Call Me Pom Pom

This is part 2 of a series on my journey of being pregnant, written with the intention to stretch the range of pregnancy experiences that have been subjected to the oppressive standards of heteropatriarchy. In another post, I wrote about the grief that moved through me when I found out I was pregnant. If you’d like to start there, click here:

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During the first trimester, I was so caught up with just the fact that I was pregnant that I didn’t have the mental capacity to deal with what it meant for me, as a nonbinary person, to carry the cultural expectation of being a mother. But I did know that every time someone called me “mama” or “mom”, my mind would ditch my body for a split second and after an unknown period of time the two pieces would come back together. What was I supposed to do in that moment? Tell them about my pronouns? Tell them not to call me mama? But what else can I be called? I had no idea.

I came out as nonbinary (though now I prefer the term gender non-conforming) a few years ago. Without the embodiment and gracefulness of trans, nonbinary, queer artists, activists, poets, liberators like Alok, Marsha, Laverne, Che Che, I would not have had the courage to challenge my own assumptions and experiences about gender. Eventually, I realized that while I felt at home in this body, I didn’t resonate with the idea of a woman all along.

Being pregnant is like one of the most gender typical things that one can do. This is because gender has been socialized to be defined by the reproductive organs of one’s body. This is also why people have a hard time differentiating between sex and gender. One of the reasons that made me feel confident about coming out was that I simply didn’t agree that my experience as a person could be captured purely through my genitals. The food I ate just now can be a part of my consciousness. The people I grew up with installed my attitude. The humming stillness of meditations showed me that my energy is beyond the binary. Being nonbinary to me means I honor both my hard edges and softness, and that these two are not separate, gender-specific features but are actually interconnected and entangled with each other.

I was sharing the pregnancy news with my friend when she said this, “I’m curious about something and you don’t have to answer if you don’t want to”. I knew what they’re about to say was going to touch somewhere tender in me. Go ahead, I said, I was already feeling tender anyway. She asked, “How are you feeling with the pregnancy given you’re nonbinary?” Up until this point, I felt privileged to be able to carry and nurture a life to be born. I remember that each gender doesn’t have to look or behave a certain way. Regardless of my gender identity, I can be whoever I want to be, dress however I like, use whatever pronouns I desire. Other than that, I was mentally prepared to forgive and let go when folks misgender me, an occasion of which the frequency was sure to increase. I thought - What people thought about me was not a part of my worries. I had a whole embryo to grow.

Since then, curious people would ask questions like “How did you get pregnant?” “Wouldn’t this (as in my gender identity) confuse your child?” “Is your partner ok about this?” Less thoughtful people would say things like, “Just wait until your kid goes to school and it’ll all go out the door.”

The most disheartening experiences happened in the clinical setting. I was she/her’d in every medical room. The way I was treated by the staff made me feel like what I said didn’t really matter to them. What mattered were compliance and protocol. Each time it happened, I was too overwhelmed to say anything. The sterile setting already stressed me out. My body was also going through a total renovation. And now I have to advocate for myself? This just seemed like a lot. I just wanted things to be easy - and I thought the easiest thing is to let things slide.

It wasn’t until one day my friend introduced me to a genderqueer parent that I was able to process all of this. As she spoke about how her partner advocated for her during medical appointments, my chest started to quiver, warm tears were gushing out of my eyes. All the ways in which I had been folding myself into the gender binary out of “convenience” were actually suffocating me. I realized that I didn’t have to set aside what felt true to me in order to get care. Plus, soon I have a life that will watch and copy everything I do. As a parent, I need to live my life in full alignment as a role model.

It was embarrassing to cry so hard during a phone call with someone I barely met. But she was so kind to hold space for me and offered me more stories of trans and gender-fabulous parenting life. In one, the family used the name “pom pom” - a combination of mom and pop - instead of mom or dad. I liked it immediately - I wanted to be a mom and a dad and something else, something fluffy and cute and encouraging, like a pom pom.

Support heals. That phone call changed my life. It gave me the right words to say when folks call me mom. It helped me to have a conversation with my partner about being more proactive about correcting folks when they misgender me. I felt like a new person. I felt like all parts of me had finally arrived.

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What do you think? How did you feel? Should I continue this pregnancy series? If you enjoy this post, please share with your community or leave a note :)