Evin

Evan is a 35 year old gay trans guy who started his medical transition as a minor at the age of 17. He is a veterinarian and is currently working for the government. He previously worked in small animal general practice while also performing in home euthanasia for pets. In addition to his veterinary degree, he also has a master's degree in public health.

Evan likes to spend time outdoors whenever he can and is an avid mountain biker, hiker, snowboarder, and cross country skier. He recently picked his oboe back up and has joined a queer community orchestra. Evan and his husband have lived all over the U. S. and Canada, but have settled in Seattle with their tuxedo cat named Thomas.

Transcript for Evin’s Episode

Evin Member Episode DONE

CONTENT WARNING: [00:00:00] We want to give a content warning for this episode. There is talk about suicide and mental health issues. Remember you can go to our website, transmasculinepodcast. com for resources for crisis lines, including the Trevor project, trans lifeline, and suicide prevention, lifeline, transmasculinepodcast. com.

INTRO: Hello everyone, welcome back. We're excited to be entering our fourth season of Stealth, a trans masculine podcast. I'm Jackal. And I'm Kai. We're your hosts for the Transmasculine Podcast. It's amazing to us that we are still going strong after two years and will be featuring our 50th episode this season.

INTRO: Our show continues to focus on the stories of people who identify as transmasculine and who transitioned either socially or medically before or around the year 2000. We will continue to make efforts [00:01:00] to include stories from trans men of color and acknowledge the importance of representation from these voices.

INTRO: The name of our show highlights two important facts that one for our generation, we were often told to hide our past and live an underground existence and that due to that, our stories are very often overlooked. We want our audience to know that we ourselves are a part of this generation of trans masculine identified people, and that we value the experiences inside our trans masculine community.

INTRO: We want people to know that throughout our lives. Each of us has had to navigate issues of disclosure, which have impacted us in many ways. As humans, we are always changing and transitioning. As elder trans men, we assume many roles. We get married and divorced. We are caretakers. We are parents. We are professionals, academics, and advocates.

INTRO: We push for human rights. and systemic change. We are exploring the various transitions that we undergo post transition. If you're new to our show, welcome. And if you're a listener from a previous season, thank you for your continued [00:02:00] support. You can find us on most social media platforms, including YouTube.

INTRO: These are trying times, and we want to acknowledge that here in the States, And throughout the world, there are groups trying to remove protections in place for our trans and non binary communities. Safety is a real concern for us, particularly our trans and non binary BIPOC siblings. We offer links to health and safety resources on our website, transmasculinepodcast.

INTRO: com. Please hold each other dear and stay in touch with us. We invite our listeners to remember that we are a living community. We are healthy. We are contributing. We have experienced loss and success. We are loved. And we welcome you to our stories.

Banter: Jackal. Yeah. I want to talk about music particularly. I love music. I do too. And like you're a punk rocker. I was raised on alternative music, punk. Yep. Lots of top 40, because when it was all like mixed together, went to the queer bars where it was just like the universal beat, lots of pop and disco. I went to the queer bar [00:03:00] that they played, um, Patty Smith.

Banter: Ooh. You know, and Wow. Yeah. In, in Los Angeles. And I was like. That, I mean, it was like my godsend cause I was punk rock anyways. And so it's like, I went to the thing and it was Gloria, G L O R I A. Yeah. Anyways, go. Yeah. So I have been since the pandemic is quote unquote eased up, even though it's COVID is everywhere and spreading, get vaccinated, get boosted everybody.

Banter: I have been going to bands again. Which makes me feel like a part of myself has just been re attached, you know, as it were, and I'm so excited. I've gone to so many bands and I really have to, I, I definitely listened to music from the two thousands and from current music, I like alternative music, but, um, I definitely go to reunion bands.

Banter: Like what have you seen? Reunion tours and go, you know, and recently, I mean, U2 is playing at the sphere in Las Vegas. [00:04:00] Uh, Chrissy Hein and the Pretenders just I think, had their last show in San Francisco and, well, I think that they were gonna go to la I was gonna actually go to LA to see, uh, my friend in October.

Banter: Nice. Um, to, uh, to see that show because I really loved The Pretenders. They were one of the first albums I ever bought actually. Yeah. And, um, and yeah, I super loved him, but I'm like, my fun, my funds aren't really. Uh, flush right now. So I had to cancel that idea, but, uh, and it was at like a, like a Lollapalooza type of thing.

Banter: Like it wasn't like, you know, going to see a show that there was just them. It was like this whole big festival and you know, I mean, I'm, I'm a crotchety old guy. Like I would have had to bring my lawn chair and like kick the little mosh pit to like go get my seat and stuff, but you know, but it was, it was on my mind.

Banter: Like I had thought about it a few months ago and my friend and I had talked about it. So. But yeah, so did you see Chrissie Hynde and the Pretenders or did you? [00:05:00] No, I saw postings about it, but I had just been thinking a lot about music because on social media, people, all my friends are going to see the Pretenders and the Stop Making Sense 40th year anniversary.

Banter: Talking Heads. Yeah, it's coming out right now. So the Talking Heads. Are you going to see them? Who are you going to see? Who have you seen? Don't keep me in suspense. We're going to see the movie, uh, right. That's coming out, but I think the talking heads might be getting back together and if they do, Oh, I'm so there.

Banter: A hundred percent. Uh, we saw love and rockets a few months ago, which is eighties. Yeah. Like, and I, yeah, but it's, you know, they were never much of. Some synth bands, like pop bands, like kind of bands like that, they're not all about like dancing and performing, things like that. They're about the music and it's nostalgic.

Banter: And I had such a great time, you know, I went and saw the X Ambassadors, which are a band from Ithaca, I think, New York. And I've seen them a few times in [00:06:00] Brooklyn. I saw them. And then I saw them most recently here at the state fair. And it was done in Salem, which is rural state fair. So from like a hipster warehouse in, you know, Bushwick and New York in Brooklyn, in Brooklyn to the state fair in Salem, Oregon.

Banter: And I will say the thing, go ahead. It reminds me just because I was like such a hardcore punker back in the day, like. Uh, Agent Orange was one of the bands that I used to hang out with and, uh, and I remember like they would just take whatever gig that came their way, right? Like they weren't picky. Like they were just trying to make a buck and, uh, they did a, like car opening show, like, like, you know, like some car lot stuff.

Banter: It's literally, yeah. Yeah. Like, it was just like during the day. You know, some Saturday, like have a live band, you know, and it's Agent Orange for this like Chevy lot or something. That's so funny. I'm all about like, it's [00:07:00] interesting. You know, Mick Jagger is still kicking and Sting just played here in Portland.

Banter: I just, I really like music. And, um, I wanted to just, just talk about that because I I'm excited about the talking heads video and, and things like that, but yeah, music is something that's really good for our soul. And unfortunately when we play music from back during the time when our interviews, interviewees transition.

Banter: Spotify, if we don't have a copy, yeah, if, if anybody, yeah, really, so yeah, we were going to be doing the transversary year, whatever the, the, you know, song was popular that year kind of thing, but Spotify has dinged us. So if you are missing, if we're missing an episode, that's why, because Spotify took it down.

Banter: And, uh, I have to go, but sometimes I have to go back and like put something else in, but also know that the people that we're putting in are trans musicians, like they're trans masculine musicians that we're now putting in to replace the [00:08:00] songs that we're missing. So, you know. I love music. Kai loves music.

Banter: If you love music, like go out there and make music, like sing, dance, you know, play the drums, whatever it is, because, uh, you know, we have great voices, like, you know, we have great stories and we have great things to say. So thanks. How did you find the musician for Vinny's episode? For Vinny's episode, who Eli, Eli Conley?

Banter: Yes. Yes. Ed Varga is amazing. You know, he is. My guru, right? And he actually, um, helped to get us, um, Oh shit. What's the L seven lead singer's name? Lee Lynn, Lynn, Lynn, Lynn. Was it Lynn? Was it Lynn that we used or was it Tribate? We used a song by, um, by one of them and, uh, Ed got us, um, permission [00:09:00] from, from him.

Banter: And then, uh, he also contacted E. Conley, who I think he's doing a collaboration with at some point. And, um, basically Eli sent us like two folders worth of all this music, you know, that he, that he has and stuff. And so like, I've got, you know, like Eddie, you know. Ed Vargas, Eddie and the heartbeats, you know, some music collection.

Banter: And then I got Eli Conley right now. So I really liked Eli's voice a lot. Yeah. Yeah. You know, I love their, I love their music style. I love their voices and, uh, and yeah, like, you know. If you are a musician and you want to, you know, contribute to our, our show, please send us your stuff, send us an email or something because, you know, you know, we are getting dinged by Spotify.

Banter: We like to put it on, but, uh, we might not be able to. And, uh, yeah, like let's highlight some trans masc voices. Exactly. Well, thanks, Jackal. Rock on brother. Rock [00:10:00] on. Punk rock on.

Outro: Evan is a 35 year old gay trans guy who started his medical transition as a minor at the age of 17. He is a veterinarian and is currently working for the government. He previously worked in small animal general practice while also performing in home euthanasia for pets. In addition to his veterinary degree, he also has a master's degree in public health.

Outro: Evan likes to spend time outdoors whenever he can and is an avid mountain biker, hiker, snowboarder, and cross country skier. He recently picked his oboe back up and has joined a queer community orchestra. Evan and his husband have lived all over the U. S. and Canada, but have settled in Seattle with their tuxedo cat named Thomas.

Outro: Evan's transversary is 2004, the same as Xander and Max Gotti, so go check out our website to see what momentous events happened in that year.

Evin Interview with Bonus: Hey, so today we're here with Evan. How are you doing today, Evan? I'm pretty good. How are you guys? I'm good. [00:11:00] Thank you. Very nice. So we don't know each other. You actually reached out to us. Do you want to tell us a little bit about who you are and why you reached out to us? Yeah, I'm part of this post transition trans guy group on Facebook and one of your episodes got posted I think Matt who I got to meet briefly, so I listened to his episode and I also a couple months ago started this really long new commute between Seattle and Olympia that takes me over an hour each way And then I just started listening to your episodes in the car.

Evin Interview with Bonus: Um, and I was like, this is the podcast I didn't know I needed right now. I just transported and like totally in this world of, I haven't really thought about trans stuff in my own trans identity for a while. And so I was just really enjoying it. And as I'm listening, I'm like. Hey, I want to answer these questions too.

Evin Interview with Bonus: I have an interesting story that I feel like is a little bit different from a lot of your guests. Um, and yeah, I reached out and was like, I don't know if I fit your demographic. I'm a little bit [00:12:00] younger than most of your guests, but it's been a while for me since I transitioned. Yeah. And I just really appreciate feeling connected to this kind of wider community of trans guys and being back in the space of listening to trans guys stories, because I think it's been a while for me.

