The Search For Emma
Reflections on the pain — and beauty — of finally understanding I’m a trans woman
The strange thing about living with gender dysphoria is that I never knew it was there. I was born in the 1950’s when the world was strictly following the gender binary. I never had a clue. This is the most staggering aspect of dealing with it now, how massively clueless I have been for over 60 years.
And I thought I was so intelligent, so well-educated, so worldly. I was, in fact, so ignorant.
I buried my gender confusion so deep that I never noticed it was there. All my life I felt something missing but I never knew what it was. I felt this odd hope that someone would just find me, see me, and even rescue me. I never understood why.
I simply accepted this empty emotional hole and forgot about it until, periodically, I would feel this sense of lack of fulfillment. It would fade away every time with simply living my life. Other life stuff would replace my questions and I would just move on.
For the last three years, suddenly, stuff became simply stuff, and a need started to emerge in its place. This need, in spite of my very desperate efforts, refused to go away. In fact, it continues to grow.
This need demands to be satisfied and I finally understand that this need is simply the need to be me.
I am Emma.
I have searched a lifetime for me, never understanding who I was. My ignorance made me afraid of me. Everyone around me shared the same ignorance and fear.
How desperately sad. How tragic. What a heartbreaking thing to finally realize… but what an amazing discovery. What an exciting realization. What an opportunity to touch a part of your neglected heart, an untouched part of your soul, and to know it’s ok to share it all with the world. It’s ok to feel these hidden pieces mend and meld to make you feel whole, finally, and to tenderly feel their warmth.
It’s like the passing of a storm. The clouds part, and the warm rays of sun create your own personal rainbow. You suddenly breathe in and know that your lungs are filled with the joy of life.
I always will hold on to these moments of discovery for the rest of my life. No one will ever take them away from me.
Finding Emma actually saved me.
I truly love Emma. I waited a lifetime to find her and she is finally home.
Emma Holiday
Please also read:
I have tied all of my stories to the above thread.
Writers note: If you have read any of my writings on Medium you will have noticed a definite theme: the incredible pain of gender dysphoria and all the difficult aspects of just being transgender.
My writing has three specific goals:
1. Writing is my therapy. I have a very limited outlet for my thoughts so I write to find a way to process the most profound experience in my life. I need to understand and I need to accept myself to move forward.
2. Being transgender, for me, is a very lonely existence and if I can share some of the things that I feel and think as I go through the process of transitioning with others who are transgender and, in some way, lessen their pain and sense of loneliness, then all of this public exposure of my personal thoughts is not a waste.
3. I write to help cisgender people understand that all trans people want is to be simply understood, accepted and treated as a normal person. We are.