Printer-friendly version

I notice that while you are laying in a tube, submerged in some sort of gelatinous liquid while breathing oxygen through some sort of regulator, time has no meaning. I don't know if I stayed there pondering the information of my birth for seconds, or minutes, or hours. It was an odd sensation, to learn of a truth that you not only didn't know, but had completely different information about. I don't know why or how the story of my father getting soused at a local bar came about, but the story was told so often that it became more than factual, it was legendary.

I tried to turn my eyes down towards my feet, to see what was going on with my body. The feeling of pins and needles encompassed my entire being. I could feel random muscles contract and relax even though I don't recall sending signals to them. Though the liquid that I was immersed in was clear, it wasn't exactly translucent. I could see no further than my chin, and if anything was happening to my body, outside of a light spasm here or there, I was unable to tell.

It felt as if I was floating. Just drifting into space, into a vast vacuum of nothingness with only my consciousness to keep me company. I don't remember the womb, I often doubt people who tell me that they could, but if any experience could replicate that feeling, this was it. Perhaps that is what this process was all about, maybe it was a rebirth. I read enough stories on the fiction sites to understand age-regression.

I smiled and closed my eyes. Wouldn't it be funny if when they opened this chamber I was a little child or an infant. That sure made for some interesting reading, but the legal ramifications were astounding. What would happen to my house? Would I still retain ownership? Kind of hard to rent out a big house when you're in diapers. Then there was work, wouldn't they call the cops after they hadn't heard from me in a few days? The cops would find my car, there would be an investigation, and though I would never be found, I'm sure after some quick research they would know my last whereabouts.

Of course, age-regression was impossible, despite what Ponce De Leon might heave believed. Or was it? When you're floating in your own mind, strange things tend to pop up.

“Child,” I hear in my ear and remember that I have a set of ear buds in.

Yes.

“How are you doing, Child?” I recognize the voice as the doctors.

I'm find. Just thinking.

“We know. Trying to get you back on track.”

Oh, right. My father.

“Partly,” I hear the nurse say. “But more to the point on the beginning of your life and how you view the events.”

I never really thought about my birth. I mean, outside of the fact that my father was suppose to be in a bar getting drunk, not frantically trying to get to the room in order to witness the event.

“Its a boy,” the doctor says.

Its a boy. I repeat the phrase over and over in my mind.

Its a boy.

Its a boy.

Its a baby and its healthy. Why don't doctors ever say that? Isn't that the first thing that they announce, what gender you are. Its a boy or its a girl, that's it. That seems to be the only question on people's mind. Even before knowing if the baby is okay, you are labeled male or female. The first words from the doctor isn't 'its a potential CEO,' or even 'it has a heart defect.' No, in the moment that you draw your first breath, you are labeled and your life is set to follow a predetermined path of what is socially acceptable and what is not. But doctors say its a boy and its a girl millions of times, but they aren't infallible; how many times are they wrong?

Wrong. That's how I've felt for so long. Wrong. I played the roll into which I was cast, all the while hoping that an understudy would take over. People expected me to be a certain way and in order to fit in, to feel accepted, I conformed to the image that others had for me. But the real question is, does the knowledge of one's gender begin at birth? I mean, in most cases, you can tell the physical gender by a quick glace at an infants groin; though there are exceptions. But usually there is either a penis or a vagina. That is physiology. But what about gender, is it the same thing? Does what sexual organs you have determine if you are male or female on a spiritual level? Is gender something you are or something that you become despite what is between your legs?

The question of the ages.

My consciousness floats away from me. I find my spirit or whatever leaving my body, and rising above the small tube in which it is contained. I know that my mind is going on another trip.

Its like watching your life on television. I can see myself. Somehow I know that it is me. A long, long time ago. I am here simply to look on, to process information, to learn.

I look on and see myself as a baby. Maybe I am nine months, maybe a year. Not yet verbal, in any real sense of the word. Sure, I babble and ramble with sounds, but nothing that could be considered speech.

