Personal

My own gender identity and exploration process

  • My Hero’s Journey, So Far
    by Meaghan Ray
    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 … Continue reading My Hero’s Journey, So Far
  • Gender Transition as a Hero’s Journey
    by Meaghan Ray
    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. … Continue reading Gender Transition as a Hero’s Journey
  • Gender Inclusivity in the Workplace: What it is and How it Feels
    by Meaghan Ray
    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 … Continue reading Gender Inclusivity in the Workplace: What it is and How it Feels
  • Welcome! Who Are You and What Do You Need?
    by Meaghan Ray
    I have now been writing this blog for three years! I recently discovered that with all those posts, my blog was not very searchable (sorry about that!) I have fixed this somewhat but also wanted to provide a snapshot of what you might find here. Depending on your situation, identity, or what brought you here, you will be looking for different things. Scroll through the section titles in this post to find one that seems … Continue reading Welcome! Who Are You and What Do You Need?
  • How to Manage Stress and Prevent Burnout Part 2
    by Meaghan Ray
    If you started with Part 1, you’ll already be familiar with my blue-yellow-green-yellow-red stress state system, what each state feels like to you, and have a variety of factors you can use to identify your stress state. If you’ve been tracking your state since last week, you may have already noticed some patterns in how your stress state fluctuates over the course of a day or week. The next step is to identify what is … Continue reading How to Manage Stress and Prevent Burnout Part 2
  • How to Manage Stress and Prevent Burnout Part 1
    by Meaghan Ray
    In an ideal world, stressors would be concrete and transient – easy to identify and able to be processed to the point of relief. But in the real world, there are a lot of stressors that are nebulous and persistent. It’s hard to relieve your stress when you can’t identify or get rid of the source. But that doesn’t mean you should ignore it. The stress is still there whether you acknowledge it or not. … Continue reading How to Manage Stress and Prevent Burnout Part 1
  • How to Work Through Areas of Emotional Stress Part 2
    by Meaghan Ray
    You will want to start with Part 1. How is everyone doing? If you have started working through steps 1 to 3 already you might be feeling a bit emotionally vulnerable, bruised, or drained. That’s ok. It’s part of the healing process. But make sure you take care of yourself. If you push yourself too fast and don’t let your emotions settle again before tackling steps 4 to 6, you will be too overwhelmed to … Continue reading How to Work Through Areas of Emotional Stress Part 2
  • How to Work Through Areas of Emotional Stress Part 1
    by Meaghan Ray
    My experiences have taught me how to work through intense situations and process emotions so that I’m not holding on to negative sources of stress and being influenced by them in ways I don’t like or can’t control. I wanted to share my strategy in the hopes that it will help you do the same. This process is based on the belief that we can, for the most part, control what is in our own … Continue reading How to Work Through Areas of Emotional Stress Part 1
  • Diastasis Recti, Body Image, and Gender
    by Meaghan Ray
    Postpartum recovery is typically portrayed as a rapid return to pre-pregnancy weight and shape. For many people, this is not an accurate representation. Many people never return to pre-pregnancy weight or shape. Some do but have to put in a lot of work to make that happen. I have a short torso so when I was pregnant, I carried my baby out in front. I started showing early and was very round. I had many … Continue reading Diastasis Recti, Body Image, and Gender
  • Trans Affirmations
    by Meaghan Ray
    I am important. My voice matters. My experience is real. My experience, my identity, and my life have value. I deserve to take up space. I am important. My voice matters. I do not owe anyone an explanation of my gender. I have control over my own identity. I have a right to any label that feels right for me. I am important. My voice matters. I do not owe anyone an explanation of my … Continue reading Trans Affirmations
  • How Dysphoria Contributes to Burnout and What You Can Do About It
    by Meaghan Ray
    WHAT IS BURNOUT? I have struggled with cycles of burnout for many years now. For a long time I felt like I was making it up, or being lazy, or finding an excuse to avoid the mundane but challenging parts of everyday life. Very little of what I was feeling matched the symptoms of depression but that was the closest I felt like I could come. Until I heard about burnout. When I’m in a … Continue reading How Dysphoria Contributes to Burnout and What You Can Do About It
  • Postpartum Update: 5 Months
    by Meaghan Ray
