HomeBecoming visible
In which we talk about Transgender Day of Visibility
Today, March 31st, is Transgender Day of Visibility. This year, 2024, it’s fifteen years since the event first started. Event is maybe a big word. It’s a marker, a day in the calendar for trans people to stand up and be loud about who they are.
The calendar sometimes seems full of queer-related events nowadays. Aside from TDoV there’s LGBTQ History Month (February, in Britain at any rate); Pride Month (June); Transgender Day of Remembrance (November); and probably more that haven’t immediately sprung into my head. It sometimes feels like there’s so many similar events in the calendar that they are coming around every week. Nevertheless, they are still all important. Transgender Day of Visibility was started as a celebration, a reaction to the only trans-specific day in the calendar being one of sadness and hurt, a reaction to the medical establishment’s position that the ultimate goal of all trans people should be to become invisible, and a reaction to those who don’t think trans people should be included under the queer umbrella. A day for us to stand up and be proud of ourselves.
Yes, ourselves.
This blog started in its current form in August 2005, getting on for nineteen years ago. In all that time, I think, I’ve not once referenced the fact that I am trans. There’s a reason for that.
I’m not just trans, I am a detransitioner. In 2005, I had just detransitioned. I went into deep, deep denial, about who I was and who I am. So, here, it was never mentioned.
I started to transition again in 2021. One of the first things one of my close friends said was: “Welcome back!” It touched me more than you can imagine. I scanned all of the content on this blog for anything that gendered me, and scrupulously removed them all. I wasn’t ready to talk about it here until now.
Transitioning, like coming out, isn’t a single event. It’s a lifelong process. But an important part of my second transition, coming out to my work colleagues, coincidentally happened two years ago today. Not specifially because it was TDoV, just because we happened to have the quarterly all-staff meeting that day and HR thought it would be a good idea to make it as face-to-face an event as possible. I didn’t mind. I had to do it three times, with separate groups of people. Each time I told them the basic facts, and each time everyone around me was as caring and supportive as possible. In general, that has absolutely been the case. The first time I came out, over twenty years ago, I did lose friends. Not most, but some. This time, everyone in my life who matters to me has been completely and unequivocally supportive of me.
There’s never a right day to come out. Just like being gay, though; if you’re trans, you’re still trans whether or not you come out. Detransitioners are still, ultimately, trans, even though they are used as a political football by the queerphobic—one reason I always kept very quiet about being a detransitioner. I was born trans, I always will be trans, and I always would have been even if I had never transitioned.
As I do transition, too, I’m becoming less visible. I look like any other middle-aged mum now. It’s not immediately obvious that I’m transgender, not at all. That’s one reason, I think, why days like TDoV are still important. Even though I do enjoy looking like any other middle aged mum, I enjoy no longer having to fight for my gender to be perceived, I will still always be trans. Like many middle aged women, I rely on HRT now. Even people who know I am trans forget that I am; a colleague recently was slightly surprised to discover that I have changed my first name. Before too long, people will only know if they go back and read things like this, or if I stand up on days like today and say so. It matters, though. In some ways, I want to be visible.
There’s a museum I’ve taken The Children to a few times, that often has the same person either behind the counter or working as a custodian in one of the rooms. They have long hair, and a beard. They appear to be male. But…every time they see me, even though they are a stranger, their face breaks out into a broad, broad smile as if they are incredibly happy to see me existing in the world as a visibly trans woman. I’ve seen that look a few times, on the faces of strangers in the street, on the faces of teenagers, even on the faces of work colleagues. They’re probably also trans people, trans people who for now are still in the closet, who haven’t been able to transition yet. Maybe they never will. But in moments like that, I know it’s good to be visible, it’s good to be able to show people that this is possible. At least one friend has told me that my transition inspired them to come out too. I hope I can keep doing that—I hope I can keep inspiring people and showing them that is possible to be out in the world as your true self. I hope all of them, everyone who sees me and feels that urge inside, is able to find themselves eventually.