Alex Myers married his wife twice. Once as part of a same-sex couple and again as an opposite-sex couple. Here’s what this taught him about marriage.
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A basset hound, the dish washer, the innkeeper, and us. That was the sum total of our wedding party the first time we got married. It was December, 2002, and we had driven from Rhode Island to Vermont. We wanted it simple, we wanted it to be about what mattered, the joining of the two of us.
An quarter hour earlier, I had stood on the porch of the honeymoon suite we’d rented for the weekend, feeling an odd reluctance. Not the typical cold feet of a bridegroom, but something else entirely. It wasn’t worry over how marriage might change me. It wasn’t hesitation to link myself to this woman. It was over the documentation, the legal standing itself.
I’d asked if there was any way that the marriage license could refer to me as “he” – I explained that I was transgender, that I was biologically female, that I lived as a man, that I didn’t want to be referred to with feminine pronouns…
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You see, we’d driven up to Vermont because, at the time, it was the only place to get a same-sex civil union. And I was standing on the porch, wondering if this was the right thing to do because I was pretty sure that I was a man and that, therefore, my wife and I weren’t a same-sex couple.
Yes, I had been born a girl and raised as a girl. But at seventeen, I had started living as a man. At eighteen, I had gone to Probate Court and legally changed my name from Alice to Alex. I had a driver’s license that said M, not F (though, admittedly, I got this because I left the box blank and the clerk at the DMV filled it in based on my appearance). No, I hadn’t had surgery. No, I wasn’t taking testosterone. But I felt I was a man; I had been living as one for seven years, after all. I had struggled for years to articulate my gender identity, to establish myself as a guy, and now, here I was, on the verge of entering a same-sex marriage, a union that seemed to undermine this sense of self.
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After breakfast that morning, my fiancé (Ilona) and I had gone through the paperwork with the innkeeper, who was also the justice of the peace. I’d asked if there was any way that the marriage license could refer to me as “he” – I explained that I was transgender, that I was biologically female, that I lived as a man, that I didn’t want to be referred to with feminine pronouns, the long list of explanations that reached towards but never quite arrived at the statement that I was a man… It always ended in the same place: I was; I wasn’t. The innkeeper made sympathetic noises, but said that the language on the license couldn’t be altered and, after all, this was a same-sex civil union.
If my wife and I walk down the street, we look like a straight couple. But the fact is, we’re not – I’d rather define myself as transgender than as a man; we’d rather define our relationship as queer: not straight, not gay, but something other.
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So there I was, outside, staring at the snow-covered fields, the deep green of the pine trees, wondering if this was the right thing to do. Was I compromising my transgender identity just to get this piece of paper? My wife and I had discussed other options. We’d considered going to Vegas, to one of those drive-thru wedding chapels. We’d been told that they only checked drivers’ licenses, that I passed as a man well enough that they wouldn’t question us.
But I had my doubts. Would such a marriage be truly legal? Could we get into trouble by presenting ourselves as something we were not (an opposite-sex couple)? Would our marriage end up being invalid because of this? (I wasn’t even sure how legitimate my driver’s license was.) In the end, we talked ourselves out of it on the basis that Las Vegas wasn’t really our style (despite the fact that I have a deep affection for Elvis impersonation) whereas Vermont decidedly was. And Vermont would be legitimate, above-board, here’s who we are.
Or was it?
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Marriage should be a validation, a confirmation, a recognition of a couple’s togetherness and commitment. I knew I loved Ilona, and I knew I wanted to marry her – to vow to be with her for the rest of our lives. But I also knew we weren’t a same-sex couple.
This is the strange no-man’s-land (sorry for the terrible pun) that some transgender people live in. Gender and, to a degree, sexual orientation, are about perception. If I walk down the street, I look like a man. If my wife and I walk down the street, we look like a straight couple. But the fact is, we’re not – I’d rather define myself as transgender than as a man; we’d rather define our relationship as queer: not straight, not gay, but something other. To explain this requires a long conversation, often with lots of questions and confusion and sometimes debate. Who we are and what we are go far beyond the capacities of a legal form or marriage license, where there are two boxes to be checked and two pronouns to choose from and no room for explanation of any sort.
So there I was, ready to be married – to this woman, at this time, forever – and entirely not ready to accept that this was how our relationship would be defined. We’d been over this before; we’d talked it through together again and again. We’d known too many GLBT couples who had been denied the simple rights and privileges given to married spouses. We knew that being married, even in a same-sex civil union that wasn’t recognized by many states, would be helpful, a safeguard against certain disastrous situations. It would also be a chance for us to publically proclaim ourselves as a couple – after all, that is part of what marriage is about beyond all the legal stuff.
