body autonomy

Pivot Points

  • Reading time:9 mins read

On prior form it may take a couple weeks to see how the second laser session pans out, but even 48 hours later I can see some funny results like a clean circle in the midst of a darker area on my chin, leaving a sort of crust around the fringe. I can assemble the story easily here; where she put down the laser, lost her place, moved on.

The face thing, it’s striking for me. It’s not just the decades of intense dysphoria around the hair, or the general sense of moving on in the transition, though all of that is important. It’s that taking action to repair this damage also represents a sort of qualitative shift in my body autonomy. I have of course taken many steps for myself, most significantly getting on HRT some 15 months ago. But there’s a directness here that feels different.

HRT, I took mostly for the mental, emotional, health benefits. I knew that physical changes were possible, some were even probable, but I wasn’t planning that far ahead; didn’t dare to hope; didn’t fully know what to think, even. And I knew that I was old; knew not to expect anything. This whole process is one step at a time; focus on the moment, and accept what may come.

The intervention sure has brought some changes, gee whiz, but that’s been less an active process on my end than my body doing its thing, responding in the way it feels best to the basic attention that I’m finally giving it. The consequences to my just taking care of myself are removed enough to be almost incidental. Even the dramatic, permanent changes are just kinda things that happened on their own, because they wanted to inevitably happen. All I did was hold the door open.

Even my boobs, which are so very eager to exist, I didn’t know to anticipate or put any kind of thought into. They’ve now become so central to my identity—this sort of symbol of my freedom and awakening, this clear irreversible change that my body decided it wanted to make, when allowed to make that choice; this indicator of who I really am. But like everything else, they were just a side effect. I didn’t even know what to want, and my body made its own decisions. All these biological changes are just me, growing, healing. What happens is what must happen.

The face, though—yes it’s also a kind of medical care, also about repairing damage. But by comparison, this is a direct, conscious operation. I’ve made a choice to actively change my body. Superficial as it may be, this also is irreversible. That’s the point. There’s no undoing this action, no going back. And yet, here I am. Doing it.

When this procedure is done, no one will ever hold that control over me again. Already after two sessions I’ve ruined this unwanted part of me that I’d so long been told I had no right to touch—and the only way out is through. There’s no salvaging this. I might as well finish burning it off now. Finally I have taken control of my life, drawn my own boundaries. This body is my own. It’s a part of me. I’m a real person. I get to say what happens to me now, same as anyone else.

To that end, since last August, maybe September, I’ve been dancing around the question of piercings. We know this. I’ve talked about it. I never understood the practice before; why people would do such a thing. But as soon as I began to wake up, and realize that I was real, my head came full of all these questions, all this potential. Who was I? What was appropriate? What did I have the right to do with myself? And why would I want that?

Turns out it’s about making a claim on yourself. One of many ways, but an ancient, relatively harmless, and extremely normalized one. With that, suddenly it make a kind of sense—so I kind of put a pin in it (as it were), realizing that while I was doing this reclaiming, that was a sudden option. A novel one, possibly an exciting one. On the edge of becoming a fascination.

Since then my mind has kept going back, so it feels less a possibility than an inevitability I’ll get at least my ears pierced, and probably sooner than later. It’s just a matter of when. The concept is starting to thrill me. This time, this choice, it’s not even about healing. I’m not doing necessary maintenance. There is no medical need to poke holes in my ears. For once, this claim is 100% elective. This time it’s about me. It’s about what I want for myself. About who I am. About being allowed, allowing myself, to make that kind of a decision. For maybe the first time in my life.

After that second laser session, this kind of euphoria swirled in my head for about 24 hours. The fact that I came back, that the first session wasn’t a fluke—I was committed to this thing. I was really doing it. I had this kind of a power over my life. Over my own body. On the evidence of this experience, I have the ability to enact change, to make decisions, to cause things happen to me. So the next day, I looked into that tattoo parlor that my therapist had recommended me.

