Outed at work

[nicks]

I was outed at work.

It's a long story, I just feel like writing it down. I don't have a blog, can't talk about it in person and just need to vent. Actually I think I'm gonna start a blog now.

Anyway.

I work in a large government organisation that employees a couple thousand people, everyone knows everyone and everyone got their job because their mum, dad, brother or sister works there. It's all a bit dodgy, but I'm not complaining (my sister and I worked there together after all).

I've been working there for 7 years now, I started my transition early in 2009. It was terrifying, I've heard so many horror stories so I expected the worst. I was pleasantly surprised, people may not have understood what I was going through (and how could they) but they accepted it, or at least didn't treat me any different.

A while after my transition started (when I was undoubtably male looking), we employed the daughter of a man in another department as a favour who worked with us casually. Last year we employed a new girl to work part time, only weeks before I went off to have top surgery. While I was away, the casual girl decided to say to the part time girl "Hey guess what, I've got some JUICY gossip on Nick that could make you judge him!". Turns out her Dad, for whatever reason, decided to tell his daughter her boss was trans. 

So the part time girl is shocked. She has no idea what this juicy gossip is, and approaches our manager asking if I had been in prison.

Yes, prison. What the hell.

My manager said no, and that it is a private and sensitive issue and that if Nick wishes to tell you that is his choice, and if not to leave it alone. (I should also add casual girl got a blasting, but continued to work with us because we had nobody else. Awkward.)

So I return to work after my chest surgery and nobody knows what I had surgery for. Part time girl is inquisitive, and I can tell she would never let the casual juicy gossip bullcrap go. I tell her my situation. She is supportive, understanding, and craps on about her avid support of the GLBT community. We get along well, and for the next 18 months I feel she is someone I can trust.

She has gone on maternity leave, her last day was Friday. She started a conversation with me that went something like this:

Part time girl: *in a fan girl excited voice* "So, am I the ONLY person around here that knows now? Now I'm gone for 12 months, does nobody else know?!!?"

Me: *awkward and uncomfortable* "well, yes I assume so. Nobody else should know. I don't think X knows"

Part time girl: "Oh X knows. Something something blah blah (I don't know what she said after that)"

Me: *shocked confused look on face* "Well X shouldn't know, this all happened a long time before X started working here. How does X know??"

Part time girl: *->-bleeped-<-s her pants because she dug her own grave* "Oh um I don't know, someone in X department must have said something, apparently the tour guides have all been gossiping about it and it has gotten back to newer part time girl (another new girl that works with me now)".
Me: *wtf* "None of those people should know. I don't even KNOW any of those people."

Part time girl: *comes up with some excuse to deflect the blame from her*

So after that little conversation, I am obviously hurt, angry, upset, and violated. I go straight to my manager and tell her what happened. I put it in writing and let it sit till Monday. I spent the entire weekend in bed, hardly ate, didn't shower, and just felt like my life is completely and utterly pointless, so why am I bothering with all of this?

Monday comes, and I speak with the HR department. My HR adviser is furious that my privacy has been violated. She gives us some sugestions and we start investigating. Such and suchs manager pulls her in to her office and asks her how she knows about me. According to X, part time girl told her ages ago.

What the effing eff.

So today comes.

Xs Manager pulls her aside again, and asks her, again, who told her. This time the story is different. I'm not really sure what she said, but apparently she wasn't very forthcoming with her information and her Manager said it sounded like she was covering for someone, but X confirmed that the new part time girl is now aware of my situation also.

Convenient.

My manager contacts part time girl.

Apparently, X brought it up with part time girl (X said the opposite), asking if she knew I was trans in which case she said yes, then they had their juicy little gossip about me. New part time girl is apparently aware of my situation through the gossip of the tour guides, but is too afraid to ask me in case it is a rumour.

I'm fuming. I go to my HR adviser, who is also fuming, but unfortunately there is not much they can do. They don't have proof of gossip, and asking around about it my fuel the fire.

What pisses me off is that the excuse the part time girl will give is "Well nobody cares they're all accepting", which is what she said to me when she told her boyfriend I was trans. Oh, and she has since told her ENTIRE FAMILY and even BRAGGED about telling them.

My issue here isn't whether or not these people accept me. My issue is that I am STEALTH. I transitioned to be a male and to be known only as such. I just want to live a quiet life without all this gossip, and without people trying to 'take the flory'. It's like she is so pathetic that to make her self feel better she has to tell people about me, and say how accepting she is of it.

