Ale:
Would you mind starting by telling me your name, your pronouns, how old you are, and where you’re from?
Kanoa:
I’m Kanoa, my pronouns are he/they, and I’m turning 38 in two weeks. Today, I call Austin home, but I grew up in Alameda, California, which is a tiny island city in the Bay Area.
Ale:
What made you want to participate in this project?
Kanoa:
I think what made me want to participate was that I am someone who gets read as a cisgender man in the world. The way that I look externally is not really who comes to mind when we think of reproductive health. Even if we bring trans folks into reproductive health, I don’t know that someone like me gets thought of as someone who gets impacted by the way that reproductive health is legislated, or someone who might end up needing emergency contraceptive care.
Ale:
Which we know is a deeply flawed belief because everyone gets affected by having or not having access to reproductive health. You and your partner are going through the process of becoming parents, how is that going and how do you feel about it?
Kanoa:
I feel great about it. This is our first pregnancy after our miscarriage last year. It’s interesting also to use the language of “our miscarriage.” My partner uses the same language, and there’s something really sweet in that, and I feel really seen when she uses that language, because it is our shared loss. The experience was so different between the two of us, but this time around, it has taken me like 19 weeks to get to a place where I can finally start allowing myself to feel a little bit of joy and excitement around it. That feeling of joy and excitement has felt very scary up until now, because there’s just been so much fear wrapped around it, and so it feels good to be at this place where I’m like “No, I’m excited, and I’m really thrilled to be a dad and a parent.”
Ale:
Do you guys ever think about or have you talked about the context in which this is happening, given that you live in Austin?
Kanoa:
We have had to have conversations about what we would do if XYZ happened at the legislative level. If gender-affirming care for adults were made illegal, we would have to leave because it would mean that my access to medical treatment would be inaccessible, which is a hard line for us. The other thing that we’re also thinking about is, there are laws in other states that say that if your kid is trans, or you’re the parent of a trans child, they can be taken away from you, and that’s so something that we have had to think about, especially just knowing that some of the most extreme, conservative states take after one another.
Ale:
Yeah, legislation in conservative states is copied/pasted from each other, no original strategy there.
Kanoa:
Texas and Florida are very much in step with one another, and we do keep an eye on what’s going on in Florida, kind of as an indicator of what might be happening here. I would say the third thing that we think a lot about is just how we will be able to legally claim parentage over our kids because my partner, as the birthing parent, will obviously not have any issue showing parentage between her and our child, but for the non-birthing parent, there are a couple of things that you can do. There’s second-parent adoption, and then you can also do a parentage order, but you have to have a social worker come to your house and check everything and essentially judge whether or not you are fit to be a parent to your own child. We are opting for the parentage order option, which is, if I remember correctly, a little bit more expensive, but it doesn’t require a social worker evaluation, so we won’t be subjected to that. However, if that gets legislated differently, we would have some things to talk about.
“I think about where my body’s at today and it’s just so hard to fight the urge to want to explain my body to people, even though that just feels like such bullshit… Because what are the chances that an IVF doctor has ever seen a metoidioplasty with testicular implants, not ever having had a vaginectomy? I just don’t trust it.”
Ale:
You mentioned how your partner will be the birthing parent, have you guys ever talked about what the other options will be if she couldn’t give birth?
Kanoa:
Yeah, for sure, that is a big part of the reason why I haven’t sought a hysterectomy, because I do want to have all of our options available to us. We have had a little bit of trouble trying to conceive. I’ve tried to take myself through the process of what would happen if Nicole discovered that we couldn’t have a second kid for whatever reason, if a second pregnancy wasn’t in the cards for her, and I tried to go through the motions of what that means — how I’d have to go off T, and I would have to prepare my body for pregnancy, and I would probably have to take other much more feminizing hormones that haven’t been in my body for a long time.