Evin Interview with Bonus: Sweet. That's very sweet. Thank you. Yeah. But let's get started. How did you learn about transmasculine identities and tell us when? Yeah, I'm a long winded person. So I'll give you like the timeline ish story. When I was like a freshman in high school, I had a whole bunch of things going on in my life. One of which is I just started suffering from like pretty intense depression.

Evin Interview with Bonus: And then I was trying to figure out my identity. I tried on the bisexual label and then lesbian label for a hot second. And then I found back in like the early two, so this was early 2000. So like 2002 was when I started high school. And that was for this like transition period for the internet, where we went from AOL [00:13:00] chat groups, barely anything before like Twitter, Instagram, et cetera, Facebook, and.

Evin Interview with Bonus: There was just all these kind of early websites where I was able to start finding other queer resources and whatnot. And I found some stuff related to lesbian identities and they linked to this guy's tripod HTML website. So I don't know if you guys remember back in the day there were these like basic HTML websites that a lot of trans guys made that they all had the same like outline and I even made one a couple years later which was like there would be the top surgery section where there'd be like the different photos of like post surgery and the little write up and then there'd be the testosterone section with every week there'd be different photos and be like here's three more chin hairs and here's a video clip of my voice dropping.

Evin Interview with Bonus: And I think a lot of trans guys can relate to this feeling though. I found this guy's website and I was like, I cannot unsee this, right? [00:14:00] I remember going to that website every day for a couple of weeks, just being transfixed and being like, what does this mean? Well, can we ask who has it? Do you remember?

Evin Interview with Bonus: Yeah, his name is Kael, K A E L. I still am Facebook friends with him, I only met him once briefly. And so, he's part of this Facebook group that I'm part of as well. And so I've known who he is for a very long time, and at one point I told him, You are the one. You're the first one that I found. And that'll always stick out in my brain.

Evin Interview with Bonus: And I remember telling a teacher about it, and being like, What is, and she's like, Oh yeah, that's interesting, whatever. It was very soon after that I was like, I can't ignore this, and I'm really scared to ask for what he's, has. But there was just something in me that was like, that's it. How old were you exactly then?

Evin Interview with Bonus: Because you said you had just started high school. Yeah. So I would have been 14, maybe had just turned 15 years old. So this is really interesting to me because you're, this is the youngest person that we've had. Identifying as trans and then wanting to transition or researching this. [00:15:00] How did you begin your medical transition then?

Evin Interview with Bonus: Yeah. Did you have support from your parents? Were you able to do it before you were 18? Give me the dirt. Yeah. So that's like part two of my high school story, right? High school is crazy for everyone. It was particularly stressful and hard for me. You know, I will say too, like before I get into that, how my parents and how I transitioned, the other.

Evin Interview with Bonus: Kind of thing that was highly relevant back then in high school was. This website called LiveJournal. Yes. So, before Twitter and before Facebook, in the early 2000s, from 2002 to 2010, was this website called LiveJournal. And I think at the time it had the biggest collection of FTM online groups of anywhere.

Evin Interview with Bonus: And I met so many trans guys through LiveJournal that I'm still friends with. That we're still connected with from all over the world, from Australia, from Nova Scotia, from South America. And that is where I found all of my [00:16:00] information. And so as a 15, 16 year old, I was like, I need to find out literally everything I can about.

Evin Interview with Bonus: And that's where I found pretty much everything I need to know, where I found other people. So I came out to my parents as trans when I had just turned 16. It was my sophomore year of high school. I wrote my mom a letter on Mother's Day and I thought to myself, Look, what a great Mother's Day present. I'm introducing her to her son.

Evin Interview with Bonus: She did not think it was great. She was like, This is so horrible, you don't know this, how could you, like, take away from my special day, blah, blah, blah. And so the question of were my parents supportive, there's two answers, there's two truths that coexist at the same time. One of which is that I was one of the most privileged, supported kids ever for trans youth.

Evin Interview with Bonus: My parents, the entire, my entire life, even now, the only thing that they care about is Making sure that I live my best life and supporting me in every [00:17:00] way. I also grew up very financially privileged as well. My parents are upper middle class and they had tons of financial resources. But my mom's downfall, if anything, is she's too much of a helicopter parent.

Evin Interview with Bonus: Just, she just wanted to do the best, so she would research everything to death. But there was very little information for parents. That's actually a generational difference in parenting styles too. Latch keep kids. Hey kid, you're on your own. See you tonight. I mean, when it's dark versus somebody who's actually like monitoring and supervising to this extent.

Evin Interview with Bonus: Yeah. Yeah. If there was a PFLAG chapter, we didn't find it or they didn't have good resources. So I remember printing off these articles from the internet, from our hallway computer and stapling them and being like. Here you go, mom and dad, here's like this one, not very good resource. And so they were wanting to do the best for me, but they didn't instantly say, okay, we support you.

Evin Interview with Bonus: It was just a long process of, do you know this for sure? You're seeing a psychiatrist and your [00:18:00] psychiatrist is saying that this is maybe problematic and not good and you don't know. And I was on antidepressants and had other, Oh, I just got diagnosed with ADHD. And also to my mom's and dad's credit, they're like, you also just became a vegetarian and gave yourself a red Mohawk.

Evin Interview with Bonus: So what's what here, but I think the thing that was really hard, and I actually recently had a conversation with my mom about this is that back then. What was missing that I think that more kids these days have from their parents is just someone saying you're okay Like you're not a burden. You're not a problem.

Evin Interview with Bonus: We support you and your identity Let's go see the specialists who can guide us through what this looks like to help a teenager transition medically There was nothing like that and there wasn't even any kind of template for my parents to be like, Oh, we should validate our kids reality and their existence, even if we need to consult more specialists before we're ready to sign off on transitioning.

Evin Interview with Bonus: There was none of that. There was just this overwhelming sense from my parents and from everyone that I [00:19:00] was a burden, that I was creating problems, that why did I have to do this, right? You're one, you're a teenager, an adolescent, which is such a trying time for anyone. You're going through puberty for the first time or through a lot of it.

Evin Interview with Bonus: And then on top of it, you're managing all this clarity about your gender presentation, seeking help, and then being told you're a burden, that who you are is imposing on other people. And no wonder a lot of us are depressed in adolescence. It makes a lot of sense. And I really appreciate how hopeful you are for the younger folks.

Evin Interview with Bonus: There are more resources. And what you would like for parents today, how to respond. Yeah, it's crazy how many trans guy friends or acquaintances that I know that have kids and their kids are now identifying as non binary or trans and I'm like, Coincidence or just they have cool parents. But one of the things I see with those kids, at least via Facebook and from talking to a couple of them is just the [00:20:00] medical decisions are one thing, but parents can always.

Evin Interview with Bonus: Validate their kid's reality for who they think they are, right? So if a kid at whatever age says, I'm a boy, you're not crossing any bridges or doing anything that you can't later change just to say, okay, we support you. What name do you want to go by? What pronouns make you feel best? What toys do you want?

Evin Interview with Bonus: That's not hurting anyone. That's something that you can always do. And so I don't think my parents ever said you're a burden, but it was what they didn't say, right? It was the. It just always, Oh, this is so hard for us. We don't know, we're not sure. Don't you want to wait till you're 20? Those kinds of things.

Evin Interview with Bonus: Right. Yeah. It's the message that you received, even if it wasn't the words that were said. Right. Yeah. Or is this really, you're, you're depressed and you have ADHD. So how do we not know? It's not that, yeah, exactly. So, yeah, so that was like, I can, if you want, I can talk about too, like the part where I medically transitioned.

Evin Interview with Bonus: [00:21:00] Well, sure. Did you do it as a teenager or did you have to wait until after school? I was 17 when I got to start, which was. It's still way later than I wanted. I was a very strong, well determined, precocious kid. And I like just had decided at age like 14, 15, like I'm going to find out everything I can about these different things that I know that I want.

Evin Interview with Bonus: One of which was transitioning. Another, which is I was determined to go to boarding school. And not just any boarding school, I researched all of the boarding schools that were in the woods in Vermont or Colorado, and then I pitched it to my parents and I was like, I need to go to this boarding school.

Evin Interview with Bonus: It's in Vermont. Um, they have no grades. We have project week instead of finals. We call our teachers by their first names. It's on a working cow farm and you get to milk cows before classes. And I get to snowboard and play oboe and do all the things that I love. And my mom was like, hold up, no, I'm not sending my kids to boarding school, they don't leave my house [00:22:00] until they go into college.

Evin Interview with Bonus: But to their credit, before they even ready to sign off on transitioning, they made me visit the school three times to make sure I was super sure. And then they said, okay. And so my junior year of high school, I started at a new school and I showed up and I said, hi, I'm Evan, and I go by he, him, and. Yeah, so that was this clean break where the previous year I, the sophomore year I identified, I used the term genderqueer.

Evin Interview with Bonus: I would have used the term non binary had it existed back then. Yeah. And I would have used they, them if that had existed or been a thing, but I, I had used whatever I could access identity wise. And then, I realized by the time I started at boarding school, I had already figured out I need to physically transition.

Evin Interview with Bonus: I absolutely have to. And yeah, so I started in a new school and they made me live in the girl's dorm for the first year I was there because I had not started physically transitioning. And my psychiatrist at the time told my parents. [00:23:00] No, do not let him start hormones because they might make him angry.

Evin Interview with Bonus: And we don't want to make his depression worse at boarding school. And I just remember that entire year, every day of waiting was agony because I was like, I know what I need. It doesn't sound like it waiting helped your mood at all. No. And so I was. On antidepressants and the very end of that story is that guess what made me not depressed wasn't Prozac.

Evin Interview with Bonus: It was testosterone. Testosterone. Yeah. We've talked about this a lot on the show where it's like finally feeling like you've gotten the medication you need to surpass some of the mental stresses that you have had. I just was like, Oh, now we're good. So my parents over the course of my junior year, we were able to go to the Philadelphia Trans Health Conference.

Evin Interview with Bonus: That year, and that was a turning point for my parents to be able to sign off on this. Also at the time, um, they heard from doctors and specialists, get up and give a [00:24:00] presentation. And for my mom, she worked in healthcare her whole career, healthcare administration. And so she was just all about the science, the data, the facts.

Evin Interview with Bonus: And before then she didn't have that. And it wasn't other trans people talking that convinced her. It was some doctor that got up there and talked. Also, I grew up outside of Philadelphia, and Philadelphia at the time, and still now, has one of the best community LGBTQ health centers, which is the Mazzoni Center.

