You and Your Gender Identity

by Dara Hoffman-Fox

  Your Bodyguard’s weapon is actually your fear. ____________________ knows just what to say while holding up that weapon: anything that will keep you from getting closer to that trunk. “You know I hate to do this, but I can’t allow you to go into that trunk. Don’t you remember how you felt before I locked all that stuff up in the trunk? Do you want to be judged? Hurt? To be cast out? Let me remind you what will happen if you take that out of the trunk …”

  Your Bodyguard is really only trying to protect you and keep you from harm. But your Bodyguard does not know what actually constitutes a real threat. This means fear (a.k.a. your Bodyguard, a.k.a. yourself) can mislead you into believing things that may not actually be true. Additionally, even if there are actual threats for you and your Bodyguard to reckon with, you have the right to choose self-actualization over continued repression.

  STEP 3: CREATING A RELATIONSHIP WITH YOUR BODYGUARD

  It might take a while for you to recognize when your Bodyguard is making their presence known. However, once you are able to do this, you can develop the habit of starting a dialogue with them whenever your fear surfaces.

  Here are some ways you can do that:

  • Thank them for being there for you all of this time.

  • Remind them that you know this is going to be scary, but you can get through this together.

  • Ask them to continue to let you know when they think you are in danger because this can help you be more vigilant and cautious.

  • Encourage them to understand your point of view, and listen to their point of view as well.

  Here’s an example of how this can work.

  SCENE: DARA IS HANGING OUT IN HER OFFICE, DEEP IN THOUGHT

  Dara (to self): I think I’m ready to get a big tattoo on my right forearm. It’s something that I’ve always admired on others, and I’ve imagined it on myself and really like the thought of it.

  Jules (enters the room): Uh, hey Dara, I couldn’t help but notice your line of thinking just now, and as your Bodyguard I have to say I’m getting a bit concerned about it.

  Dara: Hey Jules, what’s up? What do you mean?

  Jules: Well, I mean, think about it. When you were a kid you would do some, let’s say, not-so-feminine things with your friends and most of the time you got made fun of for it.

  Dara: Yeah, I remember that. Like when I’d try to play football at recess with the guys. How I’d want to be Han Solo instead of Princess Leia. How I liked having short hair and wore jeans and T-shirts all the time.

  Jules: Right! Do you remember feeling so awkward, and weird, and isolated? I hated to see you go through that! That’s when I told those not-so-feminine feelings of yours to f*ck off, because I didn’t want to see you hurt anymore.

  Dara: So you see me getting this tattoo as being a not-so-feminine thing, huh?

  Jules: Not just yes but hell yes! I’m not saying I don’t think this is a true expression of who you are, or that it wouldn’t be cool as sh*t to have it. But think about the judgment, the looks, the snickering … You’d be labeled as being butchy, or a wanna-be guy, you know?

  Dara: I can definitely see why you are worried about this, Jules. But don’t forget, I’m forty years old now, not eight. I really do think I’m ready for a step like this. And even if those things happen, I don’t know if I really care anymore!

  Jules (swinging his gun around and stomping his feet): Dara, you are killin’ me here! I really do hear what you are saying and am almost convinced that I might be acting overly protective right now. But it just makes me so nervous, I don’t want to see you get hurt, child!

  Dara: You’re awesome, Jules. I’m so lucky to have you on my side. Look, let’s find a way to do this, nice and slow, so you can feel a little more relaxed about this. I will always need you to be there to watch out for me!

  Jules: Aw … [chuckles]. Okay, I’m open to trying that idea out. Now how about we go grab a Big Kahuna Burger? All this serious talk has gotten me starving!

  The next time one of your top fears arises, take the time to dialogue with your Bodyguard to learn more about the roots of your fear.

  Setting Appointment Times with Your Fears

  If you find yourself constantly interrupted by your Fear List (see page 17) then this exercise is for you. Fears often come up without any warning: in the middle of your workday; while you’re hanging out with your partner, kids, or pets; or in the middle of a test at school. They can also slowly seep into your mind when you are more relaxed, and therefore more vulnerable: when you’re driving, showering, doing yoga, or when you’re trying to sleep.

  This exercise will help you create a plan for keeping your fears from overwhelming you and interrupting your life. You’ll learn to do this by setting appointment times with your fears. By doing so, you gain control of your fears instead of letting them control you. When you set boundaries with your fears, you are saying to them, “I’m sorry, but I’m in the middle of something right now. You’ll have to make an appointment and I’ll get back to you then.”

  Go ahead, give this a try.

  Step 1: When Do They Arrive?

  Think about a typical day. Are there certain times of day when your fears come up? Are there certain situations that trigger them?

  Step 2: Where Can You Meet Them?

  Now imagine places where you can spend time with these fears. This could be your car, a room in your home, somewhere out in nature, at a café, the gym, and so on.

  Step 3: How Long Will You Meet with Them?

