#Trans Femme Catholic

[angelwingumbrella]

Shout out to those who believe in/know the reality of Transubstantiation and who also believe in/know the reality that Queer Rights are Human Rights!

[thetorieaston2]

Let get naughty ❤️🥒

[sugarcoatednightshade]

I went to 5 highschools across three states in the the late 2010s and I'm pretty sure there was at least one out trans person at each of them. Now they all had vastly different experiences in how well they were treated by staff and students, but they were all out and proud.

were there any out trans people in your high school?

[mourningmaybells]

really sucks to think I was having a category 5 internalized homophobia event at my Jesuit college when they were showing the gay throat goat musical at the Jesuit theatre. I wish I could’ve watched it

[papenathys]

melting, you're a daydream: a story for queer brown girls

fifteen years after she left adya, pranjal reunites with her best friend and biggest what if at a book signing event.

this is a 5k word short story that contains:

trans femme bi POV // trans bi author

butch lesbian goodness

love letter to kolkata

catholic guilt

growing up queer and bengali

content warnings: mentions of societal butchphobia, transphobia and dysphoria. the story has a happy ending.

this story and characters are original property that belongs to me and if I find out that you have reposted/plagiarized it, I will take action. art is by @toripar.

if you like the story, do send me a review on this blog or on Instagram (@/sritamasen_). thank you.

[qbdatabase]

Hello!! I was looking for non-fiction books of butches and femmes that mention bisexual butches and femmes too! I guess that's a very specific thing and difficult thing to ask for but I was hoping if you knew some? In the end, I'll take any and all butch femme non-fiction books you know of please! 👉👈💖

Most of what I have for non-fiction butch/femme culture is centered around lesbians, with bisexuals being a chapter or discussion within a larger book, mainly because women-loving-women historically drew less of a distinction between lesbians and bisexuals (as that would have shoved out a lot of closeted/married women in a time when many women could not afford to not be married). But here's everything I have about butches and femmes, and I'll note if bisexuality is also discussed!

History of Butch/Femme Culture

Femme/Butch: New Considerations of the Way We Want to Go by Michelle Gibson - #1 recommendation, even if it is 20 years old

100 Crushes by Elisha Lim - contributions from butches and genderqueer folks

Challenging Lesbian Norms: Intersex, Transgender, Intersectional, and Queer Perspectives by Angela Pattatucci Aragón - more history of lesbian culture that looks beyond cisgender lesbians, discusses trans, intersex, gnc, butch, and bisexuality

The Life & Times of Butch Dykes: Portraits of Artists, Leaders, and Dreamers Who Changed the World by Eloisa Aquino - can't confirm if it includes any butch bisexuals, but it's from 2019, not twenty years ago!

Unsuitable: A History of Lesbian Fashion by Eleanor Medhurts - #2 recommendation for butch/femme culture, although I can't confirm if it includes bisexuals; published this year

Memoirs by Butch Authors

Leaving Isn't the Hardest Thing by Lauren Hough - butch lesbian

Hijab Butch Blues by Lamya H. - butch queer Muslim

Burning Butch by R/B Mertz - Catholic butch trans / nonbinary

Tomboy Survival Guide by Ivan E. Coyote - butch nonbinary

Pregnant Butch: Nine Long Months Spent in Drag by A. K. Summers - butch lesbian

Butch is a Noun by S. Bear Bergman - butch lesbian who later transitioned as a transgender man

Memoirs / Poetry / Self-Help by Femme Authors

Rust Belt Femme by Raechel Jolie - queer femme

Yoke: My Yoga of Self-Acceptance by Jessamyn Stanley - queer femme

You Grow, Gurl!: Plant Kween's Lush Guide to Growing your Garden by Christopher Griffin - queer femme nonbinary

HoodWitch: Poems / A Map of My Want by Faylita Hicks - queer femme nonbinary

[whereserpentswalk]

Yay!

We need to start depicting this lil guy doing heretical things asap!

Reblog with what acts you want to see him commit!

[pekkhum]

Are you trans yourself or is it just your daughter? :0

And in any case, how is her transition going so far?

Sending much love <3

I think this will be more fun to answer via story time and the long mode answer:

Around the time of my 37th birthday I started seeing a couple incredibly hilarious and relatable memes about being trans go by on my feed. They were just so great that I found myself seeking out more and learning to understand trans folk more and more. I kept wanting to comment and holding myself back, because, of course I'm not trans, I just feel all the things trans women feel all the time and have struggled with those feelings since I was very, very young. Still cis, though.

