Transitioning And Acceptance

One of the most common issues that those of us who choose to transition have to deal with is acceptance.  Acceptance by our "birth family", our "chosen family", our employer, our friends, and even strangers.  As I've talked about quite a bit in this blog, the acceptance I've received has been a bit of a mixed bag.

My "chosen family" which consists of my wife J, my daughter P, my ex-wife/best friend M, and so on has been wonderful.  Especially J and M - I see so many people who's spouse/SO/etc cannot accept a transition and that saddens me, but J and M have been not only accepting, but more supportive than I ever could have asked for.

My "birth family" - well as I've talked about before, one uncle/aunt have been great.  Everyone else, well not so much.  Now I will admit that I was estranged from most of them before I transitioned for various reasons, but a couple of them hurt a bit.  I was really close to my brother's oldest daughter when she grew up.  I sort of fell out of contact with her and the rest of them when I chose to transition, mainly because I wasn't sure she/they were ready to deal with the fact that I was transitioning.  J and I ran into them all at Wal-Mart probably 9 months ago and it was great to see them and I briefly was back in touch with my niece and sister-in-law.  My niece brought up seeing me/us and me thinking like a girl suggested maybe getting our nails done (I know she enjoys that) and going shopping.  That seemed like a good way to spend some time together, but obviously I was wrong as the contact basically dropped off.  We're still "Facebook friends", but we don't really chat any longer and that hurt - a lot.  The other one that sort of hurt is my Mother.  I know for a fact that she knows what's going on, and despite everything that has happened I know if things were reversed I would at least make some effort to re-establish contact and she's made none.  As I've said before, yes I could do that, but if she's not interested enough to do it, well then neither am I and I guess I'll see her at her funeral - if that.

My employer, well I've discussed that recently, suffice it to say it did not go well and that was a crushing disappointment for me.  I didn't necessarily expect them to be happy about it, but I really thought that I deserved better than what I got.  I suppose eventually I'm going to have to "seek life elsewhere", but for now I'm managing things as best I can as I do like the job.

My friends, well I don't have many - I never have.  D has been wonderful.  I'm sure part of it is that she has transitioned herself, but I believe that mostly it's because that's just the kind of person she is.  A few other "friends", well they've invited me/us out to dinner here and there, though not so much lately.  I'm not really sure why - and truthfully I no longer care.  They were ladies that I worked with for a while and while I do like them all, I don't want to feel like they are "doing me a favor" and that's how it's felt the last couple of times.  There are a few others that I keep in touch with on Facebook, a couple of them do interact with me quite a bit which is appreciated.  The rest of them, not so much.  Now I cannot really be upset about that since we weren't exactly social before, but the one bothers me as when she and I worked together I doted over her daughter quite a bit, but it is what it is.

As far as "strangers", well that's went reasonably well for me.  Although that is likely skewed that most of my interactions do tend to be with others who transition.  That's obviously ignoring those working hospitality and retail that I come into contact with as they are being paid to be professional and nice, although there have been exceptions to that.  The biggest disappointment has been with one particular religious figure.  I sought him out for some "advice" for lack of a better word.  Me being me and trying to be polite, I inquired if he minded answering a couple of questions for me.  Not only did he say he would, he even sent me a second message asking about my questions before I had gotten a chance to message him (it was a busy morning wiht work).  Well I did reply to him shortly after his second message, and *no response*.  Really bothered me a lot - if he wasn't willing to respond to what I asked about he should not have agreed to do so.  Or failing that, at least a message back that he at least read what I had sent (and I know he did as I got the notification).  A bit of a shame as I did enjoy visiting their church on the occasions we did, we did always contribute when we attended, when they would do a food drive we always went above and beyond despite the fact that we weren't actually members, and J and I spent time digging out bushes one Sunday for them.  I'm not much on physical labor, but it seemed that of the few younger people in the congregation, most didn't show up that particular Sunday.  Since we were among the youngest there, J and I chose to do the physical outside work.  There was never an expectation of quid pro quo, but I honestly thought that I at least deserved some sort of reply.  I seriously doubt that I'll ever go back there again.  Frankly, their loss...

None of the above is really the reason I wrote on this topic, it was more acceptance in general.  While there are few absolutes in this life, and as such it's often hard to group people into "boxes" as J always says, I do tend to do that when it comes to acceptance, and I do it in four groups.

• The first are those that unconditionally accept me, such as J.  
• The second are those that accept me, but prefer to keep their distance for lack of a better description, many of my friends tend to fall into this group.  
• The third are those that act like they accept me to my face, etc., but really don't.  This group is a bit harder as generally they do make it seem like they are accepting and oftentimes I may only find out by accident.  These are also the hardest for me to deal with - even harder than with group four below - as since they put on the facade of acceptance I personally want to believe they do; so it's even more crushing to find out they don't.
• The fourth and final group are those that flat out don't accept me.  In my case it would appear that this is most of my "birth family", my employer, and a couple of people I thought were friends.  When this happens to me it's always disappointing, but I still prefer these types of people than the ones in group three above.  

The fourth group is the one I'd like to expound on a bit.  All to often those in group four tend to use religion as their rationale against those that transition is that they are "cherry picking" from the Bible.  I'm by no means an expert on the Bible, but the little bit of research I've done seems to indicate that for most every argument that people use, that there is a counter argument.  The one that I got that really bugged me the most was "God doesn't make mistakes".  I have several responses for that, among them are that I don't feel he made a mistake, he simply gave me "what I could handle" and I'm handling it.  And for that matter, for those that use that line, what if your spouse/SO/child or anyone else they cared for was struck with a disease that was terminal *if not treated*.  Would they be so quick to say that "God doesn't make mistakes" and let their loved one die?  Or would they do everything in their power to save that loved one.  I believe that for the vast majority the answer is the latter.  Well I'm doing what I need to do to "save myself" so to speak.  The other thing that really bugs me is that many of these people are quick to use arguments from the Bible as I've said, but I believe the Bible also has issues with eating shellfish (among other things) and wearing certain fabrics.  Now in some cases this is Old Testament versus New Testament, but at some point isn't the Bible the Bible?  As I said, I'm by no means an expert on religion or the Bible, but it sure seems to me that there is a lot of hypocrisy going on.

I'm sure some/many/all may disagree with the paragraph above and that's just fine with me as each of us is entitled to our own opinions and beliefs.  And with that I think I'll wrap this up.

- M