David Minerva Clover

[CN: PTSD, pregnancy, birth] Something snapped inside me and I was transported backwards in time.

Faced by the extreme pressure to conform to impossible beauty ideals, I followed my instincts (and my budding feminism) and rejected them wholesale. I wasn’t going to play like that; I wasn’t going to let my gender require that I wear makeup or perform a certain way.

When I finally realized I was trans, it was after almost a year and a half of therapy, a lot of trauma, and after becoming a parent.

Yes, we should be criticizing these straight, cisgender dads. We’ve been far too easy on them for too long. It’s straight out of the patriarchy playbook.

Straight people, it isn’t that you aren’t awesome; so many of you are! It’s just that, while you enjoy the numerous advantages that your straight privilege allows you, I’d like to celebrate the little things that make being queer totally rad.

Something had clicked in my head. Suddenly I didn't give a shit when life began or whether or not a fetus counts as a “baby.” I was overwhelmed by the new-found knowledge that pregnancy is unfairly invasive in every single way.

If you believe in bodily autonomy and consent, folks should get to consent (or not) to the process of gestation. Full stop. No caveats.

A human being does not go through an experience like that without getting to know themselves really, really, well. I learned more about myself than I could have ever imagined. Today, I am going to share some of those lessons with you.