From the look of things, this is actually one of the most renowned shops in the area; almost universal praise—and yes they do piercings, of course. She told me of their professionalism, how they’re the go-to for all the queers, etc., and from the look of things, yeah, on both counts. It’s always a kick when local places rock a big “LGBT+ Friendly” tag front and center. Which shouldn’t be a surprise here on the basis of what I was told. I just didn’t realize what a big deal this place seems to be, for its particular field.

No prices online, but how much can a simple piercing be? Nothing fancy. At least to start. I still need to resolve a few things in my brain, puzzle out a few weird angles that still bother me. But there it is, when I’m ready. Sometime this summer, maybe?

Step by step, it’s like—it’s not that I’m getting myself back. I never had myself before. I always existed for someone else’s benefit. (Or their burden, depending on how they felt at the time.) This whole concept of autonomy, I’m figuring it out from nothing. It’s so new to be, and so strange and kind of surreal. What kind of dream logic is this? How can this be possible? But I’m getting over this terror of failing to keep myself mint-in-box, at the risk of being discarded as worthless. Finally breaking that seal, you know.

Nobody owns me now. I’m all on my own. I guess I’m theoretically an adult, whatever that means. So this whole process, it’s not like it’s random rebellion or anything. I mean yeah I have the hormones of a teenage girl, and my body is going through all these wild changes. But this isn’t just a reaction against crappy circumstances. This is me, learning to make decisions about myself. And goddamn, such a simple thing is such a wild reorientation of my whole relationship to life. To start to accept that I can, and have the right to, make these decisions.

It’s almost too much, you know. This floodgate. This realization of what it means to be my own person, living for my own sake rather than exclusively for someone else. To choose who I want to be, what is right for my health, not for someone else’s comfort. To follow the things that I enjoy. To understand that I have the right to enjoy things, to want things for myself. That I can just do things that make me happy in some way. That happiness is a thing worth looking into at all. That I don’t have to apologize for any of this.

Each one of these decisions I make, to another person they might be mundane. But to me they’re these mind-shattering pivot points, that challenge every bit of toxic, abusive, neglectful garbage that’s been put on me for my entire life. And each one makes the next choice a little easier. If I want it, then yes, I can do that too.

Does Azure even want earrings? Well. Maybe. I mean. Yes? I think she might. They can be pretty. We are starting to enjoy our jewelry, and this is unexplored turf. Our ears are shaped a little strangely, and I’m still not sure the best way to handle things. There are some considerations, a few things that give me pause. But the point is, this is our decision to make. No one else gets a word in. Ever.

For all the seething and spittle I’ve absorbed about how stupid and irresponsible it is, that I have taken so unfortunately to heart, this is a perfectly normal thing, that people do all the time. And it’s not that big a deal, cosmically speaking. It will never make the world explode. It will never hurt another person. I am a real person. I get to make choices. And this is a choice.

We can explore things. We can figure out life. We can figure out us.

I just want to be me, whoever that is. I just want to be her. We just want to be alive. We’ve never been allowed that before. And now we’re starting to get it. It’s becoming clearer why people put so much value in living. It’s different when you actually want to be here.

So. One thing at a time. I’ve got so much garbage I’m dealing with, right now. And I’m not even fully vaxxed yet. And the year is still young.

But I’m starting to get a grip. Bit by bit.

Just let me be alive.

Growth Cycles

  • Reading time:4 mins read

So now like three weeks and endless exfoliation later, it’s becoming clear that my first laser session did in fact do things. I have neglected to shave for a few days here, and the way things are growing in is kind of wild. A patch will seem pretty normal, then it’s just blank. It’s just ragged bits and pieces all over my lower face, though my cheeks—which are lowest on my priority list—seem to have been hit the hardest. My upper lip, which matters most to me, is only thinned in a few small irregular dots.

I do of course also have a mix of coloration; it’s not completely dark. Some is just naturally blonde or red. A few white hairs have been sneaking in the last few years. It’s unclear how much of an issue that will be in the end. But there are prickly areas with not much pigment.

