Personal – Page 5 – Purple and Green and the Life in Between

Gender Experiments: Wearing a Dress

Yesterday, I tried on a dress for the first time since high school prom. I’d been thinking about doing this for a while. I had a dress in my closet that my sister had given me that I really liked the look of but had never tried on (sorry sis). It is navy blue with a pleated knee length skirt that looks like a kilt, wide shoulder straps, and a high round neck. I was listening to a podcast about drag performers and how liberating it can be to wear clothes that allow you to feel the full spectrum of your gender. So, when I was feeling the most female I have in a couple months, I drummed up the courage and did it.

I had so much fear about what I would look like and how it would make me feel. I worried that it would make me super dysphoric and dissociate from my body. I had this irrational image of myself with long hair and a dress and makeup as if just simply putting on a dress would suddenly transform me into the most feminine version of myself.

I took steps to mitigate any dysphoria that might happen. I wore sweatpants while I was putting it on. I had my black leather bomber jacket to wear over top. I had a chainmaille necklace that is my most masculine piece of jewelry to put on. And I planned to do a workout afterwards to reconnect with my body if necessary.

I’m glad I took all those precautions but as it turned out, I didn’t really need them. I put on the dress in a room with no mirrors. I didn’t burst into flames or tears. I didn’t dissociate from my body. I took off the sweatpants and moved around a bit, feeling the skirt against my legs. That was the weirdest part – the bare legs. I rarely even wear shorts in the summer so that was a strange feeling for more than just gender reasons. I put on my chainmaille necklace, put on my leather jacket, and stepped out into the hall to look in a mirror.

The person I saw in the mirror still looked like me. I still had short hair and hairy legs and broad shoulders. I had a strange mix of relief, intrigue, and discomfort. I took a few pictures, then tried it without the jacket. Still ok. I played around with the look a bit, then took it off and returned it to the closet and put my sweatpants and hoodie back on.

These types of experiments are emotional labour. They take work. This type of thing comes easier to some people than others. At this point in my gender journey I am much more comfortable exploring in the masculine direction than the feminine one so this was a big step for me. To see myself in a dress and still feel authentic, non-binary, genderqueer, was very affirming. It tells me that I am much more secure in my identity than I was eight months ago.

This gives me hope for even more difficult things in the future, like being pregnant. If I still look like myself while wearing a dress, maybe I will still look and feel like myself when I’m pregnant.

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What experiments have you tried when exploring your gender? What types of self-care do you find useful when doing these experiments? What have you been thinking about trying but haven’t found the courage to do yet? Let me know in the comments!

Educating Others Without Compromising Your Boundaries

Sometimes those of us with experience and knowledge of trans related topics want to help educate those around us and sometimes we don’t. And that’s ok. You should never feel like you have to compromise your own mental health for the sake of addressing someone else’s ignorance. But how do you politely tell people to bugger off and educate themselves through other means? And when you are comfortable having some of those conversations, how do you know what you’re comfortable sharing and what you’re not? How do you make them aware of your boundaries without derailing the conversation or damaging your relationship with that person?

Throughout my husband’s transition and my own gender explorations I have had many different conversations with many different types of people about gender and trans related topics. Many times towards the beginning of this process I was already knee deep in a conversation before I realized that I was well past the line that this person shouldn’t have crossed. I am a very open person and I am often comfortable sharing much more personal information with others than most people are so I wasn’t personally uncomfortable with the content. What concerned me more, and often only in retrospect, was that the person I was talking to had no awareness of which questions were appropriate and which ones they should have asked special permission for (and respected my response if I said no). If you have people in your life that have a similar lack of understanding of what is appropriate to ask about or say, see my post How to Interact Respectfully with a Trans Person, or, better yet, send that person the link.

How far do you go before you recommend resources and leave the conversation? That is completely up to you. Everyone will have different boundaries relating to their privacy depending on the type of information, their relationship to the other person/people in the conversation, and the setting where the conversation is taking place. Boundaries are healthy. They are self-protective. The more experiences we have that are threatening, the more self-protective we are likely to become.

The problem comes when you don’t know where your own boundaries are until they have been crossed. This can make you vulnerable, defensive, antagonistic, and can even put your safety at risk. Often, the other person/people in the conversation don’t even know they have crossed a line. Your sudden change in manner can be a shock to them and even to yourself.

How do you avoid this? Think about your boundaries in advance. Below are some guiding questions to get you started. I recommend you add to it any time you get asked a question that triggers a warning bell in your head. Revisit this exercise every few months, when you are nearing a major transition related event, or when you’re going to be interacting with people you haven’t seen in a while (family gatherings). For each question, try to answer it for a variety of different people in your life – a co-worker, a friend, a parent, your doctor, another member of the trans community, etc.

