I've decided to split this into three sections and this is
sort of the dark middle chapter. ‘The Transgender Emperor Strikes Back’ so to
speak. This one is going to consist of me opening a lot of old wounds, events
I've for reasons you will see below have tried to forget. Up until this point
it’s been quite easy to simply think of what’s happened to me between the age
of 16 and 20 as kids just being kids. By doing so however I've almost let them
get away with doing disgusting acts in the name of an easy life. It’s about
time I let this stuff go public in the hopes of stopping others from falling
into the same trap.
It all started with a girl.
I’d begun to find some grounding with my Trans self. Could
even say I was becoming comfortable with being Charlotte in social circles.
Despite knowing that the effects of letting the world know would have massive
repercussions on everyone I knew I was not prepared to let that deter me. I
wanted people to know that this is who I was and I was proud of it. At first it
was telling a few people in confidentiality. Now looking back ten years on I
would have told 15 year old Charlotte to stop being so naïve and seriously
consider who she was prepared to tell but that’s not something you really think
about at that age. And boy did I pick the worst person to tell.
I don’t even know how I ended up telling this person. It
wasn't as if I was exactly great friends with her. Perhaps that’s what it was,
being so distant may have meant that any perceptions of who I was before hand
were limited to some polite nods and hello’s. But I told her anyway. At first
it was fine. She asked some questions, I responded and that was about it.
Everything appeared normal until my social group changed somewhat and I ended
up falling out with this person. And I bet you can guess what’s coming…
Not going to lie, mobile phones are an incredible tool until
you are on the receiving end of threats and abuse from someone who you
considered to be a friend. Threats of telling not only my friends but the
entire school, threats of social media outage and generally just making my
existence a bit of a nightmare. And who could I talk to? The other people who
knew followed her, too scared to speak out and in some cases even helped
perpetuate the cycle of abuse I received for almost 6 months. And even if I
could speak out what could I say? I had to find a circle of trust to fight my
corner and that’s when I opened up to an old childhood friend. Fortunately this
individual has been incredibly supportive and we have remained in close contact
to this day.
As I said above this continued for almost half a year, texts
and comments were an almost daily occurrence. My attempts however were in vain
and despite forging some sort of reconciliation between us she decided to tell
some people anyway. To this day I still receive comments from members of my
school year asking if I’ve admitted to being a ‘tranny’ (yeah classy guys my
school year). I decided the only way to stop this was to essentially wall
myself off and live my school life day to day until university. This however
only intensified the comments which culminated in my near self destruction some
years later.
University had come round and it was time to re invent
myself, someone who could be open in a welcoming environment that treated these
issues as normal occurrences and not a novelty for underdeveloped Neanderthal
minds. I’d begun to use social media outlets as Charlotte and had developed a
following for myself among the CD/TV/TG circles. That was until someone caught
on to it.
For the record I am trying to keep my language to a minimum
however I find it difficult to describe this individual as anything other than a
total and utter cock. This individual had for the longest wanted to inflict
some sort of damage to me, something that I found out much later on. He used
probably one of the most cowardly, despicable and downright pathetic attempts
to get at me which ultimately backfired. He convinced several of my friends
that I had while on a school trip to the United States wanted to in his words
‘fight them’. Looking back this sounds incredibly pitiable on his part but they
took the bait. I still don’t know to this day where this idea came from as this
was never the case and I never led him to believe so. The three amigos then plotted
their revenge. And it would come in the form of a public social media attack
against me. Fake Facebook and IM accounts were made as me. Public comments
about my love for ‘pink underwear’ and the like were posting across the web.
Finding out what was happening almost destroyed me. Especially since this had
been going on for a significant amount of time before I discovered it. I was at
my lowest by this point. Having my personal life thrown out where I did not
want it was incredibly disturbing to me. Some would argue that it was my own
fault for having a social media page for Charlotte however that’s essentially
blaming the victim and not the bullies.
Fortunately by this point my circle of trust had extended to
some really incredible people who rallied around me with force. The fuckers in
question who made the page were promptly forced to take down the page and had
to issue an apology however this did not shake the feeling that I had been
abused by these people. They took my personal information and used that to get
at me and there was nothing I could do. These people were miles away from me
and I had to essentially watch it unfold before my eyes. I sat there far away
from any close friends & family watching what I felt was my life unravel
before me. I wouldn't say there were any suicidal feelings, the thought has
never crossed my mind but it really did push me back into the shell and it
almost made me despise who I was. I resented Charlotte. Why did I have to
endure something that I couldn't control? It felt like an incredible weight on
my shoulders and I couldn't take it anymore. I had already lost my first long
term girlfriend partly because of this and now it felt like it was doing more
harm than good. That’s when I decided to throw away what little of Charlotte I
had. I buried her deep down inside of me and I was determined to never let her
out again….
Well I hope you all got something from the dark part of this
story. On reflection this time of my life may have informed the feisty &
fierce take no prisoners Woman Charlotte is but that’s a story for another time.
I promise the next episode will be a little lighter though. Every story should
have some sort of happy ending.
Charlie xx
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