Anyway this is just interesting to see, after a few weeks of thinking, hunh, well, maybe I’ll start to see some kind of effect after the second treatment? It’s pretty random what’s cleared and what isn’t. A right old mess, really. But hey, it’s definitely a start!

Getting rid of this garbage is not just a general dysphoria issue, though it’s bothered me for like 25 years, increasingly so as it filled in through my late 20s and 30s, and it’s maybe the biggest physical problem I have with myself right now. There’s also a body autonomy thing. I’ve talked about how I just… did not have control over my body for about a quarter of my life there, and how this was a particular thing I was not allowed to touch, even as it made me deeply miserable. So there’s a liberation in being able to say, fuck you, no. In closing that door forever.

God, this time next year—if I can take care of my face, and I can be on progesterone for a year, and be another year along with my steady e levels… I feel like I will be very close to where I want to be. There won’t be lots more to repair, that can actually be addressed. The only other thing I can think of is, maybe in a few years looking into FFS—but I’m really not certain about that. It’s not unimaginable, but we’ll just see where things are and how I feel. It’s hard to entertain right now, and that’s fine because now would not be the time.

That’s kind of it, though.

Maybe after my second shot I will start to think about getting my ears pierced. That’s kind of beside the point, but it’s proximate and it uh feels like it’s gonna actually happen, and sooner than later. Probably this year.

After I deal with my current… situation, that’s giving me all the stress, I’ve got someone eager to help me with my whole legal identity thing. Pro bono even. So that will also be untangled soon.

It’s astounding to me that I’ve set personal goals and I’m meeting them. When has that ever happened? My two big transition goals this for this year, they should be pretty well done by summer. I’ve even added another goal in there, that should happen in the next couple weeks. Broader life goals, I’m getting them done. Psychiatrist stuff, social services, etc.

I guess after my second shot I can also start thinking about my left-over medical stuff I didn’t get a chance to tend to last year. Of which there is so much. Getting a GP. Finally going to a dentist, after 20 years. God. I am getting my life in order. For the first time ever. What. Gee whiz.

After all this, basically the only thing left will be, how do I support myself? We’ll see how it goes with the disability. If that happens, there’s our answer; I get to just fuckin live. If not, uh, I don’t know what to do. But at least I’ll be a human being. All my parts will be in place. Despite everything. And we’ll just see where we can build from there.

The Start of the World?

  • Reading time:5 mins read

After more than a year on HRT, my body does not experience arousal in the way that I suffered for about 30 years there. This change is recent enough, and affects so much wiring, that I really don’t know all the implications. I just know that it comes as such a tremendous relief.

As a physiological response, what I’m getting now feels more wholesome and substantial and meaningful. It feels more real and grounded in my body, less like I’m being attacked, and it better reflects how I actually feel about myself and others, and experience true attraction. There’s less a build-up of pressure than a sort of a loosening of tension. It’s no longer this functional, goal-oriented discomfort, screaming for release. It’s a spark, an awakening of potential. Physiologically, it’s not about the genitals; it’s this glowing warmth and softness all up my torso and my face and my upper arms and legs. This sense of receptiveness. Acceptance, of fascination, anticipation. At higher levels, this shortness of breath, and all-over prickles.

My association with arousal has been this sense of wrongness, of my body working against my interests and my feelings. For my body to respond, there’s always been this dissonance, leading to shame and discomfort and piling ever more disgust on my feelings toward myself. This, it’s… different. I don’t know how to feel. I have all of this baggage to work against, all these expectations, and it’s confusing for me that it doesn’t feel so bad now. Whatever this is, it feels sort of positive, constructive—not lurid in the way I’m used to.

What’s more interesting is the sense of continuity. Each instance, it’s less its own isolated episodic happening with its own short unsatisfying arc, and more dipping back into an ongoing conversation, returning to a prior train of thought, checking back into an emotional space.

This all ties into how the act itself, which I will not labor, is now less about desperately reaching a goal than about appreciating the moment and the ongoing changing mix of feelings and senses. And it’s so much more visceral. Holistic. Decentralized. One literally sees stars.

