Sliders: The Dark Side of Transgender

SLIDERS: The Dark Side of Transgender

By Aimee Norin

Smashwords Edition

Copyright 2011, 2012 by Aimee Norin. All rights reserved. Beyond the legal minimum, no portion may be copied without written permission from the author. Email Aimee Norin at aimeenorin@gmail.com

This novel is a work of fiction. Any similarity to events or persons living or dead is purely coincidental. All characters, things, places and events appearing in this work are fictitious.

This novel is meant for adult reading and is not recommended for minors, as it is very open. Concepts, sex and language are not spared at times. It is about an unfailingly good person, male-to-female transgender, intelligent and educated, who nonetheless has issues with denial and social non-acceptance. Her personal evolution is a process of self-discovery and learning how to seek her own happiness in life.

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SLIDERS: The Dark Side of Transgender

By

Aimee Norin

The Preface is recommended

for this novel

to help understand the chapters.

Begin Reading

Preface

Copyright

Table of Contents

About the Author

Contact the Author

For Abbie

An early trailblazer.

I am not desponding by nature—and after a course of bitter mental discipline & long bodily seclusion, I come out with two learnt lessons, (as I sometimes say & oftener feel) .. the wisdom of cheerfulness—& the duty of social intercourse. Anguish has instructed me in joy—and solitude in society—it has been a wholesome and not unnatural reaction… What we call Life is a condition of the soul—and the soul must improve in happiness and wisdom, except by its own fault. These tears in our eyes, these faintings of the flesh, will not hinder such improvement!

Elizabeth Barrett Browning

1845, EBB to RB

PREFACE

Sliders: The Dark Side of Transgender isn’t like most novels on the subject. There are many examples of trans women leading happy, fulfilling lives. This author knows that and many happy depictions are in my other novels. But this is one focuses on internal or social conflicts, difficulty working through issues or finding respect. Though Regina is a heroine where she appears in my other books, Sliders delves more into the area of her personal problems. More than any other, she experiences denial of how people see her, and of some aspects of how she sees herself, which interferes with her ability to connect with people socially. Love becomes very difficult for her to find. She becomes angry, alienated and lonely later in life, before she begins to get a handle on things.

As we progress well into the 21st Century, it’s easy to criticize what someone experienced from earlier times, the terms they used, how they learned about themselves, and how they handled situations, but that would be unfair. Word/term usage changes over time, and motivations behind evolutions are not always pretty. People struggle to do the best they can, often with little to no guide in life for situations in which they find themselves.

Though living in transition continues to be very difficult or even dangerous for many, Sliders is set when the culture was even less receptive. People like Regina, with their sacrifices, suffering through their alienations, helped form the foundation for current social progress, but not without extreme personal cost.

When you see an older person who began transition decades ago, s/he deserves your respect. She may be smiling the day you see her. She may be confident—survivors tend to be. But you have no idea what she’s had to climb through to get here, the daily head games, the social games, presumptions inside and out, conflicts, abuse, or worse: friends she’s lost to suicide or hate crimes.

These few scenes are one person’s struggles. These are the conflicts in which she finds herself. These are her demons, shared openly with you. Right and wrong, good and bad, this is a novel about one woman’s experiences. Revelation of this depth celebrates the trailblazer who forges her life—by herself, usually—in a social climate of apathy, disdain, or even cruelty.

Though Regina shares her life as she honestly sees it at each stage of her transition, the novel as a whole is shared from the view of some much older transitioners, 30 to 40 years into transition, looking back. And with that, a couple of things should be obvious in the novel: (1) Issues evolve through the culture over time, with changing terminologies, changing organizational schemes, changing social attitudes; and (2) issues evolve through the protagonist over time, including the way she sees herself, her emotional needs and her gender expression.

This type of open sharing fits Regina’s character as she is also open with her life in the story—with others, with students—willing to share, to promote trans living, even if it’s about deeply personal issues that other people likely would find embarrassing. Though Regina is fiction, she is a description of one of the kindest people I could ever know: true, loyal, and genuine.

