email me at whycantibehim@gmail.com :)
Catching Elephant is a theme by Andy Taylor
I’ve been secretly keeping a running list of reasons people in my life have given me for why I am not and/or cannot be trans.
So far:
- I knit
- I played with Barbies when I was little
- I’m so beautiful
- I’m very curvy
- My mother already has a son
- There isn’t really such a thing
- It would make my life more difficult
- There’s so much else going on right now
- I like men
- It’s misogynist
- I need to find a job
- My mother wants grandchildren
- I’m too old
- It “came out of nowhere”
- It would be awkward
- It’s expensive
- It’s a lot of work
- I might be beaten or killed
- I’m short
- My family already has a lot to deal with
I have felt like that and I feel that having people who refuse to call you by your chosen name is probably the biggest reason for it sounding fake, nothings worse than a constant reminder of that other name :\ That and also the rift between legal and preferred. Since the preferred isn't legally what your name is it could feel like a lie when you say your preferred name is your name. At least that's how I've felt about it in the past. The farther I get into my transition and the more people who use my preferred name and the more I use it the less it sounds fake to my ears. I don't know how long you've been going by your preferred name but I'd say with time it'll settle in and get woven into you just as if you were born with it. :]
Thank you for taking the time to send me this - it’s very reassuring. You’re right, I do sort of feel like a liar when I ask people to address my by my preferred name rather than my current legal one. I guess I just have to remind myself that some day in the future, the two will be one and the same. :)
Name is a fence and within it you are nameless.
I’m wondering when my name is going to stop sounding fake to me. I love the name I’ve chosen, and I’m not having any second thoughts about it whatsoever, but it still feels like I am lying to someone. To myself? It still takes me longer to write and to respond to. Is it because all of the people closest to me refuse to use it, so when someone else does I’m not prepared? Is it because I’m in name and pronoun limbo? When my friend calls me one thing but my ID says another… Has anyone else experienced this problem?