Evin Interview with Bonus: And at the time, on the East Coast, it was one of two places that would hide any kind of model of one being able to treat trans youth. There's some endocrinologist in Boston, and then there's the Mazzoni Center. And I met two other trans kids that were teenagers at the time. One of them was up in Vermont, and he drove down to the Mazzoni Center to start hormones.

Evin Interview with Bonus: We just happen to live in Philadelphia. The Trans Health Conference has always been by the Mazzoni Center. And so, it was the like, here's the doctors at presenting, and then I got to go to that doctor. My parents were finally like, [00:25:00] okay. And then they had a top surgeon stand up and give the presentation.

Evin Interview with Bonus: So they're finally like, okay, like we're ready to do that. And so the end of June, after my junior year of high school, uh, my parents signed off and I started hormones. And two weeks later, I got top surgery. Wow. Wow. Yeah. And. Amazing. And I, but like for me, like maybe a year is not a long time to wait, but it was, I think it was about 16 months from the time that I realized myself that I need to physically transition to the time that I was actually allowed to start.

Evin Interview with Bonus: And that was the longest 16 months of my life. Yeah. I have to ask a question about in the media today. All the talk about trans youth and the anti trans legislation that's all around the world and saying that you're grooming our kids, the horrible misinformation that's spread about us. When you think about youth today, you mentioned that there's a lot more hopefulness and information.

Evin Interview with Bonus: The message that many of [00:26:00] the non supporters of trans and gender non conforming kids is that you're going to change your mind. You're going to make this horrible mistake. There's the de transitioner, fear mongering that gets so much airtime. What do you think about all that now as somebody who did transition in their teens?

Evin Interview with Bonus: Yeah, first off there's hard data and published journal articles saying that's not the case. That the number of people that transition as youth and then change their minds is. Negligible numbers. And there's almost always a coexisting mental health conditions going on for those kids that later changed their mind.

Evin Interview with Bonus: Every single person I know who transitioned as a youth, um, myself included, it was like, I wouldn't be here talking to you today if I hadn't transitioned in that, if I hadn't really transitioned like that, I maybe would have stuck through it, but. Here I am almost 20 years later saying I am in the same exact person that I told you I was when I was 16, right?

Evin Interview with Bonus: Yeah. And so there's the hard data and there are hard numbers. And then here I [00:27:00] am as a person just being like, it kills me. Cause like, I can't even read some of these news articles because it just, it's like a stab in the on the chest because I was a trans youth. Right. And here I am 20 years later and it's no, I only exist because I transitioned.

Evin Interview with Bonus: And this is, that's always been me. And so. Like to all the people that are saying that we couldn't be allowed to it's you're not saving us by Removing access to care. You're killing us kids Sorry to take this to a serious level But like kids will can be committing suicide because of these policies that are happening and so some kids are not gonna make it And that is on those people, those politicians hands.

Evin Interview with Bonus: Yeah, you're right. And thank you. And I, it's something that Jacqueline and I both so deeply about, like you. And I think they're not stopping at kids. Right. And I also think you're right. Kids don't have the same resources and skills and abilities. They're kids and they're just trying to live. [00:28:00] And so many people who are moving out of states where legislation is being passed or they can't access care.

Evin Interview with Bonus: And it's just such. An upheaval that's unnecessary. They're uprooting lives and they. Are using trans youth as a political pawn to, because they have unresolved trauma themselves, these politicians, and they're taking that on us as they always have. But now it's targeted acts and they don't give a shit about trans kids.

Evin Interview with Bonus: They don't really care about what the science says. And again, it's just unfortunate that we're the latest target. And I just, I pray that the trans kids in some of those states survive. That's all I want for them is to survive. Because there's that whole, it gets better campaign. I guess here I am to say, it gets better.

Evin Interview with Bonus: I want them to survive to adulthood so they can be like me and be like, I made it through. Yeah. How did you make it through those years? You started thinking about this at age 14 and coming to terms with this and you waited a couple of two, three years. How did you get through that time? The trans [00:29:00] community.

Evin Interview with Bonus: That's really what it was. God, it makes me choke up a little bit. It's fine. All of my friends that I don't know through my husband or my other partner are trans guys. And two of my friends, I've known since that age. Yeah. We've been there for each other the whole time. And even at that age, I sought out every form of trans community I could find mostly on LiveJournal and I would just spend hours up late at night on our hallway computer, AOL instant messenger, just trying to talk to them about everything.

Evin Interview with Bonus: Um, and older trans guys. I got to go to the Philadelphia Trans Health Conference. University of Vermont had a trans conference that the students ran for a couple of years. And then there was a really cool thing that happened. I went a couple of years in a row in central Massachusetts. There was. This queer kinky family that had this huge space and they hosted a trans guy camp out every year, and it would be attended by 30 or 40 trans guys.

Evin Interview with Bonus: It was like Wolf something or [00:30:00] other. Raven, what? Yeah, Raven Wolf. Yeah, yeah. And it was just like, what a magical place to be at the age of 16, 17, 18, something like that, just to be amongst trans. Guys that were my age and then to see all of these trans guys that were in their 30s 40s 50s And I remember at age 17 being like it's gonna be okay.

Evin Interview with Bonus: I just see All of these trans guys here and they are adults and we'd be around a bonfire sharing stories and going to the local swimming hole, all of us with our shirts off at age 17, 18, and being like, I feel so normal and loved. And that's, that's really what got me through. I think it's just beautiful.

Evin Interview with Bonus: I'm so glad you had support and you were actively seeking it. And I think one of the things that's come up in many of the interviews is just the level of pressure valve relief when we're around each other. We don't have to. Perform in the same way or wonder. I just think there's something so special [00:31:00] about the bond we share.

Evin Interview with Bonus: So special. Not every trans guy I know has, is like me in that they're just constantly seeking out other trans guys. But for me, I have since the second I realized I was trans, those are my closest friendships. Those are. That's my community. That's my family. So how about we talk about that time. What were some of the things that you were told about how to live your life as a trans guy back then?

Evin Interview with Bonus: Yeah. What are some of the messages that the older guys gave you when you were the 16th? I mean, it sounds like your psychiatrist is like, Oh, hell no. Don't do this. It's going to. Yeah. I think it's incredible your parents showed up for you and, and it was very complicated. You said it was like on the one hand, very helpful and supportive.

Evin Interview with Bonus: On the other hand, it was holding me back. And it was, I felt like I was a burden implication. What else were you told back then? And I think Jackal's question is great. What did other trans folks tell you? Yeah, because I do think that we've heard a little bit about not getting the support and we know that and the parents being confused to think like that, but I'm really curious about what your trans elders or the older trans guys [00:32:00] that you were interacting with, what were the messages that they gave you?

Evin Interview with Bonus: I think, honestly, I don't think there was anything overly prescriptive that they were saying. Parents. Medical establishment teachers helped me back in some ways, but the other trans guys, I can't remember it. So to me, I think all they were saying is just live your life and they were validating my existence, right?

Evin Interview with Bonus: I just remember feeling part of this community, this family, this kind of larger. part of society of other trans guys and nobody was saying you have to be a certain way. I remember meeting trans guys that identified more along the non binary spectrum. I remember meeting gay trans guys and those camp outs at Raven's Place.

Evin Interview with Bonus: They're a very kinky family there. And so I was like, what's this cage here? Let's just like anything goes. And I'm like. I can be whoever I am and there's all these different avenues. And so it was an interesting time. It was a very transitional time in the early 2000s. Right. I feel like it was way [00:33:00] better and more open and I was allowed to be myself more than I would have in the nineties perhaps, but it wasn't everywhere.

Evin Interview with Bonus: Right. My, my teachers at boarding school, the administrative school administrators, the medical establishment still had no idea what to do with me. Right. And it was this, some people were really open and accepting, but not everyone had really caught up. Did they eventually move you into a boy's dorm and bathroom situation?

Evin Interview with Bonus: How did that go? Cause I had transitioned, I worked at a gym and I ended up changing my clothes in a broom closet. No joke. Yeah, that's insane. My senior year of high school, I returned and I had top surgery and started hormones and my voice had dropped. And even before I started physically transitioning, I passed as male most of the time.

Evin Interview with Bonus: And then after physically transitioning, I, like, 100%, it was like after that first injection of testosterone and no one ever read me as female ever again. Um, with that said, my school was like, mm, the school board or the administrators [00:34:00] Don't know what to do with you. And they are not ready to let you live in a boy's dorm because you're not physically male.

Evin Interview with Bonus: And I was like, so you want me with like my chin hairs and flat chest and drop lowered voice. To go live in a girl's dorm again. And so then they struggled to come up with another solution. They're like, Oh, there's these houses on campus. Your parents can rent them and live there with you. And I'm like, my parents have full time jobs in Philadelphia.

Evin Interview with Bonus: That's not going to work. And I almost left the school until the school nurse stepped up the last second and said, we have this studio cabin across our driveway. There's no bathroom, but Evan can live in there and we'll cover his room and board essentially. So I paid day student tuition for my senior year, lived with the nurse, she drove me back, it was her and her wife, so they were my like, lesbian moms for the year, which was pretty cool, and I am a little sad that I didn't get to live in a boys dorm, cause I think that would have been a cool experience, I did for my freshman year of college, so by that point, I got to have a male roommate, and kind of that [00:35:00] typical experience, but I still remember feeling so angry, and feeling so othered by it.

Evin Interview with Bonus: The fact that I couldn't live in a boy's dorm, and now these days, my old high school, they have a trans non binary floor on one of their dorms for their students, but at the time I was there, I was the first trans, like, student they had ever had, and they just didn't know what to do, and they just flailed.

Evin Interview with Bonus: You paved the way, Evan. It's like, really, lots of bumps that you paved the way so that the younger folks now can Getting affirming treatment and humane treatment. I just have a question about stealth. The name of our podcast is stealth, right? It sounds like you went from Philadelphia to Vermont to boarding school and you were out.

Evin Interview with Bonus: Is that true? What does stealth mean to you? Yeah. Have you ever lived with, if it's stealth or non disclosing, low disclosing? After my freshman year of college, I had this moment where I was like, I don't like telling everyone that I'm trans all the time. I, I think even via LiveJournal, there was [00:36:00] discussions around the term stealth and I was like, oh, I guess I don't have to tell everyone if I don't want to, that I'm trans.

Evin Interview with Bonus: So in high school, everyone knew my history and stuff, so I couldn't have been stealth. But by the time I was in college, I started keeping that info myself. And as stuff has progressed in my life, in my professional life, in veterinary school and in my working career, I'm pretty much exclusively not out as trans, but I am in my personal social life, partners, and basically every single friend I have.

Evin Interview with Bonus: How did you come to that decision? Just evolved. I think for me, I I haven't wanted to disclose my trans status, not ever really because of being worrying about safety. I think more is because I just realized I didn't want that to be the thing that people first thought about me, right? I wanted them to see me as a guy, as a man first.

