Raine Atkinson is a trans/nonbinary college student in their early 20s. They spoke about the process of coming out to the important people in their life and about value of unconditional acceptance.
Alphabet Soup shares LGBTQ+ Missourians’ stories through portraiture and personal narratives.
Raine Atkinson: I got really lucky that most of my friends growing up ended up being queer, and I tend to stumble into friendships with other queer people more often than I do cis[gender] het[erosexual] people.
I wasn't sure how my parents were going to react – like they're not homophobic, transphobic, whatever. But they're also not great at understanding things.
So, first person I came out as non-binary too was my ex-partner, and he was a big support.
So, I slowly started coming out to friends, they started using my new name, and they were really good at it. I mean, they're queer, I expected them to be decent at it, but they did better than I was expecting even.
Laughter
Eventually, I was out to enough of my friends that I came out to my high school newspaper teacher because she was like my school mom, and if I didn't feel safe coming out to my parents yet, I figured, “Well, at least I can make one of my classes throughout the day feel a little bit less terrifying.”
And then, I remember there was an incident where one of the English teachers was like, “You’re Raine, right?” And I was like, that was the first time a teacher I hadn't had had called me my chosen name, and that was really special to me.
And then, finally, around six or seven months after I started coming out in the first place, I accidentally came after my parents. I wasn't planning on it.
There was a news story on the TV about trans issues, and I said something, and my mom was like, “You would tell us if you wanted to tell us something, right?” And I was like, “Oh, no.”
So, I don't really remember anything I said. I just sort of came out, and then right after that, I came out to my younger sister and she was like, “Yeah, I kind of assumed.”
Most of the time, I don't feel inherently accepted because I am not a woman. I am not a man. Those are the two like options, really, the two boxes.
Being accepted in the way that it feels going to Pride is knowing that those expectations aren't there, knowing that people will actually ask my pronouns and won't automatically assume just because I look one way.
Being accepted is very euphoric and very comforting.
