sarahinshadows

[sarahinshadows]

Well, I would hope that I support myself, but then again I am known for my self-loathing....

Reblog if you support asexuals and aren’t a COWARD

RB if your blog is a safe, accepting space for asexuals!

[sarahinshadows]

Gods these are all so beautiful! I wish I could rock something like these.

BIBIAN BLUE Butterflies Collection if you want to support this blog consider donating to: ko-fi.com/fashionrunways

[sarahinshadows]

Sarah is a Chicken

I had the chance to finally come out to my shrink, and I chickened out. Telling people about myself online is easy, we’re all nameless, faceless 1s and 0s. And yes, I know you all have names, and some of you might actually have faces, I am not here to shame those of you who actually have faces.

Talking here, is like talking into the void, except occasionally that void responds. I can let out all my fears, and vent, and never have to try and look anyone in the eye. This is a safe space. Sure, there is the possibility of troll attacks, and whatnot, but… they are nameless and faceless, too. I can tune them out whenever I have to, because as far as I’m concerned, they are not real.

And even admitting who I am to Nicole Maines via video chat was safe. As far as she is concerned, I am just a nameless fan. It was easy to say something to her. If I ever ran into her on the street, she wouldn’t know me from the next schlub. Well, she might notice I am freakishly tall, but she wouldn’t remember me as the person that came out to her.

I suppose I am still just afraid. Fear is practically my prime motivator.

I’m a wimp, and that is all I will ever be.

[sarahinshadows]

Light Outside the Closet

I am pondering doing something that terrifies me. I am pondering telling my shrink about myself. Not necessarily the full story, because I don’t have time for that... nor do I think I am ready to let everything out. But I think I need to get at least some of it out in the open, in a way that isn’t purely digital.

If anyone has words of encouragement, and reads this, I can use every bit of courage I can get.

[sarahinshadows]

Motivation

Been having a hard time motivating myself lately. I want to write, I really want to keep this going, but I’ve just been unable to get myself to put the words down. Hell, it has been difficult motivating myself to do much of anything.

Perhaps I’ll be better tomorrow.

[sarahinshadows]

Feeling Emo, May Delete Later

I’ve spent my 11 hours at work fighting back tears. I don’t know why. So I feel like I will indulge in an old friend... Bad poetry!

You can skip this without being subject to my ramblings. Or you can click below and read those ramblings.

Crying voiceless into the void Silence calling back Tears shed for the can-never-bes Tears fall in the black No shoulder to catch my tears No one to hold dear Doubt that anyone would notice When I am not here

[sarahinshadows]

Hiding the Pain: Part 2

I’ve covered the suicidal ideations, and the self harm yesterday, today I’d like to delve into some of the emotional problems, and maybe I’ll be able to tie it all up with the transgender thing before I am too tired to function.

I wanted to write this overnight, while at work, but it got busy, and I didn’t much care for what I did get down. So I scrapped hours of work so I can instead write from the comfort of my blanket nest. Have I mentioned how much I love blankets?

So, hiding emotions is something I learned really early on. Emotions weren’t “manly”. Crying was looked down on, so I got the joy of bottling that up. I can’t begin to say how many times one of my parents said something to the effect of “You want to cry? I’ll give you something to cry about.”

The problem is, I was an emotional person. I would cry when I was happy, or sad, or angry, or when a breeze came in, or... you get the idea. My eyes were a veritable waterfall, and I had to learn to dam that shit up, or it led to the standard childhood beatings. Soon, I only allowed myself to cry in private. My pillow became my confidant, well... my pillow and a few stuffed animals before the plush was shunted off as kid’s stuff. Let me tell you, pillows are REALLY absorbent, the amount of tears mine have endured over the years...

But cycle back to something I said earlier, “emotions weren’t ‘manly’“. Manliness was something that was forced upon me. It was the societal construct that I was forced to adopt. Despite my desire to the contrary, I was put in to sports, and other “manly” endeavors.

