I like being trans
I wrote this in response to a post on reddit asking about positive aspects to being trans, and wanted to archive it here on my blog.
Being trans has made me the person I am today. I quite like myself, so that counts for a lot.
If I got presented with the choice to redo my entire life but I was born cis, I don't think I'd accept. I would effectively be choosing to become a completely different person.
For all the struggle and difficulty that being trans has brought, it's shaped my perspective on the world so irrevocably that taking away the trans part of myself would dismantle who I am completely. And for that reason alone, it becomes something to celebrate.
I don't like dysphoria. I don't like the pain of transitioning and the medical trauma it's given me. I don't like hating my body. I didn't enjoy the decade of depression, anxiety, and suicidal thoughts I had to suffer through before I could start T. But I like being trans.
I think trans people are given the unique opportunity to be 100% intentional about who they are. As we come out, transition, and discover ourselves, we take nothing for granted. Every positive experience is made that much more worthwhile in context of all the pain that it took to achieve. I still get giddy sometimes when I look into the mirror and see a man staring back at me. I went through hell for the sake of that man, and I am so thankful every day to live as him, and know him, and know others through him and have others know him through me.