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Engaged in war against myself.

Discussion in 'Gender Identity and Expression' started by ClearlyClaire, Oct 7, 2014.

  1. ClearlyClaire

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    Warning:
    The following post is long, meandering, and may contain instances of poor humor, poor grammar, and poor spelling. Not recommended for children under the age of 13 or persons with allergy to gluten.​

    I don't know exactly what I hope to do with this post, I suppose its just a bit of a rant or a chance to get things said in public that I have never expresed before. Perhaps a little background is in order.

    I claim to be transgender, I have committed to that and I genuinely feel that I am a woman despite everything else in my life. But I am a happily married parent and a soldier for a country that feels I have no right to be a soldier. The people who know me online and are familiar with the military policy on gender dysphoria seem to offer the all to logical advice that I need to simply get out, extract myself from a situation where I cannot be true to myself. But that in and of itself would deny me of a large part of my core and identity. I may be in the National Guard, and have an established life outside of the military, but life wholely devoid of military dicipline and comradrie is altogether too terrifying for me to contemplate. I reenlsted after my first enlistment contract was over for that reason. I was scared. The army is my family, my safety net, and my home, but it shuts me out from being true to myself. How can I sit there and lie to brothers and sisters who have served two deployments in the middle east with me? How can I tell them that I am not the man they think I am, that I am not a man at all?
    On the other hand how can I continue this charade? I feel like my very existence is in violation of the very values that are the backbone of Army doctrine. Those values are loyalty, duty, respect, selfless service, honor, integrity, and personal courage.

    How can the soldiers I lead as a Sergeant be expected to be loyal to a liar? How can I do my duty when I part of that is upholding the values I have sworn to, including integrity? How can I respect a chain of command who would happily get rid of me over my very identity, and how can I expect people to respect me when they don't know who I am? How can I serve selflessly when I am only concerned with myself and being found out? What honor is there in hiding? How can I claim to life with integrity when I lie to the faces of people with whom I have shares fearful moments as mortars flew overhead? Most importantly however, how can I claim to do any of the above when I am a coward unable to face my own demons?

    I don't expect answers to those questions to come easily, if ever at all. I just had to get them all off my chest. I am a person at war with myself as I am sure many of us on this forum are. I am not so much depressed as I am lonely, and it almost seems worse. The thing about all this is that I am most certainly a coward and I feel very guilty about that. I see trans men and women living openly, often at great risk to themselves and at great costs. Costs which I am unwilling to pay. So I hide behind this shield identity of the typical American male, a subtle one because I still can do the things I enjoy. I can maintain my personality and I have no fear of being ridiculed because I am perceived as less than masculine thanks to the stigma against LGB service members being open and honest to themselves.

    In short I really don't expect answers or advice, mainly I just needed to vent and say some things out loud that have been troubling my mind lately. I hope you all have a fantastic day.

    Stay curious,

    Claire.

    ---------- Post added 8th Oct 2014 at 12:59 AM ----------

    Correction, the end of the second to last paragraph should read "thanks to the stigma against LGB service members being open and honest to themselves beginning to fade."
     
  2. DigitalHusky

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    Well one thing and foremost, by the vent I analyzed and viewed many times, I know you are not expecting answers or advice, but I cant help but to respond to it, it may not be a legit response, however if you feel the fact that you have a safety net with your second family aka Military family, though I feel that we need to dig deeper onto why you wanted to serve in the military in the first place, to be honest, I wanted to serve because I wanted to make a name for myself inside the military, however I couldn't cause I was diagnosed with Diabetes, I can see the fight you are fighting within yourself, I woudnt say you are a coward, far from it. You are just protecting yourself from the judgement, and thats understandable. What prompted you to join the military? If I remember correctly in my AFROTC years, you take an oath to the constitution in that bus shipping out to boot camp when serving no matter what branch you are.

    There's liars and there's deceitful people everywhere, am I saying you are a liar? Not at all, far from it, integrity is a big part in the military yes, I wouldn't stay focused to hard that you are transgered, personally I wouldn't care as long as you sworn to wear the uniform, and performed the tasks at hand. Is there a reason why you are feeling like this? To your second family? Are you attached to them?
     
  3. ClearlyClaire

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    I didn't mean to sound like I would reject advice, only that I am not begging for it. As for why I joined the military . . . I guess it was just the thing to do at the time. Most of my family is military. I have since developed bonds with my fellow soldiers that I could no more easily break than the bonds I have with my blood siblings. I honestly don't know what life without that is. To deny the military is to deny another aspect of who I am, you know?
     