General Info: Are you comfortable…

disclosing your birth name?
explaining why you prefer the pronouns you use?
talking about your experiences of dysphoria?
talking about specific strategies you use to change your appearance or presentation (binding, packing, tucking, padding, etc)?
talking about how supportive your family, significant other, or other people in your life are?
talking about what support groups you attend/are a part of?
talking about wait times, difficulties finding a trans friendly family doctor, and other systemic barriers?

Medical Info: Are you comfortable…

talking about medication you are on related to transitioning?
talking about changes you are experiencing as a result of those medications?
disclosing what surgeries/surgery you are interested in having/have had?

Legal Info: Are you comfortable…

talking about legal documentation changes?
discussing transphobic politics and policies?

This is by no means an exhaustive list of topics that might come up related to your own or your partner’s transition or gender identity. If your partner is the one who’s information you would be sharing, go through this list with them so they can tell you what they are comfortable with you sharing with people in your life. My husband is typically a fairly private person (at least compared to me), but often had much looser boundaries when it came to me sharing info with my coworkers or friends if they were people that he was unlikely to interact with.

Now that you know your boundaries, what do you do or say when someone asks something that you are not comfortable talking about? Try saying exactly that – “Sorry, that isn’t something I’m comfortable talking about with you.” Another phrase I use a lot (because there is rarely something I’m actually not comfortable talking about with someone) is “That is not actually something you should typically ask about a trans person.” They usually respond with “Oh, really? I had no idea.” You can also add phrases such as “Thank you for your concern” or “Thanks for trying to learn more about my experiences/trans issues” or “If you want to learn more about that I would recommend [appropriate resource].”

So whose responsibility is it to do the educating? I believe that no amount of reading on the internet can substitute for face to face conversation and personal anecdotes. But that doesn’t mean that it is always up to the minority to educate the majority. People from or connected to the trans community should not be responsible for providing all necessary information to everyone around them (especially medical professionals). That would be more than exhausting. But you will need to provide the people in your life with enough information to get them from unconsciously ignorant to consciously ignorant and explain how important it is that they educate themselves further. It will also help if you can provide them with specific resources that speak to you. They are much more likely to absorb the information they are getting from other sources if they are confident that it is relevant to your experience.

What other topics or questions would you add to the list? How do your boundaries change depending on your situation or the person you’re talking to? What phrases do you use to identify your boundaries to other people? Was there a situation where you shared something that you realized in retrospect had crossed your personal boundary? Tell me what happened in the comments below!

They/Them Pronouns

Pleural vs Singular, General vs Specific

They/them pronouns are typically seen as a plural pronoun because that is how we use it consciously. But unconsciously, we use it all the time when referring to a single person who’s gender is unknown. In this case, it is an umbrella term that is a stand in for the appropriate pronouns instead of saying he/she all the time. However, some people who don’t identify strictly as male or female may prefer they/them pronouns. In this case, it is a specific identifier, just like he and she.

If it is confusing for you to think of the same word having both a specific meaning and be an umbrella term, think of how we use the word Kleenex. Kleenex is a specific brand of facial tissue but most of the time, when we ask for a Kleenex, we are asking for whatever facial tissue is available.

It is the same with they/them pronouns. Most of the time, neutral pronouns are used as a stand-in or umbrella term to indicate a person regardless of their gender. But, occasionally, and this will be happening more and more, we are using it to identify a specific non-binary person. And having both uses for the same word is ok.

Sticking Points

When we use they/them as an umbrella term it is still the assumption that the person’s gender will be clarified to either be male or female. I’m hoping this will change as non-binary visibility and acceptance improves. If, in fact, their gender gets clarified to indeed be non-binary, it just means that you’ve been gendering them correctly the whole time and don’t need to change your pronoun usage, though the meaning will shift from an umbrella term to a specific pronoun.

If this dual meaning and the shift in meaning isn’t apparent to some people, they can be left with a sense of unfamiliarity when using they/them pronouns, as though they are using an umbrella term to refer to a specific person. They feel vaguely like they are waiting for more information about the person in order to clarify their gender, or that people who use they/them pronouns must have a vague gender identity.

Indeed, non-binary is an umbrella term as well. People of many different types of gender identities may choose to use they/them pronouns. But this doesn’t mean that their own sense of their gender is vague (see my post on How I Conceptualize Non-Binary Genders). They may choose to use non-binary as a label for ease of communication but have other labels that are more representative (for example, see The Labels I Use and Why for my personal explanation of this).

Some people feel like singular they pronouns are difficult to use or don’t feel right because they feel like they are calling a single person a plural pronoun. Again, this is just a misunderstanding of how we use they/them pronouns in everyday language. They are recognizing the conscious plural use but not realizing that they unconsciously use it in the singular form all the time. In my experience this just takes practice. Once you’ve heard people being referred to by neutral pronouns it makes sense.

How to Learn to Use They/Them Pronouns

Learning to use new pronouns, especially neutral ones, can be difficult. I have a few tricks.

