---

 
 

CHAPTER 1. THE CONVENT

If you travel some 20 miles north on US highway 27 from the town of Richmond, Indiana, and look carefully to the right, you see a small turnoff almost hidden behind a clump of trees. An insignificant white sign nailed to one of the trees proclaims

CHS
Private Property
Not a thru road

If, nonetheless, you turn down that road, and drive another 500 feet or so, you come across a bigger sign with bold black letters on a yellow background

CHS
Private Property
Trespassers will be prosecuted
to the full extent of the law

You then drive through a denser line of trees and find yourself in front of a 15-foot high chain-link fence with a locked gate. The gate can be opened using a magnetic key card - if you are one of the fortunate few people who have one. A sign directs others to get out of their vehicles and approach a closed-circuit TV camera, bringing identification with them.

Dr. Catherine Gold (AUTHOR’S NOTE: Dr. Gold is a gender psychologist, who was introduced in my story “The Doctor, II”. She has appeared in several other stories as well.) alit from her rental car and duly placed her driver’s license on the scanner next to the camera, along with a letter of invitation to a meeting at CHS. After several moments of whispered conversation which Dr. Gold could not follow, the gate swung open and she was directed to continue on to the main cluster of buildings, where a guide would wait for her.

Dr. Gold drove on for about five miles of forest. It was very beautiful in the full colors of the Indiana fall, and she even spied several deer among the trees. Then she descended into a valley, in the middle of which stood what appeared to be a large medieval monastery, built in true gothic style. It was, in fact, based on the plans of the Espirito Santo convent at Olmedo, Spain, founded by the Cistercian Sisters in 1142. A more welcoming sign proclaimed its name in full

Convent of the Holy Spirit

Welcome to those who come in peace

As Dr. Gold parked in the lot next to the entrance, a gray-clad nun came forward to greet her. “Welcome to the Convent of the Holy Spirit, Dr. Gold” she said smiling. “I am Sister Serena. The Mother Superior asked me to welcome you. She, unfortunately, will be very busy for the next half hour and asked me to give you a short introduction to our order while you are waiting. It is such a beautiful day today, let us sit here in the garden.”

Sister Serena directed Dr. Gold to a seat in a lovely courtyard garden, and began her story.

“I should begin by emphasizing two points which, I am sure, you already know. The first is that, contrary to first appearances, we are not affiliated in any way with the Catholic Church, or for that matter, with any other religious organization. While we have chosen to live according to the rule of the Cistercian Sisters, which dates back to 1125, we do not require any form of religious belief from those who live here. I am sure you noticed the most salient “missing detail” from the design of these buildings, namely that there is no cross over the entrance to the convent nor, for that matter, anywhere else except in the cells of those of the nuns who want it.

The second point, which of course is one of the reasons you are here, is that all of the sisters of this convent - including me - are biologically male. We have chosen to live our lives as cloistered nuns for a number of reasons, as I will explain.

This convent was founded forty years ago by our first Mother Superior, Sister Beatrice. What her “male” name was before that is unimportant. Suffice it to say that she began her life of frustration hidden in a male body by applying her energies and talents - as many do - to making money. In fact, she was very good at that and by the time she was 40 she was worth several hundreds of millions of dollars. However, she looked at her life with disgust. She had always felt that she was a woman and having to live her life as a purported male disgusted her. What made it worse was that no amount of makeup or surgery could make her look even remotely like an attractive female. In appearance, she resembled a cross between the old-time actors Robert Morley and Edward G. Robinson.

She therefore had the idea of founding a “convent” in which she could live a female, albeit cloistered, life away from the eyes of others. During the times when she had tried joining various support groups for crossdressers and transsexuals, she had come across others with a similar problem. Their gross male appearance belied every attempt to exhibit the feminine selves they so longed to bring out into the open. With a few friends, she therefore established and endowed the CHS Foundation, which purchased this land - very extensive by the way - and built this convent far away from prying eyes. She and her friends then shut themselves in here and tried to live the life of pious cloistered women.

Sister Beatrice tried to reach out to established churches - she, herself, had been born and raised a Catholic - but, as one can expect, was rejected. Indeed, the Catholic Church even filed a suit against the use of the name “Convent of the Holy Spirit” on the grounds that they had proprietary rights to that and similar names. Fortunately, Judge Judith Goldblatt in Indianapolis dismissed their suit. She ruled that since the term “holy spirit” (or “spiritus sanctus” in Latin) is merely a translation of the Hebrew “ruach hakodesh” which is an integral part of the Jewish religion, the Catholic Church itself appropriated it from an older religion without permission and therefore could hardly now claim any proprietary rights to it. Moreover, convents and monasteries can be found not only in a Catholic context but also in several other religions - including non-Christian religions - the Catholic Church had no special rights with regards to that. In any case, the word “convent” simply means “assembly” in Latin, and was often used in nonreligious contexts. Indeed, in some medieval societies a “convent” was merely an administrative subdivision of a province (“conventus districtus”).

