The Most Joyful Part

I’m pretty open about myself in this blog. Like it or not, take me or leave me, I usually say what I mean and mean what I say. I think it’s frankly exhausting to go through life hiding who I am, pretending to be someone I’m not to make others happy, or wearing a mask to fit in. Though we can’t completely escape the roles society says we should play, I’m just trying to be as honest as possible about who I am. RuPaul says, “You’re born naked and the rest is drag” meaning we’re all playing a role. He reminds us that we shouldn’t take ourselves too seriously. The things to take seriously are kindness, love, and sweetness. 

Not to give you cultural whiplash, but I’m now going to quote PBS travel nerd, Rick Steves. ;) Steves looks at life “with a traveler’s mindset – with curiosity, joy, and positivity.” Recently diagnosed with prostate cancer, he is determined to be open about his journey, even the potentially embarrassing parts. He says, “When I was a teenager, my mother had depression, and it was a secret in the family. That bothered me. I don’t like needless secrets. We need each other. We need to share. We need support. We need to learn from each other’s experiences.”

So in the vein of RuPaul and Rick Steves, I want to share again about the person in my life who lives these philosophies to the highest degree I know: my oldest child. My beloved kiddo is nonbinary and autistic. They came out to us about 4 years ago and were diagnosed with ASD about 2 years ago (though the ASD was more of a confirmation than a diagnosis). Now 22 years old, they’ve recently graduated from college as a member of Phi Beta Kappa and are living in GR with friends and attending grad school for a Masters in Information & Library Sciences. I am one proud mama about their academic accomplishments, but even more so about the person they are and for their bravery in trusting us with knowing who they really are.

People usually don’t understand what it means when I tell them my kid is nonbinary, (I won’t go into detail here, feel free to engage me in conversation if you’d like to know more), but I don’t mind having an honest, kind conversation with someone who is actively curious. What causes me to lose my grip on kindness and love is when people say my kid is asking a lot of them because learning a new name and pronouns is hard. The implication is that anyone who asks for those modifications is selfish and asking for too much.

I do understand that making the change takes a lot of practice and effort (I wrote a whole other blog about my journey). I mean, I have a BS in English for goodness sake; I really get it. But here’s the thing, language changes. Not just new words being added to the dictionary, but the meaning of words themselves (it’s called semantic change; did you know surly used to mean lordly or majestic?). The singular they/them isn’t new, its use is expanding. 

But that’s all just semantics. The important question to ask is, “Is it selfish for a person to ask to be seen in a way that makes them feel whole?” I’m not talking about a change in hair color or the clothes they wear (though gender expression is valid and important). I mean seen and accepted for the person they truly are inside.

Until they came out to us as nonbinary, I hadn’t understood the depth of my child’s pain and confusion in trying to mold themself into the vision of who we (and society at large) expected them to be, of living in that prescriptive, stereotypical role they were assigned to at birth. As a mom, you never want to hear that your child is in pain. But when you and the world around you helped to inflict it, there is little worse. So no, I don’t think learning a new name and pronouns, and more importantly learning how they view themself, is too much to ask. For me, it’s actually been the best, most joyful part.

To put it another way, my lovely child’s response to reading this blog was: If I had written this, it would probably be more about how to be true to yourself, rather than how to help others be true to themselves; stuff about being able to imagine possibilities other than what you’ve been told exist, more than just opening yourself to possibilities you’re just now being told exist. I think that angle can ask people to do more self-work, and connect more deeply; but again, it’s what I would have written, not what you wrote, and I think both messages are important to hear.

Some people will tell me we, my child and I, need to change to fit the world, but I don’t think that’s true. I think there’s enough space and love for us all to be authentic. For Every Body to Belong, just like we say at PIH. Like RuPaul and Rick, we just need to look at each other with love and kindness, curiosity and positivity, instead of fear and shame.

I’m sharing this today because tomorrow is Transgender Day of Remembrance. My kiddo is privileged to be accepted as they are and fairly safe in their environment, but not every trans person is. It is my fear that my child may one day be on the list of transgender, nonbinary, and gender-nonconforming people lost to anti-transgender violence. It is my hope that humanity can find enough love and curiosity to make TDOR a thing of the past.