Living My Truth, No Matter What They Say
Growing up in a big city in the ’80s and ’90s, bigotry wasn’t just tolerated—it was practically a national pastime. Homophobic and transphobic slurs flew around like seagulls at a seaside chippy, casually lobbed by adults and kids alike at the mere whiff of non-conformity. Step even slightly outside the rigid, joyless box of gender or sexuality norms—you were fair game, if you were one of the unlucky souls who didn’t quite fit the mould. Well, you had two ‘choices’—grit your teeth and endure the abuse or shove yourself into a suffocating, ill-fitting disguise and pray no one noticed the cracks.
At 12, my father took it upon himself to inform me that I “walked like a girl”—delivered, of course, with a homophobic slur for extra impact. The man barely commented on anything I did, but somehow, my gait required an immediate intervention. That night, I cried myself to sleep, replaying his words over and over, the shame settling in my chest like a weight, and from that moment on, I made a decision—if being myself meant being open to ridicule, I would bury that self so deep it would take an archaeological dig to find her.
So began the tragic, slightly pathetic saga of ‘Operation Man Up’. I bought car modding magazines despite having zero interest in engines or whatever a carburettor does. I forced myself to endure football talk in a desperate bid for masculine credibility (it didn’t work; I remained utterly clueless). I scrutinised my clothing choices like I was navigating a minefield—nothing too colourful, nothing too tight, nothing that might betray me. Even my favourite TV shows, music, and—God help me—my favourite colour became classified information. Anything that might invite suspicion had to go.
Looking back, it’s painfully obvious that no amount of pretending was ever going to change who I was, but at the time, survival meant suppression. So, I played the part, all while knowing deep down that the real me was waiting—patiently, desperately—to break free.
At the time, I didn’t have the words for what I was hiding. I just knew—deep in that nebulous, unspoken way—that something about me didn’t fit. But with no alternative perspective and no language to articulate it, I assumed this was just how everyone felt. A vague sense of wrongness, a persistent discomfort—surely that was just the standard human experience, right?
Then there is the ‘magic pill’ test. If some unseen force had offered me the chance to become a girl in an instant, no strings attached, I’d have swallowed that pill faster than you could say ‘gender dysphoria’. The funny thing? I didn’t realise back then that I already was a girl. There was no magic needed—just the courage to finally see myself for who I’d always been.
I did know one thing, though: if life were some sort of cosmic character creation screen, I’d have picked ‘female’ without a second thought. But, I reasoned, wouldn’t everyone? Who wouldn’t be curious about life from the other side? It never crossed my mind that this wasn’t some universal, passing thought. It was only decades later—after wading through layers of repression, societal conditioning, and an Olympic-level commitment to self-denial, that I realised the truth.
Throughout my life, I never felt any real connection to boys. Whatever unspoken bond was supposed to exist, whatever secret code of camaraderie they all seemed to share, it went completely over my head. Meanwhile, I felt an unshakable pull towards girls, an instinctive sense of belonging that I couldn’t explain. Mixed groups? Fine. But the moment we were forced to separate into ‘boys’ and ‘girls’? A gut-wrenching, nameless resentment bubbled up inside me. At the time, I couldn’t pinpoint why it stung so much. Turns out that being shoved into the wrong category hurts. Who knew?
When you can only relate to one group and feel like an alien in the other, you end up stranded—adrift between worlds, belonging nowhere. I felt more in common with the girls I interacted with, yet I always felt like I was on the outside looking in. Like some invisible force kept me at arm’s length, subtly reminding me that, no matter how much I understood them, I wasn’t truly ‘one of them’. The pain of not being fully accepted was like a splinter lodged deep in my skin—small enough to ignore for a while, but always there, always stinging.
So, to spare myself the agony of rejection, I buried my true self even deeper. If I couldn’t belong, I’d simply stop trying. Social interactions became a battlefield, and I avoided them like the plague. It was easier to be alone than to keep fighting for a place that always seemed just out of reach.
Growing up in a society that happily turned a blind eye to transphobia does an absolute number on your head. It seeps in quietly, insidiously, until it’s just there—woven into the very fabric of how you see yourself. For many, this internalised transphobia festers beneath the surface, unspoken but ever-present, and it is also common in the trans community itself, especially among those of us who grew up in an era where being openly trans wasn’t just frowned upon—it was practically unthinkable. The result? Years of subconscious suppression, pushing our true selves so deep down that even we lost sight of them.
