Author: Meaghan Ray

3 Types of Trans Healthcare That Everybody Should Know About

When we hear about trans people and healthcare, we mostly hear about hormones and surgery. But trans people are way more than just hormones and surgery.

As part of my current research, I am learning about the different types of barriers that trans people experience when accessing healthcare. To my surprise, the majority of the barriers discussed were in relation to accessing transition related care – ie hormones and surgery (among other things). I had to dig significantly deeper to find anything on the barriers that trans people face in accessing regular, every day health care.

What I realized was that this was a reflection on society’s view that trans people are one-dimensional – trans. As it turns out, trans people are more than just trans. They are parents and kids and employees and students and immigrants and homeless and artists and athletes. They are just as multi-faceted as cis people – maybe more so!

This goes for their healthcare needs as well. Sure, they need access to things that are specific to medical transition, but they also need access to basic health care. They break bones, get in accidents, have chronic conditions, and get sick just like cis people.

Since this concept seems to be difficult for the medical and research communities to grasp, I thought I would break it down into three categories to make it a bit more straightforward. Here goes.

TRANS SPECIFIC CARE

This category of health care needs is specific to being transgender. These are health care protocols, medications, and surgeries that are only accessed by and applied to trans people. Some of these were created specifically for trans people. Most were designed for cis people but have been adapted in ways that are now seen as separate protocols when used for transition purposes.

  • Hormone replacement therapy (HRT) for the sake of gender transition
  • Chest masculinization surgery (top surgery)
  • Vaginoplasty
  • Orchidectomy
  • Phalloplasty
  • Metoidioplasty
  • Facial feminization surgery (a collection of many different procedures including trachial shaving)
  • Gender dysphoria diagnosis
  • Psychological assistance with gender/sex incongruity
  • Voice masculinization/feminization therapy

TRANS ASSOCIATED CARE

This category of health care needs refer to services that are used by trans people in the course of medical transition but are also used in the same form by cis people.

  • Puberty blockers
  • Electrolysis
  • Hysterectomy/Salpingo-Oophorectomy
  • Breast augmentation
  • Breast reduction
  • Liposuction/sculpting
  • Scar/Skin graft care post gender affirming surgery
  • Hair transplant
  • Hair growth treatments
  • Treatment for conditions related to bottom surgery
    • Pelvic pain
    • Incontinence
    • Urethral stricture
    • Urethral fistula
    • Post-op infection
    • Dilation

TRANS SENSITIVE CARE

This category refers to all healthcare needs that are not related to medical transition. These are basic healthcare needs that may or may not interact with an aspect of medical transition. For these aspects of healthcare, being trans is not the reason for or the focus of treatment but is still an important aspect of the whole person and their experiences.

  • Diagnosis and management of chronic conditions
  • Cancer screening, diagnosis, treatment, and follow-up
  • Mental health support and psychiatric care
  • Disability related care
  • Fertility, pregnancy, birthing, postpartum, and lactation
  • Emergency care
  • Geriatric and end of life care
  • Stroke and traumatic brain injury
  • Addiction management
  • Physical Therapy and other rehabilitation services
  • Preventative healthcare and health promotion
  • etc

If you are a cis person, think of anything you have ever needed the health care system for, or anything any of your cis family and friends have needed the health care system for. Guess what? Trans people need that care too.

It is the responsibility of the health care professional to know whether any aspect of care within their scope of practice will interact with an aspect of medical transition. For example, drug interaction with HRT medications. Even if the care is irrelevant to any aspect of medical transition or their experiences as a trans person, they still need to be treated with respect, dignitiy, and compassion in order to receive the care they need and have a positive outcome related to that care.

Check out my post about how to be a trans inclusive health care professional and find other recommendations about how to be trans affirming in the related posts below. In the coming years, I will be working on guidelines for medical researchers on how to include trans people in clinical research.

Because really, trans people may be unique in many ways but they are also people with regular, every day health care needs who deserve to have equal access to appropriate, respectful care.

Note: Trans people are by no means the only group marginalized by the health care system. People with disabilities are often reduced to their disability. People with chronic pain are often labelled as drug seekers. People who are fat/obese are reduced to a BMI category or number on a scale. None of these types of stigma are acceptable. If you are a health care professional, I challenge you to learn more about the experiences of all of these marginalized groups (and others). But if you’re overwhelmed and need a place to start, you may as well start here, with trans inclusivity.

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My Hero’s Journey, So Far

Here is how my gender journey lines up with the Hero’s Journey. Missed my previous post about Gender Transition as a Hero’s Journey? Check that out first and then come back to read my story.

ORDINARY WORLD

When my husband started being identified as a man by strangers, their ingrained heteronormative views told them that I must be a woman. I started getting treated as more feminine when we were together and this didn’t sit right with me.

I had never been comfortable with the term lesbian, and instead had always called myself gay or queer.

In grade 10 I had a gender fluid experience where I would feel like a boy named Ray for a few days every few weeks, shifting back to feeling like a girl named Meaghan in between.

I grew up in a very liberal and supportive environment but at the inception of my gender journey I had moved away and was working in a more conservative and very hetero- and cis-normative environment.

CALL TO ADVENTURE

Part way through my husband’s transition, I realized that I was definitely experiencing dysphoria as well. We had been attending local PFLaG meetings and had been listening to people describe a range of identities and experiences. Some of these, especially the more androgenous, gender neutral, gender fluid, and nonbinary ones, really resonated with me.

REFUSAL OF THE CALL

However, my husband was still in the middle of navigating how to get top surgery, how to change all his legal documentation, and what to do about continually being misgendered at work, months after coming out. From witnessing his experiences and hearing about similar experiences from the community, I knew that exploring your gender and clarifying for yourself who you are and what you need to feel authentic can make not having those things feel a whole lot worse.

Knowing that my husband still needed a lot of my support and I was not working in an environment that would be condusive to coming out as nonbinary, I decided to put off all gender related self-discovery for the time being.

MEETING THE MENTOR

As soon as my husband felt fairly stable in his transition, he encouraged me to do my own gender exploration work. As a result of his transition, he finally felt ready to be a parent (being able to picture himself as a dad instead of a mom) but also did not want to be the one to be pregnant. This meant that, if possible, I would be the carrying and birthing parent.

There is so much unknown and out of your control in the process of trying to conceive, pregnancy, and birthing. I didn’t want gender related feelings to be one more. So I started to explore what felt not so great, what felt awesome, and how my gender felt on a daily basis.

CROSSING THE THRESHOLD

Turns out I am nonbinary. I discovered that I have both female and male genders which balance out to an overall experience that is a mix of the two or ‘somewhere in the middle’. I discovered that I do have some physical dysphoria during which times I feel better if I wear a binder (if my body can tolerate it). I discovered that I have significant social dysphoria and feel much better when referred to using they/them pronouns and neutral language.

