Chapter Three
Moments of the E-mail Reply and A Helping Hand.

I sat in front of my computer, reading the e-mail from Daniel like reading my own obituary in a newspaper. It was killing me, and it just showed that I wasn't stable; I didn't have control. I didn't know it, but this e-mail was the one thing, the one simple thing, that was going to send me into my darkest hours.

From Daniel
To Mattie
Date 30th March 1997

"Hi!

I'm sorry if I brought any bad feelings back to you. It is not my intention to; the last thing I would like to do is hurt someone as beautiful as you. Mattie, I understand how you must feel, probably scared, maybe happy too. I just want you to know that the person I talked with yesterday, for me, that was a wonderful person, regardless of what they wear or how they live. You know what they say, the looks don't matter, what matters is what is inside, that is the reality of a beautiful and perfect relationship.

If I could put a body and a face to you, drawing it from what I know about you, it would be a gorgeous one. I can't like you from what you are outside since I haven't ever seen you, so obviously, I enjoy you from what you are inside.

Mattie, you are a wonderful person; you deserve to be happy; if I can help you feel happiness again, that will make me happy too. If you are happy feeling like a girl (a beautiful girl that can steal a boy's heart like you did with me), then be a girl who cares what other people say. The only opinion you should care about is the opinion of the ones that actually care for you and your own. You're a wonderful person, and that's all that is important."

I stopped reading the e-mail, my heart aching and screaming for release. I couldn't believe the way this e-mail switched on Malisa even more. It had made me want to be Malisa again. Malisa wanted out. Malisa was the woman that I so much wanted and needed to be. Malisa was what I was trying to deny an existence, yet, she was fighting for freedom, and this dam e-mail was her reinforcements against my 'nothingness'.

Staring out the window, I screamed inside. I so much wanted to know why this was happening again. Why was life so cruel to send this young and innocent boy into my life? Why was this boy so hard to ignore? Could I push it away and ignore this any more?

When I thought I had just gotten stable, this happened again, dredging up the conflicting emotions, doubts, and intense need to be someone I wasn't born as. Life, my feelings, my very existence was unfair and cruel!

I looked back to the monitor and wondered if this was my doom. I continued reading the terrible, scary, confusing, lovely, loving, sweet words. I was dying, yet I couldn't really see it at that time.

"You know, I know we are far away, yet, I feel so close to you already. So fast. I've never experienced all these feelings this fast before. Usually, it would take me a long time to feel strongly for anyone, but it has happened too fast with you. It is as if you made my emotions snap into place with you. I want you to be happy. I feel you are a wonderful woman. I wish I could be with you, hold you in my arms, and feel your warm body next to mine. I want to tell you all this while we hold our hands together instead of having to write them in front of my computer.

I can't understand how life could put such a fantastic female in the body of a male. Still, I am not having these feelings for your body; I'm feeling all this for you, the person, not the body.

Malisa, excuse me for calling you this way, but that's the woman I care so much for, the female. Not the thing you are trying to hide behind. You are such a wonderful person. Every word in your IRC to me made me so happy. I wish I could hear those words instead of reading them, but we know that is not possible right now.

I don't know if what, I feel, is only friendship; it is so intense, so raw.

I feel like saying your name and looking at you; I want to be with that wonderful girl you are. You feel like a woman, act like a woman, talk like a woman. For me, that means you are a woman. I don't think either you or I can change that. I want you to feel happy and loved and know that someone cares for you.

If I had your love, I would never hurt you. Love has to be worked on constantly, and if a person as incredible and special as you gave me her love, I wouldn't ever hurt that person. The absolute opposite, I would love her as much or more. And I would feel like the luckiest guy in the world.

Malisa, I feel a better person just because I've met you. Thanks for letting me get to know you a little more and letting me discover the beauty of yourself. That beauty is in your heart and goes deeper within you than anything else. Your beauty is inside you; that's what I like about you, your interior beauty.

I'm here in my house, just thinking about you and wishing you could read my thoughts. I see you in your house, alone, and I wonder how such an incredible girl like you is alone. Here, in front of my computer, thinking and dreaming about you and wishing you are happy, and you are whatever you want to be. One is whatever one feels like. I know you feel like a girl, and for me, I see you like a girl because you are a girl.

I'll be waiting for your hopeful reply, sweet Malisa.

Love
Daniel"

I couldn't think. I couldn't breathe. This sweet e-mail had somehow made my mind like a raging river of thoughts. Why!? Why could this e-mail, out of all the others, cause such problems for me? I scanned it again. What had he said that had hit me so hard? What had he said that had made my soul scream with distress?

