Filling in the Gaps
My story thus far has focused mostly on my mental state and what led me to believe that transitioning was the only solution. In my interviews, I talk a lot about environment, and I think that it is time to talk about the one I was living in. But before I get into all of that, I want to clear something up that I think a lot of people might be thinking.
I didn’t leak this story. I was contacted by the Mail gossip section who were writing an article about me divorcing my wife. I’m not going to link to any of these articles as I disagree with the photos included and naming of my ex. I have no idea who told the Mail about this, I had shared my full story with a group of friends that, while smallish in number, is more than enough for the story to have leaked. Frankly, terrified that the story of my near-transition would be told on someone else’s terms, I told the Mail after the first article came out. This was followed by a second column, and then the request to do a feature which I did accept.
After this, I went on GB news as I felt my story might help people who are also at the lowest point of their lives and maybe prevent some mistakes. With the UK government banning hormones for under 18s, I honestly don’t feel strongly enough about any other part of that issue to speak on it. (NOTE: After reading up on the subject and really understanding the issue outside myself I have changed my mind here in a significant way in the sense that having researched more of the subject outside myself i feel the need to speak up for those that can’t. However, I won’t change the write up for the sake of intellectual consistency.)
That being said, I want to live a life that shows people other options are on the table, and they can succeed by choosing them. In short, I’m not anti-anything, I’m only ever pro things. If you’re reading this after the podcast on the Wider Lens, then you will know that mostly what I talk about is queer theory and transhuman concepts because those things are interesting, but also my truth, and that’s exactly it, it is mine. I care not if you understand it because it is mine.
My reasons for talking about this now are twofold, somewhat because of the bravery displayed by Richard Spencer in “My Wife, My Abuser” on Channel 5, but also because no matter what I do to put this behind me, it keeps coming at me, and it is continued abuse even after I am living on the other side of the world. They say the best disinfectant is sunlight so here goes.
I think to fully understand what happened to me over the last ten years, I need to start near the beginning. Nineteen, living in East London, first time living in my own place, working overtime in a bar and as a club promoter for The Box. I would meet my future ex-wife in East London. She was roughly 20 years older than myself, although I wouldn’t have thought so at the time. I think in a time of extreme loneliness and feeling shut out from most of the people around me, I felt as if with her I had found someone that cared.
For the first few months, things were fine, well, as fine as doing a ton of drugs and drinking with a person double your age can be. But the real issues would start relatively soon. I remember the first time both kinds of things that would come to be a staple in the relationship happened. The first was while I was hanging out with my roommates on my way to some gig, I got a text from her asking where I was, then calling me accusing me of cheating and asking me to show pictures of where I was to prove I wasn’t with a girl.
The second was after a night of particularly hard bingeing, she thought she saw a seagull behind a coat hanger, the paranoia making me cross the room to check for it multiple times until eventually she returned to a normal state. This, for me, was a wake-up call, and my years of drug-taking, at least hard drugs in any major way, stopped. For a while, it seemed the same for both parties, but the episodes came back more and more regularly. From maybe year 2 onwards, they became weekly. It is hard to describe what these were like to experience. The best way I can describe it is if you’ve ever seen the film “The Master” where the main character played by Joaquin Phoenix is told to cross the room and tell the master what he sees in the window over and over again, imagine this but also with someone screaming that people are coming to get us, breaking into the house, and calling the police and/or the NHS. Now, these episodes I believed were a result of some mental illness, as to my knowledge, she had stopped doing drugs.
During the time when we lived separately, I also travelled to Amsterdam with some friends for a weekend. A week before, she tore my passport in a rage, a strange foreshadowing of what I would go through later.
A few months into me living with her, a new behaviour was normalised: kicking me out. During a fight, she told me to take all my stuff and go, so I did, but no less than 2 hours later, I got a call saying come back. In my first two years, I left because of things getting physical from her side, or being treated like a punching bag for her emotions. Make no mistake, if it was just the episodes, it would have been liveable if and only if they weren’t clearly induced by drug taking.
I think it is normal at the start of abusive relationships to have a voice and stand up for yourself, but as time goes on, as gaslighting continues, and the mixed messages grow, you lose your sense of self.
The thing is, during this time, there are tons of photos of us at events and going out. You’d think we are happy as can be, but a photo is just a moment. In fact, when I look at those photos, I see myself die a little each year I am with her. It is reflected in my social media. The constant criticism about ‘don’t post that’ or ‘why are you liking this?’ made me not want to use it, hence the 5–8 year gap on my Instagram.
Soon we would be married after just 3 months, and after 3 years, moved into a house in Waterloo with a dog. I was still doing bar work and promotion at this time, but I would soon switch to working at Damien Hirst’s new Port Street gallery as a runner. I also spent a lot of time planning art shows, anything I could do to not be at home, really. Same as when I was working at the bar, I would take the double 15-hour shifts just so I didn’t have to go home to the hell I knew was waiting for me.
The house in Waterloo was bought by her parents for us, both of which are politically powerful people in Japan, but that will be relevant later. It was a brand new building with all new fittings. Within months, due to the episodes, the place was covered in dents where she had thrown objects at me and all the door handles broken and pulled off due to her believing people were hiding behind them or somehow going to come through the door.
