How do people know they're trans if they don't present as that gender?
This question is worded kind of ambiguously, but I’m going to assume ‘people’ means ‘other people.’ The short answer is that there isn’t any way to know. For this reason, I either ask new people I meet what their pronouns are, or just refer to them with they/them pronouns until told otherwise.
~ Liz
I’m going to chime in here with an answer to the other way this question can be interpreted: how can trans people know that they’re trans if they don’t present as that gender? For example, how did I know I was a guy when I still presented as a girl?
A lot of times, it’s a general feeling of discomfort, ranging from mild to severe, about presenting as their assigned birth gender. Things like being called certain pronouns or referred to by a certain name just feel wrong, which triggers a lot of people to try and figure out why. If you start looking that kind of stuff online, you’ll eventually come up with trans resources, and that’s usually when people start to think, “Hey, maybe this is what I am.” That’s not always how people know, of course, but that’s one of the more common narratives I’ve seen from trans people these days.
-Aaron
