Coming Out at Work

Last time I posted, I talked about coming out to my parents, and that was hard. Surprisingly enough, the thing I thought would be harder was actually easier: coming out at work.

Background, I work in the service industry as the assistant manager of a store. I was seen as a "Problem Solver", and therefore I was moved around stores a lot. There was a General Manager who ran a store that had several FtMs and MtFs in the past, and I had always wanted to work with her because then I'd feel more safe coming out.

So shortly after coming out to my family, I get randomly transferred to her store. Sensing massive opportunity, I first drop the bomb on our District Manager, who takes it quite well (she had a trans roomie in college), and she informs our owner. They work it out and offer their support, so I then came out to my GM and explained everything that was going on. We then informed/educated the rest of our management team, and we then did the same for each employee individually, while our DM took care of managers in the other stores.

I was lucky, though I feel any forward progress I could have made in the company is now stalled by what I am. But that's not such a huge deal, as I only work this job to pay the bills. I realize how lucky and how easy I've had it compared to other trans people. Everyone has been so accepting and wonderful about it, even if they sometimes have issues with pronouns (I had been there a month before coming out, so they knew me as a guy).

I came out at work really early in my transition, but I had good reasons. I always looked very androgynous. Even years ago, without facial hair I would sometimes get confused for a woman. By the time I came to this store, I was a 2 months on hormones and I didn't look andro anymore, I looked fem. It got to the point where guys would walk into the Men's Room while I was in there and freak out because there was a girl in there. When I wasn't working (and therefore in full fem mode), women didn't even blink when I went into the Women's Room. I was passing accidentally. It was problematic.

Fast forward 6 months, I'm full time in all aspects of my life. I go to stores I was at previously, everyone I knew from before is wonderful to me about my transition. I use the Women's Room at work proudly and without incident. The newer employees don't even know that I was a male, they accept me absolutely. It makes me happy, and I realize how extremely lucky I am as a trans woman. People comment on my height sometimes, but no one calls me out or brings it up. It's as if I've always been this way, and some of my friends from previous stores have told me in private that they weren't surprised and always kind of suspected, but that's fodder for another post...

When I Came Out

Burnt Sienna here. I'm the bisexual, Male-to-Female transgender half of this couple. I'd like to share a bit of reminiscence about when I came out as trans.

It was a Sunday back in August of last year. Kooky and the kids had walked to the local farmer's market before I woke up that morning, so when I got up I had an empty house. Which meant that I could do whatever I wanted, which was usually to raid Kooky's closet and wear her clothes around the house. So this particular morning I did as I usually did, and got dressed in something more comfortable.

Okay, so random aside: I'd been wanting to transition for ages, but never felt I could actually do it. "I'm too tall," I'd tell myself, or "I wouldn't look good as a female". In fact, I'd known that transition was possible since I was 10, and I wanted to do it sooooo badly even then. But instead I sucked it up, and went through my teenage years and early twenties trying to be the man that I so obviously wasn't.

So this day, I looked in a mirror while dressed in my wife's clothes. And I saw it. See, I had recently forgone the literal "beard" that I hid behind. Just as gay guys have fake girlfriends, or "beards", to hide behind, I too had a beard of my very own: a goatee. But what I saw, was not an awkward guy dressed in women's clothes, but a chick. A girl. Not pretty, not yet. But it was there. I broke.

So I did what any sane person shouldn't do in that situation: I pulled out my phone and told my wife right then by text message. I mean, who does that?!? She took it... well? She was shocked, but she had playfully teased me for years about how much more feminine I was than her. Like I said, I obviously wasn't a guy. So she came home from the farmer's market, and we talked. And we researched together, and we went through so many labels before we settled, eventually, on the one my therapists confirmed: I was a Male-to-Female transsexual.

Now, Kooky's been sooo accepting and wonderful, but my parents.... not so much. So I started therapy, I started living as a woman, first at home, then out in public but not at work. I had just started hormones, so it was time to tell... the parents! So I called them up and asked if I could come over alone and talk to them about something. See, I learned my lesson regarding shocking news via telephone.

So I came over. I had already told my favorite aunt, she and my uncle raised me more than my parents had. I didn't want them finding out from her that their only child was transgender. So i sat them doown for the talk. I explained everything, they sat and listened, they seemed shocked, they asked questions, and at the end we all agreed that this wasn't their choice or their fault and we were okay.

Or so I thought. First my parents wouldn't try to use proper pronouns or my new name, which is understandable to an extent that they might forget, but they weren't trying. My dad became very cold with me, and I overheard my mom telling my aunt that he was only keeping contact for the grandkids. Then he sent me a drunken text one night telling me about how lesbian love isn't real, and it's a crime against God.

I laughed. I didn't cut off contact, I didn't bitch them out. I gave them space, and time. My dad came over to see the kids and saw our family dynamic, saw the kids with me, saw Kooky with me, saw how much happier and open I was. He quit drinking cold turkey, he came around. He used my name, female pronouns - when he remembers. So now, I find out the bigger issue: my mother hates it. She puts on a face when she's dealing with it, but news from the family reaches my ears.

See, my mother is extremely passive-aggressive, so she was using my birth name as a weapon, the pronoun "he" was a bomb to be launched. And she won't budge, so we've made less room in our lives for her because of it. My therapist agrees, and pointed out that our children don't need to be exposed to her behavior. My dad gets invited over alone now under guise of helping his daughter and daughter-in-law handle the home repairs. He's really sweet now that he's dry.

More to come...