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raybearChicago Tribune Article on three transwomen. I want to e-mail the reporter and compliment the piece.
Life on the other side
Born male, they chose to become the women they knew they were
By Connie Lauerman
Tribune staff reporter
Published November 13, 2002
One of the first things Deirdre McCloskey noticed when she came out to society as a woman was "the quality of female friendship."
"It was astounding to me," said the University of Illinois-Chicago economics professor. "As a man I had lots of acquaintances. I wasn't a loner by any means. But I didn't have any real friends, and that's true of a surprisingly large number of men."
For Miranda Stevens-Miller, a research scientist at Kraft Foods, it was the realization that "your opinion was not as valuable.
"As a man I would sit in a meeting and everyone would get their opinions out there and they listened to you and it would make a difference. Now, I can make a suggestion and it's almost like it's not heard. Until it rattles round among other people in the room and then it comes out of someone else's mouth and then it's heard."
Welcome to the female gender!
It's not always easy being a woman. But for those who were born male and spent years trying to sort out their psychological discomfort about feeling female, once they make the transition into full, unabashed womanhood, the main feeling is one of relief. Any disadvantages can be taken in stride.
Transsexuals are more evident than ever among us. Often they are the butt of jokes, sensational television programs and outright discrimination in employment and housing.
Yet the word "transgender," rarely heard a few years ago, has entered the mainstream media.
"I was never a part of the men's club, because those who are transsexual don't all of a sudden become transsexual," said Stevens-Miller, a rangy blond with a model's sense of style, who is in her 50s.
"You are transsexual your whole life. Until you really figure out how you fit into the world, you don't fit anywhere. You feel like you're dealing with the world with a mask on."
Beth Plotner, a lawyer in Arlington Heights, said she thought about her gender identity all her life--often with fear. "As a child, when I got caught, we'll say, playing with inappropriate clothes, what my parents felt was proper gender behavior was literally beaten into me. I learned at a young age to hide."
Plotner, 45, began her transition from male to female in her late 30s, when the world was more accepting.
By then, transwomen were just as likely to be the woman next door or a co-worker, rather than simply distant anomalies, such as Christine Jorgensen, Renee Richards, or Welsh travel writer Jan Morris. But many, perhaps most, are not "out"; they prefer to blend in and not make an issue of their transition.
Psychiatrists use the term "gender dysphoria" to describe transsexuals' discomfort with their anatomic sex or their sense of inappropriateness in the gender role of that sex.
The incidence of people who feel that their minds and emotions don't match their bodies is 1 in every 11,900 who were born genetically male, and 1 in every 30,400 who were born genetically female.
Those statistics come from a study done in the Netherlands and replicated in other countries, including Singapore.
There is no estimate for the number of people in the U.S. Most people here pay for sexual reassignment surgery themselves. In the Netherlands and Singapore, sexual reassignment surgery is covered by national health insurance and conducted through a central clinic.
Those numbers reflect people who completed hormone therapy as well as sexual reassignment surgery. Walter Bockting, a psychologist and coordinator of transgender health services at the University of Minnesota, said the figures mean there are a lot more transgender women who may live as women but do not have the surgery. If the surgical procedures were covered by insurance, the number would be higher, he said.
Very often transwomen make the transition in middle age. Those who are married usually end up getting divorced.
Plotner's transition began at a point in her life when catastrophes had rained down on her. A power struggle at a law firm was forcing her out the door, her marriage was disintegrating, her father was diagnosed with terminal cancer, she herself had cancer, and her house was struck by lightning and caught fire.
She beat the cancer but the brush with death made her feel "entitled to some personal happiness." Her marriage ended with a contentious divorce, but she was able to win visitation rights to allow time with her two sons, 10 and 13, whom she said accepted the fact that Dad is now a woman.
Once living as a woman, Plotner, a long-haired brunette said she immediately became aware of "what a misogynistic world we live in."
"I go to the bank and people treat me with less respect. As a woman, they think I have less intelligence than I used to have."
Many challenging steps
Still, the physical transition represents another challenge. Transwomen typically undergo hormone therapy, large doses of estrogen at the beginning and an anti-androgen to block testosterone. As a result, breast size increases; fat is redistributed and body hair decreases.