Now, don’t get me wrong, sports are not inherently manly. But, at the time I felt it was an unnecessarily manly task. I wanted to learn to cook, I wanted to read, I wanted to create. I did not care for the physical.

I think this demonizing of emotions, might be part of why I hid my trans-ness. Emotions weren’t manly... I was supposed to be manly. The feminine was discouraged. If I showed interest in non-manly activities, I associated that with pain.

Who knows what my parents would have done if I had told them I was trans. Hell, at that point I didn’t even know “trans” was a thing. But to think of what my parents would have thought if I said I was a girl, and wanted to eschew that which I was told was manly...

So, I hid.

So, I hide.

So, I remain hidden.

And my pillow will continue to soak up the tears.

[sarahinshadows]

Hiding the Pain

My life has been all about hiding. And since this includes a few trigger warnings, Everything will be hidden behind a “Read More”. Heh A post about hiding being hidden, I crack myself up.

Trigger warnings: Suicidal ideation, self harm

If life taught me one thing, it taught me the importance of hiding. Hiding who I am, hiding how I feel, hiding what I do.

I’ve touched on my mental health issues in other posts, and I honestly do not know how in depth I went in those posts. I know I have discussed my anxiety, and I know I have at least mentioned in passing my depression and suicidal ideation. I want to focus on those.

I’ve pondered suicide for as long as I can remember. It has been my constant companion throughout my entire life, Always lurking there in my head, waiting for a moment of weakness to pounce. And as long as I’ve had those thoughts, I have known, on some level, that these were not “normal”... I don’t know exactly how I knew this, I just knew they were things to be hidden.

So I hid these thoughts. I locked myself up in my own head, and fought to keep it from getting out. Over the course of my life, I have made multiple poor attempts at suicide. Childish in their simplicity, looking back on them now, I can see the flaws in each and every one of them.

It should be telling that I critique my previous suicide attempts. I have pondered over those failed attempts for years, decades... I want to focus on a specific series of events.

It was in high school. I know this because it was after my first trip to a Renaissance Festival. At the festival, I bought several knives. I’d always been fascinated with sharp things. I bought these knives for a very specific purpose.

When it comes to suicidal ideas, I think the slit wrist is probably one of the most frequently pondered. It is simple in concept, much harder in execution. Having obtained my knives, I set to work.

Pain aversion is a common thing. We as a species are programed to avoid pain. That which brings us pain is bad, and thus to be avoided. However, I knew the concept of desensitization. If I could start with small pain, and work my way up slowly, I would be able to handle the big pain.

Pursuant to that idea, I began cutting. Small marks in the upper portion of my left arm. First rather shallow, superficial things. Soon growing deeper. The little ones were easy... The deeper ones took a lot, and I never fully got to the point of slitting my wrist. Instead I have a small web of scars crisscrossing my arm.

I chose the upper part of the left arm, specifically because it was easy to hide. Letting others know what I was doing was only inviting problems. And suffice to say, I realized then that pain was going to be a huge hindrance to my attempts.

This has been a sort of pattern for me. I hide everything. I suffer in silence. And now I have a place to express myself anonymously, I can sort of unload that suffering... I can start to let out some of my issues, and I can start to come to terms with who and what I am. I think suicide will come up multiple times in my writing... But that is solely to get it off my chest. These are things that I need to let go, and an anonymous place that no one reads, seems like a good way to unburden myself.

Gods... I wanted to segue into how this related to my being trans, but... This has gone on too long, I’m tired, and I need some sleep.

Perhaps I will continue tomorrow.

[sarahinshadows]

Name that Tune

Building on my post from yesterday, I want to go into another topic for which I believe society has set up a certain gender-based bias.That topic is music. Once more, I speak only of my personal experience.

I don’t know when it started. I know that up to a certain age, music was just music. Making myself feel old here, but at one point, it seemed no one cared if you listened to Twisted Sister, or Tiffany, Def Leppard or Debbie Gibson. Music was music, and no one cared. This may have had something to do with my inability to relate to my peers, but I feel that those were universal staples of 80′s music. Well, them and the standard Michael Jackson and Madonna brand of pop.

