Country & city: Norway, Tromsø
Name/nickname: Tarald Stein
Age: 30
Gender: TransMan
What did you come out as (gay, bi, transgendered, use any terms you like here)? Both as gay and transsexual
What other words would you use to describe yourself? Writer, mother, intellectual, poet
How old were you when you first realized your identity? It sounds silly, but I first identified as gay when I was a teen. Just couldn’t make sense of it because my body and everyone around me told me I was a girl and I was attracted to boys, so then I would be straight, right? But I wasn’t.
At some point I heard of transsexualism, but they were all very heterosexual and heteronormative, so I didn’t fit. For a while I thought I could live a double life; one as a man and one as a female, but it didn’t work. I got terribly depressed. I didn’t realise that I really am transsexual until I was 27. That was too late acording to the Norwegian gender clinic.
How old were you when you first told someone? 27
Did you plan it? If so, how? Yes. I had to tell my GP in order to get diagnosed and start transitioning.
What made you choose that person to tell? I had to tell him in order to transition.
Can you remember exactly what you said? I told him I wanted to talk to a doctor with experience with transgender patients. I cried.
How did you feel? Terrified
What did they say? “I have no clues to this, so of course I will help you to see someone who knows something about it.”
If you’ve experienced homophobia etc, please give an example.
Homophobia: The psychiatrist at the gender clinic told me to go have sex with a woman. This was after I told her I was gay and only attracted to men. I also think that me being gay was a reason for turning me down; giving me the wrong diagnosis and refuse to treat me.
Transphobia: The child service wanted to check up on me regularly just because was transsexual and had a child. They didn’t contact anyone with any trans-experience, although I gave them lots of phone numbers and addresses. They obviously thought transsexualism automatically makes a person incapable of being a good parent. Fortunately they closed the case after a year.
Since coming out, how “out” are you in the following areas of your life:
Educational institution: Very
Job: Mostly
Family: Totally
Friends: Totally
Media: Very
What does being out mean to you? Correct people who use wrong pronoun or name, hint to my transsexualism if someone doesn’t know, or tell them straight out, being able to talk about my past without shame, f.ex. about pregnancy.
What differences, if any, did your cultural background make to your experience of coming out? It made it easier that I belong to the ethnic majority. I think my class (academical) made it more difficult for me to realise that I am transsexual and to speak in the “right” terms at the gender clinic.
What does the concept of the closet mean to you? I don’t understand it, because I came out as soon as I could. My experience with the closet was very short, maximum a few months, and I don’t understand how people can live that way.
What advice would you give someone wanting to come out? I guess that depends on the situation. I have been very fortunate. All my friends and family respect who I am. So from my experience, coming out is a very positive thing.
If you could do it all again, would you do it any differently? If so, how? I would lie to the gender clinic so I would get treatment!
Website: http://www.tarald.net/english.html
Blog: http://tarald.wordpress.com/