Susan's Place Transgender Resources

Today was an odd day. I went shopping for clothes with my mom and wanted to try on a few things. My parents don't bring up my trans stuff and I don't bring it up to them, either. It works out a bit better for everybody this way. When I went to the fitting rooms (with my mother waiting to get a number to try stuff on) the employee pointed towards the men's fitting room. It was only the 2nd time I've been read as male since starting T and I was hesitant to actually use the men's fitting room (especially with my parent there). It was an odd situation to be read correctly and caused me to smile.

So, have there been situations where you were read as the correct/incorrect gender in a situation that was awkward or uncomfortable?

A memorable moment several years ago was when I was out having dinner with my parents and the waitress referred to me as Miss throughout the evening. I wasn't even trying to pass! I'd say at that stage in my life I was completely andro.

I transitioned in-place at a retail store, and we have many repeat customers.  Some don't recognize me (they asked if I was new) some haven't made any comments and refer to me as miss, and the rare couple still call me sir (even with boobs and a nametag with my new name).  Had one of the latter around a customer who had never been in the store before.  When he called me sir, the new customer gave him a strange look, and when he was out of ear shot, asked "Can he see okay?"
When I went the doctor to look at my imbedded piercing, my previous PCP (who I hadn't seen in a few years) wasn't available so I saw someone new.  The checkin lady showed me a sheet with all my personal info on it and had me confirm it was all correct.  I changed my address and handed it back.  She looked over her glasses at me and said "...are you sure that's all?"  After I got called to go in, the nurse gave a double take and asked my birthday and full name four separate times.

Awkward times, YES thats the story of my life lately.

Yes its nice being gendered correctly, but not when I'm not out and currently presenting male. Most times I just go with it, other times I have to let gender be known so ohhh gets weird.

1. Emergency room with son,check in nurse, "your his Father"?, Yes. "His Father"? Yes!

2. Hardware store thinking they view me as male, until clerk asks "Ms. do you need some help finding something"

3. Went to wedding reception kind of a redneck one at that. Presenting 1000% male UGH first 5 minutes there, waiting at bar man says boy your the most patient lady I ever seen.  :o

4. Many times shopping with my children, gets pretty awkward especially when they shout out DAD! in a store 1 minute after being gendered female!  >:(

The story of my life at this stage.

Does feel really good though ;D ;D

Shelly

Quote from: Just Shelly on April 11, 2011, 12:01:31 AM
Awkward times, YES thats the story of my life lately.

Yes its nice being gendered correctly, but not when I'm not out and currently presenting male. Most times I just go with it, other times I have to let gender be known so ohhh gets weird.

1. Emergency room with son,check in nurse, "your his Father"?, Yes. "His Father"? Yes!

2. Hardware store thinking they view me as male, until clerk asks "Ms. do you need some help finding something"

3. Went to wedding reception kind of a redneck one at that. Presenting 1000% male UGH first 5 minutes there, waiting at bar man says boy your the most patient lady I ever seen.  :o

4. Many times shopping with my children, gets pretty awkward especially when they shout out DAD! in a store 1 minute after being gendered female!  >:(

The story of my life at this stage.

Does feel really good though ;D ;D

Shelly

Shelly, I don't even know how you could try and pass as male! I'm assuming that you're rapidly approaching full time?

During my transition, my partner Julie Marie, used to tell me that " the only person who didn't know that I was not a full time lady was me". That might also apply to you?

Was waiting on the elevator at work. Woman (with a child in a stroller) asks where such and such was. I told her (voice is not feminine). Her little boy, must be around 2 years old, speaks out loudly saying "Are you a boy or a girl"? There are other people standing there and I feel so uncomfortable! I tried to ignore him but then he said, with a much louder voice, "Are you a boy or a girl"...ugh...pondering about the possibility of making my teeth flip around backwards so I could chew my brains out of my skull. I look at him and smile. Then, almost yelling at the top of his lungs..."ARE YOU A BOY OR A GIRL!!!!"? I said "I am a girl"...he was satisfied and paid me no more attention. I was petrified during that time but in the end, his innocence was so adorable.

The only time I screwed up big time was when I left  the country for SRS in 1974. All my paperwork was male but I didn't look very 'male' even in a baggy shirt and blue jeans.

After surgery, I was SO relieved it was all over that I gave the last of my andro clothes to my nurse's boyfriend. I was just SO happy I wasn't thinking ahead.

I was flirting with a young business man on the long trip back and it wasn't until we were walking toward Customs & Immigration  at the airport that I realized I did NOT look like my ID and if I produced male ID it was going to cause quite a commotion. I clung to the arm of the young man I had been flirting with, the Customs officer assumed we were a couple, and I passed through with no problem ..... and a WHOLE LOT OF RELIEF!