  4. DigitalHusky

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    Understandable, I see where you're coming from with the last sentence, well. How far would you want to open up yourself? That's the question mainly. If you feel comfortable with the people you trust, I'd slowly work my way, find their opinion about it, its just all about respecting someone's views, and your views as well. Like right now if you totally opened up to me, I would not care at least one bit, I have friends that serve in the military that are gay, and transgendered, and bisexual.

    I only opened up to my mom about me being gay, because not I felt comfortable about it, but I wanted her opinion about it. How she views things, and she accepted me on being gay, she's a Christian too, so she understands that no one is perfect, neither am I.

    And I also see where you're coming from with the military blood line, my cousin joined, my third cousin joined, my brother joined, and some of my dad's family is in the military/cops, and I wanted to do that, not because of my orientation I was scared of, when the MEPS found out I had diabetes I couldn't join. :/ which sucked. 'Cause it felt like I didn't have the right "blood" to serve, which is kinda dumb.

    Again Id just open up slowly and trust those who can respect your views instead. :]
     
  5. ClearlyClaire

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    If the policy were to change I'd go full open, I have the trust in my unit and leadership, its their leadership that I am wary of. That and my leadership can - and likely would - turn a blind eye, but commanders only stay around for so long, the next commander might not be so accepting. As for friends I have one transgender friend in my unit and we talk together a lot. But the army ban on service by transgender personnel is the only thing holding me back at the moment. To be fair coming out to my father is a scary thought too, but the biggest hurdle for me is losing the only rock I've had in the sweeping ocean of life.
     
  6. DigitalHusky

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    True you are right on the commanders, man thats tough. Is there anything on the UCMJ about discrimination now that the Don't Ask; Don't Tell is out?

    Like Article 93—Cruelty and maltreatment? is that still in effect?

    Clause 2 states:

    Nature of act. The cruelty, oppression, or maltreatment, although not necessarily physical, must be measured by an objective standard. Assault, improper punishment, and sexual harassment may constitute this offense. Sexual harassment includes influencing, offering to influence, or threatening the career, pay, or job of another person in exchange for sexual favors, and deliberate or repeated offensive comments or gestures of a sexual nature. The imposition of necessary or proper duties and the exaction of their performance does not constitute this offense even though the duties are arduous or hazardous or both.
     
  7. Damien

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    Hi Claire,
    I was under the impression that women are allowed to serve in the military nowadays. (I've heard of women serving in armed conflicts...)?
     
  8. ClearlyClaire

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    Gender identity is not covered under army regulations, and its not included in article 93 because gender identity discrimination is often deemed proper punishment due to a couple of regulations, noted below.

    Department of Defense Instruction 6130.03 provides for barring the enlistment of transgender applicants as follows:
    15 a. Absence of one or both testicles, congenital (752.89) or undescended (752.51).
    15 e(h). History of penis amputation (878.0)
    15 l(r). History of major abnormalities or defects of the genitalia such as change of sex (P64.5) (CPT 55970, 55980), hermaphroditism, pseudohermaphroditism, or pure gonadal dysgenesis (752.7).
    29 r. Current or history of psychosexual conditions (302), including but not limited to transsexualism, exhibitionism, transvestism, voyeurism, and other paraphilias.

    Army regulation 40-501 governs the medical standards for currently serving members and provides standards of separation:
    2-27 n. Current or history of psychosexual conditions (302), including, but not limited to transsexualism, exhibitionism, transvestism, voyeurism, and other paraphilias, do not meet the standard.

    Sources can be found via a quick google search and are open to the public. I just didn't want to post long links here.

    ---------- Post added 8th Oct 2014 at 02:45 AM ----------


    Women are, transgender people are not.
     
  9. DigitalHusky

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    Why is the military so interested into someone's pants? This is redundant..but it is what it is I suppose, there should be a petition about it. I doubt they will listen cause military law is different than civilian law, this I cannot help with...even though I wish to help, it just seems silly that they are wanting to know everything about you before entering. I wish Article 93 can be under transgendered...so you can serve openly. I find this really frustrating and a violation under humanity rights.
     
  10. ClearlyClaire

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    It is, I agree, and so do the thousands of transgender soldiers sailors and airmen currently serving. Statistics show that we enlist at twice the rate of the general population. The committee that reviewew and ultimately repealed DADT is making motions towards reviewing the ban on transgender soldiers, so there is hope.
     
  11. DigitalHusky

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    Not pulling any politics here, but most likely Republicans added that stupid rule, here's hoping for you about the reviewing/preliminaries that you need to serve openly. Now I see why you're definitely at a war with yourself, its just stupid...It sounds like the military *needs* perfect people to serve.