Evin Interview with Bonus: And I don't trust other people not to change how they think of me as once they know that I'm trans. I worry that they always think of me as a [00:37:00] trans person or what if I come out to them as trans and then they start thinking of me as something less than fully male, right? And until I could trust that they would see me exactly the way I want to be seen, I'd rather keep that info myself because Once it's out, and the thing that really influenced my opinion is I cannot imagine coming out to co workers as trans and then this idea that they would be talking about me behind my back.

Evin Interview with Bonus: I wonder if he's had surgery. Like, I wonder, you know, what that was like. Um, and so I just, I've never been really comfortable with that idea. And then the kind of final part of this is that I'm gay and I'm married. And so really the thing that was important, important to me about co workers and vet school classmates is that.

Evin Interview with Bonus: I want them to know that I'm not just a stereotypical straight white male. I want them to know that I'm some flavor of queer. And then I found that I just by coming out as gay and talking about my husband, they're like enough to know that I'm like unique and special and different in some way. And [00:38:00] I'm like, that's good enough.

Evin Interview with Bonus: I don't need to tell them the rest of it. You are unique and special. Hey, I have a follow up question. So you said that you weren't really out in, in college. Were you out to your roommate that first year and how did that work? How comfortable were you in that situation if you were or were not out? Yeah, I was out more my freshman year and I remember meeting my freshman year roommate like email They gave us each other's emails ahead of time And so I came out to him as trans that summer before I started It was fine, I think, because I was finally 18 and at college and I went to a really cool, very liberal student body college where everything was fine and yeah, no, he was just like, cool, I don't know, oh, that was one of the things I wanted to say about high school too, this whole time with like, teachers and school administrators giving me a hard time and doctors being gatekeepers, Um, my [00:39:00] classmates, both in high school and college, have never had a hard time with it at all.

Evin Interview with Bonus: When I lived in a girl's dorm, those dorm mates of mine, they never saw me as anything besides Evan and male. None of them ever slipped up on my pronouns, and I find that same thing. Other young people, it's not hard for them to just validate a trans person's existence, their classmate. They're like, Yeah, obviously Evan's not a girl.

Evin Interview with Bonus: Does he look like a girl? Does he act like a girl? No, he's their male roommate. And the other important thing about that, I think is that there's all this, again, fear mongering about if we let this one person be trans, all of the people are going to want to be trans, right? And it's these women, these girls that you went to high school with or whoever, they're not saying, oh.

Evin Interview with Bonus: Now I'm trans too, because Evan's trans. No, they recognize your gender identity and they are comfortable in their own gender identity. One person's gender identity is not challenged. No, they were just [00:40:00] females at girls dorm and I remember some of them saying, it's so shitty that you have to be stuck here, but we love you.

Evin Interview with Bonus: And you're like our brother. That's strangely stuck here with us. We care for you. It's funny. And by the time I got to college, no one had an issue. My roommate didn't have an issue. Like, what would there to be an issue about? Like, he was just like, okay, whatever. Yeah. You want to talk about the home humanities homework?

Evin Interview with Bonus: So Evan, we're focusing on life post transition and you've been medically transitioned for at least 20 years now. What are some important milestones that you've had in your life post transition? Yeah. It's hard for me to talk about the milestones without talking about the hard stuff too. The next question, what are some of the challenges you've overcome?

Evin Interview with Bonus: So do them both together. Yeah, I guess the milestones on the surface have been, the obvious ones have been finishing veterinary school, working for six years in clinical practice and doing in home euthanasia, and [00:41:00] building my life with my husband, and we've moved three different places together. Um, yeah, thank you and establishing a community here, but the most important milestones have come out of, uh, adversity and the trauma that we've gone through.

Evin Interview with Bonus: And I thought as I was finishing the later steps of my transition, so I've had. Hysterectomy, thalaplasty, erectile implant, and I thought finishing vet school that things would just get easier, um, and the opposite was true, they just kept getting harder. It was a couple of factors, most of which was not immediately related to being trans, but one of which is that my husband has had a chronic illness for at least a decade now, leading to him being repeatedly hospitalized once or twice a year, and it always comes out of left field when there's a flare up.

Evin Interview with Bonus: He's a little bit more stable these days, but Especially when we lived in Vancouver together and we were in Massachusetts. When these flare ups would happen, it would just [00:42:00] be on me to be his only caretaker. And we would just have to stop everything in our lives. And it just dialed up my anxiety every time.

Evin Interview with Bonus: And the other thing is my career. I don't know if you guys know this, but veterinarians have One of the highest rates of suicide of any profession. Wow. No, I did not know that. I thought, I know dentists do, cause you're always putting people in pain. Is it because of the euthanasia of animals? Why? Do you know why?

Evin Interview with Bonus: Yeah. Is there a why? For veterinarians as a profession, um, the, basically the factors they can point to is very high student debt, coupled with an extremely demanding career. And leaning to burnout, which is what happened to me, people are awful to veterinarians. A lot of people are awful to us when their pets are sick and they take their stress out on us.

Evin Interview with Bonus: They get very mad and belligerent, many people, because veterinary care costs money and they may or may not have that money and they just take all their frustration and [00:43:00] blame out on us. And we're doing everything we can to help their animals and all people want to do is yell at us because They think that this is a rip off or their pet's not getting better.

Evin Interview with Bonus: Where's the health insurance for my pets? Yeah. And when there is, but you got to pay for it and think ahead of time about that. And it's a customer service position in a lot of ways where you're just dealing with the general public and the general public can be all over the place and their emotions run high.

Evin Interview with Bonus: Um, working long hours, getting incredibly burnt out. And now as a profession, there's a huge demand that's surged since COVID. And veterinarians are just working insanely long hours trying to do everything, trying to fit everything in and burning the candle at both ends. And when you couple that with the, we're barely making ends meet because we got to pay off these insane student loans.

Evin Interview with Bonus: There's so many other professions that I would recommend over this one in terms of you want to get paid well for the amount of work you do, don't become a veterinarian. For me, I have very high [00:44:00] anxiety that is just triggered by stuff. And it turned out that my job just started triggering that for me. I started having panic attacks at work, doing a lot better now.

Evin Interview with Bonus: I always knew I wanted to work in public health and now I work for the government and have a job that is way more sustainable for my mental health. Associated with. Veterinarian stuff, but not actually as a vet. Correct. Yes. I need to be a veterinarian to have this position, but it's an office job in which I help sign off on health certificates for pets traveling internationally.

Evin Interview with Bonus: And what I mean, I guess, is not dealing with the customer service aspect as much. Can I, I have a question for you. I think I'm a therapist, so I have to deal with. Bureaucracy, you have to deal with insurance. I just worked for a company that was for profit. So it was volume over the care of the employees or the therapist.

Evin Interview with Bonus: Right. So I think that's a lot of the trend. And so I can hear that in what you're describing. It's counter to like care, which is supposed to be what we're all about. Right. I like actually interacting with clients. Like hearing stories and hopefully being a [00:45:00] helper if I can, if I'm doing it right. Do you miss working day to day with the animals?

Evin Interview with Bonus: No, I. Let's be real. Yeah. I don't, I did it and I did it well. Um, but the toll on me was too much. I don't like those conversations with people 'cause it causes too much anxiety for me. Yeah. And that's just who I am as a person. And so I really enjoy what I do. Right now in my job I only talk to other veterinarians and that I enjoy way more.

Evin Interview with Bonus: But yeah, it's just so much to be constantly on. My last year in clinical practice was in-home euthanasia. And the hard part was never the giving the pets a peaceful transition. It was always the, I have to become a therapist to these people and talk them through their grief and their trauma and their everything, right?

Evin Interview with Bonus: And so I did really well at it, but it just, the toll on me was just so insane. That coupled with my husband's health issues, it was just so hard. And curveballs just kept being thrown at me, one [00:46:00] of which is I broke my arm, and then another time I almost bled to death on a mountain in Colorado when I was backpacking by myself, and that's a whole other story, I ended up like having a near death experience, and so it was all of these things, I had what I'd call a trifecta of mental health diagnoses of ADHD and anxiety.

Evin Interview with Bonus: Got the anxiety under control and then depression just flared like crazy from pandemic plus all these stressors. Oh yeah. And it was like, I don't really know what's causing my depression to be so bad, but I can definitely point to a lot of things like between my profession and my trans history and being just a queer person in America today.

Evin Interview with Bonus: And to get back to the milestone question, I did intensive treatment for depression last year and the year before called TMS and it worked. And so now for the last year, I've been like not depressed. And it was weird cause the depression, it was really only the first time it happened since I was like 14 to 17.

Evin Interview with Bonus: Right. [00:47:00] And at that time, testosterone made it go away. And this time TMS made it go away and it feels like the same thing. I'm just so thankful to be here on the other side telling you, yeah, it got better again, but it was the same. I'm like the same kid that I was, right? The strong will determine I'm going to figure this out because I hate feeling depressed.

Evin Interview with Bonus: So I'm going to do all the research and Oh, I'm going to do the thing and I'm going to convince the doctors to treat me. And they did. And I was like, look, I fixed it. Nice. Um, I'm glad you're on the other side. One of the things that just pops out like without a question is just how dang strong you are.

Evin Interview with Bonus: And I'm, I know the word resilient is used, overused a lot, but I'm hearing what a determined, driven, kind person you are, who's aware of your own limitations and what your strengths are. I think that's pretty great. So go ahead, sorry to interrupt you. No, thank you. Um, yeah, I just want to say.

Evin Interview with Bonus: Congratulations on getting [00:48:00] past that because, uh, full disclosure, I have my own mental health issues and they're fucking hard. Like they're no joke. And I think getting to the other side is really, it's really a struggle and it's really admirable that you were able to do that and figure that out. Yeah. If I can go ahead.

Evin Interview with Bonus: I don't know if you want to say something, I'm going to go on to the next question. This is probably a good point to bring this up. The last hard thing that I've dealt with is in this last year. So last January, this. Trans guy that I lost touch with, but at one point we were pretty close. He lived with me and my husband for a month when he was doing one of his pharmacy rotations, he was a medical student about to finish medical school and had a lot of the same identities as me as gay and ADHD and, but just an extremely brilliant motivated healthcare professional was a pharmacist went back to medical school.

Evin Interview with Bonus: I thought he was going to change the world. He took his own life. Last January, and I see my trans guy [00:49:00] friends just struggling with mental health, right? And we all have all these other factors, but you can't ignore the commonality of we're all trans, right? And one of my friends is in and out of inpatient treatment, um, all the time.

