Garner 1

Sidney Garner

Speckman

Prose

21 November

Broken Reflections

Mirrors

Sometimes I just stand if front of the mirror and study my reflection. Sometimes I can stare long

enough for me to see something else in the mirror. It doesn’t happen often but sometimes I can

see what I want to see instead of what I have to see.

Mirrors pt. 2

Mirrors are horrible things. They show your every imperfection, your every fault, shove that this

is your body, not someone else’s body, right in your face.

They are one of my greatest’s villains.

Growing Up

To be honest, I grew up a girl.

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I didn’t particularly know I had any other option. Word like ‘queer’, ‘non-binary’, and

‘gender fluid’ were years away from entering my vocabulary, years longer still for me to actually

put them in comparison to myself. All I knew at the time was that you were either a boy or a girl

and I was born a girl.

To be honest, I thought I had rotten luck.

At a young age, my mother labeled me as a tomboy and I embraced the label with open

arms. To me it meant that I had a bit more room to stretch even if it meant I was still a girl. Of

course, this label was challenged every time I liked or did something traditionally feminine until

I finally let it go when I got my first period.

I was scared and confused, probably not an uncommon experience, but it felt like

something that shouldn’t be happening. I wanted to go back to pretending that what I had in my

pants didn’t matter. It felt like the end of being able to walk the line between girl and boy.

I tried to fit into what was expected of me. I tried to get into makeup and pretty dresses

and skirts and tried getting into what my friends were getting into. Somedays it felt right and

somedays it felt like a mask.

Hebrew School

When I joined the Mount Zion Temple’s religious school, I became the fourth girl in the third

grade Judaica classroom. This meant I was always pulled into a group with the other girls so we
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could make an all-girl table, and when we got into groups, we would have enough to make an

all-girl group. It was a confusing time to be alive.

It was nice to feel like I could belong to a group, especially after moving to a completely

different state, but the segregation was something completely new to me. In the past, I had a

healthy mix of the genders in my friend group. I missed that interaction but I felt like I was being

put at arm’s length when I tried interacting with the guys. This was also happening at regular

school, even though it was easier for me to wiggle into conversations and friendships there. It felt

like something was cracking apart.

Discovering

In a very on brand kind of fashion, I started questioning whether I was genderqueer because I

was writing a story.

I planned the main protagonist as being female but as I was writing, I could feel them

wanting to change into something else, so I started researching the wonderful spectrum of non-

binary genders. This eventually led me to forums of people talking about how they figured out or

knew that they were gender fluid.

In my mind, this was firmly research to write a realistic genderqueer character, but I had

to continuously stamp down the feeling that this all seemed familiar. There was no way I was

genderfluid. My main argument was that a lot of the people on the forums were talking about

how some of their behaviors changed with their gender and I was stuck with all my wacky quirks

24/7. But I still couldn’t quite get it out of my head.

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Hair

My hair was an issue for a while for multiple reasons.

I love the curls in my hair but I had no energy to actually style it into something that

wasn’t a frizzy mess. It never did what I wanted it to anyways. It also had become kind of a

barrier for me to hide behind when I didn’t want to interact with the world.

It needed to go.

The process was slow. I didn’t have the courage to do a major change all at once so I kept

on cutting off a chunk off hair, seeing what the reaction was then waiting a couple months before

repeating the process until I finally achieved pixie cut status in senior year.

Binding

It took me a while to build up the courage to even look at binders online. I was worried that one

of my parents would look at my history and question why I was looking at binders. If they did,

would I answer truthfully? Or would I lie through my teeth like I’m prone to do? Thankfully that

hasn’t happened yet.

When I finally built up the courage and decided to look at binders online, I basically

immediately closed the tab. There was so many different types of binders and a lot of

information you needed to know to do bind safely and a lot of different opinions on different
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types of binders and it was overwhelming. It was so confusing. I wanted all of it and I wanted

none of it.

I did finally go back to that search to see if there was a way of binding inconspicuously. I

never brought myself to actually buying a binder, I was too afraid that my parents would notice

and question (will I ever gather up the courage to tell them?), but I did find a way for me make a

homemade binder.

The first time I used it, I was a whole mess of emotions. Worried, happy, anxious, proud.

I was still feeling slight dysphoria because it wasn’t perfect and it made me feel like I was still

wearing a bra but it was also the first time that I could truly see myself as having a more

masculine body.

It was one of those days where if I could stand in front of the mirror long enough, I could

see what I wanted to see.