The exposé aspect of Sliders is inherent in the story, not in pointing out names. All characters are fictional; no person or institution is identified. Rather, some of the kinds of things that can happen in a trans person’s life also happen with this protagonist—and often in a deniable way, much as they can and do happen in life. Both the trans person (who may be in denial) and the other person (who may have an alternate agenda) can claim it was something else that was going on—with the net result that the transgender continues on her way thinking she got something she didn’t exactly get, and the other person continues on her way with whatever she sought, be it money, avoidance, or a false belief in liberality or acceptance.

Note in Chapter 1 how the doctor refers to the social effect of Regina’s surgical choices. Regina beams at his encouragement because of her strong internal needs. The doctor is aware that others in Regina’s daily life see it differently, yet withholds that perspective to promote his services. Regina is aware and educated, even suspicious of reality, but denial is so seductive, and the doctor is mixing his true understanding of reality with a sales pitch that slants that reality, enabling Regina’s denial. This is an example of Regina being mislead by someone who represents himself as an authority, by someone she regards as knowledgeable, whom she has paid to help. (Sliders does not bash doctors. For an example of a helpful doctor, see Charlie in Chapter 12.)

And the effect of a thousand things like that through various areas of life, have an effect far greater on Regina than just an understanding of her appearance. Sliders is not just about a body choice of breast size. Misdirection, misinformation, deception, minimizing, exaggerating, enabling…from others affects everything else about her as well: how she understands how other people take her; how she feels about herself; how she interprets her own reality, both in private and in public; and other choices she makes as she goes through life, which Regina later learns has led her to then present to others in a way that cascaded the problem.

A single incident, as shared in Chapter 1, may not have had a damaging affect on Regina, but many of them over time fostered a path through her life that created problems, both for Regina and for other people in her life.

The thing Regina discovers is that becoming more herself isn’t her only goal. Her goal is to be both a woman and to be accepted in society by others. She needs love, friends, family, as a woman, as a trans woman—either or both are good with Regina. She does not shy away from herself knowingly. She does not want to be an island, and couldn’t be if she tried.

But when she knew all the details of her life and transgenderism as a whole, had known market movers personally, had become, herself, a national leader of her paradigm, could readily relate reams of data to more people than were interested in listening—how could it be there was actually any denial?

It’s in the way she looked at it, valued things within it, the way she understood it.

Chapter 1 is an example of one of the things that goes on. If you do not see what is being conveyed in this chapter, in the deniable way it occurs, then you will miss what occurs in most other chapters.

SECTION 1, in 1990 at her age of 38, her first year in transition, using the terminology of the period in Los Angeles (transgenderist, specifically different from current), Regina is ultra-fem, relative to her own life-long expression; in denial of much; ecstatic with her transition yet faced with hardship.

SECTION 2, in 2005 at her age of 53, 15 years in transition, Sliders shows Regina relaxed into a much less feminine expression (for her); dressing and makeup are not so important; the newness has worn off; denial is still very operative in her life on a personal level yet she faces challenges more directly. She has become a leader of the transgender paradigm. She appears more seasoned, experienced.

SECTION 3, in 2017 at her age of 65, 27 years in transition, her denial falls away—suddenly, after a few years of peace. She is struck with an approach to herself that is radically different from what she felt before; how people in her life, professional or otherwise, have not been honest with her in how they really felt about her, how they’ve used her or even outright lied to her, which enabled denial—or how others, who were honest with what they felt, were so harsh in the telling that the message could never have been received. Thinking she was doing things in her interactions with others that were helping herself, she realizes she was sometimes hurting herself instead. And then, Regina encounters a transsexual whose life view is so harsh, that she is rocked too far the other way toward a hyper-critical self-awareness that, itself, blocks a realistic view of herself.

Is that where it ends? Is that latest realization the truth? Or is it just the next phase in her evolution?

Sliders ends in 2026, when Regina begins to recover, to understand how to seek what she wants, 36 years into transition.

It didn’t have to take that long.

Those swings in her expression and in the way she looked at herself were not just a result of her earlier-life’s artificial gender expression released at transition, but also a result of the way she encountered other people in society and how they treated her—all of which has changed (improved, I hope, in general) for trans persons as we move into the future.

Beautiful would be the life of such a person who could have been herself earlier in life, from birth, with no social derogation along the way, no related self-deception, no people misleading her, restricting her.

