How do y'all deal with being purposely and repeatedly misgendered by friends you (perhaps mistakenly) came out to?
Hey folks, I'm a 45 year old enby that was shoved into the female box at birth and never really questioned my gender despite not feeling fully at home with societal expectations and my own internal experience of girl and womanhood. I had been questioning for a couple of years once I found understanding and language to do so - I live in a pretty conservative province, have very little irl queer community and my family is quite conservative - and then started coming out explicitly last year. I also started identifying as queer, both socio politically and in sexuality, in the last couple of years - after feeling like I wasn't queer enough to be claiming it as an identity.
My coming out was and has been messy by my own standards. I hadn't had regular access to a therapist for awhile and only realized in hindsight that the support of one may have been helpful in the coming out process. I started by updating my pronouns on social media, initially using she/they pronouns, and after several months started finding that I was cringing outside and inside being referred to as she or her and updated my pronouns to they/them. I notice how I experience gender fluctuates, and sometimes I don't connect with gender at all. I am giving myself time and space to continue questioning and allowing myself to change and feel uncertain - which feels to me like a natural part of the questioning process.
And lately I've been feeling ashamed wondering if I made the right choice to come out. I was brought up religious which plays a part. I also feel what is often referred to as imposter syndrome, shaming myself and accusing myself of being a phony because I didn't realize that I'm enby sooner. And the part that really hurts, is that friends I've come out to are misgendering me and it's ongoing. It feels silly to be concerned about being misgendered considering what's happening in the world from climate collapse to multiple genocides but I'd be lying if I said it didn't hurt, and doesn't affect the way that I see myself. I look and act in ways that are perceived as feminine and sharing pronouns and using they/them pronouns doesn't seem to be very common. It's getting to me, and I'm trying not to let it, but I only opened up to very few people when I started questioning and it's pretty clear to me that people who have known me for a long time think using they and them as pronouns is inconvenient at best and ridiculous at worst.
The bigger issue is feeling like being open about a way in which I'm coming to a new understanding about myself that I should be enjoying is being treated so carelessly by others, so I'm feeling a lot of shame and anxiety instead. Homophobia and transphobia are rampant where I live, and discovering that folks who claim to be progressive draw the line at using they or them as pronouns has been disheartening to say the least. I get that they haven't known me to not identify as she/her, but if they were truly supportive wouldn't it be pretty simple to use the pronouns I want?
TLDR, how do you not let it get to you that people who are supposed to be your friends and family are purposely misgendering you? And please be gentle, I'm really going through a lot right now emotionally in a variety of ways and as much as I wish I could let unsupportive comments roll off my back, they will only add to my pain. Thank you.