I don't know what to do. I don't know what I can do. If they had of been honest in the beginning and admitted what they did, it could have been a slap on the wrist. Now I want them to recieve a formal warning, but I feel like I am being persuaded not to go down that road. My workplace is very accepting and supportive, they said they don't want to downplay my feelings, but they encouraged me to be the bigger and better person and not let them win.

I see them not winning by having their asses handed to them by the Director of HR.

If anyone was able to read through that thesis, what have you done in a similar situation? I feel so lost. I'm gearing up for my next surgery and excited, and now I feel like its all pointless. Will people ever let me be me?

[nicks]

I have no idea why half of that thesis is in bold. Sorry.

[fixed it - Padma]

[Make_It_Good]

Gosh, I would be absolutely furious! Im really sorry to hear about this situation youve unfortunately found yourself in.
   The closest Ive come to this is a friend telling her friends, and another older, unrelated friend telling his friend, family and owner of the bar wed go to together. Thankfully it didnt ever spread to my work place, but I atleast empathize with the sense of anger it leaves you with.
  It is absolutely noones right but yours to discuss this personal part of your life with people. It is more than just unfair that theyve taken it upon themselves to spread this about you.
  Gathering from all youve put, you seem like me in the sense of never even dreaming of telling any soul that I do not need to divulge this information to. Im stealth, and a guy and that is all I want to be seen as.
If I were you, understanding that your work has been great so far,  I would still push for this to go further. Its not like theyve gone round spreading the secret that you once cheated on your girlfriend, or survived a bear attack, something random that your life how you want it, rests on people not knowing, theyve told people something very major.

I hope things go well for you.

[justmeinoz]

I would be inclined to tell HR that you were prepared to ignore it up until now, but they have not stopped and are invading your privacy further and you want it quashed now.

I would stress the personal safety aspects.

I did this after my Austudy student allowance letters arrived with my old name on them.  If the local office had not acted, I let them know I was prepared to take it all the way to the top.

Karen.

[nicks]

Thanks for your response, I'm glad that you dont think I am over reacting. Everyone elses advice is to just brush it under the carpet. I want HR to do something about it, not just for me but for anyone with a sensitive issue being spread around the work place. I think its completely intolerable.

Its not like theyve gone round spreading the secret that you once cheated on your girlfriend, or survived a bear attack, something random that your life how you want it, rests on people not knowing, theyve told people something very major.

You're absolutely right about that, and I made said at work today. It's not like people are talking about who slept with who last friday night, this is my fricken life.

I would stress the personal safety aspects.

You're right, there are some crazy people out there who just can't wrap their heads around it. Imagine if someone at work is crazy and decides to beat the **** out of me if I try to use the bathroom? I know their response will probably be "oh, that won't happen" but you never know...I've been so lucky so far and I'm just waiting for my luck to run out. Thats probably why I never put my self in a situation where the potential for me to require a public bathroom is high.

Thats actually really sad on my part.

[justmeinoz]

Or, as we would say here, "rip 'em a new one HR!"

[Elena G]

Dig a hole...

find part time girl...

you know the rest...



Now more seriously, get them fired. Or something. Don't let it go to your head, but DO ACT against their actions, if not against them too. People like that don't even deserve to breath. They feed on anyone else's stuff, and the more you are compromised, the more they enjoy it. Take special care of that low-life of a b17<#, so she learns a lesson.


My god, am I angry...

[mm]

Nicks you have the situation that none of us want.  How to be yourself and not be seen as trans.  You deserve for your private life to remind private.  HR should be doing more to make your work place acceptable for you.  I would keep talking with HR until the situation is taking care of to your satisfaction.  You should be able to be stealth at work.  Good luck with your next surgery.  I hope your top surgery recovery has been great for you.

[Sarah Louise]

Like it or not, people will be people, that is people like to stick their noses in other peoples business.

People like to gossip, that has been true through out all of time and I doubt it will change.

Its rude when someone makes unnecessary/hurtful comments about co-workers, it shouldn't happen, but every one of us has had it happen (and not just about TS issues).  When it has happened to me, I have always gone to the people involved and tried to talk with them first.  Going to management was always the second (and less desireable) option for me, but that is just how I was raised and partially due to how my generation did things (I'm 67).

I usually worked for smaller companies that didn't have HR departments, so it was just your supervisor and the owners to go to.

I hope that HR can help you, but you can't just depend on them, yes they are there to protect your rights and they need to do that, but its a large company and they are trying to keep everyone happy.  Your going to need to be proactive too, step up and defend your rights from these individuals who get off on attacking anyone who is different than themselves.

Good Luck.

