This post was submitted by Levi.

“And it shouldn’t be so hard
To see your friends
That’s who they are
I don’t mean to tell you how to run your life
But make up your heart”
–“Autumn Walker” by Jets to Brazil

By now you all know that I am prone to extreme worrying and obsessive thinking. If you aren’t, then you are in for a prime example of such.

Have you ever wondered if people are just ‘humoring’ (definition: complying with your humor or mood in order to soothe or make content or more agreeable) you when it comes to something you consider serious? It is mostly done by those closest to us, and while it is often used to spare one’s feelings just like with humoring’s kin, the white lie, it may have unintended ill-consequences. Humoring is the bastard child of the white lie and tolerance.

We have all been humored by our friends and family in some regard. We first encounter it in childhood, done harmlessly by our parents, like when a 5 year old crawls around under the table barking, deciding that she’s a dog and wants to eat from a bowl on the floor without utensils. The parents might indulge the child’s request, hoping she’ll quickly get tired of being a dog before company comes to visit… or before she starts peeing in shoes. We get used to this invalidating treatment, and those close to us continue to use humoring as a method of reverse-psychology or dealing with a behavior they don’t understand/agree with without hurting us. Think of the movie Lars and the Real Girl, and how the brother and sister-in-law pretend Bianca is real.

It follows us into adulthood too, especially for people like us with so-called “alternative lifestyles.” Average situation: You come out of the closet to your friends and family. There are those who are cool with this, even supportive. There are those who are uneasy, outright hate it, or pretend the fact doesn’t exist. Then there are the people whose acceptance is for show, secretly hoping that this newly realized fact about you is just another youthful phase.

I will readily admit that I am bad at reading people – understanding what and why they are feeling and thinking – and have paranoid tendencies, so naturally I tend not to trust anyone completely. I once accused my family of plotting against me by stealing my glasses when it turned out they had just fallen off my bedside table. I am always wondering things like, “What are they really thinking about me?” and, “Are they just messing with me?” Alarm bells and questions like those merely increased ten-fold when I started coming out as trans to my closest friends.

All of the friends I have told so far have been utterly fantastic, some have even started calling me Levi almost all of the time and using male pronouns regularly. But, as always, the paranoia kicks in. So I find myself constantly pondering recently if they really see me as male, or if they are just humoring me.

Then I fixate on the idea that maybe I’m paranoid about them because I’m not yet confident in myself. Maybe I can’t picture anyone treating me as a guy because when I look in the mirror or get dressed, I see a distinctly female body. So it still catches me when a friend calls me “he” when just a few hours I was frustrated over the fact that my feminine hips and butt were still apparent (to me) through whatever pair of pants I put on, even though my pants are pretty loose and baggy. It is very distressing and confusing.

Here are some new questions that are coming into my mind: Will I ever be able to look in a mirror and not have that shocking disconnect between mind and body? How can my friends see me as the man I really am when all I see are the glaring and overwhelming bodily flaws to physically being that man?

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