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I looked at the front page of the Richmod Times and there I was!
'I'm more than a pronoun'
BY ROBIN FARMER
TIMES-DISPATCH STAFF WRITER
Jun 5, 2005
Sexuality today: An occasional series on sexual attitudes among the young
The day before her high school graduation, Laurie Petrone took clippers to the curtain of blond hair hanging halfway down her back and buzz-cut it to less than an inch.
As with most young adults leaving high school, she was eager to start the next chapter of her life on her own terms. She was already out as a lesbian at James River High School. Shaving her locks was just an exclamation point. The military haircut was a shout to the world that her life, like her hair, was hers to shape.
Now 21, Petrone is contemplating more cutting, this time of the flesh, to feel complete.
Petrone did not realize until 18 months ago that she is not a lesbian, but a man living in a woman's body. Whether to take hormones to become more masculine or undergo surgery to remove her female parts are among the issues the Mary Baldwin College senior grapples with.
Years after she came out as a lesbian, Petrone finds herself coming out all over again as a female-to-male transgender person.
Petrone's story illustrates the complexity -- physical, mental and emotional -- of sex and gender identity in a society that tends to identify people as gay or straight and male or female. Petrone's conflict over where she fits in mirrors society's unease about those who eschew traditional roles.
"When I was younger, I didn't hear anyone talk about being transgender. It's like 90 percent of transgenders come out through the gay community. Then they realize this is the person they are," said Petrone, who sports the tattoo "gender" on one ankle and "queer" spelled backward on the other.
As a female-to-male transgender person, Petrone has a male name, Ayden. But only her best friend, also female-to-male transgender, and her girlfriend use it.
"I'm not ready to be called Ayden all the time. It's another whole coming-out-of-the-closet process," said Petrone, who often passes for a slightly built man. She dresses the part: jeans or khakis on most days with button-down shirts or T-shirts and Doc Martens or Puma sneakers. She wears ties when she dresses up. Her hair, naturally darkened to a light brown, remains short on top, tapered in the back.
More important, Petrone identifies with men.
"Everybody says I think like a man. I've always been a huge tomboy. I've done things like a boy. Instead of playing with girl toys like dolls, I'd play with race cars. I never wore dresses, I hated them. I always played all kinds of sports, from pole vaulting to soccer."
She prefers to identify herself as transgender. She bristles at the word "transsexual" because "it's a harsh word . . . with a stigma."
In the world of sexual minorities, self-definition is crucial.
Generally, she isn't wedded to a male or female pronoun. Most customers at her pharmacy job as well as strangers she encounters daily think she's a guy. But the few who call her "ma'am" or "miss" aren't corrected.
"I'm Laurie, I'm more than a pronoun," she says with conviction.
"There is nothing saying I am male or anything like that. . . . until I decide or don't decide to make that change.
"I'm 50 percent sure I will have top surgery, less sure about taking hormones. I won't do bottom surgery."
If she opts for "top surgery," her breasts would be removed and her chest reconstructed to look masculine.
"What person who feels like they are male inside wants to have breasts? I sure don't."
Hormones would deepen her voice, cause her to grow facial and body hair, add muscle and stop her periods.
But she's worried about the health risks. She would have to take testosterone the rest of her life. That would increase her chance for stroke and heart diseases, health problems common for men. She hasn't started counseling, which is required before taking hormones or having surgery.
She's glad "bottom surgery" exists, but she is not interested in having a functioning phallic organ created, one that can become erect. Doing so can require several surgeries, including a hysterectomy.
"I can work with what I got."
. . .
A sociology and political-science major, Petrone did not know with certainty about her gender identity when she transferred in the fall of 2003 from Virginia Commonwealth University to Mary Baldwin, an all women's college. Not that it would have mattered.
At the quaint campus on a hill in Staunton, Petrone controls an intense schedule with precision. She has maintained a 3.4 grade-point average while juggling six classes, working about 25 hours as a certified pharmacy technician, serving as a resident adviser and logging up to 10 hours a month interning at ROSMY, the Richmond Office for Sexual Minority Youth. She also speaks to area students and faculty about transgender issues several times a month. She carries this load on six hours of sleep.
