In Portland, Oregon, every week the support group I founded and lead, Spouses' Group for the cisgender spouse (or unmarried life partner) of partners who are trans or non binary, dissolves the walls of isolation for new and old members as the dozens of members step up for each other in and out of the group. For most it
 first takes the form of having somewhere, ANYwhere to finally be able to talk about it openly. A few have the transition behind them and are doing very well as a family, and consider themselves more like mentors in the group. I think of those as Graduates. Everyone signs an informed consent paper that includes an agreement to keep things confidential-and I am probably a little too much reminding the group to keep the sharing they heard or who was there to themselves. Each new member coming in I use as a reminder to do the confidentiality speech again. Several times a month there are new people showing up for the first time. Lately I noticed that the new ones coming in are expanding the sense of community as more members find someone they can especially relate to. Besides an event based reason (mate's transition) to have in common, this group is screened and selected to also have one other very special thing in common-being supportive to their transitioning mate. One member had to wait a few weeks or more and was in agreement to do so till better sure that they were on board with walking through the transition together and doing their best to stay open to the marriage working out. Group members have thanked me for screening for supportive spouses to provide something other than all the negative stories easily found on the internet, Amanita (Freema Agyeman) in Sense8, the exception. A lot of details go into whether to be of support going forward and how. For the ones that do-and are local enough-and find Spouses' Group, they discover it is essential to have their own peeps to share the way through, to swap stories from funny to tearful, to go get a coffee together every week before group, to no longer be alone. Spouses get really brave sometimes and let the others in during really hard times- like a big ole gender dysphoria crash in the house and the spouse needing a phone friend late at night. Ideas and referrals all around town for their mates to make the transition better make up a good portion of what spouses share. It is the nature of these particular spouses (and me too) to care about the mates-I make sure Spouses remember to care for themselves too. I like to encourage not just all that but to also bring the focus back to the Spouses, "what do YOU need this week?" "How have YOU changed?" This journey is a transition for both and getting the whole family through (many have kids from babies to beyond college age) is more likely to happen with a community in which you can all be yourselves. I feel grateful for that first spouse that visited me in session and asked me to start this group back in 2016. It has been a real honor and refreshing change to have these often very high functioning couples in my office. What a great community to launch! Let me know if you want some encouragement to launch a support group in your city to assist spouses and partners. If you feel moved and able to do so safely, share this post, or site, and write your comments or questions below. Peace now, Shannon Batts relationshipgardening.weebly.com  |
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