But here’s the thing about disguises—they crack. Mine certainly did. No matter how much I tried to reinforce it, time wore it down. Society shifted bigotry (while still kicking and screaming) loosened its grip just enough, and suddenly, cracks formed where I’d spent a lifetime of subconsciously plastering over the truth.
A lot of this change came from the world moving forward—representation creeping onto our screens, social media giving voices to people who’d been silenced for too long. No amount of representation is going to make someone transgender. It’s not a choice; it’s simply the reality of who we are. Seeing others living openly, and unapologetically, makes something click. When the world starts showing you that you can be yourself and that hiding isn’t the only option, it’s hard to keep pretending. Slowly, the proverbial closet door creaked open, and for the first time, stepping out into the larger world didn’t seem so impossible.
The more this veil lifts, the clearer you see yourself—the real you, the one who’s been buried under layers of denial, fear, and societal nonsense. But with that clarity comes a gut-wrenching realisation: the outside doesn’t match the inside. And not in a bad haircut or questionable fashion choice kind of way. No, this is something far deeper, something fundamentally wrong.
Gender dysphoria isn’t just a mild inconvenience, like a bad haircut or a dodgy fashion choice, it’s a full-on existential crisis, every single day. It’s looking in the mirror and seeing a stranger staring back, hearing your own voice and feeling like you’re possessed by some bloke you’ve never met. It’s knowing exactly who you are but being stuck in a body that refuses to get the memo. And let me tell you, it’s relentless. It gnaws at you, pokes at every insecurity, and makes the simple act of existing feel like a constant battle.
Imagine waking up one day to find your reflection no longer resembles you in any way. Your voice, your body, the way the world perceives you—it’s all mismatched, completely at odds with the person you know yourself to be. Now imagine being told, “This is it. This is how you’ll look, sound, and be treated for the rest of your life”, that sinking, suffocating dread? That’s gender dysphoria at its rawest and most excruciating.
Yet, society loves to gaslight us into thinking we should just ‘accept’ this mismatch as if ignoring it will make it magically disappear. But dysphoria isn’t confusion—it’s brutal, gut-punching clarity. It’s knowing exactly what’s wrong but being told you’re the problem for wanting to fix it. That’s why, for most of us, transition isn’t some flippant choice—it’s survival, it’s breaking through the cracks, shattering the illusion, and transitioning. A lifetime of pretending, of existing in a shell that feels more like a prison, and forcing ourselves to live a lie just to keep other people comfortable? Yeah, that’s not happening.
Being transgender isn’t some ‘ideology’ or ‘woke nonsense’, no matter how much the far-right media wants to spin it. Transgender people have been a part of humanity since the first Homo sapiens stood upright. It’s not some new-age fad; it’s ingrained in biology, scientifically recognised, and well-documented throughout history. Hell, even the German Nazi Party in the 1930s couldn’t erase the truth, despite their best efforts to burn every piece of evidence.
The increase in the number of people coming out isn’t part of some manufactured ‘trend’, either. It’s a reflection of the fact that, with greater acceptance, more people feel safe enough to step into the light and share their true selves. This isn’t some new phenomenon, either. Look at left-handedness. Once feared, shunned, and even labelled ‘sinister,’ the number of left-handed people was artificially low—because society deemed them strange. But as hate for them decreased and acceptance grew, surprise, surprise, the number of left-handed people went up. Imagine that.
In recent years, as trans folks have started stepping out of the shadows, the backlash has been almost spectacular in its stupidity. Media outlets and anti-trans groups are working overtime, spreading lies, framing our very existence as some kind of ‘debate’, and pushing this nonsensical ‘gender ideology’ panic. It’s not just ignorance, it’s a full-on campaign to shove us back into our closets, silencing us once again. They can scream, shout, and try to erase us all they want—we’re not going anywhere. We exist, and we always will.
Transphobes love to cling to the misguided idea that being trans is a mental illness. Spoiler alert: it’s not. If living my life as my true self was a mental illness, I’d take it in a heartbeat over living a lie. Because let’s be real, the only real madness is pretending to be someone you’re not for the sake of other people’s fragile comfort.
Being a pansexual transgender woman isn’t ‘woke’, it’s not ‘a phase’, and it’s certainly not some kind of rebellious statement. It’s just me—finally, unapologetically, me. After years of repression, denial, and trying to squeeze myself into a role that never fit, I’ve earned the right to exist as my true self without justification.
If anything, the real ‘phase’ was pretending to be someone I wasn’t just to make society more comfortable. And trust me, that phase is well and truly over.
Cross-posted from my Substack