Yes, You Are Trans Enough: My Transition from Self-Loathing to Self-Love

by Mia Violet

To be transgender all you need is to have an inkling that the gender on your birth certificate is not quite right. That’s it.

I used to feel that the transgender label was something that couldn’t be taken unless it was bestowed upon you, or earned through a fiery trial of harassment and mental anguish.

A cisgender person is someone who feels their gender aligns with the one they were assigned at birth, the one the doctor proclaimed when they got their first look at what genitals that person arrived with. Meanwhile, ‘transgender’ is an umbrella term that essentially encompasses everybody else, so those of us who later disagree with that doctor’s assessment.

ignorant as to what it was that made me feel increasingly out of place.

I was branded as a weird and broken boy.

If you don’t know that being trans is even a concept, you’re unlikely to realise there’s a valid reason why you don’t fit in – you just assume the problem is you. All you know is there’s a standard and you’re failing to hit it.

It was the answer to a question I didn’t even know I was asking.

As we see the same narratives over

and over, it underlines in people’s minds that there is only one way to be transgender.

I had only questioned my gender once before last year, in a fleeting thought. Trans people didn’t do that. They always knew.

we trans people often have multiple coming out stories, because it’s so hard to make the first attempt stick.

Trans people are often impeccable actors. When we’re closeted, we learn how we’re supposed to move and talk, the difference between the expectation of

us and the reality. We then force ourselves to adopt an expected persona like a snug costume. Being the funny person is an easy part to play when you hate yourself, because it feels like your whole life is a joke written by somebody else. Some of the best laughs I got came from deadpan deliveries of the truth. Absurd self-deprecating punchlines are sometimes just a way to hide the fact you don’t know how to ask for help.

The reason to transition is to be yourself, to find happiness in the freedom to be open and honest. That can happen at any age, and it’s never too late.

A common effect of dysphoria is that it places a cap on your emotions and tricks you into confusing contentedness for happiness. It tells you that being numb and dissatisfied with everything is the normal way to be.

Dysphoria also twists what you hear and perceive from other people, seeing slights and prickly condescension where no ill-intent exists. When you’re dysphoric, the world feels like a grim and dreadful place, full of pettiness and callous strangers. Plenty of trans people, me included, have spent years with a reputation for being short-tempered and irritable, only to completely shred that status once they transition.

Despite my refusal to identify as a girl, I still didn’t feel like I could compare myself to other men either.

Hating comparisons to women

Often the reactions of those around us carry immense importance, especially if we’re already riddled with guilt for shaking up our presentation or pronouns. It’s very easy to think that we don’t deserve this happiness, that maintaining current relationships is more important. As trans people it’s common to feel like a burden on those around us early on. We shouldn’t. I maintain that transition is not selfish but is in fact a beautiful process of self-love and exploration.

An adult should certainly know better than to ignore the signs that their partner is unhappy. Trans is something you are, not something you become. There’s no trans-vampire

vampire that nibbles on an unsuspecting cis person’s neck, causing them to undergo a sudden transformation. Likewise, you can’t be brainwashed into becoming trans. If someone is trans, they are trans, and it will come out eventually.

Despite how it may seem from an outside perspective, transition doesn’t drastically change people. Generally we become more of ourselves, more open, more honest, happier and calmer.

I want this

When we transition, we’re still the same person underneath; we just might shed or pick up some quirks on the way. Therefore, if you love your partner for who they are, chances are you’ll still love them when they transition.

Considering myself male always felt like trying to wear shoes that were far too tight.

Wow

Pinning down a definitive description of non-binary gender identities is tricky as they’re incredibly personal. Some non-binary people consider themselves transgender, coming under the umbrella of everybody who isn’t cisgender, but others see themselves as separate from the trans community. The most basic explanation of the term could be considered to be someone whose gender is outside of the traditional binary of male or female. Although it can be tempting to think of gender as a linear spectrum, with male on one side and female on the other, that understanding doesn’t gel for all non-binary people. They can be somewhere between male and female, or they can be somewhere entirely removed from the gender binary altogether.