At some point, I think it might have been high school, music started to become gendered. For a guy, rock was the only way to go. The ladies had sole dominion over the land of pop. If I showed interest in No Doubt, I was scorned. But rocking out to Green Day got the approval of my peers.

I will admit fully that I listened to both, but only admitted to liking the rock, for personal safety reasons. Now, some may argue that No Doubt was a pop rock group, but based on the looks I go when humming Spiderwebs while walking down the halls at school, I can say that No Doubt was firmly entrenched in women’s music.

The only music that crossed gender lines was country, but country is awful, and is not worth including.

I feel that the gender of music has stayed the same, as I grew older. Listening to Katy Perry was forbidden, listening to Eminem was cool. It seemed that the older I got, the more gendered music became. To this day, I feel like listening to Taylor Swift will earn me the scorn of my peer group, but listening to Slipknot, is okay.

The problem I fall into, is that my musical tastes span the entire musical spectrum. I love classical, pop, rock, punk, heavy metal, even some rap. The playlist on my phone will go from Beethoven, to Slipknot, to Katy Perry, to the soundtrack from Rent on the regular. As long as I am listening privately, I let it go, enjoying my eclectic tastes unfettered freedom to express itself. But, I have a different playlist to listen to if others might overhear.

I find it disheartening that there appears to be societal standards of what music one can listen to, primarily if you are perceived as a guy. Hell, I half want to come out, just so I can listen to whatever I want without fear of judgment.

Does anyone else notice a sort of gender line in music? Anyone else have massively bipolar playlists? What do you listen to or think I should listen to? I’m up for anything...

Except country. Fuck country.

[sarahinshadows]

Societal Expectations

I think that it is important to address the role societal expectations plays in our lives.

We watch TV, and are bombarded with people society tells us are beautiful. The size zero woman, with amazing breasts, or perhaps the svelte man with the washboard abs. We see ads, or look in magazines and we see airbrushed “perfection”. It is practically programmed into us what to expect when it comes to the terms masculine and feminine.

Bear with me on this next part, because I’m gonna swerve a bit into cis-normative wording.

People have often talked about how this causes a body dysmorphic disorder in young girls. An expectation to be that size zero woman, because that is what feminine is. An expectation that one must have breasts of a certain size, even if that size looks absurd on a person’s frame. It leads to eating disorders and low self esteem and a general feeling of despair at the inability to reach that goal.

The same is true of young men, but not talked about nearly as much. Men are expected to have an amazing beard, and muscles that bulge even without being flexed. One must have that perfect six pack, and that v taper. This is what society has told us masculine is. It leads to insane exercise routines and stupid diets.

We are also told what masculine and feminine are in terms of activities and musical taste and taste in literature etc. Media has programmed these things into us, and it is difficult as fuck to break out of that. To realize that one can be overweight, or not some unattainable airbrushed perfection. It is doable though.

The trans community I feel has it even worse. Not only has society told us what a man or woman looks like, we often feel like we have to overcome both of these very difficult hurdles. (This may just be my own experience speaking, so I apologize if it does not speak to everyone’s experience). We have to overcome the societal expectations of our birth sex, and the societal expectations of our actual gender.

We are told certain traits are masculine, for the sake of brevity we will go with a beard. We are told that certain traits are feminine, for the sake of brevity we will go with breasts. As a trans woman, I have to get over the masculine traits, and then slide on over to the feminine traits. To achieve validity in who I am, I have to banish the masculine, and attain the feminine.

The thing is... I don’t have to do that.

Sure, there is the dysphoria, and it is an overwhelming feeling. Dysphoria is rather akin to dysmorphia. We see flaws in how we are perceived, we see that we must strive to erase those flaws to announce to the world that “I am a man/woman”. But it is not a necessity.