There was eventually a day when the dam broke and I admitted online that I am trans, but it was three days later, while reading about internalized transphobia, that it all hit home. I had myself a nice little fit about how I didn't want to be trans, not because it is bad, but because the world makes life suck for trans people. (Actually, 6 months before, in the most egg moment ever, I told a woman that I had been thinking about how hard life as a transgender lesbian would be and that it would be much easier to be a straight guy. I was wrong for reasons most trans folk can guess.)

That day, I sat my child down to explain that I've realized that I am very much trans, that I have resources she can read to understand what that all means, and that I would let her other parent know, so she had someone else to talk to if she wanted. (Thankfully, we are peacefully divorced, so that wasn't an issue.)

I later found out that my child had devoured those resources, stolen one of my skirts my work-mom gave me (she's so supportive) and tried on names, pronouns, and skirts. It was a month later that she greeted me in the morning in a skirt and informed me that she was certain her feelings weren't something else and I discovered that I have a daughter! 😊

I was in the process of trying to get HRT and my insurance changed, then my health network intentionally and willfully screwed me over and yanked my chain, because they didn't want to provide a referral (it turned out to be owned by the Catholic church, here in America), but didn't want to admit their bigotry. I was forced to change health networks and get a new primary and wait months for a new appointment for a referral and my daughter's needs were similarly delayed, but she was even further behind! I had just gotten HRT when I was laid off and left with no insurance. This means I'm on an incorrect dose and my daughter hasn't gotten hers.

To make matters worse, our ADHD has made sitting down for voice training or learning makeup (it is so overwhelming!) difficult for us and we've not found others willing and able to help with the latter. My daughter has gotten a lot of nice clothing from her mama (I'm mom, the ex is mama 🤷‍♀️), and she just looks so cute, but she hasn't felt brave enough to present at school or anything. I'm hoping a GSA in college will help, but I'm making sure not to push her. She's still figuring out her personal vibe, but it seems to lean toward her mama's style, instead of my tastes, with just a few exceptions. Whatever she goes with, I'm proud beyond belief!

I joined a writer's group and only ever introduced myself under my unmistakably femme chosen name and everyone was cool with my very unfemme appearing dysphoria hoodie wearing self. I am grateful beyond belief. The dose may be too low, but the HRT has been very much working. Unfortunately, even freshly shaved with a straight razor, my beard is forever visible (I'm told a little blush or color corrector can hide that, but keep looking horrible when I try), but thanks to HRT, I at least saw a woman with a beard shadow, when last I walked into the bathroom. (Also, I fill out my sundress more, now!)

With family and friends, we are fully socially transitioned, though, and I am grateful, every day, for those we've been able to keep. It wasn't all, but it seems I'd already cut the problems, in advance. Also, we can both wear whatever around the house, so we dress for ourselves, at least.

We dressed up extra for our first Pride parade, though! I won't have a ton of opportunities to wear that rainbow skirt, but I love it greatly!

We are early in transition, with lots of problems yet to solve, but we are so much happier, so far. I'm finally alive and she finally cares about who she will be! We're also so much closer now and have opened up a lot more to each other. I adore my daughter and I'm so glad to be her mom! 💖🥲

[stillaclownlol]

Lgbtqia+ hcs because I don't know if I'm gonna make it till June lmao (or, if I'm gonna live after it since I'm planning on wearing my flags In public 🤡)

Tw for csa mentions (because why don't I keep projecting huh)

Ashlyn Banner

-She/Her but in a "never thought about pronouns her entire life" kinda way. Doesn't mind they/them. She likes dressing masc/feeling masc, but doesn't really like being "perceived" as masc. Like...masc on her own time lmao. (I'm projecting so hard rn). "Gender neutral" kinda- like agender- but like in a "I don't care about my gender at all I just am more used to the gender they assigned me at birth"

-Demi rose 🌹 I'm also projecting here. Takes her a while to come into her feelings, but maybe that's the "never had friends ever" coming through.

Aiden Clark

-he/him but like he won't care if you use smth else for him lol. Cis gnc kinda guy eyyyyy (better in heels than ashlyn)

-unlabeled and that's how he likes it, nobody's business who he likes kissing lol. I feel like he's kissed a guy before just to try it. On the aro-allo spectrum ngl.

Ben Clark

-He/Him, is fine with They/Them. Honestly likes getting called She/Her too but she's been pretty shy about mentioning it :") Taylor likes doing her makeup if they're having a "femme-day". Settled on genderfluid/genderflux after a while.

