I've recently written a letter that I intend to give to my parents at some stage when I sum up the courage. I really need some advice (especially from other LGBT people since I don't have many LGBT friends) whether this letter is a good way of breaking it out to my parents? Thank you!! BTW - my mum has told me and my siblings that she would be okay with us being gay, my dad, not so much. He's a bit old-fashioned. BUT I know it will be difficult coming out as androgyne or agender because they haven't expressed any positive notes about things like that whenever I have raised a topic relating to that... 'To Mum and Dad, I know you’ll be wondering why I am writing you this letter, and I just want you to know that everything is okay, nothing is bad, it’s just an issue that I have decided to tell you about through this very important letter. I know I’ve had a lot of ‘issues’ and I know I haven’t been dealing with them in the best way either, I’m sorry about that. But this is something that I think I need to tell you because it’s a pressing issue that I think about more and more every day and I can’t keep it away from you any longer. I just want you to know that this doesn’t change me, I am still me. And you are still you. I’m gay and agender. I don’t know how you feel about this right now, whether you are shocked, angry, sad, happy, confused… I don’t know. But I want you to know that, as I write this in my rare free time at school, my hands are trembling from the fear of writing this. I also want you to know that this isn’t a phase or something I have chosen to be, in fact, if I could chose it, I’m pretty sure I would have chosen to be straight and fitting to my own sex so that I wouldn’t be judged or be considered ‘inhuman’ in some of the countries who look down at same sex couples. Of course you know what gay means. I like the same-sex. But what about agender? I’m going to put being agender in my own words, giving my own definitions. Agender (or androgyne) is when a person does not feel like they are the any gender at all, although they may show equal or more traits of a specific sex. There are lots of terms and explanations of it but I simply do not feel like I am any gender. Simply put, I am a female-bodied person. I am female because of my biological sex, but I am not a girl, nor a boy. Being genderless, I do feel quite wrong sometimes, that I am not who I should be and sometimes I feel wrong in my skin, it depends. I know I do have more male traits, so I act more male and think more like a male but I am not a boy nor am I male. I am quite fluid with pronouns and I will allow any pronoun like ‘she, her’ or ‘he, him’ or even neutral terms such as ‘they, them’. I don’t think I can ever be changed, I don’t think this will change but if it does, and I discover more about myself and if I turn out to actually be a girl or I realize that I am a boy and trans, then who cares right? This doesn’t affect anyone but me. I am not saying this to upset you in anyway. I am not making this up or whatever, this is genuinely how I feel inside and I can’t keep it away from you anymore. Just keep in mind that I love you both, no matter what.'
The letter is mostly pretty good, but the one thing that sets off alarm bells all over my head is this line. This doesn’t affect anyone but me. Don't get me wrong, I know what you MEANT. It's YOUR decision, and ultimately you are the only person who has any input in how that decision is made. BUT it DEFINITELY affects other people. Seriously, don't underestimate the effect a gender change can have on people. Usually I find that being binary trans (like me) causes significant disruption to people because they have to quickly get used to the idea of you being essentially a different person, but it is easier to explain how you feel 'the opposite' to someone, even if they won't fully appreciate it easily. Being non-binary trans (like you) will cause less initial obvious disruption, because in your case you don't need them to remember different pronouns or a new name and things like that BUT I think it's harder for people to understand non-binary trans. Either way it DEFINITELY affects others. Just a thought.
Thank you so much! It's nice to hear something like that, I thought there was something off about the letter but it never came to me. Being someone who has never particularly had any LGBT friends, I don't know how much someone being trans or something like that can effect me or people around them, but I will make sure to change it!
I think that's one of the biggest mistakes we tend to make. You go through so much to get to the point where you can tell people and it's so easy to think that all THEY have to do is accept it and move on...I know I did!