My mother is there and so is one of her older friends, Doris if I remember correctly. In fact, looking around I notice that we are not in the house where I grew up in, but probably Doris' house.

“He is such a pretty baby,” Doris says as she lifts me out of the playpen and spins, holding me at arms length to my giggling, gurgling delight.

My mother smiles at the compliment. “A regular doll,” she replies as she takes me and holds me in her arms. “Hardly ever fusses or complains, so unlike a man.”

Doris laughs. “Trouble on the home front?”

They go on to discuss issues at home, none sound serious enough to pay attention to. More gossip than any real problems.

'So unlike a man,' my mom had said.

I'm sure she meant it as a joke.

“Was it a joke, Mr. Nelson?” I hear the doctor say in the ear bud. I realize he is guiding my thinking, but rightly so.

'So unlike a man,' those were the words that came from my mother's mouth. She said it in a joking manner, but, like the old adage goes, maybe there is some truth behind every joke. Joke or not, even at that young age, the words got stuck in my head.

Is it possible that my mother knew. I couldn't talk back then, but I certainly understood. I knew what man and woman was, even at that young age. I knew the difference between my father and mother. I knew my father was a man and that my mother was a woman. If I was unlike a man, unlike my father, that only left one other option. My mother was saying, in essence, that I was like her, that I was like a woman. No concept was solidified in my mind yet, gender was pliable.

Did my mother really know of my struggles before I did? Or perhaps it was wishful thinking on her part? Maybe she had hoped for a daughter, though she had never led me to believe otherwise while I was growing up. Perhaps it was only a joke, just a joke, nothing more. Perhaps she didn't mean the joke at my expense, but more at my father's. He was always the demanding type when he wanted to be, and he never let a complaint go unsaid. Back then I wouldn't have realized that the jab may have been at my father. Since he wasn't at Doris' house, right in front of me, in my mind he no longer existed and any comment made I would naturally assume referred only to me.

But even now, I don't know if my mom was really talking about me with her 'so unlike a man comment,' or simply griping about my father. Perhaps a little of both. It didn't really matter either way. Those words spoken so nonchalantly had made there way into my little ears and into my still developing sense of self. Until this moment, I had forgotten those words, but realize that they have never left me.

My mind snapped back to the scene in which I was viewing, but not giving much attention to. I was on a kitchen table and my mother was changing me from a soiled diaper. It appeared as if she was doing it from memory, not paying much attention to my body or what parts I had. She was just gabbing away with Doris. But as she ran the baby wipe across my genitals the words 'so unlike a man' played over and over in the baby's mind, in my mind. I don't know how I was aware of what I was thinking as an infant, but I was. Even though my mother wasn't saying those words as I lay displayed for her and Doris, the effect was still the same.

“You know what would be fun,” Doris said loudly enough to break me away from my contemplation.

“What,” my mother replied with enthusiasm, maybe growing weary of griping about my father.

“Greg is such a pretty little baby,” Doris said as my mother finished fastening my fresh diaper. “Maybe we should dress him in one of Coleen's old outfits.

Coleen was Doris' teenage daughter. I remember later in life that she would be a babysitter for me until she went off to college and then get married. I was expecting my mother to laugh or to object at the notion of putting a little baby boy into an outfit designed for a girl.

“That's a wonderful idea,” my mother said.

My infant self didn't seem to object or raise an issue over the notion, but my adult self found it very confusing. Maybe my mother knew of my struggles, even way back when I was a baby.

I watched as the women carried me into Coleen's bedroom. I don't know why a teenage girl would still have baby clothes in her room, but evidently something was there. It didn't really matter, I was just along for the ride; both my infant and adult self.

Maybe my mother knew I felt like I was a girl on the inside, I thought again as Doris found a small box in the corner of Coleen's closet.

“She use to keep these to dress up her dolls,” Doris explains wistfully, “but she seems to have given that up in pursuit of boys.”

Maybe my mother knew I was a girl. Or maybe she was the cause.