Damn! The whole e-mail was breaking my mind in two, but the last sentence, "I know you feel like a girl, and for me, I see you like a girl because you are a girl.", killed me every time I read it.

I must have read that one sentence ten, twenty, a hundred times. Each time brought a tear and with it the thought of despair. This… just… wasn't… fair!!! I started searching inside myself, searching for whom I should be. What was I, where could I live? Not physically, but emotionally, mentally, socially. Where could I LIVE!!!

I didn't know what to do. What could I say or write? What could I say replying this young man? This one person had suddenly turned my life upside down and back to front again.

My mask of so-called normalcy cracked, crumbled and fell away as the gender problems I had been trying to hide away broke free. I felt like I was bleeding inside.

As despair filled my being, I knew I had to scream for help. Madness seemed right around the corner. I needed to talk to someone who could understand and calm me down. But where could I find that help? The pressure and torment inside me had to be released. I needed someone to listen to me. Then I suddenly remembered the one place I had cried at before…

IRC.

Many times before, I had cried while talking to people on IRC. Many times before, Internet had been my lifeline. It had helped me sort out my problems to help settle me back down. I took to the Internet like a spider to a fly, quickly injecting my frantic feelings into the channels, screaming like a baby screaming out for someone to help them. Finally, one person came to my assistance and asked me what was wrong. I couldn't believe it, I had found someone I could cry on.

I cried as I typed away to her, my feelings running wild. No, yes. This couldn't be happening again. Damn it, I can/can't handle this. I'm a man/woman/I'M A NOTHING! I screamed out to this person, holding my feelings out like flowers for the taking. After I cried to her, I knew that I would be safe again. Just the dumping of my feelings would usually allow me to ground myself, see how silly I was for feeling this way and go back to just pushing it all back, so I could ignore it.

Tennfem guided my construct Winc to a chair. If she noticed that Winc/I had only the barest resemblance to human form, she didn't show it. My initial outburst had left me too exhausted to do anything but cry before her. She sat across from me and waited. "It's going to be okay, Winc. Take your time, dear."

Noiselessly, I/Winc sniffed and tried to calm down. "I don't know how to say anything any more. I think I just need someone to talk to… Someone to just cry with." Tennfem nodded and made just the appropriate noises to keep me going. "You know, explain where I am, how I feel…" But my chest constricted again, and I was forced to admit I was crying again.

"Aw honey - it's okay….just tell me," Tennfem said, reaching across to grip my/Winc's doughy, almost shapeless hand. There was no disgust in her at his formless thing sitting in front of her. She had already defined herself in the role of counsellor, but I/Winc had no form. Just a vague shape. "Go ahead, Hon. I won't judge you." she encouraged.

"I was born a male. I should still be that." I dove in, letting the awful questions plaguing me flow through my fingers to the keyboard and then to Winc's/my lips. I could almost imagine my construct's from flowing and shifting, presenting a masculine image to match the definition I was laying out. "But I'm nothing any more. I can't be who I want to be, and I'm not male. So, what does that make me? NOTHING!" Winc/I collapsed back into its/my former, doughy shape before Tennfem's eyes.

I couldn't handle this. I was breaking up.

This wasn't working like before. With every word, every letter I typed, I felt more confused. I felt more pain. I felt myself slipping into a black, sucking void.

Seeing my distress, Tennfem said, "You dear thing! My husband is Transgender; believe me, I understand…" A thought seemed to flash across her face. "Sweetheart, where are you??!!"

"At my computer." I typed numbly. It wasn't an attempt at humour. My mind was so deadlocked in the little 'logic mantras' that had brought me to this point, I simply spit up the most straightforward and most accessible response. With a little more coaching, Tennfem was able to find out I lived in New Zealand. "Sorry. I can't think. It all hurts to do much."

So far, I could not transmit anything but my pain and hurt. She wanted to help and tried fishing to respond by letting me know her credentials. "My husband is a male who wants to be a woman; I do understand… Now tell me, why do you say you're nothing any more." I/Winc just sat there trembling. "There are others like yourself. You are a female who wants to…" She saw me/Winc wince at her faux pax. "… I mean, sorry. You're confused, right?"

No, that isn't right, I thought, thrashing against the darkness that wouldn't release me. I wasn't confused. Not really. I was mad. Fate, God, Karma, whatever had bent me over and done me raw, without even a little foreplay. I took that resentment and threw it at Tennfem. "I have the sex of a male. The stinking damn male gentiles. And I HATE IT! I hate being a man! I am not a Man! I hate being what I am not!"

