#also the whole 'my gender is a fucking yoyo' thing discouraged me from making an Official Coming Out that i might scrap after a few months

[morporkian-cryptid]

On gender, confusion, and labels

I want to talk about my experience of gender, because it’s been a long and complicated journey and I’m finally at a point where I’m not having an identity crisis every six months. I haven’t seen many people with a similar experience in my years on the Trans Website and I kinda wish I had people tell me this earlier. This is not meant to be catch-all advice for all gender-confused folks, just my own story; if others can resonate with it and feel a little less lost, then I’ll be happy.

(This is gonna be pretty long, be warned)

I experience little to no dysphoria, and that’s probably why it’s taken me so long to accept that I’m not cis. What tipped me off to the whole Gender Situation was mostly the euphoria of being perceived as a masculine woman, or mistaken for a guy.

I came out as genderfluid years ago, to about two persons. Six months and a lot of thinking later, I went back on it because it turned out it was just a phase.

Well, not a phase, more like a cycle. After that, I kept deeply questioning my gender every six to twelve months. Most of the time I’d feel like a woman (albeit without any clear idea of what “being a woman” actually meant), and every now and then I’d get clear flashes of “I’m something else” feelig and start to question my entire identity for a couple months; then go back to “nah actually I’m cis”. Rinse and repeat.

I kept cutting my hair increasingly short, event went as far as a buzzcut. I rarely wear makeup. I like when people mistake me for a boy or are confused about my gender.

Every year or so, I found myself looking at binders. Every year I flaked out. At some point I bought compression bras but barely wore them because they were uncomfortable. I like my chest in and of itself, but sometimes I don’t like the way it looks with dresses or frilly tops – I like my chest but I don’t want it to be perceived. (I did buy a binder eventually, for the few days when I want my chest gone. I don’t wear it a lot, but I’m happy to have the choice.)

For a while I played with using different pronouns; I asked my friends to call me he or they for a few days, or I’d introduce myself with those pronouns in talking groups. But most of the time I went back to “she” like an old comforting jumper.

I even changed my name for about six months, then went back to my birth name. That was a very difficult time. I didn’t want to change my name. I like my birth name a lot. What happened was, Elliott Page came out, and I heard the name Elliott and my brain kinda went, “huh I like that name, it fits, I kinda like being a girl named Elliott”; and then it was like an itch that wouldn’t go away unless I scratched it. The weight of that decision scared me. It wasn’t like pronouns or a haircut: a name is what I present myself to the world with, and I was terrified of changing such a big thing about me.

My friends were very supportive, and switched without problem. I was lucky enough to move abroad for a six-month exchange program right when that identity crisis happened, so I got the very rare occasion to introduce myself as Elliott to people who didn’t know me at all, and whom I wouldn’t see anymore after six months. My flatmates were great and called me Elliott without question.

Six months later, the name stopped fitting. I don’t know how to describe it, but it just didn’t feel like me anymore, so I went back to my birth name, and all my friends were chill with that. (I still use Elliott as a pseudonym online.)

The reason the early years of questioning my gender were really complicated, is because for a lot of my life I’ve been really into labels. I wanted to understand things and put them in neat little boxes; and my identity was no different. If I’m not a woman then I must be trans. But I feel like a woman 75% of the time. Can I call myself trans if I identify with my AGAB most of the time? Do I actually identify as a woman, though? Or am I okay with being perceived as one? What does “feeling like a woman” even mean? Technically, by definition I must be genderfluid, which means I’m trans, but that’s a word that doesn’t feel like it applies to me. I can’t be part-time trans. But I’m not exactly cis either. Then what the fuck am I??

I wanted a word to put on my identity, because if I didn’t have one then I didn’t know what I was, and that was really difficult to live with.

It took me years to shed that need for a label, and to get to the point I am at today. Today I see my gender as feelings rather than identity. My gender is too big and complicated to neatly fit into a word, or even ten. My gender is the way I dress, the way I talk, the emotions when I am called miss or sir, the feeling when I look at myself in the mirror after a fresh haircut. It’s a hundred interconnected tidbits that all shift day to day.

