A little poem I wrote on my break at work today. --- There's a man with a cart who is Rolling out pretzels. The long coils of dough pile around him Like the entrails of butchered lambs And carousel horses that don't go 'round so merrily anymore. There's a man with a booth who is Bagging goldfish. Little lives for children to play God He charges 25 cents a try And wins either way 'cause the fish are barely worth a nickel. And there's men and women and children Everywhere. Gnawing on fried dough and candy apples Like dogs with pig's ears Or more like hyenas crunching and devouring a lion's bones. And there's me and you and some other folks Sitting caged. Siamese twins and hairy beasts and psychos Watching the real sideshow unfold Looking out and seeing the world, distorted and horrifying Like an image in a funhouse mirror.
Life has been weird these last few weeks. Haven't eaten a square meal in awhile; can't choke down food for some reason even though I'm starving and I feel like I'm losing weight. Transitioning has gone from my mind. The stress of trying to pass was almost worse than the dysphoria itself. Added to that the social stigma, the health risks with hormones and surgery, and the stress on my family, I've made a decision for myself. Even if I transitioned, I would never be completely male and as such would never be satisfied with myself. I would be stuck in between, in limbo, for the rest of my life. As such, I'm not going there. I'm back into my half-girl, half-guy clothing. Shaped my eyebrows, shaved, dug the bras out of my closet. And frankly, I missed feeling comfortable. I missed not having people stare whenever I walked by. The stress has been lifted and I feel like a million bucks. Or at least I would if this week hadn't been a depressive one. But that's nothing to do with gender; that's just my effed up head. Been getting a lot of writing done lately. I think it's partly due to Ray. Me and him are funny. We're both basically mental cases, so we actually get along. We understand each other. We get that when one of us is depressed, it'll pass. We get what it feels like to want to die; I think just having someone who understands that feeling makes everything hurt a lot less. We have doubts, of course. We're not the most optimistic people. But we'll do OK I think. We don't really have anyone else.
I really do feel bad for my family. I can be a damn miserable son of a bitch sometimes. Thing is, they don't understand why and I can't make them understand it either. It's this little thing called dysphoria and it knocks me down about once or twice weekly. I guess the closest thing I can compare it to might be rapid-cycling bipolar, because with me, it goes like this: I'm ADD, so on normal days I'm flying off the hook with energy and excitement. I spend a ton of money, text everyone I know, run around outside and talk rapidly. It behaves almost like mild mania. And then it hits me, for about a whole day. I sink into depression, and it feels like I'm drowining. Like I've got an anchor tethered to my foot and someone threw me in the ocean. Hopeless. Like there's no way out. Like life is useless, hopeless, pointless, painful. I've since been to a lot of therapy, and while it doesn't make anything better, it has helped me understand what might be going on with me. I'm not bipolar, but I am sick. This depression is destroying my life, albeit slowly. And on the days where it hits, I want to curl up in a ball and die. It happened today, and it's happening right now as I write this. It's worst when my parents sit me down to talk. Just now my mother said she doesn't support me starting testosterone until I am 30 years old. She wants me to dress androgenously. Girl's jeans, fitted shirts. It sounds dumb as hell but it makes me want to jump off a building. Everytime they say something like that, like how I'll never really be a man, and how I have a woman's body whether I like it or not, or (the worst one) that I won't make a good man, that I'm not strong enough. It makes me cry sometimes. Which is weak, but I do it anyway. I dunno what to do really.