Screaming it out across the keyboard like that didn't help. It solidified how I had been trying to deny, shift, alter the narrative of my existence. For so long, I had been telling myself, enforced by the comments from my father, counsellors, and other so-called friends, that I was born male and that it was what I was. Yet, so many things made me pine to be otherwise; so many other things had pushed me further and further into realising that I wasn't whole; I was missing a massive part of my existence.

I suddenly had in a cold realisation that I was lying to myself, that the whole "non-gender" thing I was using was trying to hide from the fact that my life had been fucked over, and I would never have what I really wanted!

"I see. I understand. How is all of this accepted in your country? Can you transition into a female?"

Evidently not, I thought, recalling 'friendly comments', 'advice', half-heard snickers and occasionally the silence that accompanied my arrival in areas I wanted to belong.

"I don't know what I want any more. I don't know what I want." If I let it all out, it'll help, I thought. Then I can go back to things I can do something about.

"Let me explain; at the start of last year, I was going to change sex. Because that is how I felt I should be. However, about 3-4 months ago, I got confused. People were telling me I wasn't acting (and didn't act) like a normal/typical female. I thought that maybe I wasn't a
woman enough and couldn't change. So many people told me what I was doing wasn't right, that I wasn't thinking clearly and allowing the stress of my life and university to get to me. I wasn't a good enough woman, I wasn't a good enough man, so… what could I be? I stopped my two months of hormones. I even changed my name to Mattie on a mail list I am on because I couldn't be Malisa; I couldn't be ME!"

"Bless your heart! Honey, do not let other people deter you from achieving your dreams." Looking back, I know Tennfem was trying to be supportive and give me some of the acceptance I wanted, but I didn't bother 'listening' to her.

"I've been trying to sort out my life. I thought that maybe I was only feeling the way I did because of wanting to fit in; I don't know what I felt. I put it into anything, made excuses, made it seem like anything I was feeling wasn't me being Transsexual. I mean, I couldn't identify with females, and I sure never identified with males. Then I thought, 'okay, I'm nothing. I can't be male, and I can't be female… I'll be a NON-gender, fuck the world. I'll be something in the middle.'"

By this time, I was pounding the words out. There was so much emotion and pain, I couldn't keep up with it. With every word, another tear fell to the keyboard. A little more of my mind slipped into the darkness that was growing in my soul with every letter.

Winc's ears were dead Tennfem tried to draw me out and begin to address the problem. "Listen, would you like to correspond with my husband? S/he has been all through the whole thing before, and I'm sure could be more than helpful to you."

But I was too busy pushing my story out through Winc. "I've felt stuck, confused, but no one can live in the 'real world' androgynously!" On IRC, it's okay," I can't honestly say I was even listening to myself at this moment. I'd already found that even on IRC, I preferred to present myself in my soul's form. "… in real life, it doesn't work!"

All through this, Tennfem tried to let me know she was there to help. She asked for my address, she made all the correct comforting comments and finally pleaded with me. "Please allow us to help you. I want to be your friend if you'll let me, and so would my partner."

But none of it was registering. I don't know why, but I couldn't see Tennfem's helping hand. She had reached out her hand, offered the help I was crying out for, but I couldn't see it. It was like I was screaming, and I couldn't hear anyone else. I was in a black hole, and I felt like I was getting deeper and deeper. I was losing my mind, and I couldn't do anything to stop it.

So, I screamed on, "I figured that I could handle being a non-gendered person. Shit, after reading 'Nearly Roadkill', I saw other people out there must feel like I do about gender and how people only seem to have a binary vision where it comes to it. I mean, if I wasn't good enough a woman, and couldn't identify as a man, then I had to be in the middle, nothing, right!"

I paused a moment; that whole sentence seemed so wrong right now because it wasn't suitable for what was happening inside my soul right then. Malisa was screaming foul, and she wanted back out; it was not right for me to push her back and away from my life! But I couldn't live like her. When I had tried to live as a woman, everyone said I was wrong, everyone looked at me strangely, they judged me and my life was made hell just for being different!

I blindly continued my rapid, frantic typing, "Then I met an 18-year-old boy yesterday, whom I thought I was just going to have cybersex with. We never got to the sex. Instead, we started talking like we had known each other for ages, and he brought all the feelings of Malisa (my female self) back again. I've been trying so hard not to feel like I'm stuck in this body. And now it has all come back again with a vengeance."

"And it will keep on coming back, dear," Tennfem said. "I wish you lived here in the States and not so far away."

