Culture

The Joys and Fears of Transitioning During a Pandemic


 

For Sami Sikanas, looking in the mirror was a source of enduring frustration and despair. Her facial features, formed by the effects of testosterone during puberty, didn’t align with the image of herself that she carried internally. Sikanas, a 30-year-old landscape designer in Brooklyn, grappled with her gender identity for years, wondering whether there was a more authentic, fulfilling path she could embark upon.

“I had a transformative mushroom trip in December of 2017 around New Year’s,” she says. “That’s when I reconnected with my inner female voice. I remember thinking about how much I loved myself and all of the women in my life.”

Sikanas eventually came out to her sister and partner as a transgender woman in February of 2019. During the ensuing months, she began to change aspects of her presentation in order to reflect her gender identity, eventually starting hormone therapy, shaving her chest, and undergoing laser hair removal treatments on her face. She felt like her transition was gaining momentum. Then the COVID-19 pandemic hit, bringing the entire world, including her own, to a surreal, screeching halt.

“Only a month into the pandemic, my partner and I broke up,” says Sikanas. “I was becoming more and more feminine, and therefore less and less attractive to my partner, because he’s a gay man. My transition developed to a certain point where my gender was no longer avoidable.”

Along with the breakup, Sikanas lost her job due to the economic downturn triggered by the coronavirus. After losing her health insurance, a surprising silver lining emerged. Sikanas was able to enroll herself in a form of Medicaid that would cover the cost of the facial feminization surgery she so intensely desired — a procedure she would not have been able to previously afford. With the ability to recuperate in the safety and privacy of quarantine-induced isolation, she decided to move forward and undergo FFS.

“I think of my bedroom as my cocoon and I was slowly working on things without having to deal with the outside world,” she says. “Whether it was learning makeup or recovering from surgery, staying inside all the time. And then you come out as a butterfly on the other end.”

Sikanas began to slowly heal. Her new facial features began to settle and soften, providing her with a newfound sense of relief from the gender dysphoria that had caused her distress throughout her early adulthood. She began to feel affirmed and empowered, focusing her energies on finding a new job to support herself.

“I feel so fortunate that I had my FFS before having to do virtual job interviews,” says Sikanas. “I feel like I was armed with that weapon going into them. With virtual interviews, you don’t really have any social or physical cues, like wearing a dress or your mannerisms. It’s just your shoulders up and your face.”

As restrictions are starting to loosen, Sikanas, who landed a new job, is looking forward to being social and dating.

“As a trans woman, I would sometimes get my gender affirmed by relationships and experiences with men,” she says. “But then when you’re in a pandemic, how are you supposed to have sex or be validated when you’re locked in your little doll house?”

Other trans folks, who have also been navigating transition through the lens of the pandemic, echo those sentiments about an eagerness to return to public life as their truest selves. Able to escape the usual pressures associated with transition, like public ridicule and invasive questioning from the outside world, many trans people were able to make progress in their journeys during quarantine that may have otherwise been impossible and unrealistic. Now, forced inside for over a year and counting, they are excited to present themselves publicly, but not quite sure when they will be able to do so safely.

“Quarantine and isolation have made some of the more affirming parts of my transition go away, like being gendered properly, or being able to engage in public life as the person that I see myself as and always have,” says Erin Reed, a 32-year-old digital strategist in Germantown, Maryland. “I’m looking forward to hearing ‘she, her’ from other people and I’m looking forward to shopping at a thrift store and trying on new clothes.”

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Reed, who began her transition in 2019 and had been progressing steadily in her journey, found herself at an impasse when the pandemic forced everyone into lockdown. In January of 2020, she began the process of legally changing her name, a goal she had been looking forward to for many years. In order to do so, she had to present certain documents to the Social Security Office in her city. In an unfortunate turn of events, Reed accidentally procured the incorrect documents right as the pandemic resulted in a national shutdown. The social security office closed, indefinitely delaying her name change.



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