These surveys are being conducted by Jamison Green, and I certainly don’t think I have to attest to his coolness, do I?
If you are a trans man who has been partnered to another trans man, you can take both.
Tag: partners
Trans Couples Talk
Posted by – May 2, 2009
This is the text of the talk I gave at the Liberty Conference on May 2nd, 2009:
How We Love You: Let Us Count the Ways
There are partners who are male, female, and trans; there are partners who met their trans person before the trans person knew what was going on; there are partners who married crossdressers who had sworn off crossdressing who purged and then dressed and then purged and then dressed again; there are partners who met their husbands crossdressed; there are partners who met their trans person during transition; there are partners who met their trans person long after transition; there are partners who didn’t know their trans person was trans when they met.
You, the individuals who are in love, were in love, who are seeking companionship and partnership and occasionally a good spanking, are said to be like snowflakes. Flawless Mother Sabrina told me that one night at the now defunct Ina’s Silver Swan, and she was right. Each of your stories is unique, even when there are similarities; each of you realizes your transness, as I like to call it, in a different way: some crossdress, others do drag, others transition. Some do all three, and others – none of these, but you express your genders in some other way. But you have your stories, your characters in movies, even if and when they are comically or tragically or unfairly drawn, but those you love have – well, we’ve got a machete and a spot on the edge of the wood we mean to get through.
NYC Air Scare
Posted by – April 28, 2009
Thank you, Brian Williams. The point he made tonight on Olbermann — that 9/11 was 10 minutes ago to the people who experienced it first-hand — is only too true. I have no doubt that tons of people are upping their anti-anxiety meds and having those awful apocalyptic nightmares again as a result of this stupidity.
I remember flying from Denver a few years ago & hearing a security officer ask a flyer about their anti-anxiety meds, wanting to know if they were because he was a nervous flyer. He answered something more along the lines, “No, I’m just from New York” and a moment later, in an aside to his wife, “We are all on anti-anxiety meds.”
Yeah. We are. I don’t expect ever to have the same feelings about fall that I did before 2001.
For Milwaukee
Posted by – April 22, 2009
We had a great time in Milwaukee this past weekend: a gathering of LGBT people on Saturday night, a sex workshop at The Tool Shed on Sunday, and then a workshop on gender variance Monday afternoon followed by a 7PM lecture about queer heterosexuals.
I did meet a bunch of people who asked me about various resources I mentioned in passing, so here goes:
- Our online community forums
- The Yahoo partners group I run/moderate
- Contact info for me & Betty
- a bunch of TV, video, & audio clips of us
- That How to Fuck in High Heels porn flick (via Babeland)
& I think that’s it. If I’ve failed to mention anything I said I would post to here, feel free to email me about it or remind me in the comments section.
Trans Equality & the Feds
Posted by – April 3, 2009
NCTE asks:
What would federal policy look like if transgender people were fully and fairly included? Over the past months and years, NCTE has compiled a list of 112 separate policies that directly impact the lives of transgender people and our families that need to be added, removed or changed. Our latest publication, “Transgender Equality and the Federal Government” outlines each of these issues. We expect that some of these policies can be changed in the short term, while others will require long term activism. Some of the issues here will be at the forefront of NCTE’s work in the coming year and in other areas, our partners in this work will be the ones to lead, with our support.
You can read that document online, or check out in .pdf format.
Another Reason to Crossdress
Posted by – March 7, 2009
It’s a good reason for lizards, anyway:
Young male lizards in South Africa imitate females to fool aggressive older males into leaving them alone, in an example of transvestism in the natural world, according to South African and Australian reaseachers. They found that young male Augrabies flat lizards (pictured) delayed
displaying the extravagent coloration of sexually-mature males until they were able to defend themselves adequately.
Of course in the natural world that means dressing down, as the males wear the bright colors and the females are something like dun.
Then again, Charlotte von Mahlsdorf seemed happy enough in her plain black house dresses.
Partners’ Resources
Posted by – February 1, 2009
One of the partners who posts regularly on our forums has put together a list of online resources for partners, which she’s posted on the TransOhio website.
How cool is that? When I first went online as the girlfriend of a “CD,” there was exactly one Yahoo group, which was actually an eGroup (anyone remember those?).
The only thing that still bugs me is how much the partners of MTFs and FTMs segregate. It’s another case where I feel we draw too much of our identites from our partners’ trans ones. I’ve learned so much from partners of FTMs, male or female, straight-identified and queer.
Tomorrow Our President
Posted by – January 19, 2009
I don’t think I can watch footage of Obama talking to young volunteeers without getting weepy. The teenaged girls especially crack me up, though, and I have to say I suspect I’d be just as goofy if I got to meet the man in person, too. The awe you can see in people’s eyes is so exciting.
Tomorrow I’m just going to cry through the inaugural, I just know it. We all expect it to kick ass, & I have no doubt it will. He’s walking around today like a man who’s got a good piece written.
