Totes McGoats Confused

[CaptainPopTart]

Hello all!
While I'm writing this, I apologize if it gets confusing. I tend to talk myself in a circle.

So....I'm still trying to figure out if I am asexual. I had a post recently that mentioned how I've been feeling. But my sexuality is quite different. I'm a chick.

Now, I'm not the most feminine chick in the world. I mean....My closet is 98% men's t-shirts. Blue Jeans(These are women's jeans). And hoodies(men's) . It's what I'm allowed to wear to work and that makes life easier. What I'm getting at....I prefer male clothing. Even my pajamas are men's. I hate most feminine things. I'd rather see an action flick than romantic movie any day. Yeah, I know that has nothing to do with how I feel inside. It's just preferences.

I don't believe I'm attracted to women. I know I'm attracted to men in a way of "he looks nice." Nothing more than that. I strive for more of a platonic relationship it seems...or a friendship kind of thing.

I have thought of what I'd look like with facial hair. I've gone to many nerdy conventions and cosplayed as a male character. It allowed me to bind my chest and wear much more masculine clothing. I've even cosplayed as Tony Stark and had facial hair glued to my face.

I carry a "purse" which is a small messenger bag. I have a dominate atmosphere around me it seems...compared to my friends. (When we all go out to eat, the waitress always seems to make eye contact with me).

I do have short hair in real life. And when I had longer hair, I always had it in a pony tail. I hated wearing it down. Still to this day, I hate dresses, heels, skirts...etc. I rarely wear make up. And if I do, it's like eyeliner.

There are times when I just try to wrap my brain about my "feelings" and "thoughts" and then there are some days that I just don't care. (In a good way). I don't think about it so when I do...it's all just a bunch of BLAH! haha.

ANYWAYS...I hope this makes sense....I'm just trying to figure out who I am.

[jimerman]

um... i am not you so i cant say anything definitively, but the asexual part still seems up in the air. the gender idea on the other hand is much more fascinating at least for me. it is not unusual to be a little masculine but it seams like to me that you may be a little more than that. i would explore some more and see what you find.

[Viridzen]

I would say you're a woman with a masculine gender presentation; maybe your gender is more butch, but still a woman. Just a thought, though. I could be wrong. What you have to analyse is whether you feel like you're presenting as another gender when you dress masculine, or when that perfectly fits your gender identity (which still may reveal nothing, as many women prefer masculine presentations). At the end of the day, you'd need to know which you feel like; would you like to be recognised in society as a man, things like that. This is just for thought, though, and this may even completely miss the mark.

With the attraction, it seems like you experience aesthetic and maybe romantic/platonic attraction to men. You can be asexual and still experience this; it all depends on whether or not you experience sexual attraction.

[Star Bit]

aesthetic attraction: a fixation on someone because of their looks and or mannerisms. It does not automatically include the desire to form any; platonic or romantic, relationship.

aromantic: no romantic attraction

squish: a play on the word crush; it is the strong desire to know or befirend someone. It may also be phrased as platonic attraction.

[Dodecahedron314]

I have thought of what I'd look like with facial hair. I've gone to many nerdy conventions and cosplayed as a male character. It allowed me to bind my chest and wear much more masculine clothing. I've even cosplayed as Tony Stark and had facial hair glued to my face.

Fun fact about me: seeing how Tony Stark was portrayed in The Avengers was kind of what opened my mind to the possibility of alternate gender presentations (not necessarily identities, just presentations), because even though I wasn't questioning my gender yet, I saw his aesthetic throughout the whole movie and I was like "That. Is. So. Cool. I don't generally notice how people are dressed, but he's really well dressed. I want to look like that." Of course, then my brain decided to go "but you're a giiiiirl", because at that point the only gender identities I knew of at that point were male and female, and I knew I didn't feel male necessarily, I just hadn't figured out that I wasn't really female either. I concluded "you know what, I don't care, I do what I want", and so realized that between wanting to be awesomely witty, crazy smart, really confident, snappily dressed, and in possession of lots of money and an awesome lab, my life goal is basically to become Tony Stark, gender be danged.

Anyway, if what you're saying is that you're sort of questioning your gender, really what I would say is think about what you consider your personal concept of gender to be, then use that as a baseline. If you consider what's in your head feminine, then maybe see if that connects to any feminine-ish identities. If you consider it more masculine, maybe look into whether there are more masculine identities that go with it. It's also completely possible for it to be both, neither, something else entirely, not particularly gender-y, or fluid or fluctuating between any of those over time. I'm not going to lie, gender is a seriously weird beastie in my own experience, especially in cultures that are really binary about it, and so maybe none of that makes sense at all to you right now--that, too, is completely fine. It's ultimately all a matter of self-description.

