Okey-dokey. So it’s done. My dear friends, fellow Redditors, bloggers and interested parties as about 12:30 AEST 11 September 2012 – I’m out to my mum!

The weird part of it all was the lead up and preparation was more stressful than actually doing it. For example, it was mum’s 60th at the start of the month, so for the weeks/months leading up to it coming out was a no-no: couldn’t spoil her birthday. Also, she was planning to go away for 2 months after her birthday… leaving me a week to come out to her (fortunately it ended up being two weeks, phew).

So her birthday party was scary enough for me – I was worried the whole night people would figure me out (4.5 months hormones, family and friends I haven’t seen in 6 months to several years might have seen a real difference). The night went well (including her enjoying her party): several comments on how soft my skin is and I learnt afterwards people had mentioned how much younger I looked than my younger brother. The best comment was how good I looked for my gluten free diet (I’m gluten intolerant) and how this person (an uncle) would consider a gluten free diet too to look that good. Darling, it ain’t the diet…

So back to the actual event. Last week I’d rang mum (again stressing before hand) and made arrangements to have lunch with her yesterday. All was cool – she didn’t find this unusual or anything, even though I think me taking a day off just to have lunch with her is out of character and unusual.

In the meantime my partner and my friends had been helping me get together an information pack for mum so she’d have additional information to read. This was good, kept me focussed from my stressing out (my friends and people who follow me on Reddit and Twitter know of my propensity for anxiety attacks). Happy to share the contents of the pack – just get in contact with me.

However once the pack was finished – back to stressing. Saturday I was stressing big time, ended up visiting my best friend who’s also trans to talk and for general support. We did something I’d recommend to anyone getting ready to come out (whether G, L, B or T) – practice what you are going to say.

So Sunday I’m stressing again… My partner keeps telling me that mum will be okay with it all, she may or may not be great at the time but should come around.

Monday – ugh. At least I have work to keep my mind busy. Granted before and after work plenty of time to stress. As I’m leaving and telling my work friends see you Wednesday they’re all saying enjoy your day off. If they only knew.

That night I ended up calling my best friend (again) and seeing if she’d come over Tuesday morning – to keep me calm and on track. She agreed (such big hugs to her).

Tuesday morning, still stressing. My friend keeps me on the level and we run through the coming out speech a few more times. I’d changed it a little having read the coming out letter another friend had given her mum. I liked the way she put some things.

A spanner in the works… Mum calls about 10:30 and suggests she’d come over to my place and we’d have lunch locally. Arrggghhh. I’d planned to do it at her place, you know in case she didn’t take it well she wouldn’t have to go anywhere. No, no we’ll go somewhere near your place. Phew. Crisis averted.

Another coffee. Another pep talk from my friend. Time to go. Soooo nervous. Still I take the highway, I crank on the stereo what has been one of my rocks during the last few months – Against Me! The Rolling Stone article about Laura came out just under a month after I had my breakdown and started my transition. Listening to her music especially when you really get some of the veiled references is comforting. So I’m playing Total Clarity. One section of the song “Total Clarity” has kept me going in all of my transition:

“Will everyone, you ever meet or love be just a relationship be based on a false presumption?”

So I start with that song on my drive and each song follows one after another. Then I reach “Violence” and it gets to:

“You’ve been keeping secrets and these kinds of lies have consequences. So many possibilities for this to all end badly, it’s almost guaranteed.”

I didn’t need to hear this on the way to see mum to share my secret. I skip some tracks – get back to “Total Clarity” and play it over and over until I get there.

Parking on the lawn I take a minute. I don’t feel as stressed as I thought I should be. I knock, she answers,

I enter and plan to give her a hug. I figure this would be an indicator – something out of character. Instead it’s her hugging me first.

So we chat about stuff, the iPad my brother got her for her birthday – I set it up properly… Yay for being geeky. I can’t actually remember what else we spoke about for around 45 minutes until she said, “Well I’m hungry, why don’t we go to lunch?”

This was the moment weeks has been building too. I had no nerves, no reservations about being trans, yet I hesitated. Yet I knew now was the time. “Mum… there’s something we need to talk about before we go to lunch. You want to sit down?”

[paraphrasing because I don’t remember exactly what I said]

“Ever since I can remember I’ve had an issue with something about me. It’s caused me pain, sadness, anger, depression and self loathing about my body, about how I sound, behave and act. It’s kept me from forming close relationships with people in case they found out.

“So finally in 2009 I started doing something about my issues. Since then I’ve seen two psychologists who’ve confirmed the same thing. In April this year my issues caused me to have a breakdown.

“The psychs confirmed the same thing, they both diagnosed my with Gender Identity Disorder. Mum, I’m transgendered.”

She took it well. There were a few tears on her side.I explained about being on hormones, getting laser hair removal. She asked some questions about how my partner was taking it. How long I’d know (kindergarten). She asked if I was sure – I explained that I knew my dysphoria would have killed me in the next few years if I hadn’t done this. She asked if I was transsexual, I explained yes, but I didn’t like the term and used transgender in preference. Mum asked if I’d chosen a name – questioning if it was the female version of my male name, no: Meagan.

She told me that she would always love me and that life is short and people need to do whatever makes them happy (and she meant it).

I told her that I’d organised the mum of another transgirl to speak to if she needed to and I’d prepared an information pack for her.

We went through the pack together with me explaining the different books and print outs. She amusingly said, “With this much reading looks like I won’t have much of a holiday.” I explained it was there if she needed it. I wasn’t expecting or requiring her to read it all. The pack even included a copy of the Rolling Stone magazine with Laura Jane Grace’s coming out story. Between the music and her story I owe that girl a lot.

I offered mum the opportunity to speak to a friend or someone of she wanted or needed to – asking her just to be discrete – I clarified it was a decision I had to make about when I was ready to out myself to family, etc.

Unexpectedly she sad she was okay with things. I even offered her the details of my two psychs. She claimed (and seemed) to be okay.

Mum recognised the problem of coming out to my brother. To date I’d only tried to worry about coming out to her, but I did indicate I had serious concerns and expected it wouldn’t go well. She too thought my brother may have issues and put the information pack in the back of her car to stop him finding it.

After a bit more chatting including stating that she felt confident about my decision with the assessment of two psychs, and a few more questions such as how far I intended to go with transition (full time), am I planning SRS (still not sure), do you have many clothes (only a double closet worth – and then some). She finally said, “Well I’m hungry do you still want to go to lunch?” It was a good sign for me, she was (at least for the moment) okay with the news.

There was one point she made that I found interesting, that she felt that the lack of closeness between us had been something she’d done as a parent. I explained that it was instead about keeping the distance so no one could see my secret.

We had lunch, Yum Cha, and she came back to my place to meet my best friend (who had been waiting there to pick me up in case I fell apart and couldn’t drive myself home). I was worried the contrast between me early-ish in transition against a friend who’s been in transition for 2.5 years/fulltime for 8.5 months might have been too much, too confronting. Mum said she didn’t know when she’d get the chance to meet some of my friends so wanted to come. I think mum was cool with it all.

Mum highlighted on several occasions over the afternoon that she had indicated that she could talk the talk (being initially supportive) but would have to see if she could walk the walk (keep up the support).

After mum left my friend and I went shopping. I wanted a new charm for my bracelet to mark my coming out – had a boy mode fail in the jewellers and got a yin yang charm signifying the transition of my relationship with mum.

So it’s been 28 hours since I came out to her and about 23 since I last spoke to her… Time will only tell where my relationship with her will go from here.

Meagan