Tag Archives: trans

My One Year Anniversary of Coming Out, Sunday, September 18, 2016, by Jennifer Angelina Petro

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fading-flower

My One Year Anniversary of Coming Out

Sunday, September 18, 2016

by

Jennifer Angelina Petro

 

I look at my initial coming out letter and feel so sad.  It was such a naïve letter.  Of course, I didn’t know any better.

Part of the sadness comes, of course, from the incredible fallout my pronouncement caused.  Over this past year I have had things said to me by relatives, friends, parents of my students, and strangers that would make your skin crawl–inhuman, violent, vicious, hateful, self-centered, and humiliating things.  People crawled out of the woodwork to write me mean, toxix letters—people who haven’t spoken with me in literally decades suddenly found it their place to tell me what a fuck-up I was.  Over the course of this year, I lost friends, family, and regardless of how it was framed as my fulfilling a four-year agreement at my school—I lost a job, my home, and a marriage.

One of the reasons I stressed so much in my original letter and in subsequent letters that being transgender isn’t a choice is because so many people think I have brought all of this loss onto myself by making a sick, twisted, selfish, perverted life-style choice—a choice that wrecked everything.  And no matter what I say or how many times I say it, there will still be those who think I am choosing to be this way.  There will be people who will never speak to me again for the “choice” they think I am making.

Part of the sadness also comes from seeing how happy I was.  I have never been so happy before or since when I realized I am transgender.  It was a joy that transcended all other joys.  And, in my naiveté, I thought the world would be happy with me. My innocence was reborn even though I know people who believe that isn’t possible, and with that innocence came a youthful foolishness; for my thought that people would rejoice with me couldn’t have been more wrong.

A year later I am in a darker place than the one I mention at the beginning of my coming out letter.  It is a place of not seeing any future, any possibilities, any hope; and, as a result, there are days when I feel I cannot, nor do I want to, go on.   As of this writing I am not sure of anything, and make no promises about anything to anyone anymore.  That all sounds pretty dire, and that’s because it is.  There is another side to this year though that I also want to share.

When I came out there was also tremendous, unexpected support from people I knew and from people I didn’t know.  Mandy published her own letter that day and as a result I had more people friend me that week than perhaps ever in my Facebook history—and the vast majority of those people were from Bryn Athyn.  So while I have lost dear friends, relatives, and family, I have also gained a whole community of people who love and accept me for me, and for that I will be forever grateful.

I also met the best doctor I have ever had.  He is the kindest, most attentive, loving doctor I have ever had, and likely will ever have.  Four months after coming out, on January 11, 2016 he started me on HRT and I will be forever grateful for that too.  No, the meds doesn’t make me a woman.  I have always been a woman.  The medicine simply helps me live comfortably in my own skin.  It does not affirm who I am, nor will surgery, what it does is treat an incurable condition and, again, help me live with some semblance of peace and comfort while in a body that does not fit the inner truth of who I am.

I credit my continued existence to my present therapist, who I have another Facebook note and blog post about.

I have had moments this past year where the joy and ecstasy returned and, no matter what was going on around me, I felt like singing.  My last year teaching was a great example of joy—no, not with the parents—no, as I have already written about in other places—the majority of them flipped their wigs and said some of the meaning things anyone ever said.  It was the children and I.  We had the best year ever.  I cannot think of another group of people I would ever want to be around as I came out and began transitioning.  Despite some of the limited, transphobic thinking of their parents, these kids were enlightened beings—they ARE enlightened beings.  Sure they had questions (which I wasn’t allowed to answer), and a few concerns—mostly things like: Was I OK? Of course, as this chain of events drew us even closer together the only other thing that mattered most to them was that I stay their teacher.  They wanted me to stay more than ever, and this is completely to their credit.  The time I got to spend with them that last school year together will always be treasured, cherished, and an honor.

My own children too continue to love and support me.  They call me “Other Mom,” or “Mom Number Two,” or simply, “Mom.”  They faced our first Father’s Day with grace and made me cards for our first Mother’s Day together.  They are amazing people, growing so fast, and not really ever blinking once at my transition and all of the odd things it entails. And even though Mandy and I have divorced, we are still on the best of terms, and she continues to be one of my biggest allies.