Put the pronouns next to their name in your phone
Anytime you think of that person, say their name followed by their pronouns in your head 5 times
Work to change your mental image of the person to match their identity and their image of themselves so that it overrides your previous view of them (and potentially their physical presentation) and the correct pronouns are more likely to come out first
Hang out with people that are at least trying to use the correct pronouns
Be open to being corrected and get used to gently correcting others. Set ground rules that you will correct each other as needed (I am still terrible at this).

Do you use they/them pronouns or know someone who does? What was the process like for you in getting used to using they/them or teaching other people how to? Do you have any other tricks or ways of explaining it that have helped? Leave a comment below!!

6 Months of Self-Discovery

What I Knew at the Beginning

I have both male and female gender
I am more comfortable presenting gender neutral, tomboy, or androgynous
I’m pretty sure I experience dysphoria but I’m not sure what triggers it or what to do about it
Having my husband transition has given me the language and permission to explore my identity and has increased my discomfort at being perceived more feminine due to heteronormativity

Fears I Had

My dysphoria/discomfort would increase the more I focused on it.
I would discover that to be truly happy/whole I would need to use neutral pronouns and name and society wouldn’t be able to accommodate that.
That I would end up less comfortable than I was before starting this process.
That if I get to the point where I have to explain being non-binary to my family they would not understand.
That I would have to change jobs in order to feel comfortable.

Goals of Self Discovery

Identify how much my gender fluctuates.
Identify specific triggers of dysphoria and develop strategies to manage it on a daily basis.
Improve resilience, reduce fatigue, and generate a sense of wholeness.
Find ways to communicate my identity to others.

6 MONTHS LATER…

What I Know Now

I fluctuate between 50% female to 25% male (0 being equal amounts of each).
I have a significant amount of social dysphoria that is primarily triggered by female labels (ma’am, ladies, girl) and to a lesser extent by female pronouns (she/her).
I have a minimal to moderate amount of physical dysphoria, primarily related to chest and voice.
I am most comfortable when referred to using they/them pronouns and using the name Meaghan Ray (or having equal amount of time being identified as Ray as Meaghan).

Did My Fears Come True?

Yes, some days it feels like my dysphoria does get worse the more I focus on it. But the truth is, it is there regardless and I can either ignore it and have a vague sense of discomfort, frustration, irritability, fatigue, and lack of focus, or I can identify it for what it is, thus increasing my awareness of it but also improving my ability to address it or cope with it.
Yes, in order to live my best life I would prefer neutral pronouns 100% of the time and no, I don’t believe society (or at least my specific workplace) can accommodate that. But I also discovered that I am decently comfortable with female pronouns most days. It’s the other gendered terms that affect me more and that is something I might be able to address in the future.
No, I am definitely more comfortable now than I was before. I have significantly fewer symptoms of burnout and a ton more strategies to deal with bad dysphoria days.
I haven’t gotten to the point of coming out to my family. I have broached the subject in relation to correcting their assumptions about the binary and explaining a friend’s experience but have not discussed my own identity yet. I’m sure I will write a post about it when I do.
Changing jobs may or may not increase my comfort level. But I have become significantly more comfortable without changing jobs so I take that as a win.

Did I Achieve My Goals?

Yes, I very clearly identified how much my gender fluctuates using a chart I created which you can read about here.
Yes. Read about my physical and social dysphoria triggers and my strategies for coping here. One important step was cutting my hair short. Read about my exploration of my gender expression here.
Yes, I have noticed a significant improvement in my resilience and fatigue levels and I’m hoping that these and my sense of wholeness will continue to improve as I come out to more people.
Yes, I have some ways to communicate my identity to others though I am still working on this one.

Still Working On…

Coming out to people slowly, including my family
Introducing myself as Meaghan Ray or just Ray in queer spaces
Managing the physical discomfort that comes from wearing a binder so I can wear it as often as I feel the need to

Looking Ahead

Fears about dysphoria during pregnancy and early motherhood and how to manage it (I’m not pregnant yet but hope to be in the near future)
Being a non-binary parent

What have you learned about yourself in the last 6 months? What fears did you have before starting your own gender exploration process? How has your understanding of your own gender changed since you started to explore it more consciously? Leave a comment below and tell me your story!

Exploring My Gender Expression

I have both a female gender and male gender. This means I am most comfortable expressing my gender in ways that include both female and male components. Neither aspect of my gender is very far from the middle of the spectrum so I personally prefer a more androgynous appearance. Some people may prefer to mix aspects of presentation from the two extremes. If this is what makes them feel comfortable and authentic, I say have at it.

Gender expression is a combination of appearance and behaviour. My purpose for exploring my gender expression was to find a way to express how I feel physically in my body to help decrease physical dysphoria and to present myself in a way that makes my identity more visible to others in order to influence how they see me and interact with me in order to decrease social dysphoria.

Throughout this series of posts I will be referring to different aspects of gender presentation based on their conventional gender category. This does not mean I believe these aspects of presentation ‘belong’ to that gender or should be gendered at all. It’s just a convenient way to discuss and think about presentation since part of the purpose is to affect how others (who typically do prescribe gender categories to aspects of presentation) view us.