  Decide on a period of time you are going to set aside for these appointments with your fears. Start with a small number, such as five or ten minutes, and increase from there as you get the hang of this.

  Number of minutes:

  Step 4: How Many Times Per Day?

  How many times a day will you set these appointments? (Eventually you may even be able to change this to ‘How many times per week?’)

  Number of times per day:

  Step 5: Where Will You Keep Track of Your Appointments?

  What is your favorite method of keeping track of things? This could be a notebook, or on your phone, or your computer.

  Step 6: Scheduling Your Appointments

  During your day, whenever a fear comes up, if it is not during one of your designated appointment times to spend with your fears, jot it down in the log you identified in Step 5. Give yourself permission to let it go, knowing you will definitely be meeting with it later.

  Step 7: Self-Care Before Your Appointment

  When your next Fear Appointment arrives, go to one of the places you listed under Step 2. Choose an activity from your Self-Care Worksheet to do at the beginning of the appointment. Do the same activity each time, as this will create a comforting and grounding ritual.

  Which self-care activity did you choose?

  Step 8: Start the Clock

  Set a timer (e.g., a watch, phone, or computer) for however many minutes you have scheduled the appointment for.

  Step 9: Let the Appointment Begin

  1. Take a deep breath and say (aloud or silently), “So, Fear, what brings you in today?”

  2. Then, totally immerse yourself in the experience.

  3. During the meeting, you can: dialogue out loud; journal; scream; stomp around; punch the air; dance; laugh in the Fear’s face; video or audio record yourself; draw; sing about it.

  4. Don’t stop until your timer goes off.

  5. Take another deep breath and say, “Well, thanks for coming, Fear. See you at our next appointment.”

  Step 10: Self-Care After Your Appointment

  Choose a Post-Appointment Self-Care Activity. This can be the same or different from the one at the beginning. Again, do the same one every time, so as to signify to yourself that this appointment is over and you can return to your life.

  Which self-care activity did you choose?

  Start paying attention to when your fears make themselves known. Get into the habit of keeping track of them to tend to later,
and create a ritual for when you will be spending quality time with these fears. This will reduce the amount of distraction they create in your life and put you in the driver’s seat as to when they will be addressed.

  Take a Positive Approach

  If you believe in the power of the mind to change a negative to a positive, then give any or all of the following pointers a try. Think of these as Magic Elixirs you can whip out of your cloak at the first sign of a fear arising and douse it with these tips.

  1. REMEMBER WHY YOU ARE DOING THIS

  “People don’t transition to become less happy.”

  I heard this at the 2015 TRANSforming Gender Conference in Boulder, Colorado and was struck by its simple yet empowering truth.23 We all go through transitions over the course of our lifetimes. We go through them hoping to improve our lives even if it’s totally nerve-racking while we’re going through it. Whether or not you end up literally transitioning with regard to your gender identity, taking a closer look at yourself will more than likely result in a life transition for you.

  Go back to your logline from page 12 and write it here:

  This is your reminder of why it is you are tired of feeling the way you feel and of living the way you live. Although you may have unhappy moments along the way, your goal is to move more toward happy (or content, or peaceful, or balanced—whatever word works for you).

  2. FOCUS ON THE POSSIBLE POSITIVE OUTCOMES

  Sometimes it’s hard to know what you will end up enjoying after you go through a life transition. Right now, take a moment to imagine what your life could be like several years after you have embarked upon your gender identity journey. Think about what sorts of positive changes have occurred. Let your mind wander through the possibilities of your new life.

  List at least five positive changes that you can see resulting from making this life transition.

  What you’ve written above gives you hope. And hope is one of the most powerful elixirs you can use against fear.

  3. EXPOSE YOURSELF TO MORE POSITIVE NARRATIVES

  Many of you use social media and more than likely read through the feed on your favorite platforms several times a day. More than likely you are friends with or follow people who are transgender, nonbinary, gender diverse, or questioning their gender identity. You may follow or subscribe to groups and organizations that share these kinds of stories and experiences.

  Next time you are perusing social media, pay attention to the type of messages, videos, and stories you are taking in. Let’s look closer at the first ten to twenty posts, tweets, pictures, messages, or videos that you see.

  How many of them leave you feeling better? Inspired? Motivated? Excited?

  How many of them leave you feeling worse? Worried? Defeated? Depressed?

  If your “worse” number is higher than your “better” number, then something needs to change. Go through and remove, hide, un-like, un-follow, or block the people and groups that you need to distance yourself from (even if it’s just temporarily) so you can increase the positive number of messages you are receiving and decrease the amount of the negative messages.

  Start keeping track of your social media exposure and what it is that makes you feel better and what makes you feel worse. Take this empowering step toward gaining control over the types of messages you are taking in on a daily basis.

  Be Kind to Yourself

  There’s a good chance you are unaware of how many negative messages related to gender and gender identity you’ve taken in over the years. These messages create self-loathing and shame, which fear hungrily feeds upon. Therefore, we need to minimize how much you might be working against yourself during your gender identity exploration. The following are ideas as to how you can do this by being kinder to yourself over the course of your journey.

