankle. I wore a lot of layers that shielded the warm sun from my body and all the other sensations of summer including water. I was devastated and defeated by my chest still changing despite all my efforts. It was no longer bliss [that] I felt in summer, it was dysphoria, even though I didn’t know the name back then.
It’s unbelievable how I forgot that bliss and how amazing and blessed I feel for that bliss to return and the excitement for summer. As a kid my favorite season was summer. As a teen, my favorite season was winter ‘cause I liked wearing layers. Don’t get me wrong, while I do still enjoy the snow, I can see summer becoming my favorite season again. I’m no longer brought down and defeated by my chest. I needed this surgery to beat it.
I feel so blessed and am loving all the new sensations of my chest: in the beautiful weather, from a gentle gust of wind, to the warmth of the sun, to the fluttering of my shirt and to the warmth radiating off my own body. As a whole, my body has never felt so warm from the inside. I feel like I’m radiating heat off my own body and chest. And my scars are testament to my strength and will in my journey. I am proud of– of my scars. I love them. It’s a truly blissful feeling. I feel LIMITLESS! And I am so relieved, grateful, and very very blessed.