Joy to the Girl, the Orgy has Cum. . .

For Trans and Non Binary Folks Finding Your Inner Joy is Essential

It is the holiday season and it is a time of joy and good will unless you are afraid your identity is about to be erased. For trans and non binary folks, it is often a depressing time of year. According to the US Trans Survey, Transgender and Gender Non Binary individuals face a significantly greater chance of suffering from chronic depression and suicidal ideation. The western holiday season is a time when we are most vulnerable to those feelings. Looking around at the cisgender, heteronormative world around us we see a world that doesn’t recognize our identities and doesn’t include us in their narratives about religion, popular culture, history, science or even literature. We are largely absent from cultural narratives that which most especially this time of year celebrate heternormativity and biological family, two sources of pain and rejection for many in our community.

There is good news though, you can give someone a gift of love and transformation by accepting people in your own community and transforming the idea of family from biological family to chosen community. In fact, there is an entire social toolkit available to trans and non binary folks to ward off the holiday blues and find some inner peace. Here are some ideas to repurpose your sense of how you experience the holiday season. Whether you are a transgender or non binary person or if you have someone in your life who is, these ideas can help you refocus on finding your inner joy and source of pleasure which is essential to good health, happiness and ultimately self-acceptance:

Give the gift of a vibrator. There is nothing like the pleasure of a good buzz, especially the kind you can turn on and off. Vibrators should be on everyone’s holiday gift list. Vibrators are a great gift for every body type, cis women, trans women, trans men, cis men, non-binary and agender bodies everywhere love good vibes and nothing gives better vibes than the little toy that could, that joyful little urchin in your dresser drawer you pull out whenever you get the urge is their as a tool of self-empowerment, pleasure and joy.

Hug a Cat. June 4th is National Hug Your Cat Day but you don’t have to wait until summertime to hug a cat. In fact the best time of year to hug a cat is in the middle of winter when it is cold and dark outside. Your kitty doesn’t have any place to go or anything to do and she is just waiting for some attention. Cats are very particular to the people they will allow to let hug them. First you have to allow a cat to test drive your lap for a few sittings. If the cat approves of your lap model then you can move on to the next step, excessive stroking. Be sure when you reach this level of acceptance by your cat owner to start at the head and give it several long strokes and then do a long stroke from the head all the way to the tail. After you have reached this level of cat tender enlightenment you can then move to the hugging space. So give your cat a hug, and then feed her and then pet her and then let her out and then let her in and then feed her again.

Start Your Own Holiday Tradition. Festivus isn’t just for straight people anymore. According to the internet there are over 1,815 unique cultural holiday traditions as you can see here on wikipedia at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_multinational_festivals_and_holidays but in addition to these holidays and festivals there are an additional 2,992 unique festivals and traditions that have been started on Facebook as well as in my home town of Portland, Oregon. There is National No Pants on the Subway Day which is celebrated here in my home town and then of course there is the Naked Bike Ride. So start your own unique Trans Celebration in the middle of the holiday season and celebrate your fabulousness.

Set Up a Friend Date. So using your favourite social media app you can set up a friend date. According to the New York Times, millenials are having less sex than ever before. This could be because of the prevalence of pornography or perhaps sexual liberation just isn’t as exciting anymore as it was during the freewheeling hippy days of peace, love and understanding, but that doesn’t mean we can’t still have a good time. Set up a friend date and have some coffee, chat with someone who has a completely different life experience from you. Sex is about exploration, it is about learning and it is about fun. Setting up a friend date is a great way to see if a relationship has what it takes or if you might just have a good tennis buddy and it is a great way to chase away the holiday blues.

Wear an Ugly Sweater That Doesn’t Have Anything to do with the Holidays. We have all seen the trend these days of wearing ugly holiday sweaters. It is a cisgender, heteronormative community bonding experience. It is a way of saying, “I so don’t care about the holidays that I am going to wear this ugly holiday sweater as a way of showing just how much I actually fit in and how I really belong to this tradition.” So if ugly holiday sweaters get you down then don’t just wear a nice sweater to show your rebellious transgender identity, wear an ugly sweater that doesn’t have anything to do with the holidays then you will be a true gender rebel. No more reindeer with flashing light bulbs, or awkward stitched block patterns of a snowman covering your chest, just get a plain old ugly sweater and wear it through the entire holiday season to show that you don’t care.

Awaken Your Senses. Sex, love and dating is all your senses. You are transgender and experiencing pleasure is your birthright. Remember how wonderful it is to have an orgasm, how it feels to be touched and to touch. Remember how it feels to completely let go, to surrender yourself for a few minutes to another person. This may be about a wax candle and the heat and the feeling of dripping wax on your body, the luxury of a warm bath, the sting of the cold, or the immense peace of spooning up with a lover. Sex is all about the senses. The senses and the world of feeling is everything and you belong to that world. Your body, your beautiful trans body belongs to the world of joy and pleasure. You are a child of the universe and you were made to be right here, right now experiencing all the joy you deserve so this holiday season go out and awaken your senses and find your joy!

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