The physical dysphoria I could manage pretty well with some practice. The social dysphoria was a whole other story, especially at work.

TESTS, ALLIES, AND ENEMIES

Partly as a result of constant social dysphoria, I started expriencing periods of burnout that would last 1-2 months and re-occur every 4-6 months.

I had a few new colleagues at work that were queer and super supportive and a few others that I slowly built friendships with and eventually came out to. These allies, especially at work, were a major help on bad dysphoria days.

I had a colleague who was also a friend come out as nonbinary. Unfortunately, the support from the management team was not in place and did not appear when they needed it. There were very few allies around them and they were continually misgendered, had repeated conflicts with coworkers, and ultimately moved to a different job. As an example of what it would be like for me to come out at work, it was a pretty clear one.

Navigating the world of fertility, pregnancy, and postpartum as a nonbinary person is extremely difficult. There were times I found community and resources and felt like I could belong. There were also times that were nauseating and traumatic that I will carry with me for life.

APPROACH TO THE INNERMOST CAVE

While I was on parental leave (for a whole year – go Canada!), and in the middle of a global pandemic, I had minimal interaction with the outside world unless I reached out for it. I had significantly less dysphoria and significantly less burnout, despite being a new parent in a pandemic. This told me that my burnout was indeed primarily dysphoria related and in order to feel more comfortable in my life, and have the emotional reserve I wanted and needed to support my child, I would need to make some changes. I would need to find spaces that I was comfortable being out in. And I would need to be out in as many spaces as I could.

This was especially true around family. I wanted my kid to grow up hearing people refer to me using the correct pronouns. This meant I would first have to explain my identity to everyone my kid would be interacting with regularly (namely family) and train everyone to use my pronouns and preferred language. This would take time and my kid was growing up at a steady pace. I had to come out to family before my kid started understanding what pronouns meant and remembering and repeating phrases from those around them.

THE ORDEAL

The first step I took was to apply to a graduate school program using my preferred name, pronouns, and gender identity. I was open with my supervisor from the beginning and made it clear in my application that my identity and lived experience was a big part of why I wanted to do research work. This meant that in September, when I started school, I had the foundation and backup to expect that everyone refer to me correctly. When they don’t, I have significantly more confidence to correct them than I ever have in other environments.

When my kid was about ten months old, I bit the bullet and came out to my in-laws (who live near us) and my parents (who live across the country but were coming for a month-long visit). I did this via email with the hope of some reply, either of support or questions or concerns that I could respond to. Mostly, there was silence and confusion. I had a brief follow up conversation with my in-laws and, after a period of awkwardnes and tension, saw some awereness and progress. My sister had many follow up conversations with my parents on my behalf but I had minimal expectation that they would be able to/willing to follow through and change their use of pronouns for me during their visit.

However, their visit happened to coincide with work I was doing to develop inclusive training material for a health professions college. They were curious about my work which gave me an opening to talk about many of the issues trans people face in health care settings (mostly related to ignorance and being misgendered). The materials I was developing included a ‘bad’ version of a health care interaction and a ‘good’ version. I sent them both versions and we had a few conversations about why the ‘bad’ version was ‘bad’ and why it was important to interact in ways that were depicted in the ‘good’ version. They were able to grasp these concepts significantly better than the information my sister had attempted to explain, perhaps because it wasn’t directly about them and thus did not make them feel as defensive. They almost immediately started making an effort to use my correct pronouns. While they weren’t great at it, and they will likely back-slide between in-person visits, this was more progress than I expected and I took it as a positive sign.

REWARD

It’s an increadible feeling, being seen. It’s even better when you don’t have to fight for it first. I now have numerous allys who actively step in to do the educating and, if necessary, fighting, on my behalf. I am better at advocating for myself (or getting better at it slowly), and better at identifying situations where having an ally would be useful and then recruiting one.

Confidence, euphoria, authenticity, and visibility are pretty good rewards. Do I wish I didn’t have to fight for them? Sure. But it’s still worth the fight.

THE ROAD BACK

I now spend the majority of my time working in an inclusive environment with my name and pronouns displayed correctly on my zoom screen during ‘meetings’. I have more bandwidth to apply to my work and family. I have not had a period of burnout in over a year despite having a baby during a pandemic. I am able to exercise despite the accompanying dysphoria because, for the majority of the time, I experience more euphoria than dysphoria. I can recover easily from the few days I spend in my previous work environment where I am still not out (and likely will never be).

I am using my unique experiences and perspective to help others make their work more inclusive. I am being recognized for the value of my experiences and identity rather than ‘supported’ or ‘accommodated’.

I am thinking about the future and what I might want for myself in my transition. Are there ‘next steps’? I have a long road to recovery from pregnancy related body changes and have chosen to focus on this prior to pursuing anything further related to transition. Though, likely, at some unknown point in the future, I would like to have some form of top surgery. Will this be my ‘Ressurection’? Who knows! If you stay tuned, you’ll likely find out when I do!

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Gender Transition as a Hero’s Journey

The heroes in our favourite stories all start out as ordinary people. Their journeys often follow a similar pattern as they face trials and tribulations, discover their inner strength, and return triumphant. Joseph Campbell orginally described this story arc using 17 stages (and fairly problematic language). It has since been revised into 12 stages, most recently by Christopher Vogler.

As it turns out, these stages match the emotional stages of a gender transition pretty closely. Which means trans people are all heroes or heroes-in-training!

Here’s how it looks:

There are three parts: Departure (the beginning), Initiation (the middle), and Return (the end). These are broken down into the 12 stages.

The journey starts with the hero in the ordinary world living in a harsh and unforgiving external light in a state of unhappiness, stress, ignorance, and/or confusion.

They move to a new, extraordinary, or special world during the Initiation phase. Here they move through darkness as they struggle to discover their own internal source of light.

They then return to the ordinary world in a state of triumph and rebirth, having learned how to shine brightly from withinwith. They now have a new perspective, skill, or, in our case, identity.

As I was thinking about the steps in the Hero’s Journey and lining them up with the experience of gender transition, it was interesting how easy it was to see. Some of the original wording even makes sense without changing much except the context.

Let’s break it down and look at each of the twelve steps:

Stage 1: Ordinary World

Classic: The hero is uneasy, uncomfortable or unaware. They are living a life at the mercy of their enviornment, heredity, and personal history. The hero feels pulled in different directions and is stressed by the dilemma.

Trans: You are living with confusion and discomfort, just trying to get by with no language or understanding of why you feel different, that there is a way to relieve your distress, or what path your life is going to take.

Stage 2: Call to Adventure

Classic: Something shakes up the situation, either from external pressures or from something rising up from deep within, so the hero must face the beginnings of change.

Trans: You discover that your discomfort might be gender related by meeting a trans person, seeing a trans person represented in media, or learning about language, labels, or experiences that feel right for you.

Stage 3: Refusal of the Call

Classic: The hero feels the fear of the unknown and tries to turn away from the adventure, however briefly. This uncertainty may be voiced by someone else rather than the hero themself.