Just because I look like a man outwardly, does not mean I am not a woman. Just because I can’t wear those cute outfits that I would love to be able to wear, does not invalidate who I know I am. Do I still suffer from the dysphoria? Yes. What I see in the mirror is completely out of line with who I am. Would I love to have those perfect breasts and that size zero body? Damn skippy I would. That is where the dysphoria and the dysmorphia meet.

I think the massive amounts of surgery that trans people go through to attain the features associated with their actual gender are a symptom in part of these societal expectations. We want others to affirm that we are who we are. We want society to accept us as the man or woman we know ourselves to be.

The question is... can we be trans, and not fight against those two hurdles? Can we be women or men and present as the opposite? Is it possible to forego societal validation without negating ourselves?

Honestly I don’t know... but I think that is what living in the closet is... a sort of resignation that we will never reach that goal. We will never be that sort of Hollywood perfection. To the outside world, I will always be a 6 foot 8 man. Society will always think of me as a man. That does not in any way invalidate that I am a woman.

Who knows, maybe some day there will be a surgery that can fix all my masculine traits. It will push me over that divide that separates the masculine and the feminine. But until then, I will remain Sarah in the shadows.

I may some day let myself be known to others, but there is a part of me that wonders if that might not be worse. Would having someone call me Sarah, while I am not presenting as feminine only reinforce that dysphoria, heighten the dysmorphia?

Ugh I wish I had the answers to these questions.

[sarahinshadows]

Pronouns

You have no idea how many times I am lying in bed (or on the floor, or on the couch) I get a great idea for my next post. The problem is, my lazy ass doesn’t feel like getting up and writing at that time. Often this is due to something stupid like the need to “sleep”. To fix this, I thought I would place a note pad and a pen nearby at all times. This led to a new problem that I like to call “tired Sarah bullshit”

The top thing on the notepad when I woke up today was “Pronouns”. I didn’t give myself any indication of WHAT I wanted to write about pronouns... also my handwriting is rather sloppy so it might have said pro nouns, which would seem to indicate that there is some sort of anti-noun movement that left me feeling the need to defend the usage of nouns.

I’m going to assume it was pronouns, and move on.

When I was in school, I was taught there were a relatively small number of pronouns. I, you, he, she, it... you know the drill if you’ve taken any English class... if you haven’t taken an English class and are reading this, I applaud your self-learning of this insanely complicated language.

Now, there seems to be new neo-pronouns popping up every day. This is actually rather fascinating to me from a linguistic standpoint, since these neo-pronouns seem to have no basis in any language, and seem to be new constructs. Granted using something like “xe/xim” could be seen as a derivation of the “he/him” construct, the inclusion of the x in place of the h is intriguing.

Now, I honestly love the variation. The personalizing of pronouns is a great thing, but that does lead to potential confusion. With so many of them, it becomes hard to remember the variations. I honestly never want to get things wrong, and often fall back on a simple “they/them” pronoun combo. I find that this combo is the easiest way to:

1) avoid misgendering 2) attempt to convince people that I am not a forgetful asshole.

As an outsider to the community at large, I wonder what everyone’s stance is on these neo-pronouns. Does the inclusion of these pronouns undermine the validity of the transgender/ genderfluid/ demigender experience to the outside world? Does the public at large see these as a way to minimize various aspects of the community at large? Does someone have a pronunciation guide, so I can avoid mispronouncing them in my head?

Thoughts?

[sarahinshadows]

Deeper into the Closet

As I have stated before, I hide in the closet. I’ve lived there for so many years, the thought of leaving it is terrifying. Writing here has been helping with my fear of coming out, to the point where I thought I might out myself to a couple friends. I wasn’t quite there, but I had chosen the two friends I would come out to, and then after last night, I returned to my nice dark corner.

In the middle of our semi-regular gaming night the topic segued from political ranting to a an anti LGBT rant, full of jokes at the expense of the community. I did my best to fight back against the tide, but I ended up just over-whelmed, and rather than sticking up for the community, I ended up fighting to keep myself composed.

