My best (and only) friend is totally sweet and cool, and I'm sure that she really, really wants to be supportive and accepting of my gender and everything, but she just continues to say things like "oh, you're so special and I hope you find *someone* who is just as special as you", "I just have to let this sink in", "It's not you, it's be, but I'll just have to get used to you being a boy", "it's not you, it's me, but.. you have long hair and you look like a girl, and it's just weird" when I go on my occassional rants (that I get can be annoying but I don't really have anyone else to talk to/we usually share that stuff). We've known each other since I was 11 and still identifying as a girl, so I get her confusion, but yeah.. How do I educate her without sounding bossy or mad? Because I'm really not. I really appreciate our friendship, and I know the only reason why she is *like this* is because she's uneducated about the topic. What should I do? Thanks in advance, Johan (*hug*)
1. boys/men can have long hair too 2. when she calls you special, call her special too 3. tell her you've always been a boy, you just haven't always known/be able to express it 4. tell her that you know you're annoying [sometimes it helps admitting things to others that they and you know but think you don't] 5. does she like science? Maybe go into the biological aspects of sex and gender 6. maybe ask to try an experiment where you call her ''he/him/himself'' pronouns all day and see how she likes/dislikes it, so she can know how you [might] feel if people misgender you. That's all I've got for now.
It might also be how she's just not used to it yet; If you give her some time I'm sure she won't comment about that too much anymore. Should it really be that she just doesn't quite understand it (which isn't that unusual, I mean it's always difficult to understand things you can't relate to) maybe try to tell her exactly how you feel. You could also share some videos about stuff like gender identity with her. Check out Break Free by Ruby Rose or "Boy" - short film (it's danish and as I see you're from copenhagen that's kind of.. fitting I guess). Hope that was helpful.
Thanks for your input! :3 I tell her 1, 3 and 4 already (Like not all the time, when fitting, of course?), and I find that it has helped her understand a bit more, mm. It really sounds like I'm trying to "change" her and really educate her on everything, but I'm really just trying to get her "used to" it. Yeah. ---------- Post added 24th Jan 2016 at 10:50 AM ---------- Thank you! I do the things you mentioned in the first paragraph already, and as you wrote in the second one, I'm trying to "throw in" some videos, things I think/experience as a transguy and so on in order to make it.. a regular thing? Do you feel me? Like to make her understand that this is a big part of my everyday life and not just some strange thing that only happens online, yeah.