The Muddle Huddle

A Life Behind the Fence, My Journey Toward Self-Acceptance

AI-generated image of how I felt growing up

What happens when the loudest voices in your life are the ones inside your own head? The Muddle Huddle is a distilled memoir of inner conflict, dogged questioning, and the long road to self-acceptance. Through the lens of Internal Family Systems (IFS) and storytelling, I revisit the voices that shaped, and often silenced, my journey as a trans woman. But this isn’t just a trans story. It’s a shared human one, about what it means to make peace with yourself, one truth at a time. This piece was inspired by a poem I wrote for a 2017 NYT feature on Trans Lives; I adapted it for the Prologue below.

Prologue: The Paradox

I came to terms with what seemed like a paradox and contradiction, if not outright absurd chaos, fairly late in life. I had spent decades building an identity I believed would keep me safe, respectable, and loved. But eventually, that carefully constructed scaffolding began to buckle, and I had to dismantle it. I was almost 58 when I began life as Lisa.

Most people don’t have a clue what it’s like inside the mind of someone who is gender dysphoric. The questioning. The relentless tension. The gnawing sense that something is off, not just emotionally, not just existentially, but anatomically. That the story people saw on the outside didn’t match the one being lived on the inside.

And yet, in the middle of that inner mess, I always carried this unwavering sense that I was deeply loved. Loved in a way that didn’t fix anything, but still held me. It wasn’t enough to silence the questions, though.

“Why this?”
“Why me?”

These were the bedrock prayers of my life, even when I didn’t believe there was anyone listening.

From childhood, I did what seemed logical. But that logic was shaped entirely by what others expected, family, friends, church, culture. My sense of self was stitched together from other people’s blueprints. Meanwhile, inside, a screaming match was going on, voices clashing and contradicting, sometimes loud, sometimes gagged, often without words.

How does one survive such absurdity?

When others were dreaming of their futures, I was making sure the chains and locks around this unknown force inside me were holding tight. I was the jailer and the jailed.

I grew up envying people who seemed to move through the world freely, who didn’t question their gender, or themselves, or the very structure of meaning. I felt like a spectator behind a chain-link fence, watching everyone else play the game while I waited for some invisible permission to join.

This lifelong internal chaos didn’t disappear; it became the rich soil from which my compassion grew, and eventually inspired me to train as a spiritual health practitioner. It helped me see that what people truly need isn’t a cure, but a companion. Someone who helps them name their pain, and honours it.

Because I know now that language is its own kind of medicine.
Words can offer dignity.
Even if those words feel frightening at first.
Even if they arrive like enemies before they become best friends.

One: The Fence

As a small child, before I had words for it, I had a feeling. A dissonance.
I didn’t know what gender dysphoria was, but I knew I was not at home in the story assigned to me.

And so I watched. Quietly. Carefully.
I became the Spectator.

I watched my siblings, cousins, and schoolmates move through childhood with a confidence I couldn’t mimic. I studied the boys and men around me, absorbing what was expected, what passed and what hid the truth. I mimicked what was rewarded and suppressed what wasn’t.

I learned that being good, being obedient, doing what was expected was safer than being real.

In those years, the fence between me and the world wasn’t physical. It was the fence of language, of taboo, of silence. I longed to climb over it, to feel what others seemed to feel without shame. But my hands held the bars tightly.

I stayed on the spectator’s side.

Two: The Screaming Match

The voices inside were not gentle, even when they weren’t always loud.
They lacked coherence, but each wanted to speak, to take the lead, to be heard.
The makings of a muddle huddle.

There was the Rule-Follower, who insisted we don’t embarrass ourselves or the family.
There was the Inner Child, who longed to dance in a dress and feel beautiful.
There was the Suppressor, who quoted moral codes like blunt instruments.
There was the Pretender, who got very good at smiling while suffocating.
There was the Defender, quiet, stern, and always scanning the horizon for threats.
There was the Resolver, who tried endlessly to broker peace between the others.
There was the Victim, who curled up quietly in the corner and relived the child abuse and then the rape whenever triggered by scenes from other people’s lives, in the news, in movies, on TV — trying not to be overwhelmed by it all.
And there was the Cleaner.

She never made a sound, but she was always busy.
She scrubbed up tears before anyone could see them.
She buried the triggers, folded the pain into corners, and smoothed over 
what The Victim couldn’t hide.

She was terrified of evidence, always afraid someone would notice.
A mark on the floor. A quiver in the voice. A question left hanging.
Her job was to erase every trace of trauma, to polish the story until it gleamed.
She ironed out facial expressions. Practiced casual responses.
But her hands were raw. Her conscience, sore.

Because deep down, she feared she wasn’t protecting anyone;
She was participating in a lie.
And that guilt?
She hid that, too.

They didn’t all speak at once, but none of them ever truly left.
Sometimes it was a whisper.
Sometimes a standoff.
Sometimes, it’s an all-out brawl.

The Defender was perhaps the most conflicted of all.
They weren’t cruel, just deeply committed to keeping everyone safe.
They wanted no shame, no embarrassment. They knew how the world could respond to “difference,” and they refused to expose the family to that danger.

“Not now. It’ll ruin your marriage.”
“Not now. Your sons will suffer.”
“Not now. Your wife will feel betrayed.”
“Not ever, if it means hurting the people you love.”

