Transgender Day of Remembrance 2017

I don't consider myself a member of so called 'transgender community'. For me a 'gender transition' is merely a period in one's life when the body is being being re-tuned to reflect better one's lifelong self-perception. It's a phase, a transition, after which your life carries on - just in a different gender. Because I don't fixate so much on this aspect of my life, I rarely participate in any of the 'trans events' - and in the recent years there were plenty of them being introduced and promoted in the media.

But there is one exceptional date in my diary which I always observe. Every year. It is today - November 20th - Transgender Day of Remembrance. It is a sad day to light a candle and shed a tear and to remember so many individuals who for various reasons are no longer with us - mostly, victims of transphobic violence or those forced to take their own lives...

For me it is also a day to remember my personal friends whom I have known, whose laughter I can still hear, whose faces still smile at me from the ageing photographs and online timelines frozen in time, my friends whose lives have ended so abruptly.

One of them was Sue, a lively and happy young lady with a great sense of humour who was really and truly caring about the people around her. She worked for the ambulance in Glasgow, that's all I can now recall. She was on a call and the ambulance was unexpectedly delayed by a limo with some partying girls which was blocking the way, its driver was unsure about where he was turning...

The ambulance was late... A child has died as a result... Sue was deeply upset and off Facebook for a while. She volunteered to go and try to comfort the child's parents and explain that they've done everything they could under the circumstances... she ended up listening to a lot of abuse in her address - not just as an NHS employee but also as a transgender woman. And that was the last drop.

Like many others, she has suffered all her life from gender dysphoria and was doing her best educating people around her about her condition. But time and time again she felt judged and rejected by the entire world. She could cope no more and took her life.

She walked away to the dark land of no return, to the other side. Another unfinished conversation, another lost life, hope, warmth, one more sparkle, one more shy star swallowed by the oblivion, one less friendly soul to turn to... Life is so short, so fragile, but so precious and so worth living on...

I just wish people learned to take seriously, to understand and to support those around them who suffer from gender dysphoria. They are humans too - just like you. Their pain may not show as much as of some others. But they are in pain and discomfort... And yet - they may be saving your lives... Because they care. It would help if you cared about them too...

Please light a candle today and say a little prayer for Sue and so many others who were forced to leave this world far too early...

Please be kind to those around us. Be attentive. People come and go. And we stay and miss them. And wonder why is it always the best ones who leave us so early...

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