It should be noted that scenes are not meant to reflect the legal climate in California for the year in which the chapter is set. This novel is not about law. For legal questions, a competent lawyer should be sought. The novel had to be set somewhere, yet anywhere is a problem, because, in truth, in the United States, the legal status of trans issues has been quite variable during the time period of this novel. Different areas of the country are not consistent with each other, as the country struggles to recognize that, in truth, all people are created equal (see notes on Emancipation in Falling in Love). Some areas of the country are even opposite to others, so an effort was made to depict situations or concepts that people sometimes experience, even if they are in different areas.

Blessings to all,

Aimee Norin

BRIEF INTRODUCTION

DR. REGINA ISLER is always helpful, unfailingly good, intelligent, and extremely well educated, yet even she can have issues with denial. Is it all her doing? Or do others in society enable it?

Sliders follows Regina from 1990 with the loss of her family in Beverly Hills to 2026 and her eventual life by the beach in Santa Monica. She becomes a national leader of the transgender paradigm, yet she makes several mistakes along the way and winds up where she doesn’t want to be before she finally begins to figure herself out. People who give mixed signals, or even lie outright, easily confound her efforts at finding love and acceptance, making it difficult to find her way. Through hard experiences, she learns what she could have done better to achieve greater happiness.

SECTION 1

EXCITED IN THE BEGINNING

Age: 38

The early 1990s

Discovery is enthralling.

Sex is exciting.

Terms are of the period.

Adjustment is difficult, unrefined.

Regina is new to womanhood,

Just starting.

Denial of how people see her.

Loneliness grips with silent fingers.

CHAPTER 1

Regina Isler was happy, even high, in a way she’d never known, and no drugs were involved. Wearing only a thin paper smock, she sat on the doctor’s office examination table, in his fancy office suite high over Beverly Hills, with a smile on her face that wouldn‘t go away. Losing her wife, her kids and her home had been painful. But the reason she lost everything else, she reasoned, was that she’d gained herself, and the joy that came with that gave her an inner glow. She felt she was hugging herself from within, as if her arms were wrapped around her heart, carrying it gently into a new world.

God, how things worked, she mused, that the worst pain she’d ever known could be followed by such pervasive joy.

Usually reserved, she could contain her excitement no longer. Transition was so beautiful. She felt as if she wanted to touch everything around her, again, for the first time, to reach out and greet the life energy in everything, to be closer to it. This is an intralife reincarnation, she thought, both a death and a birth of sorts, only without forgetting the life before. She was reborn. The whole world was completely different—the way she approached life, the way the world treated her, the way she dressed, walked, talked, and moved, the things that were important to her—and every day she was becoming more giddy with excitement.

She felt the paper on the exam table beneath her. It was so soft to her touch. She’d never noticed that before. She smiled visibly. Hello, paper, she thought, greeting it as if for the first time. She heard the air-conditioning coming in through the vent, flowing perfectly through the louvers. She noticed the squeaky clean countertop filled with sterile supplies, not a hint of dust.

That window was too large for her to ignore! Her heart went out to embrace it. Such a beautiful window! The whole western wall of the room was glass. She felt an urge to go over and look out.

She glanced unnecessarily at the door. What a beautiful door! Is he coming yet? The door didn‘t answer, but Regina was sure the door’s silence meant that the coast was clear. It had to be a female door because people entered it. So giddy! She laughed to herself; this was all very unlike her. The surgeon didn’t seem to be coming in yet, and she hadn’t heard anyone lift her chart off the outer side of the door. So she slid off the table and walked over to the window. The glass was warm to her touch, glowing almost as much as she.

There it was: everything. The whole world was down there waiting for her, and she was part of it. Her heart went out to every single thing she saw, the people, birds and buildings below, the huge blue sky above, the Pacific Ocean off in the distance. She loved everything in life, as if each breath held the scent of a fragrant rose she could smell forever.

The whole decade had glowed since the beginning of her transition.

All fifteen days of it.

The ’90s will be ecstatic, she thought to herself with an uncontrollable smile. The whole world was fresh and—alive!

She touched the window and looked at the sidewalks below. All those people running around. Women with their own breasts! Wearing lingerie under everything. And people think it’s okay for them to wear it! All because they’re women.

