What it feels like to be trans, genderqueer or genderless

[Calligraphette_Coe]

It's just another one of those long lonely nights when depression and dysphoria are ganging up on me. My career is over, I just wrote kilobucks worth of checks to cover my disappoining healthcare costs and the meds seem not to be working, as if I'm walking in a graveyard after midnight witn no fear by emptiness.

 

Maybe I'll put on a few episodes of that old romantic TV show 'Beauty and Beast" and let Vincent rescue me from the despair until morning arrives and I can safely take more meds.

[the.gay.moon]

So, I currently identify as bigender, feeling both female and agender (I don't feel male much, but I'm still trying out new things. Some days I feel okay trying to refer to myself as he/him, sometimes I'm not, but I'm used to and comfortable with she/her, maybe because I'm female at birth)

 

Sometimes I'm proud to be female. Like, if you'd told me I 'do something like a girl' I'd tell them 'I am a girl', and I feel like my first instinct on being misgendered would be saying "I'm a girl-" 

 

But then one of the earlier posts in this topic, made me think, what does make me a girl?

 

I could not answer that question. I seriously can't. Like, is it what I wear? No, because I can wear whatever I want. Is it my personality? No. I'm just me. Is it my preferences? No, because my preferences don't depend on me being female. I don't know what it is that makes me a girl, apart from my body. And I feel a tiny bit of chest dysphoria, too (but I'd never get surgery, because I'm terrified of surgeries. I'd much rather just use a binder)

 

My profile picture was me trying to see myself in a more androgynous way, which is basically shorter hair (not saying that short hair makes someone look androgynous.) I fell in love with that. Obviously, or else I wouldn't have used it as a pfp. 

 

I mostly identify as agender, for the following reason. If you ever asked me what makes me a girl, I'd have no idea how to answer. I'm just me. 

[Suki-san]

It's hell if you have dysphoria, and it's heaven with euphoria.

[sNIgDhA]

I don't know what am I.. I know I'm not a boy and for last 18 years I've been told that I'm a girl. To be honest, I feel like its not me, who reject these genders, its these genders who reject me. I don't know if I'm making any sense.. I always felt like I don't belong to any gender, but currently, I really don't care about genders... or what people see me as. And that feels great! 

[sNIgDhA]

On 9/21/2020 at 6:23 PM, the.gay.moon said:

So, I currently identify as bigender, feeling both female and agender (I don't feel male much, but I'm still trying out new things. Some days I feel okay trying to refer to myself as he/him, sometimes I'm not, but I'm used to and comfortable with she/her, maybe because I'm female at birth)

 

Sometimes I'm proud to be female. Like, if you'd told me I 'do something like a girl' I'd tell them 'I am a girl', and I feel like my first instinct on being misgendered would be saying "I'm a girl-" 

 

But then one of the earlier posts in this topic, made me think, what does make me a girl?

 

I could not answer that question. I seriously can't. Like, is it what I wear? No, because I can wear whatever I want. Is it my personality? No. I'm just me. Is it my preferences? No, because my preferences don't depend on me being female. I don't know what it is that makes me a girl, apart from my body. And I feel a tiny bit of chest dysphoria, too (but I'd never get surgery, because I'm terrified of surgeries. I'd much rather just use a binder)

 

My profile picture was me trying to see myself in a more androgynous way, which is basically shorter hair (not saying that short hair makes someone look androgynous.) I fell in love with that. Obviously, or else I wouldn't have used it as a pfp. 

 

I mostly identify as agender, for the following reason. If you ever asked me what makes me a girl, I'd have no idea how to answer. I'm just me. 

Well, this is relatable!

[Coffee_Lover]

During my childhood there was never an explicit push to gender stereotypes. For me, gender was just something society wanted me to follow, a way to catagorize me. I wouldn't say i have a gender or don't, because i simply see it as something that doesn't matter to me. it may matter to other people, but to me it was just another way for people to discriminate against me. So Gender doesn't "feel" like anything but a word.