Surgery to remove male genitalia and convert parts of the penis into a vagina then completes the process.
Gender expression--how they walk, talk and dress--is up to the individual.
McCloskey, 60, a slightly prim woman whose Yorkie, Jane Austen, accompanies her to classes, said learning the female language of gestures was like studying a foreign language.
"I had to learn to change my gestures and I'm told they have gradually gotten more natural. I'm 6 feet tall, a large person, so it's important that I come across as a woman. It is an extremely bad life to be in between genders; it enrages people, particularly men."
As many transwomen do, McCloskey, whose masculine hands are a giveaway, had facial surgery to feminize her features; many electrolysis sessions; and vocal cord surgery to raise the pitch of her voice.
Stevens-Miller, a transgender activist, noticed that once she started on a low, maintenance dose of estrogen, she felt "more calm and at peace."
"Obviously hormones have a major effect on psychology. Testosterone will affect anyone's brain and make them more aggressive. I used to be hell on wheels and would have a tremendous temper and anger. I don't have that anymore."
Expressing emotions becomes more acceptable than it was when they lived as men.
"As a guy I would never cry; as a woman I cry," McCloskey said. "I think that's largely hormonal. Little boys cry, but as soon as the testosterone starts going ... believe me they want to cry as much as women do."
Dating is the one aspect of the transition that can be problematic for transsexuals.
McCloskey said she's looking for a boyfriend and has been using dating services without much success.
"I had this four-hour luncheon date recently with this really nice guy," she said. "We got along fairly well. I felt I had to tell him, so I sent him a copy of my book."
McCloskey told her harrowing story in "Crossing" (University of Chicago Press, $25).
"He didn't just drop me, but it's pretty plain he was quite surprised and I don't think much is going to come of it."
McCloskey, who was divorced and is estranged from her ex-wife and children as a result of her sex change, said her main intent is "companionship, not sex, sex, sex. Changing gender is never about sex. It's about sexuality. Sexual pleasure cannot be the point, the point is who you are."
Sexual orientation among transgenders runs the gamut, the same as in society at large. Male-to-female transpeople may have a heterosexual attraction to men or a lesbian attraction to women.
Stevens-Miller, for example, lives with a woman.
Unlike McCloskey, Stevens-Miller and Plotner, Lorraine Sade Baskerville did not try to conform to society's norms.
Waving a hand decorated with long silvery nails, she said, "I did not come out to this community. I stepped on the scene as Lorraine Sade. No way I ever considered myself a man!"
Dealing with gender early
Baskerville, 52, grew up in the Cabrini-Green housing project, the eldest of seven children. She said that since early childhood, she "self-identified as a girl. But I had to search [for information]. I thought I had a mental illness. I was always very feminine acting. I grew up with a father missing from the family. My mother was a very strong person. I learned from her."
After leaving home at 17, Baskerville worked every sort of job to make ends meet, and she started "transitioning" by doing research at the library and connecting with other people like herself.
"White transgender people have a risk involved," she said, while African-American people like herself, often battling poverty and discrimination, have less at stake.
"That's why we start out early dealing with gender at 13 or 14.
"Look what happens [to white transgenders]: They suppress everything, go in the Army, do all the stuff society says. At a certain age, they're married, kids, picket fence and the volcano erupts."
Baskerville has had several long-term relationships with men, lasting 12, 9 and 7 years, including her current involvement with a 56-year-old Jewish man who she says shares her philosophy.
"Three men in my life took care of me. They took care of me financially," she said.
Baskerville became a social worker in the 1980s and in 1995 founded TransGenesis, a social service agency for transgenders in Uptown. One of her main goals is to reach out to transgender youths, who often drop out of school because of verbal and emotional abuse, and end up on the streets.
Another goal is to start a health clinic for transgenders and a fund to award money for surgery. She is concerned about young transwomen who undergo dangerous silicone injections from "unqualified, incompetent providers underground," in an attempt to feminize their bodies. They often suffer consequences that include gangrene and HIV from unsanitary syringes, Baskerville said.