I could not imagine, in 1974, trying to explain it all to airport security! LOL!

Several years ago, before I started transitioning, some friends and I went bowling in costume on Halloween. I, naturally, made a 'costume' of one of my girlfriend-at-the-time's outfits (We were the same size. Was that a coincidence or was I subconsciously dating her for the convenient supply of clothes?) and a wig. When we were leaving the bowling alley, the guy at the counter admitted with a shocked look that he thought I was a girl until I was close enough for him to see my beard shadow. It made me happy, especially because I was kinda trying not to pass, to avoid anyone suspecting the motivation behind my costume choice.

I stopped at a freeway rest stop not too long ago and I just had a bad feeling about using the mens restroom there. It seemed really busy and I just didn't want to deal with it so I walked around it to the other side where the women's was and ducked in. I had sunglasses on and naturally there was a line in there. This old woman looked at me in the mirror reflection and then turned around and looked and said, "You're in the wrong line hun". So I was kinda like, "er, oh, sorry." So I basically just went out around the back again and waited awhile, then went back in and luckily no one was in line!

Quote from: Just Shelly on April 11, 2011, 12:01:31 AM
Awkward times, YES thats the story of my life lately.

Yes its nice being gendered correctly, but not when I'm not out and currently presenting male. Most times I just go with it, other times I have to let gender be known so ohhh gets weird.

1. Emergency room with son,check in nurse, "your his Father"?, Yes. "His Father"? Yes!

2. Hardware store thinking they view me as male, until clerk asks "Ms. do you need some help finding something"

3. Went to wedding reception kind of a redneck one at that. Presenting 1000% male UGH first 5 minutes there, waiting at bar man says boy your the most patient lady I ever seen.  :o

4. Many times shopping with my children, gets pretty awkward especially when they shout out DAD! in a store 1 minute after being gendered female!  >:(

The story of my life at this stage.

Does feel really good though ;D ;D

Shelly

Hah.. this is funny.. I have a ten year old daughter who has shouted out "Dad" imediately after I was gendered female... a bit awkward though it is kind of funny to see people's reactions.

She has begun calling me "mom" though even at home, so that doesn't happen much anymore.

I think it's interesting when you think you're being gendered male only to find out that's not the case. I was totally not dressed female once, straight out of work, and wound up stopping by the pet store to pick up some food for my Chihuahua. I must have talked to the guy behind the counter for five or ten minutes chatting about whatever, then when I left he said "Have a good night, Miss"... I was floored. Lol...

Last night my family went out to dinner, and my parents are pretty much anti transition. "If you really want this you can wait a few years" "You're being impulsive" etc, but the waitress looked at me and said "and for you ma'am?" I nearly died. xD

Quote from: Britney♥Bieber on April 11, 2011, 08:02:06 PM
Last night my family went out to dinner, and my parents are pretty much anti transition. "If you really want this you can wait a few years" "You're being impulsive" etc, but the waitress looked at me and said "and for you ma'am?" I nearly died. xD

Gah I hate when people tell me that. "You should wait a few years" or something similar. Yeah, well I've been waiting all my life, and I almost wound up dead. People just don't understand what it's like to be us and never will. I think it's great Britney that you are doing it now. I only wish I'd started when I was your age.

By the way you look adorable in your new avatar  :)

hahahaha at my old work as a grocery store cashier i was read as male by most of my customers. but my manager and coworkers still called me "she" even though they knew to call me "ryan". So one day I was working customer service and had to call my manager to help with a complication, I can't remember what it was but it wasn't an everyday mix up, and involved some math and heaving a heavy bag around. The lady said to my manager who was standing next to me something along the lines of "He's a good cashier, isn't he?" and my manager looks at her, puzzled for a second, and says, "Yep, she's a good little worker."

I just stared between the two with a look not too far off from :| and when the situation was over and I was alone I just started laughing... the customer was so confused.

Quote from: VeronikaFTH on April 11, 2011, 07:59:58 PM
Hah.. this is funny.. I have a ten year old daughter who has shouted out "Dad" imediately after I was gendered female... a bit awkward though it is kind of funny to see people's reactions.

She has begun calling me "mom" though even at home, so that doesn't happen much anymore.

I think it's interesting when you think you're being gendered male only to find out that's not the case. I was totally not dressed female once, straight out of work, and wound up stopping by the pet store to pick up some food for my Chihuahua. I must have talked to the guy behind the counter for five or ten minutes chatting about whatever, then when I left he said "Have a good night, Miss"... I was floored. Lol...