Still, we are very careful to emphasize to everyone that we are not associated with the Catholic Church or with any other organized religion, just so that there is no misunderstanding. Each sister in our convent is free to worship God in her own way, or not do so at all. We provide several chapels which are used by various groups of nuns. Every Sunday, all of the nuns meet in conclave and we discuss the spiritual aspects of our unique lives. Quite frankly, little by little we are evolving our own theology here, which tries to understand and explain how people like us have come into being and what part we play in the scheme of the world. I am sure you will be interested in hearing more about that from the Mother Superior, when you meet with her.

The convent was built by the CHS Foundation, which has funds prudently invested and is able to maintain us in reasonable comfort. Other income comes from the sale various arts and crafts done by those of the sisters who are so inclined. I am sure you have seen the wonderful large tapestry sewn in the medieval manner but with a very modern content which hangs at the Chicago Art Institute. The artist is listed as “Sister Helene of the Holy Spirit” and I am sure that the curators would be shocked to know that Sister Helene, whose needlework is so delicate and so beautiful, was a star linebacker for the Bears for several years before she joined us. They would be similarly shocked to find out that the “Holy Spirit Marmalades” for which they pay a very high price at premium gourmet shops are prepared by a former bodyguard to a Las Vegas mafia chief and a former captain in the Green Berets, who lost a leg in Afghanistan.

These, and our other sisters, are all here because they know that they could never appear in public as women - with all of the plastic surgery available and all of the cosmetics to choose from - they are just not “passable” by any definition. Some of them have the added burden of having been public figures who would be recognized instantly, no matter how much they tried to live in obscurity. Here, on the other hand, they feel safe and secure cloistered in their own world. They do not have to worry about people pointing fingers or snickering behind their backs.”

Dr. Gold interrupted the story at this point and asked if she could eventually meet with some of these sisters, but Sister Serena said that that would be contrary to the rules of the order. According to the rules, only the Mother Superior, her assistant (i.e. Sister Serena) and the Sister Victualer (who was in charge of purchasing food and other supplies needed by the convent) could meet with people from the outside. “Three of our sisters are doctors, including one who was a head of surgery at Mass. General Hospital, so we rarely even need to bring in outside medical consultants. We do so only when our in-house physicians recommend it.”

“Well,” said Dr. Gold, “your Mother Superior invited me to come here; maybe this is one of those special cases.” “Maybe,” replied Sister Serena. “I do not know what she wants to talk to you about.”

CHAPTER 2. THE MOTHER SUPERIOR

Sister Serena looked at her watch and then rose to escort Dr. Gold to the office of the Mother Superior of the convent. On the way, she explained that the current Mother Superior, Sister Mary-Hope, was only the third person to serve in that position since the convent was founded; she was elected by the membership after the death of her predecessor seven years ago. As they were introduced, Dr. Gold noticed something familiar about the tall distinguished-looking nun, but it took a few moments for her to “click” and recognize the nun standing before her as a famous and often-photographed former governor of an important New England state and (unsuccessful) candidate for Vice President of the US, who had disappeared from public view some 15 years earlier. Certainly such a person, she mused, would have a very difficult time indeed transitioning into an ordinary and anonymous female life.

Sister Mary-Hope escorted Dr. Gold to a corner of her large office, which was furnished with a pair of comfortable armchairs and a low table, on which there were already placed a pair of cups and two urns - one with tea and one with coffee. After she poured Dr. Gold’s beverage and sat down, and after the usual 10-15 minutes of small talk, she got to the point.

“I am very glad, Dr. Gold, that you accepted my invitation to come here. I am sure Sister Serena did her usual thorough job of explaining the origins of our community. Over the years, we have grown quite a bit from Sister Beatrice’s original dream. We now number over 130 nuns, and have a waiting list of several dozen more applicants, for whom we simply do not have sufficient space to accomodate. From this I deduce that we are still fulfilling an important need in the transsexual community. However, we are also fully aware that society and its relationship to transsexuals are changing rapidly. Things are not as they were in Sister Beatrice’s time, nor even as they were when I first joined this convent less than two decades ago. In order to keep up with these changes and to insure that we remain relevant for future generations, we have decided on the unprecedented step of asking a series of experts to come before us and present their views on how transsexuals are viewed today and what is likely to be their course in the future.

