I am a man. I look like a man, talk like a man. I have everything a man has. Except one thing. If you looked at me, you wouldn’t notice that it’s missing but somehow everyone can tell. They don’t need to check because they just sense it. I’m a great boyfriend, but I’m missing something that would make me the perfect boyfriend. As soon as someone realizes I don’t have it, I stop being a man in their eyes. It doesn’t make me sad, or insecure, or disappointed, it makes me painfully angry. It makes me so angry that I get dizzy and my vision goes blurry. It makes me so angry that I want to get it out physically somehow, but my body can’t physically express even a 10th of the anger I feel. I feel it behind my eyes, in my head, in my stomach, my back, my uterus. I feel it every time I suddenly realize I’m being treated much differently than the other men in the room. I feel it every time someone looks at me like I’m a confused, pathetic, girl. Like I’m a cat with its fur all spiky because I’m just so scared and weak. I feel it every time I see a thin, cis, gay man walking down the street in clothes that fit him perfectly, surrounded by women and other gays who think he’s just the coolest. I feel it every time a gay man jokes that he could never date a trans man because he only likes real men. I feel it every time I remember a guy that I hooked up with called me pretty while there was too much in my mouth for me to protest. I feel it every time a cis man does something gross to me and no one asks me if I’m ok. I feel it every time I get sad or upset and I’m told to just get over it since I want to be a man so bad. I feel it every time someone who has never once treated me like a man tells me that I shouldn’t have feelings or state my opinion because I’m a man. I feel it every time my girlfriend rolls her eyes when she sees me crying. I feel it every time I cry.
I wish I was one of those men that just bottles everything up, never cries, never confides in anyone, never shows vulnerability, but I can’t be like that. I keep trying, but nothing changes. The anger doesn’t go anywhere. It doesn’t get let out, and it doesn’t bottle up inside of me, it becomes a part of me. Because it doesn’t get easier, it just gets harder. And it gets slower, and thicker. It feels like a sickness. It isn’t dysphoria, its constant mistreatment. It’s knowing I shouldn’t accept less, but that’s how it has to be. It’s the back section of my brain, being weighed with worries that make it hard to stand upright.