My Existential Crisis as a Femme-Presenting Trans Man
Since the day I came out as a trans man, people have assumed that I would drop my femininity like a bad habit.
I didn’t change my pronouns, but folks started referring to me as “him.” They started calling me “bro” and “dude,” when they hadn’t used those words to identify me before. While part of me felt validated by these things, since my masculinity had been erased and ignored for most of my life, another part of me felt pressured not to stay true to myself in favor of fulfilling the expectations of others.
I retired my impressive makeup collection for a good stretch of time, with pain and the belief that I needed to perform one specific idea of manhood now. I looked in the mirror at myself in a skirt and grimaced with internalized transmisogyny. All I could see was a “man in a skirt,” as if that’s a bad thing.
My therapist told me the feelings I’m experiencing are natural, that it’s expected for me to be questioning what my relationship to femininity would be going forward on my path to transition. At first, I feared starting hormone therapy would mean giving up all things feminine. Was I to abandon my strong female role models, like The Halliwell Sisters, Malala and Lady Gaga, growing up? Was I going to stop binge-watching Sex and the City and painting my nails? And what was I going to do with all the lipstick I’ve acquired over the course of my beauty writing career??
But the more I’ve pondered this, and based on the pain I feel regarding these thoughts, I realized my femininity was too essential to me to give up, especially over such gender binary bullshit. Of course I can be a man in a skirt, just like I’ve always been. It would just require getting to know this new experience of femininity, as my body and public perception of me changes.
Since I’ve been more confident about my gender, I’ve been told that I look more masculine than usual. I was even asked by one person if I had already started T. I don’t know if it’s because of the more confident and self-assured (albeit masculine) way I carry myself, or because I’ve been favoring masculine clothing lately. Either way, this positive feedback makes me feel pressure to stay looking this way, the way a man “should” look. It also fails to acknowledge my fluid identity. Because while I love basking in the glow of people gendering me properly for a change, I don’t enjoy being boxed into a single gender. Because while I am a masculine-centered and identifying person who wants gender confirming surgeries, I am still non-binary.
Before I came out as a man, I identified as gender nonconforming. This was because I felt differently about my presentation and identity day by day. I can love lipstick one day, wear a packing penis another, and wear both on the same day. My identity has always been fluid like that. So once I made the choice to change my name to something more masculine and pursue the transition that my dysphoric body so desperately needs, people’s understanding of that fluidity seemed to vanish. And though I started off identifying as a non-binary man, I shifted to just “man” since the former required so much explaining on my part. No matter how progressive some of my friends are, many of them just couldn’t seem to remember or honor that I have a girly, makeup-loving side before and after I came out.
Coming out as a man threatened to rob me of my femininity. Folks treated me like I needed to be something specific once I identified as male, and they reacted in confusion when I wouldn’t meet their expectations or I’d defend my femininity when they were trying to erase it. As if I was asking them to murder my femme side simply by asking them to call me “Sebastian.” As if a man couldn’t be a femme.
Since reflecting on this, I’ve been able to interrogate and be mindful of my own internalized transmisogyny. I’ve been honoring my feminine side a lot lately, without fear of its sparkly, flower-filled potential ruining my identity as a man. Because how could something so powerful and life-giving ruin anything? I let myself admire my reflection and the feminine features of my face, as I carefully apply my favorite makeup. I also wear my chest binder and marvel over my masculine features, comforting myself when gender dysphoria hits hard on my walks past the mirror. I am learning to define what manhood means to me, and leaving plenty of room for all my wonderful feminine qualities and routines. Many things are still unsure to me about what Sebastian will look like a year from now; but what I do know is that my relationship with femininity will be a constant and empowering force in my life always. I am a man and a femme — and I’d have it no other way.
