Because it is the easy way out. Believe me.

Thinking you're some kind of pervert: the easy way out.

Pushing your feelings away: easy way.

Telling yourself that you're just sick: easy.  You can be cured of your affliction.

Harder. To actuate, to live your truth. To take a risk, and a leap of faith, and to pick up the pieces shattered by bigotry or misunderstanding.

Hard.  To start at what feels like zero, feeling impossibly clumsy and mannish. To pick up a razer and do it again the next day, and the next and the day after that.

Difficult. To book appointments and navigate opaque systems to try get the care you need. To put a needle to your body week after week. And to pay through the nose for it all.

Excruciating. To go into a shop and despite trying so damn hard getting called sir and forcing a smile anyway.

But really what makes the hard way hard is learning that it takes time. Time to heal, to grow into your emotions and body.

But at least for me, after trying the easy way for so long, I think the hard way is the first time in which I've started to discover this thing called peace.