As you know too, I am not shy about talking about surgeries and my body like I thought I was going to be.  I am going tomorrow for my first consult with a surgeon and this makes me so happy I could cry happy tears of gratitude (in fact I do cry tears of gratitude—often about this).  I want surgery more than anything else in the world.  And isn’t that funny?  I have no frame of reference for desiring such an operation, but there it is—the deepest want—longing—desire, and I dearly hope it is possible physically and financially.  And yes, this makes many people uncomfortable—especially some men who cannot fathom anyone giving up male privilege to do such a drastic (in their twisted minds) thing.  But I am all in, and I cannot wait for the next phase of my transition to begin (I will be receiving more letters from friends, family, and strangers about this paragraph, and while yes, I just made it your business by sharing this personal information it does not give you the right to be mean, send sexually insecure, shadow-based hate mail, letters, phone calls, messages—you may keep your bizarre and lust fueled—bigoted-“religious” ideas to yourself.  What I am doing to my body should be of no concern of yours.  So, to all of you already writing me hateful letters, I send a big, hearty-fuck-you in advance).

Many of you have been such dear supports and friends this past year.  I am constantly making calls for prayers, and you always answer them.  No matter how depressing and dark my posts become you love and support and encourage me.  Many of you have even donated money to my cause, and it is with all my heart I thank you.

So, here I am.  One year in.  One year CONSCIOUSLY in.   I have been transgender my whole life just not consciously. If I make it out of this next year then I believe I will be kicking some serious ass in terms of my poetry, music, and activism. I want the fight back—the joy, the bliss, the sweet sense of completeness and wholeness that was here a year ago—the sense of purpose and rightness. I want to love myself and my body, my voice, my age, and my life.  I want to believe the poems that come to me.  I want to help change the world.  I want to get remarried. I want to get all of my poems and songs out there published.

If I can step back and look at my life objectively, I see how much I have survived—many forms of abuse, hatred, and loss, and yet, here I am, alive and well, not kicking—more sort of rolling up into a ball and weeping with terror—but I am here.  I survived my life not knowing who I was.  I survived experiences meant to “make a man out of me.”  I survived traumas of many kinds, and I am still here, for that I can be proud.

So, Happy Anniversary to me.  Here’s to a smoother year.

All my love and gratitude,

Jennifer

 bright-flower

 

You are always welcome to donate what you can and want.  I am still unemployed and soon, as mentioned above, I will be starting a crowd-funding campaign for my surgeries.  Get in on the ground floor now for that and ear-mark your donations and I will not use them to buy food.  🙂  Thank you.  All my love, Jennifer

 


 

Transcendencies, A Transgender Manifesto, by Jennifer Angelina Petro

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Transcendencies

A Transgender Manifesto

by

Jennifer Angelina Petro

 

 

We are all transcendentalists

Seeking to live above duality and paradox,

We are all transcendent,

Shining across space and time in clouds

Of oxygen and carbon, hydrogen and nitrogen;

Each and every one of us transcends

Something, or someone, or somehow

Or someday—just to be able to stand here catching our breath—

We transcend and we become—

It is as simple as that.

 

Our blood streams are transcontinental,

Our lives holy translations of spirit and soul,

And if we are lucky, we sense ourselves being

Transcribed onto the pages of the world

And can take comfort in knowing

Our lives are written, revised, edited, and published

By storylines far greater than ours—

 

We are all transfigured, like Jesus on the transmountain

And then resurrected to life everlasting

Every time we transcend ourselves to become ourselves–

Life is nothing but a series of ongoing

Transplantations and transferals of fluids and spirit–

We transmogrify our way through life–

And time is transinfinite—shifting over and ever through

Many transhistorical points of references

That are increasingly transcultural and transhuman, and

Full of blood and wishes—

Everything we do, say, or think

Is transformative, setting events into motion

That change us and our world—

 

We are all transients and haven’t a clue—

Even beyond our so-called beliefs, where or when, how, or why

We will be transformed and/or transported

To otherness, to other transpossibilities—

 

Our spirits translocate and love transelevates us—

We are transpirited and our souls translucent,

Transmissible, and transoceanic—-

Why not rejoice and dance with one another

And love the best of who we are?

