“Trans 101,” from trans people themselves
Laurie Lee Hall’s Facebook profile picture
The best way to learn about trans people is from trans people themselves.
I have more to say about Laurie Lee Hall’s new book in another post (see Hey, leaders, pick a lane - is a trans person a woman or a man?), but let’s start with some general groundwork about being trans in these excerpts from her book. Laurie is a former stake president and chief architect of 73 temples. She wrote:
Biologists now suggest that gender is not “binary” but “bimodal.” A bimodal model declares that these characteristics exist on a spectrum of differences rather than in only two categories. Examination or testing cannot definitively determine gender identity. The most effective way to know a person’s gender identity is to allow them to describe their internal sense of self.
The clinical criterion for Gender Identity Disorder (GID) includes the following three conditions: Long-standing and strong identification with another gender. Long-standing disquiet about the sex assigned or a sense of contradiction in the gender-assigned role of that sex. Significant clinical discomfort or impairment at work, social situations, or other important life areas. I have documented more than one hundred instances from my life at all ages which fit this criterion.
This condition is a real medical, emotional, social, and physiological condition, the cause of which is not well understood. However, the painful dysphoria associated with it is very real. It manifests in anxiety, panic attacks, depression, and suicidal ideation.
Between one and two percent of people in the United States are born with reproductive or sexual anatomy that doesn’t fit the definition of female or male . . . Although being intersex is dissimilar from experiencing gender dysphoria, there is likely overlap. At the very least, the existence of 36,000 to 72,000 intersex children born each year (based on a US annual rate of 3.6 million live births) establishes a significant exception to any notion of gender determined solely by the sex assigned at birth.
[When I was excommunicated] a formal meeting of those in authority, acting under the teachings of those with higher authority, had rescinded my sacred ordinances. Then, scores of everyday saints implemented that administrative action through hundreds of microaggressions. Excommunication wasn’t just about the things I could no longer do, such as receiving the sacrament or attending the temple. Many who knew me before as a friend and priesthood leader accepted that I had been declared a spiritual and social pariah, as though I represented a danger to themselves and their family to be shunned. I had never experienced anything so unchristian as this.
People often told me to walk away from the LDS Church and find a more accepting faith community. Despite the treatment I continued to receive, it still was not in my heart to look elsewhere. The Latter-day Saints were my people, my faith community. They were the people I loved and wanted to serve. I still yearned to prove that someone like me, a modern Esther, could break down barriers and help the church become a safe place for transgender members.
Laurie, thanks for being brave and being yourself.
Also hear these other trans voices here on GayLDSCrossroads blog:
“5-question Interview with Valerie Green, a transgender woman”
Grayson Allgood: Imagine: Lifelong carsickness (being transgender, before transitioning)
He’s not trans, but Evan Smith has some good stuff to say in his free navigable ebook from which this blog was born, Gay LDS Crossroads: “Why are church teachings inconsistent about gender and post-mortal sexual orientation?”
As Nathan Kitchen often says, semi-quoting Jesus: “Let the queer children come unto Me.”
-Marci
PS - Looking to support a "local" bookstore instead of a behemoth? NYT bestselling author Julie Berry also owns a brick-and-mortar bookstore that ships free all over the USA with no minimum and now also has e-books. Or drop in if you're ever in Medina NY.
NB - These quotes all come from Laurie’s book, cobbled together here.
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