As you were surely told, our rule forbids all but a few select sisters from meeting with persons from the outside. This is as the sisters wish, since many of them are rather ashamed of their looks and some are afraid of having their former male identities recognized. I am not the only person in this convent who was famous - or notorious - in her previous life. However, I have reinterpreted that rule to allow the members of our community to listen as a group to a lecturer from the outside, and to interact with the lecturer through a question-and-answer period after the talk. I am afraid that I cannot allow for individual face-to-face discussions between the lecturer and sisters of this house. I hope that, under these limitations, you would agree to be the first of our speakers.

Dr. Gold thought about this for a few moments. As a scientist, she was of course used to giving talks both before her professional peers and before more general groups. However, as a clinical psychologist her main interest was in conversations with individuals. For her, the limitations which Sister Mary-Hope imposed were very stringent indeed.

“Much as I find the idea of talking to your sisters fascinating, I am afraid I am going to have to decline,” she finally said. “I have always felt that the individual give-and-take after a lecture is - for me - the most important and rewarding part, the one which justifies the long hours preparing the talk. Without an opportunity for such give-and-take, why I might just as well send you a DVD with my talk recorded on it.”

“That is a shame,” said Sister Mary-Hope, “but I cannot bend the rule any further than I have already done.”

“Well,” said Dr. Gold, “I suppose it depends on the definition of the word `meet’. What if, instead of meeting sisters in person, you allowed them to contact me by e-mail or through a closed internet chat session. That way, I will not see them in person nor be able to guess their former identities. I see that you have a computer on your desk and I imagine that you are connected to the internet.”

“That is an interesting idea,” said Sister Mary-Hope. “I will need to consult with the other sisters, and see if it is agreeable with them.”

“Then I will await your decision,” said Dr. Gold, as she rose from her seat. “It has been very interesting to meet you, and I hope that some modus vivendi will be able to be worked out so that I can communicate with some of your sisters as well.”

Sister Mary-Hope rose too, and led her to the door, on the other side of which Sister Serena was waiting to escort her back to her car. As Dr. Gold drove away, she looked at the idyllic setting of the convent. It was a very interesting idea, but she somehow felt that it was a way of evading problems rather than confronting them. To her, transitioning meant living in society, not withdrawing from it. Still, she looked forward to hearing from Sister Mary-Hope again, and was sure that she would be back.

 

To Be Continued...

---

 

---

 
 

NOTE: You have to read the first part of this story to understand what is going on here.

 
 

Dr. Gold thought long and hard about the Convent of the Holy Spirit and their approach the problem of passing. The more she thought about it, the more she disagreed with it. In fact, she was so upset that when the Mother Superior wrote to her and told her that her compromise solution was declined by the sisters, she wrote back that she was very sorry that that was their decision, but that she had chosen to accept their invitation to give a talk in any case, if she was still wanted. She felt that she had some things to say which she felt they should hear.

Sister Mary-Hope wrote back that she was very grateful for that decision, and suggested a date three weeks away. Dr. Gold accepted. She requested that arrangements could be made for a screen behind her, so that she could project images from her laptop computer while she talked. Sister Serena sent her a message that there would be no problem - a screen and a projector which could connect to her computer would be provided.

When Dr. Gold arrived at the Convent of the Holy Spirit on the appointed day, she was greeted again by Sister Serena, who assured her that all of the technical arrangements had been duly made. She escorted Dr. Gold into a large room, in which a dais had been set up for the speaker and chairs had been arranged in front of it for the audience. Three of the walls of the room had large stained-glass windows which gave it an ecclesiastic look, despite the fact that the images in them were not religious. Light streamed in through the colored glass, giving the room a bright and airy feel. However, Dr. Gold immediately noted that, because she would be facing the windows when she gave her talk, she would not be able to discern the faces of individuals in the audience clearly. She was sure that this was not accidental, and was rather miffed by it. She was being put in a box, and she did not at all like that. The fourth wall, which was to Dr. Gold’s rear, was covered by a large screen which had been lowered from above; the room was also used for showing films, as it turned out.

While Dr. Gold set up her computer and connected it to the projector provided for her, the audience filed in with the usual murmurs and shuffling. Sister Mary-Hope stepped up to the dais and motioned to Dr. Gold to sit in one of the chairs on the dais. She, herself, approached the lectern set up at the corner of the dais.

