Dead Mom and Me
Useful terms for this post - I had these as footnotes but they were too hard to understand that way (this is why editing matters, friends).
Church: Technically, my congregation does not consider itself a church. I'm attending the Vancouver Unitarians and their slogan is "spirituality without dogma." I'm still very agnostic and happily so and that does not at all make me unique in this congregation. I call it church because it's every Sunday morning and it fits in my brain that way. But we rarely hear bible stories and we never get told to believe in God a certain way - or at all. But our minister is technically a Reverand and he's very gay and it's happy.
Dead Mom: I could write an entire post just to explain this and probably will at some point. The TLDR is anytime I've any sort of interaction with my mom's "spirit" after she died in 2010, I refer to that person as Dead Mom. My mom, the one who talked to me as a human in the mortal realm, was incredibly queer/transphobic. She would have hated everything I've become. But. I don't see Dead Mom that way. This post is the first exploring this, but I doubt it will be the last.
T-versary: This is the aniversary of when I started testosterone. I started testosterone on 22 June 2021. That happened to be my mom's birthday. It wasn't planned. I took the first available appointment and then chuckled to myself about the date. But this year will be my 5 year T-versary!
This post is kicking off the start of of my campaign to fund my celebration of everything that represents Dead Mom and Me. You do not have to donate to participate! But the end of every post for a bit will be information about how that campaign is going. You've been warned.
I had the strangest experience at church yesterday. I'm not sure exactly when in the early church service I experienced this, but it was before Rev. Shawn got up to preach to us about the restorative nature of sleep (I swear I wasn't sleeping when this happened either, though the irony there would be pretty spot-on). All I know is that I was sitting in church, and I felt my mom.
Look. I might have imagined the whole thing. I'm not emotionally attached to whether this actually was my mom or whether it was a figment of my imagination that I created to process something big. It doesn't matter. Really.
This isn't the first time I've felt Dead Mom's presence and it probably won't be the last. Every time it happens, I debate whether this is a piece of my subconscious or my actual dead mother and I always land on it doesn't matter. Because either way I always end up processing something big that changes me in beautiful ways.
I haven't felt Dead Mom near me in a long time. I actually think it's because I wasn't letting her near. I have been very angry at her for a very long time. And with some crazy things that have happened in the last couple of weeks, I think something shifted where I'm not angry anymore. There's this understanding that is like a river through me right now and I both condemn the choices she made and understand why she made them. I'm heartbroken, but not angry.
Anyway, I was sitting there, crocheting (because I attend a church that does not condemn fidgeting) while I listened to a woman share something related to church business. My mother was the one who taught me to crochet basic chains and so my thoughts, very naturally, drifted to her. Almost immediately after I thought of my mom, I felt her there. I cannot explain to you what this means beyond if I'd closed my eyes, my brain would have sworn she was right next to me. It was Dead Mom.
We had a little conversation in my brain. Telepathic style thoughts. Again. Whether this was my brain only or not doesn't matter to me. But over the course of the conversation, I realized that she was giving me a gift that I have been waiting for.
The gift was acceptance.
This isn't just acceptance of me, Simon, as Simon. Dead Mom already did that.
It wasn't merely acceptance of the fact I'm in a very, very gay marriage and I'm very Not Mormon and probably a bit of a witch. Again, me and Dead Mom have navigated this.
It wasn't even just an acceptance that finally included the parts she'd broken off herself. (Dead Mom hates that this is my reality due to her actions.)
It was also an acceptance of the parts of me that need to shine a light on all the shit I've been through.
It was an acceptance that in order for me to heal, I need to tell my story, from my perspective.
My very private mother was giving me the go-ahead to air our dirty laundry.
The woman who shut the curtains to pray, because privacy was everything to her, was telling me I could finally talk without guilt. I felt her love surround me with her voice in my mind saying "tell your story, even the parts with me in it. It matters."
My mother is the most complicated person in my story. She is the villain in so many place, but she also saved me in ways that I can only appreciate right now for the first time. She would hate many of the parts of me that I took directly from her. She fiercely fought for those she loved, even if much of her fight was misguided and based on lies that literally destroyed my life for 31 years. Everything I am as a parent, I am because of her, both because of what she did right, and because of what she did wrong. My kids sometimes hear stories and want to paint her as a bad person, but she's much, much too complicated for that. She was so good. And so fucking terrible.
One time, I had a friend (who was a few years older than me and had more in life figured out than I did) tell me that she'd rather have had her abusive dad than my mom, because her dad was so easy to vilify. He could never be painted in any light but "bad" so that's what she did to protect herself.
I can't vilify my mom. I've tried. I've also tried to make a saint of her. Neither sticks because she was such a stunning shade of grey.
She's this beautiful soul, so tortured by a system that broke her, that she projected her self hatred onto her children in desperation and fear. And with almost no real support or help, she chose violence and sharp words to corral us into the very thing she didn't believe she could be: worthy of God's love.
The thing that would break my mom if she were alive and saw me and my life and my husband and our three kids, two of whom I accept as trans, isn't our identities. It is that none of us, in her understanding of the world, are worthy of God's love.
She would spit this out at us with venom, quoting scriptures taken out of context and quotes from prophets and other old men that tell of the dangers of our actions. But the underlying motivation for her would be love. (And fear. Those were inseparable in her brain, so if one came, so did the other.)