Regina was ramped. Her mind was dancing. It wouldn’t hold still. She had her own breasts, now! She looked down at them. On hormones, her breasts never developed much, so she had them augmented. She felt like a schoolgirl who had won the lottery, as if the whole world were at her feet—and there they were down below, she joked to herself again. There were so many new things to try, and so many ways to do them!

She counseled herself to slow down a little. She was normally so modest—a tenured professor of clinical psychology at a major university—but not lately and not today. She couldn’t be. She was busting—

Busting! She laughed again at her own joke, touching her lips with the fingers of her right hand. Her forearm brushed against her right breast, a fairly new feeling, which gave her another rush.

Female hormones softened her skin in ways she hadn’t expected. The surprise wasn’t just that her skin was softer to someone else’s touch; her skin itself was softer—so everything she touched was softer, too. And her own skin felt even softer to her because the fingers she used to feel it were softer. When her arm brushed her side, both textures were softer. Women’s clothes were softer than men’s, and when they graced her softer skin, the sensation was electric, leagues softer than anything she had experienced before as a man. When she bathed, her bath oils floated over her skin in a fluid harmony, a heavenly caress. And even when she did nothing in particular, just walking or moving, her skin stretched against itself and seemed so sensual.

She raised her left hand so she could see her fingers and, ever so slightly, moved each finger against the other. Her fingers were clean, nothing on them. Yet they were slick. She couldn’t escape the feeling they must have a little glycerin on them, each and every one.

Women have had this all along, she thought, and they may not have known. Unless they’d been through a transition themselves, changing from a man’s skin to a woman’s, they’d have nothing to compare. They’ve never known what they had.

She knew the people in the city below could neither see nor hear her, but she felt she should give herself permission to share her joy: it’s part of a healthy mind to vent pain, she told herself, but also to experience pleasure.

Hello, everyone! How do you do? she asked in front of the window, in her natural voice, showing the world her new C-cups. What do you think? As good as anyone’s? Brand new, she confided. Aftermarket installation. She turned sideways a bit and gave the city a profile.

The plastic surgeon came in the door suddenly, but to her surprise, she didn’t mind. She turned to smile at him, her smock still open to the front.

Good morning, Regina. The doctor said with a smile. Showing the world, right?

Regina acknowledged in a softer voice, Yes.

The doctor chuckled. A lot of my patients do that. Does it approve? he asked.

Heartily. She was sure.

Have a seat. He motioned her to the exam table.

Regina climbed back on it.

Like this? she asked, settling back.

That’s good, the doctor answered with a reassuring smile.

Regina tried to relax.

He glanced at her chart. I did you last Thursday. It’s been a week.

She nodded.

A nurse came in and then excused herself and left.

The doctor smiled at Regina. Wrong door? he suggested. Let’s just have a look now. He opened her smock a bit more. Ah! Beautiful, he exclaimed. Couldn’t look better on a movie star. I do some of them also, you know, he bragged.

Which ones?

The doctor gently felt them. Can’t say, he said with a knowing smile. "Patient confidentiality and all, but I see some of my breasts about every other time I go to the movies.

They look good, he said, back to the task at hand. They hang like I’d expect at this stage, post-op. How do they feel? he asked. He poked and massaged a little.

Still a bit numb in places, but the pain has not really been a problem. The pills you gave me worked fine.

How long did you take them?

Only for two days. I don’t like to take pills if I can avoid them. The rest are at home in the bottle. They were narcotics, a strictly controlled prescription, and Regina was aware of the problems associated with them. Do you want them back?

No. You keep them for later.

He stepped back for a look at her breasts together, framed by her largish shoulders, rib cage, and biceps.

What are you thinking? she asked.

He considered. I’m extrapolating. Considering you as a whole. You weigh about one eighty-five? I’m getting the whole picture, the gestalt. He moved his hands around her upper torso as he spoke. I want you to be happy with your results, not have to come back next year dissatisfied. You should have C-cups when you’re done. And if you ever want a reduction, just let me know. I do those, too. A smile.

I have narrow hips, a small butt. Can you do anything about that? Give me a more girlish figure? Like Cher, maybe?