My mind reels at the notion. If I had a head, it would ache at that moment. Knowledge or cause, I suppose it didn't matter. What was done, whether it came internally or from external forces, was done.

Doris pulls out a red dress that has a sewn in white frilly petticoat under the skirt.

The two women make a fuss over me as they put the dress on me. The infant eats it up.

“Look at the pretty little baby in her pretty little dress,” Doris coos.

“I told you he is a doll,” my mother says in glee as she scoops me up.

Her little dress, he is a doll. Talk about your mixed messages.

“He's too pretty to be a Greg,” Doris says as she smothers me with kisses

The baby giggles and laughs and laps up the attention.

“How about Georgina,” my mother suggest, seeming to take the game a little further.

Doris makes a sour face. “So old fashioned.”

“How about Grace?”

Doris smiles in acceptance. “Grace, Grace, our Grace,” she sings, borrowing from an old baptist hymn.

The women coo and continue to make a fuss. I don't know if my mom is letting me explore my real self or simply giving into some latent childhood fantasy she might have had as a young girl when she would dress up her dolls and make them look pretty.

There is a knock on the door, I somehow know that it is my father. I don't know enough to be worried.

“It's Pete,” my mother says casually as she carries me through the house.

My mother opens the door to let my father in. The baby looks over at him, and reaches out to be taken by the man. By the look on his face it is obvious that the man is not pleased. If they weren't at a friend's house, I am sure words would have been exchanged right then and there.

“Hi Sarah,” my father says flatly, trying to control his temper that at times got the best of him. “Hi Doris,” he says to the woman in as friendly a manner as he can muster.

“Hi Pete,” my mother says and gives him a peck on the cheek.

Coldly he doesn't return the affection.

As a child I am astutely aware of the tension.

“Hiya, Pete,” Doris says cheerfully.

“Looks like you two women had fun,” my dad tries to be social and is trying to come off indifferent about me wearing a dress.

For some reason the baby assumes his father is upset at him.

The scene pauses in front of me.

“Child?” I hear the doctor over the ear buds.

'Yes.'

“Do you think your father was upset at you during this point in time?”

'I don't know. Perhaps. If he was upset at me maybe that explains why I never spoke out about how I felt about myself and my gender issues.'

“Do you think your father believes it was your idea to put on the dress?”

The question took me a bit of guard and changed my perception of the immediate events. 'Of course not, I was a baby, that would be preposterous.'

“Do you think your father thinks you were in a position to object to being put in the dress?”

'No. I was just a baby. I did what was done to me, I had no control.'

“So, I ask you again, do you think your father is upset at you for being in that dress?”

I acquiesce. 'No, probably not.'

“If it had been your choice, do you think your father would love you any less?”

That question took more pondering than I would have liked. If it had been my choice. I suppose my father would be a shocked, perhaps even worried. But would he remove his love from me. 'No, he would still have loved me.'

“Just checking, Child.”

The scene resumes after a few more pleasantries pass between my Father and Doris. “We must be going,” my father says. “I left the car running with the A/C on. Don't want my daughter,” he says the word daughter bitterly, but tries to play it off as him being a good sport about things, “getting too hot.”

My father carries the baby to the car and places him into the restraining seat. “Its a good thing your mother is a girl,” he says while making a fist.

Girls don't get hit, the baby thinks. It wasn't important then, but that knowledge probably resurfaced a dozen times when I got spanked as a young child.

My mother shows up carrying the large baby bag and a few of my toys that we had brought over. After she places the bag in the back seat next to me she gets into the passenger seat next to my father.

My father puts the car into gear and begins to drive away. “Are you out of your mind,” my father says in a low, but strong tone.”

“What?” My mother says, confused by my father.

“Putting Greg in a dress, that's what.” My father doesn't appear extremely angry, but a bit put off. In expected there to be yelling and screaming, but really my father is just being firm.

“He's just a baby,” my mother counters.

“A boy baby,” my father emphasizes.