When life gets overwhelming, she jumps into her black Ford Ranger pickup and drives 20 minutes east to her special place to think. It is a boulder on Skyline Drive overlooking the Shenandoah Valley.
For the past seven months, Petrone has had company on her rocky perch. She often gazes at the spectacular views with her girlfriend, Elle, 20, whose real name is not used here at her request.
Elle, a petite, outgoing brunette, sees Petrone as a man and considers herself straight.
"Laurie sees herself as a male and I respect that. I believe you fall in love with people and the person they are," said the Mary Baldwin junior.
The couple met in a "Women in Philosophy" class last spring. Petrone had a crush immediately. It took Elle awhile longer to reconcile her feelings for the boyish-looking Petrone, who she initially thought was a male day student. Elle had never dated a woman before. It took time to accept that her first real love came in an unexpected package.
For Valentine's Day, Elle made 200 white, pink and red hearts and covered Petrone's dorm room floor and bed. Within minutes of seeing them, Petrone, a self-described neat freak, picked them up.
Petrone's need for order, from tidiness to detailed daily schedules and emotional control, is lessening with Elle's influence.
The couple initially were hesitant to tell their college friends about the relationship. "We didn't want them to think we were four-year queers," Petrone said with a chuckle, as she sat on her dorm bed with Elle. The term refers to girls who "date each other while they're at Mary Baldwin and then after graduation date men and get married."
Their campus friends accept the couple, but the relationship remains a secret from Elle's parents, although she suspects her father has an inkling. That Petrone must hide her affections for Elle while visiting Elle's home pains her.
Petrone said her mother, who declined to be interviewed for this article, accepts and likes Elle. Petrone's two half-sisters, 10 and 11, "know I date girls." But Petrone said she's never had the conversation she always wanted with her mom about who she is.
"We've talked vaguely about it. But it's not like, 'Hey mom, lets talk about me being queer.'"
Getting her mom to even acknowledge her interest in girls was a long time coming. At 9 and again at 12, she told her mom she was gay. Each time her mom dismissed her comments.
"The first time she said I was too young to know. The second time she said it was just a phase."
But her best friend, Allison Unroe, listened when Petrone told her at age 12.
"At the time she was dating a boy, and my reaction was, 'I don't understand,'" said Unroe, now a junior at Virginia Tech. "She explained she did care about this guy even if she didn't care about him in that intimate way. I had been exposed to homosexuals. My mom had gay friends, and I knew gay friends from church. It wasn't a big deal to me; I was like, OK."
But Petrone had another secret she initially hid from everyone, a secret that nearly killed her.
. . .
Between age 11 and 18, when despair robbed the laughter from her chocolate eyes, Petrone cut her arms and legs, usually with scissors. The last time she used a box cutter.
She cut herself because "I was numb and wanted to feel something."
Petrone said she craved attention, especially from her mother, who had remarried and had two more daughters after a bitter divorce from her father. Petrone is estranged from her father and hasn't spoken to him since winter.
Petrone grew up in Princeton, N.J. She and her mom moved to Chesterfield County on Jan. 1, 1993. Soon after her mother's remarriage, she said, she and her stepfather began to bump heads. She soon felt she was an afterthought for her mother, who she believed made her new family a priority.
When Petrone began cutting herself, her mother demanded she give her the items she used.
Counseling over the years, which Petrone started at age 5 after her parents' divorce, had little effect because she resisted it.
Like many sexual minorities, Petrone knew early which gender attracted her. Still, she fought herself. She went through a period of dating guys, including one she dated three years until her freshman year in high school.
Much of Petrone's self-assuredness about who she is came from ROSMY, an organization for gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people ages 14-21.
"It was a place I didn't have to be scared anymore. I could go in there and be uninhibited."
ROSMY not only gave her a mentor in Chris Carson, then the program director, it helped her develop her leadership skills and find her voice. Petrone founded the Richmond area's first Gay Straight Alliance Club at James River High School in 2000.
Petrone asked Ann Reinke, the school's head librarian, to be the club's adviser. Reinke recalls that even then Petrone was "incredibly mature beyond her years, direct, bright and optimistic."
Petrone was invited to speak at a faculty meeting. "I remember how she got everyone to really listen when she said words can sting like a slap. She thanked a teacher who stopped someone who had called someone else a faggot."
