Behold another installment of your heroine’s troubled, yet amusing, path.
When I wrote the first of these updates on my life and transition, I did so because I was feeling low that day. Common advice is that - by ticking over our achievements, no matter how small - we find a means to carry on. It worked the first time, and later installments in this series have been less…maudlin?
The past month, however, has been difficult. Further, I am typing this with a lingering migraine headache. Although the nausea and cold sweats have abated for now, I find myself in need of a pick-me-up.
In keeping with tradition:
I am Amethysta, and my friends call me Ame. Spend five minutes with me, and you will discover I love to make people laugh with a blend of intellectual stimulation and slapstick idiocy (just try to figure out which is which!) - in other words, I ham it up. And finally, I am typing this article off the top of my head instead of planning it at the outset - I’m jamming like a jazz performer.
To wit: Ame’s Hammy Jamming - April 2023 edition.
Another year down
Last month, I turned 53 - my first birthday with a new name and new life. Although I look phenomenal for my age (feel free to agree in the comments), I took 52 years to discover my life was never truly my own. There are 60 other articles here that discuss my gender dysphoria and subsequent gender transition, and I won’t summarize further.
Beginning about in January, however, I sensed an unfamiliar feeling: success and pride. My writing has begun to come to fruition. An unspoken goal of completing a theory of identity in parallel with my social gender transition has only minor outstanding threads to cut. The rest of my life is open to my choice…and my ambition.
I am accustomed to running into barriers in my professional career. My employers consistently appreciated my predilection to work myself to exhaustion, but the reward was never rapid advancement. Instead, I faced greater back pressure: while I was allowed to rise, I was forced to remain behind the boundaries set by nepotism and cronyism.
Unfortunately, I let the barriers define me. My low self-worth empowered my employers to keep me in line. As a writer and a thinker, however, the only barrier I face is my own self-worth.
In the past month, I began a course on creativity named “The Artist’s Way,” by Julia Cameron. I discovered my transgender experience in Cameron’s work. She speaks of allowing our inner artist to grow, to escape the confines of our proscribed expectations, and to give meaning to our existence. I simply substitute the word “woman” for “artist.”
Through the discomfort of realizing I am now my own worst barrier and the comfort afforded by the Artist’s Way tools, I have learned to care about myself and for myself.
Reading over the last paragraphs, I see I have not expressed eloquently the impact the realizations of the past month have had on my mental state.
I am frightened.
I am elated.
I have been reborn as Amethysta.
Putting myself out there
In a previous status update, I launched “The Amethysta Brand.” I began sharing myself in ways that force me to push past discomfort. Photographs, videos, podcasts, role-playing games - activities in which I either embrace everything about myself or stop completely out of embarrassment. It has been harrowing as well as exciting.
Starting in April, I began recording interviews for a podcast series titled “Why Are You?” - a series targeted at asking why a person’s identity is the way it is. The first episode should be released this coming week.
(See here for the post calling for interviewees.)
I admit, I began the first interview with no idea how to end it and only a single question. At the time of writing, I have conducted four interviews, with another planned. Despite the lack of preparation, it works. I’m very pleased with the results, and I hope you will listen to the first episode. I hope you find entertainment and food for thought.
I have another podcast in planning stages, although I do not want to jinx it by giving away too many details. I will say that I am teaming up with another transgender woman to take on current affairs, celebrate transgender victories, and postulate future change to society. We probably have enough ideas to fuel three podcasts - again, we will be limited by our ambition.
Finding my clan
Long ago (has it really only been six months?), I wrote two articles that related the “Warrior Cats” series to my transgender experience. The subsequent changes in my life demonstrate I am on the right path, that I found my clan.
That said, my thinking has also changed dramatically. I still believe the same fundamental concepts, although my focus has shifted. When I began writing, I believed it was important to explore the scientific background of transgender to help understand my own experience.
Now - after my own social transition, after hearing the experiences of many other transgender people, and after publishing my findings here - I reached a point of greater clarity. My message has smoothed out - the science is important…and the immediate response to social pressures is more important. I will explain my complete stance in the near future.
In summary, I choose positivity.
My actions have always been to prefer “making transgender normal” to speaking out. I believe strongly that being as mundane in society as possible is more effective to gain acceptance than legislation. Sarah H. wrote a similar viewpoint recently.
It is fair criticism to claim purple hair doesn’t exactly scream “mundane.” But I focus not on the external aspects of identity, but the internal. The past few months - and the last month in particular - have pushed me in ways I did not expect.
When I applied that first estrogen patch, it was not clear I embarked on a quest for freedom. I see now I sought freedom from my past, freedom from the constraints of society, and freedom for others to explore themselves. I sought freedom for all people to be exactly who they are.
That seems sufficient progress for the past month.
In keeping with tradition again, below is a recent photograph. Until next time, let freedom ring like the head of a dingbat!