Gender Reveal

I'm incredibly fortunate to be surrounded by lovely queers who support me and gently push me along my path to self-discovery. Recently, we've been working through the book, You and Your Gender Identity: A Guide to Discovery by Dara Hoffman-Fox. It's a great guide for anyone, like myself, who's been experiencing gender confusion! Throughout this exploration, I've heard about my friend's personal experiences with their gender identity journeys and I've shared some of my own. One of the reasons I've felt so hesitant to talk about this publicly is because I still don't feel like I've got it all figured out. Also, on a professional level, it's not uncommon to hear folks who previously identified as cis women, losing writing gigs, projects, and clients as a result of coming out as genderqueer. It's something that shouldn't matter, but the stress of losing material wellness makes these types of explorations feel somehow riskier (thanks a lot capitalism!) But anyways, I did some soul searching and explored why I was scared to talk about this topic. I realize there are a bunch of folks who are also in my shoes and being able to normalize the JOURNEY is helpful... I want to share some thoughts, with the understanding that some of them will likely change and they aren't polished analyses. I hope this is helpful for all of you. 

As always, I will preface with a note: Gender identity sits at the intersection of our internal feelings about ourselves as well as the way we're externally perceived by others; it's a vast and complex topic. For a lot of folks, it can be hard to align the internal with the external experience, especially since the language around gender identity is constantly evolving. On top of that, the public's understanding of gender ranges wildly. Some folks are very comfortable with the nuances of various gender identities while others are still stuck insisting that biological sex absolutely determines gender (it doesn't). All of this to say, it can be hard to feel confident in these gender explorations since we're pushing against hegemony.  I support each individual where they are in their journeys, understanding that things can and will change. I offer myself the same grace. And as I write all of these reflections, I'm speaking only for myself and my experience. If you're having questions that don't align with my experience, that's perfectly ok!  

Here are a few experiences that have shaped my past and current understanding of my gender: 

I didn't realize I was transitioning 

The trans narrative that I've most frequently heard was that a person FIRST realizes internally they don't align with their assigned gender due to feeling discomfort or dysphoria, which THEN leads them to make a series of choices to socially and/or medically transition to align with their real gender. This is even the way the book, You and Your Gender Identity, structures their exploration. I did the opposite. I changed my name, changed my appearance, changed my social relations, and changed my pronouns (more on this later) BEFORE ever thinking of myself as trans (I actually prefer gender nonconforming, also more on this later). It was only when I went through Dara's book that I had an Ah-ha moment; I realized that I'd already done most of the things I needed to decrease my discomfort without calling what I was doing "transitioning". I don't know if I'm super oblivious or constantly in denial, but this is very similar to the way I came out as gay and polyam and kinky. I was in multiple intimate loving relationships with women while insisting I was straight even if I felt very little attraction to my male partners for years before actually describing myself as gay or polyam. I was playing around with power exchanges for a really long before calling it kink. I personally find it easier to change the uncomfortable aspects of myself before adopting labels. Maybe this is partially due to the lack of access I had growing up to these alternative communities. But I think part of it also comes from an intense feeling of imposter syndrome as well as the fear of offending folks who I believe are "more trans/gay/kinky/polyam than me" (this is also unhelpful self-talk that takes a long time to unlearn). Settling into the realization that my journey had already begun (in a pretty major way) decreased a lot of my fear. I realized I deserved to do the things I needed to feel more like myself, and there doesn't have to be anxiety to label myself as anything until I'm ready. I've taken my time to come to this realization and it's ok that it happened backward. We all go through our own journey, and this made more sense to me. Plus I understand that there are some transitions that are easier and some more difficult than others, which brings me to the second point...  