In her introductory remarks, Sister Mary-Hope briefly reviewed the thoughts which led to the current precedent-breaking series of lectures by outside speakers. She hoped that they would stimulate discussion within the convent community. She then spoke briefly of Dr. Gold’s credentials as one of the world’s foremost clinical psychologists specializing in gender problems, emphasizing that Dr. Gold herself is a post-op transsexual who chose to be very open to her colleagues about and during her transition and who then continued in her same profession. She was sure that this first talk would provide the appropriate stimulation. She apologized for the fact that she, herself, could not stay for the talk because of urgent convent business which had to be taken care of.

Dr. Gold was even more irritated at what she took to be a deliberate snub on the part of Sister Mary-Hope. What possible convent business was so urgent that it had to be dealt with on a Sunday morning? Nonetheless, she tried to maintain a calm visage as she approached the lectern.

As usual, Dr. Gold began her talk by thanking her hosts for the invitation and the interest in her work. Since she was a psychologist, she would not talk about the physiological aspects of sexual reassignment surgery and the many advances which, over the past generation, have turned what was once considered an extremely difficult and risky operation into a procedure which was almost routine. If, during the 1960’s and 1970’s, only a handful of premier surgeons were willing to attempt it, SRS is now considered part of the basic toolkit of any successful plastic surgeon.

Along with this, she pointed out, went further advances in such areas as facial feminization surgery, safe methods for reduction of bone mass and muscle mass, vocal-chord tightening, hormone replacement, as well as other techniques which would make the post-operative patient feel a more complete woman. (Here she flashed several “before and after” pictures on the screen to make her point, eliciting several “oohs” and “ahs” from the audience.)

Unfortunately, Dr. Gold said, these advances in physical medicine had led to considerable problems from the point of view of a clinical psychologist. Because of the relative availability of SRS surgery, often at the hands of doctors who are not specialists in the area of gender, there has been a considerable retreat from the protocol established in the early days by Dr. Harry Benjamin to insure that the patient is indeed ready for what is going to happen. The required year of Real Life Experience before surgery has, for the most part, been shortened and sometimes abandoned altogether. Comprehensive psychological testing and counseling has too often been replaced by a short interview or two between the surgeon (who was not necessarily a gender expert and who, of course, was interested in the handsome income from each SRS operation) and the patient. There was always the latent threat of “if you will not perform this surgery, I will just hop a plane to Thailand or the Philippines or the Dominican Republic and have it done there.” The result is a sharp increase in the number of post-ops who are not ready for the life they now have to lead, not prepared for their future, and not able to cope with it. They all too often end up in a crisis mode which leads either to fervent (and futile) requests to “undo” their operation or to clinical depression and even suicide.

An increasing, and even more dangerous, phenomenon is the lowering of the age at which SRS is performed. There have been recorded cases of SRS being performed in Europe on children as young as 12, and most likely unrecorded cases of even younger children. At this age, of course, the child’s gender identity is certainly not developed enough for him or her to make any sort of rational decision, and so the operation is inevitably a wish-fulfillment on the part of the parents or guardian (“we always wanted a daughter …” or “he was just too beautiful to be a boy …”) with the child as an unwitting guinea-pig. Again, the doctors were faced with the latent or blatant threat that if they do not agree to perform the operation, the parents would just take the child to a clinic in some third-world country where questions are not asked and fees are paid up front and in cash.

What happens when the child matures and the consequences of this operation suddenly overwhelm her, was not the surgeon’s concern. (Here Dr. Gold quoted the famous lines from one of Tom Lehrer’s satirical songs: “ ’I make the rockets go up, but where they come down / Is not my department’, said Werner von Braun.”) Informal communication between psychologists indicates that the results of such early SRS operations are more often than not disastrous. What is becoming very clear is that the controls on operations performed on minors, if they exist at all, are highly inadequate.

People have lost track, she concluded, of the fact that should be obvious - removing one’s penis is not the same as removing one’s appendix. It involves definite far-reaching psychological ramifications which have to be dealt with first, before the irrevocable surgery is even attempted.

From her own experience as chief resident psychologist at the clinic of the noted gender surgeon Dr. Jayne Mautner, Dr. Gold could say that over forty percent of the applicants for SRS are rejected on the grounds of psychological incompatibility or unreadiness. In many cases, the patients are referred back to gender counselors for further preparation, before Dr. Gold will agree to look at them again. Some, unfortunately, are felt to just be there for the wrong reason - and are told so. The fact that someone has not been able to make it in the world as a male does not mean that he is going to make it as a female, no matter what his fantasies are. The root of his problem is somewhere else, not in his gender.

