Chapter Ten. Full Circle
“I’m Changing My Name”
We were visiting Daniel and hanging out in his apartment while he was finishing up a meeting with his supervisor on Zoom. We were overhearing the conversation, but not really tuning in, since it had no significance to us. But suddenly the conversation grabbed our attention.
“I would like to officially change my name in all work settings from Daniel to Jamie.”
Our eyes grew big as we quietly looked at each other. Another step to adjust to.
Daniel had earlier told us that he now identified as non-binary trans human and was using they/them pronouns. Daniel’s middle name was James, so he told us he wanted to honor us by using his given middle name but changing it to not be gender specific. So, changing to Jamie made sense to us.
We talked a little bit about it afterwards, but it wasn’t until we were back home, and I was on a phone call with Daniel that we talked about how he was wanting us to refer to him. I knew he had changed it at work, but I hadn’t really thought about me not calling him Daniel. He acknowledged it would be hard for us to switch but would really like it if we tried.
This felt big to me. After referring to my child as Daniel for more than 26 years and using the pronouns he/him, could I now say Jamie and they/them? I decided to honor my child and use the name they chose.
From here on, I will refer to them as Jamie and use they/them pronouns.
As their graduation gift from grad school, we paid for them to legally change their name.
An Invitation to Create
Scott was preaching at a church in western Massachusetts, and while we were talking in the foyer with people after the service, I got a FaceTime call from Jamie. I walked outside and answered the call. Jamie was feeling low. They were not looking for a pep talk. Just a listening ear, and I guess a face.
I was glad Scott was taking a long time, it gave me time to just be present with my discouraged child.
As the conversation went on, we began to explore things that in the past had been lifegiving to them. Thinking about their times of creating and sewing during their high school years, emerged as a big highlight. “What if you begin to create again?”
Later that night after we returned home, I found an inexpensive sewing machine on OfferUp, just a few miles from Jamie’s house. We purchased it, and Jamie went and picked it up.
Shortly after that I received one of my very favorite texts I have ever received, from Jamie.
“Mom, would you ever want to fly out sometime for a weekend for the two of us to create?”
Without hesitation I replied, “I would absolutely love to!”
Jamie had done some modeling and had been invited to a photo shoot that would require just the right gown. The elegant room that would be the backdrop had inspired a picture in Jamie’s head, and they were thinking that between the two of us we could create it.
I was so excited about the possibilities and decided to enter in with “of course we can” confidence.
I entered Jamie’s second floor condo early Saturday morning after having flown in the night before and spending the night at Leah and John’s house. The candles were lit, the table was set, and homemade bread and yogurt parfaits were beautifully served. What a perfect setting for the two of us to begin to let our creative juices flow.
While we were sipping our coffee Jamie began to describe the vision they had in their head and as they were talking the vision was coming into focus in my mind too. So fun!!
Before we jumped into Jamie’s car to head to the fabric store, Jamie added one of their blazers to the outfit I was wearing, just to bring it up a notch. We confidently walked out the door, both looking great! At least in our own minds.
Jamie had heard about this fabric warehouse, known for its amazing variety of fabrics. We couldn’t have been more excited as we walked in. It was sensory overload. It had narrow aisles with floor to ceiling rolls of fabric in every color imaginable and every texture and pattern style.
Fabric heaven!
It could have felt overwhelming, but we were inspired. It felt so great to fully enter the joy of it, and getting excited with Jamie as we would touch and feel and drape and imagine.
There was such a freedom in enjoying Jamie’s love for beauty and design, without me feeling like I had to temper it or hold them back in any way. It was a moment of freedom and love for me, that I wouldn’t have afforded myself not so terribly long ago. Love could afford to see and celebrate my child for who they were. What a robber fear is!
Ideas were flowing and our thoughts and inspirations were in sync. We did rather quickly discover that wanting to do what we had in mind was going to be way above our budget if we were to buy the fabric at this fun place.