Transitioning doesn't mean the same thing for everyone 

It's hard and confusing to try to define what it means exactly to "transition" because it's so different for each individual. The media almost exclusively portrays folks who are medically transitioning across binary genders, which can add a level of pressure to conform to those standards. I still have a difficult time applying the word "transition" to myself, again butting up against imposter syndrome and some internalized transphobia. Like anything that goes against society's expectations, there's a lot of psychological pushback that has to be overcome. Going through Dara's book, I'm realizing how important it is to define what I want from my transition rather than gauging it based on what others are doing. While it's helpful to have other folks who are mid-transition, it can get confusing too! I'll give you an example: most of my AFAB non-binary and trans friends are opting for top surgery. I'm really happy for all of them and love seeing how confident they feel afterward. I personally don't feel like medical transition is the path for me. A lot of that has to do with my history and medical trauma. The idea of surgery, needles and doctors induces a hell of a lot more anxiety than optimism for me. But it can be challenging to feel confident that I don't want top surgery because I deeply relate to their reasons for wanting a mastectomy and sometimes that plants self-doubt. Am I again just in denial? But I have to remind myself that all of our journeys are different. I've worked really hard to form a new relationship with my boobs as part of my ED recovery over the past decade. The idea of removing them no longer aligns with what I want because they're now symbolic of my recovery and body acceptance. Gender unfortunately doesn't exist in a vacuum and there are loads of intersecting factors that can contribute to people's choice to go through certain aspects of transition or not. For me, deciding not to wear a bra has been comfortable enough! One of the really big difficulties with questioning gender is trying to fit our experiences into a singular narrative. I remind myself that we're all different; some folks will wear binders, some folks will have top surgeries, some folks will wear no bras, some folks have no problems at all with their chests, some folks will start wearing lingerie, and beyond. All of these things are acceptable ways to transition, as long as they support your feeling of alignment with your gender. Transitioning, after all, is in an effort to align your internal sense of self more closely with your external, as my lovely friends pointed out. I'm continuing to give myself the reminder that there is in fact no right or wrong way to do this. Just because my pals find more comfort in medical transition, doesn't mean that's my experience, and doesn't mean any of us are more or less valid.  

I'll make a follow-up post about what I HAVE done to transition, and why those changes have felt meaningful, so be on the lookout for that!

Confusion around femininity and masculinity 

The next difficulty in validating my gender identity was challenging the stereotypes we have attached to femininity and masculinity. To keep it simple, I don't feel like a man. This made me think for a long time that I must, by default, then be a woman... obviously, this is just binary conditioning. I know there are more options than just man or woman, still, a lot of conversations around gender identities are framed as "becoming the OTHER gender," which I personally don't connect with. The umbrella term for folks like me, who don't identify strictly as one or the other, is non-binary. However, as someone who's AFAB (assigned female at birth) it's easy to dismiss what I've been feeling because I also present myself as a "high femme." Most people think I'm talking full makeup, heels, dresses, long hair, etc, but if you've seen me, you know that's not how I look. What I actually mean when I say I'm high femme is that I just smoked a joint (or am about to) and I love things that are coded feminine... sometimes. My expression changes with my internal feelings, but for the most part, I'm usually attracted to things that are coded feminine. My favorite color has always been pink. I love playing with makeup, though I'm shit at it. And my favorite shoes are high-heeled Doc Martins. But none of these things actually make me a cis-woman, because gender expression does not define identity. I know this can be hard to understand, especially for cisgender folks who may not relate to the feelings of disparity between their assigned gender and their identity.

Basically, since most of the representation of AFAB non-binary or trans folks are masculine-presenting it's harder for folks who present like me to be recognized as gender non-conforming. If you take nothing else from this, please just understand, that no matter what gender presentation you have, it doesn't mean that you're invalid. People assuming I'm cis (including myself lol) doesn't actually make me cis. It's ok that the world is taking a long time to catch up, these discussions are new for a lot of folks and learning can be hard when gender normative concepts are so engrained even for us as gender nonconforming folks. I'm giving myself and the folks around me the ability to push against their assumptions, knowing that fundamentally, I am me, regardless of how feminine or masculine I am on a given day. 

Labels feel like a big deal... and they shouldn't 

The next hurdle in my gender exploration was trying to understand what label "fit" me. I talk to queer folks about their identities all day, so I'm quite familiar with various label options, but it's always been in the context of holding space for others rather than reflecting on myself. When it came to picking a label, I felt really stuck. The most obvious was "non-binary" but for some reason, it doesn't feel like home to me. I also feared that if I adopted the wrong label, people in that community would reject me. Again, it was necessary to give me a reminder that there will always be assholes who gate-keep, and those people are not my problem to deal with. As I worked through the book, a tingle kept coming up when I read the terms "gender nonconforming" and "genderfluid." I kept thinking about it even if I felt hesitant to adopt it fully.

