Hi! I’m Charlie and I Use They/Them Pronouns

Last year’s quarantine gave us a lot of time alone with ourselves, and with it some self-discovery. Maybe you got into baking or started your first novel. I remember that every morning, my mom would get up at 6am and follow along with a guided workout video. It was a helpful routine to keep her sanity and she still does it sometimes. As for me, I found out that I wasn’t a girl. Well, at least not all the time.

Hi! I’m Charlie. Let me explain. I’ve known that I was queer since about the age of 12 when I was in eighth grade. A couple of my friends told me that they were bisexual, and when I asked what that meant, they explained that they liked both boys and girls. I said, “Oh! Me too!” and that was that. These days, I identify as omnisexual, defined on LGBTA Wiki as the sexual attraction to all genders, though gender often still plays a role in one’s attraction.

I was assigned female at birth (AFAB), which means that when I was born, the doctor held me up and declared, “It’s a girl!” I’m marked as female on my birth certificate, school forms, and my passport, but most of the time, I don’t feel that way. I identify as genderfluid, which for me means that sometimes I feel like a girl, sometimes I feel like a boy, and sometimes I feel like neither. Most of the time, though, I feel somewhere in between. Sometimes genderfluid people use multiple sets of pronouns that correspond with their changing gender, but I just use they/them pronouns.

While I’ve known that I was attracted to people of all genders from a young age, it took me a lot longer to figure out the gender side of things. Lots of people don’t realize that they don’t identify with their birth gender until puberty, when many physical and hormonal changes take place, or even much later in life. Part of what made me realize I was genderfluid was being in quarantine in the US. This isolation gave me a chance to step away from the expectations others set for me, and start thinking more about who I thought I was, not what anyone else thought.

While it took me a while to settle on my current label, I’ve come out to lots of people throughout the process. The first person I came out to was my longtime best friend, Douglas*, who also came out as trans this past year. He identifies as FTM (female-to-male) transgender and uses he/him pronouns. Being able to talk to someone who understood what I was going through because they were going through the same thing really validated my struggles and gave me a safe space to figure out my identity.

The majority of my friends are also part of the LGBTQ+ community, so they were all accepting when I came out, and have supported me through the trial-and-error process of figuring out which label feels right. It took a little while longer for my parents to come to terms with my identity, especially when I changed my name, but overall they’ve been accepting and supportive, even when they don’t quite understand exactly what I’m going through.

At Western Academy of Beijing (WAB), I’ve found that people are widely accepting of the LGBTQ+ community, and frequently show their support. WAB regularly hosts pride events, which are often charity fundraisers. Most of my teachers call me by my correct name and pronouns, and so do all the classmates that I’ve come out to. However, in general, I have noticed that people tend to assume that I’m female. This could be because of the way I dress, how my voice sounds, or for a variety of other reasons, but it still often upsets me at times when I don’t identify as a girl.

Besides people assuming that I’m female, I haven’t encountered a lot of transphobia, though I’m nervous about coming out to my extended family when I visit the US this summer. Though, if they read this article, then I guess they will already know.

So how can you create a welcoming environment for queer people, whether at your workplace, home, or anywhere else? When introducing yourself, include your pronouns so that other people feel comfortable sharing theirs. It’s as simple as saying, “Hi! I’m Charlie and I use they/them pronouns.” Also during introductions, make sure that people feel comfortable telling you their preferred name, which might be different from the one on their birth certificate. At WAB, when teachers are taking attendance on the first day of school, they’ll usually ask the class to correct them if they pronounce a name wrong or if there’s a different one they prefer. And if you make a mistake with someone’s name or pronouns, don’t worry! Just correct yourself – or listen to the person correcting you – and move on, because even the best of us mess up.

Even though my experience being queer has been a lot better than many others, it hasn’t been easy. It’s really hard to think you know who you are, then to have that change. So, when building a welcoming space, please put in the effort to make trans, nonbinary, and genderqueer people like myself comfortable. It means a lot to us.

Images: Unsplash, Charlie V