We decided to take our inspiration and ideas to a less expensive place which, by the way, we also had coupons for! Now that we knew what we were looking for, we could most likely find similar things there.
We had no pattern, only visions from Jamie’s head now downloaded into mine. It was an incredible experience for the two of us to walk around and both be drawn to the same fabrics, same colors, same crazy ideas for improvising to achieve looks we were after.
“Let’s get 10 yards of this, 15 yards of that. Do you think we could use this ribbon for this?” On and on our fun and creativity took shape. It was magical! Did we really know what we were doing? No, but we were confident we would be able to pull something great off.
Our hearts were full of excitement as we stood in the checkout line. Leah had given Jamie money for their birthday to use toward this gown. After ringing up each item and using our coupon, the amount was exactly Leah’s gift.
We spent the next two days executing the vision. Being in that space together, experiencing being fully in and being able to completely enjoy what was giving my child such joy was an unbelievable experience.
Sure, there were outbursts of frustration when the sewing machine broke down, and when it was looking like what we had envisioned wouldn’t actually work. But we just had to improvise and come up with an alternative solution. And each of those moments only added to the connection and feelings of accomplishment we got to experience together.
It was a magical gift of healing.
Jamie’s Instagram Post
mom crush monday
If you need a sign to love your trans kid, this is it.
Trans folks oftentimes missed out on childhood
bonding activities that were congruent with their
interests when they were young.
Having my mom in town to create a ball gown together
meant the absolute world to me.
Walking through the fabric depot imagining how we would
construct the perfect gown was incredibly healing. I feel so
lucky to have a mom who has chosen to love me for me.
As a kid, I could be found sitting at the kitchen table drawing
“my future wife’s wedding gown and heels” (At least that was
my excuse). Now at 26, all of those sketches of gowns and
heels get to be claimed as my own. Thank you for seeing me
mom, and for making my shrouded childhood dreams of making
myself a gown a reality. Thank you for validating that my
trans-ness is beautiful and not a mark of evil.
Parents: support your trans kids. It means the world to us to get
to be the children we have always been with you. We just want to
be embraced for the people we truly are, and what could be so
evil about that?
I Was Blind. Now I See.
The gift of having my eyes opened to be able to see my child has truly been a gift from God. God has so gently invited me along, nudging and encouraging me to keep widening my capacity to love and embrace.
I remember a conversation I had with Jamie where they were sharing things with me that once again felt outside my comfort zone. I was wondering to myself, when do I get to say, “enough stretching the limits?”
It was later that day that I was reading The Furious Longing of God by Brennan Manning. He was referring to the passage in John 15 where Jesus says, “Live in me. Make your home in me just as I do in you.” Then Brennan says, “Home is a place of welcoming love, nonjudgmental acceptance, accompanied by many signs of affection.”
Thank you, God! There are no limits!
No more uh-oh.
“Fear not,” is the recurring message of Jesus. And yet it seems to be so widely accepted that a “good mom” worries and fears.
The uh-oh is like a motor running inside constantly having to evaluate if something is good, bad, right, or wrong. It revs up our thoughts and accelerates our fears.
For me it was a lot about what was socially acceptable. Especially in the opinion of my “Christian community.” Am I staying inside the lines? Are my kids staying inside what others would approve of? It’s exhausting, but it seemed to be my job.
I have a picture in my house of a shepherd running after a flock of sheep. The sheep are kind of all over the place, not in a straight line. I found the image when I was preparing a talk on Jesus as the Good Shepherd. In the Message translation Psalm 23:6 reads: “Your beauty and love chase after me every day of my life.”
If that’s the Good Shepherd’s job, then maybe I don’t have to be so consumed with whether everyone is staying inside the lines.
The Good Shepherd is chasing after me with His love! He’s chasing after each of my children with His love. Every day of our lives!
That allows me to take the uh-oh out of my relationships, and I get to fully see and love the person right in front of me with no need to evaluate or control the outcome of where they are headed.
My child is not like the other boys.
I lay down my uh-oh.
I invite you to do the same.
