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THEN DON'T CALL ME SHE

Started by Sea-Sam, April 12, 2012, 11:44:05 PM

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Sea-Sam

This lady is really getting on my nerves. She was talking about how I'm "me" no matter what body parts I have, and that I'm awesome for knowing this early? but then she kept using female pronouns.

Wtf?  How does that even make sense? 

I'm a ->-bleeped-<-ing guy. I'm not an "it" or whatever they think I am.  I don't wish to be treated as an "it", I want you to use male pronouns. HOW HARD IS IT? 

I don't understand. No one is calling me "he", even though I tell them I want to be called that. D:   

am I just that freaking feminine in appearance that they can't say it?
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Julie Wilson

I began transitioning quite a while ago and have been living as my true self for quite a while.  In that time I have learned that very few people will refer to your true sex (use correct pronouns) until after they begin to see that sex manifest in your secondary sexual characteristics and even then there will be people who (because they know you from before) will continue to have difficulties.

What I have learned is that (for me) transition goes like this...

Clothes
Voice
Hormones
Surgery
Change of scenery

Most people neglect the last one
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tvc15

Heh, I wouldn't be surprised if this happens to a lot of us. It happened to me. I used to get the same impassioned speeches from people (which, taking into consideration their actual attitudes, was just them patting themselves on the back for, I dunno, not screaming and running away?) only to have them completely ignore the fact I'm a guy. I'd get things like "Your mother will come around; after all, you're her daughter!" or "I can see you're so much happier now, you were really unhappy as a girl," and then they'd turn around and call me "she" repeatedly...

T has helped, and I don't run into that anymore--mainly because I'm not in contact with most of those people, and the few that are still in my life have come around. Some people just need those extra visible and audible clues to remember you're a guy... it sucks for someone with no access to T but a desire for it, but I guarantee it won't be this way forever. In the meantime all I can say is keep your head up. And if you don't want T, it's just going to be harder, I'm not going to lie about it, but there have been a lot of guys who have lived entirely stealth lives without going on a drop of hormones. Anything is possible. Just get yourself out of the more poisonous spaces when you're able.

It could also be that they feel awkward calling you male pronouns if they don't think you fit the bill. I wish I could word that in a better way. I don't know you, so I'm not passing judgement. But I have experienced this as well. My mom's initial problem was that it was just "awkward" to use a new name and pronouns with family members. I put a stop to that real quick. I basically said "sorry MY life makes YOU feel so awkward, but I'm the one who has to live it and deal with hearing a million different things from a million different people and I just want to feel like a human being. I asked you what to call me and I've given you all a lot of time, and I'm not taking it back, so you might as well get used to it now."

Yeah... didn't go over well... but it worked. That was the last conversation about it we had to have. And now we're back to the way our relationship used to be, which is very good, and she's one of my strongest supporters now.


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Felix

Commenting because this thread has a lot of views and not a lot of responses. Idk what to tell you Kody. It's frustrating. I've run into that too from some people. Nominal acceptance without a shift in pronouns is hard to take seriously.
everybody's house is haunted
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justmeinoz

Just ignoring her when she is obviously talking to someone else should do it fairly quickly.
"Don't ask me, it was on fire when I lay down on it"
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GentlemanRDP

Well Kody, that's pretty rough, and I definitely know how you feel. It's very frustrating to be misgendered, I would know. For the first six to seven months after I started T, I was still consistently called a 'girl,' and a 'she,' However, now that it's been nearly a year, I am very consistently labelled as a male, and I'll tell you a few things.

It's very hard for some people who knew you as a 'girl' to adjust to calling you a 'he,' even if they accept and support you. The truth is that it's just force of habit. Now, I don't know how long you and this woman have known each other or what her relation to you is, but even if you've known each other for just a few years, she's probably known you as a woman longer than she's known you as a 'man,' but obviously, I don't know for sure.

And as far as being feminine goes, that was a huge obstacle for me in the beginning, but once I got on T and my voice started dropping, this changed greatly. Also, remember clothes, hair, mannerisms, and if you need to, binding. One more thing that I will say though, is that being feminine isn't necessarily bad when it comes to passing (Unless being seen as a gay man bothers you, because we all know that everyone thinks your gay when you're a little fem) after all, just look at how feminine some natural born men are. After I realized this and began to embrace that, I really began passing more. Thinking of it gave me confidence and helped me change the way that I move and interact with other men.

Having people call you a male can take a long time, and can be helped by passing, it took me nearly a year to start getting labeled as a guy, but eventually, it'll happen for you too :3 Good luck!
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