Sorry for double posting, but it's stories like these two that make me smile :)

Quote from: VeronikaFTH on April 11, 2011, 08:27:26 PM
Gah I hate when people tell me that. "You should wait a few years" or something similar. Yeah, well I've been waiting all my life, and I almost wound up dead. People just don't understand what it's like to be us and never will. I think it's great Britney that you are doing it now. I only wish I'd started when I was your age.

By the way you look adorable in your new avatar  :)

Honestly I don't think waiting would do anything but cause me to become more depressed and suicidal. I'm at a place where I see a great future that motivates me. But being a "man" would kill me.

Although I'm not technically out to my parents, I dress in female clothing except skirt/dress, handbag and basic makeup even when round them. A few months back I was working at their restaurant which is in a small section to a pub which is run by the landlord's partner. A couple of guys from a few feet away with the bar top between us trying to get my attention shouted "Excuse me.... erm... love?" When I approached, he was like "I'm sorry, I can't tell if you're a boy or a girl." I just shrugged. :D At soon as I turned around and walked away, he turned to the landlord's partner and asked "* I can't tell if that one's a boy or a girl." She replied "Supposed to be a boy." Oops :(

I'm so happy that in finnish the words for he and she are the same (hän). It will problably save me a lot of problems, especialy if I'm somewhere with my friends who have some dificulties rebembering about my situation.

Quote from: Kaisa on April 12, 2011, 05:17:14 AM
I'm so happy that in finnish the words for he and she are the same (hän). It will problably save me a lot of problems, especialy if I'm somewhere with my friends who have some dificulties rebembering about my situation.

D: lucky. If only all languages could have evolved that way :(

Once, I used the women's restroom at a store I was in when I was only a month or two on T and didn't feel comfortable using the men's yet.  At this point, I usually tried to just avoid public restrooms altogether, but sometimes these things happen, so I tried to hurry in and out as fast as possible.  The bathroom was empty when I went in and empty when I came out of the stall, so I was relieved.  I washed my hands and then pulled open the door to go out as a woman was pushing the door to come in.  The second she saw me, this look of complete panic came over her and she started stumbling over her words and said something about being in the wrong bathroom.  I just stayed quiet and quickly walked out. 

There was also the time I was with my girlfriend's mom (who doesn't know I'm trans) and we were referred to as "ladies" by a store employee.  Her mom quickly corrected the guy, but yeah...that was bad.

Oh my god yes. I went to a basketball game with my dad and this guy comes up and says, "I see you're raising a nice son here." I basically had a heart attack. Then, we went to this bar and the bartender said "Oh he's not old enough to drink" to which my dad said "She's not going to have any alcohol." I felt really embarrassed. But its good to know I pass I guess.

I was visiting a friend in the paych ward recently.  You have to sign in and give your ID to the clerk at the desk, so I do so.  She looks at it, looks at me, looks at it, and says "This is your ID?"  They finally have to call in the head of security to decide wether to let me in, who is slightly rude and asks me if I have a twin.  They do eventually let me in, but I wasted time visiting and was annoyed as I had already visited once and my ID was accepted no problem.
So cannot wait for my name change and ID update to go through.   >:(  At least they called me "she" and "her" throughout, so that was nice.

Last week I started to get into this great discussion with a clerk at the grocery store, talking about different types of rices and she said something about "my wife". Which was promptly ruined by my girlfriend accidentally "she"ing me. Poor clerk lady looked so confused. Similar thing happened in Wal-Mart a few weeks ago, me and Ben were screwing around and the clerk was laughing her ass off, said something about "You two boys must have a LOT of fun together" and then Frank (the friend I've complained about on and off) goes "Yeah, but only one of them is a real boy". Props to that clerk though, either she ignored it or knows someone trans or something, she kept calling me a guy the rest of the time.

I had a surprise-awesome moment yesterday though, when shipping something out at the post office (and paying with my bank card bearing the dreaded name), both ladies still called me "Sir" without hesitation. I was surprised but happy as hell.

Awkward times, though, seem to be a running trend with a lot of us.

Quote from: N.Chaos on April 16, 2011, 12:50:49 AM"Yeah, but only one of them is a real boy".

WTF.  I would've smacked him as soon as we were out of sight of the cashier.

Quote from: Serra on April 16, 2011, 10:14:04 AM
WTF.  I would've smacked him as soon as we were out of sight of the cashier.

I would have smacked him right there. 

Quote from: Maddie Secutura on April 16, 2011, 10:39:45 AM
I would have smacked him right there.

That :icon_punch:

^ I bit his head off hard enough to scare the ->-bleeped-<- out of him once we were back in the car.
Haven't had issues with it at all yet, he just doesn't use pronouns at all when we're out in public. Calls me either Nick or Nicky or "This One Over Here" and I'm entirely cool with that.