Gender reassignment surgery is expensive: $20,000 to $30,000 ($8,000 if you travel to in Bangkok, which makes it a popular destination for this kind of operation), leading some transwomen without means into illegal activities in an attempt to finance it. But they usually end up in jail instead of an operating room, Baskerville said.
Once the transition is complete, one of the biggest concerns of transwomen is physical safety.
"I'm much more careful of my physical surroundings, especially at night," said Plotner, chair of It's Time, Illinois, a transgender activist group. "A would-be mugger would perceive me as a much easier target, and then there's the issue of rape. I didn't worry about that before.
"Someone might say there are so many downsides, why would you want to do it? I had to do it. I just wanted to be me."
A lexicon of transgender terms
"Transgender" is an umbrella term for people whose gender identity or gender expression differs from their anatomical sex. The term may include but is not limited to:
Cross-dressers: People who routinely wear clothes associated with the opposite sex. Cross-dressing is a form of gender expression and is not necessarily tied to sexual orientation. Many cross-dressers are heterosexual.
Transvestites: A term that many transgender people consider derogatory. Often synonymous with female or male cross-dressers who are heterosexual.
"'Drag queens" or "kings": Female or male cross-dressers who are lesbian, gay or bisexual.
Female or male impersonators: Individuals who impersonate a different gender for entertainment purposes.
Intersexed: People whose sexual organs are ambiguous at birth. The commonly used term is hermaphrodite.
Gender transition: The process of altering one's sex that includes one or all of the following: changing one's name and/or sex on legal documents, hormone therapy, hair removal and chest and genital alteration.
Preoperative transsexuals: People who identify as one gender at all times -- a gender that conflicts with their anatomy. Many are either about to begin or are in the process of getting sex-change operations. This may also include people who have undergone or are undergoing hormonal treatment.
Postoperative transsexuals: People who have had full or partial surgery to change their gender. Transgender groups prefer the term "gender reassignment surgery" over "sex-change operation."
Source: Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation, San Francisco's Human Rights Commission, San Jose Mercury News reporting.
-- Knight Ridder Newspapers.
Life on the other side
Born male, they chose to become the women they knew they were
By Connie Lauerman
Tribune staff reporter
Published November 13, 2002
One of the first things Deirdre McCloskey noticed when she came out to society as a woman was "the quality of female friendship."
"It was astounding to me," said the University of Illinois-Chicago economics professor. "As a man I had lots of acquaintances. I wasn't a loner by any means. But I didn't have any real friends, and that's true of a surprisingly large number of men."
For Miranda Stevens-Miller, a research scientist at Kraft Foods, it was the realization that "your opinion was not as valuable.
"As a man I would sit in a meeting and everyone would get their opinions out there and they listened to you and it would make a difference. Now, I can make a suggestion and it's almost like it's not heard. Until it rattles round among other people in the room and then it comes out of someone else's mouth and then it's heard."
Welcome to the female gender!
It's not always easy being a woman. But for those who were born male and spent years trying to sort out their psychological discomfort about feeling female, once they make the transition into full, unabashed womanhood, the main feeling is one of relief. Any disadvantages can be taken in stride.
Transsexuals are more evident than ever among us. Often they are the butt of jokes, sensational television programs and outright discrimination in employment and housing.
Yet the word "transgender," rarely heard a few years ago, has entered the mainstream media.
"I was never a part of the men's club, because those who are transsexual don't all of a sudden become transsexual," said Stevens-Miller, a rangy blond with a model's sense of style, who is in her 50s.
"You are transsexual your whole life. Until you really figure out how you fit into the world, you don't fit anywhere. You feel like you're dealing with the world with a mask on."
Beth Plotner, a lawyer in Arlington Heights, said she thought about her gender identity all her life--often with fear. "As a child, when I got caught, we'll say, playing with inappropriate clothes, what my parents felt was proper gender behavior was literally beaten into me. I learned at a young age to hide."
Plotner, 45, began her transition from male to female in her late 30s, when the world was more accepting.
By then, transwomen were just as likely to be the woman next door or a co-worker, rather than simply distant anomalies, such as Christine Jorgensen, Renee Richards, or Welsh travel writer Jan Morris. But many, perhaps most, are not "out"; they prefer to blend in and not make an issue of their transition.
