What is your name and your Pronouns?

I am Maya K, and my pronouns match my presentation, so today I am She/Her

How would you describe your Gender?

In terms of “Phylum, Genus, Species” I am Transgender, NonBinary, Genderfluid.  I alternate my gender expression between male and female.  

Can you tell me a little bit about your early life? Where did you grow up, and what was your childhood like?

I grew up in the suburbs of Washington DC. My father was a Vietnam Veteran and staunch Catholic who had a Federal Government job. My mother was a nurse who worked evening shifts.  We were upper middle-class, white, and all American.  I was an only child. I never had a lot of friends but I usually had a few close friends. Grade School was tough, I didn’t seem to fit in and became the target for a lot of bullying.   

High school turned things around a bit for me. I was the team captain for the Freshman football team which earned me a great deal of “street cred” in the athletic circles.  After I blew my knee I found my way into the theater program and was a true-blue theater kid after that. 

When did you first start to sense that your gender identity didn’t align with the one you were assigned at birth?

The first sign I can remember was when I was about six or seven years old.  A visiting aunt had told me that I should never kiss my elbow, because, if I did, I would turn into a girl.  That night, in my room, I nearly dislocated my own shoulder trying to get my elbow to my lips.  When I couldn’t do it, I cried.  

How did you navigate those feelings growing up? Were there moments of clarity or struggle that stand out?

I buried those feelings pretty deep, hiding them even from myself.  I was already a social outcast at school.  Boys called each other “girly” as an insult. I didn’t dare admit that I wanted to be one.  We went to a private school with very ugly uniforms, Dress pants and button downs for the boys, plaid skirts and blouses for the girls.  I didn’t envy the girls in those uniforms, but once in a while we had “free dress” days where we could wear what we wanted.  I didn’t care much, because boys' clothes were so boring, but the girls always had so many options.  Before I was INTERESTED in girls, I looked longingly at them because I wished I could wear what they wore.  

My Mother was a nurse, and was working on her Masters, so she had a copy of the DSM V.  I would flip through it and look up “Transvestite” and “Transsexual.”  This was in the 1980s and gender dysphoria was not as well understood at the time.  The entries provided lists of criteria and I knew I met some of them but not all, so I would think “that can’t be me” 

There wasn’t much trans representation out there back then.  There was a scene in the movie “DeathStalker” where a wizard turns a guard into a woman. That scene anchored in my mind. Eventually, I would sneak into my mother’s closet and try on her clothes.  At first I was careful to only do it when I was sure that I had the house to myself.  The more I did it, the bolder I became.  I started showering in their bathroom, saying that I preferred the stall to the tub-shower in my room.  The truth was that it gave me access to their walk-in closet.  

One night, my father walked in while I had a bra on.  

He wasn’t abusive ever in his life, and I looked up to him as my hero.  His words that night hurt.  I could tell he was deeply ashamed of me.  He threw out words like “Klinger from MASH” and “Freak” and left me there devastated.

After that, I tried hard to drive those feelings down deep.  Looking back, I say that was when the girl locked herself in a cage deep in my mind and began building a boy to hide inside. I threw myself into masculine pursuits. In highschool I became the stereotypical jock archetype. I was the football team captain, who liked to move from one girl to the next, telling them that I was “just having fun” and not looking for a relationship.  

Once I blew my knee, I moved into theater, where I did well both backstage and on stage.  Theater also opened me up to a wider cross section of people.  

Once in a while “She” would peak out.  

On a school trip to Europe I made a bet with two girls that I intentionally lost, and was “forced” to let them dress me and do my makeup in their Berlin Hostel.  

Another time I “reluctantly” let a girl dress me up in exchange for a favor. I would casually drop “wouldn’t it be funny if..” statements with girls as ways to get them to dress me up. 

Eventually I discovered TG Fiction consuming it, and eventually writing my own became a pressure relief valve for me. Along the way, the boy I built became a man.  That man found a wife, got married and built a family.  From the outside I had everything.  

But “she” was still tucked inside and she was dying in her cage, meaning a part of me was dying too. I was hurting and I wouldn’t even let myself admit why. 

From time to time I would buy a few items to crossdress in secret, then purge the items in a fit of self imposed shame.  She was my deepest darkest secret.  The kind of secret that I would have rather died than reveal.  