Evin Interview with Bonus: And I lost touch with my friend. And I, so I don't know what was going on with for him, but it was another moment of like, why am I here? What's does this mean? And I still don't know what it means, but I know that I, I actively choose the opposite that I choose to be here. I choose joy. I choose life. And I want that for my friends that are just struggling.

Evin Interview with Bonus: Two of them in particular, I give them so much credit. For just hanging in there, even when they feel like they don't want to be here anymore. And I'm like, whatever it is, your cat, kayaking, mountain biking, just find something to anchor you here. And that's what the politicians are doing to us too. It's just these trickle down effects.

Evin Interview with Bonus: And as trans adults, we just get it from all sides. And so I think mental health is not talked about enough in the general world, but in trans communities in particular, where we're just [00:50:00] overly affected by it. And it was just a real reckoning moment to lose our friend like that. It was just so hard for all of us.

Evin Interview with Bonus: Cause I thought he was going to change the world and he's not. But to me, that says like another milestone. I'm just like a new outlook on life, which is I'm here to live my life joyfully. And that's the greatest F you I can give to somebody in power that thinks I shouldn't exist. I'm so sorry about your friend.

Evin Interview with Bonus: We have lost our siblings and the, the therapist to me is telling everybody we have resources on our website for crisis lines and support, but one of the things that I hear again is you have surrounded yourself by people who love you and you've gone out of your way to find resources and persons and support along the way, whether it's the, the nurses who took you in high school.

Evin Interview with Bonus: Or, and I think that's a great piece of information to share is that the research shows that if a youth has at least one person in their corner during that time, that's going to increase the odds that they're going to make it to adulthood. And I'm glad you're here. [00:51:00] And I'm so sorry to hear about your friend.

Evin Interview with Bonus: Yeah. Thank you. I'm glad I'm here too. Yeah. I want to say too, that, uh, we do have resources on our website, but also. Everyone out there has friends and family who care about them, and I personally know how hard it is to reach out if somebody isn't always reaching in. When somebody's saying, Hey, Jaco, how are you doing?

Evin Interview with Bonus: And then I can say how I'm doing really, but for me to reach out and say, I'm not doing good, it's super hard. Yeah. Please try. It is worth the effort. Somebody out there loves you and will reach back in and we'll be there for you. It's worth it. Yeah. My, I have a, like a group chat with my two closest trans guy friends.

Evin Interview with Bonus: The ones that I met. When we were 16, 17, 18 years old and the three of us, and [00:52:00] we'll just send each other a meme and be like, how's it going? How are you doing? And it's a little safe space for us. I encourage everyone to they don't already have something like that to do that And it sometimes it's too hard to send a Long paragraph of how much you're struggling, but a cat meme will do sometimes just something to say that you're there, you care, and we're here, and when things are hard, it's, hey, Tyler, just send me, just send me something to say that you're okay, and I want you to know that I'm always here to listen.

Evin Interview with Bonus: Yeah, I think sometimes leaning on support somehow, whatever that means, maybe it's, you don't want to talk about it. You just want to go get an ice cream. Or exchange memes, I'd rather not talk, let's just hang out cause it's on my mind all the time, I just want to do it. So I thank you so much again. And it is important to talk about it.

Evin Interview with Bonus: It definitely comes up on our show and myself included. I've had periods in my life where I've been depressed and I think taking testosterone [00:53:00] doesn't cure all of one's problems. And I think it can help us a lot, those of us that choose to physically, physically, mentally, medically transition. It can help a lot and it can really help things line up.

Evin Interview with Bonus: And sometimes our brains just are wired a certain way. We lean more that way, or we have periods of depression. And thank you again for sharing that. Yeah. So shifting a little bit, Evan, how do you manage issues of disclosure now in your life? Yeah. And this is probably the last, like. The big thing I wanted to talk about, which is disclosure for me on a day to day basis is not too much of a thing that takes up too much of my brain space.

Evin Interview with Bonus: I'm out to my friends, most of them are trans guys anyway, at work I'm not, and that just works better for me. And with doctors or whatever, I live in a really big liberal city with, it's really easy to just get the care that I need and stuff. The one place that it's really an [00:54:00] interesting kind of thing that I think about more often is with sex and hookups.

Evin Interview with Bonus: And so the last little backstory that I have, I'm in a really interesting place in terms of having random hookups, which I've been having random hookups with gay guys since I turned 18. And that's just part of my sexuality and whatnot. I also got lower surgery, I got phalloplasty in 2012 when I was 24, and then I got erectile implant in 2019.

Evin Interview with Bonus: And after the erectile implant in particular, I now am in a really cool and fortunate place of not needing to disclose the fact that I'm trans when I Have random hookups or even longer relationship y things, if I don't want to. Tell us about that, cause that, I'll fill in the dots there. What? How is that possible?

Evin Interview with Bonus: The other. Yes. Part of this is in the last few years, especially since the pandemic, I have found myself in a particular kink community in Seattle, which I'm not going to get into too much detail, but like any kink community, um, it's [00:55:00] this special group of gay men in Seattle that are not the standard normal gay men.

Evin Interview with Bonus: We all have this interest in common. And sex for us is not super dick focused, it's not super penis focused. And so that leads to lots of freedom in terms of, I, nobody's scrutinizing my dick. No one's looking at it super close. So if they see it, they might think, Oh, maybe that's a little bit different. But I leave the burden on them to ask what's up.

Evin Interview with Bonus: And 90 percent of the time they don't. They just don't care. And it's really amazing because especially for the one off, like, hookup, I don't have to start our interaction by saying, I'm a trans guy, here's my genitals, here's how they're different, here's how I'm different from you, and then that sets the tone for the rest of the hookup, and that was the case for me up until three ish years ago, and I just hated it because it was so stressful.

Evin Interview with Bonus: Where should I tell them ahead of time over a hookup app? Should I wait in person? But that's maybe dangerous in case they have a really bad reaction to [00:56:00] it. And I've done it all sorts of different ways. And it would always put me in this kind of shameful headspace. It almost apologized for my genitals.

Evin Interview with Bonus: I'm sorry that I'm not whatever. And so between having this really accepting and open kink community that I feel really welcomed and part of. And having this super privileged place of being post lower surgery, once in a while, I'll share that I'm trans to a guy that I'm hooking up with. But afterwards, when we're having post sex, get to know you conversation, and then it becomes just like any other personal thing about me.

Evin Interview with Bonus: It's to me, it's the same level as do I tell them that my husband has a chronic illness? Do I tell them about my own history with mental health? Sometimes I don't, but it's. Entirely my decision, and I get to invite them in to my world that I want. It was Karamo Brown. He was like, I don't like the term coming out.

Evin Interview with Bonus: I like to think of it as inviting in, right? Zion also said that on our show. Yeah. Me from the past would never believe that me now gets to have dysphoria free sex in which I get to not come [00:57:00] out as trans. And so I guess in some ways I am stealth when I get to have sex and I'm so cool. Cool. And ending.

Evin Interview with Bonus: Again, it wasn't really my goal, but I have ended up here and I'm really thankful that I get to exist in this kind of space. I'm really happy. It sounds like you're liberated and that sounds pretty great. It's in contrast to some of the things I've read about or heard from other trans guys who have had lower surgeries.

Evin Interview with Bonus: It's like, hey, I fought so hard to have this, my body aligned with how I see myself and now who's going to want me? Right. And that is a different narrative and that liberation you're feeling is really different. So I really appreciate that you're sharing that. Again, I'm unique snowflake in a lot of ways.

Evin Interview with Bonus: And one of which is I'm predominantly a gay bottom, but I needed to have lower surgery to have a hard dick. So I could be my best bottom self. And I don't know why you're that way, but I am, but I just love living in this like community and this [00:58:00] community has been so welcoming and so amazing. And I don't have to be out as trans.

Evin Interview with Bonus: The fact that I'm trans is really the least interesting thing about me in some ways when I'm there and it's very different from the vanilla gay grinder hookups where It's just those guys hadn't really figured out their shit yet, haven't really discovered their own selves. And so they felt like they're always more threatened or wary of body differences, whereas this kink community is just, Hey man, none of us are normal.

Evin Interview with Bonus: We're like the unicorns of the gays community. Who are any of us to judge, right? Anybody else? Thank you. That's beautiful. I'm glad you found your people. Yeah. So, Jekyll, where do you want to go next? Evan, let's let you decide. We've already, we've already asked about your life now. Unless you feel like you need to say more about that.

Evin Interview with Bonus: We also have the question of what are the things that you're most [00:59:00] proud of? Wasn't there a question that you've asked people that's trans joy? Yeah, I was like, I'm not prepared to answer any of the aging, like, how do you want to be remembered questions yet? My brain, super not there yet. Right, right. I liked what one of your other, or multiple of your other guests have said that all joy in my life is trans joy because I'm trans and it doesn't have to obviously be something related to trans directly.

Evin Interview with Bonus: And my therapist said this too. He's, your existence. is the biggest fuck you could ever give to somebody who thinks that you shouldn't exist, right? Hell yeah! Right? Fuck you, I exist. Right? Yeah. You just living your life joyfully is like the biggest fuck you could ever give. And so for me, I've just really embraced that, especially after losing my friend, especially after getting out of depression.

Evin Interview with Bonus: And so for me, I found that being outdoors and exercising is my happy place. And so mountain biking is my biggest thing right now. One [01:00:00] of my closest friends now is another trans guy and we mountain bike every Sunday morning together. Where do you go? Tiger Mountain, Issaquah is our favorite place to go.

Evin Interview with Bonus: And we just do our loop. We've met some other trans mountain bikers that live in Corvallis and we've mountain biked with them and we've bonded over mountain biking. Cause mountain biking is a very white male, straight white male sport. And so to find other queer people and other trans people who are into mountain biking is super special and really makes the sport feel that much more accessible for me.

Evin Interview with Bonus: I also like love snowboarding and so for me the best days are the ones where I've been out in the woods exercising getting my heart rate up. Getting some sort of like adrenaline going from some fun downhills and then finishing the day in the hot tub with a beer with my best trans guy buddies. It doesn't get better than that for me.

Evin Interview with Bonus: And I also have recreated campouts and found my own little community here in Seattle. And I just went camping with four good trans guy friends last month. We went to Alpine lakes, wilderness, like north of Cle [01:01:00] Elum. So pretty up there. We found the best campsite right by this river and north of Salmon Lissac.

Evin Interview with Bonus: And we just had an amazing weekend. I got to go hiking. My friend loves fishing and he did that. My other friends were just floating in the river and then the last night there's a meteor shower. So we all got our camp chairs, just sat out in the open area and look up at the sky to watch the meteor showers.

Evin Interview with Bonus: My friend was doing astrophotography. Yeah, that's the meaning of life. That's why I'm here to watch a meteor shower with my trans guy friends. That's beautiful. That's beautiful. And very relatable. Okay. So shifting gears just a little bit. What would you like to say to the newer trans and non binary folk?