[Sarah-Sylvia]

I believed I was a boy because that's what I was told. And all the commercials had different things between boys and girls. I already was programmed  with 'supposed' not to like girly things really young, even though I did. I was able to put it aside for quite a while, but in my teens I started wanting to be a girl. I still thought of myself as a guy who wants to a girl, and I guess on some days I still feel like that, which sucks because in my heart I'm a girl.

I'm not 'just' a girl, I'm a genderless being too, just a consicousness in a human body. But I don't get euphoria from feeling non-binary, only female, and I get a lot of dysphoria from male, it just doesn't feel like me. I think anybody can be anything, but it doesn't mean it'll feel good or right for them. Just gotta be true to how we are and do our best. It's not easy though on some days. I really want for things to be better in general, and to be more able to be myself and how I want.

 

[Anarchist Kaos]

I honestly don't know what I am, I know I'm not whatever my body is, because it feels like it isn't mine at all, it feels like at any moment it will stop following my commands and I'll just be left as nothing more than thoughts, not male or female or anything just thoughts, it's confusing, I don't even know what people mean when they say gender euphoria, I don't even know if I'm trans to be honest, maybe I'm just suffering from a mental illness and think I'm trans, because what the trans community describes as dysphoria is the closest thing I've heard to what I'm feeling.

[p0lymorphic]

I am very much agender; it feels incredibly wrong having female parts and female functionality on my body and in my brain, but when I ponder if I could be FTM I get equally weird feeling about the idea of having male parts and "male" or Testosterone-based functions like growing body and facial hair, muscle development, heightened aggressiveness.

 

I would just like to have no reproductive system whatsoever - and none of the associated components and functions like storing fat for "babymaking", parts for baby feeding, periods, fertility or virility markers of any kind. I feel dysphoric about having any kind of functionality for reproduction.

 

I guess I envision myself inside as a genderless humanoid or cyborg. If I could trade in my body for a silicone/metal alternative without all the hormones and sex parts I would be incredibly glad to.

 

 

[Anarchist Kaos]

On 11/5/2020 at 1:17 AM, p0lymorphic said:

I am very much agender; it feels incredibly wrong having female parts and female functionality on my body and in my brain, but when I ponder if I could be FTM I get equally weird feeling about the idea of having male parts and "male" or Testosterone-based functions like growing body and facial hair, muscle development, heightened aggressiveness.

 

I would just like to have no reproductive system whatsoever - and none of the associated components and functions like storing fat for "babymaking", parts for baby feeding, periods, fertility or virility markers of any kind. I feel dysphoric about having any kind of functionality for reproduction.

 

I guess I envision myself inside as a genderless humanoid or cyborg. If I could trade in my body for a silicone/metal alternative without all the hormones and sex parts I would be incredibly glad to.

 

 

I relate to this a lot.

It's weird that the only thing that makes sense is being a machine, but I do feel more comfortable thinking of mysef as one, one with the capacity to leave my body behind.

[Karst]

On 11/5/2020 at 4:17 AM, p0lymorphic said:

 

I guess I envision myself inside as a genderless humanoid or cyborg. If I could trade in my body for a silicone/metal alternative without all the hormones and sex parts I would be incredibly glad to.

 

I'm not terribly in love with my body either- I think I'd be just as happy if I were a D&D-style ooze monster.

[Oberon Jasper]

I'm non-binary and I feel kinda more like I like to present opposite. I have little to no desire to change my genitilia and find most of my dysphoria is social and mental dysphoria. I just feel like I am neither female or male and to box me in one is suffocating. I just want to exist.

