A while ago I heard about a sauna where they apparently don't know what to do with transgender people. In this sauna, the policy applies that “women” may wear a bikini, panties or top and “men” may only wear a towel. In this sauna they base gender on the legal sex of the customer. So, the letter in the passport. Inquiry showed that binders are not allowed in this sauna.

Many non-binary transgender people are extremely annoyed by the fact that you have to state your gender everywhere. For those who don't feel a man nor a woman, this is an impossible question to answer. Similar to a question like "What is your favorite colour?", and the only options you can tick are "green" or "orange". But your favorite colour is blue. Not nice!

More and more often I am attending events where it is common to ask attendees which pronouns they want to be addressed as. So, whether one wants to be addressed as he/him, they/them or she/her. This does not only happen in trans communities, but also beyond. Very liberating for that large group of people who don't identify as "men" or "women"! This development forces me to think again about my own gender identity.

It is important to have a community where you are among like-minded people. Where people accept you as you are, where half a word is enough. In short, where you are at home. For me, that is the community of transmen. Only there are made no (unspoken) assumptions about my gender, my youth and/or my physical appearance. Only there I can be fully myself without expectations.

On 22 September, Kennislink published an article about transgender people and regrets, with the somewhat trendy title "Regretting your sex change". I think it is very good that we pay attention to people who are not satisfied with their gender change. Even though the number of people with regret in the Netherlands is extremely low: about 1%, that does not make the suffering of these people less! Unfortunately, I think that Kennislink does not do justice to the situation with this article.

For a very long time I have been considering to start my own blog. However, I felt that I did not have enough to add to what all other people are already blogging. Nevertheless, time has come for me to start blogging after all!