“Knowing what you know now, would you have done anything differently?” “If I could have had a different personality? I might have changed something… But I’m like Popeye, ‘I am what I am.’”

An artist’s rendering of my dad.

My dad is old. Or at least old enough that while I know that at one point his hair was dark brown, I can’t really remember it.

It feels like I’ve only ever known him with the silver — bordering on white — hair he has now. It was a darker silver a couple years ago, and before that it was the sort of salt and pepper that softly insinuates someone is “distinguished.” But before that? It’s kind of hard to picture him. I remember what he was like, and I remember my interactions with him, but that’s all. His surface-level appearance back then is lost to me.

My dad doesn’t have this problem with me. He remembers exactly what I used to look like.

I have a lot of positive memories of my dad.

When I was in half-day kindergarten we would hang out and make things in the garage or watch documentaries on T.V. for the other half of the day. I have pictures of me from around this time wearing samurai armor made out of foam blocks, and a silver helmet made out of spray-painted cardboard. I remember making a space helmet with him out of blue kitchen wrap and cardboard. He taught me about applied creativity, and gave me the confidence to make things with my hands. A lot of my favorite memories of him throughout the years involve us making something together.

That said, he and I had a strained relationship for most of my adolescence. He says that when I was in middle and high school, I hated him. I don’t really disagree, but it seems like a harsh thing to say these days.

We often got into arguments back then. Most of them revolved around the things I was and was not interested in. Punk rock, 80s alternative, video games, anime, books, and art were my obsessions. He didn’t like or understand a lot of that. He loved sports, and believed that he had the right as a parent to tell me what I could and couldn’t do — that he was my superior. I didn’t like or understand a lot of that.

I remember him yelling at me and trying to force me to be someone I wasn’t. He remembers me being depressed, withdrawn, and running away from arguments.

Over the years, our relationship has improved. By the time I graduated from college, it was rare that our conversations would end with raised voices. By the time I got married, it was almost unheard of. There’s more respect on both sides these days.

That said, I haven’t really talked to my dad about the fact that I’m trans. I came out to him in mid June, 2016, but the only other time I can remember talking directly with him about the fact I’m trans was a brief conversation this last winter where he told me that my coming out was like a bomb going off in his life.

Sometimes I think I’m still a bomb going off in his life.

At the time he said this, I reiterated to him that I am the same person I have always been and that if he had questions or things he wanted to talk about, he should talk about them with me. He hasn’t — at least not until today.

After I came out, not talking became the status quo. It remained the status quo until I mentioned a week ago that I wanted to interview him (and my mom and brother) for a new piece I’m working on. Now I’m sitting down with him at the dining table at my parents’ house for that interview.

I’ve been thinking (and writing) a lot since I came out. Over the last year, I’ve invested a great deal of time doing a bit of personal excavation — what you might call “re-contextualization” — trying to figure out who I am, how I got here, and what it all means. I’ve taken a sieve to my memory, sifting out and collecting anything that seems significant and arranging it into something that makes sense.

As first I was motivated by the feeling that I needed to prove to everyone how trans I was. How trans? Super trans. Like, all the trans. Later, I was motivated by the need to explain to myself what happened. I wanted to know how I managed to make it to twenty-eight years old before I acted on what I had wished for since age four, and what I had a practical understanding of since I was twelve. I know now the effect that sexist stereotypes, societal pressures, cissexism, and fear has had on my life. So lately, I’ve been motivated by the need to move on. As much as I understand my past, I still struggle to let it go.

For me, moving on requires that I start integrating the perspectives of others. I have figured myself out — as best I can — now I need to figure out what that means in the context of my relationships. My wife and I have been able to work this out pretty quickly — we’ve talked about these things a lot. But the rest of my family? Not so much. This is especially true of my dad.

“Do you feel that your perception of me as a boy/man shaped the way you parented me at all?” “Absolutely.” “How?” “I tried to guide you toward being a responsible adult and expose you to things that people need to be exposed to. You were a boy, so I thought of things that boys ought to do and be exposed to.”