Like, I do not associate good things with sex, or with arousal. It’s bad, and it’s so delicate to dance around the reasons why it causes me so much grief. But broadly, cautiously, the way my body works now, it makes so much more sense to me. This feels correct. Basically healthy.

What I find interesting about this is how the body workings intersect with my emotional and psychological response. Like, the way I’m wired, I realized I’m expecting my body to behave a certain way, and it never has. And now it kinda does, and this ties into all this other stuff. The way my body now poises all up and down my frame to anticipate and measure and receive and study—it speaks volumes to my expectations of a sexual role. Those dynamics in turn feed into my wiring of how to relate to others and to myself, and my sense of self and identity.

Having estrogen in my system, it causes my body to experience arousal in such a way as to further affirm my gender and justify my core assumptions about how to relate to, feel about people. All these things that I knew on some level were right, yet were a struggle to reconcile.

Not to put too fine a point on it, but—to be wired as an unambiguous bottom, and to experience arousal as navigation of reception and acceptance? It’s congruent. The basic dissonance is gone. The slow perusal does the same with my more detached and abstracted modes of attraction. And yes, to continue the recent conversation, this also to no small extent speaks to the whole deal with attraction to men and long fixation with a particular anatomical feature that I’m just at the point of shrugging and accepting, now that the floodgates are fully demolished.

(All of which, I still feel compelled to underline, lest there be any chance of misunderstanding, remains basically hypothetical of course. See the noodling about internal and external experiences, and how they work when one is aroace. (If… one happens to be Azure, I suppose.))

Anyway, I’m at this confusing juncture here where, ever so cautiously, feeling horny no longer seems like this evil, disgusting thing that makes me wish I could vanish. It’s just… neutral. A thing one can embrace and explore, or not, to what level may feel best in the moment.

I think that’s positive. Probably? It’s weird. It grazes so hard on stuff I’m really not able to deal with still.

But this whole concept of me, it’s… getting more stable. It’s making more consistent sense. Every piece I slot in, it just confirms the placement of the rest.

I still feel like I have to tiptoe around here, but. I think it may be okay. I think we may be good. I just need to settle in. Chill out a little. Get used to the world not ending.

Start of the Breakdown

  • Reading time:6 mins read

To proceed, we may need to distinguish a few things. The trauma I have around sex per se is different from the trauma that I have around my sexuality—though both are really difficult for me to engage with to the degree I need to unpick everything. (Well, half of my sexuality, I guess I should say. The part that isn’t just nope.)

It’s way easier for me to engage with my gender, though even that has kind of two levels to it. My enbyness was obvious and no problem at all; it took a lot more work to connect with my femininity. Either way, ultimately that’s just an obvious visceral fact of me. Clearly I’m a girl, and clearly that’s on my own terms rather than some external binary road map. And, okay. Sure. It’s all inward-focused, about my relationship to myself. I can work that out, with time.

Before we even get there, though, we need some body autonomy, which is provided by recognizing my aroaceness. That’s kind of the key to everything about me, the thing that allows me ownership over myself in a way I never previously understood.

It’s all the other parts, when it stops focusing entirely inward, that are hard for me. Whenever just the concept of other people enters the picture, the terror comes along with them, right—and that scrambles and complicates any effort to understand what’s really happening, how I function.

Breaking the problem down, though—I think that may help. I think it’s easier to engage with one part at a time, carefully strip out the bits that are just other people’s damage and tend to what’s left, puzzle it into a working order and see what it’s really like under there. I think the question of the trauma around sex itself is just too big for me, as I am now—and it’s not really pressing or important, in that I’m never going to have sex again. (Well, not with another person anyway.) That’s too hard, too painful, and just… not a priority to sift.

