I’ve had mixed responses to my slow process of figuring out my identity and such. For the most part, they’ve been overwhelmingly positive, but not all of them. I’ve had at least one truly awful experience, the details of which I won’t get into here. But I think by far my most frustrating experience was with someone who pretended to be my friend, yet completely disregarded everything I had told him about myself and everything I had discovered myself to be.
I told him I’m ace, in a roundabout sort of way (we were at work at the time).
Me: I’m not really... interested in anyone.
Him: Yeah but like, boys or girls?
Me: Neither? I really don’t like anyone like that.
Him: Oh darling, we can fix that.
Me: I... don’t want or need to be fixed?
Him: Oh, honey. We’ll find you someone.
Dude. I don’t want anyone. Not in the way you’re talking about. That’s the whole point?
I told him I’m not a woman. I told him my preferred name, my pronouns. He is probably the one person I know who has consistently refused to even try to use them, despite being told numerous times. Like, people have messed up before, but at least I know they’re trying. And that one horrible experience, she was awful, but she never pretended to be anything other than awful (to me at least. She was a horrible two faced piece of work in front of our superiors, but again, that’s another story).
This guy acts like we’re such good friends. He calls me darling, and honey, and sweetie, and he’s so pleasant around me. Then he calls me by my birth name, refers to me with she/her pronouns, or says something like “bye, girls!” referring to me and the girl I’m walking with. And it’s so frustrating because when I call him out, he laughs.
Him: Do you have any idea how hard it is to change? You’re [birth name] in my head, I can’t help it.
It’s funny to me how literally everyone else in my life has assimilated the information and got on with it. He’s the only person who is making me feel like I’m not worth the effort it would cost him to even try to respect me. And with the horrible piece of work, she’s awful, but you expect awful people to be awful. I expect people who call themselves my friends to at least try to show me the smallest amount of respect.
