Hey everyone, I post here because I dont know where else to go. I hope it is okay .. So, I'm a girl. Have been from the day I was born. However I've always been a 'tomboy' as people call it. Always been one of the boys. Always been friends with just boys. In my teens I fell in love with a girl and figured I was perhaps a lesbian but I never felt very comfortable with the label. Had a few flings with girls, hang out with my dude friends playing videogames drummer in a metal band, making rude jokes about girls you know pretty standard tomboy behaviour I guess..... This was never a problem to me. My most masculine behaviour did not mean that I wasnt a girl... I mean, one can be a girl and behave like a boy right? Then about two years ago I started dating a guy from my band, which was scary because it went into everything I knew. I had to get out of the closet again sort a speak. And the responses of my environment on me dating a guy were much more negative than they were on me dating a girl. For me it was a transition now I had to be 'the woman', because in my previously gay relationships it was perfectly accepted that I was 'the man' in the relationship. However even with my (pretty feminine) boyfriend I'm for sure still 'the man'. But... WHAT DOES THIS MEAN. What is 'Men' and what is 'Woman'. My biology is that I am a woman. My personality traits scream that I am a man. But why does my biology NEED to match my behaviour? Its what the environment might want you to do but can't we just be the butchest women on the planet and the most feminine boys and still be accepted and okay in our bodies? So for me, I feel like I have no gender identity. I dont FEEL like a woman inside .. I don't FEEL like a men inside (I wouldn't know what that feels like ..) I feel like .. 'me' inside my behaviour is my personality and the things I do and love .. does that have to be labeled 'male' or 'female'? I don't know Im just pretty confused. People might ask whether I like or dislike my body. I have no specific feelings towards it. My body is quite feminine (tall and slim), but I go to the gym and get buffed up a little more. I wear quite oversized manly clothes and yes more often I wear these wrapping tops to hide my breasts. Not because I want to hide them but because they're 'in the way' and seem to forfill no specific purpose in my daily life But because I do these things I do feel that I am 'not normal', other girls dont put theyr breasts away ... or sometimes wish they had a penis ... Im just looking for some insight I guess... thanks a bunch!
" But why does my biology NEED to match my behaviour? " It doesn't. At all. Frankly, if you go only by stereotypes and I wouldn't say for certain I've ever met anyone who did. A lot of male bodied people may adhere to a lot of male stereotypes but I've never met one who got them all. How could you? By the sounds of things, you seem pretty comfortable in terms of knowing who you are, it just seems like the rest of the world is getting to you with it's constant need for labels! Does that sound about right? You don't have to be labelled anything. We HAVE labels for no-gender, and you don't even need one of those if you don't want it. Go with what feels comfortable to you.
Most cis people don't feel like they have a 'gender identity', because their body matches their brain. You're normal. There is nothing to worry about. However, if you were put in a huge, hairy, smelly, oily male body with a wrinkly scrotum and a mole-rat penis, I bet you would instantly start feeling that your 'gender identity' was female.
