Learning From Being Misgendered

I am misgendered every single day. I am misgendered when someone calls me she/woman/girl/female. I am misgendered when I’m called him/guy/boy/man/male. I struggle myself, after years of hiding this enormous aspect of my reality. But with each passing day I’m learning more and more about who I am, and with each new understanding comes growing pains…and the pain inflicted on me by those who love me the most. Continue reading Learning From Being Misgendered

Raising Faith

We currently live in culture trying so desperately to figure out how to be human and humane that there is a disturbing backward trend that results in people clinging so desperately to ignorance and fear that there is an acceptance of inhumane treatment and actions, to the point it is celebrated and stoutly, and violently, justified to act in such a manner. Somehow, somewhere in this painful growth spurt in humanity, any thought, existence, idea that makes an individual uncomfortable is automatically wrong and that person is justified to act in any manner they see fit to address it and that action should be automatically accepted because said person is just acting authentically, and well we should accept all people for who they are…

I call bullshit.
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A New Step

It all starts with one step. One realization that everything you have been told about who you are as a person is wrong. That the reason you stare yourself down in the mirror isn’t for vain pleasure, but because it is the only way you can look yourself in the eye and figure out what is wrong with the person staring back. For something is wrong with that person. There is a deep sadness behind smiling grey eyes. The upturned smirk is sardonic at best; tired and listless and forced. The person in the mirror is a stranger; they don’t look like the person you see in your mind. The person who you struggle to be in a world unforgiving to those who don’t hold the sanctity of the status quo. A body that was built in nature but forced and remolded out of what it was always meant to be, and there you are, trying to break the mold placed upon you.
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I Don’t Owe You Kindness; I Give It Anyway

Compassion, patience, time, consideration, understanding. These concessions…no concession isn’t the right word, but at the same time it is, have been asked of me over the last few months as those around me “come to terms” with my revelation regarding my gender identity. I have been talked to, talked at, talked around, ridiculed, mocked, and then asked not to take it personally because it wasn’t meant in cruelty. I’ve been told that I’m loved, but who I am can’t be accepted because it’s too hard for the other person to work through, and I’ve been flat-out ignored. I’ve been smiled at when purposefully challenged and I didn’t have the energy to fight back. I’ve been snapped at for correcting my name and pronoun, and have had my tone misunderstood. I’ve heard the panic in voices that quickly correct what they said only to not listen when I offer comfort.  Continue reading I Don’t Owe You Kindness; I Give It Anyway

You’re a Pretty Man

It is not a secret that I take immense pleasure when I am addressed/referred to as anything but female; it’s almost juvenile. I love being called sir, dude, etc because woman/female doesn’t fit. Although being male doesn’t fit either, having spent 30 years being labeled in the wrong term, any reference outside of said label is liberating. It’s exciting. It’s the opposite of everything I’ve been told I am. It’s outside of the identity I was told to have.

Still…as I begrudgingly admit, being referenced as male is incorrect, despite my somewhat childish glee from it.
Continue reading You’re a Pretty Man