"Not much at this time. There are a lot of problems with that. There have been some attempts, but the results are highly questionable and problematic. Maybe after the turn of the century. The back inserts don’t stay put well, and experimenters are having problems with infections in them. I’ll let you know if I get something going.

As far as that goes, though, you don’t need to worry, because breasts like these, he cupped them proudly, will draw the gaze of the viewer up here, and breasts are womanly. He looked at her convincingly.

Regina relaxed. Her broad smile returned.

He stood back.

There is still some swelling, he said, which is to be expected. Remember: don’t judge their looks until you’re three months post-op, when most of the swelling is gone. Until then, one may appear larger than the other, and that may change week to week. Little things you do may affect that swelling, such as rubbing them, doing anything to irritate them. Oh, and don’t sleep on your stomach. Okay, young lady?

Regina felt charmed to be called young lady. She was not so young at thirty-eight, and she was new to being called a lady. She could get used to that for the next fifty years.

The smile on her face wouldn’t go away.

That smile happens to a lot of my patients, the doctor said. Any surgery carries a risk of complications, but the way I did your implants, you’ll be just fine. I have excellent results. Just wait until the swelling is gone, same as for looks. You’ll have someone goggling at them in no time. You into men or women? the doctor asked.

Regina didn’t think the question inappropriate; she was eager to disclose and share. Women. I’ve tried men, and I can have sex like other women, but I don’t really get into it.

Then you’ll have women pouncing on your breasts in no time. But don’t let them yet. Tell them to take a number. They’re still healing.

As if it were possible, Regina seemed to smile more.

Your face may break, if you keep doing that, the doctor teased. Then I’ll get you in here for a face lift. Now let’s lie back and get into the stirrups.

There’s a need? she asked. For breasts?

It’s what women do, he reassured her.

I haven’t had surgery down there, doctor.

Since you’re here, we should look at what might be done in the future.

Regina was unsure, but she relented.

He helped her lie back and put her heels up into the stirrups. The position felt odd to her, but, she reasoned, maybe it had a place.

May I? he asked.

You’re the doctor.

He gently lifted her penis and looked under it and under the scrotum; he felt the size of the testicles, all briefly.

How long have you been on hormones?

Two years. I transitioned last month. I wanted every day of the ‘90s to be as a woman.

Good, good. So your penis has decreased in size a little on the hormones. It’s probably a bit smaller now than it was two years ago.

Yes. Maybe twenty or thirty percent. And then gently, to not hurt his feelings, she said, But I’m not really comfortable calling it a penis, anymore, Doctor. The Y chromosome has been neutralized by the hormones; it is smaller under hormones and the tissues are homologous, anyway.

Same nerves, he said weekly. Are you going to want sex reassignment surgery some day?

Oh, no. She was clear. The look on her face was not antagonistic, but wasn’t in accord either. Not for me. But thank you.

It might still function as a clitoris, the doctor said of her glans, after S.R.S. The surgeries are better than they used to be.

Remove ninety percent of the thing? Invert part of it? Rearrange? Use only part of the glans for the clit, hoping the nerve doesn’t get cut? Regina’s smile to the doctor was reassuring, confident. I’m fine the way I am.

What about intercourse? the doctor asked.

That’s what it’s for.

I mean with a vagina.

If I ever want that, anal sex will do fine.

CHAPTER 2

They raced up Interstate 15 past the desert town of Baker at ninety miles per hour in Stephanie’s red 1978 T-top Trans Am, top panels left back at home—screaming joy and laughter about womanhood to every atom of life on the planet.

Grandma and Grandpa Slow were creeping along in the right lane when the fast car raced past, a Doppler-shifted V-8 and a higher-pitched WOMAAAAAaaaaan! heard above the wind noise.

Stephanie was driving, sometimes even paying attention, which was so hard. Because she was hard.

Regina sat in the passenger seat, knees together with her left touching the center console—not because the position was ladylike, but because it seemed to put more pressure on her groin. With her genitalia tucked far back into her panties, sitting on them on the leather seats, she was getting aroused.

Regina ran her left hand over the hose on her left thigh. The tender skin she had developed from the hormones made the hose feel even more electric than before. She could feel them better than she ever could before; they were so much softer.

She looked over at Stephanie. They were both