I was reaching the end of the rant now, but instead of flushing the tension out of my system as it had before, it just kept getting worse. "I can't be a woman… I don't act like one; I don't look like one… I will never pass. I want so much just to be one, though! I can't handle this any more… I just can't handle this ANY MORE!!!"

Tennfem hugged me/Winc fiercely. "It's all right, really! You have just found TWO good friends. We are here for you; we understand!!"

"There is no one here who understands." Didn't she get it? "Most of the TS's I know just think I'm playing. Damn it, I'm going mad. I just want to escape this hell!"

She passed me her E-mail address and pleaded. "Please write to us, my husband's female self is named Ronilea, and she will be only too happy to help you… really. Please promise me that you'll write to Ronilea and allow her to help you? Okay? Please?"

I don't think I was even interested in getting help any more. I'd run the circle of 'I want/ I can't have, and I am/ I never will be, for so long that a grim resolve was beginning to form. I don't even think I would have heard help even if Tennfem had been standing in front of me.

Thoughts raced through my head, I could feel spiteful hate at the whole situation coming over me, and my resolve was just crumpling all over me. Life was over. There was no help.

"There isn't anything she can do for me," I replied, feeling a dullness coming over me as the realisation of my next move started to seep in. "I'm already seeing a counsellor, and that isn't helping! I'm gender fucked, and that is about it." The pain had to end somehow. "Do you know what it feels like, not belonging!?"

Tennfem could see where this was going and tried to hold me tighter. "Please, Winc, counsellors are one thing; someone who's been there is something else! I know from what my partner has told me how it feels, honey… honestly."

I had really been building up to this for weeks. So much time had been used telling my so-called 'peers', and they said the most hurtful things. I wasn't Trans enough, I wasn't trying to be a real woman, I was not really doing it right. No, other people who said they had Dysphoria didn't mean they really gave a rat's ass about how it was for me!

My resolve hardened. "I've spoken to a LOT of TS's! I don't know what else to say. I'm giving up…" It was with those three words, "I'm giving up", that I suddenly knew I was fucked. They weren't true. I wasn't giving up. This was more; the feelings that had been building up and over me were just too much and…

It was like I suddenly lost all thoughts, my mind chillingly clear, my emotions were impulsive, sudden, painfully sharp but directed. With a cold, calming realisation that I realised I wasn't giving up… I had already given up.

Now it was Tennfem's turn to ramble blindly. She had to know she'd lost me, but to her credit, she kept trying as long as the channel was open. "My partner is a great big guy, six feet four, very manly and hunky-looking… but in his heart, he is a petite, beautiful WOMAN… and I love this person with all my heart. Winc, please… Do you believe me that I understand?"

I couldn't reply; I wasn't even really reading any more. I rationalised that logically I didn't know how to stop the pain, and I was busy studying that logic like a jeweller checking a fine gem for flaws.

Even as Tennfem continued to talk, I counted the facets that made the dark gem that contained my soul. How could I make this gem brighter? How could I mean the feel safer and more welcoming? I couldn't answer, so… if I couldn't save the gem, then smashing it would be the only solution.

"I do understand. My partner and I have spent HOURS and HOURS talking about this. I am devoted to this person, and we would like to help you, too…really !!!"

My brain had gone into an analytical thinking model, stepping through everything like a check-list.

Facet one: Who can I go to? "I'm alone here, and that is how I feel." One tick for breaking the gem.

Facet two: Who have I got left here? "The people I thought I could talk to are nothing but backstabbers. They don't care." Second tick for breaking the gem.

"I know there are many thousands of miles in between us, but WE CARE! Would you come to the States if you could?"

Facet three: Where can I go? "If I could afford it, I would be there Today. I know that for sure." Stopping for a moment, I re-examined the first Facet again.

"The only people who care about me are there. I just wish I was there, so I could be with them… "But I couldn't be there. I couldn't afford to fly there; I couldn't just magic myself there. No, Facet one was indeed correct.

Facet four: How do I feel. I am alone; I have no one around me, no one I can really feel safe with, or even just get a hug from when I feel so profoundly down. I feel like shit, and I want to stop feeling like shit. And I can't stop feeling like shit. Third tick for breaking the gem.

"It WILL work out, Winc… BELIEVE IN YOUR DREAMS!!"

Facet five: Hope for the future? "I wish I could." But, there is no hope, no future where I can see happiness or the ability to live without this continued pain throbbing at my chest and mind every moment. There is no hope. Fourth tick for breaking the gem.

"My partner is 40 years old. He's lived with his dream for all his life… but now it's going to come true. You're still young. You can make yours come true, too!"

