Finding Nevo

by Nevo Zisin

  He told me my problem was I was insecure and had low self-esteem; that I should go and see a psychologist and fix the way I view myself. I knew this wasn’t the problem. I had plenty of self-confidence most of the time and a relatively high self-esteem. I was going through a depressive period, but who didn’t have times like that? Who didn’t feel low sometimes? That wasn’t reason enough to reject the feelings I was having towards my gender. He said if I transitioned I would always look like a freak and would never be believably male. I explained I was passing as a man about seventy per cent of the time. He told me I was delusional. He and his wife spoke about my age and lack of worldly understanding, that in time I would grow to discover new things about myself and shouldn’t make life-altering choices right now. That would have been an important point – if this wasn’t a matter of survival.

  In regards to gender issues, there is only a certain extent to which you can intellectualise things, the rest is pure emotion. I knew what I needed to feel authentically myself, to continue my life and be the best person I could be. I couldn’t necessarily explain it succinctly, but I shouldn’t have had to. I knew what I needed for me. I left his office deflated and more depressed than when I had entered. I had spent so much time convincing myself not to be trans, I certainly didn’t need it coming from anyone else.

  My other brother also couldn’t understand why I would want or need to transition. First, he tried to empower me and commend me for being a strong lesbian woman of whom he was proud, but what I heard was that he wouldn’t be proud of me if I were anything else. I felt his love and support was conditional on the image I had been performing. He then claimed I wouldn’t be a real man without a penis and it wouldn’t be worth being in an in-between zone that would confuse people. We went back and forth with emails, sending each other articles about gender issues. I sent him plenty that I would now disagree with, but at the time I didn’t understand transgender politics. I was desperately looking for anything that could make sense of the feelings I was having. He tried to use trans statistics of suicide and depression as evidence of transition regret among trans people, not understanding that those statistics were the result of discrimination and not remorse about their own gender transition. He didn’t realise that by aggressively challenging my gender identity he was contributing to these statistics, rather than minimising them.

  My sister didn’t ask difficult and intimately personal questions, she took more of a medical perspective. As a medical professional, she was concerned with the effects I might experience through transition. She understood I was trans and didn’t question it, but she wanted to ensure I was making informed decisions about my process. These were incredibly validating questions because I had done plenty of research and I could actually answer them. I could tell she appreciated that and saw how seriously I was taking the idea of medical intervention. I felt safe with her and turned to her often when I needed family support. I was grateful to have her and it made us closer. I think she also helped other members of my family come to understand and support me.

  My siblings got better in time. A lot of the initial reactions were emotionally driven and once they had more time to process and come to terms with things, issues were resolved. But the damage had been done, and I didn’t feel understood by them. My coming-out experiences with my brothers created a large rift between us. I was hurt by their reactions and, at a time when I already hated myself, the defensiveness and aggression I received made everything worse.

  I made each of my immediate family members a booklet called “How to be a supportive family member”. I compiled articles I felt were relevant and hoped this would result in more understanding. After a long while my siblings started calling me their brother and using my new name and pronouns. I mostly felt tolerated, rather than embraced and cared for. I felt very othered in my family, and that I always had to justify myself around them. I was told that I spoke of my gender or queer issues too much and should try to expand my conversation topics.

  Nevo’s Year Twelve school photo (2013)

  Chapter 8: School Is A Battlefield

  I had a big dilemma about coming out at school, as if it wasn’t a minefield enough without being transgender. I had only about six months until I was finished with school forever, and I wasn’t sure it was worth having to go through the whole social transition process. The dynamics at my very small private Jewish school were quite entrenched; I wasn’t sure how this coming out would go. I had many internal debates between my political self and my personal self. The political side asserted that this was important, as it would expose people to gender issues and would be a unique educational opportunity. It would help gender diverse people to come through the school in the future or even the Jewish community at large. But my personal self was terrified. I wasn’t sure I had the energy to educate because I was too mentally fragile. I put the thought away and tried to continue going to school as before. I didn’t want to bring attention to any changes so I continued to wear the girl’s uniform, which meant a dress in summer and a skirt in winter.

  I struggled to focus at school. I thought I could ignore my gender issues for a few more months but it started affecting my relationships. I felt like I was lying to everyone, and more importantly, that I was lying to myself. It was distressing for me to wear a dress every day and all I could think about was whether the people around me would accept who I truly was, and not the self I was choosing to show. My internal dialogue was deafening. I couldn’t escape myself. These thoughts dominated and I wasn’t able to participate in conversations. I had terrible nightmares that I would come to school in a dress and people would taunt me.

  I started wearing pants to school and the teachers got on my back about it. I didn’t want to sit everyone down and make an announcement, but I also didn’t want to have the same conversation over and over. I needed to find my truth.