It would mean that people would be all up inside my body in order to go through the motions of getting pregnant. She’s had so many vaginal ultrasounds, they’ve been so commonplace and I try to imagine myself in that position given that I’ve had a couple of gender-affirming bottom surgeries. The thing that I think about a lot is — I don’t know if this might be a lot to share about — I think about my unique anatomy. First of all, even before I had gender-affirming surgeries, I was already pretty keenly aware and not super comfy with things like paps [pap smears] and other kinds of exams for my uterine health. Then, I think about where my body’s at today and it’s just so hard to fight the urge to want to explain my body to people, even though that just feels like such bullshit. I wish so bad that I didn’t have to do that, but it’s hard for me to imagine not having to do that, if that [pregnancy] is the case, how else would you do it? Because what are the chances that an IVF doctor has ever seen a metoidioplasty with testicular implants, not ever having had a vaginectomy? I just don’t trust it.
Ale:
I wouldn’t trust it either. They don’t know what to do with our bodies, why would I ever let you touch me?
Kanoa:
I think the business of getting pregnant, having people touch my body in all of the ways—that I can get comfy with. But the explaining of my body and how it works is the part that I don’t want to do. I could miss that part.
Ale:
Last time we talked, you were telling me that you were experiencing some chronic pain after the bottom surgery?
Kanoa:
It’s something that really weighs on me just because it’s so mysterious and it’s super painful. It’s a shocking amount of pain that it stops me in my tracks, happening in a place deep inside of me. I have so much fear about the unknown, but if I make the appointment and get some answers, then it won’t hang over me as much. But it might force me into a situation where I’m having to subject my body to a medical system that really struggles to understand it and it’s ill-equipped to support trans masculine folks struggling with vaginal pain.
Ale:
How do you feel about your bottom surgeries now?
Kanoa:
The last bottom surgery that I got was testicular implants and a penile lift. The outcome of that specific procedure didn’t pan out, and it was the hardest one to recover from, because I developed a lymphatic leak. It was like a big bubble of fluid that got trapped between my skin and the incision. I had this big, bulging, uncomfortable thing happening inside me, and you can’t do anything about it. I called the surgery center asking if this is concerning, and they’re like, it’s just fluid, you just have to wait for your body to reabsorb it. It was really scary to watch my body struggle to recover.
Then, it also didn’t result in the outcome that I was hoping for, and the scar was pretty intense. Folks of color, we are typically at greater risk of keloid, and all the collagen that keeps us looking very young, makes it so scars can get kind of gnarly. Sometimes I look at it, and that one does leave me feeling a little bit of regret. There’s so little cultural conversation about what trans people do when we do end up feeling regret, and I still think the rates of regret when we’re looking at surgeries are like a very useful indicator for success rates. I don’t know that we are very good at talking to one another about regret and helping one another move through regret. Because when I found myself having those feelings, I didn’t know what to do with them, and it sent me into a little bit of a depression, right after my surgery, which is so not how you want to be feeling after a gender-affirming surgery. You just look forward to the euphoria.
Ale:
It’s so unfortunate that we don’t get to talk about all the complexities of surgeries with greater nuance, because when we do, those conversations get used against us.
Kanoa:
Yeah. When I’ve had other surgeries, the euphoria was right there on the other side. When I got top surgery, it was instant. My first bottom surgery, I was like “Ah, this is amazing,” but when it happened this time around, the euphoria wasn’t right there waiting for me on the other side. Being an older trans person, I’ve had lots of really sweet conversations with younger trans folks who have come to me and said I’m getting bottom surgery in a couple of months, what do you recommend, and what was your experience? And so many times I’ve told people to be patient with their body, to know that it’s a slow process, it’s a marathon, not a race, and then I find myself asking, “why do I have to be struggling?” I don’t know that I prepared myself very well for that outcome, an actual depression coming right after a gender-affirming surgery.
Ale:
Who do you talk to when all these things are happening, when you’re dealing with random pain, or feeling depressed after your surgery?
Kanoa:
My partner is usually my go-to, and I also have a wonderful therapist, which is great. I’ve tried to challenge myself to be really honest about what’s going on with me with Jules, my best friend, and really lean on them when I need them. I’m someone who has struggled historically with friendships. When I was in college, I had a childhood best friend that I grew up playing in bands with for most of my life, and some shit went down between us and they just decided to step out. I take responsibility for the choices that I made that led them to that point, but it was really hard, and I internalized a lot of that.