Coming Out Later in Life:

What was the turning point that made you decide to come out later in life?

The first person I ever had to come out to was myself.  COVID didn’t hit me as hard as it hit others, I worked in Mergers and Acquisitions and, aside from a few days on-site at a new acquisition once in a while, I was working from home full time already, however, the work slowed down.  Not only that, but the kids were home all the time and there were no more after-school practices or shows to worry about.  Life slowed down and, like a lot of people, it gave me time to think and explore.  

I started writing.  Before I knew it, I had published over 20 short stories and novellas and I had a full novel on my hands.  

A lot of those stories mirrored the kind of gender transformation fantasy stories I had read growing up.  The fact that they seemed to sell well only encouraged me.  

I started talking to other authors too.  Something that became apparent was that every other author I met that wrote in the “gender bender” genre was transgender in some form. Non-Binary, Trans, Fluid, etc… I still didn’t get the hint.  

In 2022, the conservatives launched their anti-trans moral panic, and, as with their prior manufactured panics around lockdowns, vaccines, masks, and CRT, I showed up to fight them at the school board.  

Through that advocacy work, I met and worked side by side with trans people for the first time. I discovered that their own stories felt a little too familiar.  Another thing I found odd was that, unlike with any other issue, I felt guilty advocating for Trans rights. Every other issue I fought for was for the sake of someone else.  I wasn’t ready to admit it, but advocating for Trans rights was advocating for myself.  There was a nugget of my Catholic guilt that didn’t like that.  

All of this was piled up in my mind and I think “she” could sense the cracks forming in my egg when I opened up my laptop and saw that the webcomic “Real Life Comics” had recently updated. 

Back in the early 2000s, I had read “Real Life Comics” regularly.  It was with PvP and Penny Arcade as my daily rotation.  Eventually, the author/artist had stopped posting updates and I stopped checking.  

Then, by chance, I was on Twitter one day and saw that someone had posted an update. 

The link took me to a series where the Author, “Greg” reads a post on Twitter about being Trans and is immediately transported inside his own mind to confront the female side that Greg had kept locked away all his life.  The two argue, then discuss, and finally agree, Greg had kept her safe all this time, but it was time for “Mae” to take over.  

The last comic shows Greg fading away, leaving Mae to face the world as herself.  

Unlike all the comics prior, that comic was signed “Mae Dean” 

I closed my laptop.  My kids were on the couch, my wife was in her recliner.  Without a word, I went to the garage and got started on a carpentry project so the sound of my bandsaw would cover my sobbing.  

I had locked “her” away inside my mind for too long.  She was me and I couldn’t hide her inside the boy anymore!  In one series of comics, Mae Dean had destroyed my old life and freed me. 

I love and hate her for that. 

Did you have fears or doubts about making that decision? If so, what were they?

By the time I had figured this all out, I was 45 years old.  I had a family, a career and people depending on me.  Not only that, I liked the boy I had built to hide inside.  I didn’t want him gone entirely.  When you ask if I have fears and doubts about my decision, I answer “what decision?”  I am still in the process of deciding.  Who says I ever have to decide? 

Yes, I do exist some of the time as Maya. I go out to events, I advocate, and I socialize but I have not set “him” aside either and the truth is I spend more time as him than I do as Maya.  

I am genderfluid, and it’s a difficult road. There are so many people who don’t understand Gender-nonconformity and fear us, and those who seek to advance their own agendas by feeding that fear. It’s a scary time right now to be gender queer. There are plenty of times where I present male for the sake of safety and protecting my family.  It makes it harder for me to determine, is “boymode” something I do for myself, or is boymode easier, safer, but never preferred? 

If we lived in an accepting world, It would give me more space to figure that part out for myself. If I could commit to one gender or another, the road might be easier to chart. I could commit fully to transition or I could set this all aside.  

There are days where I am so sure that I am female that I want to do a complete transition, Hormones, surgery, all of it. 

Then there are days where I doubt my trans identity entirely and wonder why I am even considering it.  

So there are no decisions.  I live day to day, and I am who I am that day.  I focus on things that help her without erasing him, losing weight, voice training, growing out my hair, that sort of thing. 

What was the first conversation like when you told someone about your true self?

Within days of my epiphany, I wrote a poem and posted it on Mastodon.  Note that at the time I was using my pen name “Katie” and had not yet chosen Maya as my name. 