Trans: You have immense fear about the enormity of what this would mean for your life. This fear takes over and you ignore what you have just learned, bury the knowledge deep down, convince yourself that you don’t need to transition or don’t need to think about this. You try as hard as you can to fit in with what is expected of you or numb/ignore this awareness.

Stage 4: Meeting the Mentor

Classic: The hero comes across a seasoned traveler of the worlds who gives them training, equipment, or advice that will help on the journey. Or the hero reaches within to a mentor from their past or an internal source of courage and wisdom.

Trans: You meet someone who sees you for who you are and encourages you to delve into yourself. This could be a trans or queer person from the community who is living their best life and provides the experience and support you need, a therapist that starts helping you unpack your gender identity and dysphoria, or a close friend or family member who is no longer willing to let you hide from your truth.

Stage 5: Crossing the Threshold

Classic: The hero commits to leaving the ordinary world and entering a new region or condition with unfamiliar rules and values.

Trans: You come out to yourself, accepting yourself for who you are, accepting your true authentic gender identity. You are flooded by understanding, fear, excitement, confusion, discomfort, and determination.

Stage 6: Tests, Allies, Enemies

Classic: The hero is tested and sorts out allegiances in the new, special world.

Trans: You now know why you’ve felt uncomfortable your whole life and being able to point to and name dysphoria makes it so much bigger, louder, and more constant. You search the internet for trans information and find a huge community on social media platforms and many local and national organizations that offer support. At the same time, you start recognizing all the transphobic and cisnormative language around you and feel like no one in your life will accept you for who you are.

Stage 7: Approach to the Innermost Cave

Classic: The hero and newfound allies prepare for the major challenge in the special world.

Trans: You collect information from allies about coming out and navigating transition which helps you clarify for yourself what you want/need. This intensifies the dysphoria which gets harder and harder to deal with, especially when you haven’t told anyone yet. The internal pressure of knowing what you want, who you are, and how you want to be seen builds, pushing against the confines of the closet until…

Stage 8: Ordeal

Classic: The hero enters a central space in the special world and confronts death or faces their greatest fear. Out of this moment of ‘death’ comes a new life.

Trans: You decide that coming out is worth the risk, worth the loss of those that don’t support you, worth the potential harm in order to be who you are. You take the first steps to telling others who you are, breaking down that wall one brick at a time, or by driving a bulldozer straight through it and coming out to everyone at once.

Stage 9: Reward (Seizing the Sword)

Classic: The hero takes possession of the treasure they won by facing death. There may be celebration, but there is also danger of losing the treasure again.

Trans: Some people you come out to start using your correct name and pronouns and you have your first real taste of gender euphoria and what it could feel like to live as the person you are. Not everyone is supportive or consistent and dysphoria continues to fight it’s way in. You fight to hold onto your confidence in who you are and your resolve to seek what you need, using the bursts of gender euphoria as your guiding light.

Stage 10: The Road Back

Classic: The hero is driven to complete the adventure, leaving the special world to be sure the treasure is brought home. Often a chase scene signals the urgency and danger of the mission.

Trans: You learn how to integrate your new trans identity with your life at work, home, and school, with friends and family, and in social activities, hobbies, and sports. You struggle to navigate and access the medical care and legal services you want/need in order to be safe and feel authentic in your body and identity. You are desperate for the changes and progress yet they happen at a maddeningly slow pace.

Stage 11: Resurrection

Classic: The hero is tested once more on the threshold of home. They are pruified by a last sacrifice, another moment of death and rebirth, but on a higher and more complete level. By the hero’s action, the polarities that were in conflict at the beginning are finally resolved.

Trans: You start to recognize the person in the mirror, be recognized correctly by people around you more often than not, and feel more comfortable in your body. You come up to and cross a milestone of significance for you in your transition (starting hormones, top surgery, changing your gender marker, bottom surgery, etc) with all the doubt, fear, excitement, relief, pain, re-learning, and celebrating that comes with it.

Stage 12: Return with the Elixir

Classic: The hero returns home or continues the journey, bearing some element of the treasure that has the power to transform the world as the hero has been transformed.

Trans: You reach a sense of completion related to your transition or have found confidence and peace in the sense of an ongoing and lifelong gender discovery and evolution. You are living authentically, supporting others who are questioning their gender or know someone who is, expanding your society’s view of gender and authenticity, and maybe even advocating for trans rights. Huzzah!

What an epic journey! Can you see yourself, or the trans person you love, as a hero? What stage of your Hero’s Journey are you at?

I know everyone’s transition is different. Are there stages that line up differently based on your experience?

If you add in specific details that match your own experience, what story does it tell? Who were the mentor, allies, and enemies? What tests did you face? What treasure do you carry with you to this day? What final milestone did you face and overcome during your stage of resurrection?

What was the timeline of each stage, and the journey as a whole? Did it progress in a linear fashion the way it sounds like it would here?

Share your story in the comments or send it to me in an email! If you’re willing to share it, I’ll publish it here as a post! The more stories the better. We need more variety of trans experiences and we need more trans heroes!

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Gender Inclusivity in the Workplace: What it is and How it Feels

For the last five years I have worked in the same environment. During this time, my husband came out as trans and I discovered my identity as a nonbinary person. I recently cut back on my hours at this job and started a different job. These two jobs are wildly different environments, types of work, levels of inclusion, and effects on me as a nonbinary person.

For the last few years, I assumed that any workplace connected to my chosen profession would be the same in terms of it’s effect on me with mild variability in inclusivity. But since switching to the new job, I am realizing how much of the burnout I’ve been experiencing is from inclusion related factors, or the lack of inclusivity at my previous job.

A lot of these factors are within the control of my colleagues and management staff. But some of them are simply related to the nature of the job.

WHAT A NON-INCLUSIVE WORKPLACE FEELS LIKE

When going to work at my job that has minimal inclusion, recognition, or support for my identity as a nonbinary person, I have a nebulous feeling of resistance, anxiety, apprehension, disappointment, and risk. I carry this around with me to varying degrees throughout the whole work day. It is distracting and tiring. I feel like I am hiding, shrinking, holding myself in a small tight ball inside myself for the course of the day.

Every time I have a chance to show a part of this aspect of my identity I have to make a risk vs reward calculation. Every time I encounter something that directly relates to or impacts my gender identity, even if it isn’t directed at me, I have to decide if I’m going to hide or react which is again, a risk vs reward calculation.

This isn’t to say that everything about that work environment is bad and negative. There are lots of things I like about it or else I wouldn’t still be working there. But in order to engage with the things I like about that job, I have to bring the rest of this heaviness along with me.

I am not out to the majority of people in this workplace because it doesn’t feel safe or feasible (more on this below). When I am misgendered, it is primarily out of ignorance and assumption. But, because of many factors, I expect that the majority of people would continue to misgender me even if I did come out. This means that coming out is not worth the effort or risk.

