The Price Of 'progress' Poem by David Welch

If you are now reading this note
I am hoping you'll understand,
I didn't mean for any of this,
was trying to be a good man.
All that I was trying to do
was support my only son, Dan.
It started when he was eleven,
and declared to all that he was ‘trans.'

I've always been a progressive,
and though the news struck me at first,
I wanted to do right by my son,
wanted to lighten the mental hurt,
to be stuck in the wrong body…
I did not know what would be worse.
He would need help to transition,
so we began a doctor search.

Now we lived in small town Kansas,
it's not known for progressive ways,
most doctors would not help us out,
wouldn't give us the time of day.
We had to go to Topeka,
where a man heard what we had to say,
a doctor who would help us out,
as long as we were willing to pay.

We started with hormone blockers,
to hold off the male puberty,
that was followed by estrogen,
he grew out his hair to look pretty.
At first Dan seemed much better off,
for several months looked quite happy,
though didn't like having to wait
whole year for the surgery.

But the day came, and the day went,
and then Dan's transition was complete,
he now called himself Daniella
to any people he might meet.
Soon enough the whispers went 'round
to all the people on the street,
but I cared not for their ‘old' views,
Daniella they would not defeat.

My parents stopped talking to me,
said allowing this was insane,
to cut up a child's body
who had an undeveloped brain.
They said it was child abuse,
his future nothing but pain,
and what would happen if he grew
and came to regret this drastic change?

I called them out as ‘filthy transphobes, '
said they had hateful points of view.
My father just gave me a sneer,
and said, "Your son's life is screwed."
Of course then I just doubled down,
and said, "I have no use for you."
I haven't talked to them since then,
I so believed my words were true…

For the next few years things went well,
just Danielle, me, and my wife,
and my son seemed to adapt well
to the choice he had made in life.
But about the time he turned fifteen
something about him didn't seem right,
one night I found hm in his room
Staring dolefully at a knife.

He just said, "Father…what am I? "
I said, "Danielle, what do you mean? "
He said, "I look in the mirror,
don't know if it's all a bad dream…
Am I man, or am I woman,
or something ruined and obscene?
How could you let me do this, dad?
I was a kid, not even a teen…"

The words struck cold fear in my heart.
What was I to do? I didn't know.
This was not supposed to happen,
so back to the doctor did I go,
and the words he told me there
were just another heavy blow:
Male puberty's window had passed,
It was too late, he could not grow.

He'd never be a normal man,
but he no longer felt female,
and many nights I heard my son's
low, mournful and piteous wail,
And my poor wife was in tears too,
convinced that somehow she had failed.
she'd go from sure she had done wrong,
to a lunatic who just railed.

Dan made it just a few more months,
then I walked in and found him dead
in his bedroom…he'd slit his wrists,
the very bed-sheets were stained red.
I just stood there, to stunned by it
to push any thoughts through my head,
but my wife saw and screamed her grief,
then right out of the house she fled.

I haven't seen her since the day
of my beloved son's suicide,
heard nothing of where she went,
if she's still here, or if she's died.
Even worse, I went,
and found people who testified
that such an end was too common…
the doctors and ideologues lied.

Huge numbers of ‘trans' people had
later renounced their ‘new-found' sex,
many people grew out of it
before they had their body's wrecked.
Forty to fifty-six percent
suicide rate, what the heck?
Why had they never mentioned this?
Why had they all tried to deflect?

If the world knew these problems lurked
why did they go and celebrate
something that went and killed people
at such a remarkable rate?
Did people want to ‘belong' so much
they'd give cover to this awful fate?
Were the lives of their own loved ones
worth less then accusations of 'hate? '

Evil as these ‘omissions' were
I knew something that made me cold.
I had left myself believe it all,
I had accepted what I was told.
I'd so believed my politics
that I had left myself be sold
on ideas known as pure bullsh-t
to any random three-year-old.

It's my fault for allowing this,
this is something I must address,
I cannot live with this knowledge,
it has left me a broken mess.
Please, tell my parents they were right,
that common sense is usually best.
Ruined families and shattered lives
are the price we pay for ‘progress.'

…Bang