 

Yes, I am transpierced with pain,

Yes, I have been transplanted inside

And the ground softens with every step;

Yes, I am transpolar and songs and poems

Come aching to be transubstantiated into form through me,

And yet, even as I move through a series

Of neverending transversals only to find myself

Transported into more hatred, ignorance,

And shadow-driven insecurities of the white men—

I am still here—I have not given up yet—

 

I transilluminate boundaries

That no longer have solid meaning—they never did,

But now monsters are waking up to the truth that gender

Is not fixed—it is transfixed—and no longer the transaxle

Of a tired binary sustained by them—the white men—

Whose own genitals they never truly know,

Or love, or transform into possibilities without shame—

Even though everything about people like me is transubstantiated

By living, breathing experience—for here I am, and yet I am told

I do not exist—I am told I do not deserve to exist—

Even though everything exists based on continuous

Transformations of spirit and body,

And long, transcendent series of moments

Spilling into other moments into which we are all

Given choices to hurt or to heal, love or to hate,

Explore or destroy—and the occurrences of transpeople

Hurting anyone are rare—for true transpeople

Understand pain as few others do————-

 

What makes you think you can transpose

An already faulty belief system to justify or rationalize

Your unjustifiable and irrational actions and laws?

 

Do you really think humanity will not eventually wise up

To your genocidal ways?

 

Be ye transported into a land where transcendencies

Are accepted as commonplace—because, in actuality,

They already are—

 

We all transmute oxygen and water

And food into our transubstantiating metabolisms—

Everything we do is a transaction of time and space

Body, mind, spirit, soul—no matter how far we move

From one another, we are all transactors,

And our breath transoceanic, and our lives

Transferrable with one another’s—

 

It will happen despite your barbaric ideas—

I will not be transfixed by your gaze—You

Who cannot think past your own shadow—

I am a living transmission of messages

Who illuminates your small mindedness.

 

I am not here to inspire some kind

Of transcultural revolution—

I AM a revolution—I am

Transfiguration transanimated by my every movement,

And I live as a thorn in the side

Of the white man who has lost any ability—

Indeed—if they ever had any—to transmute limited thinking

Into growth, evolution, wisdom, common sense—

Love and true, “Christian” charity—

The Jesus transfigured on the mount does not know

Hatred—no matter what Paul tried to tattoo

Onto him—Jesus was transgender—transforming

God-seed into woman-flesh—

And back again to seed and flower for all eternity—You can know this

With all certainty, if you will only look past your own

Untouched, unloved, unabused genitals—

Jesus came to transfigure you and to set your limited beliefs on fire,

Jesus came to give you a transfusion to flush out

Your hatred both of yourself and of those

Who truly live as he suggested—steeped in the beatitudes

So deeply as to be transcribed into living testaments

Of love’s transcendent power—

 

Come, shed your mantles of tissue and weariness,

Come shed your tired ideological transparencies,

And transmigrate with me to a way of living where Jesus reigns

Alongside the mother tree and the angels

Of transmogrification, and beings of transdimensional

Singing and dancing—

 

For we all transpire–and will–sooner than we want,

Life is transonic, yes, but it is death that comes at the speed of sound—

And when it does we shall all be transposed against a backdrop of light

And seen for how we really lived and breathed—

So live now with me, with us—we are your brothers and sisters

And siblings of light transilluminated with holy,

And unending folly and grace, and joy transacted

Into countless transferals—let us all be

Translocated into here and now—transgiven

Transcendencies in love, sweet love,

Everlasting.

 

 

 

 


 

 

 




URGENT MESSAGE, PLEASE READ AND SHARE by Jennifer Angelina Petro

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Dear Friends,

You may not know this but I lost my job of 16 years this past June, due, in large part, I believe, to being transgender. I am also about to lose my home leaving me a divorced, 48 year old unemployed and homeless transwoman.  I am applying to many different jobs and have only had 2 interviews in some 60 applications thus far.  Seems there is little market for people like me, even with my stellar teaching resume.

