Transitioning Meanings? Family Members' Communicative Struggles Surrounding Transgender Identity

Abstract

With the growing number of transgender individuals coming forward, it is important that scholars turn attention to the experiences of these identities and transitions for transgender persons and their families. The present study used a relational dialectics approach to analyze communication of family members (both transgender and not) about transgender identity and transition via online postings to discussion forums. Results showed three sites of struggle present for family members and partners, as well as transgender persons: Presence vs. Absence, Sameness vs. Difference, and Self vs. Other. The presence-absence and sameness-difference struggles centered on family members' and partners' experiences with grief surrounding the transgender person's transition process and the self-other struggle was centered on the issue of support. The tensions illustrated in the data, and especially the experience of loss, indicate that family members and spouses/partners of transgender persons may struggle with meaning-making surrounding a transition in sex and/or gender identity. This struggle over meaning suggests that sex and gender are fundamental to the ways in which we conceptualize and interact with relational partners and that when they change, we may conceptualize and relate to partners/relatives differently.

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