Can't You Just Be ONE Way?!

This was an interesting request from one of my best friends in high school. We were driving somewhere and I remember this scene so vividly even though it was thirty years ago.

Her, interrupting me: Can't you just be one way?!

Me, totally confused and taken off guard: What do you mean?

Her, annoyed: Like this...this thing you do. Why can't you just be like everyone else and be just one way?

Me, still clueless: I don't know.

I was shocked and completely unaware of anything that I could possibly be doing that aggravated her so much. And what did she mean about this 'one way' jazz?

Over the next few days I tried to figure out what I was doing, as a seventeen year old high school senior, that was so outrageously not 'one way'. The best I could discover is that I had work boots next to high heels next to toe shoes next to soccer cleats, in my closet. And then I had sports sweatshirts folded next to Dean sweaters folded next to pastel angora cowl neck sweaters next to over sized flannel buttoned shirts.

Was this the issue that drove my friend mad? That my closet looked like twelve different people used it?

As time rolled along I came to understand my own discomfort with being more than 'one way'. I would wear men's briefs (before it was 'stylish' to do so) under a pretty skirt and thong underwear under my man pants. My first and only pair of penny loafers were purchased not in a cute store or Bass outlet shop but rather from the little old Italian man in the beaten up shoe shop in the center of town. They were men's shoes. The shoemaker even put a penny in them for me.

I wear fedoras, and hemp caps, and pretty girly fluffy hair muffs. I love my black men wingtip shoes and my five inch heel glitter dancing shoes.

One way, you say. Who needs that boredom, I say! I also say, I am only being who I am and I can't be any other way.

I have caused great curiosity and some negative reactions from people because, quite frankly, I just don't understand GENDER. I guess I don't "play nice" when it comes to gender roles, identity, or orientation. That simply means, I live my way.

People get very very VERY confused with gender 'stuff' so in this blog I will put it all out there nice and easy. A little primer of sorts. This should make us all breathe easier and enjoy any and all ways of wonderful human kind!! We can only hope!

Gender Roles: This is the society ruling on what children, youth, adults, and elders should  do depending on whether they were born with a penis or a vagina. And for those that were born with a combination of the two or no clear visible sign of either, well, the doctors and parents got to decide on a penis or vagina, form a gender identity for the baby, and then subsequently tell the child how to behave and what to do - the child's role in the world based on her or his genitalia.

So Gender Roles affected us in ways like, I was a girl and loved to climb trees and get into wrestling fights. As a girl I was suppose to play jump rope and dress up dolls. I had absolutely no interest in many typical girl activities. When I was three years old I hurt my head because I liked to lie under my bed, chairs, and tables on my back and pretend to be a car mechanic. My father was not a car mechanic. We didn't live near an auto garage. I just innately loved pretending to fix cars!

All of these "boy" interests made me stand out, look odd, and be called a Tomboy.  Boys also faced abuse and became outcasts if they did anything like knit, cook, or chose not to want to beat up other boys on the playground. They were often called sissies.  Why do we even have to have a name for a child being authentically who she or he is? Probably because we have great difficulty feeling safe in a kaleidoscope of colorful diversity. Too bad for all of us.

People who cross dress would fall under the gender role line as they do not want to be the other gender, they simply enjoy dressing more than "one way". 

Gender Identity: This is the biological gender that we each identify as regardless of biological genitalia.

There are many incredible stories about gender identity for people of all ages. There are profound instances of children having their biological gender chosen such as the story of  David (Bruce) Reimer.

There are people who were born biologically as one gender and yet were sure, even from a very very young age, that they were suppose to be the opposite gender. http://www.colby.edu/personal/j/jfboylan/not_there.htm

In this category of gender identity there would be women and men who transition to the other gender using hormones and sometimes full surgery to have the other gender body pieces. This is sexual reassignment surgery. Not all transgender people will have full surgery. Often times they have their breasts either removed as they become fully men or hormones and augmentation as they become fully women. "Bottom" surgery is more difficult and often times people will not choose to have this.

Gender Sexual Orientation: This is the gender that one is attracted to for sexual pleasure. Gay men, Lesbian women, Heterosexual men and women, Bi-Sexual people, and Pansexual people.

Pansexual people are attracted to a person, a being, an energy source, regardless of gender or phase of gender. A Pansexual person would be in a loving sexual relationship with a transgender person and there would be no issue with what level of transitioning was or wasn't occurring.

People seem to get most confused with transgender people and their sexual preferences. It is very important to note that just because a man identifies as a woman and transitions to being a full time woman, this does not mean that he wants to be in a sexual or partnership relationship with a man once he becomes a woman.
People are attracted to a specific gender, or both genders, or all levels of gender fluidity. This does not usually change based on their gender identity. On occasion hormone use can affect a person's gender sexual orientation.

All of these three gender points; roles, identity, and orientation, exist separate from one another. We cannot judge who someone should be attracted to based on their genitals, whether they were born with the ones they have or surgically had them placed there. We also cannot judge what a person would like to do for a living or for a hobby based on their genitals, whether they were born with the ones they have or surgically had them placed there.