Right now, I have no source of money in my checking account and cannot pay for groceries or other things I need to just get by. I applied, and was turned down for, unemployment. I am trying to get food stamps and welfare, but the process is slow and I need groceries now and there are basic bills to pay, like water, electricity, etc.

If you are able, please consider donating to me on my blog using the donation button at the bottom of this post and that appears on the bottom of nearly all recent posts. I was hoping to use any donations from here for future gender-affirming surgeries (even though only 2 people have donated in the past 2 years), but anyway, I need to eat. I am desperate, and scared.  If you can, please help. I hate asking this….I have never before in my life ever asked for such a thing.  I never would have envisioned this being my life at 48.

Writing this post breaks my heart. I was going to do some sort of crowd-funding for my surgeries as soon as I got on my feet again, but to be asking for money for food is heartbreakingly sad.

But OK.  There you have it.  I have kept this blog for about 6 years and love it.  I hope you do too.  You know, if you’ve been following me all these years, that I have never asked for such a thing.  This is real.

Thank you everyone for reading and for donating. Please feel free to share this post with those who you might think would be willing and able to help.  I love you all. Thank you with all of my heart.

Yours Ever, Jennifer (Radiance)

 

 

I promise anything you send will be used for food and other day-to-day essentials until I can get foodstamps or some other source of assistance, and most hopefully, soon, a job, somewhere, anywhere.

Radiance Reporting, by Radiance Angelina Petro

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Radiance Reporting

By

Radiance Angelina Petro

************************************************

The thoughts contained in this poem

are a small part of what goes on in my head on a daily basis.

Thank you for reading.

**************************************************

On the days I take off from shaving

I think:

Ahhh, that feels

Good to not do.

And then I think:

Shit, this messes with which

Bathroom I go in if I leave the house.

I look less traditionally

Fem, and so, I probably can’t

Safely use the ladies room (my rightful restroom).

I better wear androgynous clothes

So I can use the men’s room—

I can go in there with a scruffy face and jeans,

And if I wanted to, hell

I could pee standing up (I can still do that, you know).

 Me unshaven nonbinary




Please donate to my transition.  Thank you, Radiance <3

Alien, by Jennifer Angelina Petro

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Alien

By

Jennifer Angelina Petro

 

 

I am not from around here.

I came from up there–the sky.

When I entered your gravitational pull

I vanished into a womb

And woke up one day

An intersexed jarble

Of cells and screams.

As I assembled over your earth years,

I tried to fit in to the norms and customs

Of this place, except my ways

Of being didn’t quite align with those

Of the people nearest me, so they tried

To chisel me down, hone

Me into something that better matched

Their perceptions of what they thought I should be.

Yes, I still possessed my super powers.

I could have melted them with my eyes,

I could have spoken the language

Of my cousins—the cicadas—and droned them

Into a pulp.   I could have also lifted into the night

Like an untethered star anytime

I wanted to.  But something

Kept me here, something kept me

From destroying everything in my path.

Something itched from the inside of my skin,

Something began erasing my memories

Of my other life one by one,

And it was increasingly delightful.

And even though I had morphed

Many times for the conveniences

Of space travel, this transformation

Was wholly unprecedented, and divine.

Over time, (which is what they call the experience

Of fear around here), it became apparent

That this inside being wasn’t

Inside at all—it was the whole shebang—

It was the totality of who I was,

And one day the pod cracked

And there I was, an alien unto everyone

Except myself–a sister from another planet.

And I still had my super powers.

I read minds and listened to hearts,

I learned when to hide,

I secretly saved lives in alleyways deep in the city,

Only to disappear into a puddle– lamp-lit with rain.

I could harness lightening and change entire days

Into moments of power and flame,

I could breathe finally in an atmosphere

I didn’t realize I had been suffocating in.

Now, the helmet’s gone, or at very least,

Unneeded. The space suit

I traveled in slowly disintegrates from view,

And I roam this terrestrial place

Hiding in plain sight, gradually forgetting

Where I came from,

Looking for instructions on how

To fit into this life so that ultimately,

I can remember the way home–

For now, there is no name for me,

There is no place for me to rest my head.

