When I came out to my family, after they calmed down, most of them didn’t believe I was really bi and thought I was just mistaken or just didn’t “know” because “virgins can’t possibly *know *if they’re gay or not”.
When asked if they knew they were straight before they had sex, most of them shut up, thankfully, but I think a few still think I did it for the attention when I’ve never been an attention-whore in everyday life, especially about something so inflammatory.
Thanks for the expression of support, Miller! I really don’t know where I’m going to go with this. Once I’m with a support group, I hope it will help to clarify my options. It’d be nice to change my user name, but I’ve already changed it once, and I think one change is the maximum allowed by the admins here. Oh well, “Ms. Mojo” doesn’t sound that bad. Except that my Doper name came from a very patriarchal African leader, Jomo Kenyatta. His first name means ‘Burning Spear’. Jeez, how hypermasculine can you get? :smack:
Last year, about the time my daughter turned 16, she had made friends with a lesbian girl and soon “came out” to us as lesbian. She was disappointed when we didn’t get all shocked and upset. At the time, I doubted it was for real, and it turns out I was right. But now I have to try coming out to my family, and I might have to face the very same skepticism, they might not take me seriously. Karma is funny that way. (If she really had turned out to be lesbian, I wouldn’t have minded. We could go to Queer Liberation marches together.)
Well FWIW, I didn’t know what your username meant until you explained it. Besides, it you could have done worse points at my own signature 
Also, don’t ask me when or in what thread but at some point I got the impression from one of your posts that you were female.
I always read your username as Mojo Jojo, the tyrannical monkey bent on world domination in The Powerpuff Girls. He’s badass and has one of my favorite quotes of all time: *For too long have [simians have] sat under the thumb of mankind! Now is the time to OPPOSE that thumb! *
It just makes me giggle.
I heard an interesting coming-out story the other night, from a friend of a friend; I imagine it’s okay to tell a third-hand anonymous story here:
He started to come out a few weeks ago, and the reaction wasn’t pure hatred or pure acceptance, but just denial. A lot of “No, you’re not! You can’t be!” (Some from ex-girlfriends, some from his circle of friends). But he says people have quickly come around and it’s already become a non-issue.
Then, over the next week, he started getting one-on-one calls and IMs from friends. Not one, not two, but three of his other guy friends came out to him, asking him not to tell anyone else.
Funniest (in the semi-tragic sense) part: Two of the guys are attracted to each other, but they don’t know the other’s gay and don’t know the other feels the same way.
Stories like this make me wonder how people can still be atheists. There’s definitely a God, and he’s dicking around with all of us.
I got some of that from my roommate, who was probably more acting out on disappointment (he not only came out to me but told me he was thoroughly attracted to me) than anything else.
(There’s a lot more to that story, and I’d link to the thread but it seems to have been archived, and it would be utterly OT to tell it here.)
I have such a boring coming out story. All the sturm und drang turned out to be mostly in my head, though I suppose I’m still processing parts of it.
When did I discover my sexuality? Heck, 13? Maybe 16. Inklings here and there before that. I wouldn’t say I’ve got the whole thing figured out, but I would say that the final answer would no longer upset me.
When did I come out? I was 17 when I came out to another person over the internet and 18 when I came bursting out to everyone around me.
Oh, gosh! Your user name umop ap!sdn impressed me as the cleverest one I’ve ever seen! 
And I’ve seen a lot of clever ones here!
Thank you, dear. Many internet friends in various forums have been telling me the same thing over the years. It’s the nicest compliment and encouragement a transgendered lady like me could wish for.
Just now I walked into Pizza Hut to pick up a pizza, and two little kids were playing in the vestibule. They said hi to me. “Hi, kids.” Then the little boy did a double take and said, “Hey, you have long hair! So you’re a girl!” I smiled and said, “Thank you.” The little girl echoed, “You’re a girl.” I said “Yes.”
Too cool. My first time “passing” — and I haven’t even shaved off my beard yet!
Cool story!
With your focus on language and its evolution, may I venture to suggest your name change: Dee Saussure 
Well I get that a lot, but why thank you.
You’re welcome. Last year somebody here on this board told me the same thing about the way my posts were worded.
I don’t get it. :o
Ferdinand de Saussure was an early 20th-century French linguist, the founder of Structuralism. All in all, he was the most influential thinker in linguistics of the 20th century.
Thanks for the suggestion, Poly, though I take after Noam Chomsky more myself. Back in the 1960s, when some scientists were trying to teach a chimpanzee to use human language, they named him Nim Chimpsky. 
OK, since this thread is about gender, how about grammatical transgender? First of all, be aware that most languages in the world do not even use grammatical gender in the first place. The Indo-European and Afro-Asiatic (and, to a limited extent, Dravidian) families are really the only ones that use grammatical gender. IIRC, Maori is one of the rare languages outside these families that actually uses gender. The Bantu languages use noun classes which, in terms of agreement and such, resemble gender structurally, but are divided into different categories conceptually.
Despite this, all human societies I know of have the concept of social gender. The reason TGs have hangups in this society is that it insists on a rigid binary scheme where you have to be either all-male or all-female, and your gender is invariably tied to your anatomy. Many other societies in past and present did not insist on such an unforgiving binary, allowing for a variety of gendered types of people to flourish.
Recently, I wrote an E-mail in French to a lady I had met. I was careful to make sure the verbal participles agreed in feminine gender in reference to her, but forgot that now I have to start using the feminine gender for myself too. It was my first time using French since I came out. Hélas, voici un des ajustages innombrable que je devrai faire. J’espère que je ne deviendrai pas trop fatiguée.
:smack: I just figured that out.
Thing is, we need an easier way to say what we are. Compare:
I’m gay.
Short and snappy. It’s the American way. Versus:
I’m transgendered. 
A polysyllabic word with all those consonant clusters. Doesn’t exactly roll tripplingly off the tongue, does it? One advantage the gays have over us.
Great! It’s just like life in a Mercedes Lackey novel! Now all we need are telepathic horses, or some elves, and we’ll be set.
whines-I don’t get it!
Try looking at it, er, upside down.
:smack:
I don’t mean to resurrect an old thread, but my name change just becamel legal today, and I was considering starting a thread to celebrate and share, but then I found this one.
Short version:
32 years old, MTF transsexual, married to a very supportive woman.
Knew from the time I started school, when I envied the girls’ dresses and toys, and pretty much everything else. Didn’t accept it and begin the transition process until four years ago.
Outed at work late last year.
Came out to my family about six months ago.
Came out here in this post.
If anyone wants more detail, I’d be happy to share (I’m in quite the good mood tonight). I could start a new thread with a cryptic title so that only people reading this would find it. Something like, “Number Six is now officially a girl!”
Officially a girl? So you’re post operative then?
Congratulations either way.
Sorry, I can see how that could be misleading. My legal name change went into effect today. I officially, legally have a girl’s name for the first time in my life today.
I’m still preop, in that I have my penis, but my testicles have been removed. Taking that final step might or might not cause problems with the legality of my marriage. My lawyer’s looking into it, but both the legislative law and case law in my jurisdiction are, according to him, a bit “fuzzy” on the subject.