My Pronouns
I work with a great organization in the background. (The Cloth Option)
The request was that everyone with a TOC email address add their pronouns to their email signatures.
I don't use an organizational email but was proud of them for including this in their template.
Back Story...
An amazing person that I was in college with back in 1996 (and not having an overtly sexual relationship with) wrapped her arm around my waist and said "Katherine is too much to say in bed. I'm going to call you Kat."
From that day forward I was Kat. After 19 years of trying to escape nicknames by October of my first year in college, I was Kat. My pronouns where she, her, hers.
My gender identity was female; I identified with the straight community but was a vocal advocate for alternative lifestyles (as they were labeled.)
Less Recent Past…
It's 2006. I own a construction company. My pronouns are their & they. Although I felt overtly straight and female I heard the rattle of "Dyke" and "Lesbo" behind me, I was not offended.
My masculine expression did not equate to my sexual preference. It did have something to do with my sexual and nonsexual identity.
It was almost a joke.
"Guy walks into a construction site and says 'Where's your boss' to the 40 something big black man, who responds says 'Their back there.'"
It is no joke that that person looking for me, a young white woman, would talk to everyone on my team but me.
Some may have considered me trans, butch or queer: I was just me.
More Recent Past…
It's 2013. I am a married school teacher. Fast forward and I'm going through IVF, then pregnancy and birth. My pronouns are she, her, hers.
I felt very cisgender and binary.
I chose not to find out the biological sex of my child. It was going to be a baby. It would need the same things, with a penis and testicles, a vulva and vagina, or any combination. Their room was orange, lime green and turquoise with a puppy theme in homage to our 3 boxers. This small human needed to be prepared to be a dog lover from birth, not a pink princess or blue gentleman.
Today(ish)
I'm a single parent. I'm an educator, facilitator, and influencer.
Out at the park:
"Where is your parent?" my young person is asked by a stranger…
Day 1: "He's over there"
Day 2: "Their over there"
Day 3: "She's over there"
Talking to my young person, they exclaim in delight:
Day 4: "I'm a pretty girl"
Day 5: "I'm a princess boy"
Day 6: "I'm so strong girl"
Days 1-6 and whatever my young person comes up with for 7:
Every day I respond:
"I'm right here"
"Yes you are"
Today my pronouns are fluid.
In my head it is:
I, Ours, Mine, Me, We, Yours.
To my young person:
"However I fill that role for you."
To people who don't know me & my life:
"She, Hers, Her"
To those who may ask:
"Their, They, Thank You."
I am brave. My young person is brave.
I am a (mostly) cisgender- but I would best be described as a genderfluid queer woman. I'm fine with that. I will not be offended by the pronouns you choose for me; for me, personally, gender is fluid, but I appreciate you asking.