. . .
Discussing gay and lesbian issues was easier at school than at home for Petrone.
At 16, Petrone brought home her girlfriend. Even then her mom didn't want to talk about it.
"I said, "Mom, if it was a guy, you would want to know if I slept with him. Don't you want to know if I slept with her?'"
Her mom didn't want to know.
By the middle of 11th grade, she was openly gay and making history. She brought her girlfriend to the junior prom, giving the school its first gay prom couple. When Petrone walked in with her girlfriend, students cheered.
Four days after high school graduation, she moved into an apartment with a friend. Her bleakest period soon followed. She was attending VCU full time while working three jobs to pay for tuition, rent, a car and other bills her income couldn't handle. Exhaustion and depression pushed her to the brink. She decided to end her life on Dec. 6, 2002, by slicing her wrists with a box cutter.
Carson, her friend from ROSMY, had noticed Petrone's cuts over the years and often talked to her about problems at home. Carson noticed the angry marks on her wrists that December day, too.
The two met for coffee at Petrone's request. "Laurie almost seemed kind of numb. That was one of the indications that keyed me in she wasn't doing well."
Petrone is thankful Carson knew her well enough to realize she was distraught and a danger to herself.
Carson called a psychiatrist, who recommended she take Petrone to a hospital. They went to St. Mary's.
"The doctor who examined my wrists said I was damn lucky. He said if I had cut a quarter-inch more I would have been dead."
She was admitted to the psychiatric unit for more than a week. Petrone credits Carson with saving her life. The two remain close friends. Petrone hasn't considered suicide since that December day.
. . .
Today, she said, she has never been happier. Her move to Mary Baldwin and "away from home" allowed her to bloom again.
There have been some unexpected surprises along the way.
At Mary Baldwin, Petrone, baptized as a Catholic, started attending church to join the choir and "to see if I could rekindle what I thought my faith was."
But two months later "the priest said gays are damned to hell." She stopped going.
But childhood pal Allison Unroe goes. She said she loves God by loving Petrone.
"I feel like our job is to embrace people for who and what they are unconditionally. That's what I feel Jesus would have done," Unroe said. "I can't believe the Christian community doesn't embrace everyone."
Another unexpected discovery for Petrone was learning that tensions exist between gays and lesbians and the transgender community. It's an issue she talks about at forums.
Perhaps the biggest surprise of all is learning, with Elle's help, to act more her age, to relax, to go with the flow more. She is no longer mapping out every goal.
"I like the fact I'm in limbo because it never happened before. I want to go to grad school but I want to take a year off. I don't know what I want to study. I want to live each day as it comes, not as a schedule written for every hour of the day." She eventually wants to work with children.
She finishes college next year, and she's leaning toward leaving Virginia, described by some gay-rights activists as the most anti-gay state in the nation.
"In Richmond, Patrick Henry said 'Give me liberty or give me death.' Everyone deserves their pursuit of happiness. . . . Why is it I can not have my life, my liberty and my pursuit of happiness? What makes me so different?"
Fighting for equal rights is a constant battle. She has marched, gone to news conferences, worked with organizations such as Equality Virginia and the Human Rights Campaign.
"I've done my fighting. I just need a little break. I don't know if I will stay in Virginia. I want to go and explore. If I leave, it's partly out of the political climate. But there are other reasons, too."
Also unknown is how her family will react to her publicly stating she is a female-to-male transgender person, a fact she hasn't shared with her mother or any other relative. But the truth will be a release and, she hopes, the first step to a meaningful conversation with her mom about who she is -- a conversation she has longed to have since she first told her mother she was gay at age 9.
"I'm not asking for acceptance. Acceptance is the end result. I want her to realize that I've been the person I'm becoming all of my life. Me dressing the way I did and beating the crap out of boys with sticks was not just a phase. I want her to see the timeline and how things have progressed."
She paused, saying she wanted to reflect further on the reaction she wants from her mother.
A day later, she added this:
"I just want her to see the same person she's always seen -- not gender but the person inside. I'm not changing my personality or my morals.
"My inner appearance," Petrone said, "doesn't match my outer appearance."
Contact Robin Farmer at (804) 649-6312 or rfarmer@timesdispatch.com