[senACEay_11]

My gender is kinda strange. I'd say the best way to describe it is like a graphed exponential equation. I usually tend to stay on the sloped side of "femininity," so for a while I thought I was girlflux. However, I didn't feel that I necessarily fell super neatly into that. I felt like I could possibly dip into masculine territory, but not as much as on the feminine side of things. So, I use both girlflux and agenderflux to desribe my gender.

https://www.google.com/url?sa=i&url=https%3A%2F%2Ffreesvg.org%2Fexponential-function-showing-time-constant&psig=AOvVaw0fABIBr8vrKcRBP_fiqsCK&ust=1605897740209000&source=images&cd=vfe&ved=0CAIQjRxqFwoTCPDC_t-fj-0CFQAAAAAdAAAAABAD

 

 

[little rae of sunshine]

Gender as always been confusing as a child I didnt understand what made boys and girls different and why we didnt play together after a certain point( that's when I started to hate recess bc girls want to swing and I dint get to run with the boys) honestly now I just pretend gender doesn't exist it's the easiest thing for me. I dont know if I have some form of dysphoria or just hate myself normally (at least I think it's quite normal to hate yourself but I've never been good at telling what normal or not) I tried doing some research but I stopped bc I'm too afraid to claim anything incase I'm wrong and end up hurting others

[Karst]

7 hours ago, little rae of sunshine said:

 I tried doing some research but I stopped bc I'm too afraid to claim anything incase I'm wrong and end up hurting others

You're not going to hurt anyone by exploring pronouns, labels, etc.

[Stacky]

my feeling towards this is like how I feel being ace, I feel equally towards all genders when I put it on myself.

not sure what the feeling is but I don't feel like a definite he/she/they. 

[TrustTheCloak]

Gender is weird. In my experience, it's messy and confusing and complicated.

I know I'm not a girl. I have dysphoria about my chest, and my voice, and wearing a lot of femenine things, mainly skirts and dresses.

I don't get dysphoria about more masculine/androgynous clothes. But I know I'm not a guy

Because man... genitals are wack. Could I have none of them please? Thank youuuu

So where does this leave me? Loving the terms genderqueer and non-binary. Becasue i'm not in between male and female... my gender is just...

Something. I have no idea. It has no label, which is why umbrella terms are *chef's kiss*.

But my gender.. it's not fully there. There is a bit of a disconnect. It's, in lack of a better word...

Semi-tranparent. Cue the possible demigender label

So yay! I have one half of an unnameable gender! Fun /s

Sorry for the word vomit dear reader 

[Aelin Galathynius]

On 9/22/2020 at 12:53 AM, the.gay.moon said:

But then one of the earlier posts in this topic, made me think, what does make me a girl?

 

I could not answer that question. I seriously can't. Like, is it what I wear? No, because I can wear whatever I want. Is it my personality? No. I'm just me. Is it my preferences? No, because my preferences don't depend on me being female. I don't know what it is that makes me a girl, apart from my body. And I feel a tiny bit of chest dysphoria, too (but I'd never get surgery, because I'm terrified of surgeries. I'd much rather just use a binder)

This is so relatable. I've tried talking with other people about their experiences with gender, but they all just said "oh it's whatever is in your pants", so not helpful at all. Sometimes I feel a bit like a female (probably demigirl-ish) but then other times I just want to me me with no gender attached, and present like a genderless amoeba. Sometimes I have chest dysphoria, and very much like the idea of just not having genitals at all. 

Thinking about the term greygender.

Can I just exist please? Thank you

[DemiDummy]

On 12/11/2020 at 1:29 PM, TrustTheCloak said:

I know I'm not a girl....

But I know I'm not a guy

Because man... genitals are wack. Could I have none of them please? Thank youuuu

I can soooo relate. I want no genitals at all. Can't we just be formless clouds of consciousness? Sometimes I have dysphoria about my chest, but I also go through phases where I can aesthetically appreciate them. I have a rather feminine body, and while I don't feel at home in my body, I think I'm not bad to look at. 

[quadfasciata]

On 11/5/2020 at 4:17 AM, p0lymorphic said:

I guess I envision myself inside as a genderless humanoid or cyborg. If I could trade in my body for a silicone/metal alternative without all the hormones and sex parts I would be incredibly glad to.

I don't know what my gender identity is at this point, but I really relate to this. Perhaps human conscienceness in an androgynous robotic cat?