I had a funny/annoying pass last night, I was in a wicked bad mood at Wal-Mart (for some reason it was hot as ->-bleeped-<- in there and I wore one of my heaviest hoodies, over two binders) trying to find a bathroom. I hate using the ones up front because I feel like they're right on display and EVERYONE can see me going in or out. So, I walked to the back of the massive store, all dizzy and sweaty and generally crappy-feeling. I got into the men's room, and there's this piss-wasted guy standing in front of the stall wobbling, staring at me. I'm about to go for the knife in my pants when he goes "Duuuude...I gotta crap so bad. I'm sorry man, stall's el occupied-o".

At this point I was in such a bad mood I barely registered it as a mega-pass, but later on it hit me (along with the humor of it).

Quick explanation about contra dancing:
You can line up with either all leads (generally guys) in one line facing the follows (generally women) in another line or set up staggered with the two lines facing each other and both alternating lead and follow.

Anyways, I was dancing with a male friend of mine, and the guy next to us looked over and said something along the lines of "We can't have two guys together here."  The woman he was with started chewing him out, and he looked confused.  Ends up he meant that he thought we were in the wrong configuration and that my partner wasn't supposed to be next to him.  We explained that I was leading, and it was all good from there.  ::)

My mom yelling me legal name and this little boy giving me the "there is no F ing way your a girl" look.

Having to use girls bathrooms at school and getting the its a boy stare. They better fix the unisex bathroom fast lol.

The first few times I passed I felt akward because I was happy but I did not know how to keep the ball rolling.

I've been having frequent awkward moments lately, since I finally got a job.  Some customers see me as female, and some see me as male, and one couple disagreed about how to address me.  Most of the other employees I work with know me as [birth name] so it's awkward when a customer calls me "young man" right in front of them.  Some think I'm just a young guy, and I think some of them are confused because they use both he and she and look uncomfortable using either.  Thank goodness there's a handicapped bathroom available!

My favorite time was when this older man was teasing me about having to get a ride or walk home because he didn't think I was old enough to drive.  When I told him my age he stared open mouthed and I was sure that my face, voice, and age combo had ruined any chance I had of passing until he turned to his friend and said "Hey, did you hear how old this guy is?" and went on about how young I looked.  As he was leaving he said "This guy is going to be chasing women for a long time!"  This all in front of other employees who said nothing.  I had an incredibly hard time not busting up laughing until I got away from them. :laugh:

A few years back before I was even thinking about transitioning I was learning to drive and my mom made me drive her to meet some lady in a parking lot to buy something from her. (sadly nothing illegal) When she got out I waited in the car and while they were talking the other lady said "Is that your daughter?" and my mom replied "Thats my son" ~ looking back I can't help but smile

A more recent incident happened at school this semester. The past few months I have been presenting genderneutral and occasionally I will wear a bra and get really dressed up. To avoid conflict if I am not dressed up I will just use the men's room. It was just a regular day and I was washing my hands in the men's room when someone opened the door to come in but froze when he saw me. He muttered "oh sorry, wrong bathroom" the best he could then ran off. I almost died laughing when I got out of sight.

I was read correctly at work, in fact its happened a few times. Problem was, I wasnt trying to pass, and, for all intents and purposes, was presenting as female, since thats how I'm known at work and such. And when I opened my mouth with my 'work' tone-of-voice [slightly more fem of pitch and tone] the customer got a bit embarrassed and apologised... @_x

I was happy to be read right in my head, but it was a little difficult for me at the time. xD

Not so awkward, but I was read correctly when buying a new black dress-shirt for an event, and was led to the male fitting rooms 8D I was over the moon then xD Coz I was actually trying that day xD

i was at a wedding a few years ago sitting in a pew with my dad waiting for the church to fill up with people. an older lady came up to my dad and greeted him and asked, "oh, so is this your son?" and my dad just said, "daughter" in a loud, awkward voice and kind of nodded his head. the lady blushed and said "oh i'm sorry dear, i can't see from where i'm standing" and then scurried away. there was an heavy silence and i told my dad that "i get that a lot" and he very calmly replied, "it's how you wear your hair."

at a wedding in the fall i was waiting in line in the women's washroom and there was a door in the washroom that opened into a little laundry room where some older female staff were working. i glanced into that room and noticed this one staff member staring at me very suspiciously. i continued to wait and each time i glanced back at her i saw that she was coming closer. finally she reached the bathroom and said "you know this is the women's washroom?" and i said "yes i know" and then she asked the women waiting in line with me if "everyone was okay" like i was a rapist or something....!

so yeah, weddings are extremely gendered places and i feel supremely uncomfortable whenever i'm forced to go to one!