National Coming Out Day

Hi y’all, my name is Meg and I’m trans and use they/them pronouns.  It’s National Coming Out Day tomorrow and I want to take a minute to come out as trans to anyone who has missed that piece of my journey.  About 14 months ago I wrote What Even Are My Pronouns about my transition from she/her to she/they pronouns and my early explorations of my gender.  It’s been more than a year now, I’m using they/them, and transness has become a large part of my identity.

The shift from she/they to exclusively they/them has been joyous and difficult and sometimes very confusing.  I still feel like my gender is a moving target.  I think if people didn’t expect me to have a coherent identity and a well established set of pronouns I would have a different set each day.  Sometimes I feel like she/her works, sometimes I feel very he/him, most often I feel like some sort of mishmash, something outside the restriction of binary gender.  They/them is the best way I’ve figured out to honor that mishmash and honor the way things shift for me all the time. 

It’s hard to feel like I’m always standing on moving ground, and it’s damn hard to explain it to people.  Most of the time I don’t.  I use they/them pronouns and identify as trans and I let people bring their own assumptions and definitions to that. We’re taught that identities are firm and should be easily condensible into a few words. I’d need more time than an elevator pitch to fully explain my gender and quite frankly I don’t have the energy to give that pitch to everyone I meet.

I wonder about cis people sometimes and whether they are assessing or measuring my transness.  Unless you speak haircut, I present very femme. I wear almost exclusively dresses and I enjoy makeup and fancy earrings and all the trappings of femininity.  Some part of that presentation is related to the fact that I don’t have the money to buy a new wardrobe that has more masc pieces, some part of it is that dresses are comfortable for the shape of my body and makeup is just fucking fun.  

Most cis people look at me in a dress and with bright lipstick and see a woman. When I disclose my transness I am often met with surprise. The first person I came out to using the word trans was cis and convinced me to walk it back because I wasn’t “really trans.” I wasn’t trans enough for the label.  She was visibly more comfortable when I pulled back from the word.  That was a really hard interaction and one that I still think of even though it’s far past.

I didn’t start using the word trans for quite some time after that. It wasn’t until someone in my life who is binary trans reminded me that the word trans is an umbrella term and that nonbinary fits very well under that umbrella, that I gave myself permission to think of myself as trans.  I wish I was someone who hadn’t needed that external validation but I did. Thank you, friend, for giving it to me.

In the more than a year since I came out I have leaned into trans spaces and my relationships with other trans people. Those spaces and relationships are the source of some of the purest joy that exists in my life. Trans people are not a monolith but the ones I have begun cultivating relationships with have all been incredibly welcoming and supportive.  At my first meeting of the trans affinity group connected to the queer chorus where I sing I mentioned that I was relatively newly out and one of the members came off mute to exclaim “congratulations on your new gender! Or owning the gender you have always had!”  Such a simple thing but so so important to me.

For all that this piece is about the ways that gender is hard, I need to express the joy of gender as well. Playing with gender is just fucking fun.  I recently spent some time growing out the chin and lip hair that I usually shave away.  It was delightful to see my face differently and to experience myself presenting differently than the norm for a person whose body looks like mine. I experimented with filling it in a little bit with an eyebrow pencil and it was lovely. Ultimately I started shaving again because I’m not able to grow enough hair for it to look intentional and filling in the hair every day was a drag but if my body would give me more facial hair I would be rocking a mustache right now for sure.

There is so much freedom in giving yourself space to play and knowing that you don’t have to land anyplace specific. There is such euphoria in finding a thing that feels right.  There is so much joy in being myself and remembering that myself doesn’t have to mean something static or unchanging.

It is a dark time for trans people in this nation and yet we are able to provide so much light.

I’m Meg, and I’m trans, and I’m thrilled about it.