WHAT AN INCLUSIVE WORKPLACE FEELS LIKE

At my new job, I am excited to get to work every day. I can focus and do my work efficiently. At the end of the day/week I am as tired as I would expect given the amount of work I did. I still have mild reluctance to engage with people who are not necessarily trans competent but I know that, should I need to correct them on my name or pronouns, I have the support to do that.

I entered this workplace using my preferred name, pronouns, and gender identity. Not everyone I interact with knows all of that information but I feel safe in providing it openly when I need to. I can share any parts of myself that are relevant without fear and with minimal risk vs reward calculation because the risks are much lower and the reward is more likely to occur.

Colleagues recognize the types of knowledge and expertise that my nonbinary identity affords me and come to me when they have things I can help with.

Overall it feels easy, affirming, and allows me to simply focus on my work.

WORKPLACE FACTORS THAT IMPACT GENDER INCLUSIVITY

Culture

This is the factor that we think about the most in regards to inclusivity and it is definitely the most complex one. You can think of cultural factors in three groups: policies and procedures, competence, and representation.

Policies and Procedures

Is there a policy in place that protects workers based on gender identity? Do their policy documents use gender neutral language? If they have a dress code, is it gender neutral? Do their application forms and other types of documentation such as ID and health insurance forms have inclusive fields (sex, gender, legal gender marker, legal name, preferred name, pronouns, neutral labels, etc)? Is the use of homophobic and transphobic language pervasive, ignored, discouraged, or penalized in the professional work spaces as well as the social spaces in the workplace? Is it commonplace to include pronouns in introductions and email signatures?

Competence

Is the management trained in equity, diversity, and inclusion to the degree they need to be in order to put the policies and procedures into practice? Do they know what to do if an employee or colleague comes out as trans or requests they use different language or pronouns for them? Is there positive, neutral, or negative regard for differences and diversity? Are there ‘safe space’ stickers on office doors? Is the messaging around safe spaces and being inclusive accurate to the level of competence of the staff?

See the end of this post for numerous other posts on this blog related to building basic trans competence.

Representation

Is pride month celebrated? Is diversity represented in the company/business promotional materials, staff support messaging, and among the workforce?

I’m sure there are more but these are the ones that come to mind from my experiences comparing these two work environments.

Physical Environment

This factor is a bit more straightforward but often overlooked by anyone who isn’t negatively affected by it. For gender related inclusivity, some of the questions that come to mind are:

Are there gender neutral/single use bathrooms and changing spaces (if applicable)? For places like gyms, yoga studios, and rehabilitation clinics, are there spaces that aren’t surrounded by mirrors? If asking clients about their personal or health related information, are these meeting spaces private (for both sight and sound)? Is the messaging that is visible at the entrance and throughout the space inclusive and representative of diversity?

Social Demands

This is a factor that is often overlooked and took me a while to recognize as important. My experience with it is more specific to gender identity (though I’m sure it applies to many other minority groups as well).

How many social interactions with strangers or acquaintance level co-workers are required throughout a day of work? This is important because, especially for nonbinary people, strangers, and anyone who we haven’t specifically come out to, will make incorrect assumptions about our gender identity and pronouns. No matter how inclusive the workplace is and how comfortable you are being ‘out’ in that environment, every interaction with a stranger requires coming out again.

Many of the components of the other factors make this significantly less onerous. For example if the company’s messaging is clearly trans inclusive, if employees have pronouns on their ID badges, and if the culture is supportive, affirming, and protective of trans people, I would feel much more comfortable introducing myself to a stranger using my pronouns (they/them). If the other factors are poor in terms of inclusivity, this one gets exponentially worse.

But, if the type of work requires very little interaction with strangers, it is significantly easier to get through the day in a workplace that has mediocre cultural and physical inclusivity.

  • What have your experiences been with gender inclusion in your workplace?
  • Have you ever quit a job due to it’s lack of gender inclusivity? What factors affected you the most?
  • How would you rate your current workplace on it’s gender inclusivity based on the factors above (or others that you’d like to add)?

Leave me a comment below or send me an email! I’d love to hear from you.

RELATED POSTS

Workplace and Coming Out

Surviving in a Non-Inclusive Workplace

Trans Competency

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While You Are Sleeping: A Poem to My Baby

Over the course of the last year, the first year of my child’s life, I have experienced many intense moments. Sometimes these happen over a discrete period of time – a moment, a day, or even a few weeks – and then they pass. Other times, like the one described in this poem, these intense moments happen repeatedly, in small bursts, and are related to a particular activity.

For me, one of these has been the emotions, sense of connection or disconnection, and shifts in identity that occur while I’m watching my baby sleep.

While You Are Sleeping

While you are sleeping, 
I watch.
I listen. 
Your fist clenches, opens, relaxes. 
Your breathing catches, slows, deepens. 
Your face winces, smooths, smiles. 
Peaceful.
Makes me feel peaceful.
Because of our connection.
Makes me aware of our connection.
You are the seed of my soul,
Life of my body. 

While you are sleeping, 
I watch.
I listen.
I can't help it. 
I am drawn to you. 
I feel obsessed.
Your peacefulness is a drug. 
It soothes me. 
Slows time. 
Pause. 
Quiet.

While you are sleeping,
I have given you all you need, 
For now, in this moment.
Satisfaction.
Pride.
Confidence.
No demands, frustration, concern,
To overshadow the good feelings.
The powerful feelings.
The awe.
The wonder.
The love.

While you are sleeping,
All your needs are met.
For now.
Relief.
Not being needed.
My body is my own. 
My time is my own. 
My space is my own. 
Freedom.

While you are sleeping,
All your needs are met.
For now. 
Relief. 
Not being needed.
Confusion.
I am not needed.
I am lost, untethered.
Who am I, when I’m not needed?
What do I do, when I’m not needed?
Lost.

I look at you again, 
While you are sleeping,
Peaceful.
I feel our connection.
You are the seed of my soul,
Life of my body.
I am here to protect you, 
Guide you.
I feel the enormity of the role I now live,
Feel myself filling that space and overflowing,
Expanding to be more than I am. 

While you are sleeping,
I have space, time, energy,
To care for myself. 
To care for our space. 
To rest and recharge, 
So I am ready 
For when you awake.

Over the course of the last year my identity as a human and as a parent has shifted a number of times. My relationship to myself and my child has changed, morphed, adapted. This is reflected in the different experiences that are brought out by the same activity of watching my baby sleep. The collection of experiences I describe in the poem happened over the span of our first year together. They aren’t necessarily presented in chronological order but are more of an overall impression of what I can and have experienced or thought about while watching my baby sleep. I hope some or all of it resonated with you.

If you would like to share your own experiences of what it feels like to watch your baby sleep, or another type of activity that gives you similar types of emotions and experiences, leave a comment below or send me an email. I’d love to hear from you!