I am lost, found, dissolving, evolving,

And aching to be seen for who I really am—for who you really are—

For who we all are, so that one day,

When they come looking for me,

They won’t find me—and they will take you back with them instead

With the hopes of discovering why

So many wanted me gone.

 

 

 


 


Please help support my transition.  Thank you.

My First Father’s Day Being a Mom, by Jennifer Angelina Petro

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My First Father’s Day Being a Mom

By

Jennifer Angelina Petro

 rough and tumble

 

My boys say they’re OK.

When I asked them how they felt about it being Father’s Day, they said they were OK.  One asked if he still needed to get me something.  Another said he worked double time on Mother’s Day making cards for two moms and now he appreciates the day off.

I have the best kids ever.

When I think of the times I held them as infants on my chest and sang to them, when I think of pulling them in wagons and pushing them in strollers—all the times carrying them in front packs, the fishing trips, the chasing after ice cream trucks, the making bread and chimichangas, all the times we drew together, all the stories I told at bedtime, all the snake hunts and ootheca searches (praying mantis nests), all the movies (watching Pirates of the Caribbean and the Harry Potter movies over and over and over), all the times playing catch or pitching to them, or the time I took them out of school (along with my students) to take them to see the Parade downtown when the Phillies won the World Series in 08; the teaching them to drive, the times sitting in Barnes and Noble drinking soda and looking at books, the teaching the few guitar chords I know, the screaming at the top of my lungs at Battle of the Bands, the being so proud when they won first place–It wasn’t a lie.  All that daddying.  All that fathering.  It was real.  Always will be.  Nothing will ever change my having been their father.  No matter what anyone says, nothing can ever take those memories away.

My kids can see him in the old photographs with his scruffy goatee, scruffy clothes, silly grin.  They can see hear him in my voice and see him in my hands and face.

But I am Mom Number Two.  Always was.  It’s just none of us knew it until now.

My boys are my treasures.

I love them with all of my heart.

And not just because they support me as a transgender parent, not just because they have taken this whole journey so well, and with such class, love, and good humor; but because they are good and decent people, they are my flesh and blood.  They are my kids.  Nothing will ever change that.  No matter what I look like.  No matter what happens to this body.  Nothing can ever take away twenty years of fathering.

Nothing will ever change that I love them to the moon and back.  And always will.

 

Ben's graduation 2016

A family photo at Ben’s graduation this June, 2016.  He’s the middle one, with Sam to his right, and Daniel to his left–and then Mandy, Mom Number One, and then me, Jennifer, Mom Number Two.

 

 


 

 





Please support my Gender Confirmation Surgery and furthering transition.  Thank you. <3

Pulse by Jennifer Angelina Petro

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Pulse

 

Pulse

By

Jennifer Angelina Petro

 

 

Pulses lost in the Pulse.
Pulses slowing, pulses struggling to flow
On floors, in hospital beds,
Behind tables, and rooms
Of young people existing
In secret and fear.
Pulses aching with grief and rage.
Pulses on fire with loss.
Pulses full of no more, no more, no more.
Pulses must become one pulse.
Your pulse. My pulse.
My transgender pulse.
Pulses of privilege and safety.
Pulses of people praying
In churches and mosques,
Synagogues, temples,
And living rooms.
Pulses of people in alleyways.
Pulses of people behind closed, political doors.
Pulses of your sisters.
Pulses of your brothers.
Pulses of those who do not identify
As brother or sister.
The pulse of deep humanity. Pulse
Within pulse, pulse within pulse.
Pulse of Pride.
Find inside ourselves,
Find inside each other,
Pulses to rise, pulses to fight,
Pulses to beat as one
To change the world,
To hold one another
In reverence and mourning,
To eradicate hate-mongering,
Barbarian pulses of those with ideas
Wrapped in blood, hypocrisy,
Shadow, pure insanity. Pulse
Within pulse. Find the one pulse
Of those who seek to live
In one rhythm stemming from one heart.
In the soul pulse of a nation
On the brink of revolution,
A revolution to breathe together
As we were meant to do.

