Published November 26, 2024

I’ve been thinking a lot about what happens when everything gets broken. Mostly, about what to try to build that isn’t ​breakable.

But I must say, as I think about the energy that might take, I am worried now that there is no amount of sleep that is enough. I never feel rested. It’s on a deep level, like a rechargeable battery that can no longer be recharged.

So I have to conserve my energy.

It’s getting harder because I keep spending time on what feels like a treadmill. Running in place. Running, running, running and getting nowhere.

It’s getting harder because I keep wasting energy by having to say the same things.

I don’t “identify as” transgender. I am transgender.

They’re not my preferred pronouns. They’re my pronouns.

Your high school level of knowledge about biology is of no use here.

If I haven’t asked for advice, that’s your clue that I’m not asking for advice.

That’s the short list. I keep having to say A LOT of things. More and more, it feels like a waste of time and energy.

I want off this treadmill

The world keeps wanting me to know I have precious little autonomy, and we haven’t even reached the lightning round yet. And if I wanted unsolicited advice, I could just go back to work instead of being on leave. There is no shortage of people there who think I need babysitting or to be told how to do my job or who offer advice I never asked for.

Goddess bless that couple I read about once who said they have a system worked out. If one of them vents, the other might eventually ask, “Am I here to help solve a problem or to listen?” Where do I get friends and colleagues to sign on to that approach?

Something like this is fair:

May I offer a suggestion?”

Just know that if you are neurotypical (as opposed to neurodivergent), do not have ADHD, are not trans, your idea might not be workable.

I might have to start saying this more often: If you want to tell me how to live my life, you need to come to the meetings.

Also, more and more it feels like people who have offered support to me and other trans people face to face or performatively in public spaces are secretly relieved now that they don’t have to pretend anymore. Unless you really mean it, please stop saying “trans women are women.”

While reading the comments below and feeling empathy for this person, I could also change a few words in my mind and find that it all works as an examination of anti-trans sentiment and trans-misogyny I’ve experienced in the recent past and ongoing present.

To a large degree, it also means that straight cisgender white privilege is protected.

I’m so tired.

When I have the energy to do so, I am thinking

Too long, didn’t read: I’ve been thinking a lot about what happens when everything gets broken. Mostly, about what to try to build that isn’t ​breakable.

That includes rebuilding myself. I feel like I was run over by a truck, one that is backing up so it can do it again, and again, and again. Right now, the trauma of the looming threat is bad enough. The actual execution of that threat will no doubt be worse.

I am not prepared to be declared illegal.

As we have seen and are seeing and will keep seeing, the bedrocks of a fair and just society are only as good as our willingness to keep them from being destroyed. So much is soon to be broken, again, and by the same people as before.

Being able to trust each other as we build community is at least as important as anything we attempt in the brick-and-mortar world.

Image of fuel gauge by Dmitrii_Smirnov via Shutterstock.