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How I Respond When Strangers Gender My Child

MAKING DECISIONS ABOUT MY CHILD’S GENDER PRESENTATION

When we’re going out for a walk, to a park, or to a grocery store, I have to decide what my child is going to wear. When I choose my own clothes, it is often based on gender related factors – dysphoria and euphoria, how I want my gender to be viewed by others, safety – and of course, the weather. But my goal is to provide my child with a wide variety of gender related experiences. This includes styles and colours of clothing.

Sometimes I’ll pick a well coordinated cute outfit that looks cute because it all matches and not care about the gendered component. Sometimes I’ll specifically pick an outfit that is white and pink and purple and teal. Sometimes I’ll pick clothes that are red and black and navy blue. More often, I’ll pick a mix of things – a pink top with navy blue pants and red dinosaur socks. Or a blue and yellow striped top, jeans, and pink unicorn socks.

I try to pick clothes based on what I like and the experience I want to give my child. But I am also aware that the clothes my child is wearing is the main way strangers will determine my child’s gender. Other than their clothes and accessories (hair clips, bows, toys, lunchbox, backpack, etc) children appear fairly gender neutral. I have fun using my child’s clothing to test and/or mess with strangers’ perceptions of my child’s gender (or really, since they haven’t developed a gender identity yet, their sex).

THE DREADED QUESTION

Some strangers are bold enough to ask if my child is a boy or a girl. I know this is often coming from a place of wanting to be respectful during our interaction and use the correct pronouns.

I hate this question.

As a nonbinary person, I find it frustrating, othering, and triggering. It often makes me freeze. I am stuck between the place of wanting to educate/counteract the stranger’s binary assumptions, honour our experiences as a gender creative family, and avoid conflict by providing an easy answer.

I would love to say “It doesn’t matter. Any pronouns are fine.” Of the many times I have been posed this question, I have only been able to make myself use this answer a couple times. Most often, I cave and say the gender that matches my child’s sex assigned at birth. I hate that my child hears me assign them a gender in answer to this question. This factor will become more important to me as my child gets older and may help me stick with my preferred, open ended answer.

But what if they don’t ask? What if they assume? That’s where it gets interesting.

WHEN STRANGERS ASSIGN MY CHILD A GENDER

Because of how I dress my child, and possibly because they have thick curly/wavy light brown/blonde hair, strangers choose to refer to my child as a girl or a boy in approximately equal amounts. I find this fascinating.

What’s even more interesting is that the gender they choose to assign my child doesn’t always match the societal gender norms based on the clothes I chose that day. I’ve had people assume my child is a girl when they’re wearing black, blue, and red. Less often, but still once or twice, I’ve had strangers assume my child is a boy when they’re wearing white, pink, and purple with lace or ruffles.

In no way do I think that certain colours or clothing styles are ‘girl’ clothes or ‘boy’ clothes. In fact, my whole parenting strategy around clothes and gender is an attempt to teach my child that this is not the case. But I am very much aware that people use these as gender related signals.

So when strangers assign my child a gender, what does that say about my child, or my decisions around what they wear? Absolutely nothing. It is a reflection of the stranger’s biases, stereotypes, and assumptions. Some people heavily gender strangers based on their clothing. Some people gender strangers based on their hair style or facial features, or any other numerous factors.

The funny thing to me is that the majority of these ‘gendered’ signals aren’t present in babies and young children. Yet the majority of people still look for them and make an assumption based on the limited information the parents have given them via the child’s clothing, hairstyle, and accessories. The need to assign a gender is so strong that most people will try to do it despite having limited and even conflicting information. The alternative – to not know a child’s gender – is so far outside their awareness as being an option that their brain doesn’t even consider it as a fallback plan.

TO CORRECT THEM OR NOT, THAT IS THE QUESTION

When strangers gender my child using pronouns that are associated with their sex assigned at birth, I usually go with it. This is how our child is most often gendered at home and at daycare. We are trying to provide gendered experiences from a wide range regardless of their sex assignment but we have still chosen to use binary gendered pronouns for the most part. As stated above, I often dress my child in a variety of colours and styles of clothing so I usually find it interesting and wonder what about my child’s presentation lead them in that direction.

When strangers gender my child using the binary pronouns that are not typically associated with their sex assigned at birth, more thoughts go through my head. I still find it interesting and wonder what lead them to that assumption. Then I wonder ‘Should I correct them?’ If I do, this will challenge the stranger’s connections between my child’s presentation and their gender. But it will also model to my child that their gender is supposed to match their sex assigned at birth. This is a transphobic belief and not one I want to reinforce for my child. If I don’t correct them, the stranger gets to keep their assumptions around presentation and gender in tact (unfortunately) but my child gets a more gender expansive experience of getting to see how it feels being referred to using different pronouns.

So far, I err on the side of ‘go with the flow’, avoid conflict, and provide my child with a more interesting gender experience. After all, my child’s experience is more important than expanding a stranger’s mind. However, as soon as my child expresses awareness of their own gender and a preference for a particular set of pronouns and language, I will be happily correcting strangers whenever they get it wrong.

How do you respond when someone genders your child, correctly or incorrectly? What tthoughts go through your head when deciding how to respond?

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When You Get It Wrong: How to Correct Yourself and Others When it Comes to Trans Identities

WHEN YOU MISGENDER SOMEONE

Even I, a nonbinary person with a trans husband, sometimes get people’s pronouns or preferred language wrong. Our brains are used to holding onto stereotypes and first impressions as shortcuts. It takes conscious effort to change how we perceive people and the language we are using for them. So, when someone you know comes out as trans or nonbinary, or simply asks you not to use certain language when referring to them, you will likely get it wrong at some point.

When you get it wrong, correct yourself and move on.

Do not apologize, especially not repeatedly or profusely. By apologizing, you are putting the focus on you and the mistake you made and forcing the trans person into the socially conventional role of either thanking you for the apology or excusing the original mistake, neither of which is acceptable.

The more you apologize, the more you are emphasizing the mistake in your brain. Repeating what you said with the correct pronouns, name, or other language is necessary to cement the correct version in your brain. The more you de-emphasize the mistake and emphasize the correct version, the faster your brain will adapt and stop making mistakes in the first place.

If someone else corrects you, say ‘thank you’ (not ‘sorry’), repeat it correctly, and move on.

Sometimes we are talking without hearing what we are actually saying and someone else hears the mistake for us. If the person you misgendered doesn’t correct you, it’s not because ‘it’s fine’ or they didn’t notice. Trust me, they did. It’s more likely that they don’t want to draw attention to the mistake, to themselves, or don’t have the energy to correct you and everyone else around them every time they are misgendered.

If the trans person or someone else catches your mistake and corrects you, that’s a good thing! That means that the culture of the place you are in or the relationship you have is one of support, openness, and inclusion. Respond to the mistake in a way that upholds this culture. Thank them for making the effort to bring your mistake to your attention, even though it meant going against social convention and interrupting the conversation. Correct yourself by repeating what you said with the correct language. And then move on by continuing with the conversation.

