On a recent Sunday, I was talking to a female member of my church. She told me she had been talking to a woman who knows me. It turns out it was my ex-wife’s aunt, a woman who I always liked for her offbeat sense of humor — sometimes we’d play off one another when we got together.
I never thought that my coming out as a transgender woman would destroy my marriage and all the family relationships that go with it. I know of divorced couples where the ex is included in family gatherings, but that is not my fate. It’s all pretty complicated, really complicated.
I come from a small family: I have one brother, my dad was an only child, my mom had one brother. My uncle and aunt did not have children, so I have no first cousins. My ex-wife came from a much larger family, and it was nice, although sometimes overwhelming, to be part of such a huge family, especially when our house was frequently the location of a huge family Christmas party held on New Year’s Day. Still, I felt part of something bigger, bigger than I was used to. Yet, through all the time I knew these people that I came to love, there was something they didn’t know about me. Frankly, nobody knew until I came out.
I started my male-to-female transition in earnest in early 2016. During and following my transition, it felt like a Berlin Wall of sorts was built between me and these people whom, although I was not related to by blood, I had come to know and love. Despite this wall, I knew that, on the other side, I did have some love, support, respect, and appreciation of what I’d been through, but family loyalty to my ex made it difficult to break through that wall. The loyalty and support of a family member by birth prevails, and that was not what I was. I understand all this even if it does hurt.
There is this joke: “What’s the difference between in-laws and outlaws?” Response: “Outlaws are wanted.” I like the joke, but I always appreciated and loved my in-laws, particularly my mother-in-law, who, when my mom passed in 2008, in some ways, became a surrogate mom to me. After separating from my wife and starting my transition, I know that providing support to me became more difficult, as prime loyalty was supporting her daughter, my former wife, no matter how she might have felt about the situation. I understood this, and since I care for her as much as I do, I would never have wanted to put her in that situation. Just the same, I would love the opportunity to thank my mother- and father-in-law, for all the help they provided to me and to our family along the way. I was lucky in the in-law department.
Despite the existing family division, I would love for my wife’s side of the family to meet “Me, Rev. 2.0.” At my core, I am the same person as before I transitioned to female, still there have obviously been some significant changes. There are of course the physical ones brought on by years of hormone replacement therapy, plus those same hormones also affect the way I think, approach situations, and generally live my life. It all stacks up to some real tangible changes to who I am as a person. Living as female has allowed me to be myself, and resulted in me being more caring, funnier, happier — and freeing me from the restraints of being, and living as, male. I’d be excited for my ex’s side of the family to see this part of me, the face that I show to the world everyday now. I think they’d be thrilled for me, thrilled I found the true me — if they secretly aren’t already.
This time of year, a time of celebrating with family, brings all this more to mind than ever. I
like to think that one of these holiday seasons, I might actually get invited to the big family
Christmas party. Then, these people I love from afar can meet the “me” I hid for so long.
Mariel E. Addis is a native of Florence. She left the area for 16 years but returned in 2013.