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So I joined the Navy 10 years ago. I've tried to call my mother, father and brother once a week schedules permitting. I don't do Facebook so our once-a-week calls are my only way of keeping up with everyone.
Recently my brother came out (does anyone read these) as trans and now he refers to himself as my sister and wants people to call him Elizabeth. I tried to explain to him that I've never had a sister, he wasn't my sister growing up and he doesn't feel like a sister now. As I've thought about it though I've come to realize something, maybe he changed more in the last 10 years than I realized. Maybe I've been trying to maintain a relationship with the person I knew 10 years ago and maybe the person I knew 10 years ago changed over time and my weekly phone calls weren't enough to keep me updated on how that person changed.
This was a big realization for me but it was also devastating. I don't have a sister, and I don't know who Elizabeth is, she's just some woman who claims to know me and has the face of my brother, but my brother died sometime in the last 10 years and I miss him.
Elizabeth tried to commit suicide a while back. Right while I was coming to terms with who she was. I haven't called her in a month now. It's too much. I don't have good friends, I don't have a support structure to deal with any of this. I can only crush so much in my mind vice. When these things happen I just go to work the next day and talk to no one about it. People talk to me about the petty dramas in their lives and I want to tell them about the drama in mine but I don't. The closest thing I have to a support structure is a Chinese shadow puppet board.
