Sometimes when I go out to restaurants and bars that are not completely populated by other gay folks, I scare people in the bathroom. This Saturday night, I was out with three friends and I had to use the restroom. When I walked in, there was a person in the other stall, and no one waiting. I entered the available stall and while I was using it, three or four women walked in–talking to each other. My heart stopped– just for a second. This hadn’t happened in awhile.
First, I was wearing a tie. Ties detract from every feminine aspect of my body– my chest, the width of my hips, the softness of my face/features– it seems like straight women see the tie first and the person wearing it second– so when i came out of the stall, two of them gasped before realizing I was female.
This is one of the prices I pay for my gender presentation in spaces where there is no single-user restroom available. I know many many people who experience this kind of pressure and fear and frustration every time they need to use a public restroom. Generally I can speak and immediately assuage the discomfort of the other women in the bathroom– my voice isn’t very high, but it’s certainly not the voice of a man (and less masculine now that I quit smoking).
Should I speak to assuage their discomfort? Does my right to pee in public supercede their right to feel safe in the restroom? No, it doesn’t. But it doesn’t supercede my right to feel safe in the restroom either. Someone told me to dress more femininely when I go to straight places. Well, that defeats the purpose of spending 32 years becoming the person I am. I don’t have and don’t want separate outfits to wear when I go to straight places (which are most places–even most places that I go).
Recently, my department at work was moved down two floors. We are mostly still sitting near the same people we have always sat near. I have never experienced any kind of gender or sexuality discrimination at work– I am very very lucky, I know, but my workplace is committed to being a great place to work. The move has resulted in us sharing a restroom with a whole new department of people we don’t know, and I told “wrong bathroom” at work the other day by someone I don’t know. I replied politely, “I don’t think so” and when i turned to face the person, I could see her surprise that she was wrong. I guess I’ll use the unisex a little more often until people who don’t know me are accustomed to seeing me at the copier or in the halls….which honestly is fine by me because I prefer using the unisex, but don’t want to occupy it in the even that a person with a disability is in need of the facilities.
It’s funny– I do identify as butch, but I don’t think I look like a man [nor do I want to look like a man]. I have the round body of a fat woman, but my chest is smallish [thanks, 1996 reduction!] just because I’m wearing men’s clothes doesn’t mean I’m in the wrong bathroom.
This has been happening to me for years. It happens more when I am thinner, and it happens more depending on my hairstyle. It happens more in the winter than in the summer. It happens more in bars than professional settings. It happens more in Cincinnati than Minneapolis. It happens more and more.
PATRIARCHY PARTY CRASHER 
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nome
I like the Andrea Gibson line in “Swing Set” where she says “I’m sorry ma’am but I didn’t feel like shoving this tampon up my PENIS in the men’s room” (Or something very, very close)
Ya.. it’s weird. I look like a boy to me and will pass about 50-75% of the time normally but always get read as a woman in the bathroom. *shrug* I guess I should count that as a good thing for making life easier..?
bee listy
Do you get read as woman in the women’s bathroom or the men’s?
nome
O, sorry, in the women’s. The men’s freaks me out.
Bevin
This:
“Someone told me to dress more femininely when I go to straight places. Well, that defeats the purpose of spending 32 years becoming the person I am.”
I can’t say amen enough.
Also, I can understand the struggle between wanting to utilize your entitlement to the facilities, which you have, without making other people feel comfortable and the desire for other people to feel comfortable so that you can go about your business in peace and without harm.
Glenn Marla says that he passes way more in the winter due to layering.
bee listy
A person really shouldn’t have to fight the core of their personhood just to urinate…right?!
Winter truly is kinder to me sartorially…just not in the loo.
G
I’ve definitely received the double take and/or “Umm …” when women see me in the bathroom (or locker room too, sometimes). So far no one has had the guts to TELL me “Wrong bathroom,” although I know they’re thinking it.
I’ve had well-intentioned friends tell me the same thing – maybe I should dress differently, maybe I should carry a purse (!) – partially out of concern for me, and partially because it will make THEM feel better. But I stopped trying to make things easier on others years ago and stuck with doing what’s best for me. If they have a problem with your presentation, it’s just that – their problem.
bee listy
I carry a murse sometimes…does that help? 😀
I usually get the double take– this week the wrong bathroom/gasp combo was unusual, which is what prompted me to write about it.
making others more comfortable at our expense is most definitely not an option. i just want every place in the whole world to have single user lockable restrooms.
Bond
Just: Great post.
bee listy
thank you.
M
Thank you for the excellent post! I identify as genderqueer, and have similar restroom experiences to the one you describe, especially on road trips. These days I sometimes use men’s, sometimes women’s rooms, depending on the scenario. If available, I always use a unisex single-user, or family single-user — or else a “gendered” single-user is the less good option (but better than gendered multi-stall). My partner and I will pull off to get gas and pee, and look at the gas station options, and say, “well, maybe this one is smaller and has one or two single-user restrooms” … sometimes we guess right, other times not. So it’s a game, sort of — but always a nerve-wracking one. So far I’ve been lucky, it has only been confused comments and/or strange looks — but I’m aware that there’s always that potential for violence or hatred or calling security or notifying the management. More often while traveling lately, I go with my partner to the men’s room (he’s a trans guy) and he’s teaching me all the tricks he developed (back when he needed them) to not ever getting questioned in men’s rooms.
