#nonbinary week 2020

DAY 4 (July 15): VISIBILITY FOR THE INVISIBLE

This day is dedicated to those of us who are even less visible, meaning PoC, disabled, fat, AMAB people, people over 30, etc., to share their experience.

I'm already a day late lol

Day 1 (July 12): Introductions

Share whatever you want about yourself, pronouns, labels, what nonbinary means to you etc.

Hi, I'm Noah! My pronouns are they/them in English and I use no pronouns in languages that don't have a genderneutral option (meaning that instead of saying she or he one simply says my name) - this is necessary because my mother tongue (German) doesn’t have genderneutral pronouns.

The main label I use is "nonbinary" and sometimes "trans", however I'm thinking that I may be genderfluid? But I'm not sure yet so for the time being, I'll stick to nonbinary.

Being nonbinary means to me that I'm neither a girl, nor a boy. But I don't think I'm agender - I feel like I definitely have a gender, but it's different from male or female. It doesn't fit into these two boxes. It's confusing sometimes. Sometimes I think I'm masculine aligned, sometimes I think I'm not. Sometimes I question my whole gender. I think I still have a road of discovery ahead of me :)

Day 2 (July 13): Coming to terms

This day is for coming out stories and how you realised you were nonbinary.

Well, realizing I'm nonbinary has been a process. I remember being 18 and still living with my parents, trying to bind my chest without knowing why I was doing it. After moving out, which was a couple months later, I started questioning my gender A LOT. I felt dysphoric about various parts of my body, especially my chest, my (then) long hair, my high voice. Around this time I told my roommate that I may not be a girl - I was so scared of admitting this. Her reaction was great and she's been very supportive ever since. I began to experiment with my appearance, tried binding my chest with sports bras, hid my hair under beanies, etc. I realized that this felt right. The more I moved away from being stereotypically female, the more at ease I felt with myself (I know that gender doesn’t always equal appearance, but for me it plays a role). I started telling more people about it and I received positive feedback. Somewhere in this process I also cut my hair (and dyed it blue, lol).

Also, I've identified less and less with being a woman. I've also felt a growing disconnect to my birth name, which is very feminine. Therefore, I first asked my roommate to refer to me as Noah and I slowly asked everyone of my friends. Yeah, this is were I'm at now - I still experience a great deal of gender dysphoria but it's gotten a bit better!

DAY 5 (July 16): MISCONCEPTIONS

Share what people often get wrong about your gender, and what you'd like binary people to understand.

I haven't been out for that long, so I don't have a ton of things to put on this list (and hopefully I don't have to add more but ya know 🙃).

The binary really isn't real. Like, listen, we made it up to simplify things. Humans love concepts we can wrap our brains around. But the thing is, nobody is quite so simple as any stereotype, gender role, or sex characteristic. No one is quite the ideal, so why even have an ideal in the first place? Why can't we just exist and forget about gender? It's not that hard.

I'm not trying to be a man. I don't shave my body hair as an afab. That doesn't mean I'm trying to be male. That doesn't mean I'm not feminine (especially when I still identified as female—body hair never defined anyone's gender or sex simply because everyone has varying degrees of body hair). Body hair is associated with masculinity because razor companies make tons of money keeping afabs hairless. I have hair that grows naturally. Why should I be ashamed of it? Please ask yourself why you actually think I'm "trying to be [x] gender" by choosing to do [y] thing. Deconstruct your beliefs and values; determine what they're based on, and decide whether that's an accurate portrayal of the world. Gender roles are not rigid or absolute across cultures. Nothing about shaving body hair is intrinsically female or feminine. You were made to believe that.

Sex and gender are not the same. I might have "female" parts, but that doesn't mean you need to know about it or be concerned about it. If you need to know what parts I have in order to treat me with respect, you're not treating me with respect lol. My organs and body parts are none of your business. You are not entitled to anything about me.