WHEN SOMEONE ELSE MISGENDERES SOMEONE

If people around you are making mistakes, make sure to correct them if you feel it is safe to do so. It is often easier to hear when other people make mistakes than when we do it ourselves. The more you correct someone else, the more you are emphasizing the correct version to yourself and others. You can correct others by interrupting them and stating the correct pronoun/name/language, by repeating what they said but using the correct pronoun/name/language, or by continuing on with the conversation, ensuring to use the correct pronoun/name/language with added emphasis.

If you know the person they misgendered personally, and especially if that person is often present when this misgendering occurs, consider asking them how they want you to respond in these situations. Depending on the relationships involved, they may prefer you don’t correct certain people in favour of preserving a tenuous connection. Or they may not feel comfortable correcting people themself but would really appreciate if you do it on their behalf. It may depend on who else is around or what context you’re in. Sometimes they don’t know yet and it takes some trial and error. You can always check back with them later to confirm or clarify their preferences.

WHAT IF THE PERSON THEY MISGENDERED WILL NEVER KNOW?

Let’s say you’re at a business meeting where a colleague is referring to a previous client who was trans. Or you’re a health care professional at a complex case discussion and someone brings up a case with a trans patient. Or you’re at a family gathering and your uncle refers to a celebrity who is trans. Now let’s say this colleague or family member uses transphobic or ignorant language when referring to the trans person.

What do you do?

You have three options:

  1. Correct them in the moment
  2. Correct them later, in private
  3. Don’t correct them at all

How you decide is important. If you would pick option 1 if there are trans people present who would be directly affected by their comments, and option 2 or 3 if there were no trans people present at the time, I take issue with this. You are assuming that you would know or be able to tell if there are trans people present. This means you are assuming that either trans people are recognizable by how they look (false), or that, because you are an ally, anyone who is trans or questioning would have told you (also false). It also means that you are assuming that if you don’t know of any trans people in the room, everyone must be cis. You are using cisgender as the baseline until proven otherwise rather than keeping an open mind.

I would prefer if you decide based on safety and energy. If you were to correct them in the moment, would it put you at risk, create a much bigger argument that would lead to significantly more transphobia rather than less, or use more energy than you personally have at this time? If any of these are true for you, then pick option 2 or 3, using the same questions to decide. If none of these are true for you, please choose option 1. You never know who in the room needs to hear the correction, either for themself, someone they love, or someone they will interact with in the near future.

Let’s look at each of these options in more detail.

Option 1: Correct them in the moment

This takes practice. The first few times someone says something transphobic in front of you it will be gone and the conversation will have moved on before your brain clicks in and says hey, that’s not right. If you are socially confident, you might be able to interrupt the conversation to make the correction. If not, it will take some planning and repetition.

Make note of phrases that you’ve encountered and what the correct phrase would be or what assumption needs to be corrected. Plan a one sentence correction that you could say. Also plan an interjection to use to get the attention of the people in the conversation first. There’s no point in making a correction if no one hears it. Something like “Excuse me, I heard you say something that I don’t think is right” works well.

The goal isn’t to create a debate around language use and trans issues. It’s to correct how they are referring to a person or using terminology in this context and continue the conversation. So keep your corrections relevant to the topic at hand, using examples specific to the current conversation.

This option takes significant confidence and energy, even if you aren’t a trans person. But it gets easier with practice. It also takes some quick calculations about what the social environment is, how the people in the room are likely to respond to your correction, and whether you have sufficient social capital to be heard. This is a small scale example of the types of calculations that trans people make all day long. It’s part of what it means to be an ally.

Option 2: Correct them later, in private

If, for whatever reason, option 1 isn’t going to be good for you or potential trans people in the room, or the moment passed and you didn’t recognize it or decide what to do about it until later, option 2 is the next best. You have time to think about what you want to say, gather some resources that might be helpful, and pick an appropriate time when they might be more receptive and/or you feel safer or more capable of making a good impact.

This can be a face to face conversation, a text, a phone call, or an email. Sometimes it’s best to have it in writing, sometimes not. You could also consider having backup included in the conversation if necessary – either someone else who was in the room, a supervisor, or an inclusion and diversity rep if one exists in your setting. You can make sure they go with you for the conversation or add them to the email, even privately if necessary.

The important part is that you take action. If the person who made the mistake is receptive, you will be supporting them in making a positive change and providing useful resources. If they aren’t receptive, you are safer and know that you’ll have to take it to the next level should this issue come up again.

The major drawbacks of this option are that the other people in the room didn’t hear the correction so a) they may not recognize that what was said was wrong, b) they may not know what should have been said instead even if they know it was wrong, and c) any trans, nonbinary, or questioning people in the room don’t know you are an ally. So, if you choose option 2, consider other things you can do to address these aspects as well.

Option 3: Don’t correct them at all

This is the least useful option but is also the safest. Only pick this option if you have no other choice. But, if you do have to pick this option, consider other ways you can get information out to the people around you about common errors or assumptions about trans people and corrections/accurate information. Because if you didn’t correct them, and no one else did, it’s not only the person that made the mistake that needs the information but everyone else who was present and didn’t say anything either.

I hope this helps you feel more prepared and more comfortable with correcting yourself and others instead of letting mistakes slide. Leave a comment below with your experiences of correcting yourself or others and any other tips or suggestions you have.

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From Baby to Toddler: First Birthday and First Anniversary of Birthing

MILESTONES VS ANNIVERSARIES

Milestones are typically cumulative: one leads to the next and to the next, either in number (as with birthdays) or in skill level (as with motor development). Anniversaries, on the other hand, are a remembering of a singular event. Milestones feel like an accomplishment, a moving forward. Anniversaries feel like pausing and looking back, to see how far we’ve come.

The first birthday of my child was a strange mix of both. Their first birthday: a huge milestone, and hopefully the first of many birthdays to come. The one-year anniversary of their birth: this time last year I was in labour for four days, having an experience unlike any other in my life.

The birthday celebration feels very external – it’s about the baby, how much they’ve changed and grown in one year (so much!) and celebrating with family. The anniversary of birthing feels very internal and personal. It’s an experience I went through with my husband that we have only shared with a couple people.

So how are you supposed to celebrate these two highly interconnected experiences that are so wildly different?

FIRST BIRTHDAY: IS IT REALLY THAT IMPORTANT?

For most birthdays, it’s all about the person who’s birthday it is. But for a child’s first birthday, they don’t really understand what’s happening, don’t have any expectations of what a birthday is, and won’t be disappointed if it is skipped altogether. So why bother with all the fuss?

For the parents of course! Getting through the first year of your child’s life is a huge accomplishment. Whether it felt easy or hard, take this excuse to celebrate!