A quick summary:
Gender roles: the oppressive story that represses true joy in people because they are ostracized if they do not act, work, sit, behave, dress as a society tells them to do based on whether they have a vagina or a penis. (hhmm...do I have an opinion on this?)
Gender Identity: the emotional, mental, spiritual, and physical need to be a specific gender regardless of the biological parts of either vagina or penis, and breasts or no breasts, that one was born with. One could also be a combination of both genders, Androgynous or Universal (as someone lovingly told me that I was/am)
Gender Sexual Orientation: the sexual and relationship partnerships that one feels authentically drawn to engage in. Homosexual (same gender, biological or surgical), heterosexual (opposite genders, biological or surgical), bi-sexual (attracted to both genders), and pansexual (attracted to any and all genders and fluidity of genders).

As I have had the opportunity of age, wisdom, reflection, and beautiful people in my life as friends, lovers, and partners, I have come to rejoice and celebrate that I can't be just one way. I am not one way. I am a Pansexual Universal human who lives far beyond gender roles. This is because I see love as the only defining criteria for living. So I guess, I am ONE WAY afterall...and that ONE WAY is total and pure love, respect, awe, and support of each person to live a life based from the exact gender role, gender identity, and gender sexual orientation that aligns with their joyful, beautiful, unique self.

My Hormones Made Me Do It!

Hormones make us do wild, emotional things - just ask any teacher of middle school students! I remember being on recess duty when there was an especially harsh "throw water bottles at each others' junk" game

going on. Why middle school age boys like to whip hard objects at each others penises and scrotum (is a bunch of scrotum called scroti?) alludes me and perhaps has been a curious question since the beginning of time.The girls took sides regarding which boy should be defended, with one girl actually scratching the " bad boy" in the head. Often times my role at that school was to sit the small class down and unpack the heightened hysteria.

Another day a recess fight between two boys landed them in the main classroom with the math teacher. She was an incredible woman and did a wonderful job following their completely sporadic conversation and moods. As I joined the group, the boys were just beginning to find common ground between them...sobbing about all their fears and difficulties in life. These boys went from anger and defensiveness, to bonding over how hard life was as a twelve year old all in the span of twenty minutes.

Dear friends, we all get slammed by hormones. This is a fact of being a human. When we are young we begin cycling at about eight years old. Our hormones begin to surge in during periods of time letting us get used to the natural chemicals that will keep us hostage for the next forty years or so of our lives!

When we get to eleven and twelve years old those hormones start really pushing our bodies into new shapes, changes in voice pitch, pimples, and more intense sexual reactions to stimulation. There also is natural practicing of the equipment, shall we say, and this can cause great distress to boys in the locker room when their penises just decide to rise to erection when they are all changing. Those dang hormones making us do all this stuff!!

We get loaded up with natural hormones, and then things fly...sometimes literally. I remember one guy friend was a little shell shocked with he moved in with his girlfriend. "I didn't know that P.M.S. stood for Pack My Suitcase!" Oh what a ride it all is.

Women definitely can be taken over by hormones during much of their lives. We start cycling at age eight, get the full blown monthly slam, pregnancies can thrown in a huge curve ball, and then peri - menopause is just a bizarre surreal existence. My second hot flash of peri-menopause occurred in Deb's Natural Gourmet market in Concord, Ma. The fire department had to be called in and I am not kidding. It was a 911 alert and I did not make the call because I was passing out after being thrust into the dairy cooler by a friend I hadn't seen in five years. Oh hormones, you make my heart sing...you make everything groovy...wild thing....

Alas, it is not only women who go through hormonal insanity, much to the chagrin of you men out there who don't listen to the very real annoying things that you do and discount it all when we are foaming at the mouth while shoving sweet, then salty, then sweet, then chocolate, then sweet, then salty, in to our mouths. Men actually have cycles as well. When men begin to have a decrease in testosterone it can be very difficult. Testosterone begins to decline for men in their 30s. If there is low testosterone then men can feel very tired, depressed, anxious, weak, and lose their sex drive. This can lead to erectile dysfunction. Testosterone is also very important for overall body health.

And while we have heard about women affected by natural hormones going off the edge, men injecting hormones think they are succeeding having an edge, http://abcnews.go.com/Health/Drugs/middle-age-men-turn-testosterone-edge-health-risks/story?id=17203276

Hormones are natural in the human body and they have their own ebb and flow which both men and women need to learn to accept in themselves and in each other. At some points in our lives, both men and women can have a spike in hormone levels, a significant change in hormone balance, or a decline in hormone levels. Both genders react to the hormone amounts being secreted, and both genders are greatly impacted emotionally and physically by their hormone levels. When our hormones are doing their wild things, we all can be uncomfortable. I will never forget the look on my ex husband's face when he met me in the grocery check out line with a package of bacon I had asked him to run and get. I was about five months pregnant with our first daughter and was craving a good bit of bacon. When I turned the package over to look at the 'bacon window' I saw a display of white fat. I began to both sob and yell at him in line. "This is a terrible package of bacon! Can't you see all the fat? Where is the bacon? Where is the bacon here?!" He looked worse than a deer in the headlights!

By the second pregnancy his reaction was less of shock and panic and more direct. I had taken an entire half gallon of vanilla ice cream and covered it in peanut butter and then poured chocolate syrup all over it. I snuggled my eight month pregnant body into the bed and dug in with a huge spoon. It looked delicious. Then I spooned it into my mouth. Tears began to drip out of the corner of my eyes. "This is not as good as I thought it would be..." I can still feel the disappointment and wave of despair related to that discovery twenty seven years ago!!

My ex husband didn't even look up from his book. "Next time maybe you shouldn't use all the ice cream for a craving. Try out a little bit first."

 But of course I had no choice -  my hormones made me do it!