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Feminism: Sex and gender discussions

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Original poster

From now on, I was in an LGBTQ+ family’: my husband came out as trans while I was on maternity leave

183 replies

Defaultname · 02/01/2021 15:27

www.theguardian.com/society/2021/jan/02/from-now-on-i-was-in-an-lgbtq-family-my-husband-came-out-as-trans-while-i-was-on-maternity-leave

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Original poster
Defaultname · 02/01/2021 15:36

There's about a week's worth of reading there, but while the last paragraph stands (I think it's got a typo) it's worth quoting.

"I can never change what happened to my marriage. I can never change the anti-trans sentiment that some cling to. I used to think it was “not my place to get involved”, but now I know what hearing an ally say they believe you, believe in you, can mean. I feel a responsibility to admit how limited my assumptions used to be, and to be open and honest about what our life now is. By accepting my body for what it is, and all women’s bodies for what they are. I am average, we are average. Perhaps together we can shift the mean."

If she's really talking about changing the meaning of 'woman', and I think that's a reasonable supposition, it's cute that someone's made the slip of stressing that it's Mean People, who are the problem.

OP posts:
NiceGerbil · 02/01/2021 15:36

God that's long and meandering.

I got bored sorry couldn't get through it even skimming!

NiceGerbil · 02/01/2021 15:41

Xposts!

MissLucyEyelesbarrow · 02/01/2021 15:41

THIS WOMAN IS A HERETIC. She divorced her partner just for transitioning. How dare she? Naturally, she conceals her crime by pretending the issue was trust but we know the truth. Burn her.

Thelnebriati · 02/01/2021 15:42

As a trans widow I found it common for AGP partners to lose interest after you give birth (or even during late stages of pregnancy), because you no longer fulfil the fantasy.

Its distressing to realise that up until that point you were the focus of their attention as part of their paraphilia, not because they loved you.

SquishySquirmy · 02/01/2021 15:44

Poor woman, she's been through a hell of a lot.
And then when she was at the most vulnerable point of her life, that revelation! What timing.

She seems to have rationalized a way in which they can be happy. I hope that they stay happy, and that her ex continues to be so "consistent" and helpful if, for example, she starts seeing someone else. Or if the ex is no longer satisfied by the transition and acceptance, and needs a new panacea.

HDDD · 02/01/2021 15:47

Heartbreaking read

Floisme · 02/01/2021 15:50

I think I had better keep to myself my opinion of someone who would come out as trans when their wife has just done something that only a female can do.

mintkoala · 02/01/2021 15:58

I found this odd:
'And it showed me that when I used to speak about “the average woman”, it was a lazy, self-reflective assumption: we bled, we fed, we bred. I would sit happily discussing the books I had written, all the while perpetuating the idea of “woman” as white, fertile, able-bodied, straight, cis.'

Does anyone really think that only white women are women, or that disabled women aren't women? This comes up so often that I wonder whether some people do actually feel this on some level.

Original poster
Defaultname · 02/01/2021 16:02

@MissLucyEyelesbarrow

THIS WOMAN IS A HERETIC. She divorced her partner just for transitioning. How dare she? Naturally, she conceals her crime by pretending the issue was trust but we know the truth. Burn her.
Initially, say for the first couple of hours I was working my way through it, I thought it was going to be full trans-widow.

I suppose the headline could have been full-on supportive. "Reader, I became a lesbian' would have been good.

As Shakespeare put it,

"Some are born lesbian, some achieve it. And some have lesbianism thrust upon 'em."

OP posts:
RickiTarr · 02/01/2021 16:05

She’s a hostage.

nauticant · 02/01/2021 16:11

It is a very long article.

I read it as providing another route to a positive outcome. The usual result was transition -> happy lesbian couple. Now we have transition -> separation, validation of the new identity, and respect on both sides with everyone being happy.

I wonder when The Guardian start publishing articles that deal with the other outcomes?

MyVisionsComeFromScent · 02/01/2021 16:11

quite impressed that the article was in the Grauniad though, it definitely wasn't the rah rah rah cheerleader isn't it all so wonderful article I'd have expected from them

EdgeOfACoin · 02/01/2021 16:15

I found the cognitive dissonance in that article startling.

She goes into detail about her difficulties conceiving and the toll that pregnancy and breastfeeding has taken on her body.

