Resetting

Both of my children are trans. They are adults, not children. They are 23 and 24. Their stories are their own, and they are unique. My heart is wrapped tightly around each of them. I remember with one of them, when they told me, and then told me again, and then desperately tried again to explain to me … finally something made sense. I was going to go there with them, or I would be sending them off into a life I would never truly know, with a wound slashed so deep that it would stretch from me to them. “I don’t know where you are going, but I’m going there with you,” I remember saying. It may have been my greatest leap of faith, ever. When you have a trans kid, or two trans kids, you have your skin peeled back and then you grow a thicker one. The old skin is the expectations that culture puts on you, your upbringing puts on you. Subconscious. Friends. Family. Religion. Workplace. Gender identities that slip past the narrow boundaries our society allows are deeply threatening to many. Surprising. Confusing. The new skin you grow is understanding. Empathy. A love with a fierceness great and wide. When your kid comes to you and says, this is me, please see me, the choice is clear. You rise or you fall. Too many parents fall. You? You see them. And you hold on tight as they carry you to places you’ve never been.

I feel this way, on the eve of bringing home a wheelchair with Mark in it. I have only one choice. It’s to go with him. He is there. I would imagine that he is just as scared as I am.

I could rise or I could fall.

Me? I am rising.

I will give it my all.