Dear Westwood Community,

By the time you are reading this, I will (God willing) be out of top surgery, and the aforementioned “something” in the subject line of this email will indeed be off my chest. As I am writing this, I am feeling many things, fear and anxiety among them. As you are reading this, I am on the other side, beginning a new chapter in a new body that will carry me through the rest of my life.

I keep thinking of a scene from the third Harry Potter book when (minor spoiler alert) Harry is trapped in the Forbidden Forest, about to die at the hands of the dementors (soul-sucking darkness monsters). He tries to cast a spell to deflect them, but he is not strong enough. At the last moment, just before the life leaves his body, he sees a figure on the other side of the river who successfully casts the protective spell and saves his life. Harry is not sure who the mysterious figure is, but we later discover that the stronger, more powerful wizard who saves his life is him, from the future.

I have known that I was eventually going to get top surgery for over half my life now. For a long time, I was too scared to tell anyone. When I finally had a conversation with my family, I was twenty, the pandemic was in full swing, and, when my mom offered to help start the ball rolling on getting the surgery, I knew, in the holy, inexplicable way we sometimes do, that it wasn’t the right time.

This knowledge devastated me, having already waited so long and felt so much discomfort in my body. But I trusted that feeling, the feeling that told me to wait. I was in a tough place (as many of us were). I felt isolated, lonely, and desperate for a way out. It would have been easy to see top surgery as the solution I was craving, but the feeling I received told me that I needed to undergo the procedure when I was in a different, better place. It told me I would someday have a community that celebrated me for who I was. It told me I would find a life that allowed me to arrive in a new body with joy and amazement without any grief or desperation, that there would come a time when the surgery would be a rebirth, not an escape.

I now write to you from the life I dreamed of back then. I look around and see abundant support and love from our Westwood community and beyond. I am surrounded by people who I feel held and seen by, who love me for and beyond my being trans, in the body I have right now and in the body I will continue to grow and heal into.

I find myself on the other side of the river, sending back the knowledge, love, and strength I have now found to the younger versions of me, not only the one from four years ago, but the ones from before as well, from all the years I wished for this and wondered if the time would ever come.*

Generally speaking, I am a more private person. I do not publicly share much regarding my personal life, but when Pastor Molly asked if I was comfortable sharing the news about this surgery with the congregation, I agreed, surprising myself. Since then, I have experienced an outpouring of support from people in our community. I want to say thank you, from the bottom of my now-flat chest, for the ways you have shown up for me and will continue to show up with your prayers, food, and love.

This is a big moment for me, something I have wanted for a long time. It is also a scary time to be trans. I am grateful beyond words to be in a community that supports and loves me so well, even with the future as uncertain as it is. I invite you to take a moment today and notice where you are; appreciate one thing you have that a past version of you could have only dreamed of. Send some love back in time, to the other side of the river, to the version of you who prayed to get to where you are now, and wasn’t sure they ever would. And maybe, if you can, receive some reassurance from a time yet to come.

Keep the faith, I’ll see you in a few weeks.

Everest

*The irony of using a Harry Potter scene here is not lost on me, given the author’s tendency towards transphobia. But, for me at least, it feels special to reclaim the scene in this way and retell it to you with a trans lens. No hate.