“You were a boy.” Was I? I certainly don’t see it that way. Sure, for a substantial portion of my life I would have said I was a boy. And sure, everyone thought I was a boy. I mean, I certainly looked like a boy. But was I boy? I don’t believe I was. In fact, I believe that anyone who thought I was a boy — including myself — was wrong.

My dad has trouble thinking of it that way, and it sometimes upsets him that I do. This is most obvious when it comes to my pronouns. My dad has had a hard time with my pronouns. In his own words:

“I hate the pronoun shit.”

His struggle with my pronouns is even more pronounced when talking about me in the past. As I said, he doesn’t have the problem I have with remembering appearances. He remembers exactly what I used to look like. He says his memory is very visual.

“When you were 3 you were a boy, when you were 8 you were a boy etc. By all definitions you were a boy. The history is already written.”

We’re about half way through the interview and this statement causes me to break one of my self-imposed interview rules. I told myself I was here to listen, not talk, and that’s mostly what I’ve been doing — listening. But this is too much.

So, I mention the concept of a personal retcon — something I explore in “How am I not myself?” — and explain it to my dad. He doesn’t like it. He says that while my actions and behaviors were fiction to me, they were factual to everyone else. He says I played the role of a boy and that as a result, it’s difficult sometimes to think of me as female — especially in the past.

Roll for wisdom.

I tell him that I understand his perspective, and that “playing a role” is a pretty accurate read of the situation.

But, I tell him, it still hurts to hear him talk about me in the past as if I was something I was not.

I want to say more. I want to tell him that thinking of me as a boy in the past requires privileging surface level appearances over who I really was. I want to tell him that his thinking of it this way makes me feel like my thoughts and feelings at the time didn’t matter — that all that mattered is what other people thought about me. I want to tell him that thinking of it this way even after I have transitioned makes me feel like my thoughts and feelings now don’t matter — that even now, all that matters is what people think about me.

I want to tell him that what other people have thought about me — and what some people still think of me — is and always has been the problem. I want to tell him that the distress and pain I have experienced was caused by the idea that my thoughts and feelings didn’t matter, and that all that mattered was what other people thought about me. I want to tell him that the fact that he struggles to think of me as a girl in the past, combined with his statements that he perceives me in the same way he always has, sometimes makes me feel like he doesn’t see me.

I want to tell him that his struggle to think of me as a girl in the past makes me worry that to him, I will always and forever be his son, not his daughter — even if he changes the pronouns he uses for me.

But I don’t tell him. I can’t.

These thoughts and feelings are just a writhing mass of discomfort and I can’t pick them apart fast enough to say anything. And even supposing I could, I’m not here to talk. I’m here to listen. He continues.

I think you’re being insensitive to us when you’re sensitive to the pronouns.

My dad doesn’t seem to like the fact that his struggle with my pronouns in these situations hurts me. I think he’d prefer it if I wasn’t hurt when he says “he” or “him” or “his.” He wants me to understand how difficult it is to say “she” or “her” or “hers.” He says he already feels bad enough when he makes a mistake and that he hates it when people make him feel even worse about it. He says he hates that friends of mine told me he used the wrong pronouns in front of them at a recent get-together at my house. He says it’s highly embarrassing.

He says he feels like he’s being policed.

I tell him I understand the feeling. I tell him I’ll try to be more empathetic.

My dad tells me that coming out — like all trying times in someone’s life — is always a self-centered process. He says that’s not a value judgement, but a simple statement of fact. When he says it, it doesn’t feel like a simple statement of fact. He tells me that he understands why someone would be self-centered in my situation. After all, he says, I’ve been having to be something I’m not and I’m finally free.

I don’t feel self-centered. I feel helpless.

I don’t tell him that I don’t feel free. I don’t tell him that I probably won’t feel free until the people I care about, and who care about me, see me and not what I used to look like. After all, I’m here to listen, not talk.

So I listen.