Help me, my loved one is trans. What should I do?

Everything you keep asking me, and maybe even some answers

Hi friends,

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So. Your kid isn’t talking to you because they’re trans. (You think.)

Or maybe your long time partner just had the talk with you and they’re nonbinary and you don’t know how to deal with it.

Or your friend changed their name and you don’t know what else that means they want to change.

It can be scary to step outside the norm of the gender conventions we were all raised with. It can be really difficult to convince your brain to break out of the habits of referring to someone a certain way, especially if you have been close to them for years.

The most challenging part of having a family member come out as trans, I suspect, is it throws you into having a controversial identity yourself (a person who loves and supports a trans person).

Many family members attempt to maintain the status quo. They use the trans person’s old name and pronouns for as long as possible. They say things like, “can’t you be a strong woman instead of talking about being a nonbinary person?”

And then, they wonder why the trans person in their life calls and visits less often, or cuts off contact all together.

I’ve had a few conversations with parents who tell me they have a trans child. “My daughter did this…she did that…she changed her name…I don’t know why she doesn’t talk to me recently”

My first question is to check if the parent is referring to the child’s gender correctly. “So is your child transitioning from male to female?”

A lot of the time, the parent says it’s the other way around. “No, she’s becoming a boy and has asked me to use ‘he’, but it’s so hard.” (The correct way to say this is more like, “No, he is a boy.” And try not to misgender your kid to start out with.)

One reason why people talk to me, an openly trans person, about their trans kids is because they want to understand what being trans is about. They think if they just understood it better, maybe they could be more accepting.

A lot of people think it’s optional to use the right words to refer to someone (like their name and pronouns and gendered terms like daughter and son). But it’s not good enough to say, “I accept you,” if you use old words that are painfully incorrect.

Saying “daughter” when you now know you have a son, is incorrect. It lets your child know that your fiction of who they are is more important than their real life self they have shared with you.

The number one thing you can do for your family member to show you love and support them is to make your best effort to speak about them correctly and respectfully, affirming their identity which they have shared with you.

Speaking respectfully (whether or not they are in the room with you) is a prerequisite to digging deeper, learning more, finding out what being trans means to them (if they are willing and able to share).

Some people (including myself) have real trouble describing what these gender feelings are like. It’s taken me years of attempting to write about it to start describing what it’s like to be nonbinary or transmasculine. Sometimes when someone asks me a question about my gender expression my brain goes blank, or buzzy, or fades out, and I feel like I literally have no thoughts on the topic. A lifetime of gender conditioning to not think about it, just do what you’re supposed to, is hard to work around.

If someone asks you to use a new name for them, the most respectful thing you can do is just use their new name. No explanation required. That’s it, from your perspective. It doesn’t have to be deep or mysterious or difficult.

Multiple people in my life have changed their own names, but found it difficult to deal with my name change. Is it because my name change is related to my gender? Or they do not like the name I chose? Or change is difficult? Or the hypocrisy is real?

A very long time friend of mine, a family member, has fluctuated back and forth between not calling me anything, using my new name in writing on perhaps two occasions, ever, and insisting that calling me by my old name is fine. I love this person, but, this behavior makes it difficult for me to feel comfortable around her. Hearing my old name makes me wince and feel bad about myself, at this point. And there’s a difference between accidentally coming out with the name you’ve known me by for years and intentionally using a name that is no longer valid for me.

We’ve reached a truce, of sorts, of her not calling me by any name. But it still makes it profoundly uncomfortable for me to call her on a landline - what name should I give? If I just show up at her house occasionally, is that rude, or is that the only way we can connect?

All this struggle, over a name. I wish I could just let it go from my side. I really have tried. It’s hard to not feel that involuntary discomfort. Many things in my life seem like they would be easier if I conformed to society’s expectations. But I have learned, over and over again, when I disregard who I really am, it’s far harder for me in the long run. The reason I write about these things is to share what a difference it can make when we value and respect our own unique selves.

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Take care,

Rey