Beyond Magenta: Transgender Teens Speak Out (19 page)

The first day of high school was the day I came out to most of my friends. I put on a horrible-fitting polo shirt and shorts that were too big for me. I went to school and told people that I was a boy and my name is Cameron and to call me
he.

They were, like, “What?”

“I’m a boy, and my name is Cameron, and call me
he.
I’m trans, transgender.”

“Um, like, okay.”

For the most part, they did.

I had some issues with two teachers, that didn’t make a whole lot of sense to me ’cause they never knew me as a girl, so why would they call me
she
?

The thing with pronouns is, I can understand if people have trouble switching the pronouns if they have difficulty calling someone
he
when they called said person
she
for most of said person’s life. But when someone who you’ve not met is told what pronouns to use, or if someone on your behalf tells them what pronouns to use, and it’s totally disregarded, I don’t think that’s okay.

Names too. I never had issues with my name. For some reason nouns are easier to remember than pronouns.

I confronted those teachers indirectly because the social worker at the school was on my side. “Well, this teacher was not listening to me when I said call me
he.
” And the social worker talked to the teacher.

But if I had confronted the teachers and been aggressive about it, they probably would have said, “Oh, I’m sorry, you look like a girl to me.”
That
would not have been okay. A, because it’s just rude to tell a trans guy he looks like a girl for obvious reasons — because in many cases that’s what he’s trying not to look like. And B, that’s no excuse to disregard pronouns just because somebody looks like something else. That’s stupid. Yeah.

Overall, the environment for gay kids at OHS is pretty awesome. I’m about as queer as you can get, and I didn’t get crap from anyone. I’m currently president of the GSA and Noah is vice president. We’re going to the gay prom together as friends.

I got one prank phone call: “I’m looking for the gay.”

But I don’t count that because it didn’t really bother me, and it was only once. I’m as out as one can possibly be, and I’m getting away with only a prank phone call? Yes! Yes, please. That’s awesome.

I didn’t go through any kind of harassment, which was kind of weird. Most of the trans people I know go through some situation or some story about being bullied or harassed. I didn’t have that. I had a strong support system in place.

Without New York City or New Haven nearby, there would be no therapy, no testosterone, no trans kids or parents of trans kids support groups. If I didn’t live in Westchester, there would be no gay prom, no PFLAG (Parents, Families, and Friends of Lesbians and Gays) group for my parents.

I think the lack of crap I’ve gotten about being trans and queer and all that has enabled me to be stronger. I wanted to make sure I took advantage of that in the future. I wanted to make use of my strength by helping others.

There is a course offered called “Gender Ideology.” It is half women’s studies and half queer theory. I’m taking it, of course, and it’s going to be awesome. We do have other controversial classes. There’s a class called “Racism, Classism, and Sexism.” It was given at the high school, but it’s a university class from SUNY, Albany. I took it and it was pretty phenomenal.

November 11, 2010. A month before I turned sixteen, I began taking hormones. That’s why my voice is low.

November 11, 2011 was one year on T (testosterone), which is pretty cool.

My period stopped two months after I started T. My voice started dropping a little before Christmas. There was some shrinkage in my breasts, which was cool. I started shaving. I can feel some stubble right now. My mustache grows fastest.

Testosterone is definitely a sexy hormone. My sex drive went way up once I started taking it. Testosterone makes me go
Kajooo! Kajooo! Kajooo!
What’s really weird and kind of bizarre is that my testosterone level fluctuates. A couple of days after the shot, the level is at the highest, and a couple of days before the shot it is at the lowest. My sex drive fluctuates too. Right after the shot I’m really horny, and before the shot I’m not good for anything.

I’ve been thinking about switching to a half a dose every week rather than a full dose every other week. It would be the same dose but less fluctuation. That would be good ’cause hormone fluctuations are not fun. It’s not just sex. It’s the mood swings and the energy swings. My mood goes down before I get a shot. I’m like, blah, lethargic, and I get sort of moody.

There’s a lot of information on side effects of testosterone. There’s tons of legitimate information online. It’s important to find information that really is legit.

Right now I’m sort of a lump, with no defined muscles. But if I actually do stuff like push-ups, my arms respond to that. It doesn’t just happen overnight, but it’s easier to build muscle. Hopefully I will be doing that this summer.

