Transmen

Saturday 15th October 1994

by Jamie Walker

(The Gender Centre advise that this article may not be current and as such certain content, including but not limited to persons, contact details and dates may not apply. Where legal authority or medical related matters are cited, responsibility lies with the reader to obtain the most current relevant legal authority and/or medical publication.)

So, all you wonderful people ... I've been doing weights for 3 weeks now. I really like how I feel after a workout, even though there isn't much visible result yet. It's different than all the other exercise things. I've done, I do feel more manly, yeah!

I am finding as I more consciously exercise my "male" self in public that he is a lot more outgoing and self-assured than the female construct I'd been using for social interaction all these years. That one is, always shy, self-effacing, insecure ... and no wonder! Not because it was particularly "feminine" ... it wasn't. But it's a construct, an act, not real. It couldn't have self-confidence: it didn't have a self!

Now I understand better also why people have often thought of me as secure and powerful, even though my own self-image was that of powerless and afraid. They were seeing the real me underneath, which I had hidden from myself. I've also been noticing something else neat - as I become more comfortable in my social male self, I am enjoying and appreciating the company of genetic women a lot more. I'm thinking that there's not that subconscious pressure to be "one of them" and the subsequent discomfort because I never did, so I can relax and enjoy them as "other". It's great! In fact, that's been holding in a lot of social situations ... if I find myself feeling uncomfortable with an attractive hethet guy, or a woman talking about "us women", or just walking down the street, I remind myself I'm a boy, I'm other, and I get this smile on my face and get all relaxed.

I'm out to a few of my best friends and my son, and as of last week, to all the people in the house where I live (six people). People are being wonderful with me, accepting, asking questions, thinking, dealing with it, even if they don't really understand. Of course, that is the mode of the house and of my friends ... come to think of it, it's the reason I chose them in the first place.

My ideal is to present as I am, to be true to myself, whatever part of my self may be operating at the time. I don't want to try to pretend to be some idea of a "man" any more than I want to continue the false construct of a "woman" that I was using before. I want to explore freely the ways of the person that is me. Who I know is definitely not a "woman", (even though the physical cues do confuse people and who is some kind of man, although not in the mode of the dominant culture in this country. I know I'm lucky that the genetic men, who are the people I mostly hang out with, are also not in the mode of the dominant culture ... they are silly, loving, warm, sexy, accepting art techno geeks, so I have great models to follow as I bring myself literally out of the woods and into the company of other people.

My goal is to have top surgery by this time next year. Although with my attitude, I think I may not be getting it through Benjamin standards!

That is the statement that made my housemates wake up and take notice, even though for weeks I'd been talking about my gender stuff and put my poem and manifesto as an art display on the wall outside my room and all. It is interesting that I haven't changed since that statement, but as my housemates and friends come to terms with it, their behaviour to me changes and it helps me feel more comfortable in exploring my behaviour.

I know I'm lucky to be able to do this ... I don't have a straight job to deal with or disapproving family to fight. My motto the last few years has been, "hey, I'm an artist, I can do anything I want!"

(Jamie plans to have top surgery)

Got my head shaved at the party, it's cold! You can see why, there's these viens running all over, right close to the surface, heat dissipation for that overactive brain. But then you have the hair to keep the heat in. Make up your mind, bod!

So now I wear a hat all the time, cause it's cold. But I do like the new do. Major. I really don't know why, I just like it, it looks normal for me, it looks like me. Who ever woulda thought?

Another weird thing is that when I look at myself in the bathroom mirror, I look bizarre ... some old wrinkled geek with a bald blue head, but when I look at myself in the hall mirror only six feet away, I look major cool, and I grin at myself.

When I looked really scary in the bathroom mirror was with the black lines on my non-hairline. (I'm going to have to ask the line maker what exactly was the point of those lines!

The head shaving event was major wonderful. (why am I using the word "major" so much?) Hey, this is my "today" file, I can write however I want). Anyway, I had it planned for a month, that I would shave my head at the party. And that I wanted lots of people around that I cared about, and that it would be a signifier for me of the beginning of major physical and psychic change, culminating in the surgery March 15. And it happened! I was worried I wouldn't recognise the right time, but I did, caught the wave, surround by warm male bodies all happy, and a sober and trusted person to oversee the job.

I danced a lot too. It's been a long time since I danced at a party. It's the first time I ever enjoyed dancing with people.

I'm not sure exactly what got me to dance ... I was a little toasted, but that hasn't ever helped before. I do remember standing on the edge, as usual, bouncing up and down to the music, as usual, and wishing, as usual, that I wasn't too self-conscious to dance, and then I had a kind of vision of a tribal thing, of initiation ceremonies, and realised that it was all men out there dancing, and went "ah!" and started in.

Polare is published in Australia by The Gender Centre Inc. which is funded by the Department of Community Services under the S.A.A.P. Program and supported by the N.S.W. Health Department through the AIDS and Infectious Diseases Branch. Polare provides a forum for discussion and debate on gender issues. Advertisers are advised that all advertising is their responsibility under the Trade Practices Act. Unsolicited contributions are welcome, though no guarantee is made by the Editor that they will be published, nor any discussion entered into. The editor reserves the right to edit such contributions without notification. Any submission which appears in Polare may be published on our internet site. Opinions expressed in this publication do not necessarily reflect those of the Editor, The Gender Centre Inc.I, the Department of Community Services or the N.S.W. Department of Health.