Rhonda's Blog

Rhonda's Blog

Sat, 28 Dec 2019

Puberty

I was musing about writing about this publicly. For the first time in all these years of writing pretty personal stuff about my feelings, my way of becoming more honest with myself and a more authentic person through that I was thinking about letting you in on this is a good idea.

You see, people have used information from my personal blog in the past, and tried to use it against me. Needless to say they failed with it, and it only showed their true face. So why does it feel different this time?

Thing is, I'm in the midst of my second puberty, and the hormones are kicking in in complete hardcore mode. And it doesn't help at all that there is trans antagonist crap from the past and also from the present popping up left and right at a pace and a concentrated amount that is hard to swallow on its own without the puberty.

Yes, I used to be able to take those things with a much more stable state. But every. Single. Of. These. Issues is draining all the energy out of myself. And even though I'm aware that I'm not the only one trying to fix all of those, even though for some spots I'm the only one doing the work, it's easier said than done that I don't have to fix the world, when the areas involved mean the world to me. Are areas that support me in so many ways. Are places that I need. And on top of that, the hormones are multiplying the energy drain of those.

So ... I know it's not that common. I know you are not used to a grown up person to go through puberty. But for god's sake. Don't make it harder than it has to be. I know it's hard to deal with a 46 year old teenager, so to say, I'm just trying to survive in this world of systematic oppression of trans people.

It would be nice to go for a week without having to cry your eyes out because another hostile event happened that directly affects your existence. The existence of trans lives aren't a matter of different opinions or different points of view, so don't treat it like that, if you want me to believe that you are a person able of empathy and basic respect.

Sidenote: Finishing to write this at this year's #36c3 is quite interesting because of the conference title: Resource Exhaution. Oh the irony.

/personal | permanent link | Comments: 14

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Ivan wrote at 2019-12-29 07:45:

With all my respects to you and your feelings, why should I read those things in a Debian and/or Ubuntu planet?

Rhonda wrote at 2019-12-29 11:46:

With all my respects to you and your feelings, I'm not forcing you to read it. You can skip over it like with any other post that you might not be interested about :)
Maybe you want to read about what planet is about on here: https://wiki.debian.org/PlanetDebian and on here: https://wiki.ubuntu.com/PlanetUbuntu

Sune wrote at 2019-12-29 16:40:

But you have cool earrings.

John wrote at 2019-12-29 19:53:

Nobody ask you to mix GNU GPL stuff with very personal topic related to the family and best friends. Isn't it about basic respect which you ask?

Charles wrote at 2019-12-29 22:56:

If you're a grown-up, how can you have another puberty? Seems like a rather ridiculous proposition to me.
Why would I even comment? Well, this incoherent and rather poorly written post was unfortunately syndicated through Planet Ubuntu, which was automatically added by my feed reader Liferea.
If you'd like to have less of us "transphobic" (I assume you'll classify me as such) people commenting on your emotional (crying your eyes out) posts, consider not syndicating these personal posts to the whole Planet.
xoxo Charles

Rhonda wrote at 2019-12-31 07:37:

Thanks for your concerns, Charles - but no. I get it that you are ignorant of trans lifes and doesn't want to learn about it. That's crystal clear from your comment. And yes, some people feel triggered to comment with their hate on trans people on such posts. Though no, not writing about it isn't helpful. Even the "don't ask don't tell" approach of the US army got abandoned for the reason that it rather encourages abuse than gaining understanding.
Puberty is result of hormones, if you are unaware of that, and calling it ridiculous makes it clear that your self-classification seems to be fitting. Other people are able to take from it an understanding of what this might mean for trans people in their lifes, and yet others might be able to take from it that they aren't alone with those feelings. And those are the ones that get me to continue to write about it. Feel free to ignore the urge to comment and just move on, if you are able of that action in the future. :)
And John: See above links about Planet, and also: Neither Debian nor Ubuntu are only about GNU GPL stuff, free software is much more than that. Isn't it about basic respect of other free licenses too? :)
Sending hugs, Rhonda

Federico wrote at 2020-01-01 13:44:

Thanks for writing about this. Debian is made by a community of humans, human interaction needs to work for the project to succeed and being aware of hormones seems important.

Michael N. wrote at 2020-01-02 14:32:

Wishing you all the best-our trans son is learning to deal with a variety of challenges (not just with the transition, but also being a young adult POC in a state that's neutral at best and too often, actively hostile towards him)....wishing more progress, happiness and joy to you and yours in 2020!