    We’ve all seen the representations of postpartum people in media who are frustrated with not being able to lose ‘those last five pounds’ when they’re five weeks postpartum. Let me tell you now, this is not reality. At least not for me. My body did a whole lot more during pregnancy and birth than just put on a few pounds. Therefore, my body finding it’s way to a new, stable normal is not all about … Continue reading Postpartum Update: 5 Months
  • Discovering My Identity as a Parent
    by Meaghan Ray
    Recently, I’ve been thinking about my identity as a parent. Yes, as someone who has a child I am responsible for, I am automatically deemed a parent. But what does that actually mean for me as a person? What does it mean to identify as a parent? How does this new part of my identity mesh or clash with other components of who I am? As a queer person, I have an understanding that identity … Continue reading Discovering My Identity as a Parent
  • Gender in Isolation
    by Meaghan Ray
    In the time of the COVID 19 pandemic, many of us are living in physical isolation. We have significantly less social interaction, especially with strangers, and the majority of our social time is over the internet using video chat. Depending on your situation, this time of isolation may have been helpful or harmful as it relates to your gender. For me, it has been a bit of both. My experience of isolation, in general, has … Continue reading Gender in Isolation
  • Making Sense of Myself by Writing Poetry
    by Meaghan Ray
    Back in 2008, a few years after my initial gender questioning experience but many years before I actually figured out my gender or heard the term ‘nonbinary’, I wrote a poem for an LGBT publication at my university. I was going through boxes of notebooks and found the one I had written it in. Reading through it, I found it incredible how accurate it still feels. I don’t even think it was chosen for the … Continue reading Making Sense of Myself by Writing Poetry
  • Goal Setting 2021
    by Meaghan Ray
    If the year 2020 taught us anything, it was that anything can happen and we need to be flexible in order to survive. One of the ways I failed in this was when I set my goals for 2020. Every year in December I set up my bullet journal for the next year. This includes writing down my goals and deciding how I’m going to track them. Having goals that work for me helps me … Continue reading Goal Setting 2021
  • Feeding My Baby as a Nonbinary Person
    by Meaghan Ray
    PLANNING When I was pregnant and looking ahead to having a newborn, it was very hard for me to tell how I would feel about nursing. I have dysphoria around my chest that fluctuates and when I read information on or listened to people talk about ‘breastfeeding’, my dysphoria would get worse. I didn’t always know if that was because I was feeling more masculine at the time I was absorbing the information, because the … Continue reading Feeding My Baby as a Nonbinary Person
  • When Your Name or Pronouns Fluctuate
    by Meaghan Ray
    Many people that have a fluid gender identity use different names and/or pronouns at different times. Figuring out how to make this work for you can be a challenge, and then following through and making it happen is even harder. I’m still learning how to do this but I thought I’d share what I’ve learned so far. KNOW YOURSELF The first step to knowing what pronouns or name you prefer at a given time or … Continue reading When Your Name or Pronouns Fluctuate
  • Contextual Voice Dysphoria
    by Meaghan Ray
    Note: I refer to gender based vocal pitch ranges throughout this post. All ranges are based on cis averages used in vocal pitch analyzer apps and choral voice ranges. This is not my preferred way to talk about it and I wish I had better language to use that was not cis-normative but for ease of communication I have stuck with this phrasing. Most of the time, I like my voice. It generally sits in … Continue reading Contextual Voice Dysphoria
  • My Body, My Identity, My Experiences
    by Meaghan Ray
    Lately, I have struggled to feel excited and comfortable with the idea and experience of being pregnant. I have felt like the more visibly pregnant I get, the more invisible my nonbinary identity becomes, both to myself and others. Recently, someone in one of the online groups I am a part of stated something similar to what I have written below and it resonated a lot with me. I wanted to put these thoughts into … Continue reading My Body, My Identity, My Experiences
  • New Year, New Goals
    by Meaghan Ray
    Happy New Year! Though not specifically gender related, I thought I’d talk about my current goal setting process. This is something that has helped me maintain a sense of progress and control which is especially important during unpredictable fluctuations in my gender, frustrating stages of transition, or other stressful life events. Step 1: WHAT is your goal? During the second half of December and first half of January, I think about the different areas of … Continue reading New Year, New Goals
  • Wearing a Binder: Recommendations and Exercises
    by Meaghan Ray
    If you haven’t read it yet, check out Wearing a Binder: Physiological Effects. I will refer to the same areas of the body and some of those effects in this post. GENERAL RECOMMENDATIONS Try to wear it as short a time as possible. Most recommendations state no longer than 8 hours but if you work 8 or 10 or 12 hour days, that just isn’t possible. Just know that the longer you wear it, the … Continue reading Wearing a Binder: Recommendations and Exercises
