The most remarkable thing happened

The most remarkable thing happened today. To many folk it might seem like something so insignificant but to me as a transgender person it validated my existence just that little bit more.

I work at a nursing college as an administrator (amongst other things) and this week I was registering and orientating a new group of students. Usually I introduce myself to the students with my chosen name and not my deadname which certain colleagues and old students still use. Additionally, for the past few years I have decided to deliberately include my gender-neutral honorific or title which is Mx.

As an act of defiance and to somehow make this request to use my chosen title and name permanent, I write them on the whiteboard: MX. CARLA. I then tell students that I’m a transgender person and that my honorific has been around for quite some time and that they have learned something new today.
When telling students this I notice the look of confusion on their faces but I do not dwell any further on the topic. I give them the chance to do their own research.

Pronounced /mɪks/ MIKS or /mʌks/ MUKS and despite being in existence for many years as a gender neutral alternative to Mr or Mrs the honorific Mx. was only included in the Oxford English Dictionary in 2015.

An honorific like Mr or Mrs can easily be taken for granted, however, a gender neutral option like Mx. removes the requirement for me as a transgender person to have to identify with any side of the male-female binary and helps to remove any anxiety of having to conform to those limited options society gives us. As Queers we have forged our own options which are far more diverse but still valid.

After telling students what my chosen honorific is I do not expect them to use it or to pronounce it correctly at all. The fact that I could educate them about this honorific is enough for me but somehow this time something different happened. Something changed.

Two days later while still busy with registration with the same group I was chatting to one of the students. Seemingly out of nowhere the student referred to me as ‘Meks Carla.’ In a different place, a different country even this would be standard practice but in South Africa this is still very much a new thing. This was the first time that a student had referred to me by my honorific and with such little effort. To me it was a big deal.

As I was walking away and signing off other students’ paperwork I was low key fighting tears. They were bits of relief around my eyes. I was trying to do a classic resting bitch face move while casually pretending that I was having a sinus problem due to the aircon which was set to a few degrees cooler than hell as it was an icy cold day.

When the day was nearing close I had to take some students to my office to capture their details on the system. Another student referred to me as ‘Miks Carla’.

What surprised me the most was that my honorific was being said by a student so effortlessly without any much ceremony and without any awkwardness.

I actually wanted to go to both of these students and ask them if they’d Googled the honorific and practiced how to pronounce it but then again I wouldn’t want to be the one making things awkward.
It took a single word from two students for me to realise that the new normal that I have been craving for so long is finally here.

There were no protestations from an older generation refusing to be ‘politically correct’ *insert eyeroll here* but rather somebody who took the time to learn new ways of respecting somebody else better. Perhaps even learning how to be better as a professional nurse who works with all sorts of patients from different races, backgrounds, cultures, disabilities, sexual orientations and genders. All I know is that next time I won’t cry when a student calls me Miks Carla. It will be normal.

❤❤❤