I have been going back and forth if I shall put this out on social media, oscillating between two minds and that’s when my therapist helped me re-gain the clarity around the positive mindset shift, the change this information can lead to, more than anything else.
So, that’s my mother in the picture playing candy crush (her cope up mechanism to maintain her mental health), dad – behind the camera, both of them waiting in my hospital room as I recover in my hospital bed from the corrective(revision) – gender affirmation surgery that I had to undergo in Bangkok, this August.
I can’t even fathom how difficult it must have been for them to stand behind me every step of the way in my ‘journey’ all along. Their child, their love for their child has always been above everything else for them. They didn’t succumb to the societal pressure. I give my parents the entire credit for this balance, for who I was and am, especially for still having been able to retain a sane mind. My stress constantly found an equal opposition in the love I constantly got from my parents, my sisters and friends. They held me tight through that darkest of times when I was just an inch away from collapsing.
Even though my parents belong to a conservative milieu they have been super progressive in their approach, and they understand the importance of family support and the transformative difference it can bring in the lives of people who come out as lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender. And when parents and families share their stories, they not only bolster them but embolden others to do the same!!
Amita Karadkhedkar 