It always surprises me when people tell me how brave I am for being openly transgender.

It doesn’t seem like bravery to me because I know how painful it was to live in the “before”—the time of hiding and questions and thinking no one would love me if they knew the truth. It took some courage to choose to live honestly—it always does—but no more (or less,) I think, than for anyone else.

That’s the thing. Every time I tell my story, people come to me and tell me about the long journey they’ve made (or wish to make) to live in a way that feels honest and real.

They tell me the ways that they don’t fit into the boxes that were offered to them. Men tell me how they never felt manly enough and women tell me about the ways they never felt like a “real woman” because of some difference they perceived as a flaw. Gay and lesbian people reveal the deep spiritual struggle of learning to love themselves and believe that they too, have inherent worth and dignity.

And most recently all of us have been hearing the terrible stories about bullying and how children are taking their lives in response to a culture of meanness that tells them they are worthless. I grieve for these kids because I know that pain so personally. And I’m also furious that the best response adults seem to have come up with is, “It gets better.”

“It gets better” is not enough. When we say “It gets better,” we’re essentially asking a kid who is being abused to just endure until some magical time when the meanness stops. When we say “It gets better,” we’re saying, “Oh yeah, that’s just how adolescence is. You just have to take it for a few years.”

The truth is, our kids can’t wait until it gets better. We’ve seen kids end their lives at 12, 13, 14—they have years of middle school and high school ahead of them. And it won’t get better unless someone steps in to stop the bullying—or at very least chooses to be there afterwards to tend to the physical, emotional, and spiritual wounds and send a message of love and acceptance.

Every day I meet people who tell me about how hard their own journey was and how they feared they would not survive the pressure to be something they were not. If all of us gathered our courage and stood up to the bullies—not just kids, but bullies all around us in the media, advertising, politics, churches—maybe our kids wouldn’t have to wait for it get better. Maybe it could be better now.

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Rev. Sean Parker Dennison

Sean Parker Dennison has been a UU minister since 2000, and is currently a community minister in Flint, Michigan.He is also a painter, poet, parent, and partner.

Latest posts by Rev. Sean Parker Dennison (see all)

• Love the Limits - July 1, 2021
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• Living in a Multi-Racial Family - November 11, 2011