[Obsessed_With_Dragons]

My experience with gender is very messy, as gender itself can be very complicated and confusing for anyone. I hate it when people misgender me, but I am super euphoric when people go out of their way to let me know they think I'm valid (even when it gets a little overdramatic and silly). I absolutely hate stereotypes pertaining to gender! It feels like I can't get respected as my gender if I am overly feminine or not androgynous enough. However, this has been changing as I am becoming more comfortable with my gender, as well as becoming better at not caring what others think about me.

However, I don't really feel trapped in the wrong body. Although I'm rather scared of getting more feminine body parts as I grow older, my body doesn't feel wrong as of right now. I don't feel trapped in it because it just feels like my body first and a female body second. I still absolutely hate the idea of anybody (including doctors and family members I trust) seeing my genitals, although I think a lot of this comes from my sex/nudity repulsion.

[AavaMeri]

I hope you don't mind a cis person coming to see this thread, because I find this super interesting. I feel like understanding slightly better things -- most importantly that the experience is really variable and that everyone is their own expert. Further more of a reason why people need to be listened to and not just assumed.

 

And it also makes me think why on Earth I'm a cis-woman, like the OP described, "how would you describe knowing that your gender identity does match your body?" Well, since I align with society's expectations, I rarely really think about if I'm a woman or not. I know that is a privilege in our current society, having no one to question my gender (even if the gender expression is sometimes questioned). So I kinda had to think hard for this because I need to kick open things I tend to take granted (privilege thing again). WHY do I think I am a cis-woman?

Short version: Got lucky, got the correct label from the start, never felt like I wanted to change it (even if I was exposed to the ideas of male gender and non-binary genders).

Longer version:

I rarely thought about "why am I a girl/woman" during my life, so I highlight moments when I did.

I have two brothers, and sometimes it did occur to me to think "what is it like to be a boy" (I didn't know about the non-cis-binary genders when I was a child). It was further amplified by that most childhood friends of mine were boys, due to various things like a close family having three sons and no daughters (and me, a shy kid, rarely bringing female friends for a visit).  At one point in pre-school age, I tucked my hair into my cap and pretended to be a boy for a moment, partially to emulate the trio of Donald Duck's nephews (c-c-c-combo!), but it didn't last long. I had a period when I felt like I understood boys' social clues better than girls', due to having more experience in socializing with boys.

Despite that I felt more at ease with boys, I never felt like BEING one of them. Sure, I wasn't treated as a boy, and I was given throwaway roles like Princess or Medic in pretend games, but yet, I didn't really feel like things should have been different. I don't have any major disagreements with my body (minus that periods suck and this and this on my face could be different). I had no troubles with being called a girl, even if it landed me onto different roles in games (as kid, I did have those "this goes to this gender" ideas). However my interests were still very different from my classmate girls: at one point when we were asked to make a story about either horse-riding or soccer, I was the only girl who picked a soccer story. I was kinda the class weirdo when it came to the gender expression, but no, I never felt off when I was called a girl.

When I got older, I read about genders and lack of genders outside the cis-binary. Reading about this further proved that I'm a cis-female: I couldn't relate to the stories other than the "I want to be me and not something than people want me to be" level. However further reading about non-straight sexualities made me go more "wait a minute", and the rest is history. 

While I am a cis-woman, my gender expression isn't full-blown feminine, and I don't like it to be full-blown feminine. I prefer suits over dresses for example, and my ideal self is more of a princely character than a wise queen. I have a group of female friends, among whom I feel good but still a bit odd one, and also among male friends I'm cool but again the odd one. I don't mind being the odd one. However, being the odd one and liking steer style to the masculine direction doesn't mean I'm anything but cis-woman. I do have wondered things like if I'm androgynous or non-binary, but it doesn't feel correct. I AM a woman, I just like the masculine fashion. I would feel really weird if I was said to be any other gender/lack of than a woman.

