Gender stuff has been weird.
Apr. 3rd, 2013 09:18 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
gementPronouns, names, all gendered markers have been feeling actively weird for, when I count it out, several years at this point. They fit wrong, like itchy sweaters.
I used to have some nice binary options. While I wished I could get more guy time, it got honored here and there, and I could more or less put it away between times.
I had a female housemate for a year or so who shared my (male but socially androgynous) name. I basically shelved the name, and the identity, for that year, and just lived in a blenderized state for a while, mixing up my clothes and presentation more and more. That housemate's been gone for a while, but the blenderization remained.
My birth name, with its very gendered inflection, has been stinging, just sounding so GIRLY, since about then.
For a while when I started dating W it was a relief, an active relief, to get a space where I was unambiguously treated as male. Then I learned there was such a thing as too much guy time, which was an excess I had really, really never expected to be offered.
We've been going to the local club, and I've been firmly introducing myself with my male name, and feeling the need for downtime from it, trying to roll with it as a relatively androgynous alternative and thinking of a more masculine abbreviation as the 'really guy' version, but it's still my male name and sometimes it's just a bad fit.
Then I've been going into new workplaces, introducing myself with a firm handshake and... muscle memory from the club says I should give the male name (which sounds like a lie) and I swallow it down and give the female name (which sounds like a lie plus it's bucking the muscle memory).
I've been growing out my hair for the Logan's Run costumes. The last month I was starting to feel actively dysphoric about the way I imagined people were seeing my GIRL GIRL GIRL hair. I'm so glad to have it short again, but not too short, because then it's into butch masculine military presentation and that's wrong too.
I had a couple of dreams recently, confirming on two separate occasions that wincing because someone casually gendered me (Excuse me, ma'am. *wince*) has become so routine that it happens in my dreams realistically, unremarkably and without comment. It's just there. Just like in real life.
People have asked, politely and when they see how often I bind despite the fact it gives me migraines, if I've considered reduction surgery. I haven't. At all. I like my body's shape, I like how it moves. I like my facial shape and my voice unless I'm thinking actively about how they're read in specific situations. The one thing I'm not freaked out by is my body. Not interested in messing with that.
Last night, and at least once before, I remembered dreaming that I was naked and had a routine, center-of-the-cis-bell-curve male body. The dream called attention to this because someone else at the beach hadn't expected to see nudity and made a face. I looked down at my body, clear specific visual memory of a typical if somewhat chilled physiology, and then shrugged, because it's the beach and they can live with it. There was no sense of oddity, just like there's no sense of oddity when I look down at my routine female body.
I want to be all the things, and in the absence of getting all the people to see me as all the things all the time, whatever bit is not being recognized squeaks. I'm living with a nearly constant squeak. This is not just frustrating, not even just annoying anymore, it's BORING. It's tedious to have the same problem over and over, with no emotional movement, nothing that I can tell people to do to fix it.
I've asked a couple of partners to start using "they" as my pronoun, and sometimes "Shape" as my name. I also answer to "Space," "M," and "Ferret." These words are place holders. I say, "I'm between gender identities right now, but I'm sending out applications."
I'm not asking that of everyone, though if you think of using "they" that would be awesome.
I think I'm going to start to ask people to be mindful of gendered role words, though. Those I consistently want either neutral or masculine if neutral isn't a choice, and they weigh more heavily than pronouns.
Prince. Time Lord. Sir. Handsome.
Sibling. Kid, Kiddo, Sprogling, Child-person (better than either daughter or son).
Person (better than lady or gentleman in most situations, unless I'm exceedingly dapper). Ferret.
"You, sir, are a ferret and a gentleman."
It'll have to do for now. Stupid sweaters.
I used to have some nice binary options. While I wished I could get more guy time, it got honored here and there, and I could more or less put it away between times.
I had a female housemate for a year or so who shared my (male but socially androgynous) name. I basically shelved the name, and the identity, for that year, and just lived in a blenderized state for a while, mixing up my clothes and presentation more and more. That housemate's been gone for a while, but the blenderization remained.
My birth name, with its very gendered inflection, has been stinging, just sounding so GIRLY, since about then.
For a while when I started dating W it was a relief, an active relief, to get a space where I was unambiguously treated as male. Then I learned there was such a thing as too much guy time, which was an excess I had really, really never expected to be offered.
We've been going to the local club, and I've been firmly introducing myself with my male name, and feeling the need for downtime from it, trying to roll with it as a relatively androgynous alternative and thinking of a more masculine abbreviation as the 'really guy' version, but it's still my male name and sometimes it's just a bad fit.
Then I've been going into new workplaces, introducing myself with a firm handshake and... muscle memory from the club says I should give the male name (which sounds like a lie) and I swallow it down and give the female name (which sounds like a lie plus it's bucking the muscle memory).
I've been growing out my hair for the Logan's Run costumes. The last month I was starting to feel actively dysphoric about the way I imagined people were seeing my GIRL GIRL GIRL hair. I'm so glad to have it short again, but not too short, because then it's into butch masculine military presentation and that's wrong too.
