A Partner's Story....The Narrative of Loss? 3

What does your journey feel like? That is the first question I suggest might be explored with the partners, relatives or others close to trans people, using Jake Lever’s work on spirituality as a tool for discussion.

My own answer would be one of loss, confusion and then a gradually emerging sense of contentment and happiness.

The more I read the clearer it becomes that feelings of loss for partners and others close to the trans person are normal. This has been something in preparing for next weeks paper that I have become even more aware of. Over the last week I have found it is something that support sites such as TG Pals identify. It is something that trans people writing their autobiographies have identified. A good example is Mark Rees 1996 autobiography which sets out something of the development of societies understanding of trans in the late 20^th century through the telling of his own story. He talks, briefly on page 88 of the sense of loss his mother had. Then there is the academic work. The most useful I have found is that of Dr.Kristen Norwood who is based at Fontbonne University. Her work has included Grieving gender: Trans-identities, transition, and ambiguous loss. Communication Monographs, 80 (2013). Tina Livingstone’s work has also been useful.

The loss hasn’t felt simple. It involves what Norwood describes as ambiguous loss,(a theme she has developed from Dr. Pauline Boss). That is it is a complex feeling which is based upon situations where there are feelings of loss but the normal markers are not there. With those close to trans people Norwood notes that the cognitive struggle going on is because the trans person seems to be simultaneously there and not there, constant and changed.

This cognitive confusion is one which I can very much relate to. There was a clear cognitive dissonance between who my partner was saying he was and who I knew him to be.

We were lucky that within my overall life journey I have gained a knowledge of social theory. It gave myself and my husband a tool to use when we knew our meanings were so different we were struggling to come to anything like a shared understanding. Norwood talks of this failure to come to a shared meaning relational dialectics theory. Whilst that is a linguistic tool it seems to have some aspects in common with the symbolic interactionist and the post-modern theoretical models which my husband and I used. We used those sociological tools to identify (i) we were talking across each other and failing to find any kind of shared meaning, (ii) we were limited by the language we had and (iii) identity was not fixed but it was something core in terms of how we saw ourselves and saw others.

Now I know most people don’t have this kind of map easily available to them……but between the hugs, tears and screaming at each other it was what we found meant we could learn to communicate with each other.

So this raises the question…..where most people don’t have that level of cultural capital to fall back on how do we help them through this minefield where meanings aren’t and can’t be shared? I mean in the mist of a crisis Howard Becker and Foucault don't easily creep in to conversation. How do we help people find ways to communicate each other, sometimes about things we don’t even have adequate language for? I don’t know….but any suggestions would be helpfully received as I believe if we could find an answer to this one it would help so many people who are in relationship with trans people.

With regard to Boss’ work on ambiguous loss theory one thing she says on her website is one of the problematic features is there is “no mourning ritual” which is part of what allows one to say goodbye. Thus, the confusion is prolonged.

On my journey it did feel like I have that point of what could be regarded as a mourning ritual, although for all others involved it was intended to be an act of celebration.  This is what I am going to look at in my next post when I discuss the significance of the naming ceremony.

Also just a note to say the reason why I am putting so many blogs on the topic up so quickly is that the first paper/ presentation I am giving on this topic is going to be on Thursday at the trans and faith symposium. The blog posts, as I indicated, are part of how I am doing my thinking for this. They are also, perhaps, my attempt (however clumsy) at trying to contribute a little piece to the jigsaw which is people's wider understanding of trans people, their families and particularly their partners.  This is something a few people have been encouraging me to start thinking about doing of late.