Ale:
I don’t know if it’s because I’m so friend-oriented, but having friends step out on me like that triggers the shit out of my abandonment issues haha.
Kanoa:
Hahaha yeah. I internalized that “clearly I am a bad person, and I’m bound to hurt people as a friend,” so I haven’t had very deep, intimate friendships for a long time. This is my first one in a very long time and I feel like it’s a constant push and pull internally with me where I try to remind myself that Jules loves me, and that they want to hear how I’m doing but I also feel scared or nervous about doing too much or hurting them, putting my foot in my mouth.
Ale:
Do you ever talk to Jules about your sense of masculinity and gender and how you feel about it in your body?
Kanoa:
All the time, that’s how we came to be so close. I was thinking about this because I was in a meeting the other day, and someone asked this really great question which was what’s something that you wish you could have a second chance at? It made me think about how little time I got to be a young man on this earth. I transitioned when I was 25 and it’s hard not to feel that young manhood was here and gone in an instant. I have my grandfather’s genes and they came for my hairline so quickly. I got to be a strapping young man with hair for like 10 years and it’s hard for that to feel like it was not enough time. At the beginning I had a lot of fun with my hair, I wanted to grow it out long for my wedding down to my shoulders. I got to live out some of my fantasies around having long hair like my cousins in Hawaii, who are big burly Polynesian guys with long black hair and that was really fun.
And now I’m this new chapter of my life where I have different tools to play with, but I also think so much of queer culture is also youth culture, so I find it difficult to know what that means for my self expression when it comes to wanting to bring my masculinity and my queerness together cohesively. When we think about queer fashion, it’s very youth coded in a way that’s brilliant, but it doesn’t really make sense for someone like me. So now I’m like “well, what does it mean to be an older, queer, trans masculine person in the world who still wants to have fun with gender?” Of course, I still want to paint my nails every once in a while, I still want to wear a crop top every once in a while and there aren’t very many examples of those aesthetics on older bodies, so it makes me feel very aware of my age and kind of like “is this for me? Is it appropriate for me to be doing this?”
“I think what comes up for me when I’m really struggling… is my struggle to ask for support connected to my trauma around my family or friendships that have failed, or is it patriarchy telling me that I don’t deserve support?”
Ale:
Do you have any older trans friends, who you could check in with about these kinds of things, even if they’re not here in Austin?
Kanoa:
I don’t know that I do. Maybe that’s part of it, is that there’s so few people in my life who are older trans masculine folks. I can think of celebrities, but I’m not a celebrity and I’m not trying to pull red carpet looks or anything. Also the generation right before me, folks who transitioned in the early 2000s were much more likely to go stealth. There’s a really great trans masculine podcast called Stealth that talks about this, and it just means that folks are just a little bit harder to find.
Ale:
Have your feelings evolved around masculinity since you first transitioned?
Kanoa:
I think the way that I relate to people, and how I build relationships with people that can hold some of the darker parts of my masculinity, parts of it that feel like difficult to say out loud has changed. I’m trying to really expand how many folks I can reach out to for support when I really need it, but it’s challenging because I think what comes up for me when I’m really struggling – let’s say I’m having a really bad day and I’m just really sad for whatever reason, and I know that I need support – but I’m struggling to ask for it, is my struggle to ask for support connected to my trauma around my family or friendships that have failed, or is it patriarchy telling me that I don’t deserve support? And to try and disentangle those things feels, like, really challenging. Patriarchy tells you can be sad for like 30 seconds and then you have to get it together, and you got to move on to finding solutions and figuring out a plan to being strong for yourself and your community, but I’m trying to be better at giving myself more time to be a mess and not have it all together.
Ale:
The patriarchy really messes everyone up, but you have a project called Abundant Masculinities that tries to tackle that. How is it received by both cis and trans men?
Kanoa:
It’s hard, it’s been a struggle. It’s usually pretty easy for me to get trans men and trans masculine folks in the room to do some work around masculinity, but it is harder to get cis men to stay in the room because I’m trying to disrupt whatever thoughts or ideas they’ve internalized about what it means to be a good man in the world, but I need them with me long enough to pick that apart, to deconstruct that.
