Beyond binary


Transgender students share stories of challenge, discrimination and adjusting to college life


pride_week

Connie Smith presented as a man when she first arrived at Central Michigan University. When she started presenting as a woman, she felt more comfortable and more like a person.

“I was pretty much on the verge of killing myself when I was presenting as a guy,” Smith said.

The Detroit junior started experiencing depression in fifth grade, which was when she said male gender roles were forcefully pushed on her by society, peers and family.

Smith is part of the 41 percent of transgender people who reported an attempt of suicide in their lifetime according to "Injustice at Every Turn,” a report by the National Center for Transgender Equality and The Task Force. In comparison, suicide attempts are self-reported in 1.6 percent of respondents for the general population.

Glossary of terms 

Transgender: people whose gender identity or expression is different from those typically associated with the sex assigned to them at birth

Cisgender: term used to describe people whose gender identity or expression aligns with those typically associated with the sex assigned to them at birth

Gender identity: refers to a person's innate, deeply-felt psychological identification as a man, woman or some other gender

Sex: designation of a person at birth as either "male" or "female" based on their anatomy and/or their biology

Gender: traditional or stereotypical roles, behaviors, activities and attributes that a given society considers appropriate for men and women

Transitioning: process some transgender people go through to begin living as the gender with which they identify, rather than the sex assigned to them at birth. This may or may not include hormone therapy, sex reassignment surgery and other medical procedures.

Gender-nonconforming/non-binary: broad term referring to people who do not behave in a way that conforms to the traditional expectations of their gender, or whose gender expression does not neatly fit into a category

Heteronormative: world view that promotes heterosexuality as the normal or preferred sexual orientation

*Some definitions based on the Human Rights Campaign

Being incorrectly gendered, professors who don’t use inclusive language, lack of gender-neutral bathrooms and more, are some ways transgender students on CMU’s campus have been treated differently than the average cisgender student.

In the bathroom

Trans people don’t have consistent and convenient access to restrooms they feel safe using.

“The majority of people don’t have to think about it. The majority of people aren’t trans or gender non-conforming. Especially people who are part of administration doing the decision making,” said Kai Niezgoda, Royal Oak junior and Transcend president, who identifies as transgender and non-binary.

Almost half of the academic buildings on campus lack a gender neutral bathroom, though not every student at CMU identifies as a woman or a man. 

“Now that I blend in, I just use the girls restroom,” Smith said. “Before I could figure out how to do things right, I had to walk across campus just to use the bathroom, I would drive home because I just didn’t want to deal with it.”

Certain students feel uncomfortable or unsafe using a gendered bathroom could fall under the categories of someone who identifies as non-binary, a person whose physical appearance doesn’t match their gender identity, a trans person who hasn’t transitioned yet or is in the early stages, people with disabilities or people with small children that aren’t their same gender.

“I’m not advocating all bathrooms be unisex,” Niezgoda said. “I think there is an importance of having safe bathrooms for women too. Having a women’s and men’s room isn’t really a problem—just having an adequate number of unisex as well I think is a good solution. I would define adequate as more than one in every building, which currently isn’t happening.”

Every time CMU constructs a new building or does major reconstruction on a building, a unisex bathroom is installed.

In terms of restrooms, Director of LGBTQ services Shannon Jolliff said her office is in the process of designing a campaign that will raise awareness of not policing the restrooms on campus.

“We want to start a conversation on our campus around why we shouldn’t police restrooms, why we should just let people pee in privacy,” Jolliff said.

Jolliff said bathrooms are a huge issue on campus, and sometimes when gender-neutral bathrooms are added to buildings, they aren’t in convenient locations—like the basement of Anspach. She said it is important to realize there are many other problems transgender students face.

“When we only focus on one thing we forget about all of the other things that trans folks are experiencing,” Jolliff said.

In the classroom

Smith recounts a time she went to class without getting ready and was still addressed as a woman by her teacher.

“Victory! I have blended in,” Smith said, recalling the experience.

She said the majority of her professors have been good about referring to her by her pronouns: ‘she, her and hers,’ and is generally understanding when professors refer to her by her given name, because it appears on the roster. The first day of one of her classes, however, one of her professors called everyone ‘Mr.’ or ‘Miss’ before saying their name during attendance.

“I’m just sitting there thinking please don’t say it, please don’t say it…” Smith recalled. “Really quietly I said, ‘it’s Miss’ and scooted down in my chair and hid under my desk for the rest of the class. I was straight out embarrassed.”

If a student wants to be called a name that doesn’t reflect their name on the roster, they usually have to go to their professors before classes begin. The student will have to come out to them the first time they meet their professors, and hope they remember which pronouns and name to use during class.

“Most faculty have a positive response, but there are some that say ‘Do I really have to do this?’ and the answer is yes, you do because it is a protected group under our nondiscrimination policy, and failure to do so violates that policy,” Jolliff said.

