We often think of dress as a costume: something that we put on over our internal self, which might reflect or obscure our true identity, but never reshape it. But while the distinction between ‘gender identity’ and ‘gender expression’ is a useful teaching tool, helping to underscore the point that we can’t tell anyone’s gender just from looking at them – I use it myself every time I deliver trans awareness training – the reality of our experience is often more complex. My own dress both reflects and reshapes my gender: sometimes it’s the case that I put on jewellery and a bright, fitted cardigan because I’m feeling less male and more non-binary on that particular morning, but sometimes the reverse is true. Both kinds of gendered experience are equally true for me: my gender isn’t less authentic because a pair of dangly earrings can change how it feels.

— Before We Were Trans by Kit Heyam (Page 149)