So, as a lot of you know, I have been questioning my gender identity for the past few months, after I realised I've had dysphoria for the past 5 years of my life. Since the beginning of this month (or year you could say ) I've been keeping a daily diary of my dysphoria, recording how I've my thoughts, how I've been feeling etc. I figured that once I started going to a psychologist I could bring it along to show him, also I figured it would help me in confirming to myself that I AM transgender, but all it's done is make me doubt even more. Through this I've realised one thing, there are times where I'm fine being male, and other times where I hate my masculine body and want it to just be female. This adds up to about 80% of the time I want to be female with the other 20% where I'm "fine" being my biological gender. This has confused me a lot but has raised a lot of questions. One of which is: am I transgender or gender fluid? Anyway now for the big questions! I had more, but Google has helped some-what with those. 1. Ok so this needs a bit of background information. There are times where I absolutely HATE my masculine body, to the point where I'm in tears and just want to be female, but then there are other times where fine with being male, but want to be less masculine and want feminine features. It's just the switch in what I feel that I am, female mentally (want to be called Alice and to be called female pronouns) and then male mentally, but this is where it gets complicated! When I feel fine being male I still WANT to look female and would prefer to be called a gender neutral nickname (for example Alexander to Alex, that is not my given name btw ). It's like I want to be seen as female but want to be male, it's a really weird feeling and I don't know what it makes me. To confirm I only feel like this when I'm ok being male, not when I feel female. What does everyone think? I have no answer, and I guess leads onto the next question. 2. Is it possible to be gender fluid but have a preferred gender opposite to your biological one? and all this after I was so sure that I was transgender -.-* Sorry for the nonstop questions guys, I really have no one to talk to about this (even though my 1 Fabulous Friend is awesome, she really doesn't know a lot about gender identity stuff :lol: )
First point: Transgender is the umbrella term, it includes geneder fluid, the word you want is transSEXUAL! On to the questions: 1. Let's just examine your feelings for a moment in terms of intensity. On a girly day, you are in tears because of your male body - that's some seriously intense emotion. On a non-girly day, having the male body doesn't bother you much - which is about as weak as emotions get, this would be apathy if you hadn't said that on those days you would still PREFER to have more feminine features and a neutral name, these may not be the same intense emotions that you feel on girly days but they still point in the same direction. Imagine this the other way around. If you had been born a girl, would you be sitting here on the non-girly days going 'I really think I should be a man', or would you be more likely to just dress a bit more neutral? <-Note, that is just something to think about, not a definitive answer to your problem! 2. Actually I'm not sure...I suppose yes? In the same way you can be bi with a preference...does make me wonder though, because in this instance it suggests you would be making a preference of gender identity which I don't think you can do, as opposed to gender expression which you CAN choose...if you are just choosing gender expression then would that be something different? Someone else can probably answer better. One last thing I can think of is some advice my therapist gave me when I told him about my gender questions. "You're doing the typical GUY thing and trying to over-think it. Stop trying to turn it into science and consider your feelings for a change" Annoyingly accurate. I tried to do the same thing as you! I had a blog where I recorded any feelings I had when I was experimenting with clothes and things and the more I did it the less things made sense. Because at that point I wasn't actually involved in my feelings, I was trying to observe them from outside instead of paying attention to whether or not they felt right. Don't know if that helps you, but there you go!
That was one answer I was considering, that it is just less intense dysphoria... I would be more likely to be sitting here in gender neutral clothing, I hadn't looked at it from that perspective! Thanks for taking the time to answer my questions Holly! I'll try not to self-analyse myself as much, as hard as that is! Also sorry for using the wrong term, I'm still getting used to them all :/.
As always, ElliaOtaku gives a pretty great answer. I can offer my current experiences for comparison: Right now I consider myself gender fluid because I have those days where I'm 'fine' being male. I've been wondering though... are these fine days just days where I'm more scared of the idea of transition? I was really shocked with the idea of transition when I realized I must be transgender in some way. Thinking that I was maybe transsexual... I quickly dug deeper. To me, transition would be a big and scary thing to go through. But my point is this... When I do feel fine as a male... am I just trying to get myself to accept that I am one? In order to avoid change? I have this looming feeling that this could be the case. I'm not inside your head reading your feelings, so I don't know if this could be a possibility for you. If not, that's probably a good thing. I just thought I'd share. ^_^
As always indeed! I know exactly that feeling! There are those days when I feel alright being male. The idea of transitioning scares me to, and I did take into consideration that this "fine being a guy" feeling is just me trying to convince myself that I am ok being male. This is backed up by the fact that, when I'm feeling that way, I still want to be as feminine as possible. I now know this is not what I want, I want to be female, I don't want to be a feminine guy. Thanks Skyline! Thanks for sharing!
Sounds all too familiar, but it sounds like you're still female. If you want to be female and on the occasional day you feel indifferent to a male body. Still sounds female to me.
Any time! If you find you are self-analysing again, don't worry too much, just make a not and move on! I catch myself doing it all the time Hard habit to break!
I agree with miiaaaaa. And I know that feeling. Sometimes I feel ok in my male body, just like if I feminize just enough I would be ok. Question is, is that inclusive of medical transition? Is it just my misses clothes and shaving? Just like I said. Take it slow. Sometimes, I think my gender marker is as it is to try to convince myself that maybe i won't need meds and/or surgery. But other times, I'm absolutely certain that I NEED it.
