Trans: Disability
Viewing transness through the lens of disability.
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Here’s where I’m at. It’s nearly two years since I came out publicly as a trans woman and started HRT. It’s Trans Awareness Week right now - from the 13th to the 20th of November. The 20th of November is Trans Day of Remembrance, which signifies the end of Awareness Week. It is also my birthday. Ironic that I was born on a day that memorialises transgender people “whose lives were lost in acts of anti-transgender violence.”1
I was born with hearing impairment in both ears and have worn hearing aids every day since the age of 4. I can tell you (speaking of course only of my experience) that being trans is an infinitely more disabling experience than being deaf. I don’t go to the cinema because they essentially never have subtitles, I sit in the front seat of a car when more than two people are in the car so that I can hear and I can’t make conversation with anyone when I swim at the pool or the beach, but other than that, my deafness is something that takes a back seat in most of my life.
My transness however is in the driver’s seat swerving all over the road at full speed and I am mostly just along for the ride. Healthcare for deaf people is available, accessible and even 100% free in Australia until a person is 26 years’ old. Healthcare for trans people is largely privatised, stigmatised, expensive as all hell and constantly being pushed backwards by people who see transness as a deliberate and voluntary act of transgression. Would you ever see a politician or media personality talking about deaf people the way they do about trans people? Attempting to block our access to hearing aids, specialists, resources, Medicare coverage, support workers? It’s sickening.
When I was a kid I often felt quite distressed about my deafness, I struggled to participate in group conversations, I didn’t know what the popular songs were at the time, let alone the lyrics, I couldn’t watch T.V with others because I needed the volume so loud, or they didn’t want the subtitles obstructing their view. It took me many years to let go of the stigma of asking, or asserting my need, for accommodations with my deafness. Being deaf, like being trans, is largely an invisible disability.
What I mean by this is that a lot of people, especially if they don’t know me well enough, will not even realise I am trans, assuming I am a man and treating me as such. (Several times people have gibed at me “You need hearing aids!” Only to become mortified when I revealed to them I was already wearing hearing aids.) Even if someone does know I’m trans they often know so little about it that they might as well not know that I’m trans. (I once stayed in the house of a 70 year old artist who said I was the first trans person he had ever met.) This does not necessarily make them a bad person, but it proves the fact that the experience of being trans is largely an unseen one. And this is why things like Trans Awareness Week are vital.
Put it this way, imagine that I did not have hearing aids. I would know that hearing aids would be fundamentally and significantly beneficial to my quality of life. Imagine there is no public healthcare and that hearing aids are worth $25,000. (This is the cost of FFS or Vaginoplasty) (Hearing aids are worth around $2,000 and I will have to pay for them out of pocket after the age of 26.) Just to get these hearing aids someone like myself has to find a job with a higher income (which is a whole other can of worms when it comes to being trans navigating the job market), organise a crowdfund fundraiser, ask family for money (possibly having to wait until receiving an inheritance - dark, right?) and take out a bank loan. This is exactly what I am doing right now to access gender affirming healthcare.
On top of a financial burden stacked so high it makes you woozy, the distress of gender dysphoria charges on in the driver’s seat every day. The more time passes the more the negative symptoms of being trans are compounded. I can’t say it enough so here it is in all caps: GENDER AFFIRMING HEALTHCARE SAVES LIVES. To reiterate this, here is a dark thought I find myself having often (content warning) - I have more control over whether I live or not than ever being in a body that will completely alleviate my dysphoria. Put simply, the only way to not be trans is to not be alive.
Being trans is figuring out every single day how to get through the day without spiralling into these kinds of thoughts. It’s claustrophobic, like being stuck in an elevator and the only way to get out is to spend years working and saving and putting aside the normal healthy things that able bodied people in their 20s are spending their money on. Every time I go on social media and see people on holiday, I am reminded that I would have to sacrifice accessing healthcare sooner if I went on holiday. I would have to sacrifice healthcare to buy a car. I would have to sacrifice healthcare if I wanted to invest money in my music career. If my phone were to suddenly stop working or someone stole my guitar, those costs would delay my access to healthcare. Trans people are so vulnerable, constantly on the knife edge.
Picture a person holding a 20kg weight above their head. This represents the weight of being trans. Add another 15kg for being deaf. Add 10kg for not having enough money to pay the rent this month, or 10kg for heartbreak, or for loss. Add 5kg for having a bad day. Let’s say all of these things are happening at once, that’s 60kg. Now take away the weight of being trans and of being deaf. Now it only weighs 25kg. The person with the 25kg is going to cope much better with everyday challenges, they are more likely to have the time and resources to navigate the world and thrive. Cis people get their bodies for free and because of it are able to use their resources, and vitally, money for personal gain and pleasure in a way that so many trans people are not able to.
By the time I’ve saved and spent the $50,000 dollars I’m looking at for gender affirming care, I will likely be in my 30s or close to it. Having spent all of that money, (which by the way is half of a deposit on a house) I will effectively be starting from scratch. When I looked in the mirror this morning I didn’t ask myself, do I look like a cute girl today, I asked myself if I even looked like a girl at all. Trans people are so impeded in the race to succeeding in life. So many people are trying to take us backwards. Trans healthcare saves lives, just as healthcare for deaf people does, or for any other disability, or illnesses physical or mental. So be an ally, be active in your ally-ship, share your privilege and fight for us because we are exhausted.