Total clarity: "I'm 25 and feel like a 12-year-old lost in New York." Dull as ditch water. And brightness? Logic had shown me that it was pointless, I had checked it off in my mind, and with the maddening rush of clarity, I knew this was the right thing to do.

"I can't live with this any more… I can't!!!!!! I'm breaking up inside!!!!!!!!!"

That was my final hit of the "enter" button, as the despair, anger, and pain washed over my heart, my head, my soul. I was so angry that I had finally realised my whole existence was for nothing; it was pointless, it meant nothing to anyone, even to myself.

I struck out, my arms thrashing for the closest thing. My arms wiped across the table, clearing the papers, books, and filing cabinet from the table to the floor with an all mighty crash.

My hand rose while forming into a fist and crashed into the computer, smashing the off button and cracking the casing. This closed my link to the Internet, IRC, and the world. And in the eerie silence, the fan of the computer dead, no sound outside, I was alone, and I was breaking down.

I was crying then like I had never cried before. "NOOOOO!" I shouted, my tears just making me more upset and angrier, driving me deeper into despair. I collapsed to the floor, my head pounding on the carpet underneath me.

Not once, not twice, but six times my head thrashed against the floor, trying to kill the black thoughts building inside my mind. "I want to die!" I cried to god, to anyone, anyone that would make it happen. "KILL ME… DAMN IT KILL ME!!!!"

I was buried in the feelings of grief, the feeling of emptiness and despair overcoming my common sense and my mind. I wanted it all to just go away. I wanted protection from the pain and the confusion. I just wanted to die. WHY, WHY can't I be a female? Why can't I just BE ME!!! DAMN THIS LIFE! DAMN IT TO HELL! This was all that kept running through my mind as I continued to hit my head against the stone floor.

I hated everyone and myself. I hated this world, my life in it and the prospect of continuing to live like this. 'Why couldn't I be a woman?' rushed through my head as I cried out for peace. I want to be a girl. Nothing should hurt this bad. Not even death.

It was then I knew it was time. I had had my outburst, my moment of trying to push away the thoughts, but my emotional, violent tantrum hadn't solved anything.

In cold, stark reality, I reaffirmed that death couldn't hurt this much; nothing could hurt as much as I felt right then. Nothing. I knew right then how to end it, and right then, at that very moment. I was terrified, but at the same time, resolved in my course of action.

I had a plan in my mind, a perfect method to end the pain, and it was going to work. I knew it would. It was simple; no one was at home, I had full access to the medicine cabinet, and I knew there were a lot of sleeping tablets and Panadol (painkillers) in there. I knew it would work.

The resolve came over me, and I attempted to get up like a zombie. But my body wouldn't move. My mind was set; I wanted to do this; I knew it was the only way to get over this pain and anguish. Yet, my body lay there, unwilling to play along with the self-destructive action. I cursed my damn body for not cooperating - but I was too tired in my head to fight. I lay there, figuring that given time, my uncooperative side would relax, but my course of action wouldn't. I would do this. It was the only way.

As I lay there, knowing how the end would come, and my mother's presence appeared before me. Not an image, but a feeling. There was a sense of her standing there looking down at me. The feeling of her love washed over me.

My anger at being denied my death, at my body refusing to move, suddenly turned to despair and then utter sadness. I started to cry again, my mind crying out in pain. I felt sorry like I had hurt her, pained her. Why couldn't I just do it? Why couldn't I just get it over and done and leave this life behind? Death was within my reach. Why couldn't I just do it?

The despair seemed to have jolted my body back to action, and I managed to get up from the floor. Even my mother's love hadn't obliterated my resolve. I knew I had to take those tablets. Living like this wasn't an option any more!

Slowing my breathing with a large deep breath, I calmed myself down. This was going to be hard enough as it was; I couldn't break down while I was taking those pills. I had to finish this, and this was the only way to kill this pain. I had resolved myself. I had to stop this pain once and for all.

I went to walk out of the study, but I couldn't move once again! My body denied me, and it continued to fight. My mind screamed out in anguish. I wanted to get those tablets, so I could finish this now!

But I still couldn't move.

I stood there for twenty minutes, frozen like ice, just crying and unable to move. I think I collapsed as I found myself lying on the floor.

My body wasn't going to help me, and then there was that nagging feeling of my Mum watching over me.

I just lay there, confused. I wanted to end it; I needed to finish it… but why didn't my body want to?

I placed my hands to my head and just continued to cry a waterfall of tears. A dull headache throbbed against my skull.

I was breathing deeply and just listening to the silence of nothing as darkness took me.