I am still exploring my gender expression and will continue to, off and on, for my whole life as I change as a person, but here are some of the aspects I have considered.

APPEARANCE

Clothing

You can do almost anything you want with clothing. You can pick different articles of clothing (skirt or dress, slacks and bowtie), different styles (golf shirt vs blouse, short shorts vs long shorts), and different colours (darker, neutral, or royal colours are typically more masculine, softer lighter colours are typically feminine).

You can combine any of these components in any way, for example a feminine bottom (skirt) with a masculine top (button up shirt and bowtie), or adopt a consistent gender presentation that is similar day to day or wildly different depending on how you feel.

As an AFAB person, my base appearance is more feminine so I am more comfortable when I wear more masculine clothing to balance that out. My sense of gender fluctuates somewhat but stays generally closer to the middle than either end of the spectrum so my clothing doesn’t change a ton.

Body Hair and Head Hair

Body hair, in my North American culture, is generally viewed as more masculine. This includes leg hair and underarm hair. At some point in my early to mid teens I tried shaving my legs. Not only was having to shave annoying but it felt uncomfortable to me so I stopped. I can now identify the discomfort I felt as relating to gender. This was a mild component of dysphoria triggered by shaving my legs. This dysphoria at least has an easy fix – don’t shave.

Facial hair is especially seen as masculine. As I am not on testosterone and do not have facial hair I have to make up for this in other ways. I have never particularly wanted to have facial hair but some days it would be nice to have the shortcut to being identified as male.

Head hair is something I’ve experimented with very recently. Growing up I always had long hair and almost always had it tied back in a pony tail or braid. In my early twenties I did Cuts for Cancer and had it cut to just above ear length. I quite enjoyed this but didn’t specifically identify it as a gender based experience. I slowly grew it out, mostly due to neglect, but then the undercut style came into fashion. I started with the basic undercut at the back, then expanded it up one side. I was almost exclusively wearing the long part of my hair in a bun. I worked up the courage and finally got it all cut short. This has been one of the best experiences since starting to explore my gender identity and play with expression. It has offset my base feminine appearance to the point where I feel comfortable adding a bit of feminine flair back in. I feel more like myself and I like what I see when I look in the mirror.

Accessories and Jewelry

Most jewelry is seen as feminine. Thicker, darker, or chunkier jewelry is on the more masculine side. I have two necklaces that are more gender neutral or masculine, and two that are more feminine. Watches are something that can be either depending on style, so I wear a more masculine style watch. I do not have my ears pierced but I do sometimes wear an ear cuff. I have three – straight lines (more masculine), crossing zig zag lines that looks a bit elven (neutral), and a rose (feminine).

Switching up my jewelry and other accessories is one of the main ways I deal with dysphoria. I have to wear pretty similar clothes every day at work so I don’t have as many presentation options with clothing.

BEHAVIOUR

I think of behaviour as anything that wouldn’t be discernible from a picture. This can include physical movements and postures, voice, word choices, interaction style, and mannerisms. Some examples are how you cross your legs, altering the pitch of your voice, or your physical greeting style (handshake, hug, one-arm hug, fist bump, etc).

Women typically apologize more, especially if they’re interrupting or offering an opinion. This is a hard habit to break if you are the type of person that does this a lot but if you are trying to be read as more masculine, breaking this habit might help.

When walking towards someone in a hallway or on the sidewalk, women are more likely to move out of the way, even if they were only taking up half of the space to begin with. So, without being rude and blocking the hallway, hold your ground next time and see how it feels. I will do this if I am passing a more masculine person but I will still move out of the way if it is a more feminine person.

Men typically hold doors for women. So, if you are feeling more masculine, hold doors for women (and men, and people in general), or insist that the guy who is trying to hold the door for you walk through first.

Over the course of a few months, I have consciously worked to lower the pitch of my voice. I have a music and choir background so part of how I do this is by working to expand my singing range into lower registers. This helps to maintain the resonant quality despite using the lower end of my range (so I don’t sound monotone or growly when I talk). Some days I will work harder at this than others depending on whether my masculine side or feminine side is more dominant that day. The times when I have to correct my voice more consciously is when I am greeting people, when I’m talking on the phone, when I’m talking to animals or children, and when I’m excited.

I’m sure there are many more aspects to gender expression that can be explored. One of the other main ones that I have used is binding which I will discuss in a future post.

What are some ways you have played with your gender expression? Is this based on dysphoria or other aspects to your gender identity? Leave a comment below to share your experiences!

Dealing with Frustration

WHY FRUSTRATION?

It feels like frustration has become my default setting. Frustration is a result of having a goal but having minimal progress towards that goal. It’s a feeling of stagnation, of constantly coming up against immovable barriers and being powerless to make a difference. The more important the goal is to you or the bigger the effect that the goal will have on your life, the more urgently you want it and the less you can tolerate stagnation without becoming overwhelmed frustration.

