In February 2024, I had prime surgical procedure — a type of gender-affirming care that was not too long ago labeled “mutilation” by the president of america in one of many many heinous government orders he issued since his inauguration.
A 12 months in the past, within the post-anesthesia care unit of a New Jersey hospital, a nurse clacked at a keyboard whereas I opened and closed my eyes slowly, not but acutely aware sufficient to recollect somebody had simply operated on my chest. She requested me how I used to be feeling and positioned a small Styrofoam cup of crushed ice on the bedside desk. As I picked up the cup with a weak grasp and crushed frozen water between my enamel, I started to recall why I used to be there. Once I tried to place the cup again down, it slipped from my hand and hit the bottom. “I’m so sorry,” I slurred, nonetheless in a twilight of anesthetics and euphoria, my mind so blissed out by the considered lastly having a flat chest that I used to be utterly numb to the ache.
That very same week, 16-year-old Nex Benedict wakened on the ground of their faculty lavatory after having their head repeatedly slammed into the tile, after having “blacked out” as they described hours later when police had been lastly contacted.
Once I learn the information about Nex, a nonbinary teenager in southwest America who reportedly used each he/him and so they/them pronouns, I pictured them on that loo ground and puzzled in the event that they felt numb. I puzzled in the event that they dissociated from their physique, from the current second, floating their mind to someplace else — someplace happier — regardless of the inevitable swelling. Or perhaps he felt the whole lot. Perhaps he felt a magnified sense of dysphoria — the furthest reverse of euphoria — having been attacked for current as his genuine self.
My mom thought I’d die on the working desk. She informed me no less than 100 occasions, “It’s a major surgery!” and “It’s risky!” I knew it was main and I used to be already effectively acquainted with threat because it pertained to the way in which I current my physique on the earth. However I didn’t die. After I dropped that cup of ice within the PACU, I got here to in a post-op room the place a brand new nurse known as my mother and my spouse and informed them they may come see me. After they walked in to search out me sitting upright, my mother’s reduction was palpable. I smiled and I might see the worry shed from her physique. Every little thing was lighter.
I chewed the driest graham cracker I’d ever tasted because the nurse confirmed my spouse how you can strip blood from the drain tubes hanging out of my sides. My chest was lined by mounds of gauze pads and a black compression vest, so I couldn’t see something — I couldn’t but see myself. However I too was relieved. I too shed a weight.
After Nex was examined by a physician and cleared for launch from the hospital, Sue Benedict doubtless didn’t think about he would die. Nex referred to Sue, their organic grandmother and authorized guardian, as “mom.” The assault within the faculty lavatory left the excessive schooler with bruises throughout his spherical, baby-shaped face and scratches on his scalp that lay beneath an androgynous haircut. The varsity didn’t name an ambulance, regardless of the blood on the ground, so Sue took him to a close-by hospital.
Nex went residence after being examined, and after police visited and informed them the incident can be thought-about a “mutual fight” that Nex “initiated essentially.” Sue informed reporters her youngster went to mattress and drifted off to music as he often did. Maybe he cried himself to sleep combating off the voices in his head that informed him the world can be a greater place with out him. Maybe his bruises ached as he dreamt about getting revenge on his bullies. We don’t know. We do know he collapsed the following day. Nex’s mother watched as his eyes rolled again in his head and he stopped respiratory. Later that day, in a pediatric emergency room, Nex was declared lifeless.
Courtesy of Jackie Domenus
The primary time I met with my surgeon in hopes of scheduling prime surgical procedure, it was over a video name. She requested me questions on myself — typical ones, like, “Where are you from?” and “What do you do for work?” Then she requested me to inform her about myself: how I perceive my gender, how I’d arrived on the choice to have tissue carved out of my chest with a scalpel. I informed her how every day after I acquired dressed, the reflection of my chest within the mirror made me recoil, how my again always ached from carrying a binder any time I left the home, how I had reached a degree the place I acknowledged that if I get one physique and one lifetime, I’ve the best to really feel comfy in it. She listened intently, nodding from the opposite facet of my cellphone display screen.