Even though the nondiscrimination policy is meant to protect against micro aggressions, there is no formal required diversity training for professors educating them on how to interact with trans students.

Niezgoda and Smith have both experienced being mis-gendered by their professors, sometimes by accident, and sometimes in a derogatory way.

Professors use exclusive language frequently in the classroom when they refer to “girls” and “guys,” excluding anyone who doesn’t fall into those categories, Niezgoda said.

“That’s a micro aggression I deal with often,” Niezgoda said. “People like to think we’ve come so far in terms of being progressive about gender and being gender neutral, but people are really not gender neutral in the language they use the majority of the time.”

Contacting classmates, using flex dollars to get coffee at Starbucks and swiping into events on campus are ways trans students are forced to go by birth names that tie them to a gender they don’t identify with.

“Every time I email someone it has my birth name and my middle name, both of which are extremely feminine, so people don’t know who it is,” Niezgoda said. “If I give someone my name and they try to find me in the email system by my first name, they might not be able to find me.”

The school will not change a global I.D., student email or name on an I.D. card unless that person’s name is changed legally.

On almost every form sent out by the university that asks people to give personal information, there is no space for genders outside of the binary, Niezgoda said.

In Residence Halls

If a student wants to utilize gender-neutral housing, they must contact Residence Life and potentially live alone unless they can identify another trans student, which is usually not the case for incoming freshmen.

“The option to live by yourself does impact identity development for college students in general,” Jolliff said. “I think part of the development we go through is in that first year (of college) when you’re living with people, you learn and grow from them.”

Niezgoda has worked toward making applications for gender neutral housing part of the general application process. This will make it easier to reach out to incoming trans students, but it has yet to be implemented, Niezgoda said.

Transitioning

Not all trans people experience body dysmorphia and decide to alter their body to their gender they identify with, but this is something Smith hopes to pursue when she is financially able through hormone replacement therapy, or HRT.

“Getting hormone replacement therapy is just like getting a surgery for your health that’s necessary,” Smith said. “It’s not like you’re changing your body, it’s still yours.”

Some trans people don’t present as the gender they identify with until they get HRT, but Smith decided to utilize things like stuffing, makeup and changing her voice to a higher pitch to present in a more feminine way in the meantime.

“When I first started presenting as a girl I did feel more comfortable with myself," Smith said. "Over time that comfort with myself just sort of spread to everything else and now my whole brain is happy because all of my issues from before just seemed to stem from the body dysphoria I was feeling."

For a trans person to go through with hormone replacement surgery, they must first see a gender therapist and get their approval before they are able to go through with HRT.

“There are gatekeeper gender therapists that you go to in order to essentially help you through this very hard time and then help you gain access to the resources you need and then they make it their job to ensure that that never happens.”

Smith said some of her past therapists have accused her of not being transgender, which kept a “gate” on her getting resources like HRT and voice therapy. Her current therapist, however, has given her the go-ahead for HRT whenever she is able to pay for it.

Deanna Heath is a Licensed Master Social Worker psychotherapist for transgender and questioning people who owns and practices at Mount Pleasant Counseling. She recently formed Transgender Services of Michigan to provide supportive services to the transgender community. Heath has been in private practice for four years and in that time has served more than 150 trans and gender non-conforming clients.

Heath said she provides clients with support and understanding, and tries to normalize their experiences and feelings.

“It is important these services are available locally. Having services and support available on or near campus is very important to many in the trans community,” Heath said.

Trans perspective on gender

Niezgoda said our society places so much emphasis on gender partly because it is a product of patriarchal and heteronormative ideals.

“While some trans people might not have a gender consciousness in that sense and be critical of misogyny and patriarchy, people are and a lot of trans people are working to deconstruct these ideas around binary gender we have as a society.”

Pride Week is a chance for trans, gender-nonconforming and other queer people to come together and celebrate the diversity of the LGBTQ community.

“For a group of people that so often faces negative social consequences, it’s really important to set aside this positive space of time to just celebrate all of the things we do have,” Niezgoda said.

How to be an ally

Connie’s favorite reaction when she was coming out to her friends as transgender was when she told her best friend and he was completely unfazed by the news.

“There are some people that make it a big deal in a bad way and the ones who are trying to do good and overcompensate,” Smith said.

Niezgoda’s advice to cisgender allies is to work in pronouns you respond to when introducing yourself to someone before asking them what pronouns they respond to.

“People tend to think that if a trans person is around then they would know that they were trans,” Niezgoda said. “That isn’t always the case—you can't tell if someone is trans just by looking at them.”

Niezgoda equates judging a person’s gender identity at first glance to thinking you know a stranger’s name just by glancing at them. Jolliff noted the importance of listening to the experiences of trans people.

“Hear these trans voices, here from these folks who are saying ‘this is how this has affected me on campus,” she said.

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About Kate Carlson

Editor-in-Chief Kate Carlson is a senior from Lapeer who is majoring in journalism with a minor in ...

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