I've spent a lot of time this last year chatting with my Mom. Her short term memory is shot, but her long term memory is better than ever. I think the thing I thunk about hiding "who" I was, where no one would ever know, really failed rather badly.

My Mom knew I was different. It broke her heart knowing how much I hurt without knowing exactly why. She says it wouldn't have made a difference to her, but agrees it would possibly have been fatal. When, many years later she saw me for the first time, she was delighted. My dad was embarrassed, and angry because he was embarrassed.

Together, My Mom and I talked about being different, and about being a girl. It was difficult. She wants to take the blame. I was taught from my earliest years how to cook, sew, clean, whatever you want to include. Like most kids, I complained about it, but I learned.

Still, my Mom and I talked to each other. From the time I was five or six I was the one person in the world who would always listen to her, and who was ALWAYS her friend. Yes, I was a child. Yes, it probably wasn't very fair - I knew things a child should never have learned about her parents. But she was always my best friend too.

With my Dad, I was always trying to be what he wanted. Most of the time I didn't succeed. I wrote the following in a story.

"She’s tried so hard to be the man she knew she could never be. She’s been like a caterpillar,
always knowing she was a butterfly, but always trying to be the best caterpillar she could be.
Thank God she finally worked up the courage to spin her cocoon.”

I don't think my Mom could have been so supportive in those repressed years of the sixties. I'm not sure it would have mattered a whole lot, she would never have been able to convince my Dad I was anything other than the "SON" he wanted for his first born child. No matter, I knew I'd never succeed, but had no choice but to try anyway. There was absolutely NO WAY I could succeed. So I continued to be the best moth I could be instead.

A recurring theme drilled into my skull from both of my parents was you don't judge someone because of what they are, you judge them for who they are. Both of my parent's modeled that, for the most part. Gender? No Way In HELL.

I wish I believed I wouldn't have been a massive disappointment to my Dad (and probably my Mom too) if he had known "who" I was. Instead, I'm pretty certain I would have been judged for "what" I was. A flaming sexual deviant - at least in my Dad's eyes. I have to remind myself all the time they didn't know any better.

Thanks for writing something that made me think.

they didn't know any better
they didn't know any better
they didn't know any better ...

sigh