  • Wearing a Binder: Physiological Effects
    by Meaghan Ray
    Wearing a binder is sometimes the only way that a person with dysphoria related to having breasts can leave the house. The psychological and emotional impacts of dysphoria are often worse than the physical discomfort from the binder. But that doesn’t mean we should ignore the binder’s effects on our body. I strongly believe that the more you know about something, the more you can do to make it better. If you are someone who … Continue reading Wearing a Binder: Physiological Effects
  • The Coming Out Equation
    by Meaghan Ray
    Coming out is not a one time thing. The closet metaphor may be accurate for how it feels with each instance but it is not a good metaphor for the lifelong process and constant decisions. Coming out is a matter of degrees. You can be completely open about your identity or experience or just hint at one part of it. You can also be out to a different extent to different people. Deciding how ‘out’ … Continue reading The Coming Out Equation
  • It’s All About Bathrooms
    by Meaghan Ray
    BATHROOMS ARE A BIG ISSUE The bathroom debate has gotten a lot of media attention lately. Should trans people be forced to use the bathroom that relates to their sex assigned at birth or be free to use the bathroom they are most comfortable with? I don’t want to go too much into the political debate but I can’t leave it be without making a couple key points: How exactly would this be enforced? With … Continue reading It’s All About Bathrooms
  • Getting Through the Dark Months
    by Meaghan Ray
    Growing up I never really noticed mood effects from the winter. The shortest days were still at least 10 hours of sunlight. Then I moved north and now the days get shorter much earlier and the shortest days are only 7 hours of sunlight. It’s amazing what those extra 3 hours can do. In the last few years I’ve noticed my mood, motivation, and energy level dropping around mid October. By November, if I haven’t … Continue reading Getting Through the Dark Months
  • Talking About Your Gender Identity: When, Why, and How
    by Meaghan Ray
    Talking about your gender identity can be hard, draining, scary, and even jeopardize your safety. But it can also be hugely rewarding, allowing you to be open, honest, more comfortable, find the support you need, as well as educate others. So how do you decide if it’s worth having those conversations? How do you know when the right time is? And how do you actually start the conversation or respond to a probing question? The … Continue reading Talking About Your Gender Identity: When, Why, and How
  • Explaining Dysphoria to Cis People
    by Meaghan Ray
    Explaining what dysphoria feels like to cis people is always difficult. In order to try to understand they relate it to their own experiences of discomfort with body image or not fitting the stereotypes for their gender. While these experiences are generally in the right ballpark, they are still not the same as dysphoria. Here are some of the phrases I have found that help: Wearing an ill-fitting piece of clothing that you can’t take … Continue reading Explaining Dysphoria to Cis People
  • Passing as Nonbinary
    by Meaghan Ray
    ‘Passing’ refers to blending in with societies norms and expectations for your gender.So what about non-binary people? The concept of passing requires the society we live in to have a specific set of expectations for a particular gender. But what if they don’t even recognize that gender?
  • Lost and Found in Transition
    by Meaghan Ray
    LOST IN TRANSITION With any change comes a letting go of what was and a discovery of what could be. This is the process of grieving. It can be overwhelming. As changes go, gender transition is one of the biggest. Some losses are forever. Some are temporary. Some are hard. Some are easy. Straightforward medical care Access Fertility Familiarity Safety Security Global travel Friends Family Relationships Relatability Not everything you lose is negative. Some things … Continue reading Lost and Found in Transition
  • Misgendering is More Than Name and Pronouns
    by Meaghan Ray
    The most basic way to respect a trans person is by using their preferred name and pronouns whenever and wherever they have requested you do so. But there is much more to respecting someone’s gender than simply using the correct name and pronouns. Most of the time, when we are talking directly to someone, we don’t use their name and pronouns. It’s only when we refer to them in third person or talk about something … Continue reading Misgendering is More Than Name and Pronouns
  • Name Options
    by Meaghan Ray
    Picking a new name is a quintessential part of gender transition. But not every trans person feels the need to change their name. Some are perfectly comfortable with their given name. Some have more than one name and use different ones depending on how they feel or who they’re with. This is my experience.