John wrote at 2020-01-04 18:22:

Regarding licenses you are right. Regarding https://wiki.debian.org/PlanetDebian "Remember: try not to annoy people." I think it is on or over my limit due scope of topic. For me it is absolutely understandable, that hormones have huge impact on behaviour. I had uderstood it during my puberty. If somebody uses hormones, it will have big impact on body and behaviour. Hypotetically, if I wrote blog about taking hormones by me or my girlfriend I would be not presenting this post on any tech or computer "planet", but I can imagine an exception. If it is open source insuline pump, I have nothing against it. Sending chars and bytes :) John

Amir wrote at 2020-01-04 23:15:

Thank you so much for this post, Rhonda. As Federico put it so aptly: Debian is about humans, not just code. Thanks for the insight and all the best wishes. My cis-puberty was ages ago, but I sadly don't have many fond memories of it. Here's hoping that yours won't be as taxing .
Planet sites are an opportunity to learn about so many more overarching topics than just software. I've never seen anyone complain about the plethora of other quite off-topic endeavors or pastimes of other contributors ranging from childcare, to gardening, to random book clubs. Yet talking about trans people and puberty is what suddenly irks some people. Odd and worrying.

Rhonda wrote at 2020-01-07 11:02:

There's a crux in that though, John, and I guess you are aware of it yourself. Is it annoying to you personal to hear about trans troubles in this world that you can't relate to and rather not want to know about, or is it annoying "in general" (whatever that might be).
Personally I consider e.g. tons of R related posts annoying, because it's a language I'm not really interested in. But I'm also aware that that's a personal annoyance and not a general one, especially also not an intentional one.
On the contrary, the feedback I receive from people is quite empowering. In the sense of from other trans people that these aren't single-issues that cis people usually ignore on, but also from cis people unaware of it finding a way to deal better with trans people they happen to know. Frankly spoken, this social empowerment outweights your personal annoyance with the topic very much. I'm still sorry that it annoys you, but I can't follow your wish to not talk about my transition.
Thanks for your understanding. :)

Günther wrote at 2020-01-07 16:20:

Ivan wrote at 2019-12-29 07:45: "With all my respects to you and your feelings, why should I read those things in a Debian and/or Ubuntu planet?"
With all my personal disrespect for this comment: The World and it's software is mainly maintained by humans. So one should and could care about this major source too.
@Rhonda: Your work is amazing, as it is sourced of an amazing person: You.

John wrote at 2020-01-07 16:55:

Sorry for misunderstanding. Your post is not annoying in content! Your post is on tech planet and this is only thing what is wrong. Yes, childcare, gardening, book clubs belong to everyday life and planet is open for humans. https://wiki.debian.org/PlanetDebian Please have a look on point 3. I can't imagine more excessively personal information than is related with change of gender. Has anybody written post about problems to have child or issues with sexual intercourse and how he/she feels? Rhonda, I'm presenting only my opinion and don't take me wrong. I think it is important to be autentic and not pretending. You have chance to get not only positive (and sometimes false) feedback. I don't like people who pretend and are two-faced. Maybe you are wondering about why John is not trans too? I am happy with my gender and I respect result of nature (maybe girls has something easier, but it is okay as is). I'm not too much nice, but I don't plan to visit plastic surgeon. I'm not the cleverest, but it is not the problem. Once my girlfriend was considering increasing of her breasts. I said You have nice natural ones! Why she wanted bigger breasts? Because it is possible and almost every woman can have. There are so many photos with women with silicone breasts. Is it normal to have silicone breasts for young nice girl? I think No! This is also my general attitude to change of gender. BTW. What are cis people? Of course I have nothing against writing blog about almost anything including gender change.

Charles wrote at 2020-01-14 17:42:

Rhonda, it is not weird that you are receiving empowering feedback regarding your transition and your personal lifestyle choices and I am not surprised at all. It's generally (exceptions exist) bad form and rude to criticize someones lifestyle choices, which I did not do in my previous post.
I am simply complaining about what I consider quite bad taste, in broadcasting quite personal subjects (which I take you're not deeming as personal as I do) to the whole Planet Ubuntu.
Especially since subjects regarding sex, sexuality, politics, religion and other sensitive matters are hard to discuss soberly in an online setting.
To your credit, at least you have posted my comments after moderation, which I applaud you for.
Best whishes, Charles

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