To say I am disheartened at this point, is an understatement. 1 step forward, 3 steps back...

I need to find a community in the area that I might be able to try and be myself around.

[sarahinshadows]

On the Topic of Trust

I have mentioned in the past, that I have issues with trust. I don’t trust people, because when you trust people, you only open yourself up to pain. This is not to say I don’t occasionally learn to trust people, it just means that it takes a lot to get me to trust you. Does that make me a horrible partner? Perhaps... but once I do trust you, I am all in. If you gain my trust, I will trust you implicitly.

And, as it tuns out, everyone I have ever trusted has managed to use that trust to cause me pain. Which in turn makes me even less trusting.

Shall we take a walk down the path of my most recent betrayal of trust? Warning… This is VERY long, but I think worth the read to get to understand me better.

First off, there may be some hyperbole in the following story. In panic situations I have been known to sort of black parts of my memory out. The core of the story is 100% true, there just might be embellishments here and there based on the redacted parts of my memory

For this, there are things you must understand about me. One, I am absolutely terrified of crowds. I can last for short periods in a crowd, but if I don’t get out quickly enough, I tend to create a path through to safety, sometimes in a very physical manner.

Over time, I had created a coping mechanism. Something I liked to call an emotional anchor. The anchor was a person who I managed to trust at least slightly, who I can anchor myself to. I use them as my strength when the tumultuous sea of the crowd begins to toss me violently.

My most recent anchor, was my former girlfriend.

We had decided to go to GenCon together. For those that don’t know, GenCon is like a nerd paradise. several days of board games and insanity. It is also insanely popular and can draw crowds that are more than a little extreme. Several months prior to GenCon, I began voicing my growing unease about the whole ordeal, but the former girlfriend kept telling me it would be okay, she’d be there with me.

I had explained to her my need of an emotional anchor. She knew how terrified of crowds I was. She seemed to accept those things and seemed understanding.

Perhaps a week or two before the convention, my anxiety hit a peak. I told her to go without me, I can’t stomach the thought of going. I mean I was getting physically ill at the thought of the crowds. She again assured me that she would be there with me. She knew I needed that anchor, and she said she was ready to be that anchor. The first day went relatively well. While I was still a little flustered, I had my anchor and managed to make it through

The second day, things went to shit.

She told me at the beginning of the day that she planned on going off and doing her own thing. I naturally voiced misgivings about the validity of this course of action, but she assured me that we would meet up again at 4:30 ish for a panel. Reluctantly I agreed, and we went our separate ways for the day. My path took me to artist’s alley. The artist’s alley tends to be the least crowded in conventions, and I knew a couple of the artists, so I had someone to talk to to keep my mind off the teeming mass.

Around 2:30 ish, the crowds began to overwhelm me, so I decided to break away, and hide in the lobby near where the panel was going to be. To my shock, the line was already fairly extensive, and so I got in line, immediately texting my girlfriend that the line was large, but I was saving her a spot.

No answer.

Half an hour later, I texted again, this time through Facebook, to see if that worked.

No answer.

At this point the line had grown to the point that the lobby was becoming impassable. So, the convention overlords started moving us into a small room, to sort of ease the mass of people away from the lobby. Naturally, I texted again, letting her know that the line was moving, and it would soon be really hard for me to save her a spot.

No answer.

The line advanced to the point that I was brought into the room, and who do I see toward the front of the line? That’s right. My former girlfriend. Since I had been holding a spot for her, I figured she was holding a spot for me. I walked in her direction, only to be greeted with a very gruff “No cuts!” from my ex. With terror in my eyes, and a cold grip on my heart, I assumed my place in the serpentine line inside the room.

At first, I was doing okay. Sure, there was a crowd, but I had room. I could hold my arms out, and I had room to move. Space in a crowd can also make crowds bearable. I suppose in part to it cutting down on the crowdy-ness.