You may be thinking, why didn’t you just get her help? It seems like she needed it. You’d be right, but you combine these episodes, a refusal to acknowledge them, and physical violence, it becomes kind of hard, and you feel that without you they would be in more trouble, so it is your duty to not only look after them but also keep their state private as they have asked to, on pain of leaving you.
To make this story shorter, just copy what I wrote above for the first 3 years and turn the volume up, and we are at year 6. Covid hits, and we move to Japan, at least that’s the story I tell people. The real problem is that I finally caught on to the fact that these episodes of paranoia, violence, and general insanity were in fact linked to drugs. I threatened to leave, and somehow I ended up suggesting we go to Japan to get her off drugs as it is extremely hard to get them there.
Honestly, the first few months there were great. For the first time, life was on my terms. I had contacts out there, and within a year, I held a massive art show. I built a life for myself, and mostly, we didn’t see each other. Busy with her job, things worked because we barely saw each other, and I was free for the most part from the episodes, not the verbal or emotional abuse, but I had learned to just take that.
Soon though, drink and drugs in another form would come back, abusing ADHD medication and drinking litres of sochu a day (it’s a Japanese drink like sake but stronger). The abuse would come back towards the middle of 2022. I would try to talk about it with her, but I think she knew so decided that the best place in the whole of Tokyo to talk about this was in an English bar for expats some 2 hours from our house. In hindsight, it was obviously a tactic to make it impossible to speak my mind without people I knew spoke English overhearing.
By the end of our conversation, we had decided we were going to adopt a child, not sure how that happened. I think this might be the point something in my mind broke, and I started to realise I couldn’t deal with the situation. Returning to the UK for a short stay, while there, I would make the decision that the only way out was to take my life. On my return to Japan, I very nearly did after telling my ex-wife this, she responded with, “How dare you leave that for me to find?” After a day of not being able to leave bed, I had the constant, “What’s wrong?” “Are you gay?” “Are you trans?” and any number of random thoughts she had to try to work out what was wrong with me.
I need to stop here for some context. I have always suffered from some form of dysphoria, gender or otherwise. I talk about this on the Wider Lens podcast, so if you’re reading after that, you know exactly what I mean.
The trans suggestion she made stuck with me, and all those times I had thought about it before clicked. Yes, this was it. My ex cemented it a bit too much, even going so far as to try and make me sign this email contract (i didn't). I have blacked out anything that mentions names or anything too personal for the internet.
This screenshot I think gives you some idea of the type of person I was with. Even if I had ended up going through with the choice of transitioning under these conditions, what kind of life would I have led? In a sense, any choice I had on the matter was taken.
During my time transitioning, I wore a body shaping corset most days and slept in it, painted my nails, and began socially transitioning. I posted images to Instagram with many filters. Here are some of them.
This is, as the trans community would put it, very “eggy” behaviour. If you’re thinking why aren’t there any bad images of me dressed up and in makeup, first off, that’s weird, why are you thinking that? But also because I was a model, I know what I look like, I wouldn’t allow a bad photo of me online if I can help it.
Most of these are in my archive. I only keep one up in public, as a marker so I don’t forget what happened to me. Back to the timeline, fights, episodes, and name-calling only increased. Yet now I have something I didn’t before: the constant “you aren’t a man” or “you’re unable to provide” millions, a failure, etc., no longer stung because I was a girl. I didn’t have to adhere to these heteronormative values, and that was truly freeing. But as with abusers, this pushback was treated like any other, with doubling down and force.
I had already, for the last year or so, been hiding my laptop, printing extra bank cards, and leaving a dummy passport around, as she would make a habit of hiding these or threatening to destroy them. I already had a go bag packed before I knew why I should have one. As I was regularly kicked out of the house without anything, in a country where I only had a basic understanding of how to speak the language and no ability to read it, with no money and no passport.
The week before I left Japan was the build-up to an exhibition in Yokohama. One evening, after drinking a large amount, an insult was thrown at me that was beyond anything that had been said before, referencing my childhood abuse. I struck back as Sacha did. Now this resulted in her taking a knife to her throat for an hour and then making threats. If I was to come closer, it would be both of us. After this, I knew I had to get out of the situation. I hung the exhibition, and at the event, told a few people what had happened and that I was scared. That evening, I locked myself in the toilet out of fear until she fell asleep.
The next morning, I woke up, got back into my suit (I was still dressing male), and left Tokyo, going straight to the airport with nothing but a PC and assorted makeup and other items of female clothing. Leaving a house, two dogs, business opportunities, and anything else I had gotten over the last ten years behind, but even as I knew this, the only thing in my mind was I am alive, and I am the only irreplaceable thing.
From here, the story is mostly public, but a few small details, I am putting this out to fill in the blanks and tell my story on my terms.
I don’t have to provide evidence of everything I have said, as this is not a courtroom, and due to recent actions on her side, that is a looming possibility. Rest assured, I make no assertions without evidence and am perfectly prepared to defend myself should this article itself cause any legal issues.
I also don’t want to drag this out publicly, as mentioned at the start, all this came to me. I only hope my story will help others who are in the same situation.
If I were to cover every detail of my story, it would be a book, which is also in the works.
When abusers tell you what they think of you, believe them.