Then my pastor-in-law came to town and asked me to describe what it meant when people identified themselves as fluid. He was curious because he'd heard someone in his congregation bring up that term, and I spend my days explaining this sort of stuff. But rather than keeping it theoretical, I found that I was explaining my own experience. What I told him was that I experience variations in my gender depending on the day. Some days I feel feminine and other days I wake up feeling more masculine, but most days I sit somewhere in between on the spectrum. The way I recognize that my gender is shifting is by listening to my intuition. On certain days, I feel a strong attraction to certain clothing, mannerisms, preferences, and behaviors; on other days my attraction entirely changes. This brings me back to my name: Sam Cat. I use Sam Cat as a first and last name, as well as two first names. Some people call me Sam, which makes me feel more masculine, and some people call me Cat, which makes me feel more feminine. I like both depending on the context. These two names reflect me as an entire person composed of various parts. I can't imagine being just one or the other, the same way I can't imagine being just a woman. That's asking to bisect half of myself, which hardly seems fair. I now listen to my gut and give myself permission to evolve and flow with my gender rather than squashing parts of me or trying to conform to a rigid set of expectations. The conversation with my pastor-in-law helped me realize how much more comfortable I was with labeling myself as genderfluid than as a cisgender woman because it reflects me as a whole rather than as a part. It also helped me understand that labels aren't everything. And my acceptance now comes after making an almost complete transition. You get to play with labels, wait, change them, hesitate, or enthusiastically embrace them, or disregard them entirely. Again, labels are linguistic tools. They work if they work, they don't if they don't. 

Discomfort and euphoria feel different to everyone over time

Throughout this exploration, I also recognized how discomfort and euphoria show up differently over time and based on the context. Back when I was still using my dead name, I couldn't have explained to you why I felt so uncomfortable. I had a constant sense of unease, especially when I had to introduce myself to new people. I moved around A LOT so this happened really frequently. It wasn't that I felt uncomfortable meeting new people, it was just the introductions. Having to say my dead name in front of a group of people always made me feel incredibly anxious. I never associated that with gender dysphoria, until I changed my name and that went away. Suddenly, the anxiety was gone, until people asked me about my "real" name and that wave of dread would come back up. Cis people would mostly just scratch their heads and go "huh, that's interesting," and luckily would go back to calling me Sam. When my friends and pals started calling me Sam I had a gush of euphoria. I felt at home. And that's a feeling I'm now very attuned to. The things that come naturally and make me feel comfort, I hold on to. I had the same experience after finishing my half-sleeve, I looked in the mirror and felt more like myself. I'm always discovering new things that make me feel aligned, and I'm giving myself permission to trust myself when that happens.

On the other hand, my pronouns make me feel entirely indifferent. My first language is french, and a lot of my head ramblings are correspondingly in french. I cannot think of myself as anything but "elle" in French, and so I have less of a negative reaction to the equivalent "she" in English. However, since I work mostly with queer folks who are often more thoughtful when it comes to using neutral pronouns, a lot of people who don't know more refer to me as "they," and I appreciate that! So while my pronouns don't cause me either discomfort or euphoria, I have started using she/they because it aligns both with how I see myself internally, as well as how my clients, followers, and peers do. It's been a good transition that was largely made for me, but that feels comfortable. 

It's been really useful for me to be aware of the aspects of my gender identity that are more or less important based on how much discomfort and euphoria it brings me. I recognize that not everyone has the same level of prickliness depending on their experience and it's really important for me to represent myself authentically. 

I don't have to prove shit to anyone 

My last lesson was that people will shit on me regardless of if they're cis or trans. It SUCKS meeting cis folks who insist that their reality is the only one that exists. It SUCKS (maybe even more) when other queers take a dump on each other for not being queer enough. It feels cruel, invalidating, and unnecessary. Unfortunately, empathy is scarce regardless of gender. Part of coming into myself has been realizing that people who don't like me, won't like me regardless of how I identify. Trying to prove myself to people who have no interest in supporting me is a waste of my time. My energy is far better spent sharing with people who have similar experiences, people who are interested in learning, people who are expansive in their thinking, and people who are also confused!

I recognize that there are a lot of people in the world who don't understand what I'm talking about and won't take the time to try to learn. They'll continue to insist there are only two genders, and that it has to be related to our biological sex (again, no it doesn't). That's on them. There are also trans people who will set a bar for what it means to "actually be trans." Guess what, that bar is imaginary, no one has autocratic control over queerness. These people are not the ones I need to prove myself to. In fact, I don't need to prove myself to anyone. The people in my life who know me, see me and support me understand that all the changes I'm undergoing are part of me becoming MORE myself. They're happy for me, they're learning with me, and they're there when I'm doubting myself. And above all, they don't require that I prove shit to them in order to be loved. I'm embracing what feels good without putting pressure on myself. I'm also sharing with folks who I know care more about me as a human than about me as a cis woman.  

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