[DigbyDriver]

Have you looked at androgyny? I've been trying to be careful about too many labels since they can get oddly specific, but I'm heading into my late 20's now and I still have no sexual attraction and no clear idea of my mental gender, though it tends to lean towards male most of the time.

Androgyny made the most sense for me since it had the best explanation for how confused I felt growing up. I'm pretty thankful for also being asexual because if I had to choose a gender to be attracted to, I'd lean your direction and say male, but I can only imagine how confusing sexual attraction would make that. I used to think I was a bit nuts because the only way I could describe my sexuality was "attracted to dudes...but only as a dude...and it's weird when they like me back because I know they're thinking of me as a chick...and because sex is gross."

On real confusing days I just do like you do and try not to think about it too hard.

Good luck,

Add

[Emery.]

What can be deduced from your post is that you're masculine in many mannerisms/behaviours, and probably you're not all the way trans ( id as mostly transguy, neutrois), because you don't metion dysphoria. Makes sense?

You could be anything from a tomboy/butch/andro kind of woman to some sort of transmasculine genderqueer. Intermediate options: probably demiwoman/girl, genderless/agender, genderfluid, androgyne, or any combination of all those options etc.

As for sexuality, everyone experiences their sexuality in a different way, so I can't speak for everyone, but if you don't dream sometimes of a romantic relationship, or are not interested, I'd say you are aromantic. Sexuality goes in an analogic way. Not interested in sex = asexual. (Sexuals often wish they could have sex with some particualr person and imagine this)

Not related: Tony Stark <3 I love him. And messenger bags. Sigh. Tony is one of my favourite movie characters. I wish I could pull off such a cosplay.

I saw his aesthetic throughout the whole movie and I was like "That. Is. So. Cool. I don't generally notice how people are dressed, but he's really well dressed. I want to look like that." Of course, then my brain decided to go "but you're a giiiiirl", because at that point the only gender identities I knew of at that point were male and female, and I knew I didn't feel male necessarily, I just hadn't figured out that I wasn't really female either. I concluded "you know what, I don't care, I do what I want", and so realized that between wanting to be awesomely witty, crazy smart, really confident, snappily dressed, and in possession of lots of money and an awesome lab, my life goal is basically to become Tony Stark, gender be danged.

Me the same! He's so awsome! Lab (crazy geek here ;) )<3<3 ! And his style is wow. (Sorry for the not so sophisticated style, I hope you understand) I was disappointed soooo much that actually he's the stereotype of a macho guy, and I'm a girl. And I identified with him sooo much... This was in the very beginning of my gender journey. Sigh.

Anyway, if what you're saying is that you're sort of questioning your gender, really what I would say is think about what you consider your personal concept of gender to be, then use that as a baseline. If you consider what's in your head feminine, then maybe see if that connects to any feminine-ish identities. If you consider it more masculine, maybe look into whether there are more masculine identities that go with it. It's also completely possible for it to be both, neither, something else entirely, not particularly gender-y, or fluid or fluctuating between any of those over time. I'm not going to lie, gender is a seriously weird beastie in my own experience, especially in cultures that are really binary about it, and so maybe none of that makes sense at all to you right now--that, too, is completely fine. It's ultimately all a matter of self-description.

I completely agree here, especially with the bold.

[dash]

Tony Stark -- and here I went to MIT and no one told me we have our own superhero!

Please tell me there is canon or fanfic about his days at MIT.

(By the way, "my gender is geek" is also totally valid for a gender, at least in my crowd.)

[Dodecahedron314]

Tony Stark -- and here I went to MIT and no one told me we have our own superhero!

Please tell me there is canon or fanfic about his days at MIT.

(By the way, "my gender is geek" is also totally valid for a gender, at least in my crowd.)

