Private Finished Shattered

Some practices—older, more storied ones—had receptionists. Vito, on the other hand, did not. His office was small, half-decorated, and dominated by a low, round table in the center of the room, ringed by a number of chairs. There was no obvious desk, nor any computers, and when Xera opened the door Vito was already in one of the chairs, flipping through a file.

He glanced up when she came in, and then stood, offering his hand to her automatically.

"My ten o'clock? It's nice to meet you, Xera. Come in, take a seat wherever, and we can get started." The paperwork was already done, nicely out of the way, and he was eager to get started on his first appointment of the day. "Why don't you let me know what made you decide to come in."

Ah, there it was. Tale as old as time and all that: it wasn't uncommon—really, it was common—for there to be a level of emotional whiplash when meeting people who they had known before transitioning. Depending on how it had been handled, and what their home life was like, there were a lot of different options and a lot of them were unpleasant.

Showing absolutely no signs of being bothered by Xera being trans—he certainly wouldn't be, of all people—he nudged the conversation towards what he was hoping to hear.

"Can I ask for some more detail on what happened, and how that went for you? I'm not sure of your circumstances, and depending on the sort of community you grew up in and your family, the response can be quite varied."

Vito truly wished that stories like Xera's weren't so common. It felt like even on island, those trans youth who ended up in his office had families who'd disowned them more often than not.

Really, it was a common sentiment among all sorts of LGBT youth, but it certainly felt like trans youth were lagging behind in terms of parental acceptance, and Vito was confident the data would back him up on that.

"It's good that you have at least one person you can speak to, at least," he said, happy there was at least that much. "Do you live with her?" Really, he was hoping for more information on Xera's connection to her mother, but it was better to ask short questions to start, fishing for information and seeing what Xera would volunteer.

So Xera had been shut out. She was upset not because the person she'd met had misgendered her, but instead because she hadn't. Because even someone she wasn't close with, who she hadn't spoken to in a long time was willing to accept her as she was...

...And her family wasn't.

It was a hard, painful situation. Nothing Vito could say would make it better. He didn't have the power to slap some sense into Xera's family and make them realize the mistake they were making. The only thing he could do was help Xera accept the situation as it was, and that was a point he opted to stress first.

"Coming out is a lifelong thing, but for most people, the response they get from their family is key. What you're experiencing now is that disconnect—that the response you got from your parents is so at odds from the response you get elsewhere. I imagine the response you get on Manta Carlos, in particular, has only highlighted the difference, because Manta Carlos is..." He offered a small smile as he searched for the best phrasing. "...Very accepting of those who exist outside a strict cissexual gender binary, whether they're trans, nonbinary, or intersex."

And of course those who didn't exist on a human gender binary at all, of course.

"That difference is key, because it's impossible not to compare the reaction we get from other people when they know such a significant fact about ourselves."

It was obviously deeply emotional for her, even without taking the tears into account. But it was also something that Vito knew a lot about, and something he'd both studied as part of his schooling, and had personal experience with.

"It isn't cowardice to not share private medical information with people without a good reason. Transitioning isn't something that's one-size-fits-all. Everyone has a different experience. Everyone has different start and end points. Some people want to be out and proud about it. They want people to recognize their experiences, so that others can gain strength from it. Others want it to be private—they want it to be treated like nothing at all, not even recognized. There isn't a right or wrong answer. There's pros and cons to both, and every person has to make their own choice. But it's important to realize that no one owes anyone else that information. People don't have the right to know about your sexual orientation, gender identity, sex life, or medical information. That's a full stop—no one has the right to that."

Not everyone got the memo on that, unfortunately.

"Relationships are more complicated, but deciding when to disclose information they might find relevant is a tricky, messy situation. Some people won't care. Some will. Even on Manta Carlos—which is leagues above a lot of other places—some people are still judgemental, so not wanting to say right away is understandable."