This is one of the reasons that even though her choices left me scarred in ways I'm still discovering, I cannot hate her. I do judge her. I judge her very much. But I feel so much love for her too. I see what she was trying to do. I think she was wrong and she was given enough information that she should have chosen love a little harder and fear a lot less. If she were still alive and still the same in that regard, she wouldn't be part of my life right now, the same way I cut my dad out.
Honestly, I believe the only reason we can have a "relationship" is because she is dead. What a heavy load that is.
So yeah, maybe in a moment of tenderness, my brain created this experience so that I could finally tell her parts of my story without feeling guilt for betraying her. It's possible. In that case, clearly my subconscious needs me to tell this so badly it's literally creating a scenario for me to accept this need for radical honesty and maybe I should then, you know, listen to myself and tell my story.
Or maybe this was actually my mom. And she really is okay with me telling her parts of my story. In which case, I guess in order to honor my mom, I need to tell my story.
My take away is I need to tell my story.
I need to finish writing my book. I need to start my 5 year T-versary project that I've been talking about for months. I need to start putting my fingers where my keyboard is and start typing. I need to make more videos where I talk about what it was like growing up in my childhood home.
I need people to hear how different childhood can look when your parents are more worried about whether you survive to adulthood than their beliefs.
I'm living this complicated, beautiful story with my kids and my husband and it's too beautiful, even in its pain, for it to be kept to myself.
People have been telling me for years that my life is a story worth sharing.
I've been telling myself since I was a child, that someday I would share my soul on paper.
So why not now? Why not today?
After having my mom's soul give me the okay, I have nothing left to lose. The people who will be mad will be mad no matter what. I've long ago given up believing anything I ever do will make them happy for me.
And my living mother would hate this. I am not going to pretend there was a tiny piece of her that would have been happy with my choice to be radically honest.
But at church today, Dead Mom did what Dead Mom does and she chose her love for me over her mortal fears. Fear doesn't guide Dead Mom. She's able to root into her true guiding principle: love.
Again, maybe this is all in my head. It's fine.
I'm still going to do it though.
THE PROJECT: DEAD MOM SAYS GAY JUST MEANS HAPPY!
In honor of my complicated relationship with my mom, and being out as trans for 5 years this year, I am going to be doing a big celebration honoring myself, and Dead Mom. I'm hoping to launch parts of the project on Mother's Day and conclude it on 22 June 2026.
So. Help me properly celebrate my mom's birthday and my 5 year T-versary by helping fund my project.
It comes in stages (as each stage is met, I will update this post!)
Stage 1 - A Garden ($50): If you read my post A Bit of Earth, you'd know I've been dreaming of having a garden for years. This also ties into very fond memories with my mom. But. We planted some seeds and either they were mostly duds or some small critter ate a bunch. I'm guessing it was a critter. I want to replace some of those seeds with starters. I really don't have money for them though. This is why we bought seeds. I will document this journey on my Instagram.
Stage 2 - Website ($250): I'm hoping to launch this on 10 May - Mother's Day. I already have hosting, so I just need to buy the domain! What domain? I'll announce when the website is up. I also need to pay myself to take time away from my actual job to get the website up. All in all, I'm expecting this to be about $250 worth of missing work. I'm not calculating upkeep costs in this. The only reason I'm really including any of this pricing is I just moved my family internationally, and if I'm not spending time with my family or my business, I kind of need it to also be paid right now. Down the road, I don't expect that to be true.
Stage 3 - Billboard ($5,000): A very real, but taken wildly out of context, quote by my mother plastered on a billboard in Salt Lake County, Utah to commemorate Dead Mom's acceptance of her queer children and grandchildren. The quote: "Gay just means happy." I will have a whole post about it here and on the website from stage 1 so you'll know what's coming before it comes. The website will be listed on the billboard and will tell my story of how Dead Mom first told me she was okay with me being queer as well as how I'm reclaiming myself by being the parent she never could be.
Bonus points! This would also be launched during pride month. This is purely coincidental, but also. My mom would have hated it. Which makes it perfect.
Stage 4 - Crochet Lessons ($120): (Why is this one after the more expensive one? Simple. I want the more expensive thing first.) I don't know for sure what this will cost? But I found a knitting class for about this price, so I'm guessing I can probably find someone to teach me some crochet techniques for the same price. I have my mother's creative streak and I want to make dish cloths with weird patterns on them like she did but make it mine. I really want a way to reconnect to some of the creativity she offered me. I also am terrible at learning crochet from videos or books. I've tried.
Stage 5 - Camping ($1500): I would like to take my kids on a camping trip the week of my mom's birthday and my T-versary. My mom would take us kids camping when my dad was off galivanting in Europe and I love camping. But also. International Move. Going camping means I cannot work that week. I also am lacking camping supplies. Between the lost work and the camping supplies, this one feels like a bit of a Dream, but it would mean so much to me.
Stage 6+ - Readers' Choice (?): If by some miraculous event, we get to this point, I'll give you a few different options of what celebration item I would like to Do Next and you can vote on what you want me to work for!
If you would like to help me with this plan, donate here!
If you want to wish me a happy T-versary, you can write me a letter!
Simon
Unit 244 - 3271 Dunbar St
Vancouver, BC V6S 0M1
CA
(Don't get too excited. It's a mailbox at a UPS store not even near where I currently live. But I can get mail there. So write me? Just address it to Simon, no last name, and it should get to me fine. 😸)