“This,” Dr. Gold remarked, “leads me to the notion of ‘passing’, and I would like to take some time to dwell on it. The notion did not begin with transsexuals, and has a long history. Members of marginal groups in society often try to alter their perceived identities in order to fit in with the majority. Thus, immigrants to the United States would often change their surnames (as my own great-grandfather did when he came to America and changed his name from ‘Goldstein’ to ‘Gold’ so that it would be easier for him to find a job as a mathematics teacher), have plastic surgery on their noses or ears, jettison the cultural traditions and religion of their forefathers, take expensive lessons to mask their foreign accents and mannerisms, all in order to fit in with, what was then, the dominant Anglo-Saxon majority.

The most noted case of passing, and the source of the term (immigrants usually talked in terms of ‘assimilation’ rather than ‘passing’), had to do with Afro-Americans. Until very recently, white skin color was essentially a necessary condition for success in mainstream society. Therefore, light-skinned Afro-Americans would further bleach their skins, straighten their hair, operate on their faces if necessary, and then move to a new location, passing themselves off as whites. This was usually a process which was very psychologically painful since it inevitably entailed cutting themselves off from their families and often choosing not to bring children into the world, lest some errant recessive gene produce a black baby.

If one reads the fiction and nonfiction written by and for Afro-Americans during the early decades of the 20th century, one finds that the theme of passing plays an important part, and is considered at great length. A plethora of ads for skin bleach, hair straightening creams, and even cosmetic surgery could be found in all magazines aimed at the Afro-American community well into the 1960’s.

Stories of successful passing (including rumors that senator So-and-So, Hollywood celebrity Such-and-Such, or Wall Street tycoon You-Know-Who are really homeboys, one generation removed from the cotton fields, who successfully passed) were continually repeated and embellished. In fact, the pros and cons of passing seemed almost an obsession among various layers of Afro-American society at the time.

Thus, passing provided an escape hatch for a few Afro-Americans to make it in the mainstream of society, but only for a few. Those who were too obviously black or obviously negroid in their features could not pass, and they knew it. So for them, this escape hatch was unreachable. What was the alternative? For some, the alternative was to close in: if the predominant society did not want them, then they will just go off and live by themselves. (A slight murmuring in the audience indicated to Dr. Gold that her point had been made.) This led to various movements, the most extreme of which were a variety of “back to Africa” movements. Fortunately, there was also another approach, namely a concerted effort to alter the definition of what constituted success in the mainstream of society by excluding color or race as a factor. After many generations of hard struggle, this is finally reaching its culmination. If we see many Afro-Americans reach high positions in society now, including the presidency of the United States, it is not because they have learned to pass as whites but because skin color is no longer considered as a relevant criterion for advancing within the mainstream. There is no longer any overwhelming need to pass.”

“Now,” said Dr. Gold after taking a drink of water, “let us talk about women and about transsexuals. Beauty has always been a criterion for a woman to advance in society, any society. Beautiful women automatically get the social breaks, and respect, which other women have to work for. Transsexual women, no less than genetic women, are faced with the dilemma of having to meet this criterion.

We all dream of being accepted not just women but as beautiful women. At the very beginning of the transition process, when we think about how it would end, we all fantasize ourselves as looking something like this (and here Dr. Gold showed several pictures of fashion models and playmates of the month). Most stories posted on the internet and aimed at the transgendered community are based on the premise that an “ordinary guy” dresses (or is forced to dress) as a woman for the first time and finds that he is not only passable but in fact stunningly beautiful.

This is not surprising or even unexpected. Most ten-year-old genetic girls also see themselves in their fantasies as blossoming out into a raving beauty. The vast majority of them won’t, of course, and neither will the vast majority of transsexuals. True physical beauty is prized, inter alia, because it is a rare phenomenon.

A much larger number of women, but still a definite minority of the whole, will turn out to be sufficiently attractive so that, with the aid of cosmetics or cosmetic surgery, diets, exercise, and continual effort, they can become reasonable facsimiles of the above, at least enough to pass as beautiful women for a few years of their lives. Consider these as being the analogs of the light-skinned Afro-Americans who could, with considerable effort, reach a stage where they could pass as whites.

What about the rest? It is an unfortunate fact of life that most genetic women, and most post-op transsexuals, are not all that beautiful by contemporary social standards. They are just ordinary. With appropriate cosmetics, skin care, dieting, etc. they can get by as being fairly good-looking, and most likely even attract a man (though he will probably be no movie star either). Just go to any supermarket at 10am on a weekday and see the housewives - all married - with their hair in curlers and without makeup, to see what reality is like. These women would never be considered as beautiful women, but they manage to live as women without doubting themselves. Most transsexuals will eventually find themselves in this group and adjust their expectations accordingly.