We initially didn’t really care about having a party. Everyone was busy, I was navigating the end of parental leave and returning to work, and our kid was just starting daycare and was exhausted. But we knew we would feel disappointed if we didn’t. So we made it work. We had a small family gathering outdoors and our baby got to try cake for the first time. It was nothing extravagent but it was definitely important.

Our baby is now officially a toddler (but that doesn’t mean I’m going to stop calling them my baby).

REMEMBERING THE BIRTHING PROCESS

In the days leading up to my baby’s first birthday, I was tracking what was happening the year before. A year ago at this time I was just starting labour. A year ago at this time we were talking to the midwife for the second day in a row. A year ago at this time things were getting pretty intense and I was already exhausted. A year ago at this time we were heading to the hospital. A year ago at this time we were holding our baby for the first time.

I had a long slow labour. This remembering, therefore, spans the three days prior to my baby’s birthday as well as the birthday itself. At the same time as wanting to remember these experiences, life was continuing on. I was at work one of those days. We were doing two hour daycare visits on two of those days. My husband was working for three of those days and we didn’t have much time to reminisce together. So sometimes, something important had happened the year prior, but the moment had already passed by the time I had the awareness to remember.

It felt like I was doing the experience and myself a disservice by missing these key moments. But really, no one around me knew or cared. It was just for myself and therefore I can decide how and when I remember them. Not remembering them at that exact moment a year later doesn’t mean they didn’t happen, that I’ve forgotten about them, or that I’m ignoring the impact they had. It just means that it was one experience, a moment in time, and I am continuing to live my life beyond that moment.

I definitely want to find a way to commemorate this experience more concretely next year. I want to include my husband, and potentially even my child, in my remembering process. I want to build a tradition.

BUILDING TRADITIONS

Traditions are important. They are used to mark milestones (such as having a birthday celebration) and anniversaries (such as going on a date or exchanging gifts on your wedding anniversary). Because of this, a tradition can tie these two wildly different connected experiences toogether.

For me, a tradition around my birthing experience would involve some recognition of the intensity and endurance involved in that experience. It would be a remembering and celebrating of what my body was and is capable of and the role my husband played in supporting me through that process. This year, I did this mostly on my own, internally, with a bit of sharing with my husband.

A tradition around my child’s birthday would be pretty typical – the cake and candles, the presents, and the family gathering. I also want to include a reflection on the past year – some of my child’s, and our family’s, important experiences, challenges, and achievements. This year, we had a family party with cake (no candles because fire and one-year-olds is a dangerous combination), and my husband and I did a quiet re-reading of our monthly baby journal entries and a look back through our pictures and videos.

One way we could combine these experiences in the future is with a candle. I would light the candle on the anniversary of when my labour started, each of the next few evenings we would share some memories of the labour experience and the past year of our child’s life, and on their birthday we would light the candles on their birthday cake (or cupcake if the actual party is on a different day) using the same candle. My labour candle lights my child’s birthday candles. It has the symbolism and recognition I’m looking for.

Maybe next year I’ll write another post describing what we actually end up doing. Until then, let me know what your experience of your child’s first birthday was. How do you comemorate your labour and birthing experience?

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From Baby to Toddler: The End of Parental Leave and Start of Daycare

In Canada, where I live, we have a year long parental leave. It was amazing to get to spend the majority of my time with my baby for their entire first year of life. This is the time we lay the groundwork for the bond we will have from then on.

Life took on a completely different pattern when I was on parental leave. It had a narrow focus that required me to develop a wide range of new skills. It felt like my ‘normal’ life was put on pause for a year while I did this new ‘caring for my baby’ thing. It was like stepping sideways onto a completely different track of my life. The weird part was not knowing how these two tracks would merge at the end of the year.

PARENTAL LEAVE IN A PANDEMIC

Parental leave can feel isolating – you are away from all your work related friends, spending most of your time at home caring the your new baby. The friends you used to hang out with may or may not be interested in hanging out with you and your baby. You may find those friends are no longer the type of support you need. Or you no longer seem to have much in common now that your focus has shifted. At times being on leave with a new baby did feel isolating. But, being an introvert, I think it didn’t bother me as much as it would some people.

My parental leave overlapped entirely with the global COVID-19 pandemic. This meant that everyone, not just me, was feeling isolated. As a result, I felt less alone in the experience. There was lots of media attention given to the emotional effects of isolation and the development of internet based communication systems. Many social groups were adapted to online platforms. This gave me access to support networks that I would not have had otherwise. Many of these were local groups in the US that I could now access over zoom.

So, overall, despite the general isolation of being at home with a baby, reinforced by the pandemic, I ended up feeling less isolated than I would have otherwise. But the contact I had was with a completely different set of people than those in my previous life. So when my leave finished and I went back to work, very few people had seen or heard from me in a year. And everyone wanted to know how my baby and I were doing.

REINTEGRATING WITH THE WORLD

The end of parental leave is like pushing our way out of our family cocoon (reinforced by the pandemic-induced isolation) and re-entering the world, now as a family of three. Or, to continue with the same metaphor as above, it feels like trying to merge two tracks that are wildly different. It feels vulnerable and shaky.

Some of this shakiness is logistical – we can no longer simply get ready for work and leave, come home and make dinner, hang out and go to bed. One of us has to get our kid ready for their day and feed them, drop our kid off at daycare, pick them up, and then do all the things in the evening we’ve been doing the past year. In this way, the tracks don’t so much merge as we shift back and forth between them throughout the day – the family/childcare track and the work track. These compenents are easy to predict and plan in advance, even if they feel a bit overwhelming at the start.

The parts that are more shaky are how our family is perceived and how to be as authentic as possible without spending more energy than we have. How to manage the impact of attending daycare (more on this below). How to stay focused on our non-baby related tasks when we’ve been so used to focusing the majority of our attention and time on our baby. These are the more nebulous emotional things that we will have to navigate or learn as we go.

Reintegrating with the world is also socially overwhelming. I went from having limited social contact, especially with the pandemic, to seeing all my work colleagues again. I was answering the same questions over and over. Inevitably, one of those questions was ‘remind me again, did you have a boy or a girl?’ I know it’s just small talk and people wanting to connect but it throws all the societal assumptions about gender that I’ve been happily avoiding this past year in my face.

I have to re-learn how to let the dysphoria enducing comments and situations roll of my back and leave the irritation from these situations at work as much as possible. Having a fun, cute baby to come home to definitely helps.

STARTING DAYCARE

After spending almost every day together, having my baby spend five of seven days at daycare feels like there will be monumental distance between us. I feel like I will miss important steps in their development. Or miss enough of the little incremental developments so that when they show a new skill or level of understanding, it will come as a surprise. It will feel sudden. I will feel like they are growing too fast for me to keep up.

Maybe this is true. But maybe, if I spend dedicated play time with them during the times we do spend together (early mornings, evenings, and weekends), it will be enough time to see these small shifts. It’s not like they’ll be at daycare 24/7 afterall.