 

me selfie

Stop the Killing, Stop the Hate, A Memorial Day Message By Jennifer Angelina Petro

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Stop the Killing, Stop the Hate,

A Memorial Day Message

By

Jennifer Angelina Petro

 

 “Jesus loves me this, I know.”  Do you?

 

Many die every day fighting wars both inner and outer, for freedom–yes, for freedom–in a country meant to protect the freedoms of all individuals–in a “Christian” nation supposedly founded on equal rights for all.   Transgender people like me fight to exist, to pee, to not have to justify and explain my right to simply live.  Every solider that died for American wars fought to keep people like me safe.

 

We are not a threat to “American Christian values.” I am not a threat. There has still, to this day–ever been one recorded incident of a true trans person harming anyone in any public bathroom EVER, and yet dozens and dozens of politicians and “religious” people have been charged with sex crimes and no one is murdering them (not that we should, of course).  We are not a threat to the radical feminists or to the radical, so-called, defenders of American values.

 

There is a wiki article that shows how the war on transgender people only gets worse and worse.  These are people fighting wars and battles simply to exist in their own country. Of course, many have been murdered and were never reported. Many, many suicides happen every day and are not listed here. These are murders too.  And the people inciting violence on them are responsible for their deaths—the pastors, politicians—the parents who kick their kids out of the house, the bullies who torment them—they are all responsible for killing the human beings just trying to fight the battle for their right to exist.

 

Notice how the numbers increase year by year. It is no coincidence that the more hate is spewed from so-called Christian leaders and politicians the more transpeople die–the more on the LBGTIQA spectrum die (yes, I know, and the media gives it all more attention and that accounts too for the increase in numbers).

 

Stop the hate. Stop the murder. Stop the suicides. Love your kids like real parents should. Love and accept your family members like real families should. Protect your loved ones.

 

While we remember the lives of those lost for our country–remember they died for people like me—that I may live with the same freedoms as you.

 

Don’t dishonor their memory by standing by and allowing another new civil rights battle and genocide to be waged on people like me on our watch. Don’t dishonor their memory by hating people like me and supporting those who would take away my freedoms or have people like me wiped from the face of the planet.

 

Transgender people like me and all other LGBTQIA people have never been a threat to “Christian” values.  If those values were so strong, so rooted in the “true religion of God,” then no one should fear their ever being harmed.  My rights do not invade yours.  Your ability to marry whomever you choose is in no way effected by who I choose to marry.  Prove how solid and true your values are and LIVE them.  Jesus NEVER hated people like me and he would weep to know how many parents kick their children out of their houses, or bully them to suicide.  Jesus would weep to know people like me are killed for simply being who we are—who “God” supposedly “made us to be.”  Jesus would be appalled to see his name, his teachings used to spread needless and shameful hatred, violence, bigotry.  If your truth was so strong it wouldn’t need defending from transpeople who just want to pee in a public restroom–who just want to LIVE in peace.

 

If you go to churches of any kind–temples, mosques, any type of religious body–advocate for us–for me.  Write to politicians and tell them to wage war on the issues that matter—poverty, crime, homelessness, student debt, pollution, and so on.

 

Memorial Day.

 

Let’s not make any more memories of those killed in the line of duty–abroad–or here–here with people like me just trying to live our lives in peace–here in our families, in our towns, in our schools, in our sacred places of freedom.

 

Peace, Jennifer

 

me selfie


 

 





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My Nest Was Built With Little Bones, by Jennifer Angelina Petro

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My Nest Was Built With Little Bones

By

Jennifer Angelina Petro

 

 

 

My nest was built with little bones,

Shells, feathers, twigs, candy wrappers,

Shiny things, torn pages of catechisms, shabads,

And pornographic magazines,

It was made of moss and hair, abandoned ribbons,

Scraps of red bandannas, silken scarves,

Shopping lists, and spit.

 

 

For years I incubated beneath the hollow-boned lark,

Or was it a mockingbird?

My shell survived storms

And long stretches where only monsters,

Drunken owls, and sleepy seagulls smothered me

In the night.  I learned to hide myself—

A nest within a nest—an egg within an egg;

I lived tucking parts of me away

I never wanted.  Brooding memories

Filled the nest like bits of worms regurgitated,

And every now and again I caught a glimpse of a faraway blue sky.

