Relatively Unfamiliar Situations and Unintentionally Mixing up Another Person's Pronouns

[JustGeorge]

I try my best. Sometimes I screw up(especially if it is a 'change' from how I met them; takes a bit of time to get used to). I hope people are patient with me.

I sometimes struggle verbally if I have to use both he and she in a sentence. My tongue flops them. For example: " @ChristineM said he wanted a cookie, and @Debater Slayer said she wanted a piece of cake." Its embarrassing, but it seems to be more speech related than gender related... I cringe and wonder who heard me when it happens...

I don't have any pronoun preferences. Most use 'she', though, because it fits the appearance.

 

[VoidCat]

I try my best. Sometimes I screw up(especially if it is a 'change' from how I met them; takes a bit of time to get used to). I hope people are patient with me.

I sometimes struggle verbally if I have to use both he and she in a sentence. My tongue flops them. For example: " @ChristineM said he wanted a cookie, and @Debater Slayer said she wanted a piece of cake." Its embarrassing, but it seems to be more speech related than gender related... I cringe and wonder who heard me when it happens...

I don't have any pronoun preferences. Most use 'she', though, because it fits the appearance.

I use cat/catself for you

 

[JustGeorge]

I use cat/catself for you

You do!

 

[Revoltingest]

Another relevant fact: In Arabic, "you" is gendered, as are possessive pronouns and all nouns in the language. That means that using another person's gender pronouns occurs even when you address them in the second person, as opposed to English where "you" is genderless.

Gender is over-rated.
Chinese is better this way.

 

[libre]

I also got her pronouns wrong a couple of times by sheer force of habit, since I'm used to addressing most people as members of the gender matching their sex (as I suspect most people are used to, given that most people's gender indeed matches their biological sex). Our mutual friends told me that it was okay and that she didn't have any issues with such mix-ups as long as they came from people who didn't intentionally misgender her.

This has been the same perspective of the trans people who I've met, including my eldest sibling. Habits aren't changed in a day.

The one recommendation I can tack onto this thread is not to say 'sorry' if you are politely corrected on pronouns. If a trans person is correcting your use of pronouns, it is a show of good faith that they trust it is not intentional, and repeat apologies can add pressure and feelings of awkwardness to the person who's correcting you.

Instead, a better way to respond is to say 'thank you', which acknowledges that the person is trying to help you change your habit, and encourages such reminders.

 

[Shadow Wolf]

I sometimes struggle verbally if I have to use both he and she in a sentence. My tongue flops them. For example: " @ChristineM said he wanted a cookie, and @Debater Slayer said she wanted a piece of cake." Its embarrassing, but it seems to be more speech related than gender related... I cringe and wonder who heard me when it happens...

I do that. Just the other day I was printing labels for bottles at work, and someone asked who's getting stabbed next. It was some guy, I had already had his label printed, but I was printing out a different label, for female donor, and so I said "she is," and then had to correct myself.