It typically feels shameful to be a 31-year-old who has solely simply begun to totally perceive themself. However the surgeon understood me as “human,” trusting that I knew what was greatest for me — that her sufferers know what’s greatest for them — an idea that conservative politicians are hellbent on ignoring, no matter the info demonstrating a less-than-1% remorse fee for folk who endure gender-affirming surgical procedure. They’re particularly insistent on stripping trans folks 19 years or youthful of their bodily autonomy, although solely 0.04% of trans youth obtain gender-related surgical procedure, as most gender-affirming look after minors sometimes entails social transition or puberty blockers with reversible results.
However as an grownup receiving gender-affirming care in New Jersey, a liberal-leaning state, each nurse checked my chart and confirmed my pronouns at every appointment earlier than and after surgical procedure. Nobody made assumptions. Within the pre-op hospital room, the nurse who slid an IV needle into the vein on my hand was doubtless in her 60s. She laughed with me concerning the ugliness of the hospital robe as she tied it above my bare again. Regardless of the distinction in our generations, I didn’t really feel judged for the process I used to be about to endure. This sense of consolation was afforded to me over and over all through your complete course of, making certain I used to be not ostracized, not “othered.”
Nex Benedict attended Owasso Excessive Faculty in Owasso, Oklahoma. Ryan Walters, the state superintendent of Oklahoma’s public colleges, has made it abundantly clear no colleges within the state will permit college students to make use of pronouns or names that differ from those they had been assigned at start. Walters has argued publicly that nonbinary and transgender folks don’t exist, including to latest arguments made by different conservatives who’ve coined and weaponized the made-up time period “transgenderism,” labeling it an ideology of “wokeness.”
A instructor at Owasso Excessive Faculty whom Nex admired — whom Nex in all probability felt comfy being themself with — was pressured to resign in 2022 after Chaya Raichik, the net character behind Libs of TikTok, the far-right social media account, criticized him publicly. The instructor confronted a slew of harassment, prompting him to depart his place. Walters then appointed Raichik to a state committee liable for reviewing the appropriateness of books at school libraries.
It’s clear Nex’s faculty district doesn’t care concerning the consolation of queer and trans youngsters, nor does it care if college students are made to really feel “othered.” Owasso trans college students have cited strict lavatory legal guidelines and anti-LGBTQ+ rhetoric because the impetus for fixed bullying, which can solely grow to be extra harmful with Trump’s latest government order focusing on educators who assist their LGBTQ+ college students. Very similar to Nex, for eight hours a day, 5 days every week, many queer and trans youth are pressured to be taught in an setting the place these in cost reject them — loudly and brazenly — beneath the guise of “protecting” them.
Once I was in highschool, we didn’t speak about gender critically. We didn’t have the vocabulary for it. I hated carrying attire or skirts, a lot most well-liked board shorts to bikini bottoms, and infrequently tried to mimic the mannerisms of my man mates. We did speak about sexuality. We known as issues “gay” after we meant “corny,” and known as one another “fag” after we meant “annoying.” The few youngsters everybody knew had been homosexual had been bullied mercilessly.
When somebody began a rumor that I used to be a lesbian, everybody jumped on the bandwagon, whispering about it within the hallways, messaging about it on AIM. I used to be in such deep denial and repression about my sexuality that I knew “lesbian” solely to be an insult, one thing I wanted to defend myself in opposition to. I seethed with rage. I wished nothing greater than to ball my fist up and launch it sq. into the faces of the “popular” ladies who wished everybody to suppose otherwise of me. However I used to be by no means courageous sufficient to face up for myself. I wouldn’t be comfy sufficient to come back out till maturity. Within the meantime, I labored to make myself invisible, dressing like all the opposite ladies, kissing all of the boys, mixing in.