I'm not out.  

I fight for Trans rights, At community meetings, at Statehouse hearings, I walk the halls and talk to lawmakers. I think it helps the cause for White CIS Male lawmakers to hear these words from a fellow White CIS Man, who they think that I am, Because.  

I am not out. 

I come home to a loving family, I am madly and passionately in love with my wife of 18 years.  I often wonder if I would lose it all if I was honest about myself.  

I am not out.  

I write and publish under a woman's name.  I cross dress and feed the selfies through AI editors to make author headshots.  I have cultivated "Katie" as an entire digital persona.  I sit down at the keyboard and wrap myself in her, glowing in euphoria when others online call me "her"

I am not out. 

I have Trans friends, I work with them on advocacy, they see me as their CIS ally, I worry that they would feel demoralized or betrayed if they found out I was not a CIS ally, but a coward who would fight for them but not join them.  Even to those with whom I have a kindred spirit 

I am not out.  

I am not a typical man, I am also not a woman.  If given "the button" I would agonize endlessly over what to do.  I feel masculine and feminine, powerful and vulnerable, I want to wear blue jeans and flannel but I also want a spiny skirt and a flirty top to show off curves I do not have.  

I am not out.  

I am not Katie, I am not _____, I am too afraid to be who I am, so I am never myself.  

Because 

I am not out.”

I linked that post and dropped it in the chat room of a Trans Advocacy group I worked with.  They were having a “launch party” that night.  I was so afraid, I almost didn’t go.  

When I arrived, I was met with hugs and welcome to the community.   It was one of the happiest moments of my journey.  

The first person I told outside “Queer Circles” was my best friend. He lives across the country but we chat in text most days. When I told him that outside some activists and my therapists, he was the first person I told, he said “Wow so that's… i'm kind of honored” and then asked if he should change my information on chat to help him avoid misgendering me.  It was pretty great. 

Reflections on Identity:

How has coming out changed your daily life, your relationships, and your sense of self?

I still fluctuate between boy-mode and Maya so a lot of my daily life has remained the same. I came out at my job on my last day before a layoff. It was very liberating that the last time that I walked out of that office where I had worked for 18 years as a man, was in heels and a skirt.  

Coming out to my wife was a challenge.  There was a lot she didn’t understand.  Living my whole life with these questions of gender on my mind, you tend to forget that most CIS people never give it a second thought.  We had a lot of assumptions and misconceptions to work through.  Couples counseling was a great help.  In the end, we both realized that our biggest fear through all this was of losing each other.   Once that clicked, things found a new normal.  

Today, we went cosmetic shopping together and she buys me jewelry.  

For myself, it is astonishing that this secret that I used to think would be so destructive is out there in the world. I am living a life that I once thought was impossible and as a result, it feels like a cloud has vanished and I can finally feel the sun.  

If you could go back in time and talk to your younger self, what would you say?

You are not alone.  That secret is not as dark as you think it is and people will still love you when you find out. 

What do you wish more people understood about transitioning later in life?

On the positive side, It is never too late!  To paraphrase Billy Crystal in “When Harry Met Sally” When you decide how you want to spend the rest of your life, you want the rest of your life to start right now.  

On the less positive side, there is a lot of regret.  I never got to be a high-school girl, never tried out for cheer or went to prom in a pretty dress.  I never got to be a college co-ed or be a young woman starting her career.  All those milestones of womanhood are in the past and Maya had to watch them slip away from inside her cage.  I am so sorry. 

Looking Forward:

What brings you joy and fulfillment in this chapter of your life?

Family and Community.  First, coming out to my wife showed me the level of love and commitment we share.  Second, the community I have found since I came out has been amazing.  Richmond is a fantastic and inclusive city and the LGBTQ+ Community in this city has welcomed me, taught me, sheltered me, and brought me so much joy. 

How do you hope your story might inspire or help others?

I KNOW there are others out there hiding from the world and even themselves.  They may think that they are alone, or that they are not “trans enough” or that it’s too late.  I hope that one of them reads this and it gives them room to explore their own possibilities.  

If you could sum up your journey in one sentence, what would it be?

I decided to throw everything into my midlife crisis and made it a Gender Crisis, where some people get a new car, I picked up a new wardrobe, makeup, shapewear, and new pronouns!