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Gender fluid or just a phase?

Discussion in 'Gender Identity and Expression' started by Chemical, Oct 22, 2016.

  1. Chemical

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    I have got a problem. Am I gender fluid?
    Please let me explain. I’ve felt this way for about 5 years and I’ve only recently started to properly ask myself these types of things. At first I thought it was absurd though the more I’ve looked into it the more gender fluid things can find that I think apply to me. I’m only 17 and I have no idea if this is normal for a teenager my age or not.

    I cut my hair very short and when I first did it I found myself loving it (why didn’t I do this sooner?) but after a few days I hated it (what was I thinking?) I loved my long hair and found myself wanting it back. Then after another few days I found myself loving it for the reason I hated it just a few days ago; it made me look less feminine. After that I began to swing back and forth between loving looking less feminine and hating it.

    Someday I hate even looking at makeup wondering why anyone would wear it, other times I wish I was able to just wear some without people questioning it. I never put on makeup so the one time I did people were instantly curious, let’s just say I haven’t worn makeup since, even though sometimes I really want to.

    For practically everything else it’s always worked the same way; I just can’t stop swinging between wanting to be more feminine and hating being female in the first place.

    Sometimes I love being on the girls only team, sometimes I wish I could just move to the boy’s side without people questioning it.

    Sometimes I love wearing dresses with the pinks and the sparkly things, other times I just want to wear something else (anything but a dress. To be honest sometimes I even wish to wear the boys uniform.)

    The most confusing; sometimes I wish people would use male pronouns with me sometimes. (haven’t worked up the courage to ask them to though.)

    I could go on and on but I think you’ve got the point.

    I’m incredibly lucky to have an incredibly supportive group made up of both boys and girls, they practically became my lifeline (they recently helped me out of my depression) should I tell them I’m at least questioning this? Or leave it longer to see if I’m just going through a phase? I have no idea what to do right now… :icon_sad:

    Sorry if this was long with tonnes of grammatical errors, it became quite therapeutic to write.
     
    #1 Chemical, Oct 22, 2016
    Last edited: Oct 22, 2016
  2. EverDeer

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    Just a quick reminder that what you like to wear / do / your expression is different than your identity, but honestly if you've been solidly thinking about this four 5+ years now it sounds much less like a phase than not.

    Just to clarify, you do want to be treated as a boy rather than a girl sometimes? Or you'd like others to see you that way, or for example at times when you'd rather be treated like a boy you don't feel the image of your body matches up with how you "should be" but when you feel like a girl it does? I think these are some of the more important things to think about when it comes to your actual "identity" rather than your expression.

    If I could give some advice on doubt though, it would be that just because you feel comfortable how others see you and how you were born some of the time, and feel like your birth gender some of the time, and not at others, doesn't make you less trans/genderfluid! In fact, I think the very nature of genderfluid is that how it feel is never static. When I was first coming to terms with myself, I went through many periods of feeling like I "wasn't trans enough" or didn't count because my feelings never stayed one way and there were days that I was comfortable being seen as a girl and other days I wasn't- so I figured it had to be a phase and I had to learn how to be comfortable as a girl -all- of the time. This isn't true though! So although I can't truly tell you who you really are, I think its very likely that you have feelings akin to being genderfluid, and you should look into why your feelings about your presentation changes to discover if it is because you just have vastly different interests some of the time or if its because you want to change how people view you because of how you feel internally :slight_smile:
     
  3. Chemical

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    When i do feel like a boy i'm sort of comfortable with my body but at the same time i'm not. Does that make any sense at all?

    I have a constant 'in the middle' feeling. When i feel like a boy i don't feel like a 'full' boy and when i feel more feminine i don't feel like a complete girl. Like i feel like neither but with a constant male or female preference.

    I have no idea if i'm explaining this right. Can you even be neither, but with a switching preference?
     
    #3 Chemical, Oct 22, 2016
    Last edited: Oct 22, 2016
  4. EverDeer

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    Yes absolutely! But do know that there is a difference between feeling masculine and feminine, and feeling like a boy and girl. And also, just because you "feel more like a boy" when you're wanting to present in a masculine way or feeling more masculine doesn't always necessarily mean you want to identify as a boy for that time being, but if you do, that could mean you are some type of genderfluid or bigender.

    As far as identities go though, Androgyne is an identity that is simultaneously masculine & feminine and male & female or in the middle of male and female. Bigender is when you switch back and forth between 2 genders.

    For me personally, I use demigender which means having a partial association to a gender. Demiboy would be feeling partially male, but not entirely, and demigirl would be feeling partially female but not entirely either. I also say I am genderflux, which means how much I feel like a certain gender changes...so I also feel agender at times too.
     
  5. TheGreyBetween

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  6. Creativemind

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    Most of this is based on gender roles. I'm a cis woman that is mostly masculine, I hate dresses, makeup, and all of that girly shit, but I'm still a woman.

    The question is why do you feel male or female without these roles involved? And that should tell you you're answer.