It really is true that us Gen Xers finally understand the Kennedy thing the Boomers have been going on about our entire lives. We never had this kind of president before, someone who is really an inspiration, and young and strong and sexy, with a beautiful wife to boot.
Riddle Me This
Posted by – January 4, 2009
A slight altercation in the partners’ group got me thinking: what is the difference between (1) changing your expectations of what your partner is actually able to bring to the table and (2) simply lowering your standards?
Douglass
Posted by – December 26, 2008
One of the partners on our MHB boards mentioned recently that she’d never apply for an LGBT scholarship, because she doesn’t identify as LGBT, and it reminded me that I never told the story about me & the LGBT Blogger Initiative Conference I went to.
It seems I am perplexing to people, & I felt a little bit like an odd duck while I was there. It came up because at some point, someone announced that grants might become available for LGBT bloggers, and a few people told me that they hoped I would get one. But someone also mentioned that they could see others have an issue with the fact that I’m not LGB or T. My standard response these days is – “I’m the Q that gets left off a lot.”
But still it’s an issue that has come up, & may come up even moreso that I’m thinking about going back to grad school. Will I choose, like the partner above, not to apply for any LGBT scholarships? As a sort of liminal queer, probably I wouldn’t, except that then there’s the whole issue of what I do & what I’d want to study – which is all about the LGBT, and the T in particular.
The other question I was asked, which I’ve been asked before, is why? Why the trans community? & To be honest, I just don’t know. I was charmed by my very first meetings with trans people, & continue to have a deep love for the trans community & for trans people. Aside from my Debsian sense of social justice, that is.
Tim McFeeley did a wonderful “short history of the LGBT movement” (which I was pleased to note I knew cold!) as a workhop that Sunday morning, and he closed with a quote by Frederick Douglass:
When I ran away from slavery, it was for myself; when I advocated emancipation, it was for my people; but when I stood up for the rights of women, self was out of the question, and I found a little nobility in the act.
That’s my answer & I’m sticking to it.
To the Femmes
Posted by – December 24, 2008
As a little Christmas present to my lovely wife, and to all of you lovely femmes out there, I thought I’d post this lovely piece I found about a month ago & have been meaning to link to.
= and =
Does anyone else find it odd that Valkyrie comes out tomorrow? I mean, a movie about Hitler on the same day that all the Jewish folks go to the movies? Okay, it’s about killing Hitler, but still.
= and =
Merry Christmas Eve!
Holiday Angst
Posted by – December 16, 2008
There is something about the Christmas season that makes you think about life in sad ways.
I had a friend visiting not too long ago who had just heard that a friend of hers had decided to have a baby despite the fact that she didn’t have a husband. She kept repeating how sorry she felt for her, not to have had a husband and father, and all I could think was that she did have her child, who was healthy, and she had a good job to be a single parent – she’s a teacher – and that life comes with a lot of goddamn compromises.
I think about my lovely set of friends from high school and so many have had unfortunate surprises in their lives: babies born with serious medical conditions, boyfriends in near-fatal accidents, people who wanted children & didn’t have them (yet), people who didn’t and who did. There are so many ways things can go a little awry, or a lot awry, but I found myself feeling a little angry at the pity my friend was expressing, maybe because I’ve felt that kind of pity directed at me, although not from her, because I married someone trans.
So I’ve been thinking this winter about how to make room in my life for other people’s decisions in a way that really is fair to them. I’m tired of feeling like everyone’s a control freak, as if we all know better than others about what they need or should have. I’m not sure what the answer is but as we all get ready to see old friends and family I thought it might be something to think about.
Life is not easy, but it’s definitely that much harder when you can feel someone’s judgement on the back of your head.
Queer Christmas
Posted by – December 13, 2008
Oh boy! Queer Christmas TV! Rufus Wainwright making cookies with Martha Stewart and his own mother. A bunch of the rest of the family – like Martha and Anna McGarrigle – are in the audience, all of them wearing sweaters Kate McGarrigle made.
The McGarrigles were in town to perform The McGarrigle Christmas Hour at Carnegie Hall last night.
He mentions his boyfriend, losing his ski sweater in a disco in Paris, and opera – more than once. Way too cute.
Blogger Initiative
Posted by – December 9, 2008
As many of you know, I was at the LGBT Bloggers’ Initiative this past weekend, feeling simultaneously like the new kid on the block and the old whore. Many of my fellow bloggers – I realized during a presentation on media access by Cathy Renna – are bloggers, only. It never occurred to me that being a blogger who was a published book author first was weird, but there I was.
Nevermind that for now. I met a smattering of lovely people who are active in the LGBT blogosphere, some of whom I knew before and some who I didn’t: Dana of Mombian, a whole bunch of the folks at Bilerico, including Bil, Serena, Irene, and Alex; some of the Pam’s House Blend crew, including Pam herself and Autumn Sandeen. Among other I ran into were Allyson Robinson at the HRC cocktail party on Friday night, Mara Keisling of NCTE on Saturday afternoon (at the infamous Mayflower Hotel), as well as Tahlib Disney-Britton of Freedom to Marry, James from gayagenda.com, and Tobias Packer of Equality Florida.