Meanwhile, the Resolver tried to mediate:

“Let’s find a compromise.”
“Maybe there’s a way to live in the middle — not too visible, not too hidden.”

But the Victim — oh, the Victim was so tired.
She bore the emotional weight, crushed by conflict, isolated by silence, devastated by the impossibility of wholeness.
They all looked away.

Three: The Game Plan

Eventually, a plan was handed down, or maybe it was assembled bit by bit from the world around me. Either way, it became the rulebook.

Be a good son.
Be a provider.
Be a man.
Get married.
Have children.
Go to church.
Hold it together.

Each voice took a different stance.
The Rule-Follower cheered.
The Defender nodded.
The Suppressor added scripture.
The Pretender rehearsed.
The Resolver smoothed.
The Inner Child disappeared.
The Victim sat in the back row, not protesting, just absorbing it all.
And The Cleaner? Always nearby. Always watching.

She followed The Victim like a shadow, sweeping up evidence, wiping away contradictions.
She vacuumed awkward pauses from conversations, brushed microexpressions off mirrors, and ensured everything remained presentable.
To the outside world, I was steady, cheerful, and competent.
That was her doing.

But every night, she’d lie awake, wondering if she had missed a spot.
If someone had seen.
If someone had guessed.

And in that wondering,
a shame deeper than any stain she ever managed to erase.

Some parts blamed her for not being stronger.
Others pitied her.
No one helped.

From the outside, the plan held.
But inside, the fence hadn’t vanished, it had just moved inward.

Four: The Crack in the Playbook

The plan held for a long time. Longer than it should have. It was efficient. Admired. But it wasn’t sustainable.

The cracks started in silence.
In the sighs between roles.
In the long stare into darkness before sleep.

The Pretender forgot his lines.
The Defender faltered.
The Resolver juggled too much.
The Victim stopped weeping and started watching.

That’s when the Self appeared.
Not to correct or scold. Just to witness.
She looked at every voice. She didn’t turn away.
Her presence changed the acoustics of the huddle.

What once sounded like chaos now sounded like a plea:

“Can we stop pretending?”
“Can we stop hurting?”
“Can we stop being afraid?”

The light had started to seep in.

Five: The Sacred Disruption

There comes a point when holding it together becomes more perilous than letting it fall apart.

Then came the sermon. A new pastor, a new voice, speaking about scripture:

“It is dangerous to take a few words or a single verse out of context and formulate a doctrine, then try to live by it… or worse, force others to.”

Something cracked inside me.
“Have I done that?” I asked myself.
And the answer was yes.

For years, I had clung to the line:

“God created them male and female.”

I used it as a shield.
As a sword.
Against myself.
Against the possibility.

But then my eyes fell on the rest of Matthew 19 — the part no one ever seemed to preach on:

“Some are born eunuchs.
Some are made eunuchs by others.
And some choose to live as eunuchs for the sake of the kingdom of heaven.
Let those who can accept this, accept it.”

It wasn’t literal. It was liberating.

Later, I prayed, not for escape, but for clarity:

“If this is acceptable, help me find some reflection of it, something I can hold.”

Weeks later, I found the Ethiopian eunuch in Acts 8.
A foreigner. A gender-nonconforming outsider.
Reading scripture.
Searching.
Welcomed.
Baptized.
Never asked to change.

Something in me said:

“You belong too.”

The Self didn’t preach.
She stood beside the other voices, even the ones still afraid, and said:

“Maybe you haven’t been running from the truth.
Maybe you’ve been circling it your whole life.”

That was the sacred disruption.

The Cleaner didn’t know what to do.
She reached for her tools, but nothing needed tidying.
No tears to dry. No panic to contain. No trace to erase.

Just truth, sitting there, unhidden.

And for the first time,
She wondered if maybe, just maybe,
She could rest.

Six: The Ultimate Play

The voices didn’t disappear.
They didn’t suddenly agree.
But something had shifted.

The screaming match quieted into a huddle.

The Rule-Follower sat stiffly.
The Defender unclenched.
The Suppressor lingered near the door.
The Resolver had gone quiet.
The Inner Child peeked in, wide-eyed with anticipation.
The Victim stood steady, no longer alone.

And in the center, the Self waited.

There was no vote.
Just breath.
And then a decision nearly sixty years in the making.

“We can’t keep living in hiding,” the Self said.
“It’s not survival anymore. It’s erasure.”

And they knew it was true.

The Pretender folded his costume.
The Defender sighed,

“Then we protect her differently now.”

The Inner Child smiled.

I stepped forward — not fully formed, not fearless, but real.

Epilogue: The Language of Liberation

The screaming match became a conversation.
The fence became a bridge.
The rulebook evolved into a journal with space for edits.

The Self, once buried, now leads with compassion.
Not with perfection.
Not with certainty.
But with clarity, earned, one truth at a time.

Every part had wisdom.
Even the ones who hurt me.
They loved in the only way they knew how.
Now I get to love them back, not by obeying, but by honouring.

I also offer this to others.
A mirror.
A seat at their own table.

Because we all need words, true words,
to name what’s been buried
and to set ourselves free.

This story reflects one thread in that journey. I hope it offers you space to reflect, to breathe, to begin again. If something in these words resonates, you’re warmly invited to chime in.