By Mey Rude — 2018
“Maybe instead of biology, I should be cursing the culture that taught me I’m less of a woman because I can’t have children.”
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CLEAR ALL
Creating spaces where the need to assimilate, conform, and belong are no longer important
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A three-time U.S. champion in figure skating, Eliot Halverson is Colombian-born, was adopted and raised by a white Minnesotan family and is transgender non-binary.
For as long as I could remember I wanted to be one of those stay-at-home moms. Damn the two degrees and a promising career. I wanted to raise kids, go to the park, and make cute lunches for us all. Super difficult and thankless job, but I was here for it.
When I told my family I was trans, one of their initial reactions was, “But you’re so hairy! It’s going to be so difficult to remove all your hair to be a woman, so you should just give up.” They were zeroing in on my body hair as the barrier for me to be seen as feminine.
One of life’s paradoxes is that we are encouraged to “be ourselves,” but are often punished when we do.
For LGBTQ youth in particular, the Internet can be a refuge—a safe place to feel less alone. For queer youth to feel normal, they need to see, read and hear the voices of others who look like them and use the same identifying labels.
“Representation and visibility is given to us by larger power structures, but what do we give ourselves? I’m more interested in that. What questions are we asking ourselves to grow and heal? To challenge the ways this world constantly teaches us to hate ourselves?”
Out pro wrestler Logan Black found the response to his coming out ‘overwhelming in the best way.’
I already have to deal with being Black in America and the risk that comes with that, but the vulnerability of being Black and trans is even greater.
Some of us regret what we did, some of us regret what we didn’t do… some of us regret all of the above. And since “motherhood without regrets” is really not a thing, let’s have a conversation about how we can soothe the pain of regret in motherhood.