TRANS DAY OF VISIBILITY | Today we're celebrating #TransDayofVisibility! We'd like to thank Alex – an inspiring member of headspace Werribee's youth advocacy group – who has shared with us his story.
"My name is Alex, I’m 17 years old, I’m a VCE student in year 11 and I take two year 12 classes. In my spare time I like to read young adult fiction, usually fantasy, as well as write my own. I play video games; I’m obsessed with anything Marvel. I’m an avid footy fan and I happen to be a transgender man. (That means that I was born female, but I now identify as male).
I don’t usually identify that way. Usually I’m just a man. Today is, however, Transgender Day of Visibility, or TDOV. So today I am out and proud. I have not always enjoyed being out, sometimes I still don’t. I feel as though people interact with me differently if they know I’m trans. They tiptoe around me and don’t have the same conversations they would with anyone else.
It’s hard to feel proud of who I am sometimes. I feel trapped in a situation I didn’t ask for, confined to a fear that it won’t ever feel right to be myself and to exist authentically within myself. I feel as though the gravity of my situation made me grow up faster than anyone would have liked me to.
My transition has shattered any expectations or hopes my parents had planned for my future. My parents told me that they felt they were losing a daughter. I felt like a burden upon them and their lives; I still do. I don’t think there will ever come a day where I don’t feel like this.
I came out over four years ago. I’m now over a year on testosterone and planning for top surgery next year. We’ve come so far, my family and I. It’s because of our resilience, our adaptability.
But I wouldn’t be where I am today without the inspiration of trans role models, people like Chella Man and, more locally, Nevo Zisin. People who have inspired me to be myself and be a voice, telling people that it is more than okay to be who you are and to always be true to yourself. The way that I am has given me a voice and the chance to #beseen. It has changed the way I want to live my life and who I want to be.
I would never have dreamed of going into politics a few years ago, nor would I be on the school debate team. I definitely would not be giving speeches of my experiences or writing blog posts about them!
So today I am out and proud because it’s #TDOV, but I hope we can work together towards a society where I can feel okay to be out and proud every day, because it’s who I am. I hope we can work towards a society where everyone feels that way, trans or not.
Happy Transgender Day of Visibility! Continue to be yourself and #beseen."
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