Neutrality

Devin Kane, a queer, disabled, non-binary artist, dabbling in things of the creative persuasion.

IG: @devinkane.art

I used to have long hair. Long, thick hair, down to about here (past my collarbones). For years, I wore it down in an effort to forcibly feminise myself so that maybe I could somehow, someday end up feeling like a girl.

The thing with long hair though, especially as thick as mine was, is it’s hard to maintain. Shoulders fell from sockets while brushing it, wrists popped out trying to wrestle it into a bobble, fingers slipped out of place when lathering it with shampoo, elbows and even my neck buckled under its weight. In my efforts to try and conform, I didn’t feel any sense of ownership over my own body. I couldn’t recognise the face in the mirror, framed by wavy strands of disheveled hair that seemed so overtly out of place. Visions of short haircuts had floated around in my head for some time, inspiration nestled in my camera roll and in uncommitted musings with friends, fantasizing over boyish Pinterest haircuts, never brave enough to bring it to life. 

One Sunday night, I reached breaking point and I shaved every inch of my unkempt hair off in my kitchen.

That first look in the mirror, my head free of tangled hair, all its unbearable weight, gone, it was a feeling unlike any other. I stood in front of my bedroom mirror, beaming at my reflection, a reflection that, for the first time, didn’t oppose my gaze.

I spent the following day at school answering questions from peers and teachers alike, mainly people wanting to know if I had done it for charity. The honest and guilty truth is I did it for me and only me. It does make me wonder how many people from that time thought I was some kind of selfish hair hoarder. 

I didn’t want to get into the awkward details of my hair being too difficult to handle and I repeated the words ‘I was just fed up with my hair’ to anyone that asked.

Which was true to a degree, but what they didn’t know was that this haircut had completely changed the way I looked at myself. It was like I had opened a door to how I was supposed to look, how I was supposed to feel. 

I’d always wanted to see what was behind that door, big, bold and daunting, only ever peeking behind it when I tucked my hair up into beanies to imitate the look I had so longed for. I’ve often wondered how long I’d have dwelt on the idea of someday chopping it all off had my disability not helped me make the decision that night. Chronic pain, fatigue, my mental health, sensory issues. They had guided me in its direction and I fell into the world of androgyny head first.

Spending years with undiagnosed chronic pain had a pretty negative impact on my mental health. Being in pain everyday and having no answer as to why, I questioned everything about myself to the point that I was convinced I was either insane or somehow faking it without even realising. As a result, I fell victim to that ill-informed mentality that using a mobility aid was a sign of weakness and that I didn’t truly need one. 

After shaving my head, my self-worth started clawing its way out of the pits of self-doubt, and I found something other than shame in my disability. 

I bought myself a pair of bright and colourful crutches. They boasted of fake confidence and were extravagant in comparison to my old pair. The mould of the handles, the make of the crutch, were much kinder to the joints in my arms and best of all, they were silent. 

The first time I used these new crutches was Foyle Pride 2021, my very first pride. I had realised I was queer a month prior to this, sitting down one night with my diary and a pen. In a scribbling Catholic-guilt ridden ramble, I talked myself through the first stage of coming out. It almost felt like coming out to myself in a way, because I had buried the feelings for so long that I wasn’t even sure how to deal with them anymore. 

My journey to the parade route that day was tainted by the incessant droning of accusatory voices through microphones, telling me I was a sinner and would burn in hell. I pondered on the idea of just going home, until I was surrounded by all of the other proud queer folk, loud and defiant. 

All of a sudden, my crutches no longer screamed of so-called weakness. They had gotten me here and allowed me to stay, amongst a crowd of strangers who were unapologetically themselves. Without them, I would’ve never been able to stay long enough to confirm that pride was one of the first times I truly felt I belonged. 

Any previous urge I’d had to dissect the how and the why of my gentle swaying towards gender non-conformity had been combatted by the idea that I was too old, that I would’ve realised sooner, that I didn’t feel badly enough to transition, that I was ‘just a teenager’. Like I’d been told in reference to my pain. 

But I met trans people, saw trans people online, read about non-binary people and my understanding of trans identities expanded beyond what I thought was possible. There was no one way to be trans. 

So, I did it my way, digging up those banished questions, and I trialed she/they pronouns first. I instantly felt the difference in my response to the two sets of pronouns, quickly changing to exclusively they/them. I adopted gender neutral language and a new name, abandoning birth-given syllables and labels, and I felt as secure as I had ever felt, embodied by these new, yet familiar, words. The unconscious mental flinch that came with being referred to as she, with being referred to as a girl, was gone, and the clarity I had been waiting for was slowly seeping into my life.

For so long, binary genders were the extent of my knowledge, not aware that existing outside of them was even a possibility. That place outside of the binary slowly made everything make sense. Even the fact that I might’ve been one of the very few transmasculine people that hoped and hoped for boobs. 

I was very flat-chested in my adolescence, but was plagued by that irrefutable sense that something about my body wasn’t right. Of course, I hadn’t yet encountered the concept of dysphoria and I became naively convinced that my disconnect from my assigned gender at birth could be solved with a more developed chest. To put it bluntly, boobs. Boobs would make me feel like a real girl, right? Right?

That hope was dashed when finally, I had them and their irreversible presence made everything a million times worse.

By chance, I came across a video of a trans man demonstrating how he flattened his chest using trans tape, but buying things to alleviate dysphoria felt a little too real at the time and I had no idea if flattening my chest would even help, if my cracking ribs could withstand the pressure of a binder, if my sensory issues would even allow it to stay pressed against my skin. The idea of buying a binder, buying trans tape, felt so far in my future, but, luckily, in a small black bag, with my compression gloves, splints and painkillers, I had KT tape for my joints. Upon seeing that video, that KT tape took on a new and equally as supportive purpose.