Yet the fact that her partner likes to wear foundation and shave their legs is apparently sufficient to make them a woman. And the writer berates herself in that final paragraph for previously having had an overly narrow view of womanhood.

The strange thing is, in the beginning her partner seems to have embraced the idea that a man could shave his legs and wear makeup, yet still be a man.

It's a really odd article. I wonder whether the writer believes what she is saying deep down.

nauticant · 02/01/2021 16:16

The name Alexandra Heminsley rang a bell so I had a quick look*. Her living is as an "Author, speaker, journalist & event host" and part of her pitch is selling the ideology:

twitter.com/Hemmo/status/1269400031821512711

BeansMeansWines · 02/01/2021 16:22

I found this really odd. Also it’s clearly a mash up taken from her book.

Throughout it talks about women’s biology and how conscious of her body and its functioning she is. Then suddenly she has her experience of being groped denied and thus argues that we should accept her husband as a woman as it’s not nice to have your experience denied.

Some serious cognitive dissonance going on.

Possibly coupled with subconsciously knowing that a TERFy book wouldn’t sell. And would make her a meanie.

DaysAreGettingLongerNow · 02/01/2021 16:22

It's not actually an article, it's an excerpt from her latest book.

I read the first one she wrote (I think it was the first), about running. I enjoyed it. This one doesn't sound like my thing though.

ArabellaScott · 02/01/2021 16:24

What a rough time she's had. Really feel for her.

The last few paras seemed really odd, tacked on at the end where she 'comes to terms' with all the shite that's she's had thrown at her.

A judge fails to protect her from sexual assault, and she suddenly forgives her husband for his terrible failure to support her?

I hope she has good, strong, sensible women around her to actually help out and not feed her more bullshit. She sounds like she could really use some down to earth women around her.

ArabellaScott · 02/01/2021 16:26

it’s clearly a mash up

Ah, I see. Maybe that's why it all seemed to segue so oddly from all of the genuinely horrible things she's been through to a sudden epiphany of how silly she'd been to think her husband who'd impregnated her couldn't be a woman just like her.

Original poster
Defaultname · 02/01/2021 16:26

[quote nauticant]The name Alexandra Heminsley rang a bell so I had a quick look*. Her living is as an "Author, speaker, journalist & event host" and part of her pitch is selling the ideology:

twitter.com/Hemmo/status/1269400031821512711

Oh. I see Harry Potter books are banned from the household. Say what you like about JKR but I don't think she's ever ejected someone from her house just because they wore unconvential clothes.

OP posts:
despairenting · 02/01/2021 16:28

"I mean I have accepted that I am not this.” A hand gestured at the body I had lain next to each night for the last five years. “I have accepted that this body doesn’t represent who I am.”

Yeah, mate, as a disabled woman...mine neither.

mintkoala · 02/01/2021 16:28

I feel like I might read the book to see if it makes more sense at length? It just feels like a lot is being left out. Like she goes on about how she had the very difficult pregnancy and birth, and the sexual assault, and she wanted to say to her husband, why do you want to transition to this? Did she actually have a conversation, or a row, with him about this, and what did he say? In the article we just segue to them having a nice calm friendship.

Floisme · 02/01/2021 16:30

I've read it twice now. Not only had she just given birth, she had experienced multiple miscarriage, failed rounds of IVF, a sexual assault while pregnant, a hazardous labour and then struggled to breastfeed. Imagine going through all that and then have your husband announce, 'I'm a woman too.'
I feel so angry on her behalf.

EdgeOfACoin · 02/01/2021 16:34

A judge fails to protect her from sexual assault, and she suddenly forgives her husband for his terrible failure to support her?

Yes, that was appalling. The judge didn't give her testimony much weight, since she had been pregnant when the assault happened and must therefore have been in a state of heightened emotion.

That is sexism of the highest order and something that only a woman would ever be subject to. No mtf transitioner would ever have this experience. Not one. Ever.

How she can experience all this and then reach her final conclusion is completely beyond me.

DazzlePaintedBattlePants · 02/01/2021 16:38

I take away 3 things from that article. Firstly, editing appears to be a lost art. Secondly, the author is desperately unhappy and needs a lot of good therapy and space away from the father of her child, and thirdly, that something must be up at the Guardian as I didn’t think they would have published this not so long ago...