I felt like I had to be told I was trans for it to be true, to ensure I wasn’t snatching up a term that I wasn’t allowed to touch.

I believed I was the very definition of ‘not trans enough’, someone just outside of eligibility. However, I reserved that label for myself alone. I knew I would never doubt or question anybody else who announced themselves as transgender but I was measuring myself against severely firm standards and criteria.

From being a child through to being a teenager and now being an adult, how it felt was identical. All that had changed was my understanding of it and the labels that I used, but I was still that same person with the same consistent feeling.

I’d never been longing to become a girl, I’d been struggling with pretending to be a boy.

I perpetually pictured worst-case scenarios, such as being screamed at in the street every day, beaten to a pulp by

drunks, or slowly dying of starvation in poverty.

Transition is presented as the ultimate goal for trans people, but many who don’t identify on a binary spectrum don’t want to publicly change their name and pronouns, or make any changes to their body. They may simply shift their appearance through fashion and hairstyle, or even make no new changes at all.

By choosing to transition, you need to be prepared to ignore anybody who says you’re doing it wrong, or not going fast or slow enough. Each trans person is an authority on their own gender and transition but not anybody else’s.

That’s when it clicked: I shouldn’t care if strangers saw me as trans, a woman, or a man, either now or in the future. Trying to ‘pass’ had pointlessly complicated my life with little pay-off. By just being myself at the convention and knowing that my female gender was mine alone to define, I was truly and utterly happy.

I abhorred hearing masculine pronouns and had to bite my tongue not to correct everyone.

inconveniencing family was better than lying to them until they inevitably died in ignorance.

Innocent misgendering by the general public can still be painful, as it’s often taken as a sign that no matter the effort we may have put in, we’re still seen as that old persona we’re trying to leave behind.

If we can reach a place where nobody’s gender is assumed based on a best fit guess, then it would do wonders for trans people.

if I could easily treat others like that, why was I so harsh and critical of myself?

I specifically wanted to move away from lofty ambitions and just accept who I already was, with a few tweaks here and there.

To be happy you have to realise that you deserve a break, and that you’re no use to anybody if you’ve burnt yourself out.

Finding happiness didn’t mean actively ignoring what was happening in the world, it meant understanding boundaries, realistic limitations, and the importance of looking after yourself.

I then reminded myself that it didn’t matter if I was misgendered; I knew who I was and liked how I looked. It was fine to enjoy being correctly gendered, but I was only wasting my energy by thinking about how I might receive the wrong pronouns.

Sometimes transition is just about giving yourself a tune-up and an upgrade. Nobody has to prove that they deserve to transition and come out as transgender.

Because regardless of how inferior or inadequate someone feels, if they want to transition for any reason, then they are trans enough.

it had been about that feeling deep in my gut, the one that had reminded me that so much of my life didn’t feel right; the same part of me that had told me I wasn’t trans enough, wasn’t woman enough, wasn’t loud enough, and just wasn’t good enough.

it’s liberating to know that my evolving identity no longer takes up so much of my headspace. I no longer waste time thinking about the validity of who I am, what others think of me, or how I’m going to untangle the next logistical mess that comes from being trans. I’m at peace.

Ultimately, we’re just trying to live the only way that we can, by being true to who we are.

Expecting all trans people to follow a similar path, or come equipped with obvious visual clues, is a mistake, yet it’s one repeated endlessly.

Until everybody who identifies as transgender feels included and protected, then we’ve only got selective acceptance for the privileged.

It will be easy to doubt yourself, to question whether you’re making the right choice, but I assure you that if you have these feelings then they are well worth exploring and seeing through. Always remember that you deserve to be whoever you want to be, and what your transition entails is entirely up to you and nobody else. Being transgender is complicated, confusing, scary, and sometimes downright weird, but it’s also funny, invigorating, and empowering.