Psychiatrists use the term "gender dysphoria" to describe transsexuals' discomfort with their anatomic sex or their sense of inappropriateness in the gender role of that sex.
The incidence of people who feel that their minds and emotions don't match their bodies is 1 in every 11,900 who were born genetically male, and 1 in every 30,400 who were born genetically female.
Those statistics come from a study done in the Netherlands and replicated in other countries, including Singapore.
There is no estimate for the number of people in the U.S. Most people here pay for sexual reassignment surgery themselves. In the Netherlands and Singapore, sexual reassignment surgery is covered by national health insurance and conducted through a central clinic.
Those numbers reflect people who completed hormone therapy as well as sexual reassignment surgery. Walter Bockting, a psychologist and coordinator of transgender health services at the University of Minnesota, said the figures mean there are a lot more transgender women who may live as women but do not have the surgery. If the surgical procedures were covered by insurance, the number would be higher, he said.
Very often transwomen make the transition in middle age. Those who are married usually end up getting divorced.
Plotner's transition began at a point in her life when catastrophes had rained down on her. A power struggle at a law firm was forcing her out the door, her marriage was disintegrating, her father was diagnosed with terminal cancer, she herself had cancer, and her house was struck by lightning and caught fire.
She beat the cancer but the brush with death made her feel "entitled to some personal happiness." Her marriage ended with a contentious divorce, but she was able to win visitation rights to allow time with her two sons, 10 and 13, whom she said accepted the fact that Dad is now a woman.
Once living as a woman, Plotner, a long-haired brunette said she immediately became aware of "what a misogynistic world we live in."
"I go to the bank and people treat me with less respect. As a woman, they think I have less intelligence than I used to have."
Many challenging steps
Still, the physical transition represents another challenge. Transwomen typically undergo hormone therapy, large doses of estrogen at the beginning and an anti-androgen to block testosterone. As a result, breast size increases; fat is redistributed and body hair decreases.
Surgery to remove male genitalia and convert parts of the penis into a vagina then completes the process.
Gender expression--how they walk, talk and dress--is up to the individual.
McCloskey, 60, a slightly prim woman whose Yorkie, Jane Austen, accompanies her to classes, said learning the female language of gestures was like studying a foreign language.
"I had to learn to change my gestures and I'm told they have gradually gotten more natural. I'm 6 feet tall, a large person, so it's important that I come across as a woman. It is an extremely bad life to be in between genders; it enrages people, particularly men."
As many transwomen do, McCloskey, whose masculine hands are a giveaway, had facial surgery to feminize her features; many electrolysis sessions; and vocal cord surgery to raise the pitch of her voice.
Stevens-Miller, a transgender activist, noticed that once she started on a low, maintenance dose of estrogen, she felt "more calm and at peace."
"Obviously hormones have a major effect on psychology. Testosterone will affect anyone's brain and make them more aggressive. I used to be hell on wheels and would have a tremendous temper and anger. I don't have that anymore."
Expressing emotions becomes more acceptable than it was when they lived as men.
"As a guy I would never cry; as a woman I cry," McCloskey said. "I think that's largely hormonal. Little boys cry, but as soon as the testosterone starts going ... believe me they want to cry as much as women do."
Dating is the one aspect of the transition that can be problematic for transsexuals.
McCloskey said she's looking for a boyfriend and has been using dating services without much success.
"I had this four-hour luncheon date recently with this really nice guy," she said. "We got along fairly well. I felt I had to tell him, so I sent him a copy of my book."
McCloskey told her harrowing story in "Crossing" (University of Chicago Press, $25).
"He didn't just drop me, but it's pretty plain he was quite surprised and I don't think much is going to come of it."
McCloskey, who was divorced and is estranged from her ex-wife and children as a result of her sex change, said her main intent is "companionship, not sex, sex, sex. Changing gender is never about sex. It's about sexuality. Sexual pleasure cannot be the point, the point is who you are."
Sexual orientation among transgenders runs the gamut, the same as in society at large. Male-to-female transpeople may have a heterosexual attraction to men or a lesbian attraction to women.
Stevens-Miller, for example, lives with a woman.
Unlike McCloskey, Stevens-Miller and Plotner, Lorraine Sade Baskerville did not try to conform to society's norms.
