There But for the Grace of God Go I

My parents both used this phrase often as I was growing up, “There but for the grace of God go I.”

It’s a bit awkward as sentences go, at least for me. But I think the sentiment was meant more toward empathy than pity. It speaks to the idea that we are all human, and if the circumstances of my own life had been just a bit different, I could find myself homeless, or addicted, or learning to accommodate physical or emotional challenges that I don’t directly experience. It was applicable to anyone going through stuff I am not. It could just as easily say, “remember to be kind, because you do not live anyone else’s story.”

This idea seems to have fallen deeply out of favor, and I’m wondering if we don’t want to bring it -or something like it- back into the vernacular. The trouble with the notion is that it maybe assumes a hierarchy of experience. “My life is better than that life over there.” The finest people I know are not the ones who’ve had it easy their entire lives. In fact, I’ve seen a coldness that can come from the pampered that truly rattles me. And that’s not to say suffering is a virtue, either.

We all get our portion of suffering, one way or another because living as a human is a messy business. I learned young not to envy anyone else.

Where I am going comes from reading about the absolute nonsense spewed on the internet about a video from Boston Children’s Hospital. The video is about hysterectomy as a part of gender-affirming care. FOR PEOPLE AGED 18 OR OLDER. This was of course twisted into the LIE that they perform surgery on minors, which they do NOT. I’ve read that this current LIE was started by a human called “Libs of TikTok.” Whoever started this bullshit is a terrorist. Plain and simple, along with those who jump on that angry, misguided bandwagon intent on making life feel less safe for those trying to save the lives of children, and the children themselves.

I have several issues with this entire, absurd MESS stirred up by people who have no idea what they are talking about, but they froth at the mouth for ways to further marginalize and endanger the lives of trans CHILDREN and trans people everywhere. They hear about a procedure they decide is absolutely horrifying TO THEM, and (I guess?) find value in their own lives by stirring up ugly controversy to frighten those who provide healthcare to trans people. May they reap what they sow. Their actions are terroristic and should be dealt with accordingly. Kids are having cancer treatments postponed for reasons of safety. That is NOT ok. But where the beliefs of law enforcement intersect with the beliefs of those intent on harming the trans community with their deception, guess who bears the brunt?

What I cannot fathom is why OUR healthcare is ANY of their business. Literally, who do these people think they are? The inconsistencies in their arguments are absurdly obvious, yet they get widespread attention they desperately seem to need and continue to disrupt a population that does NO harm to them. And the trans kids getting healthcare aren’t being harmed, either. They are being affirmed. And the fact that you can’t tell the difference, over something that is none of your business, to begin with, and you are willing to tell LIES to make your hateful twisted point does not make you a useful human. It makes you a credible threat to a peaceful society. Every human who believes in inalienable human rights should be resoundingly condemning this attack on liberty. But, trans folks are icky, right? So we deserve this stuff, right? It won’t end with us, friends. History (remember history?) tells us this will never end well if left to fester unabated.

There are all KINDS of surgeries that sound horrifying to those who don’t need them. I knew a woman who had a large portion of her jaw removed. A rare form of cancer made it essential to her survival if only to give her some months to put her affairs in order. My mother had to have 80% of her stomach removed and resected because it ceased to function as a muscle and move food through her body. It was a long surgery with a very long recovery time. But it gave her another 12 years or so of life. Hysterectomies happen every day. For some, this is highly traumatic, for some it is absolutely LIFE-affirming. Same goes for mastectomies. One woman’s horror is another man’s freedom. And none of it is anyone else’s business. If you want that heart bypass covered by insurance, you may want to take a seat before you try to tell me what I get to have.

Now, all trans people do not have surgeries. Or take hormones. Some don’t feel the need, some don’t have access, some have other health concerns that preclude intervention, and some make their decisions based on having few to no options. Some because they depend on people who would not support them, or their obligations to others preclude a life change at the moment. I was there, I get it. I don’t speak for all or any of us, I speak for me. But each trans person has a story, and as we live our individual stories, one common thread is the seeking to know, and often needing to express, authenticity in this world.

I finally came out as trans because I am trans. Denying this fact was painful. I was born into a body with external genitalia, which society labels as “male” yet I am wired as female. I know myself to be female. My essence, the way my mind functions, and the activities, and experiences I am attracted to -are not “male.” And I spent several years living as a gay “male,” thinking maybe that would feel like enough authenticity -but it was not the whole truth. It was not MY whole truth. And if there is anything I value in this world -like so many of my LGBTQ+ siblings -it is getting to the entire truth of things for ME.