And then, finally, there are those women who are, to call a dog a dog, just plain ugly. They may be big and rawboned; they may have a lantern jaw or a beaked nose; they may be too fat or too scrawny. In any case, they are not ‘passable’ under even the most liberal definitions of beauty. Genetic women who fall in this category have really no recourse but to rue their fate and try to make the best of it. Transsexuals tend to rue theirs even more, and blame God or whomever for trapping them in an ‘unpassable’ male body.

What should they do? They could hide themselves from society, choosing to live in solitude so as to avoid the scorn and pity of others. (Again, there was definite murmuring in the audience, as well as a spate of coughing.) Or they could live with it, somehow.

And then there is another strategy, the same as that of the Afro-Americans: work to remove physical beauty as a criterion for female achievement and acceptance in society. Now the admiration of physical beauty is not going to go away, of course, but one can and should take the stand that women (genetic or transsexual) who are not blessed with a beautiful body nonetheless are equal members of society and deserve the same chances and respect as all other women.

This has always been possible to some extent, if one has some other irons in the fire. Samuel Butler, in his novel The Way of all Flesh which attacked the hypocrisy of Victorian society, maintained that in order to get a man, a girl had to decide which of three criteria she was going to meet: she had to be either beautiful or intelligent or talented. Otherwise there was no hope for her. Certainly, intelligent or talented women have often managed to make their mark even if they lacked physical beauty. (Here Dr. Gold showed images of famed Russian/American mathematician Olga Tausky-Todd, Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir, American ambassador to the United Nations Jeanne Kirkpatrick, and former U. S. Attorney General Janet Reno.) These women lived and advanced in society and what a shame it would have been had they decided to retreat to a convent because they thought they were not beautiful enough to be ‘passable’ according to the criteria of their day.

The problem, of course, is to insure as well that those women who are neither beautiful nor particularly intelligent nor particularly talented still get their fair chance to live their lives to the furthest extent.”

Here Dr. Gold again took a sip of water and let her point sink in.

“The important thing to realize is that this is not so much a problem of transsexuals as it is a problem of all women. Actually, I suppose that I should say that is a problem of all humans since men, too, who are far from the norms of male beauty also have their problems - but that is a different issue that it is best not to let this sidetrack us at the moment.

In short, we have a problem that transsexual women, perhaps in disproportionate numbers, tend to fall into a category that is hampered in its enjoyment of its rightful share of the social pie because of certain physical criteria. People tend to look down on a woman with a deep voice or a lantern jaw. That is true whether her vagina was there when she was born or was created by a skilled surgeon. There is nothing we can do about physical attraction, but we can insist that it not be a reason for denying anyone her place in society.

In this connection, I would also like to mention one other group of people whose lot is perhaps even worse than ours, namely the physically handicapped. If you think that you are shunned or scorned because of the tone of your voice or the size of your body, consider what it must be like for those who are missing limbs, or whose faces and bodies are severely disfigured. How many of them would like to retreat to a safe haven where they are not seen by society? Leprosaria served two functions - to keep lepers out of the public eye so people didn’t have to look at them and to protect the lepers themselves from social scorn (contrary to what many people think, leprosy is not particularly contagious).

Some physically handicapped managed to be quite successful in insuring that their bodies do not limit them in their advancement in the world. President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, though confined to a wheel chair for a good part of his life, managed to ‘pass’ because he was able to manipulate the media so that he was never photographed sitting in it. Christian Herter, Secretary of State at the end of the Eisenhower administration, walked with leg braces and crutches but also made sure that these never appeared in official photographs. But the physically handicapped no longer feel the need to do this and the Americans with Disabilities Act insures that they are not barred from social advancement because of being disabled. “

Here Dr. Gold stopped for a moment and took another sip of water.

“If I had a chance to talk to a post-op transsexual who now feels that she cannot live in society because of her physical appearance, my immediate question would be to ask her why she did not anticipate this before she had her operation. Did she really believe that changing her genitals would also change her physical stature or the timbre of her voice? The answer I would surely get is that the need to live externally like the woman she knew she is internally was so great, that it overwhelmed all other considerations. Fine, but those problems are still there. Why didn’t you think ahead of time of the strategy you were going to going to adopt to confront them or adapt to the limitations imposed by them? As I said at the beginning of my talk, there are great advances in medical techniques which would help make a post-op transsexual fit in better with the social norms, but they are expensive and sometimes hazardous. Of course, one can take a ‘damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead!’ approach - in which case one can hardly cry afterwards about the torpedoes being in the water. A much more fruitful approach would have been to sit down with a gender counselor and gameplan strategies for dealing with the most likely situations which will arrive after one starts living fulltime as a woman. The year of Real-Life Experience which Dr. Benjamin insisted on was intended to aid in doing just that. Once you realistically face problems you are likely to encounter, you can undoubtedly overcome them or learn to live with them.”

