It is the day before Donald Trump is to be inaugurated, and I sit in a plastic surgery waiting room, holding my son’s hand. He is 28—a grown man, a scientist, and someone who has spent years making sure this is the right decision. He waited until after college, went through counseling, and made his choice with clarity and courage. He is about to undergo top surgery. A moment of affirmation. A moment of truth. A moment of finally becoming.
Becoming not from She to They.
But from She to He.
I whisper, “I’d like to borrow that flannel when you’re done with it.”
He rolled his eyes. “Mom.”
That morning, in the too-big hospital gown and pre-op socks, I saw not just my child, but every hand I hold in my work on a clinical care team as a spiritual chaplain. That was my role—to come alongside people, regardless of belief or background, in the rawest, most uncertain moments of their lives. I sat with those who identified with religion, those who didn’t, and many who simply whispered, “I don’t know what I believe.” I didn’t offer answers. I offered presence. I held hands. I listened.
In my past work as a spiritual hospital chaplain, I held the hands of people who were sure they had done everything right—and those who feared they had wasted their whole lives in hiding. I held hands that trembled with fear and hands that reached, quietly, for mercy. Some hands belonged to people who were finally ready to be who they truly were—only to realize it was too late. And in that hospital waiting room, holding my son’s hand, I knew: this was one of the bravest moments I’d ever witnessed.
My son is a scientist. An entomologist. He studies insects that, like people, don’t always fit binary molds. Insects that self-replicate, insects with dual sex characteristics, insects that change form, shape, purpose.
There’s a rare phenomenon called gynandromorphism—where an organism displays both male and female characteristics. Some butterflies and stick insects emerge with one side of their body appearing male, and the other female. Nature doesn’t panic. Nature doesn’t legislate. It just lets them be.
While it’s uncommon, some insects even experience sequential hermaphroditism, developing first as female and later becoming male—or the reverse. Certain stick insects show these patterns, too, with characteristics distributed randomly or mirrored on either side. And in some Hymenopteran insects—like ants, bees, and wasps—males can be produced from unfertilized eggs through parthenogenesis. They are born without ever having been conceived the way we think of it. Just—poof—there they are.
When my son talks about these things, his voice lifts with reverence for the small, misunderstood miracles of life. “Some insects,” he once explained, “are born in a form that doesn’t match their adult purpose. They molt. They evolve.”
Just like us.
Nature doesn’t need a debate to validate existence. Despite what politicians or media figures declare—despite the fearmongering of fringe activists—nature blooms anyway. It molts, transforms, becomes. No law has ever stopped a butterfly from emerging with two wings of different genders. Nature is non-political. No campaign has ever convinced a fly to stop pollinating. While humans legislate identity, nature simply lets life do what it’s here to do: become.
And that’s what I see in my son. He tends to the tiniest creatures—pollinators that make life possible. And like them, I show up too. I’m a momma bear parent. I will be there for my children, no matter what—just as bees return to blossoms, again and again. The courage it takes to live like that, to care for fragile lives when the world insists they don’t matter—that’s the same courage I see in him. The same courage I hope to live by.
Because what is braver than blooming, anyway? Especially when the world tells you not to.
During the pandemic, I worked overtime in end-of-life care. Instead of losing five patients a month, I lost five a day. I watched as people were wheeled into hospital rooms they’d never leave. I stood six feet away from crying daughters on Zoom. I spoke behind masks and face shields. Some days I prayed. Some days I cursed the sky. Some days I just sat in silence with unmanageable grief.
At night, I couldn’t sleep. So I started planting seeds in my garden. Seeds I bought from the Dollar Store—zinnias, cucumbers, snapdragons. Seeds that would bloom a leaf, a flower, vegetables. I planted seeds so I could see how things grow when they’re rooted in love and given the right care and soil. It helped me remember that things live and grow and bloom every single day.
That COVID spring, my son would visit and walk through the garden with me. He’d crouch low to inspect a curled leaf or a curious bug and explain, so gently, “Don’t disrupt the soil all at once, Mom. There’s life underneath. Microbiomes. Root systems. Whole communities of beings down there. You have to let them settle.”
As my wildflower seeds started to bloom, I noticed more butterflies, more bees—and flies too. Did you know that flies are pollinators? Even though most people don’t find them beautiful, they help feed the earth. They’re out there, quietly saving the planet. Just because we don’t honor something doesn’t mean it isn’t doing sacred work.
I stopped using bug sprays. No poisons. No “pest control.” Instead, I planted things that worked with the land, not against it. Companion planting, my son taught me. Biological control. You plant something sacrificial to attract the pests and protect the main crop. It’s sometimes called trap cropping. You give up a little to preserve something more important.
I never expected it would be my own child who would teach me the most about courage.
And it wasn’t the surgery that made him brave. It was every moment before and after: the way he faced the world in Texas, a state that often told him he shouldn’t exist. The way he corrected people, calmly, when they misgendered him. The way he moved through the world with quiet confidence, asserting his place in it with every step: I am here. I am whole. I am exactly who I say I am.
The older I get, the less patience I have for platitudes. I do not believe in a divine plan that condemns some and saves others. I do not believe queer kids are suffering for someone else’s enlightenment. If there’s any force I still believe in, I call it the Big Ball of Benevolence—a unified love-consciousness, maybe cosmic, maybe cellular—that moves with us, expands with us, and grows when we are ready.
My son lives fully now. He is planting seeds of research, growing new truths, spreading wings of knowledge over species both fragile and fierce. He reminds me—without ever needing to say it—that courage doesn’t always look like a shout. Sometimes it’s a quiet unfolding. A molt. A bloom.
Because in the end, what matters isn’t control. It’s becoming what we already are.
While I was waiting for my son to come out of surgery, I couldn’t help but think about all the hands I held on that clinical team. People who whispered regrets they never dared speak aloud before. Some were gay. Some were trans. Some had never told a soul who they really were. I sat beside them as they faced the truth—sometimes too late.
I wonder, if that might be the best we can do in this life: tend to the earth around us, honor the small lives in our care, and hold hands—firmly, gently—when someone we love says, “This is who I am.” In a world where being yourself can mean losing your family, your job, even your health benefits—courage is not theoretical. It’s lived. It’s breath and risk and hope. And still, the most courageous thing I have ever seen is my son, simply living in this world. Choosing to bloom anyway. Because in the end, what matters isn’t control. It’s blooming into what we already are. And what I know now, more than ever, is that no one should have to wait until the end of life to finally begin.
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