Voice, Part I
I’m in bed.
It’s 7:30am, so that’s no huge surprise. And I’m always in bed when I’m writing. But I am very much in bed right now. I’m in cozy clothes in my mind. I’m taking it easy on myself not just physically but emotionally. And I will be for a month or two.
Why am I in bed? Frankly, I’m not sure what else to do. I was supposed to get surgery on my face on March 22nd. After that, and after the monthlong recovery period, I would have looked to the average person like a woman. I could walk the streets of LA, of San Francisco, of Minneapolis, of Antwerp, looking to others like the person I am inside.
Then, in a bizarre, unlikely, cruel twist, Dr. Bart van de Ven died of an illness three weeks before my FFS procedure.
That procedure was going to be a lot more than cosmetic. It was going to launch my new life. Just before I left, I would file paperwork with the county of San Francisco to change my name. I would close my business — the one named after my deadname — a few days before my surgery. I was going to recover in an Airbnb I rented near SFO, tended to first by my mother, then by a group of select friends. After that, I would find a new place to live. Then I would go on the job market for the first time since 2003. I would start a new life… as Amie.
So now I’m in bed.
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I had some internalized criticism of my facial procedure. That’s not unusual either — I have an internalized critique of everything. This one pertained to how easy it would be — would have been — to receive the results of surgery. Fly to Belgium. Pick my face. Knock me out. Et voilà!
Transitioning — I’m not sure if you know this yet — is hard. Allowing a master surgeon to make your face into that of a beautiful woman? Well, it’s not easy, I suppose. But I would not be — would not have been — the person doing the work.
(The therapist in me — married to a therapist for 15 years and good friends with a half-dozen others, I am basically an unlicensed practitioner — wants to point out the fact that I had to fight my way into this clinic, had to convince the good, dead doctor that he could take on one more American client, that I had put together meticulous plans to arrive in advance of my surgery, my chosen sister Maria in tow, that I had put in work to make this happen. He — weirdly, my internalized therapist is a man — is right. But what does it matter?)
Let me tell you about something that is not easy: changing your voice.
I have been working with a voice teacher for almost exactly one year. (I want to give you his name, but I have the hots for him, and I feel like I can’t give you his name and tell you I have the hots for him. The hots are much more fun…)
Together we have worked. Worked on resonance. On breath. Intonation. Cadence. We discovered multiple aspects of voice, of my voice, that I intentionally degraded in order to avoid exposure and therefore potential embarrassment. (I used to, for example, severely restrict my outgoing airflow because I was nervous I had bad breath.)
Together, we built a new voice, one that resonates in the nose and nasopharynx, that has the pitch and timbre of a feminine voice, one that — most importantly — sounds like me.
Building a new skill set is hard. I’ve done it. Implementing it as a habit is hard in a different way.
I’m working on it.
I had been planning to unveil my new voice after surgery.
After one year of nearly-weekly lessons and nearly-daily practice, I have decided to go full-time with my voice, now. I do not have the face to match that voice. I do my best, through expensive makeup, high quality brushes, professional technique, smoke, and mirrors, to disguise the fact that I went through a male puberty.
I will not let my face be a hindrance to my voice.
I will not let one setback prevent me from expressing myself.
I will, as my voice teacher said to me yesterday, give my friends and family the gift of listening to me in my truest expression.
I have put in the work.
Now, let’s have some fun with it.
