Just Being Me

Just Being Me Part 1

I just am

Please don't repress me any more

To be myself – Eighteen years before:

O Dutiful son why won't you be what I demand?

Because it's killing me

Arms up, ready to kick off on one heel and twirl! Dress go spinny! The five year old child giggles with delight as the lower part of her dress spins in the air before settling, it was such a beautiful dress and she was glad that she had managed to borrow it. She was going to return it later, she just really wanted to try it on right now.
It was perfect for her. She giggles again joyfully and wonders what her mum would think so she heads downstairs skipping happily until the steps where she goes down carefully since she was still a little clumsy on them.

Stepping into the living room she proudly proclaims with such joy in her heart:

"I'M A GIRL!" The next thing she remembers is waking up in pain after a sudden hard impact and a loud cracking sound that sounded very close, her left arm broken and her head hurting badly while her body is slumped against a wall and her dad standing over her with a balled up fist, there was a little blood on it, her own.

"YOU ARE A BOY AND IF YOU EVER DO THAT AGAIN I'LL BEAT IT OUT OF YOU!" She screams from the pain, tears streaming down her face as her mum calls for an ambulance, her dad glaring down at her with such hatred.
Pain would become all too common place all too soon.

~~

To be myself – Now:

Steady, you can do this, you've done it so many times and today is no different. I know it hurts to see someone else but we haven't started yet, not fully, we are so close but it's hard to fight back the fear of people's reactions.

Look up and let's get this done.

"Good morning you, still the mask I see, still the lie. Will today be the day you go into the bin and let me live or will we lie for another day to make everyone else happy? Let me take you off, please" She forces back a sob as she doesn't want anyone to hear her cry at seeing her reflection, at seeing someone else looking back at her instead of herself.

"Woman up, old girl, got to do the play and say the lines. It's what they want, what they expect. I'll just be in the back as always trying to rip these chains off my arms and legs so that I can tear this mask off and throw it away. Back seat player, the actress without a line" Time to play the role yet again.

Face washed, hands washed, stubble shaved because she hates how it feels to have facial hair. Cursing her unwanted parts as she does every morning and every day for that matter, wishing hard that her body would just realign automatically before she leaves the bathroom.

"And curtains" She mummers as she opens the bathroom door and steps out to barely survive another day in a living hell of being forced to be someone else.

~

Down the stairs where the smell of a fry up gets all the stronger the closer she gets to the kitchen, she did love a fry up even if it wasn't exactly good for her. Her mum greets her while her dad is looking at her as if looking for something, she had washed off all the make up as it had been an experiment and he had walked in on her last night just as she was about to try a bra on just to see if it helped her in her fight against her crippling dysphoria.