(If not else, there is a perpetual gender confirmation for me when I play online: I get annoyed inside when people STILL use "he/him" as pronoun when referring to a player they don't know, and it goes especially personal when I'm referred as a "he/him". "EXCUSE ME don't pretend all players here are guys, sheesh!" There's "they/them", people!)

Edited January 24, 2021 by AavaMeri

[Enne Kristin]

Well, to me this sounds reasonable... I am agenderflux leaning a bit to femininity, but i am mostly on the inbetweenish part of spectrums, neutral, agender, multigender.. it simply changes over time - which can be disturbing and I don't like it. but it is what I am. I am married to a woman who identifies as "masculine woman", she is cis but has many  masculine attributes, but clearly says she is a woman. just like that there can be (high) femme women, tomboys (which I associate with younger people... but my spouse was like that in her twens), nonconforming women etc. --. this is completely ok and there are many more. ok, some might argue some labels like femme, stud, butch are "lesbian-only", but I think if you are more into suits use the label "soft butch". when I was younger ace and nonbinary afab people were just part of the lesbian community and they didn't mind if someone used those labels. but think of it, maybe someone might not like an ace using them today... example: my wife wears jeans, sneakers, hoodies, flannels, outdoor jackets and a beany or snapback cap and a bob haircut. We have been read as a lesbian couple of two butches... well. whatever you call yourself, it is your label. you are valid  

[AavaMeri]

Thanks! You, too, are valid.

I pondered the femme-butch spectrum at some point too, but figured that I don't want to use it. Despite having a variety of masculine interests and style choices, there are also areas in my life in which I don't feel that masculine; for example, while I dress in somewhat masculine manner, may way to converse isn't that masculine (for example I have trouble with being assertive, and I rather go lengths to avoid hurting people's feelings). I think I rather let that sub-label alone at least for now, even if the mild butch side does sound more appealing to me than the mild femme side.

...I think I just got a liiiiiittle bit of more understanding of what some non-binary people go through? A fascinating result.

EDIT: Maybe the femme-butch spectrum could be useful for me to describe my fashion sense, but not quite other things, at least not now.

Edited January 24, 2021 by AavaMeri

[Enne Kristin]

there are demigenders by the way, like Demigirl, and others like Xirl, Gxrl Xoman/Wxman for example with very subtle differences in meaning. Demi doesn't mean half by the way, this gender means the person feels a certain connection to a gender. this can be a VERY strong one (Magiwoman) or a very minor one . It just means partial identification with that gender...

[AavaMeri]

Hmmm, demigender does sound sorta right, but for now I do like just "woman", at least for the time being. Thanks for informing!

[Enne Kristin]

by the way, did you ever take a gendertest  don't take it too serious and don't let it direct you, but it helps sorting ones thoughts...  https://www.quotev.com/quiz/11233383/What-is-your-Gender-Identity-version-255 

 

It is just a test...

[AavaMeri]

Quickly skimmed it, still says cis-female. I guess here I stand and here I stay (for the time being). Mascgirl was second.

Edited January 24, 2021 by AavaMeri

[Stacky]

I've always thought of my gender as a blob of whatever color I felt like. 
But I looked more into it and now its a blob of white but only the outline is visible?
I'm not sure what this means. But I don't associate with any particular pronoun like a bunch of you. To me they are just an easier way of referring to someone without using their name. 

I don't really care if I present more feminine or masculine, just no dresses or skirts because they are uncomfortable. This is only in the way I dress tho.

I do not want any part of the things you call genitals. I really don't like my chest, I just want it gone. 
I don't really feel like telling people my gender if i figure it out, it just doesn't seem like that big of a deal to me. I don't want to declare my gender to people. 

[Aelin Galathynius]

On 1/25/2021 at 8:20 AM, AavaMeri said:

I hope you don't mind a cis person coming to see this thread, because I find this super interesting

OMG thank you so much for explaining a cis person's view of gender!! I've never had the oppertunity to talk to cis people in depth about gender, so this helps A LOT