Not just Tony Stark--if I remember correctly from the time I watched Fantastic Four at 2 in the morning on a trip for a futurism competition, Reed Richards is also an MIT alum. This was during a time (junior year) when I was really, really, really obsessed with getting into MIT, plus I'd just gotten a really bad squish on a fellow nerd who was also of the physics-y persuasion (he complimented my Large Hadron Collider shirt, and told me he envied the telescope I'd gotten at the thrift store and the fact that I had three periodic tables (well, two and an element photography calendar, close enough) on my wall! How can you not immediately develop a squish on that kind of person?!), so it was an interesting coincidence that that movie just happened to be on after Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets, which was the original reason why the hotel room TV got turned on. Anyway, yet another MIT grad of whose lab I am insanely jealous.

[TheStarrySkai]

Hmm. You seem like your asexual. As for your gender.....

Gender is how you think of yourself regardless gender stereotypes [as they are completely unnecessary and should be destroyed immediately]. What do you want people to think of you as: girl? boy? gender neutral?? no gender??? ect.

[CaptainPopTart]

What can be deduced from your post is that you're masculine in many mannerisms/behaviours, and probably you're not all the way trans ( id as mostly transguy, neutrois), because you don't metion dysphoria. Makes sense?

You could be anything from a tomboy/butch/andro kind of woman to some sort of transmasculine genderqueer. Intermediate options: probably demiwoman/girl, genderless/agender, genderfluid, androgyne, or any combination of all those options etc.

As for sexuality, everyone experiences their sexuality in a different way, so I can't speak for everyone, but if you don't dream sometimes of a romantic relationship, or are not interested, I'd say you are aromantic. Sexuality goes in an analogic way. Not interested in sex = asexual. (Sexuals often wish they could have sex with some particualr person and imagine this)

Not related: Tony Stark <3 I love him. And messenger bags. Sigh. Tony is one of my favourite movie characters. I wish I could pull off such a cosplay.

I saw his aesthetic throughout the whole movie and I was like "That. Is. So. Cool. I don't generally notice how people are dressed, but he's really well dressed. I want to look like that." Of course, then my brain decided to go "but you're a giiiiirl", because at that point the only gender identities I knew of at that point were male and female, and I knew I didn't feel male necessarily, I just hadn't figured out that I wasn't really female either. I concluded "you know what, I don't care, I do what I want", and so realized that between wanting to be awesomely witty, crazy smart, really confident, snappily dressed, and in possession of lots of money and an awesome lab, my life goal is basically to become Tony Stark, gender be danged.

Me the same! He's so awsome! Lab (crazy geek here ;) )<3<3 ! And his style is wow. (Sorry for the not so sophisticated style, I hope you understand) I was disappointed soooo much that actually he's the stereotype of a macho guy, and I'm a girl. And I identified with him sooo much... This was in the very beginning of my gender journey. Sigh.

Anyway, if what you're saying is that you're sort of questioning your gender, really what I would say is think about what you consider your personal concept of gender to be, then use that as a baseline. If you consider what's in your head feminine, then maybe see if that connects to any feminine-ish identities. If you consider it more masculine, maybe look into whether there are more masculine identities that go with it. It's also completely possible for it to be both, neither, something else entirely, not particularly gender-y, or fluid or fluctuating between any of those over time. I'm not going to lie, gender is a seriously weird beastie in my own experience, especially in cultures that are really binary about it, and so maybe none of that makes sense at all to you right now--that, too, is completely fine. It's ultimately all a matter of self-description.

I completely agree here, especially with the bold.

Yeah, I think it all makes sense...I'm just in kind of a rut...like...now what? What do I do next? You know? I doubt I'm making any sense at all....It's like....what are the clues I'm supposed to find to help me figure this all out...

[Emery.]

Yeah, I think it all makes sense...I'm just in kind of a rut...like...now what? What do I do next? You know? I doubt I'm making any sense at all....It's like....what are the clues I'm supposed to find to help me figure this all out...

What do you want (in terms of gender)? Do you feel right when someone calls you female, male, genderqueer? Or how would you feel in such a situation? Did you think that you're a girl/woman or a boy/man in you life and by how much, in what circumstances? What are your feelings about this identification? What would you like to be called and thought of as? Do you care about it? Do you have a clear feeling of being some gender at least sometimes? How often and which one? Is it static or does it change completely, or more like showing a different side of a die?

The likelihood is that if you identify as female, you can (only can) be offended if someone continually greets you "good morning, sir", for example. I don't give a sh** what someone thinks about my genitals, and I was very surprised while watching a video by a butch woman/genderqueer (can't remember, this person did not id as male for sure), and she/they said she/they feels bad about someone calling her "sir".

I can't be much help besides undestanding gender identity in terms of my understanding, because it's all I've done so far.