So far, our daycare experience has gone well. We found a daycare we were comfortable with that had a spot available when we needed it. We did a couple two hour visits to get my child familiar with the environment and staff while still having me as a safety net. On the second visit I left for an hour which did not phase my child in the least.

In the first full days of daycare, we dropped them off as late in the morning as we could and picked them up as early as our work schedules would allow. Even with these shortened days, our baby was exhausted. They have been napping on the way to daycare and after coming home in addition to the midday nap they get at daycare. As long as we give them these times to sleep, they seem to be doing ok.

My baby is definitely aware of spending less time with us. They need a lot more time being held, especially in the morning and after naps. They dislike spending as much time as they used to in the stroller or carseat where they can’t see or interact with us (though this could also be related to their increasing independence). Since I also need more cuddle time with my baby, so far I am ok with this.

BALANCING RISK AND REWARD

When we first decided daycare was the best option, we weighed the pros and cons of each option available to us. But just because we settled on full time daycare doesn’t mean we don’t have to continue to be aware of the risks and rewards. Knowing the risks will help us mitigate them or adjust for them. Knowing the rewards will help us get the most benefit from it. So here are a few of the risks and rewards we are noticing:

Risks associated with daycare

  • COVID exposure risk – no masks, lots of adults and kids in a small space (we wear masks any time we go in)
  • Considerably less bonding time
  • Less control over our child’s schedule to give them what they need (mostly in terms of sleep)
  • Financial risk due to high cost

Rewards associated with daycare

  • Exposure to more germs leads to a stronger immune system
  • Socialization
  • More guided activities and resources
  • More personal freedom for work/school

How do our experiences reintegrating with the world and starting daycare compare to yours? I imagine if you are in a country that only has six weeks of paid parental leave and you had to return to work at that time your experiences would be wildly different. Please share in the comments below!

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From Baby to Toddler: The End of Bottle Feeding

WHY BOTTLE FEEDING?

If you’ve been following along with our journey, you’ll know that we have been bottle feeding our baby since they were two weeks old. This is because of issues with lactation and dysphoria. As soon as we tried bottles, it was night and day. It just worked so much better for us.

Generally, bottle feeding is treated as a stand-in or substitute for the more preferred nursing/body-feeding. I don’t think this is fair. In our case, I was able to be much more present and engaged in the activity of feeding my baby when feeding from a bottle than feeding from my body. I actually enjoyed holding them close and snuggling as they ate. So as far as I’m concerned, whatever feeding method allows your baby to be fed the calories they need in a safe way and allows you to connect with them as much as possible is the best way to feed your baby.

So, because we’ve been bottle feeding since two weeks old, we’ve had a pretty solid routine of mixing formula, heating bottles, feeding and cuddling our baby 3-4 times per day, and steralizing/washing the bottles and nipples. Even after we started giving solid foods, they continued to drink the majority of their bottles. This started to change around ten months.

THE END IS NIGH

As our baby got better at eating solid foods, we started offering solids more often. We started with only at lunch time, then added dinner time, then added breakfast, and now have 3-5 times they will eat depending on what is happening. At about ten months, they started to drink less and less of the formula in the bottles. So we cut down from four bottles a day to three. We had to try this a few times before it actually worked without them getting too hungry.

Then, as we increased the number of solid food meals we were offering, we just ran out of time in the day to offer as many bottles. Our baby was also too interested in playing and cruising to want to sit still to drink from the bottle. So, for a little while, we offered formula in a sippy-cup style bottle with a straw. They drank way more from that than when they were forced to sit still and drink from a baby bottle. It worked great as a transition from three bottles to two.

Then the bottle at the end of the day, after dinner, was becoming more and more of a struggle. Our baby would either be too tired, too full from dinner, or too active to want to sit still and drink. So we did the same thing – put some formula in a sippy cup that they could drink from on the go if they wanted, or not, as they chose. And more often than not, was left mostly untouched. So, rather suddenly, we were down to only one bottle per day – first thing in the morning.

As they turn one year old, this is where we’re at. They are doing great getting calories from solid foods and cows milk during the day, and have one bottle of formula, and the cuddles that go with it, first thing in the morning. How long will this last? Who knows. But getting here from a solid four bottles a day was a pretty smooth and steady process.

FOLLOWING MY BABY’S LEAD

The biggest thing throughout this transition from bottle feeding to eating primarily solids was following my baby’s lead. Some of the signs we noticed along the way that told us they were ready for the next step were:

  • Eating less from each bottle
  • Getting antsy while drinking from a bottle and giving up on it in favour of playing
  • Preferring to drink from the bottle while on the go instead of while cuddling
  • Doing well drinking water independently from a straw cup with handles
  • Doing well consuming solid foods multiples times a day

Some of the signs that we were progressing too fast for them were:

  • Being too hungry to focus on the newer skill of eating solid foods
  • Getting cranky in the later afternoon before it was time for dinner despite having good sleep
  • Drinking everything from every bottle we offered when they had not been finishing bottles for a while before we made the latest change

Most of the signs they were ready to progress were around skill acquisition and independence. Most of the signs that we were going too fast were aroung hunger. We never really noticed signs related to needing more cuddle time to make up for the loss of cuddle time as they were having fewer bottles. Maybe this is because we were still spending the majority of the time with them (as I was still on parental leave). Perhaps if they had been starting daycare at the same time this would have been a factor.

WHY DOES IT MATTER?

Just because my baby didn’t seem to be concerned by the decrease in cuddle time as they had fewer bottles didn’t mean it didn’t matter to me. I noticed it. Each time I feed them a bottle in the morning and they snuggle in my lap and hold onto my finger or touch my face, it resonates with all the memories of the other times we have done this. The late night times, the right-before-nap times, the out-at-the-park times. These memories around feeding my baby are visceral and strong and one of the main threads through the first year of their life – our entire existence together so far.

What will it be like when we no longer have that first bottle in the morning to bring those memories and emotions to the surface? What will we find as a substitute? I don’t know yet because we’re not quite there but I can tell you that, as much as I try to stay in the moment and not grieve in advance, I am already grieving the end of those feeding time cuddles.

On the other side, seeing them independently use a toddler cup and be in control of when they want some, how much they have, and hand it back to us when they’re done is so rewarding. This type of independence is a big part of feeling like my baby is becoming a toddler.

So, we will keep giving our baby a bottle first thing in the morning for as long as they want to have it. When we finish the formula we have, we will offer warm cows milk instead. Because sometimes it’s not what you’re feeding your baby that’s important, but the time you spend with them while you feed them.

Maybe by the time they give up that last bottle, family meal times will feel just as special as those cuddles in the rocking chair.

Where are you at in your feeding journey? What was your transition from nursing/body/bottle feeding to solids like? What emotions did it bring up along the way? Share your experiences in the comments!

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