Sexuality, though, is a totally different thing, if obviously related. That’s way more hypothetical, more about ideas than actions. Yes it’s hard to engage with some of these ideas, but it’s just a playground of the mind in the end really. There is still mirrored glass. It’s way easier for me to deal with the notion of being pan, and what goes into that (or… hypothetically, uh, into me, one says with intense bottom energy), what it means for my ideas about myself and the way I relate to the world and the people around me and in my imagination—than it will ever be to deal with my past experiences, and how I feel about the actual practical elements of sex and just—

I can’t even finish that thought, Christ. Even approaching it makes the dam threaten to burst. I don’t feel like crying right now. It’s 12:30 am. So, I’m just—I’m not going to go there, for now. And that’s fine. Doesn’t mean I’ll never reconcile, never work at it. But, you know. One thing at a time. I don’t have to deal with what’s happened to me to play with the nuances of the way I’m wired to think and feel about people. That’s got enough baggage, that’s confusing enough. But, I think it’s workable if I just take it as its own thing. If deeply peculiar for me to engage with.

I’ve got so much to get over here. All this internal mess, that’s just a reflection of other people’s problems. And so much of that weight, it doesn’t even reflect the reality of who I am. It’s based on all these wild misconceptions of me as a person. So the question is, why am I listening to it? Why is it affecting me at all? But that’s how they get you with the programming, right.

So. Okay. I guess that’s kinda where my hyperfocus is gonna be for a while. Call this stage four of Azure unpacking (ignoring the neurology, which is related but kind of its own separate set of concerns from the whole queer parade I’ve got running through my head here). I’m a non-binary girl. I’m so very aroace, holy shit. But, it is also clear that I am intrinsically pan. And that’s weird to engage and hard for me to understand, and I guess I’m ready to try now.

To be precise, I need to understand it in relation to me, to Azure, not to the gender that other people misdiagnosed for me so long ago, or the persona they projected onto me. That’s never going to lead anywhere useful.

I got, like, feelings here. And I guess this is a long time coming, huh. I’ve never really been in a place in my life, in my relationship to myself, to even begin to figure them out. They’ve always been here in hindsight, same as I’ve always been a girl even when I didn’t have the tools to see it clearly. I just, what feelings I housed, they weren’t ready to rise to the surface.

In this dive, I don’t want to be crass about it. I don’t want to be performative or weird. I definitely don’t want to make other people uncomfortable. But this isn’t about anyone else; this is me, this is is my space, my self, my recovery. And I guess this needs to be my interest for the next while.

So. Okay. Shit, fine. Yeah. I’m, uh, gonna have to think on this, and where to go from here. Now that we’re dropping this next brick of shame off the highest possible bridge.

God, this is what we’re actively engaging with now.

All right. Let’s see where this leads.

I’m hella pan here. And, uh. Right now the fixation is on certain dimensions of that which have a novelty of not previously being allowed recognition.

It’s normal for a girl to be into dudes. Well, if it were anyone else I’d say of course it is, dummy. It’s normal for anyone to be into anyone. It’s always different rules for me than for others. I’m gonna have to really start checking myself on that line of thinking.

Whee, so.

…

Here we go, I guess.

The Overton Binary

  • Reading time:6 mins read

It’s hard to understand these things sometimes, and it can take a while to put the pieces together even after the vocabulary is there, but it’s becoming clear that I’ve never much understood the gender binary at all. It’s always struck me as a gross and distressing performance. This goes for both ends of the scale, though as I present male I’m closer to the grossness of that extreme. Heck, as with reactionary politics that extreme tends to overwhelm the whole scale; let’s not kid ourselves. But any strong, exclusive gender performance weirds me out. Like, why can’t people just be themselves, with all that entails? Why slot into these reductive archetypes, that so far as I can see only serve to maintain a power structure? Like so many barriers between people. Like the notions of race and class, and all of this.

(I don’t mean to criticize people for choosing or falling into a role; what frustrates me is the social framework that practically requires people to pick a side — because life is war, and someone’s gonna have to win it. (P.S., the house always wins! (The house is Patriarchy!)))