At this point Dr. Gold unplugged her computer from the projector and closed it. “I had hoped to talk individually with some of you, but Sister Mary-Hope made it clear that that would be against your rule. Even a compromise solution of communicating anonymously by email or a closed secure private chat room was ruled out. Under these circumstances, I think that questions from the audience would also be a waste of time, and so I prefer not to answer any. I thank you for your patience in listening to my views, which I realize went against the grain of the beliefs on which this convent was established. But I understand that this series of talks was intended to provoke an internal dialog among your community, and I hope that I have done that.”

With that, Dr. Gold strode off of the dais and out of the room, not waiting for Sister Serena to accompany her. She made her way back to her car and left the CHS, hoping that, if she ever saw it again, it would be a very different place.

 

To Be Continued...

---

 

---

 
 

NOTE: You have to read the first two parts of this story to understand what is going on here.

 
 

Dr. Gold did not expect to hear any reaction to her talk at the Convent of the Holy Spirit, except possibly from the sisters themselves. The convent was, after all, cut off from the rest of the world. She was therefore very surprised when her boss, Dr. Jayne Mautner, brought up the topic one day, while the two were eating lunch together, as they did every day, at their favorite restaurant.

“I hear that you created quite a stir at the CHS, Catherine” said Dr. Mautner. “Yes I did,” responded Dr. Gold, “but how did you know about it?” “Oh,” replied Dr. Mautner smiling, “I have my spies everywhere.”

She then went on to explain that, several years before, one of the sisters at the Convent of the Holy Spirit had actually filed a lawsuit against the surgeon who had operated on her, claiming that he turned her into a “freak”, who could no longer function in society. Dr. Mautner had been requested by the defense to serve as an expert witness. She had asked the doctor what happened, and he explained that the patient had adamantly refused all psychological counseling or any preparatory sessions with a gender specialist, and had insisted on an immediate operation.

“I told him he was a damned fool for operating under those circumstances,” she said, “and he agreed. But at the time he was caught up in a very messy divorce situation and - quite frankly - he needed the money. In any case, he was smart enough to have videotaped his meetings with the patient in which he repeatedly stressed the importance of psychological counseling in the strongest terms, and he made her sign a disclaimer saying that she had heard and understood his advice on the subject and, of her own free will, rejected it. The document specifically absolved him of all responsibilities for anything that would befall her as a result of her failure to heed his advice. He won the case, by the way.”

Dr. Mautner had insisted on physically examining the plaintiff sister involved, and the Mother Superior at the time refused, citing the order’s rules. However, Dr. Mautner was able to obtain a court order to force the issue, and so was let into the convent for that purpose and that purpose only. The Mother Superior insisted, as a condition, that one of the other sisters be present at all times during the examination.

“It turned out, quite fortuitously, that the nun she picked was in fact a former patient of mine, who was using the name Sister Serena.” “I met her there,” said Dr. Gold, “but I don’t recall her being a patient in our clinic.”

“It was during the year you were on sabbatical,” said Dr. Mautner. “Dr. Hardy, who replaced you while you were away, treated her. I will tell you her real name, and you can look up the file when we get back to the office, if you wish. Her story is a very sad one, I am afraid.”

Dr. Mautner went on to relate how Sister Serena had actually had a fairly good transition. She was no raving beauty, but was accepted as a woman by others in her surroundings and found a reasonable job as a copywriter for a local advertising agency, which fit her abilities. She seemed to be on the way to a rather humdrum but otherwise normal life. “And then,” said Dr. Mautner, “she fell in love with one of the men in her office. I mean really head-over-heels in love. All was well at first, but then the guy found out that she was a post-op transsexual and started to emotionally abuse her in the worst possible way. Within a few months, she had lost all confidence in herself and, literally, refused to leave her apartment because she was convinced the whole world was making fun of her. By the time I found out what had happened to her, and offered my help, she was already involved with the CHS people, and soon afterwards moved into the convent.”

“She is number-two honcho there now,” said Dr. Gold, “so it has apparently helped her.”