I had a couple of dreams recently, confirming on two separate occasions that wincing because someone casually gendered me (Excuse me, ma'am. *wince*) has become so routine that it happens in my dreams realistically, unremarkably and without comment. It's just there. Just like in real life.
People have asked, politely and when they see how often I bind despite the fact it gives me migraines, if I've considered reduction surgery. I haven't. At all. I like my body's shape, I like how it moves. I like my facial shape and my voice unless I'm thinking actively about how they're read in specific situations. The one thing I'm not freaked out by is my body. Not interested in messing with that.
Last night, and at least once before, I remembered dreaming that I was naked and had a routine, center-of-the-cis-bell-curve male body. The dream called attention to this because someone else at the beach hadn't expected to see nudity and made a face. I looked down at my body, clear specific visual memory of a typical if somewhat chilled physiology, and then shrugged, because it's the beach and they can live with it. There was no sense of oddity, just like there's no sense of oddity when I look down at my routine female body.
I want to be all the things, and in the absence of getting all the people to see me as all the things all the time, whatever bit is not being recognized squeaks. I'm living with a nearly constant squeak. This is not just frustrating, not even just annoying anymore, it's BORING. It's tedious to have the same problem over and over, with no emotional movement, nothing that I can tell people to do to fix it.
I've asked a couple of partners to start using "they" as my pronoun, and sometimes "Shape" as my name. I also answer to "Space," "M," and "Ferret." These words are place holders. I say, "I'm between gender identities right now, but I'm sending out applications."
I'm not asking that of everyone, though if you think of using "they" that would be awesome.
I think I'm going to start to ask people to be mindful of gendered role words, though. Those I consistently want either neutral or masculine if neutral isn't a choice, and they weigh more heavily than pronouns.
Prince. Time Lord. Sir. Handsome.
Sibling. Kid, Kiddo, Sprogling, Child-person (better than either daughter or son).
Person (better than lady or gentleman in most situations, unless I'm exceedingly dapper). Ferret.
"You, sir, are a ferret and a gentleman."
It'll have to do for now. Stupid sweaters.
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no subject
Date: 2013-04-04 06:46 am (UTC)Not that we encounter one another much, but I can probably manage "they". I dated someone for about 18 months for whom that was the preferred pronoun, and got pretty good at using it.
no subject
Date: 2013-04-04 05:17 pm (UTC)Space Core was, of course, the source of Space. (Prince of Space. I'm the best at space! Space. Dad, are you Space? Yes, son. Now we are a family again. Space!)
no subject
Date: 2013-04-04 12:19 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-04-04 12:39 pm (UTC)You, sir, are a ferret and a gentleman and a scholar. :)
no subject
Date: 2013-04-04 05:20 pm (UTC)I think she may be right. Must test this hypothesis.
no subject
Date: 2013-04-04 06:16 pm (UTC)If I were the Empress of Language, I'd make everyone switch to the genderless Na'vi pronouns. Not only are they gender-neutral, they have dual and trial forms, and they distinguish between we meaning "you and I" and we meaning "I and others, but not you". And they have second person plurals, instead of y'all or all y'all.
no subject
Date: 2013-04-04 05:18 pm (UTC)Nibling. I like that.
no subject
Date: 2013-04-05 12:03 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-04-05 12:14 am (UTC)Whatever else you do in your life, you have accomplished a deeply satisfying inside joke.
no subject
Date: 2013-04-16 12:01 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-04-04 05:22 pm (UTC)Is Mana still acceptable or would you like to be refiled?
Also, do you know anyone who might like the binders I bought from you a couple years back? I'm happy to ship them to you for free passing along, I just don't think goodwill here would know what to do with them... and I'm not going to be wearing anything flattening for quite a while now.
Thirdly, I'd like leather care assistance if you have any pointers for boots that have suede accents and are covered in playa... still.. (we went 3 summers ago now I think)
no subject
Date: 2013-04-04 06:02 pm (UTC)2) Yes, send them my way, I'll see them placed with local gender support groups if they don't fit me.
3) Oy. Playa dust is on the list of things that makes Leather Jesus cry, and suede is almost impossible to care for in the first place.
Step 1: get as much dust off the boots as possible using wind power. Use your vacuum's upholstery tool. ("Vacuum the crap out of it," W says.) Compressed air if you've got it handy.
Step 2: wipe gently with vinegar:water diluted 1:10 to neutralize the pH.
Step 3: don't take leather you care about to the playa. :D
[These tips and more can be found in W's book, Beyond Bootblacking, available on Amazon!]
no subject
Date: 2013-04-05 02:39 am (UTC)I've always been partial to Ferret. Ferrets make me die of cute.
no subject
Date: 2013-04-16 01:25 am (UTC)I'm sorry you're struggling with the itchiness of the poor fit of words.
How can mere words describe the wonder that is you?
Sending love from afar,
Ti
no subject
Date: 2013-04-16 03:14 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-04-16 11:54 am (UTC)I post more on reddit lately. Not too much personal stuff, though. I hang out in some parenting forums doling out gentle discipline advice, and I moderate the breastfeeding forum. Humdrum stuff.