It seems that more and more I find myself looking back at my past
and wondering what could have been, what would my life be like if I made
different decisions, followed different paths, or even been born in the right
body. I know that it isn’t healthy to
dwell on the past too much but I still find it to be an interesting exercise
and, mainly due to my cynical nature, these scenarios tend to end on a bit of a
downer. I suspect that everyone has
thoughts like this about their lives, in that I’m nothing special, but I do
wonder how many people can look back and say that they are grateful for the
experiences they have had due to the choices they made, as well as things they
had no control over, throughout their life.
One of the big “what ifs” that I tend to think about is, “what if
I had been born as a girl in body as well as in mind?” I imagine what life would have been like
growing up and being socialized as female instead of male and I find it really
easy to turn these thoughts toward fantasizing about the perfect life as a
woman without taking all the negatives into consideration. It is really easy to think about what
childhood would be like, viewing it through rose tinted glasses but once you
start applying a dose of reality to the situation, things get a bit darker and
you have to start asking yourself some serious questions. For example, the thought that if I had been
born with a female body, I never would have experienced the bullying that I
experienced because I would be more comfortable with the body given to me which
means I wouldn’t have had to try so hard to fit in with the other people of the
same sex. But when you really think
about it, yes I would have experienced bullying, it just would have been a
different type of bullying, after all, from the stories I have heard from
people that grew up female, girls can be pretty vicious. I also like to think that if I had been born
with a female body, I wouldn’t have been molested but once again, if you think
about it, the likelihood of me being molested would have gone up as would the
chances of me being raped. It always has
a downside that comes with it once you apply the real world to the fantasies.
I also tend to think about what would have happened if I had told
my parents that I was a girl instead of a boy when I was a child. Would they have listened to me? Would they
have dismissed it as a phase and hoped that I grew out of it? Would they have sent me to reparative therapy
instead of sending me to the type of therapist I needed? Each of these questions creates a multitude
of branches to explore in the realm of “what if” and those are just a fraction
of the ones I have had pass through my head.
The “what if” scenarios can be fun to explore but they can also
lead to a lot of regret. Personally, I live with a lot of regret and a lot of
that regret is what leads to thoughts like the ones I mentioned earlier in this
post. Regret is one of the biggest
things I deal with though, I am slowly starting to overcome those regrets and
appreciate the experiences I have had in my life, even the bad ones, because
they have made me who I am today. If I
had followed any of those other potential paths in life, there is no way I
could be the person I am and there is no telling where I would be now. Some of those paths may have been better
choices that would have ultimately led to a better life for myself but on the
other side of that coin are the possibility that they would have just made my
life worse.
Ultimately, I am who I am, at the place that I am, because of the
choices I had and the decisions have I made.
I am the culmination of my experiences and of the lessons I have learned
in my life. If I were to take any of
those experiences away, even the slighted one, it would change who I am and who
I will be in the future as I continue along the journey of life. Yes, I have regrets, we all do, it’s just
part of being alive, but I can’t let those regrets rule my life. I have to move forward and try to make the
best of the cards I have been played and the choices I have made due to
that. I hope that one day I can move
past my regrets so that I can fully appreciate the life I am living.
While it has been hard, I now, for the most part, thank God for
making me the way he did. I wish I knew
why he made me like this but I am thankful none the less. Gender dysphoria sucks and being transgender
is hard and sometimes even overwhelming but being like this gives myself and
others like me to have unique outlook on life because we get the chance to
experience it from both ends of the binary spectrum. Yes, society hates us and tries to erase our
existence. Yes, people commit some of
the most horrific and gruesome crimes against us. Yes, people tell us constantly that they are
worried for our souls just before telling us to go kill ourselves. But, even with those negatives, I still think
that we are blessed and hopefully, one day, society will come around to seeing
that as well.
- Arylin Michelle
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