10 Annoying & Awkward Things Muslim Converts Have To Deal With

Whether it's among fellow Muslims or with our non-Muslim family and friends, all of these things happen and every time we cringe a little inside.

1. Random people trying to rename us. Constantly.

We chose to keep our birth name, and there is nothing that says we have to change it. It has a good meaning, and after a lifetime we’re pretty attached to it.

2. If we did change our name, some people we knew prior just refuse to call us by it

3. Being told being Muslim is just a phase

4. Experiencing weird culture based racism among Muslims

We don’t particularly care about what group you're biased against or why. Racism is not okay, and especially now that we’re in Islam we’re not going to just go along with it.

5. Being accused of trying to “steal” born Muslims off the marriage market

It’s a matter of statistics- there are more born Muslim than there are converts, so yeah, there's a much higher chance we'll probably marry one of them. Deal with it.

6. Women’s gatherings in general

We end up at these things when a well meaning sister won't take no for an answer, even if we legitimately had other plans. It wouldn't be so bad if we knew someone here, or if someone actually talked to us. Instead, everyone just tries to feed us food we don't want, stares at us and generally speaks in a language we don't understand.

7. Being dismissed or not taken seriously because we're converts

8. People assuming we converted for a man

One of the first questions people ask us is "Where is you're husband from", which to us sounds like "We don't think you're serious about Islam" and "Why on earth would you convert for any other reason except for a man?!"

9. Having our clothing & style choices criticized by pretty much everyone.

Everyone has an opinion about how we’re dressing, and they let us know how wrong we are in our choices. We don’t remember asking you.

10. Random people hugging us

This is kind of weird. But we'll get used to it... eventually.