Evin Interview with Bonus: What would you like to say to them? Who you are is okay. Who you think you are is exactly who you are. You get to tell people who you are and anyone telling you that you're not that, don't listen to them. Anyone who thinks that you shouldn't have access to the medical care that you need is [01:02:00] wrong. Tune out all of those voices of the people.

Evin Interview with Bonus: Who don't believe you or who are giving you a hard time, even if you're 10, 12, 14 years old, or even younger, just who you are is valid and beautiful and okay. And if you can't be validated by the people around you, just hang on until you're 18 or until. You can find those people that will support you.

Evin Interview with Bonus: Thank you. Thank you, Evan. We just ran our demographics for season three, which include listeners under 18. We definitely have had listenership that's grown a little bit for people under 18. Thank you. And a lot of listeners are under 25. Thank you for expressing that. And we're a hundred percent. With you there, my brother, and as we think about wrapping up today's interview, before we get to the bonus questions, is there something that we didn't ask today that we should have asked?

Evin Interview with Bonus: Any last comment? [01:03:00] No, that last comment was it there's a whole life for you and I guess the other piece of advice I have is find out what you love in life and hold onto that. For me, it's become mountain biking and playing oboe and spending time with my trans guy friends. Um, And I do really encourage, even if people are more introvert loners, still find your trans community, even if it's that one friend, right?

Evin Interview with Bonus: Push yourself to go to a trans conference or online if you're the type of person that in person events are too much for you. Find your online communities. And for me, the closest trans guys that I'm friends with are the ones that I have things in common with besides being trans. The ones that I can go on snowboard trips with, the ones that.

Evin Interview with Bonus: We'll go hiking with me. Cause good to talk about being trans, but if someone's like a super like indoorsy artist person, like that's cool. And I love them, but like, we're going to run out of stuff to talk about. So find your people in, in, but find those community spaces as [01:04:00] well, wherever, wherever you are.

Evin Interview with Bonus: And if that needs to be online, the internet really saved my life. It really did. I'm so thankful for early 2000s internet and those basic HTML websites and live journal. That's part of the reason I'm still here. And those trans guys, it's been a privilege to watch all of us grow older together and to see these other trans guys around the world.

Evin Interview with Bonus: Surviving and living their lives fully. It's like we've made it. Yeah. Thank you. One of the things that is very consistently relayed to us on Instagram and Twitter is I didn't even know there were people out there who lived a life beyond what they've lived, that there was a history there. You found community, you express such appreciation and joy for those of us who came before you and for your current connection.

Evin Interview with Bonus: And how much you value being connected to trans guys and how important that is. I agree with you a hundred percent. It's such a special, unique bond that we share. Thank you [01:05:00] for sharing it with us today. Thank you for being here today and for reaching out to us, Evan, really. Yeah, Evan, I just want to say thank you as well, because you.

Evin Interview with Bonus: I've been quite emotional this episode and that heartfelt caring really shines through both from your own experience and the struggles that you've endured and just caring for our community and your brothers. Yeah, totally. Last serious thing. The Facebook group I'm part of, I haven't bought one yet, but when they, somebody came up with this message and they made t shirts and with it.

Evin Interview with Bonus: And they say. Trans people will live forever. Yeah, and we will. And I don't know if you have become a member, but we have our, um, member section that has this whole history of trans people. So like we go back, we're even talking about Joan of Arc, our trans sisters, so we've done a bunch of that. We've been here since the dawn of time and [01:06:00] we will be here when the world collapses.

Evin Interview with Bonus: So yeah, yeah. Thank you so much. Thank you to our members. We're here with Evan for our bonus questions. Evan. I don't know, you're part of a younger generation. I don't even know if this was an issue for you or not, but what do you think about being asked your pronouns? I did transition long enough ago that it's been an evolution and I've seen it through when I first identified as genderqueer for a hot second, when I was 16, there's pronouns that were not he, him, or she, her were like ze, zeer.

Evin Interview with Bonus: Yeah, and I could never get my mouth around those, so I never use them. I have had this conversation with other trans guys where we have related that we've had a instant reaction of being a little bit uncomfortable. I love that there's a huge movement to normalize asking pronouns and listing pronouns in queer spaces, even in non queer spaces.

Evin Interview with Bonus: Like a lot of people in professional life, I'll see [01:07:00] their email signature. We'll have their pronouns and I love normalizing that as a trans person with a history of being not gendered correctly, way back in the day, I have an instant reaction of why are you asking my pronouns? Don't I look like he, him, right?

Evin Interview with Bonus: But if I went by they, them, I would really value the fact that somebody asked that. I try to stuff that reaction away and realize that's my own shit and that especially for my nine binary community siblings, it is so important to normalize asking. What pronouns are, I've gotten over that a little bit. I think I'll always have the reaction in my head of don't I look like a he?

Evin Interview with Bonus: Just call me what you think I am. But I think it is really important to allow people to tell you what their pronouns are rather than you assuming. Yeah, it's interesting. Thank you so much. How did you come up with your name? Evan, we always like the naming stories are very interesting. Yeah, the first part of that is I'll say that I spell it E V I N and the I comes from the early 2000s, the [01:08:00] term boy, B O I was very popular.

Evin Interview with Bonus: Right. And so that was my username had some version of boy in it. And so when I picked Evan, since I'm a trans guy, I'm going to spell it funny and I'm going to put an I in there instead. I can also go back to the LiveJournal days. I remember being 15 and being like, I need a name that's not my current name.

Evin Interview with Bonus: And. Let me make a poll on LiveJournal for my 15 year old audience and came up with a couple different options and they're the most stereotypical trans guy names ever, which I love. And I was like, it could be Xander or Graham or Caden or Alex or Aiden. Yep. And then the last option I knew my mom had told me.

Evin Interview with Bonus: When I was little, that if I'd been born a boy, she was going to name me either Jeffrey, which I hated or Evan. And so I put Evan there and then I spelled it Evan and everyone voted for Evan. And then I was like, in the comments, I was like, should I do it? Evan with an I, like boy with an I, and everyone's like, [01:09:00] yeah, do that.

Evin Interview with Bonus: So out of this anonymous internet post from age 15, I have my name. And I feel so thankful because. I've always loved my name and I've never been like, Oh man, that was a mistake. Cause I could have picked something like awful because I was like 15 and I did a lot of questionable things back then. That's awesome.

Evin Interview with Bonus: I actually love that story. That's sweet. Do you have a time in your life that you didn't know you were going to disclose, didn't know you're going to need to disclose and then all of a sudden you had to disclose or chose not to disclose? What, what did you do in that situation? I was thinking about this and the only story I could think of, and I told you guys previously that I pretty much am not out to any of my coworkers.

Evin Interview with Bonus: There's been some rare exceptions. One job I had in Vancouver, I told two different coworkers at two different times because I had worked with them long enough that I wanted to share my personal life with them anyway. [01:10:00] So being trans was just one of the things I told them. But one of the co workers, I told her it was a Christmas holiday party and then we had dinner and then a smaller group of us went out to get drinks and then it ended up being too many drinks and a couple drinks in and we're dancing and then I tell her, I would have never done that if not for alcohol.

Evin Interview with Bonus: But her response was. I always knew there was something different about you, and that could have sounded horrible if I had come from the wrong person and the wrong tone, but the way she said it, and the relationship we had, it was actually a really sweet response, because to me, what it meant was, I always knew that there was something more special about you.

Evin Interview with Bonus: I'm a better communicator than most cis guys in my mind. I'm a little bit more emotionally sensitive and I think that's what she was getting at, was like, those are the traits that I see in you and now it makes sense. I had also told her at the same time that my husband and I had an open relationship.

Evin Interview with Bonus: And that blew her mind way more than me being trans. She was like, wait, what? You're not monogamous? You have random [01:11:00] hookups? And I was like, surprise. It sounds like you've done a lot of introspection over time. And I think that must contribute to your ability to articulate things, including emotions and storytell in the way that your friend appreciated.

Evin Interview with Bonus: Yeah, and I think especially being a veterinarian in a very stressful clinic kind of job, she was my vet tech, she was my right hand woman, and you have that work wife type of relationship for a very stressful career where we had each other's backs. So that's where I took her comments to be very supportive.

Evin Interview with Bonus: Nice. Thank you. All right. Many of us have joked about wanting to have some sort of code so we can communicate with each other. When you don't personally know someone, but you are suspected they're trans masked, when you see or meet them, how do you typically respond? I don't say anything. I actually, we had a, an electrician do a ton of work and her apprentice was definitely a non binary person who was non binary appearing, was going by male pronouns and it [01:12:00] was very obvious.

Evin Interview with Bonus: And they were in our house for two weeks doing work. And the whole time I was like, should I say something, shouldn't I? I didn't. Cause I thought if I was in their shoes. I just would be caught off guard and I would just be very frozen and like, how did they read me or not sure. I mean, it depends on where it would be and who was saying it, but I, I don't know how they're going to react.

Evin Interview with Bonus: And so I respect this person enough to not be in front of other people. Are you trans too? It's hard. Cause I think that would have been a nice connection, but I think it's just one of those things I've learned. I'm going to let those moments pass by. And then maybe that could have been a nice connection, but I don't want to risk making them feel like.

Evin Interview with Bonus: Uncomfortable, so I'm going to just keep it to myself. It just makes me think of like passing notes in the classroom, right? I'm trans, are you too? And then it's weird, but yeah, it's hard to read. I think that Apprentice and I, there's an extra sense of safety and familiarity, but we didn't need to say it.

Evin Interview with Bonus: We could just see it without having to say it out loud. [01:13:00] I think to let cis persons who suspect or know some of these trans and say, are you trans or ask us these really personal questions. They're not the only ones to deal with this. We have to think on our feet and decide. And so for you, when somebody clocks you as trans, if that happens, how do you respond?

Evin Interview with Bonus: I don't know if that's ever happened or if it does, I haven't remembered. And it's interesting because again, I think there's a lot of times where maybe someone suspects, but they don't know. But I'm like, or do they just think I'm like a short gay guy? I don't know. So yeah, I don't know. I think it hasn't really happened to me in my conscious memories.

Evin Interview with Bonus: I feel pretty fortunate unless those. Instances would have led me to meet more people, but I feel pretty, like I have pretty good community already. How would you suggest another person who knows or knows you approach you if they want to connect because they're trans? I don't know. If you can get my email, then I'll be way less caught off guard.[01:14:00] 

Evin Interview with Bonus: You can just let me have time to reflect on it. But if it does happen, I would always hope it just be something very open, I guess. I'd want them to feel, Hey, are you trans or whatever? But can you share something with me? I would want to be approached as somebody who's a community member rather than a finger pointing, in a sense.