  PUT YOUR SELF-CARE CHECKLIST TO WORK

  Find at least one activity a day to do for yourself from your checklist. You can certainly do more, as well as doing several at the same time. Continue to add ideas to the checklist as you discover what it is you enjoy in life, what brings you into balance, and what gives you comfort.

  If you didn’t receive an adequate amount of care during your childhood and/or didn’t have self-care modeled for you, this might be difficult to try and can feel initially uncomfortable. Take it slow and allow yourself to adjust to self-care becoming a regular part of your daily life. Your body and mind will eventually begin to ease into it, so keep at it until it becomes as natural to you as breathing.

  CUT DOWN ON EXCESSIVE ESCAPISM

  You may have noticed that you indulge too much and too often in certain activities on your Self-Care Checklist. These activities, if done in excess, can become distractions and escapes that inhibit forward motion.

  If reading that caused you to feel even a little uncomfortable, ask yourself, “Is this true for me?” Circle your answer below.

  YES

  MAYBE

  NO

  If you answered YES or MAYBE, then this is no easy step to take. These activities have provided you with comfort over the years, protecting you from whatever it is you have buried about yourself. However, these self-care activities crossed over at some point into an avoidance technique.

  What activities on your Self-Care Checklist do you think you might use for avoidance and/or excessive escapism?

  Let’s approach cutting back on avoidance and excessive escapism in your life step-by-step.

  Step 1: Cutting back a little at a time

  If you’re spending, on average, four hours a day playing online games, cut it down to three. If you watch Netflix twelve hours a week, cut it down to ten. If you’re on social media three hours a day, cut it down to two-and-a-half. During this downtime, you can:

  • Continue to work through more of this guide.

  • Explore whatever it is that this guide stirs up or inspires in you.

  • Journal about the challenges you encounter, what did and didn’t work, and how you are going to stay motivated to keep moving forward.

  • Do a different Self-Care Activity that you know is not excessively escapist.

  Continue to chip away at the amount of time you are in the excessive zone with any of the Self-Care Activities. You’ll know you’ve reached your sweet spot with these activities when you sense they are helping you recuperate, as opposed helping you avoid.

  What else could you do during the times when you are used to doing this activity?

  Step 2: Determining the right amount of time

  Next time you are over-indulging in one of your Self-Care Activities, listen for that little voice inside that says, “I should probably stop soon,” or, “Just one more episode/game/chapter.” Think of this voice as an alarm clock inside of you that has a snooze button. The little voice goes off—you hit the snooze. The little voice goes off again fifteen minutes later. “Time to stop,” the little voice says. This is when you should close down/shut it/walk away and find something else to do.

  At what point during your activity do you usually begin to hear this voice?

  Once you get into the habit of catching this voice when it comes up:

  • Set an actual timer for fifteen minutes, giving you time to wrap up your activity.

  • When the timer goes off, stop what you are doing. No matter what.

  • Have something else already planned for you to do when you stop.

  Step 3: Find other things to do

  The activity doesn’t matter as much as being sure to already have it planned. One trick is to make this something that you have to do at the time you are supposed to stop what you are doing:

  • Tell someone you’ll call them at the time you need to stop your activity.

  • Tell a family member or friend you will meet them somewhere/pick them up at a certain time.

  • Have a class, meeting, or gathering you are really motivated to go to.

  Turning to activities on your Self-Care Checklist that engage a completely different part of your min
d, changing up your environment, and awakening your other senses can also help to break these patterns of behavior. This can include physical activity, meditation, cooking or baking, listening to music, taking a shower, sitting in a park, etc.

  What activities can you schedule for yourself ahead of time so you can do them once you stop your excessively escapist activity?

  CREATE A NURTURER

  At the very heart of self-care is the ability to receive nurturing.

  What does the word “nurturing” bring up for you? What do you imagine, ideally, that the experience of nurturing would feel like to you?

  This answer will be different for everyone. Some people need warm, comforting, and gentle nurturing. Others need nurturing that is wise and mentor-like. Still others enjoy a more playful, enthusiastic, and empowering side of nurturing. There are even those who connect best with the tough love approach of nurturing.

  Your Nurturer can also work together with your Bodyguard as a team. The Nurturer can be there to help keep your Bodyguard calm, enabling you to be able to turn to both of them for advice, to complain about life, and lean on for support.

  Use the space below to create your very own Nurturer. If you want to picture an animal instead of a person, such as a lioness, or a mythical creature, then by all means do so. The only stipulation is they need to be someone or something that you can easily conjure up in your mind when you are in need of nurturing. Imagine them holding you, preparing you tea or a big lunch, listening to you, giving you advice, or making you laugh. The mind is powerful enough that, if you allow yourself to really sink into these experiences with your Nurturer, you will feel physically better afterwards: a reduction of your blood pressure, a slowing of your breathing, a calming of your mind.