The same feeling that had overwhelmed me when I shaved my head returned 7 months later, in my bathroom, in the middle of the night, when I secretly followed that video tutorial and embraced that glimpse of the silhouette that had been hiding beneath my body. It wasn’t perfect but it was moving in the right direction, granting me a taste of that euphoria that I had been chasing since shaving my head; chest, out of sight, out of mind.

Without the tape that bound my joints, how long would it have been until I bound my chest? How much longer would it have been before I stepped into my GP office, ready to start my pursuit of top surgery? Would I have even made it that far?

Pursuing gender affirming care is a gruelling process, with hormone shortages, bans on puberty blockers, waitlists that are over 7 years long for a first consultation, and not a single surgeon who will perform gender affirming surgery in Ireland. It is a battle of constantly having to prove ourselves and one wrong word, one doctor to not believe us, and any possibility for gender-affirming care is out the window.

I recently had a private appointment to diagnose gender dysphoria, so that I could begin my medical transition. In the lead up to the appointment, my brain was torturing me with endless scenarios of how horribly wrong it could go, how it was entirely plausible that this was it, that this appointment would dictate my entire future and I shouldn’t get my hopes up. I spent the night before, scrawling copious notes and searching my house for nail polish remover, petrified that they would use my wearing of nail polish against me. But that appointment surpassed all of my expectations; I had never been so validated by any medical professional in my whole life. I had been geared up for a debate, for an hour of intense self-advocacy. Instead, I left with a diagnosis of gender incongruence, obtained without the emotional expense I have been so conditioned to expect.

Being disabled has taught me what the healthcare system is like. I have left the vast majority of appointments more hopeless and dejected than when I entered, and to have one be so successful, to have a medical professional be so validating? It almost didn’t feel real as I ended the call, my reflection appearing on the black screen, with the knowledge that this wasn’t it. 

Trans and disabled people are constantly having to fight for recognition within the medical community, for someone to take us seriously. 

At age 13, I was told that ‘I had done this to myself’, that I’d made myself an ‘invalid’, because I was using hospital-given crutches to cope with the pain that no-one could stop. In my years of seeking an answer, several doctors tried to imply that I was just a sullen teenager that wanted out of PE lessons. I was even outright told that it was anxiety. I've never seen subluxations listed on any list of anxiety symptoms, but ok.

I know what it’s like to be doubted. All it takes is one stumble, one person to decide that they don’t believe you and your entire experience is disregarded. 

Words cannot describe how relieved I am to have had such a positive experience in a single appointment, and yet I also feel immense guilt at the fact that I got so lucky. That this is what we consider ‘lucky’. To be heard; Not everyone leaves the appointment with the means to continue their transition. Not everyone even gets an appointment. Especially not when disability is involved. 

It enrages me that disabled people have to fight so hard for an ounce of recognition, that every doctor’s appointment feels like a judgement panel, that we have to become experts in self-advocacy just to get adequate support. It enrages me that my experience as a disabled person had led me to expect only disappointment as a trans person. 

I wasn’t very good at the whole self-advocacy thing in the early years. My school wouldn’t accommodate my disability, even when I asked them outright. Not allowed into the school in my wheelchair, denied access to the lift, insisting on my participation in PE, even with a doctors’ note. It was blatant ableism and my self-doubt and internalised ableism made sure I kept my mouth shut in the face of their apathy. 

At 16, I finally started combatting their ableist notions, the vice-principal in particular who took issue with me being unable to take the stairs when the lift was out of order, which was more often than not. More concerned with the hoodie I was wearing under my blazer, she told me to ‘fix my uniform and sort it out myself.’

Well, I took that as an invitation to thunder my way out of the school, returning home and emailing her from my house, stating that I would not return to school until she was willing to meet my accessibility needs. That same day, she had deadnamed me and I corrected her, which wasn’t something I had ever really done before, especially not to someone in a place of authority.

I spent my secondary education terrified to speak up about my accessibility needs and when it came to correcting people on my name, on my pronouns, when it came to defending my identity, I felt that same resistance. I felt like I was asking for too much. 

Now that I no longer look through the tainted lens of internalised ableism, it is clear to me that all I am asking for is the right adjustments to allow me to access the things that non-disabled people can. It is not too much to ask for. 

People like to portray disability as this horrible, awful tragedy or this heartwarming, inspiring experience and it is sickeningly ironic to me that we are stars of society’s inspiration porn, while they can’t be bothered to treat us like people. I’ve had a classmate tell me that they would kill themself if they had to live with my disability, and people tell me that I’m an inspiration for coming to school. Society’s inherent inaccessibility is not an inspiring story, our lives are not perfect pinnacles of inspiration, disabled people don’t want your infantilising admiration for going about our days. What we want is for businesses, for schools, for the government, for everyone to do better, so that it doesn’t have to be so hard anymore, to be treated like people.

When it comes to gender, all I am asking is that you call me the right name, use the right pronouns, trust that when I tell you who I am, I know what I’m fucking talking about. I don’t want to be stuck as this shell of a person that resembles a girl. I just want to be. It is not too much ask for.

I used to try and understand my disability and my transness separately. But they have been so closely interlinked, whether I’ve been aware of it or not; I am not a perfectly content disabled person, nor do I consider my disability tragic, in the same way that I am not a boy and I am not a girl. It doesn’t have to be either or.

In my relationship with my transness and disability, in both, I have found complete and utter neutrality.