During various stages in my husband’s transition we had to wait for medical and legal systems to change, creep up a waitlist, wait for the physical changes to happen that come with HRT (Hormone Replacement Therapy, in Jake’s case, testosterone), or wait for people to start using the correct name and pronouns. For myself, I find that the more dysphoria I feel, the less resilient to life’s stressors I am. I am less patient and more easily frustrated, especially when gender related topics or situations come up.

I have developed a number of strategies for dealing with or minimizing frustration that I thought I’d share with you. I have a couple general strategies, a couple for dealing with the waiting and frustrations associated with transitioning, and a couple for minimizing the increase in frustration due to dysphoria. I hope you find them useful.

GENERAL STRATEGIES

Get Enough Sleep

When I haven’t been getting enough sleep I am tired, cranky, and my brain hasn’t had enough time to recover from one day’s stress so it bleeds into the next day. I have to drink more caffeine to get through my day which makes me jittery. These effects are strongest when I haven’t had enough sleep, but are also present if I didn’t sleep at the right time (went to bed late and slept in), even if I slept for 8+ hours.

Suggestion: try tracking your sleep patterns and your mood, frustration level, energy level, or whatever symptoms you experience personally. Try planning your sleep as a part of your day just like you would with other important tasks.

Exercise

Frustration is a stagnant feeling. It is a holding of tension that has nowhere to go. For me, exercise helps. It gives me a feeling of getting that tension or energy moving and expelling it in a functional way. Some people accomplish the same thing by cleaning. I have found a base level of cardio exercise per week helps decrease the day to day frustration level and doing a harder weights workout helps if there is something specific that triggered a build up of frustration. I feel like martial arts or boxing would also serve the same purpose though I haven’t tried these personally.

Suggestion: try building exercise into your weekly plan if it isn’t already. Start at a level that feels ridiculously easy to accomplish and only increase the goal when you’ve been able to accomplish it three weeks in a row. Increase it by no more than 10% at a time. Try different types of exercise and note their effects on your mental and emotional state. When you have an increase in frustration, fatigue, anxiety, or whatever it is that you experience, schedule in the type of exercise that helps you manage that symptom the most. See my post At the Gym for my own exploration of exercise and dysphoria.

FRUSTRATION WITH WAITING

Get Involved

If you have the energy and time to do so, getting involved in changing the systems that are in your way can give a sense of purpose to your struggle and decrease the frustration. However, burning yourself out with advocacy will not help deal with frustration so be careful not to overextend. Advocacy doesn’t have to mean petitions or lobbying the government. It can mean volunteering at your local LGBT center, offering to do a presentation or review the policies at your workplace, or writing a blog.

Find a Project to Work On

Frustration is a result of a feeling of stagnation. You want to be seeing progress on something but you aren’t so you feel frustrated. It is a build up of tension and has nowhere to go. So find something else to focus on that you enjoy that will give you a sense of progress. Projects that involve learning new skills, are creative in nature, result in a shareable product or provide a helpful service for others, and can be broken down into small steps (frequently accomplishing milestones gives the best sense of progress). I find creative projects the most beneficial. You can pour your frustration onto the page, into a drawing or painting, or into a piece of music.

MORE EASILY FRUSTRATED DUE TO DYSPHORIA

Authentic Experiences

Seek out or create opportunities where you can be yourself and feel comfortable. Hang out with people that you are ‘out’ to. Spend time with people that have similar experiences or identities to you. Engage in activities that don’t trigger dysphoria or relate to your gender at all (gender non-specific activities). You read more about my own search for authentic experiences here: Finding Sources of Support and Experimenting with My Name and Pronouns.

Optimize Management of Dysphoria

Explore the specific sources of your dysphoria and develop as many strategies strategies for decreasing or managing your dysphoria as you can. For me, this process involved three stages: explore my identity, track and identify sources of dysphoria, and trial variations in gender expression to develop management strategies. Dara Hoffman-Fox’s book You and Your Gender Identity: A guide to discovery walks you through this process in a methodical process that I found very helpful. I have written about my experiences with this process in My Initial Gender Exploration Process, My Experiences with Gender Dysphoria and Euphoria, My Physical vs. Social Sense of Gender. I hope those posts will help you with this strategy.

Do you experience frustration the way I do or for similar reasons? How do you deal with frustration? Have you used similar strategies to the ones I describe above? Do you have other strategies that I didn’t mention that have worked for you? Leave a comment below! Your strategies may work better than mine do for someone else!

Visibility and Representation

VISIBILITY

I define visibility as feeling seen by those around you, consciously or unconsciously. This can be specific to a particular aspect of your identity or a recognition of the complexity and intersectionality of different parts of your identity.

Visibility is also being recognized by a stranger as belonging to the same group giving a sense of solidarity and community. Being visible as a queer person can give unspoken support for someone in the closet who may be struggling. This can be done using symbols, colours, flags, or expression styles.

