For simplicity of documentation, W@W uses the term woman/women. This includes those who do not identify as women but have gynecological conditions or who are pregnant.
What Is Gender Identity?
A set of feelings and beliefs a person has about their gender. It is feeling or knowing that you are a certain gender, regardless of your body or the sex assigned to you at birth.
Sometimes it can seem difficult or complicated to understand gender, and you might worry about getting it ‘wrong’. Some of the concepts and language may be very new to you and you may be reading or hearing lots of different ideas.
A good starting place is to avoid making assumptions based on what people look like and try to be sensitive and inclusive. Being kind is always the best approach: whether you are trying to learn about the issues or trying to teach someone about them.
Any harassment or bullying of people because of how they identify, or present is wrong whether it is because they don’t conform to a gender stereotype, or because of their gender identity. For more information, please see ‘Helpful Links’
What Is Transitioning?
Transitioning generally refers to the process of changing from the gender that a person is assigned at birth to the one with which they identify. There are three main types, which are social, medical and legal. A person who is transitioning may do d in one, some, or all these ways, and it is important to remember that this is a very personal and individual process.
For some, transitioning is a process with a clear end after which that person may identify as simply male or female, putting their former gender identity behind them. In these cases, it is disrespectful to continue to refer to them as transgender. For others, being transgender is important to how they see themselves and something that they may wish to share with people around them.
A person transitioning has the legal right under the Equality Act 2010, to take time off work:
- To attend appointments with either the Gender Identity Clinic (GIC)
- For treatment restricted to specific times e.g. hormone injections, blood tests etc.
- For surgical procedures.
However, the employee should be reasonable too and, wherever possible attend clinical appointments outside of their normal working hours.