There’s a part of me that says “yes, gender is shit, abolish all gender” and also “isn’t it beautiful to think about a world where you can expand on what it means to be a man?,” but that does mean pushing at the boundaries of their very narrow definitions of what it means to be a man, and that does kind of blow the whole thing up. I think the starting place is just add a little bit more nuance and a little bit more dimensions to what it means to be a man, and I’m—I really want them to see that as something that they can benefit from. That’s not something we do because trans people need it, we do it because everybody needs it. Cis men also need a more nuanced, multi-dimensional, multi-faceted definition of what it means to be a man, because everybody fails under the current gender norm, haha.
Ale:
Everybody has a gender failed at some point haha, as much as we want to say fuck gender all together, I don’t think thats a realistic solution. You mentioned that you’ve been playing around with your gender more?
Kanoa:
Yeah, I think I felt there were some safety concerns when I first started transitioning, around 2014 when nonbinary visibility was at an all-time low and we weren’t really having conversations about transness that weren’t in this very binary way. So I don’t know that I really knew that there were other options available to me. And then you couple that with being in Texas feeling like very binary masculinity was the only kind of option for me. My family is from Hawai, so I’ve done a lot of research and they had a long history of reverence for their gender identity and Māhū identity, so I’m trying to interrogate what that means for me to have a connection to that culture, and maybe releasing myself of the pressure to ascribe to a very binary identity. I think it also feels connected to aging because we don’t see very many examples of aging trans folks who are still playing around with gender in really playful ways. I think most of the older, trans folks that I know are pretty binary. So it takes a lot of psychological work for me, and I have to challenge myself to do it, and to create those opportunities for myself because the default is very binary, and masculinity is also kind of boring haha. No, honestly, I really try to challenge myself to be a little bit more playful with fashion and clothes that are still age-appropriate.
Ale:
To wrap up the interview, how do you feel about becoming a dad?
Kanoa:
I’ve known that I have wanted to be a parent for most of my life. I’ve always found myself gravitating towards mentoring younger queer and trans folks, so I feel really excited. It’s funny, I like watching women’s sports, and the only way that I engage with sports is through women’s sports. It’s so much more interesting. I find men’s sports actually really boring. Austin just got a professional volleyball league and Nicole and I were watching the game and — wow I’m gonna cry — she was telling me how she loves knowing that our kid is gonna grow up watching me watch women’s sports, and how that felt affirming for her.
And it made me think about all these things that I could potentially end up doing with this kid. It will be so different than the version of masculinity that I grew up with, and how I have this really unique opportunity to break some generational curses and cycles. I will also be confronted with a lot of childhood trauma, but I’m excited for that, and to being forced to make eye contact with things that I’ve been avoiding. I think children of queer and trans families are so often brought into the world in incredibly intentional ways. There are very few accidental queer and trans pregnancies haha.
“I’ve known that I have wanted to be a parent for most of my life. I’ve always found myself gravitating towards mentoring younger queer and trans folks, so I feel really excited.”
Ale:
Yeah, I think it’s safe to assumed that most of them are planned haha.
Kanoa:
I think we have thought through so many aspects of parenthood and how our family is going to change and challenge the family structure, and what are the values that we want to bring into being parents, so it’s kind of incredible to think about the ways that this kid is gonna have a shot at a childhood that is so vastly different than any of the childhoods that any of us had. I’m looking forward to being challenged by parenthood.
Ale:
When you and Nicole had the miscarriage, were you able to process any of the emotions associated with becoming a parent?
Kanoa:
I was very even-keeled the whole time in a way that was helpful because it meant that she was able to really fall apart, and I was able to really hold it together for her. But in the following months, I had finally started to feel the grief, it finally started to impact me and that was around the same time when I was having conversations with my therapist about things that happened to me when I was younger, and my inability to really let myself feel. So I went on a journey where I took an edible and I listened to music that made me feel really sad. I cried so hard and it was the grief of losing this baby, but I think it was also a lifetime of suppressed emotions coming to the surface, and it all came out of me all at once. It was cathartic.
To learn more, visit the Abundant Masculinities Instagram page.