Initially, as a gay person, I used rainbows for visibility. Then, after Jake and I started dating (before Jake’s transition), I was much more visible as being queer by being part of a gay couple and talking about my wife. When Jake transitioned I loss this visibility because I am now seen as part of a straight couple and I talk about my husband. I struggled with this loss of visibility because it felt like a loss of identity. Once I recognized it as a visibility issue I went back to my previous habits of using rainbow symbols and talking about the queer aspects of my identity more openly. It took a bit of work to find ways of doing this that didn’t out Jake as trans but it’s definitely possible.

More recently, I’ve wanted to be visible as genderqueer or nonbinary. This is still fairly new and since I’m not ready to be as open about it with everyone in my life I have to rely on symbols/flags that other genderqueer people will recognize or changing my appearance such as cutting my hair short. More on this to come.

REPRESENTATION

I think of representation as seeing yourself in media, or at least seeing realistic portrayals of a particular aspect of your identity. Often, appropriate representation isn’t spontaneously available and I have searched for it online.

As with visibility, the representation I feel connected to has shifted over time, through Jake’s transition and into my own gender exploration process. Initially, lesbian role models spoke to me the most, then trans masculine role models while I was trying to understand Jake’s identity and experiences, and now, nonbinary and genderqueer role models are what I connect with the most.

I have found both visibility and representation to be extremely important to me, especially with aspects of my identity that are typically invisible. Do you find visibility and/or representation important? How has your need for and type of visibility and representation changed as your identity has evolved? Leave a comment below!

Why I Don’t Identify As Trans

Trans

The root word trans typically means across or change. As a queer identity it has two main meanings. The binary version is that a trans person identifies with the opposite gender from what they were assigned at birth (still the way society interprets the label). The gender spectrum version is that they do not identify with the gender they were assigned at birth (this is the definition that I use). None of these definitions really fit me as I still do identify with the gender I was assigned at birth but I also identify with other parts of the gender spectrum at the same time.

experience with a label is important

My experience with the trans label is primarily through my husband’s transition from female to male. This involved a change of name both socially and legally, a change of gender pronouns and legal gender marker, and various components of a medical transition. None of this applies to me or what my personal acceptance and exploration path looks like (at least not yet).

Trans is not the same as ‘not cis’

For me, Trans is a specific identity that covers many different types of experiences but not necessarily all identities that are not cis. Many people use it as an umbrella term to cover any identity that is not cis-gendered (their gender matches what they were assigned at birth). Technically I would fall under that umbrella term. But that is not how I define trans. I don’t see ‘trans’ and ‘cis’ as opposites. Someone else with an identity similar to mine is totally free to use the label trans if it suits them.

Presentation

Even though my presentation is often fairly masculine, I am socially read as female. If I used the label trans I would either be read as a pre-T trans guy or a trans woman (which is a label that is generally used by AMAB people who identify as female), neither of which applies to me and really just confuses the situation.

Me

My gender is both the same as what I was assigned at birth and includes a component that is different from what I was assigned at birth. My husband’s experience is very different from mine and I strongly associate the label ‘trans’ with his experience. Many people who are not cis have a feeling of being ‘not trans enough’ to earn the label or to ‘qualify’ to use the label trans. I too have to fight against the feeling of not being legitimate in my gender experience but since I do not have an affinity with the label ‘trans’ I can’t express it using the phrase ‘not trans enough’. I have found other labels I prefer which you can read about here.

What is your definition and experience of the label Trans? Is it a label you identify with? Have you struggled with other people assuming your identity is something other than what it is as a result of using the label Trans? If you don’t associate with the label Trans, what other labels do you use instead? Leave a comment below and share your experiences!

Experimenting with My Name and Pronouns

I recently went on a vacation with my husband where I was attending a conference and was able to pick the name and pronouns that would appear on my ID badge. My husband asked if I wanted to use my male name, Ray, and they/them pronouns as an experiment to see how it felt. After some thought and a couple of conversations with trusted friends I decided to go for it.

My gender identity includes a female component which I was assigned at birth (named Meaghan) and a male component which I began to experience in the middle of grade 10 (named Ray). I am Meaghan in my everyday life and for a long time kept the name Ray and that part of my identity hidden. Since my husband began his transition from female to male I have been exploring my own gender more. (More on my own story here, my exploration process here, and my identity labels here).

Lately, I have begun using the name Ray and using neutral pronouns among other queer/gender non-conforming friends. This group of people are generally better at adjusting names and pronouns because they’ve had more practice and are more flexible in their thinking about identity. This allows me to express the part of myself that generally feels hidden or invisible to society. It has helped me feel more seen, more whole, and more authentic with a lot less fear and judgment.

The first few times I tried this were incredibly nerve-wracking. What would people say? Would they make mistakes? Would they correct themselves? Would I have to correct them? How would I feel? Would I get weird looks from the people around us? As it turned out, my friends were great and no-one around us seemed to notice. Maybe they assumed that by Ray I really meant Rae as in short for Rachael but who cares. It felt awesome.