“That is not quite true,” said Dr. Mautner. “She was appointed to the position she holds because she is very articulate and makes a nice impression on outsiders. But she really has very little power. The Mother Superior, Sister Mary-Hope, is as manipulative, scheming, and power-hungry a person as she was when she was a national political figure. Some things even surgery cannot change. In fact, it is because of her feelings of ambiguity to the whole convent that Sister Serena contacted me again a few years ago.”

“She contacted you? That must have been very difficult. I gathered that the only telephone and computer link in the entire convent are in Sister Mary-Hope’s office.”

“That is probably true. However, Sister Serena sometimes had to leave the convent to take care of outside business. One time she had to go to Indianapolis to appear before some subcommittee of the legislature that - under pressure from the Catholic church - decided to investigate the CHS, yet again. (As usual, her appearance was extremely effective and the idea of an investigation was dropped.) She called me from there and spilled out her doubts and fears. We finally ended up conspiring together to bend the convent rule, if not actually break it.”

“What did you do?”

“I opened a cellular-phone account in my name, and gave her the phone. She smuggled it back into the convent in her habit. Since that day, she calls and texts me quite regularly. That is how I know all about what happened at your talk. You apparently opened a whole can of worms there, and the sisters talk about it constantly. They definitely find your ideas intriguing, though controversial.”

“Well, I suppose that Sister Mary-Hope can only blame herself, since she was the one who initiated the idea of outside speakers.”

“Is that what she told you? She really is a manipulative bitch! The idea actually came from several of the other nuns, and Sister Mary-Hope fought it with all of her power, but lost in a showdown at one of the weekly conclaves. I suppose that every politician uses the same trick - if you cannot stop something from happening, you co-opt it and take all the credit for it. By the way, I was the one who suggested, through Sister Serena, that you be the first speaker. I figured that you are blunt enough to stir the waters, as you surely did.”

“Well, the whole idea of that convent really ticked me off,” said Dr. Gold. “It is against everything I stand for. Separating oneself from society is never the answer.”

“Are you sure?” replied Dr. Mautner. “I thought so too at the beginning, but Sister Serena convinced me that I might be wrong. I know that the current belief among professionals is that one should not institutionalize social misfits but try to alter the norms of society to allow them to live lives as productive and normative as they can within the social milieu, and I know you believe in that strongly. But does that work all of the time? Consider the mentally weak and the nonviolent mentally ill. A generation ago, they were released en masse from institutions and asylums and set adrift in the ‘normal’ world, into which they were somehow to be integrated. Of course, they were supposed to be under constant supervision and care of counselors and doctors, but as we know there is never enough money available for adequate supervision. Many of them made it - more or less -- but a good number did not, and just drifted under the social radar and into the ranks of the homeless. Is living out of a shopping cart and sleeping in a cardboard box behind K-Mart really preferable to being incarcerated in a closed institution?

There are some people who just cannot adjust to society, even to a society which has made strides to accept them. For them, a closed environment just might be the best solution. Remember that the sisters of the Convent of the Holy Spirit were not sentenced there. They are, legally, sane and rational adults who made their decision of their own accord. They joined the convent voluntarily and can leave any time they wish. From what I understand from Sister Serena, the CHS Foundation awards a very generous amount of money to any sister who feels that her place is no longer in the convent, so that she may restart her life on the outside, and that a few sisters have actually taken this route in the past.”

“Sure they can leave, just like Sartre’s version of hell in his play No Exit,” replied Dr. Gold. “The door is open and anyone can leave hell whenever they want - but nobody does. Or maybe the Convent of the Holy Spirit should be thought of as a cloistered version of the Hotel California. Nobody leaves. Still, I can only hope that, after my talk, some will find courage to head for the door.”

“It won’t happen,” replied Dr. Mautner. “I asked Sister Serena if she would consider leaving based on your talk, and she said no. While she thought that many of the other sisters might perhaps benefit from what you said, she also felt that her case was too far gone. She could never risk trying to live a ‘normal life’ again. I asked her to sound out the others and, the next time we talked, she said that everyone she talked to felt the same way. Every sister she spoke to gave the same response: Dr. Gold’s talk was very thought-provoking and might apply to some of the others, but not to her!”

“They are all in denial,” said Dr. Gold.

“Or they are all brutally honest about the situation,” responded Dr. Mautner. “One has no way of knowing. But why, in the name of some prevailing sociological theory, deny them the opportunity to live in a way which they feel fits them or castigate them for doing so? The whole problem of a transsexual finding her place in society is a very complex one, as you know, and the more options available the better. This includes the option of dropping out of society, if she feels that she just can’t handle it.”

Since it was her turn, Dr. Gold took out her credit card to pay for the meal. She will have a lot of thinking to do, when she will get back to her office.