Evin Interview with Bonus: Thank you. How can we be more supportive of our trans masculine brothers and siblings? Both of our generation and older and younger. Yeah. I think I've just said a lot of that, but just like building community wherever possible, right. And validating people's identities and not questioning their identities, not having any kind of like witness tests for back in the day, it was.

Evin Interview with Bonus: Like if you're a gay, that wasn't okay, if you're a trans guy and you know, these days it's progressed. I think there's some non binary phobia within the [01:15:00] trans community. Um, and that really is not helpful to anybody. Um, I think just taking people at their word, believing who they are, and then fostering community, trans community spaces wherever possible and bonding over those things that.

Evin Interview with Bonus: Bringing it together in addition to being trans, right? Camping trips, knitting club, whatever it is. Sometimes it's really hard when you go to a trans support group and you're there twiddling your fingers. And it's like, Hey, if we could be doing art project at the same time to break the ice, I think there should be more things like that exist.

Evin Interview with Bonus: And I, yeah, I tried to foster my own little tiny corner of that, but I wish that I had more resources and maybe I will make to encourage bigger gatherings of trans people so we can meet more people, meet more of each other. So thank you so much again for being part of our show. We're super happy that you reached out to us and, uh, yeah, your story, like being a teenager, you're the first, uh, person who really transitioned in high school and, uh, with the support of their [01:16:00] parents, although it took them a minute to get on board, which is expected.

Evin Interview with Bonus: So thank you so much for being part of our show and, and I hope you have a great rest of your day. Yeah. And thank you guys for creating this space. Again, I'll finish with this comment I started with, which is, this is the podcast I didn't know I needed. I'm a huge podcast person and again, this feels like the sense of community that I had in those early days at the camp outs or the trans conferences, there's spaces are maybe not always available in person, but just hearing the voices.

Evin Interview with Bonus: I feel like I'm back at Raven's camp out. I agree. And that's been one of the thrills of doing this. We got to meet new people like you and to connect with the people that we knew back then. Went camping with a lot of us spread out all over the world. Thank you so much again for listening, for supporting us and for contacting us and sharing your stories today.

Evin Interview with Bonus: Really appreciate it, Evan. [01:17:00] 

Reflections: We'd like to give a content warning for this episode, as we do talk a bit about mental health and suicide. So Kai, what did you think about the interview with Evan? Wow. I learned a lot about what it was like to be a teenager back in the early 2000s who was wanting to transition. And what that was like.

Reflections: I really am glad that he reached out to us. And I, I'm especially touched by his phrase, It was the podcast that I didn't know I needed. And I, that connection that we share, I think that's our theme for season four. We share a bond unlike any other. That was the first thing that came to mind. Such a lovely storyteller and interviewee.

Reflections: What about you? I, I was very touched the majority of what he said because he, he really feels it. Right. I could tell he was choking up. I could tell that he is emotionally invested in what he's saying and his message to kids, not only comes from his own [01:18:00] experience. As a kid, as a teenager, wanting bodily autonomy and needing to do his transition, but also from the pain of losing his friend recently, the compassion he has for his own parents, but knowing that they were struggling to do the best they can because they didn't have the resources.

Reflections: All of the things that he was tying together, I think really had a flavor of emotive caring that. That really carried through throughout the interview. I agree with you. And I, I think he expresses that you can tell how much he deeply cares about others and about community. And I also think he found it. I think it's so wild to hear about what.

Reflections: He found back in the day, those HTML websites, live journal was so big back then. I remember writing on it. I don't know if you ever did that, but that was such a great [01:19:00] connection. I got to know you. I don't remember that one. Rewriting. Yeah. And then supports in the school, like, like how scrappy he was back then to really stick to his guns and say, this is who I am.

Reflections: And having a psychiatrist. Not be a hundred percent affirming. I'm not surprised about that though. Yeah at all, you know, they're not there. I mean most Therapists psychiatrists, you know aren't necessarily supportive now and especially with younger people exactly That's my point. Is that the in spite of that lack of support from his mental health Provider.

Reflections: Yeah. He had a sense of who he was. And that's, you know, what wants us to take away is that he stood by that and worked as best he could with in this establishment with his parents. He found support that nurse story as he was isolated from the rest of the dorms because he didn't that was awesome. Like, let's applaud those two lesbian nurses, man, like for giving him the support and that lesbian motherhood, [01:20:00] you know, because A lot of lesbians were and are turf, turfs, you know, then back in the day, you know, now, and they were really, really supportive of him.

Reflections: And that's awesome. Like applaud that. Yes. Yeah. No, I agree. He found supportive people throughout. And I think whether that was going to a health conference or a conference or a camping trip or. Whatever it is, that's something that he has really invested time and effort in throughout his life. And he's a young person that he talked about just how vital it is to his survival and wellbeing to be connected currently with people.

Reflections: And he has. Worked really hard to create and sustain his connection to others. So I'm really, really, really, really happy. He just sounds so liberated in his body and his expression as he continues to discover his sexuality and his connection to other people. Man. And I thought that was really beautiful.

Reflections: No, but I mean, like to be open about his sexuality since he [01:21:00] was like 18, he was very clear about that. Like he's random hookups, like, let's do it. Yeah. Yeah. I just, I'm glad he reached out. So thanks Evan. I know Evan. Thank you. Lean on each other when you can, even if it's sending a cat meme, check in on each other.

Reflections: We're here again. There's resources on our website if you're in crisis. So take care of everybody. Take care.

All About Adam: Hey, welcome to the new segment, all about Adam, we want to thank you so much for supporting the work we're doing in our members only section. It really means a lot and we want you to know how much we appreciate you. We just want you to know that Kai and I are revamping our member section for season four and we will offer the transitory segment.

All About Adam: Highlighting trans men throughout history and those no longer with us. Every other episode about once a month. And now we're adding this new segment all about [01:22:00] Adam, which highlights our fabulously hilarious and eccentric volunteer Adam, as he rambles semi coherently about his transitional drama or really whatever he feels like talking about that particular week.

All About Adam: So on with the show and let's learn all about Adam. The other day, I went through what I've since realized is somewhat of a trans mask rite of passage. I was at the dermatologist for a random thing, and the nurse doing my intake was asking the usual health history questions. As you know if you've listened to my segments previously, I live in the progressive liberal bubble of New York City, and thus have the luxury of not having to hide my trans identity for the most part.

All About Adam: So anyway, I mentioned to the nurse the fact that I'm trans. I forget why it was relevant at the time. Actually, it probably wasn't. But so anyway, she pauses when I tell her this and looks kind of visibly freaked out and then starts apologizing and asks if she should make a note of it on my chart so that the staff know to refer to me as she [01:23:00] her.

All About Adam: So I say, no, I use he him, and I'm not sure why that needs to go on my chart. And then she starts stumbling over her words. Something something about wanting to make sure everyone in the practice was respectful of my gender identity, especially before I'd started to transition, at which point I finally realized that she thought I was coming out to her as a trans woman.

All About Adam: And look, I realize that passing is not a goal of transition, and I am extremely cognizant of all the myriad problems inherent in the entire framework of passing. But yeah, that moment was pretty clarifying to me if I had any lingering doubts as to exactly how the world perceives me these days. Namely as a white, able bodied, assigned male at birth, dude.

All About Adam: Talk about a mindfuck. We've heard from so many guys on this podcast about the erasure and invisibility that seems to come part and parcel with the transmasc experience given a long enough timeline. For those who have chosen to pursue medical transition, that is. And, of course, it's also a super sensitive topic to bring up within broader trans [01:24:00] spaces since the protective cloak of invisibility is something that I know many trans women would give literally anything to have considering the constant threat of violence experienced by visibly trans people.

All About Adam: The reality is that we don't get to have it both ways. We don't get to pick and choose how the world sees us. When we give up our visible connection to queerness, we are often, indeed, trading safety for community, assimilation with one group for exile from another. We could spin our wheels bemoaning these trade offs and debating which fate is better or worse, Or we could just acknowledge our own individual reality for what it is and move forward from there.

All About Adam: This is what I've been trying to do ever since my failed attempt at launching a secret transmasc bat signal, but it has not been easy. After enduring 42 years of being incorrectly perceived as one thing, there was and is a big part of me that rails against the seeming injustice of being unseen yet again.

All About Adam: The neighborhood I live in is very diverse and super queer and I absolutely love living here, but people take one look at me [01:25:00] and my girlfriend and my two kids, who very much look like they could be hers, and they come to some extremely incorrect assumptions about our family. And sometimes it makes me want to scream.

All About Adam: And more often, it makes me leap to disclose my trans identity to literally anyone and everyone who will listen, even when my transness has absolutely no bearing on anything whatsoever. Cue random acts of unsolicited disclosure to, for example, the intake nurse at my dermatologist's office, my UPS delivery guy, way too many Uber drivers, an embarrassing number of baristas and restaurant servers, this random woman I was chatting at for less than two minutes at a bookstore yesterday.

All About Adam: You get the picture. If you've listened to any of my previous ramblings on this topic, you will no doubt note that this has been somewhat of a recurring theme for me, and something that I've gotten a tad defensive Some might even say soapbox y about. Through my ongoing attempts at meditation and mindfulness practices, I've gotten a little better at paying attention to places in my life where I'm really holding on to [01:26:00] something with a clenched fist.

All About Adam: Also, Jackal made a comment about something I said a few months ago that made me realize that my desperate need to disclose all the time to everyone was perhaps being driven by something other than a purely altruistic desire to promote trans visibility. As always, Jackal, I do appreciate our friendship and your candor.

All About Adam: So I started pulling at this thread, trying to figure out why it was that this vague feeling of not being fully seen was causing such absolute existential panic for me, and I realized that it was because I was using my past, and specifically my past history as someone who experienced sexual assault in an AFAB body, as a way of defining my identity.

All About Adam: Which is normal. Everyone's past informs who they are, as do our past traumas. But in my case, I realized it was less about defining me in any positive sense, as a survivor, as a champion of bodily autonomy, or a defender of human rights, and more about distancing myself from an identity that I absolutely did not want to be seen as.

All About Adam: Namely, a potential perpetrator of that [01:27:00] violence. That's why it was feeling like such an existential threat to have my past taken away from me by strangers who don't know that I'm trans. And that's a precarious situation to be in, to be hanging my sense of identity on the very limited perception of me taken in by strangers, since I generally don't make a habit of walking around with a detailed resume of my 44 year history stapled to my forehead.