When my husband was at the beginning of his transition and was trying to find a name that fit we went through a similar process of testing different names. We quickly figured out that when you’re only two people hanging out with each other you rarely use each other’s first name. So we did a trial period while we were on vacation and were more likely to be introducing ourselves to people or talking to each other from a distance. Turns out when the vacation is a camping trip where you are trying to avoid human contact this also doesn’t work very well. But it did give us an extended period of time when we forced ourselves to think of my husband using different names and in the end did help him settle on one. (More on my husband’s transition in Part 1, Part 2, and Part 3).

My situation was slightly different. When I first began to experience having a male identity it included the name Ray right from the beginning. So I didn’t have to look for a name or test a few out and narrow it down. I’m also not transitioning to using that name at all times instead of my female one. I want to be able to use either name depending on the situation and how I feel at the time. Ideally, I’d be using each name 50% of the time but I don’t think that is feasible, at least not yet.

So when my husband suggested I opt for using the name Ray and using neutral pronouns for the entire week at the conference I decided to go for it.

I wasn’t sure how it would feel to hear myself be referred to by that name all the time. What if it felt just as uncomfortable because I wasn’t hearing my female name anymore? What if I got weird looks or comments? What if it was just such an intense experience that it was distracting or exhausting?

None of this happened. It was awesome.

Typically when you change your name people make a lot of mistakes because they have known you by a different name previously. And if you’re just testing out a name and ask them to switch back and forth it’s even less likely to work. Since I was introducing myself to the people at the conference for the first time and I was wearing a name badge with my name right on it this didn’t happen. They got it right the whole time because they had no other name to call me.

The pronouns were a different story. People still defaulted to female pronouns even though I had ‘they/them’ printed below my name on my badge. I wasn’t the only one at the conference that used neutral pronouns. And it was standard that everyone had their pronouns printed on their badge. So in general the conference was very proactive and supportive. But still, people struggled to wrap their heads around using they/them. When this became evident on the first day I changed my expectations from ‘a chance for me to feel seen and live authentically for a week’ to ‘a chance for people around me to be exposed to they/them pronouns and have a chance to practice with them’. This reframing helped decrease the frustration, disappointment, and dysphoria immensely.

The whole experience also gave my husband a chance to practice using the name Ray and they/them pronouns when referring to me. I know he’s nervous about struggling with this, especially because I’m not switching 100% and will potentially be asking him to switch back and forth in different situations. I don’t know how to make this easier for him but I’m sure we’ll figure it out as we go along.

I highly recommend testing out names and pronouns on vacations or isolated opportunities such as social groups, camp, or conferences where you are meeting people for the first time that you are less likely to interact with after the fact. As it turned out, I have kept in touch with a lot of the people I met and therefore have had to re-introduce myself using my female name but hopefully, since they were primed to think of my as Ray first, they will see me as a combination of the two.

Have you experimented with a different name or different pronouns? How did the experience work out for you? Have you ever been asked by someone else to use a different name or different pronouns? What was difficult about this and what made it easier? Tell me your story in the comments below!

Finding Support

Whether you’re the one trying to figure out your gender or you partner is questioning theirs, you need a support system. This can come in many forms. Below are a few of the types of support I have found useful.

I think of support as a two way street. Ways that you are participating, communicating with others, where they know who you are. I think of resources as something you look at where the person who put it out there doesn’t know who you are. This post is about support. If you’re looking for resources, also useful but less personal, see my resources page.

Friends

Especially early on in the process, finding one good friend who can be a sounding board is extremely helpful. Having someone to tell your fears and thoughts and confusion to eases the internal pressure and helps you feel less alone. They can provide support, be a resource, help you clarify your thoughts, and help you experiment with a different name or presentation. They can be a shopping buddy if you’re looking for a new wardrobe. If they are more familiar with the queer community in your local area than you are they can help you connect to other types of support.

Before my husband came out to the world as trans, he came out to a mutual friend so that I would have someone to talk to. This friend helped me clarify how I was feeling and test out how I would respond to the questions I would likely get from others. Since I’ve been exploring my own gender identity, my husband has been my sounding board. As someone who also experiences dysphoria he is invaluable for commiserating or suggesting management strategies.

queer community

The queer community is where you’ll find people who have a better understanding of the language, experiences, and fear you might have. Queer events give you a safe place to be who you are, express your identity, and use whatever labels, name, or pronouns you want. Just having a safe place to be can be a big relief. Leaving these places can feel like putting your mask back on or going back in the closet so it’s nice to know when the next event/meet up will be so you have something to look forward to.

I have found the queer community very helpful since I came out as gay. I have always needed to be around people who have similar experiences and understand what I’m going through. We were initially part of a queer sports league which was great for exercise as well as queer time. Community became even more important when my husband came out as trans but we found that we had to find different groups that had a more trans focus. I have also been part of a queer choir which again, is great for getting time around queer people as well as keeping music in my life. Often these activity-focused queer groups are the nicest because the support and camaraderie are there but you don’t have to tell your life story to everyone or talk about what’s currently going on. Sometimes, talking is too difficult and all you need is the support.

