Via Mr Muldoon, a tale of what sounds like mid-life contrivance:
I told my husband I now use they and them pronouns after 15 years together. We are both learning how not to misgender me.
Imagine the fun.
The contriver in question is Amanda Elend, a scrupulously progressive woman whose list of causes is extensive, if somewhat predictable. She tells us,
My partner and I got married over a decade ago, knowing we might end up hating each other.
Ah, the basis of any sound marriage.
We understood people grew and that sometimes meant growing apart. But still, we thought our chances were good. Fifteen years later, we’re still happily married, but boy, did we grow. I now identify as a bisexual, nonbinary person, and my family is learning to adapt.
Coinciding, oddly enough, with the big four-oh:
At first, it was difficult to reconcile the fact that I’m bisexual and nonbinary at 40 years old. It felt like I was co-opting a label designated for younger generations. But it all felt right; they weren’t labels. They were my identity.
The idea of having an identity – one with boutique status and complications that have to be danced around in an affirming manner – is terribly important to Ms Elend. And as we’ve seen, self-definition is very in right now, and quite competitive. Plus, there’s so much potential for chiding and rituals of atonement:
[My husband] is still working to understand the complexities of my identity, but I know that he is trying. For example, he recently apologised for not defaulting to “they” when he talked about me.
Ms Elend’s children, aged six and nine, were also informed of their mother’s elevation to the role of Fascinating Being:
I suddenly decided to tell my kids in the car one day. They were in their booster seats in the back, and my partner was driving.
The word husband is used intermittently. Sometimes it’s partner.
Looking awkwardly back at them, I told them I never wanted to stop growing or getting to know myself and I recently realised that I’m nonbinary. I also told them that if I weren’t with their dad, I now knew that I would be open to relationships with those like me and those who’re different.
“Can we still call you mom?” my 9-year-old asked.
You see, every small child wants a mom whose new pronouns have to be memorised, and who reveals that their family is suddenly conditional, one option among many. A mom who, in middle-age, is still on a journey of self-absorption – sorry, self-discovery – and who could at any moment become a radically different, and altogether more fashionable, kind of entity. Quite what a six-year-old is supposed to do with such information, beyond feeling confused or insecure, is unclear.
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