Waving a hand decorated with long silvery nails, she said, "I did not come out to this community. I stepped on the scene as Lorraine Sade. No way I ever considered myself a man!"
Dealing with gender early
Baskerville, 52, grew up in the Cabrini-Green housing project, the eldest of seven children. She said that since early childhood, she "self-identified as a girl. But I had to search [for information]. I thought I had a mental illness. I was always very feminine acting. I grew up with a father missing from the family. My mother was a very strong person. I learned from her."
After leaving home at 17, Baskerville worked every sort of job to make ends meet, and she started "transitioning" by doing research at the library and connecting with other people like herself.
"White transgender people have a risk involved," she said, while African-American people like herself, often battling poverty and discrimination, have less at stake.
"That's why we start out early dealing with gender at 13 or 14.
"Look what happens [to white transgenders]: They suppress everything, go in the Army, do all the stuff society says. At a certain age, they're married, kids, picket fence and the volcano erupts."
Baskerville has had several long-term relationships with men, lasting 12, 9 and 7 years, including her current involvement with a 56-year-old Jewish man who she says shares her philosophy.
"Three men in my life took care of me. They took care of me financially," she said.
Baskerville became a social worker in the 1980s and in 1995 founded TransGenesis, a social service agency for transgenders in Uptown. One of her main goals is to reach out to transgender youths, who often drop out of school because of verbal and emotional abuse, and end up on the streets.
Another goal is to start a health clinic for transgenders and a fund to award money for surgery. She is concerned about young transwomen who undergo dangerous silicone injections from "unqualified, incompetent providers underground," in an attempt to feminize their bodies. They often suffer consequences that include gangrene and HIV from unsanitary syringes, Baskerville said.
Gender reassignment surgery is expensive: $20,000 to $30,000 ($8,000 if you travel to in Bangkok, which makes it a popular destination for this kind of operation), leading some transwomen without means into illegal activities in an attempt to finance it. But they usually end up in jail instead of an operating room, Baskerville said.
Once the transition is complete, one of the biggest concerns of transwomen is physical safety.
"I'm much more careful of my physical surroundings, especially at night," said Plotner, chair of It's Time, Illinois, a transgender activist group. "A would-be mugger would perceive me as a much easier target, and then there's the issue of rape. I didn't worry about that before.
"Someone might say there are so many downsides, why would you want to do it? I had to do it. I just wanted to be me."
A lexicon of transgender terms
"Transgender" is an umbrella term for people whose gender identity or gender expression differs from their anatomical sex. The term may include but is not limited to:
Cross-dressers: People who routinely wear clothes associated with the opposite sex. Cross-dressing is a form of gender expression and is not necessarily tied to sexual orientation. Many cross-dressers are heterosexual.
Transvestites: A term that many transgender people consider derogatory. Often synonymous with female or male cross-dressers who are heterosexual.
"'Drag queens" or "kings": Female or male cross-dressers who are lesbian, gay or bisexual.
Female or male impersonators: Individuals who impersonate a different gender for entertainment purposes.
Intersexed: People whose sexual organs are ambiguous at birth. The commonly used term is hermaphrodite.
Gender transition: The process of altering one's sex that includes one or all of the following: changing one's name and/or sex on legal documents, hormone therapy, hair removal and chest and genital alteration.
Preoperative transsexuals: People who identify as one gender at all times -- a gender that conflicts with their anatomy. Many are either about to begin or are in the process of getting sex-change operations. This may also include people who have undergone or are undergoing hormonal treatment.
Postoperative transsexuals: People who have had full or partial surgery to change their gender. Transgender groups prefer the term "gender reassignment surgery" over "sex-change operation."
Source: Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation, San Francisco's Human Rights Commission, San Jose Mercury News reporting.
-- Knight Ridder Newspapers.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2002-11-13 01:16 pm (UTC)i dont think that is true all of the time.
no subject
Date: 2002-11-13 01:18 pm (UTC)also, it looks like the reporter got the definitions from another source anyway. strange.
no subject
Date: 2002-11-13 01:24 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2002-11-13 01:43 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2002-11-13 02:34 pm (UTC)