I resent it when people tell me to just talk to the women in the women’s room (my voice is also female-sounding), or smile, or such things, so that they are put more at ease — I shouldn’t have to think about their comfort. bah.
Thanks again — nice to be able to talk about all of this!
bee
I really love single restrooms– i was talking about this last night w/ my friend Ethan. I want them to be called omniperson/omnisex or all gender instead of unisex or gender neutral. The tricks to not being noticed in the men’s room are tricks we should all have…that would be amazing.
nome
Haha! This is dorkish and a little off-the-wall but my mom and I were just having a linguistical convo about how we should call them “omnisex” when they are for all genders, not “unisex” since “unisex” is technically what we have when we say “men” and “women” bathrooms.
bee listy
i’m a latin nerd and a lover of words and language, and a nitpicking virgo– i want things to be said well. 🙂
Undercover Punk
bee listy, HI!
I’m pretty attuned to butches, I realize, but I just have to say that I’ve NEVER–not once– had the urge to kick someone out of the women’s room! I’ve been nervous plenty of times (like pretty much every time cause I’m super vigilant like that), but I’ve never had the inclination to tell someone to LEAVE. It just amazes me that women feel the need to do this.
Anyways, GREAT post!! 🙂 Thanks for writing.
nome
Why have you felt nervous? From where does this feeling stem? Seriously, these emotions need to be examined because they play into why bathrooms are so hard for trans folks and those who just don’t fit into models of what “man” and “woman” look like. Sure, you don’t act on your worries but people pick up on that stuff and it sucks. At least, I pick up on when someone isn’t sure what the hell I am and I am put in a position where it is suddenly my job to prove I belong, in their eyes.
bee listy
i don’t know exactly how UP meant nervous-but i get nervous in large public restrooms for my own safety outside of my gender– i get nervous because I have known women attacked by men in public restrooms.
nome
Also, you don’t get a cookie for not kicking someone out of a bathroom. Jussayin.
Undercover Punk
Nome, thanks for jussayin! I only commented because I thought bee listy was going to send me cookies in the mail. Damn. I hate it when that happens. And you’re always so POLITE to me. It really helps build community and foster feelings of solidarity. Thanks again!
bee listy
i’m a cook, not a baker. you don’t want any cookies i’d send you. i think i understood where you were going– check my other comments…
Undercover Punk
Cakes, cookies, bombs, dinner– I like it all!
nome
Sorry to keep replying and not putting it all in one comment. I’m being a little out of it due to it being early, cold and I’m trying to cram in some homework. But I forgot to add in this bit:
Please note how this post is not about being run out of bathrooms, although that’s a legit concern too. It’s about women feeling nervous of us folk who don’t necessarily look like women, but use the women’s bathroom and doing things like gasping, or double glancing, or startling, or whatever.
bee listy
i think that people more likely to be aware of butches and other tarnsmasculine poeple are way less likely to police our presence in the bathroom.
i get nervous in public restrooms too– not just afraid that someone will try to tell me i don’t belong, but also that i could be targeted for violence, so i am also vigilant in the restroom.
Undercover Punk
I’m sorry, I want to make clear that the ‘wrong bathroom’ experience is not what I’m incredulous about– it’s the correctors’ cursory, presumptuous, and shaming approach to the situation that I find amazing. Certainly women have the Right to feel safe in the women’s room! But this Right does not include being RUDE to other women without asking politely the first time whether they’re in the right place. It’s only civil.
nome
Saying you do what is the problem presented in the post does not create any sort of solidarity or community. I’m just pointing out the irony of beelisty writing a post about how uncomfortable it is when women act nervous and you come in and center it on yourself by saying, “ya, I do that. But I don’t kick anyone out!” You didn’t even say anything along the lines of “but I am confronting these feelings and trying to change” or “but I am challenging this idea in myself and in those around me.”
bee listy
again, i’m not sure UP was saying she does this– i got the impression that UP was saying “i’m vigilant in the bathroom because i don’t feel safe for many reasons” but i could be misinterpreting.
Undercover Punk
Thank you, bee listy. I did not comment here with disrespectful intentions. I did not fully explain myself, hence the 2nd comment I left last night that is still pending. But thank you (sincerely!) for giving me the benefit of the doubt.
bee listy
the still pending comment was an accidental oversight 🙂
Undercover Punk
I am vigilant against *acts of violence* in the women’s bathroom. Particularly at night, when the bathroom is located in an isolated area, down a hallway, around a quiet corner, or is relatively empty. Would you like statistics?
Again, thank you for doubting the validity of my nervousness, suggesting that my “emotions need to be examined,” and concluding that I’m part of the problem.
nome
*nod* No, that’s true. I’m sorry, UP. Genuinely. I majorly jumped the gun and it’s true that bathrooms are not always safe spaces. I had read your comment as meaning “nervous of people who look weird” and it was the one-straw-too-many with how stressed I’ve been lately. Still, it was unfair of me to take out frustrations w/ folks on you. I should have asked for clarification, if anything. The problem is our rape culture, which makes women need to be so nervous, not the women themselves.
Undercover Punk
Apology accepted, nome. Thank you (sincerely). I agree the Rape Culture is the Real Problem!
Janimaify
What’s weird is that at my high school, we legitimately sometimes have guys in the girls loos if they don’t feel comfortable in the men’s and they don’t even get weird looks.