Crossdressing Husband & Father on NPR
Posted by – November 30, 2008
Some things you just never expect. NPR recently did a show about a crossdressing husband & father that was about as off the mark as Dr. Phil usually is. Pathologizing, full of the embarassed & shamed comments by the wife and commentary of the narrator, it was rife with ignorance and misunderstanding, and seemed to equate this person’s other mental health issues with his need to crossdress.
Wow. I wish I were more often pleasantly suprrised by the media, but I really never expected this kind of crappy story-telling from NPR. Just one opinion that offset all the negativity would have been nice.
That the story is about someone who is deceased makes it all the more sickening. There is no one to represent Doug/Donna to explain what crossdressing is all about.
You can listen to it here – all of 12 minutes & nothing redeemable! – & narrated by a family “friend.” Feh.
Last OC Column, or That Was Quick
Posted by – November 24, 2008
Easy come, easy go: I got word last week that OurChart.com is no longer, or will soon be no longer, or will no longer be updated, or something like that. So no, I wasn’t fired; everyone was.
So here’s the last column I wrote for them. It went up today, as planned, but there will be no more to follow.
(If anyone knows of a magazine that needs a queer relationships columnist, you know where to find me!)
Review: She’s a Boy I Knew
Posted by – November 22, 2008
A friend of a friend in Lincoln, Nebraska got to see the documentary She’s a Boy I Knew which I’d heard good things about, so I asked her to write a review.
by Dr. Pat. Tetreault
She’s A Boy I Knew is a remarkably well-made film. It is honest, funny, poignant and real. Canadian Gwen Haworth narrates and directs the documentary about her life, her coming out process regarding her gender and sexuality, and how her transition to become the woman she is meant to be impacts her life as well as the lives of those she loves and who love her. Through the use of home videos and interviews with family members and friends, including her ex-wife, Gwen reveals the depth and range of emotion and the process involved in coming out and in transitioning. Brief animated segments are also included to lighten the film while providing background information. More
Letter To a Wife
Posted by – November 21, 2008
My friend Shirene, who I met while I was researching My Husband Betty, and at a SPICE conference to boot, has contined to work with wives who have just found out their husbands are crossdressers. She wrote this letter recently to one such wife, and I thought it was worth sharing here, for any husband who might want to use it to help come out to his wife, or for any wife who has just found out.
I don’t necessarily agree with how she simplifies certain issues – like the “crossdressers are heterosexual” meme – but a lot of the rest of it is a good “talking down” for a new wife who might be completely panicking.
Dear Jill,
Hi. I hope you don’t mind receiving a letter like this from a stranger, but my husband is transgender also and I know that if I could have received a letter such as this when I found out, it would have made it easier on both me and my husband. My name is Shirene, I’m 43, we live in S******, IL and I’ve known about Shayla since ‘98. We’re at 555 555 5555.
I will admit it’s somewhat of an adapted form letter so please ignore the things that don’t apply to your situation and please excuse the things I’m telling you that you already know. More
Dan Savage, Parent
Posted by – November 12, 2008
Dan Savage in the NYT on the Arkansas ruling prohibiting unmarried couples – not just gay and lesbian ones – from adopting or fostering children:
That state’s Proposed Initiative Act No. 1, approved by nearly 57 percent of voters last week, bans people who are “cohabitating outside a valid marriage†from serving as foster parents or adopting children. While the measure bans both gay and straight members of cohabitating couples as foster or adoptive parents, the Arkansas Family Council wrote it expressly to thwart “the gay agenda.†Right now, there are 3,700 other children across Arkansas in state custody; 1,000 of them are available for adoption. The overwhelming majority of these children have been abused, neglected or abandoned by their heterosexual parents.
Even before the law passed, the state estimated that it had only about a quarter of the foster parents it needed. Beginning on Jan. 1, a grandmother in Arkansas cohabitating with her opposite-sex partner because marrying might reduce their pension benefits is barred from taking in her own grandchild; a gay man living with his male partner cannot adopt his deceased sister’s children.
I really do wonder how even people who hate gay folks think this is justified.
(thanks to Tina for the link!)
Danish Girl’s Wife
Posted by – November 12, 2008
It turns out that Nicole Kidman will be playing Lili Elbe in the upcoming movie The Danish Girl. Her wife will be played by Charlize Theron.
Thoughts:
- The movie is based on the book The Danish Girl
.
- With Theron & Kidman playing them, this just seems like another excuse for “hot lesbian innuendo.”
- I’m also a little perturbed by the “play a transsexual / get an oscar” trend.
- Still, i’ve always expected the wife of a trans woman to be played by someone like Kathy Bates, & at her worst, too, so Charlize Theron isn’t so bad. Except that the book seems to imply her husband’s transsexuality was her own fault, and in the reviews of the book, it seems she comes off as a cheerleadery sort.