  • The Egocentricity of Dysphoria
    by Meaghan Ray
    Having dysphoria can be an all-consuming experience. Especially when it first starts, when you first identify it as dysphoria, or when it shifts. If the dysphoria is stable over a longer period of time, it is somewhat easier to ignore and manage but even then, there are days when it is all-consuming. Dysphoria causes obsession about little things that no one else would care about. You might brush off their concern or minimize it but … Continue reading The Egocentricity of Dysphoria
  • Menstruation and Gender
    by Meaghan Ray
    Having a menstrual cycle is treated as a very female experience. It is seen as the transition from being a girl to being a woman. It is treated as a symbol of fertility and future motherhood. So it is understandable that people who menstruate but who do not identify as women would struggle a lot with this time of the month. Menstruation is a huge trigger for dysphoria in a lot of people. For people … Continue reading Menstruation and Gender
  • Different Ways to Explore Your Gender
    by Meaghan Ray
    The period of time between wondering if you might not be cis and figuring out what your gender actually is can be confusing, frustrating, scary, and isolating. There are many different ways to explore your gender. Don’t be afraid to try more than one. You might use all of these strategies at different times or only a couple of them. I hope this helps you find the most authentic and comfortable version of yourself. Practical … Continue reading Different Ways to Explore Your Gender
  • What’s in a Name and How to Pick One
    by Meaghan Ray
    For many gender non-conforming and trans people, names are super important. Just like pronouns, names often have a specific gender attached to them. There are female names, male names, and gender neutral names. Often one of the first things that a trans person will do, after coming out to themselves and before coming out to their broader community, is to pick a new name. This name is considered their chosen name. Their previous name is … Continue reading What’s in a Name and How to Pick One
  • Why Labels Matter
    by Meaghan Ray
    I have often heard complaints about why people (usually queer people) feel the need to label themselves, or why there are so many different labels, or how labels are so restrictive, and how its unnecessary to put yourself in a box. Usually, the people making these statements are cisgendered and straight. They have never struggled with having to figure out a part of their identity, find a way to explain it to others, and find … Continue reading Why Labels Matter
  • Treating Your Body Well Can Help Manage Dysphoria
    by Meaghan Ray
    Sometimes for folks who experience dysphoria it feels like the only ways they experience their body are negative. This can easily lead to negative self-talk and the tendency to ignore the ways that our bodies help us navigate the world every day. Dysphoria is not always predictable or manageable. It springs up at the worst times and can be extremely persistent. It can lead to a feeling of fighting with our bodies or feeling out … Continue reading Treating Your Body Well Can Help Manage Dysphoria
  • How to Explain your Fluid Gender Identity
    by Meaghan Ray
    Gender fluid identities can be difficult to explain to people. Even once your audience understands gender beyond the binary, they may not have any experience with fluctuations in their own gender or know someone with a fluid gender identity. Let’s say someone asks you how you identify with regards to gender (for example, asks your pronouns). For gender fluid people (typically people who experience their gender as a single point on the spectrum that shifts … Continue reading How to Explain your Fluid Gender Identity
  • AFAB and AMAB Non-Binary Differences and Similarities
    by Meaghan Ray
    Note: Since writing this post I have learned that the use of AMAB and AFAB to categorize people, especially nonbinary people, is exclusionary, reductive, and often not helpful in describing experiences in an accessible way. I am working to stop using these terms. I have chosen to leave this post up for now. If you feel strongly about what is written here please leave a comment or send me an email. I appreciate your input. … Continue reading AFAB and AMAB Non-Binary Differences and Similarities
  • Gender Experiments: Wearing a Dress
    by Meaghan Ray
    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 … Continue reading Gender Experiments: Wearing a Dress
  • Educating Others Without Compromising Your Boundaries
    by Meaghan Ray
    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 … Continue reading Educating Others Without Compromising Your Boundaries
  • They/Them Pronouns
    by Meaghan Ray
    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 … Continue reading They/Them Pronouns
  • 6 Months of Self-Discovery
    by Meaghan Ray
    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 … Continue reading 6 Months of Self-Discovery
  • Exploring My Gender Expression
    by Meaghan Ray
    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 … Continue reading Exploring My Gender Expression
  • Dealing with Frustration
    by Meaghan Ray
    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 … Continue reading Dealing with Frustration
  • Visibility and Representation
    by Meaghan Ray
    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 … Continue reading Visibility and Representation
  • Why I Don’t Identify As Trans
    by Meaghan Ray
    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 … Continue reading Why I Don’t Identify As Trans
  • Experimenting with My Name and Pronouns
    by Meaghan Ray
    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 … Continue reading Experimenting with My Name and Pronouns
  • Finding Support
    by Meaghan Ray
    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 … Continue reading Finding Support