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PEOPLE ARE PEOPLE

PROLOGUE

JAMES IS THE KIND OF GUY PEOPLE ARE DRAWN TO— extraverted, smart, funny, caring. James is the center of his large group of friends, and his cell phone buzzed with incessant calls and texts as he and your author Susan talked in the bustling coffee shop in his hometown, a rural village in upstate New York. A talented writer and artist, James works at the local food pantry and manages the town’s community garden. You know the type: He’s the caretaker, the peace-maker, the organizer.

James is also transgender. He is biologically female, but he identified as male very early in life. In fact, he can’t even remember a time when he didn’t feel like a male. “I remember being a little kid and trying to get my friends to refer to me as a boy,” he says. His early identification as male evoked a range of reactions. His friends awkwardly attempted to ignore it. His father was angry. His mother was conflicted. Both parents insisted he call himself a “tomboy” instead of a boy, firmly correcting him again and again. Lacking any other way to describe his feelings, James soon began parroting his parents: “I am not a girl; I am a tomboy.”

But even though James faced unusual challenges growing up, his childhood was in other ways no different from that of other children. Through his childhood and adolescence, James progressed through the typical stages of development that we’ll learn about in this chapter.

It wasn’t until middle school that James first heard the term transgender, but at the time he didn’t apply it to himself. James just wanted to live his life in accord with his sense of self—as a boy, not a girl. Although he sometimes tried dressing and acting as a female, he just felt more comfortable with “boy stuff.”

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A turning point came a few years ago, when James was 22 years old. Dressed in women’s clothes—“a figure-fitting tank top and everything”—James was working at the community garden. A young boy, trying to be chivalrous, offered to shovel for him. James blew up. “Don’t treat me like a woman,” he screamed.

Later that day, another staff member who overhead James’s extreme reaction asked James point-blank if he had ever thought he might be transgender. Thoughtful, James went home and did some research. “Oh my God,” he realized, “this explains everything!”

But rather than being shocked or exhilarated by his discovery, James was simply relieved to learn that there was a term for his experience—and to learn that it was one that he shared with many other people. It helped him in the development of his overall sense of self—not just his gender identity. Matter-of-factly, he began to live as a man, first swapping out his female clothes for male clothes, then slowly but surely coming out as transgender to his friends and family. And he continued to work toward his career goal— to help other young people dealing with the same issues he has faced.

Someday, James hopes to be able to afford to have surgery to alter some of his female sex characteristics to more closely match his identity as male. For now, he is developing a life living as a man.

A turning point came a few years ago, when James was 22 years old. Dressed in women’s clothes—“a figure-fitting tank top and everything”—James was working at the community garden. A young boy, trying to be chivalrous, offered to shovel for him. James blew up. “Don’t treat me like a woman,” he screamed.

Later that day, another staff member who overhead James’s extreme reaction asked James point-blank if he had ever thought he might be transgender. Thoughtful, James went home and did some research. “Oh my God,” he realized, “this explains everything!”

But rather than being shocked or exhilarated by his discovery, James was simply relieved to learn that there was a term for his experience—and to learn that it was one that he shared with many other people. It helped him in the development of his overall sense of self—not just his gender identity. Matter-of-factly, he began to live as a man, first swapping out his female clothes for male clothes, then slowly but surely coming out as transgender to his friends and family. And he continued to work toward his career goal— to help other young people dealing with the same issues he has faced.

Someday, James hopes to be able to afford to have surgery to alter some of his female sex characteristics to more closely match his identity as male. For now, he is developing a life living as a man.

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As is true for all of us, James’s relationships with friends and family are an important part of his life. When James became comfortable telling people that he was transgender, the news elicited a range of reactions from anger and confusion to complete acceptance. His brother was among those who accepted James unconditionally. He said, “Well, I never really saw you as a sister in the first place, so I don’t think anything is changing other than pronouns.”

In addition to acceptance of his gender identity, James shares the same kinds of dreams many of us have during early adulthood. He would like a home in the woods, and a family of his own. “I’d like to have a kid. Or two. I’d probably pick adoption if I could.” And James also wants to be a part of a broader community. “I don’t like being around only people who are similar to me. That’s boring. I like a range of people. And I guess my message is we really need to start viewing people as people. Not by their skin tone. Not by their LGBTQ status. And not by their gender. People are people.”

What James’s story illustrates is that who we become in this life—our ongoing development—is not determined by any single characteristic or quality. James is transgender, but that’s not the only part of James’s development as a person. Like you, James is defined by more than a single characteristic. Nonetheless, James’s story illustrates that gender identity is a potent force that shapes and directs the overall development of each of our lives, including the relationships we form. In this chapter, we’ll explore the many aspects of human development, including how gender identity and gender roles affect all of our lives. Throughout the chapter, we’ll come back to James’s story.