All About Adam: I've been reading a lot of stuff on Buddhism as of late. It's part of my aforementioned attempt at cultivating a stronger meditation practice in the hopes of being a less shit person. And I'm definitely way too much of a novice to get into any real nuanced discussion of eastern spiritual anything here, but one thing I read recently that really stuck with me was this notion that the ego, as a separate and distinct entity from the true self, only exists in the past and the future.

All About Adam: Jackal and I subsequently got into a whole long conversation about this. The guy has a minor in religion and a vastly deeper knowledge of this stuff than I do, so he was able to quickly poke holes in my drastic oversimplification of this idea. [01:28:00] But, for my own purposes, and for the purpose of this meandering story, I really like the simplicity of this framing.

All About Adam: What it pointed to, for me, was the fact that I have been leaning way too heavily on my past as a means of trying to carve out an identity for myself. When what I really should be doing, or rather what I want to be doing, is defining myself through my words and through my actions now in the present moment.

All About Adam: Yes, obviously my past informs how I'm showing up in the present moment, but does it define me? Or rather, can it define me in the eyes of strangers who don't have access to this full history? No. And the same thing goes for all of my imagined future acts of benevolence and generosity and magnanimity, which no one else sees since they only exist in this imagined future inside my wormy little brain.

All About Adam: All of that, once again, is just my ego, flaunting its feathers in some hypothetical future tense. In the present moment, it counts for jack shit. Again, I'm oversimplifying. Jackal would probably like me to [01:29:00] underscore this point another 6 or 17 times. But this framing was super helpful for me to start noticing the places where my ego was feeling threatened, and more importantly, in helping me to recognize that my ego is not actually me.

All About Adam: Whether you meditate or not, any sort of basic mindfulness practice is just so freaking helpful in terms of slowing down the gears so you can really start to see what's going on in any given moment. Whenever I do this, I'm invariably surprised at what I find my mind doing. For a particularly relevant example, my mind is, more often than I'd like to admit, making the exact same sorts of reductive assumptions about the identities of other people.

All About Adam: Collapsing their lived experiences and their complicated personal histories in the exact same way that I've been whinging about for the past five minutes. That one was a real kicker to uncover. Thankfully, I'm pretty comfortable with my own hypocrisy by this point. But yeah, I've been doing this for my entire life, I think.

All About Adam: But we all do this. It's the nature of the human mind to sort and categorize. [01:30:00] It's one of the first skills we learn as infants, sorting objects into like and not like, humans into safe and not safe. It's a survival tactic, a way of efficiently processing the constant onslaught of new sensory inputs we encounter every second of every day.

All About Adam: So that, for example, we know to run when we hear a big animal charging at us without having to pause and examine the precise nature of its sharp teeth and giant claws. It's simply not feasible for us to approach every new object, every new human, every new experience with a purely beginner's mind.

All About Adam: Though now that I think of it, I'm pretty sure Oliver Sacks wrote a fascinating story about a patient who, due to some traumatic brain injury, did exactly this. But suffice it to say, the guy didn't get much else done, since he had to relearn what a chair was every time he encountered one. We use categories as a way of efficiently processing information so that we can make semi informed decisions as we stumble through the chaos of life.

All About Adam: But it's not a perfect system, and a greater awareness of its pitfalls and shortcomings can go a really long way. [01:31:00] We seem to take identity labels for granted these days. White, black, cis, trans, straight, gay, democrat, republican. But what's wild to me is the fact that the entire concept of identity, as it currently functions in our society, is an extremely new invention.

All About Adam: Identity really only emerged in its current form post World War II, which is kind of shocking when you think about it. Obviously, the constructs of race, gender, sexual orientation, nationality, the majority of the constructs were created prior to that, but people simply weren't talking about their identities in the way that now dominates virtually all sociopolitical discourse.

All About Adam: It's a new thing, and yet the way we talk about identity and identity labels now makes it seem as if it's always been this way, which just isn't true. Sexuality is a particularly good example for the purposes of highlighting this dramatic shift in worldview. Prior to the mid 19th century, there was no concept of sexual orientation as an identity.

All About Adam: Sex was just an [01:32:00] activity, an action verb, where one put one's dick, as it were. The norms and laws around it were varyingly enforced throughout the course of human history. Hence, anti sodomy laws and whatnot. But it was only with the birth of psychiatry in the mid 1800s that we saw the genesis of sexuality as an identity rather than just an action.

All About Adam: Now, I'm not here to make arguments against the importance of this shift insofar as social and political acceptance. The creation of an identity group seems to be a prerequisite for the advancement of rights and protections for the actions and behaviors specific to that group. So, sex, marriage, etc. Once these activities become inextricably tethered to an identity group, the discourse then shifts from that of policing actions to that of policing human existence, which, you know, is kinda less cool.

All About Adam: So again, from the perspective of advancing human rights, the shift from actions to identities makes a lot of sense strategically. But what have we sacrificed in the process? [01:33:00] This is a question that contemporary philosopher Kwame Anthony Appiah has spent the bulk of his career focusing on, and it's a question I find super interesting.

All About Adam: His stance, while obviously far more nuanced than I can get into here, but it's basically that we sacrifice quite a bit of our shared experience of humanity when we put so much weight into our subgroup identities. He's a big proponent of cosmopolitanism, which is the idea that all humans are citizens of the world first.

All About Adam: And that our individual politics and beliefs should always come a distant second. You can think of it as sort of the antithesis to nationalism. It dates back to Greek philosopher Diogenes, whose work laid a lot of the foundation for Stoicism, and who apparently had a habit of passing out in the bathtubs of his friends and hosts, who, attempting to get him to go the fuck home, would presumably ask where he came from, to which he'd respond, I am a citizen of the world.

All About Adam: God, I love the Greeks. Anyway, my point here is that I think both the Greeks and the Buddhists were probably onto [01:34:00] something, and that perhaps I should spend a little less time fretting about whether or not my trans identity is being fully seen, and a little more time focusing on just being a decent human in the present moment.

All About Adam: Which is easier said than done, especially when your nervous system has been conditioned by trauma, but I'm working on it. And so I meditate, and I do my little mindfulness practices, and I try to remind myself that my ego isn't me, and that all that really matters is how I'm showing up now, in this moment, and in the next moment, and the next, and the next, and that every one of those moments is a chance for me to define myself in a way that is much more real and much more meaningful than any identity label can ever be.

All About Adam: The world sees me as just a guy these days, which is, of course, exactly what I spent the past two and a half years begging everyone to see me as. So here I am, just a guy. So what kind of just a guy do I want to be? How can I be the change that I want to see in the world through my actions as a person who is generally [01:35:00] perceived to be a straight, White, able bodied, seemingly cis man.

All About Adam: How can I do this without leaning on my past, or on my transness, or on other invisible aspects of my identity? So here's where I am, once again, just going to fully embrace my own hypocrisy. I think I probably need to shut up and stop disclosing to people all the time. I'm pretty sure that's just my ego.

All About Adam: wringing its precious little hands and fretting about how I'm being perceived by the big bad world. Now to be clear, I'm only speaking for myself here. And as a reminder, I live in a super trans aware place, so it's not like I'm exactly blowing people's minds with my random self disclosures. I talked on a previous episode about how I do think it's important to disclose when I'm in places or settings wherein I actually do have the possibility to maybe shift someone's perspective, But for the most part, that's not my day to day life.

All About Adam: And as I think about what my own neighborhood, my own community, actually needs right now, it's probably more examples of positive masculinity coming from able bodied, [01:36:00] cishet white men. So, I'm trying to embrace it. It being my perceived identity. And I'm trying to lean into the type of masculinity that I want to see more of in the world.

All About Adam: The kind that embraces people freely and often. The kind that lets others speak first and that really listens to what they have to say. The kind that is conscious of how much space I'm taking up. Both literally and metaphorically, and who welcomes the opportunity to give that space to others. The kind that opens doors for everyone.

All About Adam: The kind that reflexively soothes the random crying kid on the playground without fear of being perceived as creepy. The kind that dances badly, like really badly, to Beyoncé whenever Single Ladies comes on. The kind that shows up for my friends and for my kids and for strangers as much as possible. The kind that meditates, the kind that judges other humans based on their actions rather than on their identities, or maybe, just maybe, the kind that doesn't judge them at all.

All About Adam: I don't know. It's a work in progress. Just like this All About Adam segment, which I am still somewhat convinced is an [01:37:00] elaborate prank arranged by my mom, or my girlfriend, or my therapist, or maybe all three of them working together as a way of getting me to spill deeply embarrassing details from the darkest corners of my wormy little brain.

All About Adam: Unsure to what end, but anyway. That's it for this week. Thanks for listening and I look forward to boring you again next month. Wow, I don't know whether to laugh or to cry, to get mad or to cheer. Every time I hear one of Adam's stories, my emotions run the gamut. We hope you enjoyed this week's segment of All About Adam as much as we did.

All About Adam: Thanks for listening and on with the show.

Transponder Q: And now it's time for Transponder. So today's Transponder question is who is your favorite transgender musician? You can answer this question on our Instagram page, [01:38:00] Transmasculine Podcast, or our ex feed at Podcast Stealth. We look forward to hearing from you. Lastly, this show would be nothing without our guests who share their insight Expertise and heartfelt stories.

Transponder Q: We absolutely adore you and are forever grateful to you. Good job today. Jekyll. Good job to you. for listening to today's podcast. Stealth tries to capture stories of those who transitioned before. the year 2000. We recognize that language has its limitations. The words we use to describe ourselves and our community evolve over time and will not represent everyone's experience.

Transponder Q: We also want you to know that the health and well being of our community is our number one priority. In fact, we want to give a shout out to parents who are supporting their gender nonconforming kids. Supporting your child in the development and expression of their identity is not child abuse. We support you and love you for supporting your kids.

Transponder Q: We fully anticipate that people and groups will express positivity and [01:39:00] negativity in response to our stories. We're prepared to deal with this, and as you know, thrilled to be one small part of our community. We offer links to health and safety resources on our website, we monitor our social media platforms, we respond to feedback from our audience, and we will be accountable when we screw up.

Transponder Q: We want you to know that we are just two guys doing this in our spare time. As we enter season four, we are getting better, but we are still rookies and still two old farts to boot. So we ask that you still be patient with us as we learn the ropes and find our way. The opinions expressed on our podcast are our own and those of our guests.

Transponder Q: We do not represent any outside entity. Remember, if you're interested in sharing your story, we would love to hear from you. If you're interested in volunteering, please let us know. Your feedback and support are essential to our show's success. podcast. Tell your friends, share on social media, and rate us on your favorite streaming platform.

Transponder Q: [01:40:00] You can find us on Instagram, Transmasking Podcast, on X, formerly Twitter, At podcast stealth on YouTube, stealth, the trans masculine podcast, and be sure to check out our website, trans masculine podcast. com. Thank you for joining us until next time.