  We had a Facebook group with everyone in Year Twelve and after a lot of consideration I sent the following message:

  “Hey guys, I’d like to make this as brief as I possibly can but apologise in advance if I don’t succeed. Before I explain what this is about, I’d like to initially entrench in all of your minds how open I am about this and that I will absolutely welcome any questions any of you have. I’d also really appreciate if this wasn’t discussed behind my back but rather with me as I’m not ashamed, nor embarrassed and would like to enlighten all of those who do not understand. I’d preferably like this information to stay within the school but if there are people you’d like to tell then please just ask me first.

  Basically, recently I’ve had a lot of self-reflection and have discovered that I am transgender. For those of you who do not know what this means, in short, it means that my mind and body do not match up in the sense that, in my mind I feel like I am male but my body is that of a female. Now that’s not a great definition and obviously it’ll bring a lot of confusion. I never really understood it myself either. So please research it or ask me questions if you’re unsure of what this means.

  Starting from next term, I’d like to be referred to with male pronouns (he, him) and my preferred male name which is Nevo (pronounced Neh-voh) but everyone can just call me Nev. I’ve already spoken to most of my teachers about it and everyone has been extremely understanding and supportive. Now I recognise that this is a huge change and will take a long time for everyone to adjust to. So please don’t stress if you stuff up or make any mistakes, I’m really fine with it, I just truly appreciate people trying and as long as you’re comfortable with it, I’ll be happy to correct you as it’s something I already do internally now anyway.

  I wanted to bring this up now rather than during the holidays so that you guys have the opportunity to speak to me in person about this if you choose to and also have a little more time to adjust to the thought. I appreciate all the support I have already received and really hope all of you can engage with that.”

  The response to my coming out to the year level was quite surprisi
ng – there wasn’t one. A few people commented and commended me on my bravery. Others messaged me privately to show their support, but in general I didn’t hear from the majority of people. I assumed it was a non-issue and felt relieved. I expected things would change at school, that people would treat me differently or approach me with unending questions. However nothing changed, everything was exactly the same, no one had any questions for me. I didn’t understand but I preferred no reaction to a bad one. The first instance it was brought up publicly was when I walked into a literature classroom and everyone had shifted seats. I liked to sit in the same seat every day, and so I felt displaced and confused. I asked what was going on and said I hated change, to which another student responded, “Really? Coming from you?” which I thought was quite funny.

  Soon it became clear my coming out hadn’t been as well received as I thought. People had been talking about me behind my back, claiming that I was attention-seeking and rejecting that I could ever transition to be a man. I felt insecure and lonely at school for the rest of the year. The teachers were quite good and tried hard. They were afraid of making mistakes with my pronouns but at that point I had plenty of patience to help walk them through it. It got to a stage where they began correcting themselves if they made mistakes, or other students would, and I was able to relax a bit.

  The main issue for me with coming out at school was that I was still very new to the ideas of gender transition and gender politics. I was only beginning to learn these things myself, and yet I was expected to teach everyone else. I sent articles to teachers and had meetings with them, trying to work out where the appropriate place to go to the bathroom would be, what uniform I could wear and so forth. It was a tiring process, one I couldn’t help wish had already been established through policy. I like to think that in future, the journey will be easier for gender diverse students in that school because the administration have a better understanding now.

  We decided it would be more appropriate for me to use the accessible toilet rather than the men’s, because I hadn’t come out to everyone in the school and I didn’t feel safe going in there. It was very different going into men’s toilets in public with people that didn’t know me, compared to the toilets at school. I went to the accessible toilet even though I didn’t feel entitled to that space either, but was grateful to be offered a safe place to pee. Luckily, I was in Year Twelve and didn’t have to deal with gender-divided school sports. I tried to change the name on my school email but my principal was concerned I might change my mind and it wouldn’t be reversible. The “irreversible” concern has come up many times throughout my transition.

  Life at school continued as usual and I tried to get through the last few months without completely breaking down. I kept to my studies and myself and mostly only interacted with my friends. I avoided the people I knew were talking about me behind my back. The thing that got me through was knowing that regardless of what I did or what happened, high school would inevitably end, and I wouldn’t have to see anyone I didn’t want to see ever again.

  In preparation for the advertising degree I was considering undertaking, I went to a creative workshop at RMIT in the mid-year school holidays. By this point I was passing as a man most of the time in one-off interactions. Usually as soon as I opened my mouth to speak, people would hear my voice, they would correct themselves and apologise. This was the first full day I went being read as a man.