-Greyromantic Caedsexual (Ace). Shane was part of a group of slightly older kids, and when he was getting bullied Shane and some other kids sexually assaulted him multiple times...technically was a queer assault since Ben was seen as a sissy because his personality and hobbies were "feminine", and this was to goad him into having a physical reaction :/

Taylor Hernández

(Ngl I'm so annoyed there's not more colors but whatever)

-She/Her and They/Them, identified as cis for a long time since it was what they knew, but once she learned more about it she experimented with her gender a lot more, they identified as non-binary for a while before moving to paragirl.

-Pan to aro/ace pipeline because I'm projecting :) she didn't really handle it well at the beginning, but Ben, Ash and Aiden are all also a-spec so she had a lot of support ^_^ They felt "invalid" because of the csa they went through when they were younger and they thought it was more like a trauma response than their actual sexuality. After talking with Ben about it tho she understood that even if they were related that didn't make her any less valid.

Tyler Hernández

-He/Him cis guy I'm sorry/lh

-was kinda annoying about queer people because actually being raised as a Catholic Mexican boy makes you kinda weird (IM SORRY THIS IS JUST FROM PERSONAL EXPERIENCE) BUT he gets better I promise

-Bisexual boyfailure and took him crushing on Logan to accept it 🤡

Logan Fields

-He/Him and a bit of a stickler about it because he gets misgendered rather frequently (less as he got older but still), doesn't mind getting called gendered terms tho (Taylor calls him "sis", and he calls himself an "Astrology girl")

-intersex, found out when he was 15ish since his puberty had been delayed, and he's really insecure about it...🙃 he was assigned male at birth so he wouldn't say he's trans, but his experiences overlap a fair bit. Takes testorone and medication because he has low electrolytes. I could write a whole essay here but I have to go soon 😭

-Gay :> He realized pretty quickly but he's intensely scared of people finding out, has only told his grandparents. They took it very well ^_^ His grandpa has some gay friends so sometimes Logan goes to the senior center to talk with them about stuff :)

[pronounmelon]

The more I see the lack of style in all of the "good" characters the more I realize it's most likely due to the fact that fashion experimentation, fun colors and patterns are more often associated with trans people- usually transmascs and nonbinary identities + "Urrghhh we must be NORMAL Queers-so we must look as acceptable as possible to the cishets! Because we're NORMAL" like how everyone seems to think that after you hit your 20s you're not allowed to be 'fun' anymore if its not drinking and football games, anything fun and bright is 'childish.'

NO YOURE SO RIGHT Rusty actually actively makes fun of trans ppl who see themselves in shows like Steven Universe cause they’re kids shows…. Like girlybootilicious I thought we were past not being able to find merit in shows with a young target audience… don’t disrespect Steven Universe when it was the first animated show EVER to have a lesbian wedding be the focal point of an episode. Rebecca Sugar fought HARD for that shit. Rusty reminds me of how JK Rowling writes women… how she makes them only valuable if they have masculine interests and “aren’t like the other girls!!!” While characters like Dolores Umbridge who enjoy their pink and makeup and stuff are super evil… it’s great to be masculine and femininity isn’t inherently for women but the not like other girls attitude and bullying femmes is very much rooted in misogyny.

Rusty acts like “weird” queer people are sooo responsible for her oppression when, looking at pictures of her, she literally looks like 90% of my middle aged female teachers back when I went to catholic school. Like dude if “looking normal” worked that well to stop your oppression you’d be a ceo but we are all still dealing with homophobia, transphobia, all that shit.

[hyakinthou-naos]

[this is @whats-the-word-again , or Alek]

Hello! I hope you're doing well :D I just wanted to pop in and say thank you. I think you posted it a little while ago now, but the post about masc/enby people veiling really helped me. I'm a trans guy and had been wanting to veil for the longest time, but I always felt hesitant because of how it's heavily associated with being a woman / femme and dysphoria said it was a no-go. I had been re-thinking it recently and seeing your post was the last push for me to get over my hesitation. I crotched myself a veil and I've felt so much joy every time I wear it! (which isn't too often as it's hot where I live and I practice secretly from my family)

I haven't felt as dysphoric (or even at all) as I thought I would when I wear it and I feel closer to the gods for it. So thank you so much :))

(sorry this was so long 😭)

Khaire Alek,

Thank you so much for your kind message! And no need to apologize for the length of your ask, we really enjoy and appreciate hearing from our patrons and visitors.

