Helen Boyd Kramer's journal on gender and stuff
So if I were to host a trans couples/trans partners weekend retreat, would you come? What if it were in Philly?
If you’re interested, let me know by leaving a comment or posting in our thread about it or emailing me. Let me know what you’d like the conference to be like by describing a day at it.
I’m very much in the planning/idea stages, so input is welcome.
Cleaning in an air-conditioned apartment is very odd, indeed, as eventually the time comes when you have to bring a box of old books or a bag of garbage outside & then you’re hit by the wall of heat, you go limp and sweaty instantaneously, all your resolve dripping away like the sweat off the end of your nose.
There’s a nutty little song by the late Ian Dury (& his Blockheads) called “Reasons to be Cheerful” that’s basically a list of the smaller things that, when you think of them, might encourage you to get out of bed in the morning.
I thought it might be appropriate for me to make my own list, since as of today, we’ve been married for six years, and I’m in a good mood, & feeling grateful for a bunch of things in my life.
So now, go make a list of just a few things that make you happy while you’re listening to these songs that always lighten my mood. Continue reading “Reasons to be Cheerful, Pt. 6”
So do I get to be a private person, too?
That’s the thought that’s been going through my head lately, since a partner in another online group for partners I belonged to recently commented that she was feeling hesitant about reading She’s Not the Man I Married because Betty stepped in to defend me on some occasion on the message boards.
& I was a little surprised, for two reasons: (1) because the idea of someone deciding I’m not independent enough or that I’ve hidden behind Betty’s skirts (as it were) kind of confounds me in general, considering the criticism I get more often is that I’m such a ball-buster who is exploiting Betty for the fame & fortune, and (2) because it never occurred to me that others wouldn’t recognize that while I have a public life as a partner & as an author, I’m also still also just one of a gazillion partners of trans people who is trundling through this experience. Continue reading “Public/Private”
I’m up at my usual ungodly hour having just finished a piece for an upcoming anthology called TransForming Community: Stories from Merging Trans and Queer Communities which will come out on Suspect Thoughts Press next year and is being edited by Michelle Tea and Julia Serano.
It comes out of a spoken word series Michelle Tea started a while back; Julia Serano recently reported on her experience at one.
My piece is on queer heterosexuals, specifically crossdressers/transvestites and their female partners, and how we do or don’t fit into queer community, or straight community, or trans community, depending.
It’s also about how to tie your shoes.
When I have a final edit, I’ll put an excerpt of it up here.
I’m sure that some people are unclear as to why I would have started Trans Group Blog, which is a separate, and group-oriented, blog about trans issues.
I did so because (1) I think it’s a resource that’s long been needed, so that authors on trans subjects can discuss various happenings and theories and resources, like a high-tech, low-budget trans magazine; and (2) because I’m aware I’ve been a useful resource on trans issues for people, which has been a privilege & a pleasure. But I’ve also realized that when I’m between books, I’d like to blog a little more about other things, & I assume other blog readers are something like me: they don’t want to wade through reports of concerts I’ve seen in order to get info/resources on trans stuff.
So in order to me to be more than a writer on trans issues, I started the new blog, where I will cross-post anything about trans stuff that I write for here. That way I can also write about other things here – writing projects, music, politics, what-have-you – so that people who read my stuff can read a ton more kinds of things, and people who are just looking for what I have to say on various trans subjects can read that.
My old friends occasionally get flummoxed over what name to call me when I’m doing readings & the like, & this past Thursday for my reading at Sugar was no different. My dear friend & former roomie Maurice asked me more than once if he could call me “Gail” at the reading, & I told him he could call me whatever. “But I should call you Helen,” he continued. “Sure, call me Helen.” He wasn’t sure if he’d remember, so I told him to call me “G” which is actually what he’s called me for years. It seemed settled.
Of course when we got to the bookstore he called me Gail about half a dozen times, & I don’t mind it at all; I really don’t care what my old friends call me – I just thought it was funny.
But I also thought that maybe when trans people get upset about someone getting their name wrong, it has nothing to do with gender & everything to do with the funny way your brain works (or doesn’t work) with your mouth. Because I knew Maurice meant to call me G, & it was as if, because he was thinking, “don’t call her gail don’t call her gail don’t call her gail” of course Gail was what came out.
Just sayin’.
& In the meanwhile, my thanks to Maurice & his lovely wife for putting me up while I was in Balto.
Reid Vanderbergh is a therapist in private practice in Portland, Oregon who began his transition in 1995, and started taking hormones in 1997, at the age of 41. He went to Portland State University and then did his MA in Couseling Psychology at John F. Kennedy University. He is a member of the WPATH (World Professional Association for Transgender Health, formerly known as HBIGDA), the IFGE, as well as the American Asssociation of Marriage and Family Therapists. He is the author of Transition & Beyond, published by Q Press
(1) As far as I know, you are the only therapist who is also trans to write a book about transness. Do you worry about people assuming you’re biased (in a good or bad way)?
As far as I know, no other trans therapists have published books about working with trans clients. I have had the experience of people assuming I am biased in the direction of transition; usually, those who make this assumption are related in some way to a client considering transition. However, when this comes up, I explain to them that I am not biased toward transition, precisely because I DO know how difficult and life-changing this process is. Therefore I don’t approach it lightly.
Now that my book is out there, I expect this question to come up among people who don’t know me, and also don’t know any clients who have worked with me. I hope people will ask me the question directly, rather than making the assumption that because I’m trans and did choose physical transition, that I automatically assume that’s the path for all my trans clients.
The one arena which worries me somewhat around this question of bias is academia. I’m hoping my book will be used as a text; my fear is, if I am seen as a community member writing about my own community, my book may be “suspect” because it may not be considered objective enough for academic credibility. Being subjective has been considered the ultimate faux pas within academia. Not that I think this as a valid view – I think the ultimate experts on a lived experience are those who undertake it – but I do fear this attitude may affect acceptance of my book within academia.
As some of you may remember, Avalon Publishing Group – my publisher – were bought by Perseus Books a few months back, and today they announced the news that my first imprint, Thunder’s Mouth Press, is being disbanded. It’s part of the re-organization, as imprint Carroll & Graf is also going, as are 24 employees of the former Avalon.
My Husband Betty will hopefully stay in print, as the book is now in its sixth printing and continues to make money, but still: it’s kind of sad to see my first home as a writer cease to exist.
So I decided to take a flying leap out of the gender world & read a novel, right? & I chose The Alienist, since it was a book Betty had recommended to our reading group years ago for a meeting that I missed. And what does the first grisly murder scene entail? A young boy painted and dressed like a girl who’s been selling himself sexually to survive.
Is that weird or what? It’s like no matter what I do, there’s a tranny somewhere, or more like everywhere. I can’t escape.