I know it’s not easy, and I come from a position of privilege. Relatively speaking. I present male, white. I’m pretty well-educated, tall. All I’ve really got against me (until you get to know me) is some extreme social awkwardness, which I can sometimes fake my way around. Even with all that, though, I’ve been bullied pretty much my whole life for not being male enough. I made an easy target in middle school. People more than occasionally assume I’m gay. My ex-spouse used to freak out whenever I did or said anything she perceived as un-masculine.

Thing is, I don’t understand this charade. At all. I’ve never thought of myself as male, really. Or female. I’m just, I’m me. Gender performance has never been a topic that’s crossed my mind, unless someone made it my problem. Which again maybe is my privilege, in part. Presenting nominally (foppishly) male, I don’t have to worry too much about physical or sexual violence. Emotional abuse is another topic, and I do seem to have a personality that lends itself to predators. But that’s probably more to do with my mild autism than any gender issue.

It’s all this outside thing, you know. I don’t mind presenting as male, if I’m not expected to put on this gender performance. I don’t think there’s anything wrong with my identity, and my body issues are more around awkwardness than my relative androgyny. I’m just me, is all.

Awkwardness and boundaries. Goddamn, the boundaries. So hard to know where to maintain, and where I should make an exception. Though I’m starting to understand that may be never. Because it never feels right. So, that’s my choice, right? It’s my body. It’s for me, before anyone.

For above reasons, it’s probably to my advantage to present as male. So it’s fortunate things turned out that way. Might as well ride that train, right? Won that social lottery. But for I think similar reasons to why I recognize myself as ace, being forced into a binary hurts me. I could do without another therapist marveling at how gender roles in my relationships always seem to end up “flipped.” That’s got less to do with gender, guys, than with personalities. A passive person tends to attract aggressive people. (Recognizing my asexuality helps there.) I could do without anyone ever telling me I’m wrong for not being what they expect me to be, playing some role that has nothing to do with me. I could do without anyone in my life who can’t accept me for who I am, before what they think I should be. Same as I try to do with them.

I’m pretty messed up, and I probably always will be. But I’m starting to find that line between what I think is actually a character flaw that I need to work on — of which I have many — and what’s everyone else’s problem. Of which I’m starting to think there may be far more.

It still makes me really sad, though.

I find it way easier to identify with women, but that may be less to do with femininity in itself than the extreme awfulness of masculinity as performed in this culture. Some kind of an Overton window thing, kinda. If that can even be adapted to a gender spectrum. Again both extremes feel weird and icky. It’d be nice if everyone were lent the freedom to just be themselves. Like, toss the whole spectrum in the trash. What good is it? But power structures make this easier for some than others.

It’s like. In English we just have the word “cousin,” right? Same for lots of family terms. We’re not very specific. In some other languages, they bug out if you don’t specify a gender. They Need To Know if you’re talking about your male-cousin or female-cousin. It’s Important. Coming at that from an anglophone angle, it sounds comical. What should it matter? If the gender plays a role, it’ll come up in the conversation, right? If not, who cares. It’s just a shame that attitude doesn’t stretch further. I don’t even much get why gender should be a thing.

Anyway. I don’t know how much this is some deep-seated philosophy and how much you can attribute back to that autism (which plays into not understanding or much caring about social conventions beyond, you know, trying to be kind to people). But I don’t live in this world. However much of an expression of privilege it may be, based on my skin tone and anatomy and the vocabulary I use, I don’t like these power games and I don’t want to play them. I don’t like to play any game where there’s a winner and a loser. I’m… okay with myself if left alone.

And that’s really what it comes down to: wanting to be left alone. Building friendships based on kindness and mutual appreciation and acceptance, not on some socially driven power game. I don’t really get sexuality. I don’t really get gender. I want little to do with either.

I never want to again be in a situation where I’m tied to someone not through friendship but through expectation of some role performance. I won’t be objectified like that, same as I don’t want to objectify anyone else. Just, be people, yo. Be good. Don’t just use each other.

And if anyone has a 6′ long slim purple overcoat, I’ll totally take it.

Autumn dress is the best dress, man.