Expressing gender

[periphery]

I previously considered myself male or non-binary in a way that was male-adjacent, but I've recently started more actively considering myself genderqueer and no longer primarily identifying with masculinity. I've decided I want to grow my hair out to be more androgynous, and a lot of my ideas about how I want to express my new gender kind of rely on this - different hairstyles, accessories, etc - but my hair's currently very short and it's going to take a long time to grow out.

But in the meantime, I still want to be able to express & embody my new understanding of my gender, but I don't know how. I still want to continue wearing the same clothes I have before, same jewellery, etc, so I don't want to change my wardrobe, and I'm not interested in makeup.

I've started asking my friends to use they/them pronouns and gender neutral language for me, but I feel like I need something else. I've found some ways of expressing my gender online - I've been making pinterest boards visualising my ideas about gender & changing my social media profiles and I've found that helpful to some extent. But I still feel like I need more of a way to externalise my gender while I wait for my hair to grow out. Do you have any suggestions for what I could think about?

[Heather]

Hi there, periphery.

Can you say some more about why longer hair feels like a good expression of your gender to you? I feel like if I can hear more about that from you, we'll be better able to help you come up with some ideas while you wait on it!

[periphery]

I feel like I have an androgynous face (and my stature is small) so my hair has a big impact on whether I'm perceived as male or not. I've had short hair for about 6 years and I've generally felt like a good hair day and a bad hair day is the different between passing and not passing, and so by growing my hair out (and I will probably style it in more feminine ways) I'm making the active choice to not pass as male but do something else instead. Cutting my hair was kind of the point at which my transition became real and public to me back in 2020 when I first came out as trans male and before that my long hair always felt like a main point of my (female) gender expression. So even though I'm not changing my clothing or style it feels to me like growing my hair out is enough to have a big impact on how my gender is perceived and how I perceive my gender expression. Does that make sense?

[Latha]

Hi there, Periphery! It does make sense!

I know you've said you want to keep your clothes and jewellery as is... what about other accessories? Do you think you might like externalizing your gender through the things you carry? To list some examples, you might change your phone case, bag, wallet, or headphones... Or you might consider using interesting charms and keychains or patches.

[periphery]

That's a good idea - I already do this to some extent but it's definitely something I can focus more on. I'm already a big fan of pins but I do want to add to my collection and accessorising bags could be an easy way in. I've also decided to change my phone case and I want to start using stickers and patches more to accessorise things without changing them completely. I think I want to explore using accessories more broadly as well, it's definitely something to think about. Thanks for your help!

[char]

Hi Periphery! Glad that Heather and Latha have been able to help you. As always, you can shoot us a message if you have any more concerns ^_^