Some questions for parents in the community
Some questions for parents in the community
First off, I am still relatively new here, and I hope I don't offend anyone with any of these questions, but some things I've been wondering lately. And that I'm probably going to have to work through before too long.
Same sex/gender parents, do your children call both of you the same or different names?(mom/dad etc.)
Trans* parents, if you had children before you came out, did what they call you change? I've only been aware of one instance of this situation and the kids still called her dad.
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I'm a trans mum. My kiddo was 11 when I transitioned. They called me dad for a while, because I told them they could use whatever feels comfortable for them.
However, their other mum (my ex, who I'm not on good terms with but is a genuine LGBTQ ally) pulled my kiddo aside and pointed out that calling me dad was probably making me uncomfortable.
So my kiddo had a chat with me about it. I ruled out "mum" because that's what their other mum uses, and ultimately we just settled on my name.
They're 18 these days
I was really hoping to hear from another trans* person!
I'm sorry to hear about your ex 😕
At first, I thought, "no, I could never accept mom. I didn't birth them, that would feel like invading...." but later I remembered, like an idiot, "lots of moms did not give birth the their child". I noticed at some point in the Real Life Comics, if you're familiar, a while after Mae starts transitioning, their daughter still calls her dad, or daddy. I've been wondering how others feel about that.
I assume since you talked about it, your child calling you by your name isn't weird? I suppose since it's a chosen name maybe it feels affirming?
I'm definitely not out to my kids yet. The oldest one just started school, so 🤷♀️ no idea how, or when a good time is.
Also, if it's not too much (dm is fine too), just out of curiosity, do the kids show any gnc signs? Before I realized myself, the oldest had some stuff that made me start questioning for him, now (probably around the same age) started some stuff that makes me wonder.
I joked with my partner that we started with 3 boys 1 girl, are we going to end up with 4 girls instead? 😅
My kiddo is pretty pragmatic about things, so they came to me and said "So, mum pointed out that calling you dad causes people to misgender you, and said I should talk to you about that. So would you prefer I call you mum or Ada?"
I said mum is taken, but we can find another word that means mum, or they can just use Ada, and they went with that. It was weird at first, absolutely, but it was never dysphoria inducing like Dad. I hated being called Dad, but because I'd told my kiddo they could use whatever was comfortable, I just endured it without speaking up. So when my ex pushed my kiddo to have a conversation with me, it was a huge relief.
I'm sorry to hear about your ex 😕
We broke up years before I transitioned for reasons that have nothing to do with my transition.
She hates me, but she genders me correctly when yelling slurs at me
Also, if it’s not too much (dm is fine too), just out of curiosity, do the kids show any gnc signs?
My kiddo is non binary (probably agender?) and uses they/them pronouns. They came out as gay not long after I came out to them, and whilst I suspected they might be gay, I didn't see any real signs of gender diversity until they came out to me.
But they summarised their experience of gender as "what the fuck even is gender?", so I guess it's not surprising that they didn't express gender in a strong way :)
Oof! I'm even more sorry to hear about your ex 😓
The genetic gender stuff is really fascinating to me right now. Partially because how little it's talked about, and partially because how common it seems, which makes the first part even more interesting.
I do agree with your kiddo sometimes. When I really get heated thinking about it, I do tend to get to the idea that "Gender is bullshit!" it's just stuff and behavior separated into boxes with labels, it's fucking stupid!
The genetic gender stuff is really fascinating to me right now. Partially because how little it’s talked about, and partially because how common it seems, which makes the first part even more interesting.
I don't know of any trans people in my biological family (granted, I'm not close to most of them; I only recently met some of my half-sibs a few years ago). My brother is a bit GNC but pretty cis. But I wonder about my mom (whom isn't blood related). Kinda suspect she'd be in the agender-spectrum, but she also unfortunately listens to way too much "conservative" sources and can be bit transphobic at times and since she doesn't care about things like pronouns, she's also not good at using trans people's correct pronouns.
I feel you there... My parents have recently decorated the outside of the house with like 3 new pro-trump flags and it's disappointing as hell. Like at some point I may have to choose between being me and having them around, which sucks they're the grandparents my kids are most comfortable with and the only reason we get breaks occasionally.
Worse than my issues, I fear that one of them is possibly queer themselves, and if the grandparents make too big of a stink about it I'll have to put my foot down sooner. I can deal with shit coming at me to an extent, but I will not let it come at them, if I can find a way for them to not go through extra shit.
The good thing is given my parents are queer, they're not really supportive of republicans. And given my mom is GNC, she's always been fine with us being GNC. But I think one of the main reasons I haven't said anything about my gender is because I don't want to deal with the "that's normal" kind of response that a lot of people with trans-in-denial parents get at this point.
I think I'm going to end up with that attitude on multiple things, unfortunately. 😓
Step 1 is probably coming out autistic, which I fully expect to be meet with the classic "you don't seem autistic" said to the person conditioned tonot present that way.
Good luck with it! Hopefully you don't get the "autistic people can't be trans" response. I sorta fell into that thinking when I was younger, but more in a "I must be missing something" since I knew I didn't get gender as a whole. Unfortunately too many people are willing to weaponize their ignorance instead of just admitting they don't understand something.
Yeah... Til literally yesterday, I did not know that was a thing 😓