Being a transgender, how does it feel?

This isn't the normal time I write an article but hey... It's Friday and with very minimum work plus alot of things going on in my mind, there couldn't be a better time.

Seeing is believing they say, but as a person who's slowly losing trust in her eyes, this saying is growing stale on me. No.. I am neither blind nor do I have eye defects, but sometimes from the spooky, scary, tabooic things my eyes have seen, I sometimes wonder if they aren't playing tricks on me for real. I had even written an article about an experience :https://read.cash/@DocLayla/were-they-real-or-are-were-my-eyes-playing-tricks-on-me-599dc4e5

I have always heard about the term "transgender" and what it entails. Did I once think it to be a hoax? Yes. But as I got more exposed to information and news, I grew to believe they exist. My experience today further confirmed this belief :

Some time after getting the Friday snacks ready for my nieces, I went out to buy some toiletries and recharge card from a nearby kiosk. On arrival, I saw this girl who guides over the store, sprawled on a chair with a black gown on, legs wide spread(she wasn't wearing any underwear), sleeping undisturbed. Her short black dress had ridden over her legs and there it was :

The male sex organs were so prominent!

The partially erect male genital with testicles were there alright, there's no denying that fact. Stupid thoughts started flooding into my brain "but wait.... She has breasts and long hair doesn't she..? " Dumbfounded Layla stood there watching for some time , then later summoned courage to leave the store and she really didn't know whether to cry at that moment. She didn't wake her up from her sleep. What the hell have her eyes just seen?

I got home finally and after recovering from what seemed to be a shock, curious me searched for a lecture note where I wrote some details about that case in class. We treated the topic in my sophomore year of medschool so I just wanted to refresh my memory. Without boring you with much details, transgenders are formed by one of these :

• In cases where men have external female genitalia (vagina and vulva), you might be thinking that lack the male hormone testosterone. Actually that's not true as most transgender male have testes which are the gonads triggered by testosterone. The male tract is also present as a result of the Mullerian Inhibiting Substance(MIS) whose function is the forming of the tract. However the formation of the penis and scrotum isn't the responsibility of testosterone but the function of another variant known as Dihydroxytestosterone(DHT).

Now if something happens before birth and the testosterone refuses to convert into DHT, despite the male child having structures like the seminal vesicle, epididymis and so on, he ends up being born without a penis but a vulva,clitoris and labias, making him a male transgender.

• For the females however, unlike the male, no substance is required to promote the development of the external genitalia. It happens automatically. So how are female transgenders formed then?

In the cases of females, when they are at the embryonic stage, they might have excess androgens(which converts testosterone into DHT), since DHT is responsible for the formation of the penis and scrotum the girl child will end up having a penis and scrotum when she's born, hence she becomes a female transgender. Even with the breasts and all.

It is worth noting that the above listed are only how transgender births are influenced phenotypically.

There can also be genetic influences where there's a deletion of the Y-chromosome in males making them female when born. Same goes for the XX-chromosome.

Lol,this isn't a medical class so why did I bring this up? Well for two reasons: to share some knowledge and for all of us to realize that these people didn't create themselves that way. They didn't bargain for it. They were simply created that way by God almighty and it doesn't make them less human, or bad, or displaced.

In society, these people are mocked, ostracised and jeered at. Most of them hide their identity because they are scared of what others will say. Some parents who don't accept the will of God abandon such kids when they give birth to them. They face a displacement of identity, they don't know whether to call themselves male or female. When you say you are female, your genitals prove you wrong. So who do you marry? A man or a woman?

When you say you're male, your genitals prove you wrong. So who do you marry? A man or woman?

Keeping marriage aside, these people find it difficult to associate with others because of their condition. The insecurity is overwhelming. How does it feel to be a woman trapped in a male's body or a man trapped in a female's body?

These people, without us contributing to it, are already facing personal identity problems of their own. How about showing some love, compassion and acceptance? Is that too much to ask for?

Is it their fault they are the way they are?.. Or are you mocking a creation of God's?

These people need us, they need our acceptance, they need us to help them come out of the caves they have lived in for so long. They don't have to live in that cave all their lives. They need us to show them how beautiful, strong, and normal they are..... Just they way they are. In fact we should see them as one of God's miracles and learn to appreciate them.

If you know any trans where you live, be kind to THEM.

As for the girl I saw today, I won't reveal anything to her. I thank God she didn't know I saw what I saw. Only God knows how she must have felt. I will just be extra-friendly to her than I used to be.

TRANS-LIFE MATTER.

Thanks for reading this piece.

Special thanks to all my sponsors, up voters, commenters and viewers. You're all part of the inspiration.

Yours Layly,

❤❤❤❤

All images from Unsplash. Com