i am nonbinary

[enby03030]

i am a nonbinary teen and i want to come out to my parents soon to use they/them pronouns. i have identified as nonbinary for almost two years and i have been struggling with body dysphoria and being referred to as my birth name and pronouns. i have no wish for surgery/ hormones/ puberty blockers etc. as i know that i am still young and i might change my mind later on (iirc the brain doesn’t develop fully until you are 25), but i would like my parents to use my chosen name and pronouns. i have been scrolling through mumsnet to see whether the general parental population of the uk supports trans teens and i’ve been shocked to find the amount of anti-trans rhetoric throughout the platform. i genuinely want to know if a parent would support their child throughout the changes i mentioned above.

My children know that great-grandad's idea of "women have certain types of personality, and men have entirely different ones" is a bit silly, so I don't think they will be convinced that a personality dictates what sex you are.

Not liking your body for any reason is bloody hard, and I hope I can guide them through it should it make them miserable.

Sam Smith has a lot to answer for along with social media.

Your parents love you. I am 99.99999999% sure of this.

Humans are binary, you are male OR female, not both, not neither. You have a personality that is unique to you.

You don't need surgery, hormones, puberty blockers etc. None of these things will make you happy. None of these things will change your sex, every fibre of your being will remain male OR female as was determined in your mother's womb by your father's sperm for the remainder of your life - and I wish you a long and happy life.

The teenage years can be tough. Concentrate on living a healthy life, avoid drugs, alcohol, cigarettes and study hard. Get outdoors as much as possible. Reduce your screen time. Get involved in sports or dancing or other physical activities. Volunteer. Live your best life.

It's okay to be attracted to males or females or even both.

Pronouns are a nonsense, you can't expect anyone else to accept your ideology. Don't waste time on this.

Remember, your parents love you.

Here is one of my happy songs, it comes with an instruction, "rest your head upon the grass and listen to it grow"

And remember, your parents love you

And saying that people have to call you what you want or you may commit suicide is the worst kind of emotional manipulation.

Saying you’re non binary supports the patriarchy. It’s completely conformist and helps to undermine women.

Having said that I hope you work through this as a phase and embrace yourself as a gender non conforming person who understands the reality of their sex.

Or instead your a researcher of some sort looking for mumsnet perspectives ?

there’s been a bit of confusion over the meaning of non-binary so i would like to clarify.

...

tbh, i can’t explain how nonbinary genders work.

Best clarification we've had so far on here, I reckon.

Plus if you go by biological scientific identification then can a person be mis gendered ? Surely just because a person thinks e.g. They can fly, does not mean they can fly unless they were born with wings ect ?

😂

I don't "feel like a woman" or "feel like a man", because I cannot know how anyone else feels. I only know how to feel like me. I'm a woman, but a gender non-conforming one - I mostly wear trousers, mens jumpers and DMs, my hair is buzz-cut, I rarely wear make up, never wear stereotypically "girlie" things. I'm still a woman. I was unhappy with my body in my teenage years, I thought I was too skinny. Most people are unhappy with their bodies during puberty, everything is growing/not growing, changing/not changing, but we only get one body and the vast majority of us get used to it and learn to live with our perceived flaws. I certainly did.

There is no anti-trans rhetoric on this site, just wise posters who have the benefit of decades of life experience and are passionately pro-women's, children's and LGB rights, all of which are being eroded by a, frankly, bonkers ideology.

That's a fair point and I know I've been a pickle with my questions, but all the best and positivity

Femininity is not a pre-requisite to fit the definition of Woman. Just because you don't feel feminine doesn't mean you are "womanning" wrong.

If you are a child, you should be talking to your parents, not strangers online.

www.samaritans.org/

Please speak to someone if you are feeling suicidal or that you might hurt yourself. The Samaritans will listen.

@enby03030 talk to your parents, you say this has been 2 years, I’m sure they’ve noticed something.
i am glad to not be a teenager now, it’s so hard. I think I would have assumed I would have had to come out as non binary or a transgender male. I like blue, wear trousers, was the only woman in a science club and entered a male dominated STEM university subject and then career. But I am a woman. Well I’m just me, I don’t need to justify if I don’t like pink and sparkles and home making. My husband thinks I am pretty awesome and doesn’t like it when people assume out household roles based on my gender. Just be you and not have to tell others what you are, you are just you no matter what colour or music you like or who you fall in love with. Just be you.