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That afternoon, we stood before the innkeeper, with the basset hound on the couch behind us, and the dishwasher serving as our witness, and said our vows and signed our names, and were married. Afterwards, we went snow-shoeing, and I remember feeling glad that we had that piece of paper, that we were legitimate, legal, an entity declared before the state. At the same time, I also knew that in some way that piece of paper didn’t describe us at all that, even, it perhaps contradicted who we were as a couple, and how I understood my gender.
Years of married life passed, as they tend to do. Marriage is funny like that. There’s a build-up to it, a looming sensation, like the heaviness that charges the air before a thunderstorm. And then it happens… and becomes not an event but a state of being. My wife and I were married. It’s almost a magical word in our society: married. Rights and benefits, overt and subconscious, accrue to you, and no one ever asks for evidence beyond you saying: we’re married, this is my wife, this is my husband.
What I hadn’t anticipated was that this document would also end my marriage: my wife and I were no longer a same-sex couple. Our civil union was annulled. Dissolved.
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Then something changed. I turned 25. I had been living as a man for over seven years. When I came out at seventeen, I passed well. I looked like a 15 year-old boy. Beardless cheeks, with the slight roundness of late adolescence. Slender legs and torso. At 25, I still looked like I was 15, except that I was starting to go gray. It became harder for me to pass, at least when I had to convince people I was an adult, and I was facing the prospect of becoming a full-time teacher that fall: I would be in charge of a classroom of 16-year-olds, and I didn’t want to look like one of them. So I started to take testosterone, and strange things happened.
I don’t mean the physical stuff. Yes, I got stubble, and more body hair, and a deeper voice. Overnight – or so it felt – all the fat in my body migrated from my thighs and butt to settle into a new residence in my lower belly. Yes, there was that, among other shifts (it is an entirely different thing to go through puberty at the age of 25. It is also entirely different to go through puberty at the age of 25 while teaching a class of 15-year-olds who are also going through puberty). But the strangest alteration of all was my legal status: I was no longer female.
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The state of Maine, where I was born and raised, changed my birth certificate to reflect my new sex. When I got the official document in the mail, I was delighted. This made me legitimate. This meant my license and my passport and everything else could reflect the fact that I was a guy. What I hadn’t anticipated was that this document would also end my marriage: my wife and I were no longer a same-sex couple. Our civil union was annulled. Dissolved. Just like that, all our legal ties had been unknotted.
We entered a new round of negotiations. Did we need to get remarried? Did that piece of paper matter at all? Weren’t we the same couple as we had always been? Of course we were, and of course a certificate didn’t really matter – it wouldn’t be what held us together. But I still wanted to get it.
So we went back to Vermont. We brought with us a tidy stack of documents: this one proving we had been a same-sex couple, joined in civil union. This one showing that the State of Maine said I was a man. This one applying to be wed as an opposite-sex couple. A pleasant, though slightly befuddled clerk handled all the paper, gave my birth certificate close scrutiny and then typed up our marriage license. A justice of the peace, in sandals and with a beard to his waist, married us right there in City Hall. We signed. We kissed. We were married again.
I still can’t make sense of these pieces of paper. What does it mean to be legally a man? I have, intact, the body I was born with. All my organs, all my flesh, the same. When I was born, I was female, a girl – that was me. At seventeen, I cut my hair short; at eighteen I changed my name. I was a guy, transgender, that was me. At twenty-four, I started injecting testosterone, by twenty-five I no longer got my period. I could do pull-ups. I had to shave at least every other day. I was man? I was transgender. The State of Maine said I was male. I was me.
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And why should any of this matter to marriage? Ultimately, marriage is the joining of two people – a public declaration of their commitment to each other. Who each person is will shift over time – their faith, their health, their aspirations, their citizenship, their gender. All of that can change within a marriage. A marriage is a container, nothing more. A file folder that helps us organize our society. That same-sex civil union no better defined us as people, as a couple, than our opposite-sex marriage now does.
Over time, I have become grateful for this. I am glad that neither marriage fits, just as I am glad that neither birth certificate fits. It is a reminder that my wife and I are more than the legal documents; that what we share between us cannot be defined or determined or explained. I believe, in fact, that this is what constitutes the essence of marriage and of self: it is ever-changing. What it was at the beginning has long since shifted, and we would be fools to want it to stay the same.
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Photo: Kim Carpenter/ Flickr
I found this article very interesting from a documentation perspective. I myself am a transman who entered into a “same sex” marriage prior to transition. However, many legal outlets informed me that the only way to have my marriage license updated was to get divorced then remarried. (Which ironically enough I was also told could be considered fraud since I had no intention of not being with my partner…wrap your brain around that one!). Being trans is tough, but the paperwork is really the kick in the ass! No one knows what the rules are – and since we’re such… Read more »
I just wanted to say that this post is so beautiful. I wish you and your beloved many more joyful years together. <3