Branded T

Sex/Drugs And disco

Life at this time consisted of important rituals and concerns. The responsibility I had to my colleagues, peers, and fellow cohorts was overwhelming. I needed a specific outfit to wear each night. Not having a tremendous income it was taxing trying to come up with a fab outfit each and every night. I needed something that could travel since I might not go home for a few days. I needed something that would bring attention to my elongated skeleton. I needed something that would get me drugs and get me laid. This was a highly stressful position and I was grateful to the downers and the uppers to help me through these trying times. There was a girl by the name of Taxi, see ‘Pink Ladies’, who was the queen, well queen of queens in NYC. She could make a rope look like a fashion statement. She later hung herself which was photographed and placed in Fashion Wear Weekly. I am kidding, but she could’ve. She had the amazing talent of taking nothing and making it look like something. In reality she had nothing but she definitely looked like she had everything. I guess that was the point. It didn’t matter what you had, what you were, your morals, values, education, or spirituality. None of that mattered in the Discos. It just mattered what you looked like (this kind of reminds me of where I live now in Los Angeles).

My responsibilities to life and my fellow hombres was that I looked a certain way (I never looked the way I wanted anyway so I guess I wasn’t a success). I needed to be available sexually and I needed to take the right amount of substances so that I could function e.g. dance the hustle, give good head, get laid, and make it home and go back out the next evening. These were some trying times and at eighteen years old I don’t think it was fair that I had to juggle so much responsibility.

Suicide I

This first suicide attempt is vague. I don’t remember what occurred that made me react so impulsively. However, the things I do remember I will share with you. These issues I will bring up are important for many reasons. They symbolize and reinstate the power of addiction and how it plays out in a person’s life in addition to how it directly affects the family system. These issues touch upon my internal racism that one must work on, on a daily basis to heal from it as well as to help others heal that are affected by its ignorance. This also touches upon how societal transphobia plays out in one’s (a person of TS experience) life and how as a society we have work to do.

My first suicide attempt took place in my dad’s apartment in Midwood Brooklyn. I moved back to his house after running out of my bat/bar mitzvah money.  I think I spent all the money in six months. I am not totally sure of the time frame. My dad had a one bedroom and I was living in the living room. Or should I say existing, or taking up space in that apartment. I used a lot of uppers. I snorted coke when people offered it to me, and took tuinals often. I needed to control my emotions and these drugs helped. You see, life on the streets, the death of my mom, my irresponsible behaviors and actions to myself, my family, my inability to focus, my transexual identity, the issues a youngster faces who is trans, and a world full of misunderstanding, ignorance and hatred towards the trans experience led me down this path. I am not a victim but at this point in my life I needed direction. I needed therapy, support, guidance, and lots of loving. Drugs did all that and more. That was the positive side effect of drugs. They kept me going and they kept my overwhelming sadness dormant. However, sometimes the drugs just didn’t work and this is when the suicide attempts would emerge.

I am telling this part of my story for these reasons. My priority is that it might help the reader who is depressed and does not see the light. Somehow I am hoping this book gets into your hands and mind and you will see that there is ‘a light at the end of the tunnel’. I aspire to see that your impulsivity does not have to be exploited and you can ride the depression through. Exactly what I am trying to do again in my life at the age of 43 and what I should’ve known at the ages of 19, 23, 26, and many other times.

It was nighttime and I made a decision. I was going to take all my pills because there was no hope. I knew I wanted to die a pretty corpse so I made myself up. I put on my best bra and panties. I heard somewhere that if one has injected silicone anywhere in their body that it would shift when you die. So I put this bra on so that I would keep the new bozangas in place. I wrote a note to my dad, my poor dad (how dare I do this to him again. He had lived through this with his wife and now his youngest kid was going to put him through this torture).

I told him I was sorry but my life was wrong. I couldn’t get past what had happened to me with my mom, trans stuff, and my self-hate. I didn’t realize it then but my depression had a lot to do with my drug intake and how the drugs magnified everything.

I believe I will die with a depressive personality but it is manageable if it is not magnified by substances.

I wrote this note and left it next to my bed. I took the pills with a glass of milk because milk is good for your bones. No you asshole!

I took it because I didn’t want to throw up all those pills. You ask, “What was she thinking?” Did I think I was going to die before anyone found me? Was I screaming out for help? Did I need more attention like the fainting spell at summer camp?

I did think I was going to die and I wanted to die. I didn’t have the luxury of a car like my mom so I had to stay home (they found my mom in her car in Seaview Park).