Dan Savage described his son’s birth father as “nice, in that affable, unflappable way only straight guys ever are,” and it’s always stuck with me. How much easier it must be to be nice when you have all the privileges of maleness and straightness (and in that case, cis-ness and whiteness, too.)
I have worked with trans folk and not known they were trans. When I have known, it hasn’t been an issue except with a couple of folks. More interesting to me was the reaction of my fellow volunteers in the world of motorsports, mainly the person outing themself did a very good job of it. I was in charge of a fairly large group of volunteers that this person belonged to. They came out to the first person, one of my crew chiefs, who set up a meeting for the three of us. It really helps for someone making a big change to line up the support of management before actually appearing as a different gender, so I was very glad to know. This person was crossing from male to female and wanted to a) let me know that they would be showering at least an hour before the other women headed to the showers and asked how the women might respond to the switch on using the public bathroom. I was able to say that my group would have no issue, but that I couldn’t respond for others. I told them that I would support them if someone did have issues. I was also able to point to a racer who was trans that the worker didn’t know about.
It wasn’t perfect. There were two men who got squicky, but they could hardly object as the person no longer shared their showers or toilets, but that was it in public. One of the men, panicky, said “What do I do if she askes me out?” I replied, “Do what I would do if you asked me out; turn her down.”
Kudos to them for being brave enough to tell the world who they really are. Life is already challenging for these folks. A coworker’s insecurity can only make it harder.
I don’t have any personal experience with trans co-workers (that I know of), but I do have a trans childhood friend and a trans cousin (both female but AMAB).
If a trans co-worker opened up to me and wanted to talk about these issues, I’d do my level best to be thoughtful and sensitive.
Personally, I wouldn’t initiate the conversation around that topic, though, any more than I might ask a female co-worker if she had recently gotten breast implants.
Some things are none of my business and totally inappropriate topics for the workplace … IMHO.