The fun part about all of this is that many people really think that I or any other nonbinary person is making a big deal out of their identity. Essentially forcing it on others as it were. But here's the thing: 1) the binary, in many cultures, is compulsory. It is very difficult to opt out of without some kind of social ramification (depending on who you are, where you are, etc.); and 2) in that same vein, us non-binary pals tend to find our identities to be pretty simple. Our gender might be special to us, yes, and we might love to talk about it, but that doesn't mean we want to constantly have to explain it. It isn't a big deal that we aren't in the binary. It's only world-altering to you because you don't understand it. But it's not a wild concept, nor is it anything new, especially to us. Truly, who we are shouldn't be mind-blowing. We aren't asking for all this attention. We just wanted to be treated like normal. We want you to call us by our preferred pronouns, just like you would anyone else. We want you to call us by our chosen names, just like anyone else, and give us the same respect afforded to everyone else, as if we were just another normal part of society. Because we are.

If you don't know what our pronouns are, ask. If you don't know what honorific/prefix we use, ask. If you don't know our preferred label, ask. If you don't know our preferred name, ask. Please don't assume. Asking shows us you care. For example, since no one asked, here is my list of answers: they/them; M. [Name]; agender/non-binary; I don't know my preferred name right now, but you can call me androj.

DAY 7 (July 18): TRANSITION

Share if and how you (want to) transition. This includes social, medical, legal and anything else that YOU define as part of your transition.

One of my biggest transition points is probably my pronouns. I'm still finding it difficult socially to tell people when they used the wrong pronouns; it's not like I have a visceral reaction to being called she/her, especially by people who I know respect me. But at the same time, I do notice it, and it isn't quite right to my ear. In writing, it's even more noticeable. I think my biggest issue is not wanting to be a burden, not wanting to make a fuss. But if people love me, they'll understand. And when I correct you, I don't want you to apologize profusely; I just want you to correct yourself and keep going. It's not a big deal to make a mistale, so don't make it into one by proclaiming your guilt. Just make the switch, and keep right on going as before.

I'm still working through the name issue. Right now I'm still technically Jen, legally Jennifer. I'm not sure how I feel about it right now. Currently, I'm not sure what new name I would choose. As a fiction writer, I have a lot of creative freedom at my fingertips. But, like before, I'm afraid of being a burden to others, afraid of seeming unreasonable. I have a bad habit of putting my needs and feelings second. When I finally put myself first, I found out I was non-binary. So, as I learn to keep doing it, I imagine a new name will follow. And trust me, it'll probably be pretty damn cool. ✌🏻 (Also, am I the only one who wants to go by many names? Daenerys Targaryen had it right all along.)

As far as legally affirming my gender, I'm not sure how I would go about that, or if the United States even officially recognizes non-binary identities. (If non-binary is a recognized gender in the US, I would like to pursue that; at the time of writing this, I'm a bit ignorant of policies, laws, and protections surrounding that.) My only hesitance with legally transitioning is how it might be categorized. While I might want to transition my gender, I don't consider myself transgender. Of course, I don't consider myself cisgender either. I consider myself without gender at all, or agender. But it's my perception that most of the time, to the government, you're either male or female, or potentially "other" (which really doesn't feel good either lol). I don't want to give off the impression I'm trying to be of any gender. I'm genderless. So until the government can recognize my gender for what it is, and until they provide protections for me and for those like me, I may only be transitioning socially with my name and pronouns. And the name is probably the only thing I can legally do. The government doesn't care about your pronouns or gender identity unless you're in the binary. And even then, they don't always listen or care. So 🤷🏻‍♂️

Day 1: Introduction

NAME: Androj (no, that's not my real name, I'm in name limbo currently, and this is also my online name sooooo)

PRONOUNS: they/them (lmao as an English major graduate, this fucks me up in a lot of ways from a comprehension standpoint, so I'm in pronoun limbo but those feel the best tbh. I just always end up reading "they/them" as plural in writing and that makes it so hard for comprehension and clarity (which I am absolutely concerned about as a writer lol), so I'm constantly looking for ways to better uplift non-binary identities through carefully crafted sentence structures & increased clarity of subject. Representation is so important, and with that, so is clarity and reader experience/comprehension—neither should be sacrificed. English is stupid so I'm making it better.)

LABELS: Non-binary, androgynous, probably agender (limbo is fun lol)