This week I came out to the boss. He’s a nice guy and I think of him as a mate. We’ve talked a lot about difficulties in our lives before now, so I felt that I could trust him.

We went to a local pub for lunch, which we do every few weeks. It was my turn to pay. I had nachos, he had a burger. After a brief talk about work, there was a silence: he knew I wanted to tell him stuff.

I began by saying that about six months ago I came out to my husband as non-binary and that I wanted to have “identity affirming surgery”. I explained that this has proved really difficult for my husband and it was largely at the source of our recent difficulties. I was honest, but not overly detailed. I then said that I was having the surgery at the start of February – and that was what the leave was for. He listened well, but he might have been slightly stunned.

His first question was to clarify what “non-binary” meant. I explained that whilst one’s genetic gender is usually pretty clear and apparently lends itself to binary interpretations (with a few exceptions), the way some people feel about themselves doesn’t have to confirm to any standard motion of male or female. There’s the obvious man-in-woman’s body and vice versa, which people seem to be able to get their heads around (mostly), but there are people who don’t feel entirely one gender or the other, or maybe they don’t feel they entirely being too a single gender, but definitely don’t feel the other. Or maybe don’t feel like they fit entirely in any gender. I said that I felt semi-masc, which I then explained as not feeling happy being fully masculine. He seemed to get it.

He asked if I was going to start dressing differently. I said I wasn’t. I also said that I was happy with he/him pronouns.

This was clearly a strange new world that he was being introduced to, and he did himself credit.

I said that he could ask me anything about it, and in my new unfiltered and uninhibited life I felt that I could answer.

He asked about hormones and understood their importance from some personal experience of his own. I think he worked out which bits of me were going and what would be staying. We might even have used the castration word to refer to the procedure!

I have to say that it was hugely positive experience for me and that I am privileged to work with somebody who is so open minded. Whilst I really won’t know what he made of it all until I see him in the office next week, I’m pretty confident that he will be just the same with me. I can definitely count him as a friend.