Born a Girl, Became a Woman

Boy, girl, female, and male, woman and man- every single one of us is assigned a gender at birth. Within seconds of a baby being born, the doctor or midwife announces 'It's a boy' or 'it's a girl', and your gender identity is set for the rest of your life. Theoretically, from that moment on until you die, you will be put either in the blue group or pink group.

And for most of us this is a non-issue, as we never have a need to question our gender identity. We are conditioned from infancy, as we lay in our blue or pink world, to assimilate and socialise in to our gender. We go from girl babies, to little girls, to young women to women, without giving our gender identity a thought.

As women, our social feminisation is deep-rooted and instinctive. According to Scientific America, (source: Girl Brain, Boy Brain? By Lise Eliot. September 8, 2009), which states that 'Sex differences in empathy emerge in infancy and persist throughout development, though the gap between adult women and men is larger than between girls and boys. ' Gender socialisation is the more focused form of socialisation; it is how children of different sexes are socialised into their gender roles (source: Socialization and Gender Roles within the Family: A study on adolescents and their parents in Great Britain. Isabella Crespi Department of Sociology, Catholic University of Milan, Italy).

There are the thousands of babies, who are born biologically male or biologically female, but as they grow up, it slowly becomes apparent that the birth announcement 'it's a boy' should have been 'it's a girl' or vice versa. Gender identity disorder or gender dysphoria, is a conflict between a person's actual physical gender and the gender that person identifies himself or herself as (source: US National Library of Medicine. PUBMED Health.February 18, 2010. ). It is not known what causes transgenderism or whether it is physical or biological, mental, emotional or social.

Today female hormones and gender reassignment surgery are more accessible and a bit more readily available. And so every year thousands of Male to Female (MTF) transwomen relinquish their masculinity and undergo extreme surgery to remove their male parts. It is understandable, that for the duration of the transition, for these ladies it is about achieving the female physical appearance, so that they can take their place in society as a woman. We live, after all, in a society where the physical appearance is crucial to acceptance.

Over the years, the transgender political movement has taken huge steps forward and they have fought long and hard to ensure human and civil liberties for Trans people. It is only right that their human rights to health care, employment and housing are not only recognised but respected and enforced. No one should have to live in fear for their lives and be subjected to harassment and persecution, simply because of who they are. If we all accept that while 'the world is not comprehensible, but it is embraceable: through the embracing of one of its beings' (source: Martin Buber), we can make the world a much nicer place for every one of us.

Having lived through the process of a MTF transition, I appreciate what a Herculean effort it takes to transition from a male energy to a feminine one. I witnessed and empathised with the overwhelming need to be true to oneself; the constant struggle and fight for the basic right to exist and live. I admire and respect their courage, resilience, and determination and the strong belief in oneself that they possess.

I am also intrigued with the similarities and disparities between women and Trans women and the political and social variances, particularly in the context of the empowerment of women.

I recently attended a course entitled 'Awakening Feminine Power' which is about harnessing the creative energies of life and bringing balance to the feminine and masculine aspects of life. So it is interesting to note that there is a group of Trans women who have lived all their lives as a white, middle class male, typically got married and had children and usually worked in a very male dominated industry. Around middle age, they decide they want to go through a Male to Female transition. Yet pre, post and during transition they continue to operate within the male paradigm utilising their male traits and characteristics, (possibly because they have already successfully proven themselves as men and feel most comfortable there). Although it also perpetuates the dogma that business is based on the male energy since the male business model is the only one that is in existence, it seems to me we can learn from these women!