As a fellow trans-masc person, I too thought veiling would be dysphoria inducing and was pleasantly surprised to find it actually helped me feel more confident.

We cannot find the source at the moment, but if memory serves - there is historical precedent showing that men would also veil for religious reasons in Hellenic Greece/antiquity.

(The following is just an opinion, not necessarily fact) In our opinion, the prevalence of the Catholic Church, and Christianity in general, has created a cultural sense that veiling is solely something done by women and feminine people. So much of religious life, past and present, has been needlessly gendered and divided. At the Temple we find this division actively harmful and seek to blur or erase these gendered roles within religious and spiritual practice.

Wishing you all the best on your journey,

- The Temple of Hyacinthus

[lesbocs]

FINAL ROUND FOR THE LESBIAN OC BRACKET 2023!

MARIYAM BASKERVILLE (she/they) (@upvote)

"hiii!!! this is a character from a horror rpg maker game series that perhaps one day i will make.

mary is a poor pathetic meow meow final girl who has doomed the narrative itself. she has the ability to see anomalies (ghosts, demons, spirits, etc-- basically anything supernatural) but nobody believes her. she's a student at an all girl's catholic school in rural ohio in a vaguely post-apocalyptic timeline who is relentlessly bullied by her peers for being weird and neurodivergent and she has a sucky home life so all around she's having a terrible time. she's kind of eccentric and super into the occult, which in the good catholic town of woolwick is not accepted at all. her only ally is her older brother, callum, who she is very dependent upon but he apparently runs away from home shortly after a fight between the two of them. (it's a misunderstanding, he has his own demon stuff going on) and she's left in her senior year of high school feeling like shit.

so yeah life hates her and she hates life back. but !!! her solution to her very vitriolic misanthropy and unhappy circumstances is to open a portal to hell and allow her fucked up town to be consumed by it. on devil's night (the night before halloween, where kids play pranks and throw toilet paper at houses and etc) she sets her plan into motion and manages to find her way into getting roped up in the hijinks of a group of misfits (all students her age at the catholic girls school and all wlw and most of them are pretty nice actually) and horror game shit ensues with her getting involved in too because she's just a strange beast motivated by years and years of resentment and didn't really plan shit out… but she survives in the true end yay ^__^ sort of. schrodinger's cat girl.

she plays a vaguely overarching antagonistic role in the series over all but her intentions slowly become more benign as the story progresses… also she develops weird homoerotic enemies to allies to friends to STABS YOU IN THE BACK relationships with two of the other girls in the cast. idk mary is just a silly quirky trans autistic lesbian and yes she wants to destroy the whole world in her grief for her brother and the life she never had but she looked cute doing it!!!"

you can learn more about her here! (art for mariyam by pommeplisa on twitter)

🧡💛🤍💗💖

REAH (she/her) (@sev-wildfang)

"Not only does Reah beat up homophobes and transphobes for a living, she also literally astral projected out of her body to protect her femme once. It cost her an arm but not her charm. She ran away from a Church orphanage at age 12, she's Lucifer's personal chosen, she's 7ft tall (not counting the horns), she radiates warmth, and speaks with the drawl of a corn-fed southern gentlebutch. Let her into your heart or she might cry."

you can learn more about her here!

[orkbutch]

“Shar (real name Sharon)” for the bad nun au is so fucking genius im screaming. Also, SH’s cult being full of radfems is very interesting considering that in-game she’s (or was) super supportive of one of her peers who’s a trans woman (Nocturne) so I like to think the same happened in the AU

Oh yeah, these are also like 70's radfems so their politics are antecedents to modern GC, but distinctly different! More Andrea Dworkin but also homophobic. The Sharrans in Bad Nun are basically a tiny death cult started in a catholic girls school by one charismatic alumnus. Also Shadowheart was like 13 when she was groomed into it. By 16 she was already like, "Oh, this isn't GOOD huh."

At first I considered having the Sharran equivalent be Catholicism the whole way through, but honestly, it just didn't feel true to Shadowheart's trauma in the game! Catholicism is terribly destructive, but it doesn't have the vital Thing that Shadowheart's cult experience had that informed a lot of her trauma: a small, secretive community that was able to be extremely controlling, and a focus on her being "special". As a cult survivor, I think this latter element is really important to distinguishing between general religious trauma and cult trauma.