I also came out as trans to be counted. Sitting in the relative comfort of an identity better understood and accepted by folks at large might have been “easier” but it wasn’t accurate. I’m not a silly woman, or a tRump-voting woman, or a diminutive woman. But I am, using the words and concepts available to me and the rest of us, a woman. A real one. A real woman of trans experience. And I am done hiding for the comfort of others. My determination to live in truth is off-putting to some. Whether because a confident trans woman makes them question their prejudices, or because they have suppressed big parts of their own story, I cannot say. That is for them to know and wrestle.

Now, regardless of which surgeries I have or don’t, the fact that I know who and what I am doesn’t change. My comfort level with my own body may increase as I affirm it, but the fundamental truth of me remains. I am far more than a set of “genitals” and I am beyond exhausted by these folks who insist on defining all of us by what was between our legs at birth. There are as many ways to experience this life as there are folks living it -and to focus hateful attention on a small percentage of the population you don’t begin to understand is also one. But how very sad to get your self “worth” from smearing people who’ve never done a thing to you.

Had I been born 18 years ago instead of 56, I would likely be having surgery here and now, as the culmination of years of talk therapy, years of telling a variety of experts exactly who I am, a few years spent on the godsend called “puberty blockers” and the introduction of the correct hormones FOR ME, beginning around age 15 or 16. Who I am inside has never changed, even as I attempted every contortion you all proposed for one such as me, including conversion through manipulative prayer and exorcism.

Advances in the understanding of trans medicine make a more “normal” life possible, giving today’s trans folk the opportunity to move about the world as their authentic gender as safely and comfortably as possible. All of which is none of anyone else’s business unless they are directly involved in our lives.

For me, it’s about Congruence. Some of us have it and take it for granted, and some of us don’t. It’s actually just that simple. I reject the idea of a “birth defect” or “being born in the wrong body” because I find those terms demeaning, incomplete, and awkward. I’m not “broken” I’m simply not like YOU. If you were born as cishet, and you don’t have to put so much thought and angst into gender or orientation, GOOD FOR YOU. Why would you ever spend a moment of your time trying to impede anyone else from having what you take for granted? Why is that how you spend your time? You’re not “saving” anyone from anything, you are putting your nose where it doesn’t belong. And you are endangering young people who never did a thing to you as you question their loving parents’ right to parent THEIR OWN CHILDREN — something you say shouldn’t happen to you. Which is it?

So, what is it that these folks are “accomplishing” by fussing with a prestigious institution dedicated to saving and improving the lives of children? Nothing worth having or doing, for sure. It is my fervent prayer these fellow humans terrorizing me and mine will find something worthwhile to do with their own short time on earth, instead of fixating on us. Find something positive to contribute that does not involve LYING on the internet about innocent people who have done NOTHING to harm you or anyone else.

I still hold to the premise that factual knowledge matters. I still believe that once humans know better, they are inclined to be and do better. And I refuse to spend my own precious time debating bullies and liars. The internet is a powerful tool that can be used to educate, illuminate, and make knowledge more accessible. It can unite us in a better and deeper understanding of one another, or it can unite us in ignorance, fear, and vitriol where telling lies and half-truths fan flames of a malicious form of discontent we should be seeking to extinguish with compassion, love, and the sharing of verifiable information -not promulgating nasty conjecture.

If you thought I was saying “There but for the grace of God go I” should be adopted by these hatemongers toward trans people, you are mistaken.

I’m saying it of ME. I’m enormously grateful that I don’t engage in pointless, ugly behavior to disrupt the lives of others. I am thankful that I do not possess a mind so small, and a heart so cold, that I would sling words like “groomer” at innocents while refusing to hold myself to account for my own ugliness and harmful, worthless behavior. Ain’t nobody perfect. Least of all me. But I have been absorbing bullying and hate from others my entire life, yet I have not allowed those experiences to overtake my humanity. That is my commitment to myself and this life -to find and express my own value. To seek a purpose that illuminates, and, hopefully, unites. I’m trying my level best to understand the folks who are choosing to waste their precious lives fussing with beautiful, RARE, children who are simply telling this world who they are. I struggle to understand those challenging the amazing parents loving their kids enough to challenge their own beliefs and learn to love more completely. Love MUST win.

There but for the grace of God go I.

Peace, Lovelies

- MM

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