This set of ideas you’ve got attached to about gender and what you have to do if you don’t feel you ‘belong’ to a gender is so, so muddled up, OP. It’s not good for you in any way and it really does serve sexism.

Be gender non conforming! We champion you! But your sex will never change - and saying you’re non binary achieves nothing but: membership to a club based on imaginary rules and helps to reinforce sexist stereotypes.

Please be an independent thinker. Don’t just swallow this wholesale.

Sorry basically what @Joolsin said.

@enby03030 more people are going to feel like you when children are now brought up to be boys like blue and girls like pink and have to wear skirts and makeup. I see this in my family and it’s truly shocking.

if your child comes out to you as trans/nonbinary, calling them by their preferred name and pronouns is suicide prevention

Sorry, I know you are young, but it is patently incorrect to say that suicide is prevented by calling people certain names or pronouns. That is not a prevention for suicide.

And plus1 to the poster who linked to the Samaritans if you’re feeling scared or crap OP. Believe it or not GC women like me really, really care about you and your generation.

there’s a lot of negativity round here and can y’all chill for a sec like my dudes i just want to not want to cry when my parents talk to me and y’all are telling me to just woman my way thru it? like bro u don’t even know my birth gender u could be affirming my transgender mess lmao

Hi @enby03030
Your parents love you, wholeheartedly, and are not going to stop.

My teenage child recently declared themselves nonbinary (you can read my thread here) and my response to my child has only been love, acceptance and concern for their wellbeing.

The fact that I don't believe in the unscientific and unprovable magic of gender substance doesn't mean that I can't love and respect my child who does seem to believe in such things, and it's much much more important for my child to feel loved and secure than it is for us to share the same beliefs.

Disagreement is not hatred. Some people believe in physical reality and there's no more proof of the existence of gender-identities than there is of the existence of angels or unicorns but believers and non-believers can still love each other.

Your parents may be believers, some are. You are only going to find out if you talk to them. If they are gender-critical then please understand that it's entirely possible that their experience of the idea of gender is actually very very similar to the experience of someone identifying as nonbinary. In both points of view you'll find people who don't feel they have either a male or a female gender identity. The difference seems to be broadly that someone who identifies as NB works on the assumption that most people do have a recognisably male or female gender identity which exists independently of their sex, and that NB are a small exception to that rule, whereas GC people work on the assumption that most people get on with their lives recognising and accepting their physical sex without registering any kind of identifiable sensation of having a gender identity, and that therefore 99% of people are nonbinary unless they declare themselves otherwise (but will generally use pronouns based on sex, rather than gender, which is what has always been conventional in our language). It's impossible to say which of these is correct as no one can ever experience what it means to have another person's sense of self so there's no way to define what it feels like to have any particular gender identity so can never be verifiable how prevalent any particular feeling is, or whether people who use the same words are feeling the same thing.

Which is just a long-winded way of saying even if your parents do disagree with your understanding of gender, that doesn't mean they don't understand any of what you are going through.

I have no idea to what extent I speak for other parents in general or yours in particular, but I believe it will be generally true - we love you, we get that it's tough going through puberty in a world as sexist as this, and if you feel you need to ask people to use they/them pronouns of you as part of coming to terms with the world then we will do our best.

I am in my 50s. I don't "feel" like a female, I just am one. I had short hair all through my childhood and, it being the 70s, was often in Arran jumpers and bright coloured trousers to climb trees or explore the bracken and gorse fields nearby. I was often misgendered as a child, which used to make me disgruntled but not sad. I would just say "I'm a GIRL, Silly" and that would be that.

My opinion on non binary is that it is a luxury belief, part of that teenaged striving to be different and interesting whilst being actually very conformist within the age cohort. In terms of Maslow's hierarchy of needs, it sits right at the top in "self actualisation", which is actually a pretty privileged position to be in. Hence its popularity in the Western world middle and educated classes, who have their basic needs met. My own foray was into vegetarianism, still quite rare back then.
I don't think that many Afghanistani, Sierra Leonean or Congolese teens are non binary; they are too busy trying to survive.

Anyway good luck OP. Just remember - if someone doesn't get it, or makes mistakes - it doesn't really matter. I am sure you are still loved.

But then that's up to you to correct the record so you can receive the appropriate perspectives that may help you with your cause ?

@enby03030 what's the purpose in talking with riddles if you need specific information ?