Online groups

These are great. There are facebook groups for everything imaginable. Some of them are closed and you need to ask to join. Some of them are hidden and you need an invite from someone in the group (which is easiest to get by meeting people in the queer community or participating in similar online groups that have overlapping members). These groups give you a place to post questions, rant about a bad experience, celebrate milestones that other people wouldn’t understand the significance of, or just read what other people have been saying.

I’ve been part of online groups for our local trans/NB community, partners of trans men, genderfluid people, etc. There are groups dedicated to top surgery, bottom surgery, and HRT. Both my husband and I have used these groups to ask questions of others that have already gone through what were going through and provide support to others that are just starting something that we’ve already done. Some groups we are in separately and some we are in together. On days that were harder, I would check the group I liked the best almost hourly to feel a connection with other people who understood. I wish I had found these groups earlier in his transition process but I still find them useful today.

PFLaG

PFLaG stands for Parents and Friends of Lesbians and Gays. There are support groups all over North America. It may not seem politically correct or very inclusive but as it turns out, the support group in our area is mainly trans focused and very well run. This group is designed to take people from not accepting to accepting to celebrating their own or their loved one’s identities. The group includes people of all LGBT identities as well as friends and family. The discussion is different every time and includes whatever topics people want to discuss. We get the perspective of other people going through the process, friends who are trying to be good supporters, parents who are struggling to understand, siblings who are trying to build a new bond, and sometimes health professionals who want to be more inclusive.

This was one of the first sources of support we found. The group near us runs once a month. It was big enough that we could sit and listen without having to participate if we didn’t want to. No matter what was discussed we always got something out of it. It was like a release of pressure, an emotional breath of fresh air. During the harder months we would measure time based on how long it was until the next PFLaG meeting.

A few meetings in someone mentioned another PFLaG meeting near us at the opposite time in the month. For a couple of months we went to both. This second meeting was quite a bit smaller which pretty much required participation. At some point my husband couldn’t make one of the smaller meetings so I went by myself and ended up talking about a bunch of the stuff that I didn’t want to burden him with (mainly my anxiety about how he was really doing, fears about the possibility of him getting beaten up, my observations of the toll that coming out was taking on his mental health, etc). We decided that it was a good idea for me to have my own separate group to go to, especially since I was getting more out of the groups at this point than he was. So we would go to the bigger group together (whenever possible) and I could go to the smaller group by myself when I felt like I needed to. I continued going for about a year but eventually didn’t need as much support. We have continued going to the larger group for nearly 3 years and I have been helping to run a separate group every third month specifically for partners of trans people.

Lately, I have been finding the group helpful in providing support through my own gender discovery journey. Even once life is not specifically about our personal gender experiences we will likely still be attending just to have somewhere to be where the majority of people understand this aspect of our lives and so that we can provide support to others that are just starting the process.

therapists

Finding a trans-friendly therapist is very important. Some therapists present themselves as trans-knowledgeable, trans-positive, or trans-friendly but, as we have learned from friends in our various groups, some are operating from a very old and transphobic play-book. The best way to find a truly trans-positive therapist is to get a recommendation from someone in the community who is further along in the process than you are. When you are just starting out you don’t necessarily know what it means to be trans-positive. Only in discussing the things that your therapist has said to you with others in the community will you get the perspective that you need. Sometimes the therapist has already done serious damage to the person’s sense of self-worth.

A good rule of thumb in my book is that if you are coming away from therapy with more guilt, shame, fear, confusion, self-hatred, and dysphoria, this is not a good therapist for you to be seeing. Look online. Find support groups. Find friends that you can talk to. Ask around for recommendations. If you have a local queer community centre, ask them for recommendations. If the therapist they recommended was the one that made you feel worse, stop going anyway. There are other resources and other therapists out there that can help. Check out my resources page for some other options.

trans-friendly health professionals

These are rare in our experience. As a trans person you will need to receive care from family doctors, endocrinologists, psychiatrists, pharmacists, dentists, specialists (gynecologists, proctologists, fertility docs, speech therapists, physiotherapists), and surgeons. The more times you interact with a health professional that is not trans friendly the less likely you are to access health care the next time you need it. Finding trans-friendly and trans-knowledgeable health professionals is not only going to help you get through your transition but also take away a big source of stress. Finding trans-friendly professionals is easiest by asking your support groups.

Trans-friendly and trans-knowledgeable family doctors are especially rare and so much in demand that our community filled up the caseload of three family doctors in a row as they were suggested to the group. If you are a healthcare professional or you know of one that might be open to learning more about trans care and trans issues, give them/look up as many resources as you can. Spreading this information is one of the best things allies can do.

What are your support systems? How did you find trans-friendly therapists and other health professionals? Leave a comment below!