From Wrecked-Up Friend to Transgender Gem

When the Meta Quest 2 virtual reality headset was released to market in 2020, I was sorely tempted to buy one. Recently, two very good friends of mine encouraged me to buy a Quest 2 — mainly to play Beat Saber with them online. When I found there is a Lady Gaga song pack, that clinched the deal. Despite my protestations against the concept, I really love the song “Born This Way.” Dancing to it makes me feel happy. (Mi amore vole fe, yeah!)

The point, however, is that playing Lady Gaga songs in Beat Saber set me on a kick to listen to more of her work. I first heard “The Fame Monster” — her second album — in 2010, during a particularly dark time in my life. Admittedly, before I began gender transition in 2022, there were few light times in my life. But listening to the song “Speechless” after a decade and a new perspective afforded by hormone therapy and social transition showed me how stark the contrast is.

The old feelings evoked by the song came flooding back. I realize my perception of myself has not changed dramatically, despite many changes to my mental health and quality of life. The song still brings me to tears. I hope you indulge me as I align the lyrics with my life and process the changes I’ve gone through.

Could we fix you if you broke?

“Speechless” was written to encourage Lady Gaga’s father to address his heart condition. However, I always heard it as a description of Lady Gaga’s loser friends: failing at life, lost in drugs and alcohol, but who — if they could just be reached — might be able to redeem their lives and souls.

Like all teenagers, I thought the song was written directly to me. I mean, I was in my 40s at the time I heard it, but still — it was written directly to me, because nothing described my sense of self as well as “loser,” “failing at life,” and “lost in drugs and alcohol.” I wished I could redeem my life and soul, but I had little hope.

I can’t believe
What you said to me,
Last night we were alone.
You threw your arms up.
Baby, you gave up — you gave up.
…
Could we fix you if you broke?
And is your punchline just a joke?

At that point in life, I did not expect anything to improve. I hoped my anti-psychotic and anti-depressant could mask enough pain to allow me to carry on, but I had given up making plans outside how to find my next drink. I criticized everybody around me, but I would not look too closely at myself.

I am too broken; that is obvious. One more major break and there will be no fixing me. I am a cosmic joke, never expected to flourish.

My outlook in 2010 was that the only way to fix my life was to end it. It would be easier than untangling the mess I’d made. It would be easier for everybody around me.

What could possibly be the impact? Where is the person I am? Where is the value I bring? The world would never notice I was gone.

Wrecked-up friends

I can’t believe how you looked at me
With your Johnnie Walker eyes.
He’s going to get you
And after he’s through
There’s going to be no love left to rye.

Frankly, I didn’t want to fix anything. Instead, I drowned my pain, my sorrow, my disappointment in myself in alcohol. My relationships suffered from the amount I drank. I was functional — I could get to work. I could do my work. And I judged the restaurants where I ate lunch or dinner by whether I could drink at them and how stiff a drink I would be able to get.

And I know that it’s complicated,
But I’m a loser at love, so baby — 
Raise a glass to mend
All the broken hearts of
All my wrecked-up friends.

And there it is…in a fading F chord, The Grand Summary of Me: A Wrecked-Up Friend. Somebody you wouldn’t bring home to meet your parents, but occasionally raise a glass in her memory. Nobody could reach her, and it didn’t matter, anyway. She didn’t deserve more of our time and thought than that.

Could you give it all up for you?

And after all the drinks and the bars we’ve been to
Would you give it all up? Could you give it all up for you?
And after all the boys and the girls we’ve been through
Would you give it all up? Could you give it all up
If I promised, boy, to you:
That I’ll never talk again.
And I’ll never love again.
I’ll never write a song,
Won’t even sing along,
I’ll never love again.

I can answer the question above. Would I give it all up? Could I give it all up? If somebody pledged to sacrifice everything that gave her life meaning to save mine, could I give up all my drinking and self-destruction to help myself, even if just for her sake?

No.

Maybe I could. But I wouldn’t.

There is nothing there — no person, no value, no nothing. Don’t give up anything to save me. Don’t lose everything only to find you lost more than you thought in saving me.

I’m not worth it.

Transgender gem

Some men may follow me,
But you choose Death and Company.

Reading back over what I wrote, all the statements evaluating myself are present tense.

There is no decision I made in my life — no degree I finished, no job I took or left, no book I read, nothing — that has had as positive an impact on my life as applying that first estrogen patch on July 7, 2022. It was the best thing I did in my 52 years.

But applying that estrogen patch has created the most difficult work I face going forward, because it forces me to look at how I perceive myself — to challenge it, reject it, and rebuild a sense of self with which I can live the rest of my life.

And fuck, is that hard.

I still see a loser, failing at life. I quit drinking in 2013, but I still see a useless sod. I choose Death and Company.

How do I do anything these days? How have I gotten here? Truly, I don’t know. I start something and finish it. I’m as surprised as anybody.

The last step in my journey is not to accept my transgender, to apply that first estrogen patch, to change my name, buy new clothes, recover from any surgery.

The last step is to choose to believe it. To choose to believe in myself. To pick up the pieces of the life I left behind, painstakingly glue them back together, and carry on. To shine like the amethyst I named myself after — to capture the light and to reflect it back to the world in life, in love, and in celebration of Amethysta.

I am frightened to rebuild my sense of self. My whole life confirmed I do not deserve happiness, and now I must disagree with everybody and everything that built it up inside my head. I’m not asking for praise or exhortations that I’m wrong — that everything I wrote above is purely wrong. Please — hold those comments, because there is nothing you can do to affect my fear.

I need to make the choice.

But shit — you, whoever you are, the reader — if I learn to do it, if I can believe it, there is hope for you as well. We can both reclaim ourselves, our identities, our lives, and our souls.

We just need to make the choice.

I’m working on it.