Sheesh.
So I'm talking to my mom on the phone today about, among other things, my getting American citizenship. Apparently everything's gone through Homeland Security fine, so they're sending the paperwork to the State Department, who will contact me with what I need to do next. Peachy keen.
Then, since we're talking about existing in the US, we start talking about arrangements to come see her next year. I tell her that if I'm going to be on hormones (which I told her would start in October, rather than now), I'd rather come down to visit her in February than over the summer. Or, we can make arrangements to meet somewhere else, but it would pretty well have to be in Canada because I might have problems crossing the border. We're discussing this, and at one point she says, "Can't you just wait to take the hormones?"
Heavens above, this woman is going to drive me insane.
Let me clarify, first of all, that my mom isn't one of the "evil anti-transition mothers" that you hear horror stories about. She's been open to the idea since I first came out to her, and I know that if push comes to shove, she'll support me (which is a better deal than many people have). But she's also been a worrier about everything since I started. She has her own ideas and issues around both life-changing events and relations between men and women, having some recent bad experiences and paradigm shifts herself. So, I know she's bringing some of her own baggage into things.
But for crying out loud, asking me to "just wait"? I told her that no, I can't, and reassured her that if it wasn't the right thing for me, I would stop doing it. Now she's pushing me to write down exactly why I want to transition. I don't really want to, partially because I don't know how to express it, partially because I'm afraid she'll criticize me for it and partially because I don't think I should have to justify transition to other people. I don't want to tell her to just screw off, because it'll strain things between us and her support means a lot to me. But geez, it's bad enough having to justify my existence to society at large, let alone to my own mother.
Then, since we're talking about existing in the US, we start talking about arrangements to come see her next year. I tell her that if I'm going to be on hormones (which I told her would start in October, rather than now), I'd rather come down to visit her in February than over the summer. Or, we can make arrangements to meet somewhere else, but it would pretty well have to be in Canada because I might have problems crossing the border. We're discussing this, and at one point she says, "Can't you just wait to take the hormones?"
Heavens above, this woman is going to drive me insane.
Let me clarify, first of all, that my mom isn't one of the "evil anti-transition mothers" that you hear horror stories about. She's been open to the idea since I first came out to her, and I know that if push comes to shove, she'll support me (which is a better deal than many people have). But she's also been a worrier about everything since I started. She has her own ideas and issues around both life-changing events and relations between men and women, having some recent bad experiences and paradigm shifts herself. So, I know she's bringing some of her own baggage into things.
But for crying out loud, asking me to "just wait"? I told her that no, I can't, and reassured her that if it wasn't the right thing for me, I would stop doing it. Now she's pushing me to write down exactly why I want to transition. I don't really want to, partially because I don't know how to express it, partially because I'm afraid she'll criticize me for it and partially because I don't think I should have to justify transition to other people. I don't want to tell her to just screw off, because it'll strain things between us and her support means a lot to me. But geez, it's bad enough having to justify my existence to society at large, let alone to my own mother.