Vanity Fair’s recent photo spread in the July issue shows the new Caitlyn Jenner, formerly known as Bruce Jenner, with a cover photo of Caitlyn after facial surgery clearly identifying as a female. She is currently all the rage.
I asked transitioning people to talk about their life and how they feel about some of the issues that Caitlyn might be experiencing and what it is like to be transgender in our country today. I also interviewed the people that love them, work to empower them or counsel them. I have learned that the prejudice and bias around trans is wide spread and can be hateful, yet it is also subtle, even among those of us who want to be empathetic. In order to debunk some of the myths and answer some of the bigger questions, I interviewed Finneus and several other transgender people and I talked to other experts, the people who are living the struggles every day, and those that help them, and love them.
Finneus is a female to male transgender person who identifies as he, and lives in the Georgia area. He volunteered to be interviewed for a series of articles on what it’s like to be transgender and to answer some questions about how he feels about Caitlyn Jenner’s recent transition. This is the first in a series of articles on Being Transgender, and the people who care about them.
As a psychotherapist and sexologist (and nontrans or cisgender) writing this series I realized I knew much less than I thought about these issues. I found that many of my initial questions were offensive, including things like, what name do you want to use in the article? Which caused one interviewee to write me a lengthy and frustrated response about the names we choose to use versus real names and how many transgender folks don’t have the choices the rest of us have, and that all names are real, aren’t they? Or are they? I was unclear. Since then I have found myself more sensitive to the questions about what pronouns to use in the articles, and how to refer respectfully to names about identity, gender and sex and I tread more carefully in all matters related to choice.
Read my full interview with Finneus on HuffingtonPost: BEING TRANSGENDER: The WORDS THAT HURT
For more info, pick up the July issue of Vanity Fair Magazine, and watch for more articles on my blog, at Huffington Post/drtammynelson/ or for more info go to www.drtammynelson.com. My next posts in this series will be about the partner of a transgender person, a transgender advocate in Washington DC, and a transgender psychotherapist who is transitioning herself.
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