Going Out

The first time I went out specifically dressed and groom and wanting to be noticed as a boy was

when I was going to temple. I was wearing my one and only guys button down and was wearing

my sibling’s bow tie. My hair was groomed back and I was wearing my darker pair of

eyeglasses. My parents thought I looked like a waiter; I thought I looked snazzy.

The Call
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In my senior year of high school, my sibling called my father to break the news that they were

non-binary. I listened to Vi explain to him how they never felt like a girl or a boy from the

kitchen. While the news surprised everyone else in our family, I wasn’t too surprised but I was

surprised how jealous of them standing in that kitchen. They had it figured out while I was

second-guessing myself on everything. I was jealous that they could say it out loud with so much

confidence.

It also felt that any possibility of me talking to one of my parents about my questioning of

my gender identity flew out the window. What if they thought I was just following in Vi’s

footsteps? They couldn’t possibly believe that me starting to question myself was totally

separated from Vi’s declaration. For that matter, how could I be totally sure that I came to these

questions and conclusions by myself and wasn’t subconsciously mimicking my sibling’s path?

When the phone finally got passed to me, I didn’t particularly want to talk to Vi right

then and there, there were too many conflicting thoughts and emotions floating in my mind, but I

still forced myself to smile and tell them that I loved and supported them. It wasn’t their fault I

was a mess on the inside.

Car Ride

The next time I was in the car alone with my mother after Vi’s call, we, naturally, had a

conversation on it.

She was confused and was trying to get a better understanding of what Vi said to her

about their gender. I tried to be as helpful as I could but, to be honest, I never really had that
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conversation with them. I just knew Vi said that they didn’t really believe in gender and that they

posted on Facebook that they were non-binary which led to two very awkward

calls/conversations with out parents.

I think there came a point in the conversation where my mom asked me how I felt about

my gender, if I was questioning it at all.

I think I hesitated for a second. I know I replied back “no.”

Watching

I spend a lot of time in public people watching. I already knew how to sit, walk, and talk like a

girl but I wanted, no, needed to know how to act like a guy. In class, I watched how they would

sit in their chairs. In the cafeteria, I watched how they placed their arms on the table while they

were eating. I studied how they stood and how they walked to classes. I got lessons on how to be

a girl from the women around me growing up but no one was going to teach me on how to be a

guy.

Scared

I’m scared of a lot of things.

I’m scared of what will happen when my parents find out. I’m scared my sibling will

think I’m just copying them. I’m scared my friends will drop me. I’m scared every time I tell

someone new that I’m not exactly always a girl. I’m scared that they will laugh in my face.
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I’m scared that I’m going to wander into the guy’s section in a clothing store and be told I

don’t belong there. I’m scared that my shopping habits are going to tip off my parents.

I’m scared that I’m a fake and that I’m just forcing myself to feel and think these things

because I want to be special. I’m scared that one day someone is going to call me out on it.

I’m scared about writing this all down.

The First Time

The first time I got mistaken for a man was when I was standing in line for pizza.

I was wearing a skirt but the attendant saw my hair or maybe my coat first. She almost

immediately corrected herself but I already heard it. It was a bit euphoric being called sir, even if

it was weird being called that when I was having an in-between day.

I was grinning for the rest of the day.

Recently

I helped moderate a conversation between my mom and her best friend. Sheri’s niece had

apparently been struggling with her gender for awhile and was probably going to come and live

with Sheri for a while. My mom was there to help Sheri’s mind wrapped around what taking care

of someone who was struggling with their gender meant and I was there to add a more modern

perspective and to make sure they were ‘using all the terms right’.
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Mom specifically stuck with talking about Vi and Sheri’s niece during the conversation

but I can’t help wonder if she invited me along because she somehow knows.

What I Figured Out so Far

I figured out that sometimes I’m a girl.

Sometimes I’m a boy.

Sometimes I’m both and sometimes I’m neither but they feel very similar and it’s hard to

figure out the difference.

Sometimes I spend days as one gender and sometimes I wake up as neither, eat lunch as a

girl, and go to bed as a boy.

Sometimes I can find peace in saying that I’m gender fluid and sometimes it feels like

I’m just stealing the label.

I figured out that when professors ask for your preferred pronouns on a sheet of paper, I

get very panicky and want to circle all of them but always chicken out and circle she/her.

I figured out that bathrooms can also be daunting.

I figured out that it’s okay to share my struggles with my friends. They won’t always

understand but they will care enough to support me. I figured out that it’s probably be okay for

me to share my struggles with my family, I just have to be ready for a lot of questions and a lot

of misunderstanding, but also a lot of love.

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I figured out that it’s okay to be whatever I am and it’s okay if that changes.