We had a visit from an individual and the rider of their email politely asked for them to be referred to in gender neutral terms. This was done by all but it’s very hard when you are not used to it.
Agreed it's hard to retrain one's brain. I have now had multiple non-binary colleagues and I still occasionally slip up despite a lot of practice. Most of the time I do get it right now.
They can tell I'm making an effort in general, and I generally self-correct right after saying the wrong pronoun, so (as they've confirmed to me) no offense results from the mistakes. The offense happens when people don't genuinely try.
Nobody's trying to make it a gotcha game, and I'm sure the person appreciated your attempts to respect their wishes, whether or not any mistakes were made! It will become more natural with more practice.
Agreed, and this is exactly what I tell people who sometimes forget to compose their emails to me in 12pt Comic Sans font like my email rider requests.