That comfort was not to last.

The convention overlords entered the room and informed us that they needed to fit even more people into the room, so we were going to have to get closer together. Reluctantly, I allowed the crowd to push in, my heart beating faster by the second. Soon, the crowd was so packed, that I couldn’t turn around without hitting someone, we were in shoulder to shoulder and pressed up to each other. I lasted a rather impressive five minutes.

The terror welled up until finally the dam broke. Like a bulldozer, I rammed my way through the crowd, pushing people out of the way as I tried desperately to escape. This led to a long period of fear induced crying, in the middle of a gigantic mass of people.

The day went on, I mixed benzos and alcohol to calm myself down (bad combo! Never do it!) It managed to calm my heart to at least relatively normal levels.

Blah blah blah, the convention ended, or at least my time at the convention ended.

Sunday, rather going to the convention, we were set to drive to St. Louis for a good spot to watch a total solar eclipse. Rather than taking two cars down, with her family in one, and me and her in the other, she thought it more prudent to all go in a single car. Being the giant that I am, this led to uncomfortable closeness during a drive that took nearly 3 times as long as it should have. This was another level of torture that the weekend decided to thrust upon me.

Again, this is a part of my life she knew about… I did not like having no room, and so I spent the entire way, breathing heavily and justifying to myself that getting out of the car and walking back to my car was not the answer. Even If by that point my car was nearly 100 miles away.

Blah blah blah, the eclipse happened, and we went back the same way we had come. 1 car, packed with 5 bodies. Again, I was terrified, and again the trip took nearly 3 times as long as it should have.

Fast forward to a week later.

I had not been able to get a word out of my ex. She wouldn’t reply to my texts. Only after several days of intermittent texting did she respond with the infamous line, “We need to talk”

As such things often go, she told me she wanted to break up, and had since before the convention. Had she broken up with me prior to the convention, I would have been fine. Sure, there would be the heartbreak of losing someone to cuddle with, but I would have survived.

Instead, she allowed the personal torture of the entire trip happen. She tortured me mentally and emotionally, knowing full well that she had no intention of staying with me. Had she broke up beforehand, I would have been out the price of the ticket, but meh… I was already ready to do that.

I had an emotionally break at this point.

I had been tortured to the point that I couldn’t take it. This was the point where I sought therapy, because my mind had turned to suicide so strongly that I did not know if I was going to be able to survive.

Blah blah blah, my trust had been betrayed, and I have not been able to trust anyone since.

Any good break up stories from anyone that might have made it this far?

[sarahinshadows]

Labels

We all apply labels to ourselves, even if it is just in our head. For my purposes I would like to go into a somewhat lengthy post about my specific labels for myself. Well, two of those labels really.

I would like to talk about asexual and biromantic.

Now, I would like to start off by saying I have no real close friends in the LGBTQ+ community. I have no one I can talk to face to face. I suppose a part of that may be because I hide in the closet, but I do believe that if I did have a close friend who identified themselves as part of the community, I might be much more likely to come out... to them at least.

Why do I mention that? Simple. Because my labels are self-made. I honestly do not know if I meet the criteria used to decide whether one is asexual or biromantic... frankly, I don’t even know if biromantic is a thing, or if there is some other better term I could use. Or are the labels unique for everyone? Does biromantic, if it is a thing, negate the asexual?

Gods, I think that imposter syndrome is rearing its ugly head again.

What do I mean when I call myself asexual? I think I touched on this topic in perhaps my introduction. Basically, I don’t feel sexual attraction to people. I can recognize that their aesthetic is visually appealing. I can recognize that they are athletic, or if they smell nice. I recognize nice hair, and beautiful eyes. But at no point do I say to myself “I’d like to have sex with that individual”. This gets me to thinking, perhaps I don’t know what sexual attraction feels like? I mean, can anyone really describe to another personal the intricacies of human emotion and sensation? Don’t we at some point have to mentally decide that “This is what ‘pain’ is” or “This is what happiness is”? GAH! This line of thought always makes my brain hurt, and I honestly do not know how best to articulate my thoughts on this.

