TRAUMA

Trauma part l

13th January 2003 Mathew Elijah M was born at 13 minutes past 1 in the morning. The doctor Swaddled me in a pink blanket and said congratulations it's a girl, well that's what they thought... little did I know that the thought of being a girl would make me shiver on the inside and want to die and that blue holden ute at the age of three would now be my life. I grew up being involved in a lot of sporting activities which I loved and adored at the time and over time I began to distance myself because I felt different, I felt like an outsider, why did I have to wear a leotard to do flips and be the elegant girl that they wanted me to be, I wanted to be outside in the mud with my foster brother playing with Tonka trucks and doing what boys my age did.

I am now 12, I'm about to enter high school. my parents have spilt up by now due to just fighting and not being happy anymore, over the summer of 2014 I started to question, was that feelings of wanting to play with my foster bother in mud and that blue ute the life I really wanted to live, I suppressed it until I was 14 and in that time my older brother and older sister were on drugs so I didn't get to really talk to my mum at the time because I didn't want to stress her out with my problems of discomfort and dysphoria because she was dealing with them so I just kept it to myself and during this time I really started to question what it meant to be lgbtq, it all arose because I started to form this crush on one of my friends, I even had the courage to ask her out and I got rejected that absolutely shattered my heart, the first girl I liked didn't love me back. I'm now 13 a lot has happened I'm now friends with the girl that broke my heart and her friends, I've had an online relationship by now and that ended because of the distance because I was in Australia and she was in America.

This is where I really started to question my gender identity and sexuality up until this point I have been a cisgender female, had my first period the same day of the first day of high school, I've had my first real heart break, had my first experience with liking a girl and it not go the way I had planned, and just to top it all off I'm starting to question my gender and sexuality one more time . I have done some really deep research and one day I stumbled across this video of this transgender person explaining his coming out story and it clicked he felt the same way I felt, the feeling of discomfort the idea of long hair, breasts, feminine voice and all this other stuff mentioned in the video. Fast forward to October 16th 2017....Today I have received a letter from the school that needed to be signed for this excursion I wanted to go to, nows my chance to finally tell my mum and now step dad now I really felt, So hear goes nothing I write several copies, crumpling them up and trying again, trying to find the right words to say until I'm down to my final copy of the letter several sheets of crumpled up paper later, here it is the final copy....

I folded the letter that contained the way I truly felt and slipped it in the envelope and the manage to reseal it to the best of my ability, I went out to the kitchen, by this point my nerves are rising I'm getting sweaty palms and 3.. 2.. 1.. I approach mum and spit out;

"I have this letter that needs to be signed"

semi throws it at her because of nerves and semi runs away and hides, to then over hear my step dad say that ( deadname's) writing and I go into deep panic now. I hear foot step approach my bedroom door at this point I'm about ready to cry my mums opens the door and sees me crying sitting on my bed she comes over and sits beside me and the rest was all a blur. Fast forward to the 28th of May 2019 I'm now sitting in the office with my guidance councillor, the principal and my parents and we are discussing changing my name in the school system and all within in 20 minutes I'm now Mathew M in the school system

Fast forward to 7:30 AM,November 7th 2019. I'm now about to swallow my first Testosterone pill, I've legally changed my name, I've had a years worth of gender clinic appointments, been on blockers, I now have the hair cut I've always wanted. and within a spilt seconds of swallowing that pill that would change my life completely, all the childhood suppressed feelings began to fade I'm now on the journey to self love, acceptance and top surgery. One last fast forward it it now the present day, I'm now 3 months on hormones , have a loving family and partner I have created a LGBTQIA+ and allies club at my school, I'm now on 2 different committees dealing with like minded youth, helping guide them through what I went through, and organising events I wish I had attended, working towards a career in social work.

so this concludes the Story of one transgender individual with a life story to some day tell my children, to help inspire other young kids and show them it is okay to be authentic, it is okay to be who you are and create a new family that which loves and supports you. Just remember that you are loved and that you are valid, and you will get where you want to be in life, just be patient, hold on tight.. As for the cisgender people that my stumble across this, thank you for reading this and not judging me for being different, thank you for your support and love.