 

 

When the egg hatched and the nest

Bloomed, I stared blindly into myself,

Wiggling stubs of wings I so wanted covered with feathers and flight.

Yet now, I live, I walk, a nest on legs, a human egg, a permanent fledgling—

Wings clipped, song raspy with rain and darkness,

And a road of eggshells spreading out before me wherever I go.

 










Thank you for helping support my GRS and the Wonder Child Blog

 

 

 

 


 

Reflections on My First Official Mother’s Day, by Jennifer Angelina Petro

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Some Thoughts on My First Official Mother’s Day

by

Jennifer Angelina Petro

 

yellow rose

 

 

Being assigned the wrong gender when I was born had three wonderful unforeseen consequences much later in life: my three sons.  No matter how unsettled I was inside I loved being a dad.  I sang Van Morrison songs to the kids when they were still in the womb.  When they were born I placed them on my chest and sang them to sleep as I rocked them in the rocking chair.  I prayed over them, blessed them, and wrote them songs.  I took them on wagon rides and to play grounds and parks.  When they were older I took them bug hunting, snake hunting, puppy hunting, and ice cream truck hunting.  I remember one day chasing an ice cream truck around the neighborhood after school until we were able to get close enough to run after it.  We went fishing.  I dragged them to used bookstores.  I taught them the love of nachos, Mr. Bean, and baseball.  When we went to Michigan I bought them enough candy to last them on a drive to Idaho.  I drew with them.  I drew for them.  I taught them guitar chords.  I bought them guitars, drums, mandolins, trombones, keyboards, amps, and drums.  Of course, these are things any mother could do.  That isn’t my point.  My point is I did those because I loved being a parent—a parent who thought they were a dad doing what they thought, at the time, were dad things.  As it turns out, I did all these things as a mother—they were both motherly and fatherly.

 

I longed (and still do long) to be pregnant and carry a child. I am well aware that will never happen.  I deeply wanted to breast feed a child.  I am well aware that will never happen either.  And while these are saddnesses I will carry always to one degree or another, I have accepted the facts.  On the eve of my Mother’s Day, I find myself feeling strange, and in sort of a limbo.  I did my usual texting to the kids today to remind them to get something for their mom—Mom Number One.  I told them not to get me anything.  Part of me wants them to always think and remember me as dad, and yet, speaking of facts, I am a mom—a mom who gave birth to herself while she was still parenting her own children.  Mother and matter are related in their Latin roots.  They mean source—the stuff of the world—the feminine force of things.  I have been, without knowing it, motherly giver and the source of origin for many things in the lives of my children.  Father, in Latin (Dutch, vader—now you know what the “Vader” means in Darth Vader.), means paternal and Supreme Being; I have not been a supreme being except for when they were infants and in my arms or in my care in the woods, or when they were young and I made up stories for them stories until they fell asleep.  I have been paternal to my children.  I have cared for them when they were sick.  I have laid down with them when they had nightmares.

 

Being motherly and fatherly makes me a genderqueer parent.  And as the physical symptoms/manifestations of being wrongly assigned male at birth are slowly kneaded and shaped into the female parts I have always wanted, the fatherly form will fade, yet the fatherly spirit will always remain.  And as the physical form of my real gender identity is fashioned, the motherly spirit will grow.  I am a two-spirit parent who has untied things that have always been, from the beginning of time, united.

 

On this Mother’s Day, I am grateful for my three children.  I am grateful for my own mother.  Many of my relatives believe she is turning over in her grave at her “Joey,” being a “Jennifer,” and these are difficult fears for me to shake.  I want to believe she would be happy and only care if I was happy.  She would be worried sick about my impending future—no doubt about that—she would be telling me of all the teaching jobs open in Michigan, but she would be happy I am happy.   I am also grateful to Mandy—the one who physically carried the kids and gave birth to them.  She has been, and is, a wonderful mom.  And on this, my first Mother’s Day, I am grateful for me and this wild, miraculous journey I am on.

 

So Happy Mother’s Day to all the Mom’s Out there—no matter what gender you are or aren’t.

 

Happy Mother’s Day to me.

 

 


 

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