[Jeatyn]

I'm so sorry that happened to you and I don't think you're overreacting at all


A similar thing happened to me while I was on a training course, the teacher knew about my situation and kept referring to me as a girl, I corrected her politely endless times and then about a week in I lost it and stood up in class and was like "SERIOUSLY why do you keep calling me a girl?" and she mumbled some crap basically saying she knows I'm trans and she's trying her best but it's hard for her blah blah blah. Which of course sent ripples around the room of "oh I knew something was weird the hips give it away" "oh wow I totally didn't know I saw her in the mens bathroom and everything ewww!" and all that kind of crap.


I immediately went to see the manager and kicked up a huge fuss, I was moved to a different class, she was fired. It was too late by then though, everyone in the entire building knew. It really does make you think...what is the bloody point of even trying?

[sneakersjay]

I transitioned on the job 4 years ago.  I had 3 surgeries while working there, though they only knew about 2.  When I came out management put it out there that harrassing me or dissing me  behind my back would not be tolerated.  Over time it is a non-issue with some rare pronoun slip-ups by certain people.  It used to bother me; now I ignore it because at this point anybody looking at me will only see me as male.  I also know if stripped naked my anatomy passes as male, albeit with a few scars and very small junk.


We have had scores of new employees start here since I was fully transitioned and appearing as  male.  I have never heard anyone gossip nor have I ever heard that people have outed me.  That said, my place of employment has been a huge gossip mill and I can't imagine that this 'juicy gossip' has never been spoken to any new employee.


I guess what I am trying to say is:  Yes, if I found out that everybody at work knew my business, I, too, would be pissed.  However, nobody is saying anything, nobody is asking rude questions, no one is avoiding me, nobody is overly interested in getting to know me.  I am assuming they all know, but I never speak of anything transition related with the extremely rare exception of 1 or 2 very supportive employees and only in private.  Even if I have to refer to myself in the past, I always use male pronouns, call myself my  kids' dad, etc.


By having HR get involved, and question people, it makes it seem like a bigger deal than it is, especially if all this time you didn't know that anyone knew.  They might have heard it but didn't believe it, or didnt' care, and still see you as male.  By bringing attention to it might make it a bigger deal than it should have been.  Taking aside this employee that confessed she blabbed, then having HR speak directly to her is in order, for sure.  But pulling other people aside, asking if they knew about Nick, who told them, etc, seems like overkill.


I understand your frustration, believe me.  I can't stand the fact that I have an F history.  I want to forget about it permanently.  But even going to the doctor for something as innocuous as a cholesterol check gets me having to blab about trans crap I'd rather forget.
Jay

[mm]

sneakersjay, great to hear your surgeries went fine and so is your job.  I hope to be there some day too.  Can you stand at the urinal to pee, that is my big goal in finally passing I think?

[nicks]

Wow, thank you all for your replies. I was feeling very alone in this, and now I feel much better. I've calmed down over the past few days and I've let go of a bit of my anger, but I'm still very hurt so I thank you all for sharing your stories and for your great advice.

sneakersjay: You sound like you're in a similar work place situation to me, for the most part nobody cares and nobody treats me any different which is great. I'm just Nick. I don't like getting HR involved because it can be a long and stressful process, and others may see me as a "dobber". Mainly I just want HR to sit her down and say oi, what you did was messed up so don't do it again or it will go on your permanent record.   

Jeatyn: What happened to you in your training course is disgusting, I'm glad that woman got fired. That's a very selfish thing to say that it was 'hard for her'. I can understand that it can be hard for family, friends and partners to adjust from she to he, Nikki to Nick, but for a stranger...what a joke. Those people are dispicable.

[Cindy]

Hi Nicks,

I would push for the person to be fired and I would ensure that any references  include a clause saying that she was incapable of keeping confidential data and is a risk in any job were that is required.

The reason for dismissal is the spreading of rumours, leaking of confidential information, sexual harassment and an inability to be a team member.  You may have legal recourse as well in that she has slandered you. The laws of libel and slander are complex and I know the USA laws are different to those in Australia, but she has to be legally responsible for her actions in damaging your 'reputation'.

On the plus side the 'company' appears to be very supportive.

Sadly I have no idea why such stupid people are so stupid. Sorry .

You do need to deal with it at a personal level and move on. Don't let such people destroy what you have so successfully built. You are a really good looking guy be proud ..

Ciny

[Azmaria]

rather than classified, it's privacy act information, but same reasoning otherwise. i recommend you make sure HR rips her a new one and she's fired for not being able to keep her mouth shut and defamation of person.

being supportive means keeping your mouth shut and being trustworthy with personal information - not spreading it around like butter on toast.