Trans Parent
by Tom R.
I’m a parent.
I’m also a transparent. Or a trans-parent. Or maybe a Trans Parent.
It’s odd that I can’t write that descriptor in a more definite way, especially since my whole life I’ve understood the word ‘transparent’ to mean something that was easily seen, or at least seen through.
Maybe that’s the difficulty.
When I first learned that our child was trans-sexual - or transgendered - or dealing with what a book called Gender Identity Disorder, the situation surely wasn’t transparent. I struggled to see clearly. How do I think of this? How do I understand it? After all, aren’t new situations clarified by categorizing, by making an analogy of the new, confusing situation to one that’s more familiar, better-understood? If only I could be logical enough, smart enough – then I could see through the clutter, then things would be more ‘transparent’.
Logic proved elusive.
But I persisted. I read – and researched – and googled. “Talk about your feelings” was the common suggestion I found everywhere. Talking it out would surely be the key that turned the lock. What’s easier than talking? But talking about feelings – after a lifetime of mostly suppressing them, of believing that feelings can obscure clarity, and often lead to thinking that’s wishful and murky rather than strong and precise. And exactly how was I supposed to talk about feelings when I didn’t understand how I felt?
Talking about my feelings was going to be hard.
If only things could be easier – like when our child was younger, and I could recognize the growth, appreciate the struggles, find joy in the many successes, console (at least as best I could) the infrequent failures. I was a father, a homework-helper, an occasional sports coach. Do-the-right-thing, bring-home-the-bacon, task-focused Dad stuff. It was how I showed I loved my family. In return my family loved me.
I was a parent.
And then it happened - there it was. Transparency. Like the song said, “I can see clearly now.”
I see that the role of parent is all about the two-way exchange of love, an exchange that’s as different from time to time as it is from person to person. That exchange has never stopped – it’s still necessary – for parents in general and for transparents in particular. I still recognize growth and appreciate struggles. I still share joy in successes and console disappointments. The times are surely different – my homework-helping value is long past, and don’t even ask about sports coaching. But trans-parenting has added new dimensions to my experience, new facets for my view. The suppressed feelings came out. I love my child - still, I need to tell him so – often, and I need him to love me. I need to be clear and transparent about that.
In so many ways, we’re still the same. The same people. The same needs. The same love.
And yet we are different. We’ve all changed. We’ve all grown. I hope we’ve improved. I just can’t put a label on the changes – and I don’t need to.
I love my family. My family loves me.
I’m a parent.