A reality most trans people have to live with is that people might memorize our respective pronouns, but that doesn't mean that they recognize our respective gender identities or respect them. It's a sad reality because it is one we often have to face from our friends and families as well. These are the challenges that come with existing as a trans/non-binary person with people who knew you before you came out.
Part of my journey as a non-binary person living in this society is learning to accept that people are always going to perceive me based on their level of cultural experience. However, a more important part of my journey in self-acceptance and self-realisation has been choosing to surround myself with people who are willing and able to meet me as my authentic self. This has influenced the way
that I make friends, partnerships and even date.
I feel that I talk a lot about dating in your teens/early twenties. However, nothing will ever prepare you for the realities of dating as a queer person, and in my case, the reality of trying to date as a non binary person. The dating pool in the queer community is exactly that, a pool. If anything, it is a tiny jacuzzi; it is made up of a dismally small community. One which can often be saturated with as many bigots as there are in the world of heterosexuals. So you end up not really having that many options for who to date.
The cool thing about being non binary (& pansexual) is that (theoretically) I get to date people of whatever sexuality. The key word in that sentence has to be theoretically. In theory, I should be able to date whoever I want, as long as attraction and compatibility is in our favour. In practice, there are challenges that come with existing as a trans non binary person when you are trying to date inside and outside of the queer community.
As a non binary person, I have found it challenging to form relationships with cisgender people, especially cis men. I always make it clear to people that I am a non-binary person, that is who I am and it is a fundamental part of my identity. To not see me through that lens is to not see me at all. However, often when trying to date cis people, there is an expectationbby them for me to perform femininity. For me to play a role in order to make them feel comfortable.
A lot of cis men experience gender through a narrow lens, gender doesn't exist on a spectrum for them, it's not expansive. Instead it's something that is fixed, never growing and never changing. Due to this, a lot of them struggle with the concept of my non-binary identity. Therefore it is hard for them to understand that my femininity is not tied to womanhood, and that my masculinity is not tied to manhood.
I will not lie, my experience in dating cis women has been more or less the same. A great deal of people don't understand what it is to be non-binary, and therefore they tend to ignore it. This big part of my identity, who I am, tends to be ignored, or "blueticked" I may say. This leads to me feeling like I am not truly seen in relationships. It leads to me feeling that my transness is not seen at all.
Cis people, in my experience, often get into relationships to date someone whose gender they feel is opposite to theirs. Even in their interactions with me, there is an effort to make me perform femininity in the way that they have experienced it-as tied to womanhood.
In my journey of radical self acceptance, I have found that I no longer want to suppress parts of myself in order to make the people around me happy. I have done it for the longest time, I am not willing to do it now, as an adult, and I am certainly not doing it for a romantic relationship.
As trans people, we spend our entire lives trying to fit into the mould of the person society says we must be, and when we finally begin the journey of accepting ourselves for who we truly are, the price is that we must kill our false selves. There is mourning involved, there is grief involved. However, it is all worth it because at the end of the day we are able to then look in the mirror to face the truest versions of ourselves.
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