“He seems to like it,” my mother says as she turns towards the baby and sees that he is still smiling while holding onto the satin skirt.

I see my father frown in the rear view mirror.

“Child?” The voice says into the ear bud as the discussion around me stops.

'Yes?'

“Did you like it? Did you enjoy being placed in the dress?”

'It looks that way. And considering what I do at home in my spare time, I guess I did.'

“Outside of what you know about your adult life, do you think the baby likes being in the dress?”

I look at my infantile self. We are connected and I know exactly what is on his mind. Yes, he is smiling. But not because he is in a dress, but because his mother looked back at him, sort of like a game of peek-a-boo. The baby would've smiled whether he was in a dress, or in a suit, or completely naked. What he was wearing was immaterial. 'I suppose he is indifferent.'

“And how do you feel, as an adult, knowing that as a child you were dressed in such a manner?”

'I certainly did make a pretty girl.'

“But how do you feel?'

How do I feel? That is a tougher question than I imagined it would be. 'I suppose I am indifferent as well.'

“Why is that?” The doctor continues.

'What I wear, doesn't define who I am.' I never had that thought before, but it feels empowering.

“When you go to work in a suit, does that mean you aren't Grace?”

'No it doesn't.'

“When you are home and in a wig and dress, does that mean you aren't Greg?”

The question brings me pause and I do not answer.

“We have a long way to go before we completely tear down the barriers that keep you from living as the gender you were meant to be,” the doctor says calmly. “Rest assured we will get there today.”

The scene in front of me continues.

“He is still our son,” my father emphasizes.

“Okay,” my mom gives in. “I won't put our son in a dress until he asks me to.” She laughs.

“I'm sure he will never ask,” my dad replies and laughs along with my mom.

The baby's ears picks up every word.

He will never ask to be put in a dress. He knows his dad would disapprove and that is one thing he doesn't want to happen.

The scene fades away and I become aware that I am back in the tube, alone with my own thoughts. It is amazing that before I was consciously aware of anything, the world around me had such an effect on shaping my life. As an adult I could see what I was learning, but as a child, an infant, I was powerless against the forces around me.

I was my father's son and I wanted his approval. That approval would come only if I conformed to the image he had for me in the grander sense of things. I am sure he would have wanted a sports superstar over a computer geek, but those were more precise desires. Desires could be given up when ever they seemed unattainable. Expectations, however, were less likely to go away. My father expected me to be his son, not his daughter. With that came a certain set of rules that I would have to conform to in order to retain his love.

“Do you think your father would have not loved you if you were a girl?” the doctor asked through the ear bud.

'Not if I were born a girl.' I think emphatically.

“You don't think you were born a girl?”

The question was too deep for me to answer, but certainly gave me something to think about.

After a few minutes again, I heard the doctor once more. “Let me ask you a similar question. If you told your father that you were a girl, do you think he would hate you?”

'No. But I do think he would be disappointed.'

“At what?”

For that I didn't have an answer to. I just assume he would be disappointed. Doesn't every father want to have a son? That means if I was born with a vagina he would've been disappointed from day one. That doesn't really sound like my dad though. It sounds more like something society has told me over and over again and I just attributed it to my dad.

I lay there in silence as I let go of my thoughts. Was I who I was because of culture? Did I have to give up being me just because society expected something else of who I am? The questions abound and I was not equipped to answer them.

---

Author's note: Once again a story has gotten away from me. I really go into some projects thinking that it is going to be a stand alone story and this was one of them. You can forget that sister. This has now become a philosophical view of GID set in some sort of bizarre sci-fi setting. I am asking interesting questions and I hope people are enjoying it, or at least getting something out of it. I can never gauge how I am doing any more, it seems that a few authors are garnering all the hits and kudos and I am sort of in a bargain bin somewhere in the back. Anyway... feel free to comment and kudo. I would really love to get others people's insight on these things.

---

If you liked this post, you can leave a comment and/or a kudo!
Click the Good Story! button above to leave the author a kudo:
And please, remember to comment, too! Thanks.