Cults make you feel special, important - so important and special that other people outside the cult could never understand you, including your family. (Side note, SH's final scene with her parents destroyed me because I think it captured an emotional experience specific to cult survivors that I have very rarely seen captured in fiction! It was brutal!) Simultaneously they are trying to destroy every unique and important thing about who you are. That takes focused manipulation and social control that you don't get so potently from most Catholic communities, because they involve families that are still together and well rooted in their larger, non-Catholic social context. Also only a weird fucked cult leader is gonna change your name to Shadowheart.

That said, her time in the cloister as a nun is an extension of that trauma - its the period where she's still processing her trauma by reproducing what she's learned, not at Shar's whim but because this is all she knows with how to cope. At 27, after 10 years in the cloister, a few years accepting her queerness and a new group of supportive people, she finally begins to move beyond just coping.

Oh man NOCTURNE UGH I LOVE HER I NEED TO DRAW THEM TOGETHER SO BAD .... But in Bad Nun Nocturne starts as a penpal she made while in boarding school though a school letter exchange program! She had a few penpals but Nocturne is the only one she kept up with because they ended up commisterating in their letters about being queer and confused about it. By the time Shadowheart was 5+ years a nun and had started sneaking out into the queer night life, Nocturne had changed her name, moved to London and was living her sexy trans life. Shes an ex-catholic kid herself and a hot goth, which Shad immediately loved, so they're super tight and occasional fuck buddies. Nocturne kept all their letters and helps her remember shit because The Trauma has left Shad with huge memory gaps. (Side note in Bad Nun Shadowheart usually goes by Shad because its a little gnc and makes her feel her femme dykism real good. Jenevelle is basically like... the name of her inner child, who she has a non existent (but hopefully in repair!) relationship with.)

[cisplus]

Sometimes I think about how terfs always talk about how women have a "universal sisterhood" and always have each other's backs, and I get incredibly pissed off as a queer woman.

I've been bullied and ostracized relentlessly since I was 12 for being queer, mostly by other girls. I lost my best friends -- girls who swore we were sisters and they'd be in my life forever -- when they found out I was bisexual. I had a roommate throw fits every night because she didn't think it was morally right for me to live with her (a straight Catholic woman). And so on, and so on.

I want to stress that I'm a cis, femme bi girl. Straight cis women are much, much worse to trans women, butch women, and lesbian women.

There is no "universal sisterhood." Anyone who says otherwise has no idea what it's like to live as a marginalized woman/girl.

[papenathys]

good news! my work will be featured on the second volume of Beloved Zine (@belovedzine ), a zine centring butch/femme, sapphic and trans experiences. my short story is called "melting, you're a daydream" it's about two Bengali Catholic schoolgirls falling in and out of love over the years: featuring Adya (left), a butch lesbian and Pranjal (right), a trans femme bisexual. I cannot wait for you all to meet them!

beautiful artwork of my girls by @toripar . unfortunately the art will not be present in the zine, but I will upload the story along with the art piece separately on a drive so you can access it once it is published.

[uh-velkommen]

The hardest part about being where I am gender wise is that I never really feel like I belong in queer spaces. I don't usually go around talking about my gender because I still present femme and use she/her pronouns and I just never EVER meet trans masc people. I feel like I'm doing queerness wrong because I never outwardly express who I am. I don't feel like I fit in with lesbians and I can't entirely relate to trans women. Sometimes I get along with Gay men but even with cis gays you can never be sure if they support trans people. I've recently started thinking about the dilemma surrounding "Women & Trans/non binary" spaces where they're often talking about femme leaning non binary people or trans women. Would I even be welcomed in spaces like that if I transition? Would I be looked at funny for being a man in women's spaces?

When I was younger I used to get clocked all the time for coming off a bit masculine and that was before I even knew I was different but as I've gotten older, it's gotten harder to give off those vibes. Maybe because over the years I've become less and less of a person. I've buried all sense of personality and identity sooo deep due to trauma and fear. I don't know how I'll ever be a boy when I can't even be a person.

I've been spending so much energy trying to figure out how I'll convince cishet people of who I am because at the moment, that's all I have in my life. Ultra Catholic traditional small-minded generationally impoverished housewives. People I wouldn't even be friends with if it weren't for having no other options. They'll never see me for who I am. And somehow it feels like I'll never find my little queer fam.

My mind is full of "what ifs" and "whens," so I'm trying really hard to focus on the now. What is the next thing I can do to feel like myself? What little changes can I make that won't immediately raise questions but will ultimately lead to the life I want? Because if I keep thinking about the future, I'll get too overwhelmed and eventually give up. It's easier to sit in discontentment than to think about change.