From the pages of Metro, where Ms Rachel Meghan is talking about herself:
“I’m non-binary,” I told a neighbour. We were at a barbecue and talking about queerness. I went on to explain that although my pronouns are they/she and ‘she’ is acceptable, I much prefer ‘they’.
The barbecue is in Hell. Did I mention that?
“That’s cool,” my neighbour replied, adding, “My daughter is also non-binary.”
Or, “I have badges too,” she said.
I felt accepted – but then, just seconds later, that same person yelled to their partner at the grill: “She said she wanted a hamburger!”
Oh calamity. All that specialness – dashed to pieces.
It wasn’t the first time this had happened; far from it – which is why I reluctantly continue to offer up ‘she’ as a pronoun. It’s exhausting having to constantly correct people…
And yet correcting people, constantly, attempting to make them mouth absurdities, remains a go-to impulse. An irresistible temptation. Despite those claims of exhaustion. Funny, that. Whether other parties might be fatigued by this habit is, alas, not explored.
Throw the fact that I’m a mother into the mix and people basically consider it permission to see me as a woman
Well, given observable reality, that will happen.
There follows the inevitable rumbling about having been a teenager who didn’t want to get her nails done, as if this were incontestable evidence of themness, of being super-special. But we can file that under generic, wearying prattle.
everything came to a head after I became a mother.
Pretensions of themness, the craving to seem special – perhaps more special than one is – would, I suppose become harder to sustain. Given the arrival of someone more important, someone whose needs tend to come first.
I never saw myself as a mum when I was younger, just because I didn’t think I’d ever be in a long-term relationship.
That’s the spirit.
I always thought I was too weird to date.
Not sure whether that’s a fear or an aspiration.
My husband and I got married in 2020, and I became pregnant in 2023.
As women so often do.
My anatomy allows me to be pregnant, no matter how I identify, it’s just how my body works.
Specifically, a woman’s body.
But I’m also a spiritual person,
As, like, totally spiritual people feel compelled to say.
So, becoming a mum gave me a new confidence and a fresh level of knowing myself.
A spirituality of self. How terribly innovative.
After my maternity leave, I worked at a very queer space, a bookstore and bar, where I was surrounded by the LGBTQ+ community. It was here I really felt I’d found my people, and the words to describe myself.
Again, self. And repeated descriptions thereof.
I was still worried about having to correct others frequently; but eventually I decided it was more worth it to live as my truth. In 2025, I came out as genderqueer, then non-binary.
So many badges, and they’re all so shiny. Also, my truth.
My son is two now, and still too little to truly understand, but as he gets older I explain a little bit more here and there. I say, “Mummy isn’t a woman; they’re just Mummy.”
Better start saving for those counselling sessions.
My son even calls me ‘bubba’ instead of ‘mama’ most of the time – I didn’t instruct him to do that, I think he just clocked my queerness on his own.
As two-year-olds do, of course. I can hear those eyebrows raising from here.
The newer people in my life, like my co-workers and regulars at the bookstore, have no issues using they/them pronouns – but I’ve noticed that it’s a lot harder for people that have known me for a long time.
Having known the author as a girl and then as a woman, presumably. Not as some imaginary, unsexed being. One who’s had sex and consequently a child.
My husband – who had no problem with me coming out – sometimes struggles, but he makes a pointed effort to refer to me gender-neutrally.
Imagine the fun. All those corrections and self-corrections. All that pointed effort. The evenings must fly by.
However, one family member, while very leftist and accepting,
No laughing at the back.
finds it hard seeing me as anything but a woman. When I told them about my pronouns, they even went as far to say “What does it matter if you’re not in the room?”
How very dare they.
But of course it matters. It’s about how I want to be perceived by the world, and the people who love me should be supportive of that; wherever I am.
You see, in a sense, she’s always in the room, policing how her self is being perceived. On account of being so spiritual.
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