Because I’m perceived as male, I get male privileges. It weirds me out a little bit. Male privilege means I don’t have to prove myself for my opinion to have weight. People assume that I’m intelligent. People assume that I have something to say. I get a fair amount of respect.

By being male, I’m automatically given some kind of validity that is weird. “Wait, guys, I haven’t said anything yet. And besides, you shouldn’t be giving me male privilege because I’m not really a guy — at least not by your standards. By your standards, I’m definitely not.”

People don’t see me as a person they can talk down to. A stranger won’t call me “sweetheart.” The only person who can call me “sweetheart” is my grandma.

I like to think that I can fend off society’s male expectations pretty well. Society wants all kinds of things from the boys. They want us to be masculine and to wrestle, to swear, and to be aggressive and assertive. To some degree, society wants us to be misogynistic. But I’ve never really gone along with what people say I should do, in case you didn’t notice. I do more things to actively
not
fit male expectations than I do to fit the expectations.

I’m wearing five earrings — I got that done yesterday. Five earrings is a minor act of rebellion at society and gender ’cause guys are supposed to wear one earring, if any. However minor that may be, it’s something I’m supposed to be doing, so I don’t do it.

Sewing is not something I’m supposed to be doing, either. I tailored this shirt because it was too big for me. I like it a lot better. It was not flattering before; it was like a bag.

And another thing is guys are not supposed to wear bright colors. The standard colors of guys are basically limited to gray, black, brown, dark green, dark blue, maybe dark maroon, white, sometimes orange, but that’s about it. And I’m like, nope, I’m not going to do that. I’ll go with purple.

Whenever I wear a tie, it’s almost always colorful. The most beautiful tie I ever had was hot pink. But I also have a skinny, rainbow tie that’s awesome too.

I first came out to my brother back at hippie camp, which happened right before nerd camp. At this hippie camp, everyone was different and way more awesome than they are in the real world, myself included. When I first came out to my brother, he was really cool about it. But when we got back to the real world, and it was time for middle school again, he stopped being cool about it. At first he would use pronouns as a weapon. Whenever he was mad at me, he’d call me
she,
and whenever he wasn’t mad at me, he’d call me
he.
And when he was really pissed, I was
that thing.

I think that was just a basic sibling rivalry thing, I don’t think it was because I came out. You’re pissed at your sibling, you’re not going to give them human status. It’s “that thing across the dinner table.”

The first few times he said it, I was chill, but after a while I started picking up a trend that happened whenever he got mad. I became pretty pissed because that is
not
playing fair, that is hitting way below the belt, and it is not acceptable. I tried to confront him, but that didn’t work out because my brother is far more aggressive than I am, far more confrontational than I am. He can out-confront me. At this point, he doesn’t want to talk about anything trans or queer related, and that’s kind of difficult. He’s into cycling, he’s a hard-core cyclist, and he talks about that with Dad 24/7. And I barely ever talk about trans things, or at least barely ever in relation to how much he talks about cycling. Whenever I bring it up, he says, “We always talk about trans stuff.”

“Nope. Not really. We always talk about cycling. Shut up.”

We’re expected to fight. We’re teenage brothers, so that’s just how it goes.

For the most part, his old friends know that I’m trans and call me
he.
I don’t hang out with the new friends he has because they’re annoying.

We’re fourteen and a half months apart, but we’re two years apart in school because I’m like a junior, rising senior. It’s very exciting. That means I have to apply to college.

I think we will get better when I leave for college because I won’t have to deal with him on a daily basis, and he and my parents won’t have to deal with me on a daily basis.

My understanding is that people at school ask him questions about me instead of asking me, which is really, really weird. It’s like, “If you talk to Cam, you’re going to catch the trans? You can’t talk to Cam!” I don’t know. People are silly about that.

Once I don’t have to deal with him every day, and share a bathroom with him, and have to see him being a slob every day, then, yeah, we’ll probably get closer.

What’s interesting is that the straight, non-trans population seems to think that trans people automatically have allies in gay people. And that gay people automatically have allies in the trans community. And they do Not, capital
N.

We need to stand together to fight the system. If trans people stand alone, we have no chance.
No chance at all!
I think all people who are oppressed in one way or another should stand together — women, queer people, people of color, disabled people, whatever. All the special-interest groups, minority groups, have a much better chance of effecting change if we stick together. We definitely shouldn’t hate each other. That’s a stupid thing.