  At one point we were doing an activity where we had to brainstorm ideas for a mascara product. The tutor asked us what we thought were the reasons why women wear mascara between the ages of fifteen and thirty-five. A debate began and a girl stood up and explained that those are the primary ages when women are vying for the attention of men, and that usually by age thirty-five, women have settled down with a husband and are no longer on “the hunt”. I had been anxious the whole day because I was worried someone would misgender me or question the fact that I was a man, so I was terrified to rebut what I considered a grossly inaccurate statement. Yet I stood up and tried to explain that women do not necessarily buy make-up and use it for the attention of men; that this does not take into account women of different sexual orientations, or those who use make-up as an art form of self-expression. Also, it is highly unlikely if a woman has been wearing mascara her entire life that she would stop because she was married. I went on to talk a bit more about beauty standards in the media and the misogyny intrinsically connected to it.

  The applause I received afterwards was embarrassing. As a woman feminist I was laughed at, ridiculed and not taken seriously. But in a room filled with people who read me as a man, seeing a man stick up for women’s rights and women’s issues was commended. I had never before been positively regarded for being a feminist and I was acutely aware the only thing that had changed was people’s reading of my gender. This proved to me that people respect men more than women, even in issues concerning women.

  Being read as a man in feminist spaces brought new problems. I felt strange speaking on behalf of women’s issues, as someone who was assumed to be a man. I held the oppressions of my past closely and in situations where I was read as a cisgender man, I wasn’t sure how to express that without being seen as a mansplainer.

  Any anxieties I had about school came to a climax with plans for muck-up day. Muck-up day was an opportunity for Year Twelves to have a little fun, mess up the school a bit and have an assembly celebrating the year level. The assembly consisted of three dances: a group dance with everyone, a boys’ dance and a girls’ dance. Rehearsals began and I realised I hadn’t been invited to either the girls’ or the boys’ dances. I figured it was an oversight and told one of the guys. He explained that the boys were refusing to have me in their dance. My heart dropped. I hadn’t even considered that this would be an issue or the decision would be made behind my back, without any input from me.

  I asked for more information from others and found out there had been recent debate in the boys’ WhatsApp group (which I didn’t know existed) about my gender identity and its validity. I was devastated. I couldn’t look at any of the boys. I wasn’t sure who was on which side of the debate and who was discussing intimate details about my body.

  I didn’t go to school for a few days; I couldn’t. This incident brought back a lot of difficult memories of the bullying I experienced as a child and I began to panic. I desperately wanted to run away from everything – from school, from the boys, from myself. I reached out to my friends, all of whom were girls, and they informed me they didn’t want to get involved in the discussion. They weren’t particularly confrontational and I think they were afraid of the boys. I went back to school and tried to put on a brave face.

  While I was absent, a small group of boys had gone to the admin office, demanding action against the bullying I was a victim of. I don’t think the school administration knew how to handle this dilemma. The response was, “Perhaps if this is causing trouble, she should not be part of the dance.” Wrong pronoun, misgendered. And they obviously hadn’t got the memo that victim-blaming is not the best way to address bullying issues.

  The boys were unsatisfied with this response and made a Facebook group with other allies in the year level and tried to brainstorm the best way to fix the situation. I didn’t know any of this was going on and was appreciative when I found out, but I also felt vulnerable that a discussion relating to me was happening without my voice. I felt powerless, and at the same time was upset to the point I wasn’t sure I had the capacity to be involved. Eventually, the principal called a meeting for the year level. She sat everyone down and explained that being transgender is a valid identity. To hear that affirmation come from a religious Jewish woman was amazing. From this followed a debate between my side of the room defending me and the other side arguing against.

  I felt dehumanised to have people talking about my gender identity as if I wasn’t present. People kept looking at me throughout and I had to pretend their piercing stares and hateful words weren’
t hurting me deeply. The outcome was that I was allowed to be part of the dance. I respectfully declined the invitation. The conversation was more important than the result anyway. On muck-up day, I sat back as the boys and girls did their dances and hid the tears I felt welling up.

  I was ready to change my name on Facebook, then I realised there were people who may not be as ready for the change as I was. There were family members, family friends and others that I hadn’t yet come out to. I didn’t feel it appropriate to do it through a Facebook name change, so I deleted them. I started with the people most emotionally removed from me and then went closer with family friends and family. Maybe this wouldn’t seem as significant to people from a different generation, or those who have managed to escape the tight grips of Facebook addiction, but deleting people close to me was a devastating experience.

  Facebook is an important part of my life. It’s a way to stay in touch with people – especially people I don’t often catch up with, or those who live far away. It is also a network for me to reach out to other trans people around the world and receive support that I don’t have access to in person.

  I got rid of a lot of people. I wasn’t hiding from them or shutting them out, I was trying to protect them. The one that upset me the most was deleting my mum. I kept imagining the moment when I would add each of them back. Would they accept me, and how much of that acceptance would be limited to the online world?