The best way I’ve found to describe my experience of gender, is this:

I am not a woman

I am fine with being perceived as a woman

I do not want to be perceived as feminine

These are the three things I’m certain of right now (and they might change later! And that’s okay!), and my day-to-day gender presentation hinges around them. I no longer try to look inside myself and ask “What is my Gender?”, because I’ve never found a straight (ha!) answer, and that’s only ever brought me anguish. What I do now, is look in the mirror and ask myself “Do I like this outfit?”, look at a sentence I wrote and ask myself “Do I like these pronouns?”. I’ve kind of applied the Marie Kondo method to my gender: does this spark joy? Then I’m doing it. In this text I’m sending to my friend, does calling myself “handsome” spark joy? Then I’m calling myself “handsome”. Does wearing a binder under this dress spark joy? Then binder it is. If I want to try out a new name, I can tell my friends and they’ll try it out with me, and if it turns out I don’t like it, I can always ask them to go back to the old one. The gender feelings I’m feeling right now are as real as the ones I felt yesterday or the ones I’ll feel tomorrow, they’re as important and I am allowed to indulge in them.

With labels, I do sort of the same thing, although I’m not quite there yet. The best word I’ve found to describe myself is genderqueer, because it’s vague enough to not imprison me inside a box. Sometimes I’ll say I’m non-binary if that’s relevant to the context of the discussion. I still don’t actively describe myself as trans, because the vastness of that word and the experiences it comes with is still a bit scary for me – but I don’t forbid myself anymore from taking part in things labelled as “trans”, like talking groups, pride events, Tumblr posts and Discord servers. Even if I don’t identify with the word, I identify with many of the experiences, and I do technically fall under the definition of transgender. I’m allowed to be part of that community, even if I kinda just lurk around the doorstep. Maybe one day I’ll be comfortable enough to actually come in, and proudly call myself transgender.

I have been sort of toying with the idea of maybe one day going on T. If I had had that idea a few years earlier, I would have freaked out and had another identity crisis over it, like I did with the name change. As things are right now, I’m just sort of considering the idea and giving myself time to think about it, do research, try alternative ways to change my body first. There’s no rush at all. I know now that my perception of my own gender varies over time, and that I can take years to get comfortable with aspects of my identity or presentation. I can take my time; I can go on T in a few years when I’m certain, or I can decide I don’t want that. I don’t have to make a big decision now.

Seeing transition this way is incredibly freeing.

I’m very lucky to experience minimal gender dysphoria, but because of that, I conflated “being okay with people perceiving me as a woman” with “actually being a woman”. I mostly use she/her and my feminine birth name, not because they describe my gender (they very much don’t), but because they’re comfortable. It’s like I’m goth but I don’t find goth clothes comfortable, and displaying my identity as goth isn’t worth the discomfort of wearing itchy clothes. So I prefer to wear this old sweater that’s super comfy even if it doesn’t reflect my tastes, and stick a couple of skull pins on it so other goths know I’m actually one of them. Just because the sweater isn’t goth doesn’t mean I’m not goth inside. Just because I go by she/her and a feminine name doesn’t mean I’m not non-binary inside. Explaining my actual gender to the people around me isn’t worth the hassle, misunderstanding and possible debates about my identity; the people who understand know, and the others don’t, whatever.

(TL;DR) So, yeah. This is a lot of text to really just say, if finding a word for your gender hurts, don’t try to find a word. Focus on the experiences, do what makes you happy, gender-wise. Labels can be helpful, but if they’re not, you are not obligated to use one. Gender is incredibly complex and cannot be easily summarized by words. At the end of the day, what’s important is your feelings, and trying to make them good feelings.

#i hope this can help someone feel less lost than i used to feel #this is deeply personal but thankfully i'm now at a point in my life where exploring my gender doesn't hurt anymore #so i can be open about it #i never really came out as genderqueer because all my friends were involved in my journey there #so they knew all along there was a Gender Situation going on so an Official Coming Out was pointless #also the whole 'my gender is a fucking yoyo' thing discouraged me from making an Official Coming Out that i might scrap after a few months #i'm queer. my gender is queer. that's all i'm able to say about it and that's all people need to know #personal #long post #gender #gender stuff #genderqueer #non-binary #nonbinary #genderfluid #lgbt #lgbt+ #lgbtq