Courtesy of Jackie Domenus
Neither in denial or filled with disgrace, Nex was 16 and proudly capable of determine themself as nonbinary, to say their true identification to the world. They had been a straight-A scholar who beloved studying, cooking, and caring for his or her cat. They’d mates who undoubtedly beloved and admired them, like their trans buddy who entered the toilet with them the day of the incident.
A bunch of three ladies had reportedly been repeatedly bullying Nex and his buddy, “making comments, calling them names, and throwing things at them,” as Sue Benedict recalled her youngster telling her days earlier than the assault. These three ladies reportedly started making enjoyable of the way in which Nex laughed, so he poured water on the ladies. In response, the ladies pulled Nex’s toes out from beneath him and beat him till he blacked out. The subsequent day, he was lifeless.
Practically a month after the assault, Nex’s demise was dominated a suicide. Prior to creating that dedication, the Owasso Police Division launched an announcement claiming that “the decedent did not die as a result of trauma” after reviewing the preliminary outcomes of his post-mortem. It’s onerous to belief a corrupt system hellbent on making queer and trans youngsters’ lives a dwelling hell, however even when that assertion was true, maybe what they need to have stated was “the decedent did not die as a result of head trauma.” As a result of for too many queer and trans youngsters in Oklahoma, to attend faculty is trauma. To be always plagued by your friends for not becoming right into a predetermined narrative is trauma. To seek out your self — to search out happiness — solely to have it stripped away daily, little by little, till dwelling not appears a viable possibility, absolutely is trauma.
The day of Nex’s funeral, I used to be mendacity comfortably on my sofa watching dangerous actuality tv with a pint of Ben & Jerry’s resting on my mastectomy pillow. My incisions had been therapeutic slowly beneath my compression vest and whereas I wouldn’t see my new chest for an additional week till my first post-op appointment, I used to be elated. My spouse stored an organized document of how a lot fluid my drains collected and a cautious schedule of my rotating over-the-counter ache meds. My coworkers despatched me a digital card filled with effectively needs. My mates confirmed up for me in methods I couldn’t have imagined. I felt grateful — proud even — to have decided towards my very own happiness, my very own affirmation. I seemed ahead to regaining energy and vary of movement and finally reentering the world authentically myself.
However there was one thing that nagged at me as I sat propped up in opposition to fluffy pillows, having fun with ice cream as I recovered, and reposted an infographic to Instagram a couple of youngster being overwhelmed half to demise for not conforming to gender norms. There was one thing sinister about celebrating a gender-affirming surgical procedure whereas it was (and nonetheless is) unlawful for highschool youngsters to entry any gender-affirming care in Oklahoma and several other different states (and shortly, maybe, in every single place on this nation). There was one thing disturbing about waking up from anesthesia as a brand new individual whereas a household ready to say their remaining goodbyes to their beloved one.
Courtesy of Jackie Domenus
For some, Nex Benedict’s demise was simply one other tragedy, simply one other “that’s a shame” on a protracted record of atrocities America has grow to be numb to. I hope it was a wakeup name for others. For me, it was a stark reminder that as free as I’ll really feel, I stay in a rustic that might moderately I die, than be myself — a notion that has solely grown extra apparent with a brand new administration that’s perversely intent on eradicating queer and trans folks. However I received’t let this be the tip. We owe it to Nex to struggle for equality, fundamental human rights, and the chance to be — to totally stay every day as — nobody however ourselves.
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Jackie Domenus (they/she) is a queer author from New Jersey. Their first ebook, “No Offense: A Memoir In Essays,” was revealed with ELJ Editions in February 2025. A former Sundress Academy for the Arts resident and Tin Home Workshop graduate, Jackie’s work has appeared in The Regular Faculty, The Offing, Pidgeonholes, Foglifter Journal, and elsewhere. Discover extra from her at byjackied.com.
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