In flux between identities: the mental health impacts of transphobia

By Jay*

Content warning: this blog explores the impact of transphobia, and includes mention of deaths of trans people.

Caveat: I am one trans person. I don’t represent all or any other trans people. I’m not an expert. I’m only an expert in my experience.

If I could say one thing as a trans person, it’s this: my existence isn’t a threat to you. I’m more at threat from you debating my existence.

I think a lot about what it’s like for those of us who have parts of our identities become ‘hot topics’; when our existence, lives, and experiences are contested. It’s hard enough trying to cope in this world and figure ourselves out, whether we’re trans or not. I just want to live my life, instead of feeling like I’m dodging transphobic bullets from the media, the government, and the world.

I have the privilege of being able to somewhat hide my trans identity and play along with being cisgender in certain settings. But it’s exhausting never being able to be my full self and having to be in flux between identities. I don’t have the privilege of safety and stability that cisgender people have. I hate hiding from myself all the time. There’s things I probably would like to explore further in my gender identity, but so much of my time and energy is spent trying to blend in for my safety. I’m scared I’ll always be living a half-life. That’s not good for anyone’s mental health.

I’m particularly hypervigilant about my gender identity in the context of mental health services. I’m always wondering what name to use or if I’ll mention my gender identity. If I am myself, I’ll be worrying about documents not lining up and what other people might think if they see them and what the consequences could be. When writing articles like this, I never use my real name. I’m always living in some level of fear.

When I have been authentic in NHS services, it’s backfired. I had a therapist clock that I might be ‘androgynous’ which made me open up to them. At the time it felt quite nice to use my name and pronouns, but it wasn’t worth it. When passing me onto other services, they had outed me without my consent. They knew about using my cisgender name and pronouns in other areas of my life, so it came as quite a shock. To them they probably thought they were doing the right thing, but to me it put me in a vulnerable position. I’ve had lots of harm done to me in mental health services, so I was already terrified of somewhere new. Now they knew I was trans, and what would they think of that? It’s not something I’d ever lead with, especially not in the NHS, with its current climate of hostility against trans people, fuelled by the UK government.

I’m fortunate to be able to afford private therapy, as I don’t trust mental health services at all. Even when I’m paying for my care, I’m on guard. When I first approached my last therapist, I immediately tested them in how they felt about LGBTQIA+ people over email. We worked together for some time, but it turned out they were not as accepting as I thought and they could no longer work with me. I was left hurt again for feeling like I am the problem because of who I am, something I cannot change. I’m open about my identity at work but I’m always wondering what they think, too. It’s not my responsibility and it’s important for me to be myself in some spaces, but I’m always wondering about when a bubble of safety will be burst.

People always ask, “what can I do to help?”. Unsurprisingly, there’s no one right answer and it’s so multifaceted. From my experience these are some things that I think are important:

• Stop debating our lives. Questioning trans existence is literally killing us. Each year the statistics about suicide and trans people appear during Pride Month. The deaths of young trans people are horrendously overlooked and covered up. We need actions that go beyond repeating the stats each year.
• Think about what it means to be an ally. You need to think outside a cisgender perspective and research, learn, and listen to us. Find out what we as trans people want and how we keep ourselves safe. It’s not how you might assume.
• Put us in positions of power. You need to be led by trans people and experts by experience. We need to see trans representation everywhere, but you have to create the environments for us to be there.
• Learn about trans experiences. Read our work, follow us on social media, pay us for our time. You need to look outside systems and policies. We’re not there but we are here. Come to organisations that we already trust and that hold immense knowledge.
• Intersectionality is essential, not an afterthought. We’re not just trans people. We have multiple intersecting identities, which are also often marginalised and oppressed. Intersectionality needs to be at the core of all of our work to see people as and support their whole selves.
• You don’t need to be a specialist to support us. People get panicky about how to support trans people. All I’ve ever wanted is your respect and compassion as another human being. Stop debating our existence, start affirming our lives.

For my siblings outside of the binary or system in any way, remember we are out here, and we have always been here. We’re not going anywhere, we exist in struggle, but we could do with less of a fight.

Check out this glossary of terms from TransActual, read more about intersectionality, or check out more actions you can take to support trans people.

*Jay is a pseudonym used by the author – name and address supplied