Anyway, is my self-label of asexual a direct result of my lack of trust in other people? Is it tied to the dysphoria? If I was comfortable in my own body, would I want to be intimate with people? I don’t know. Frankly, it is something that I have lain awake at night pondering rather frequently. With all that said, as things are currently, I do not feel anything that my mind would label sexual attraction to other human beings.

Biromantic is an interesting term. For me it means I can feel romantic attraction to any person. That is to say, I don’t want to fuck them, but I wouldn’t mind curling up near a fire with them, or watch TV snuggled up together under a blanket. Nothing sexual, just a sort of platonic cuddling. There is a part of me that desires physical contact, while there is a part of me that is utterly repulsed by the concept of physical contact. I want to be wooed, I want to woo, but I do not want to woo woo! I like the feeling of companionship. I think that may be the real thing, I crave companionship. I want someone to be there when I cry, or to share my happiness with. I want a partner. I want someone who I can truly and completely open up to.

Does this make sense at all?

My brain hurts now… I’m going to curl up in my blanket nest now.

[sarahinshadows]

Well, I want to play along!

Female, Biromantic Asexual, Tacos have lettuce so they count as a vegetable!

if you’re lgbt tag this with your gender/sexuality and your favourite kind of chips

[sarahinshadows]

*Squeals at the cuteness*

[sarahinshadows]

Personal Evolution

I am going to do something that I have never done in this post... I am going to associate my birth name with my name. I mean, I’m only going to give you first and middle name, I’m leaving my last name private.

It is worth mentioning, I have only once vocalized my trans-ness... and that was to Nicole Maines. So, she is the only person who has ever heard me speak the words, or at least in a sort of rambling round about fashion. For me, it was important to say it to someone who could relate to what I had to say... and sure, a celebrity is not really the best person to come out to, but it’s not like she’ll remember me, right? So in the end it was about the safest thing.

So this is harder than I thought it would be.

My birth name, is Michael Daniel (insert last name here).

I want to say, that from an early age, I absolutely fucking hated my real name. I can’t stand it. I tried shortening it to Mike, to be at least a little more bearable, but it still never felt right. Daniel / Dan never felt right, either. As a child I never thought of using any other name.

Being raised Catholic, I was Confirmed, and thus in the Catholic church, I got a second middle name, for some bullshit reason or other. This was the first time I was ever able to actually CHOOSE a name. It might be of interest that the name I eventually chose, was “James”. (Hey! Now you know the origins of two parts of my name!)

Moving on to college, I was lost in a sea of Mikes. Literally. My first class was a calculus class, and there were 13 fucking Mikes in my class... 13! With my last name, I was the LAST Mike called when the professor was doing roll call. By the time they got to me, every conceivable iteration of Mike had been taken. So for the second time in my life I got to choose a name. This time, I chose Frank.

In all of this, I never once considered using a female name. I knew that it would set me up as ...unusual. And I never wanted to stick out. I went with safe names. Always looking out for my own safety. I had been hurt by my peers enough, I refused to offer any more fodder to that particular fire.

It was during my first couple years as Frank, that Sarah was born

I’m sure other trans people can relate to that hunt for the right name. The name that feels somehow...right. I had tried out a number of different names. Entirely too many. I will not bore you with an exhaustive list. It was on IRC that I first tried Sarah, and for the first time, I had a name that I thought felt like me.

Sarah was actually sort of an inside joke. A joke so inside, that only I was in on it. But now you can be, too!

In the long long ago, there was a book released. It was a children’s book, and it was called “Sarah, Plain and Tall”. I can’t actually remember a damned thing about the book itself, other than the title. But that title... it described me so well. I am rather plain, and also extremely tall. 6′8 to be exact.

And now you know the reason behind all three names I use! Aren’t you lucky?