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How does it feel to be non-binary?

Discussion in 'Gender Identity and Expression' started by i am just me, Oct 31, 2016.

  1. i am just me

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    So I am in the process of figuring out my gender identity. By now, I am thinking that I'm non-binary as neither the label woman or man seems suit me. I've recently watched a youtube video which described the feeling really well: It's like I am in a souvenir store where they sell these keychains with names on them and I can never find one with my name on it. So I get an ill-matching nickname - man or woman.

    To take this metaphor further, finding out I am non-binary and accepting it is like crafting my own keychain with my name on it. However, I get reminded everyday that this keychain is not for sale in the stores and I still have to go by my ill-matching nickname far to often.

    How would you describe being non-binary?
     
  2. DAFriend

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    Everyone is different. for me it's like all of those key chains have part of my name on them but, none has my full name. I am both genders and, no gender at all simultaneously. I might present as female mannerisms one minute and male the next, then neutral the third minute you are around me.

    Might wear a mini skirt at lunch and, be in jeans and a lumberjack shirt for dinner, you just never know with me. I do what feels right, feels like me in the moment. I don't really think about what gender I am consciously unless asked, all of them or none of them fit - take your pick.

    I have friends who are gender fluid, some to lesser or grater degrees and, are one one day, the other the next. And I have friends, like me that are both all of the time.

    Like today, I have on Armani sweat pants, a Hanes wife beater shirt and, full female makeup, and ladies flip flops for shoes. Just what feels comfortable today. I want to kick back like a classy gentleman after a long day at the office and, be a beautiful woman doing it, so I did. :slight_smile:
     
  3. EverDeer

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    This might sound weird but sometimes I think of it like...everyone else growing up around me into their own skins and me just being an awkward kid constantly trying to fit into these baggy adult clothes that would make me look "right" but still not fitting. I just remember being like 13 and reading all kinds of articles online about how young girls have low self esteem because they're still learning to "fit in" and how eventually one day I looked around me and it's like that had happened for everyone else except me, like everyone had learned how to be themselves fitting into these social standards but I was still scrambling around and apparently I was the only one not being myself, even though I was trying to do just that. Now it's kind of like.... being a scientist in disguise on a foreign planet. Making friends and fitting in, but feeling somehow like there's a glass wall between you and everyone. Or like that book about Corduroy the bear where he's a stuffed bear in a store whose missing a button, and all the other animals are so pretty with bows and matching packaging and everyone wants to buy them...but because he's missing something that was supposed to be put on him by someone else, nobody wants him and he doesn't know why.
     
  4. TheSideKick

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    I would describe non-binary as how my friend puts it, being a spork in a world of spoons and forks. You have similar characteristics of both, but you are still considered a separate thing all together. You might not notice it at first, but it becomes more obvious the older you get.

    Exactly how you'll find out is hard to say since its different for everyone. It might be your thought process seems to change whenever you switch genders, you feel isolated when a group/class of yours is separated by boys on the left & girls on the right, or you don't see what's the big deal in dressing in different types of clothing each day as they're just clothes to you(But remember gender expression does not always equal gender).

    That's how I would consider it anyway of course in the long run, only you can decide what you are. Hopefully this helps sort your thoughts a bit on the subject, do ask if you have any more questions. It's no trouble at all. :icon_bigg
     
  5. Synesthesia

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    For me it's more like not being able to decide between the two, not being able to buy both, so I kind of try to break them in half and combine them and it doesn't work very well because of the issues I have with my body mostly, but also cause you know non-binary identity isn't acknowledged. Even if I was physically completely male, I'd still be non-binary.

    Also relate to this, probably doesn't help that I also look really young.
     
    #5 Synesthesia, Oct 31, 2016
    Last edited: Oct 31, 2016
  6. Hats

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    Generally, it feels like a double dose of imposter syndrome, because my gender identity is neither constant nor straightforward. It feels like I don’t fit in anywhere but at the same time I have a greater sense of freedom because I don’t fit neatly into a single box.

    In terms of what my gender feels like, imagine you have a light which can show blue light and pink light and you have a slider which changes the concentration. So the light can show exclusively blue or exclusively pink, or any shade in between made by combining the two colours. That's the genderfluid bit of me. On top of that there are two more lights, one exclusively blue and one exclusively pink. The lights are either on or off and the brightness can be changed, but the two lights always operate together and they are independent from the genderfluid slider. This is the bigender bit of me.

    If the bigender lights are off, then my gender will be somewhere on a scale between masculine and feminine. It could be exclusively one or the other, or a shade in between. If the bigender lights are on then there are two options: either I feel both at once (if the gender slider isn’t active) or I feel both at once with the genderfluid light overlaid on top. In that case I am both male and female AND on the scale between the two, and this can lead to some pretty nasty combinations.

    For example, let’s say the bigender lights are both on and but the genderfluid slider is set in the middle. That’s not too bad – I’d probably just say I’m somewhere in between male and female. If the bigender lights are off and the slider is set to male, then I’d identify as male. But if the bigender lights are on and the genderfluid slider is set to female then I just feel completely lost. I feel both genders simultaneously but the girl aspect of me fights tooth and nail for recognition while the boy aspect uses the “if I’m a boy then I can’t be a girl” argument to invalidate my femininity.

    So to go back to your keychain analogy, it's like wanting the blue one, then the pink one, then the purple one, then two of the blue ones and one of the pink ones, then the blue one and the pink one plus the purple one...they're all "correct" and have their merits but I can't really settle on one or several of them consistently. The lack of stability is annoying.
     
  7. i am just me

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    That's so great! Has it always been like this? Or did you go through a process of figuring this out? How long did it take you? What did you find most helpful?

    Thank you so much! You certainly are helping me a lot!

    Wow, that sounds extremly confusing. What's your strategy to deal with those identities fighting each other?

    And to all of you: I just want to thank you for your replies. I am still relatively new to the world of LGBT. It's great to learn about all the different identities there are. It makes me feel far less weird and alone.
     
  8. Hats

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    At the moment I just have to ride the waves and allow myself to feel all those messy feelings without trying to suppress any of them. Suppression and denial only leads to worse shifts for me.
     
  9. EverDeer

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    This is an awesome analogy!! I thought of something almost just like it a while ago actually and thought I was the only one lol! I always imagined it like having different layers on a digital drawing program, and changing the opacity on certain layers. So like, for example for me, I think it would be like.... if I had a yellow layer that was constantly turned on (representing agender/neutral) and then a pink layer and a blue layer that could be turned on at different times overtop of the yellow layer, and then faded with an opacity slider (demigirl/demiboy). So sometimes it would be a very faint pink overtop of the yellow, or sometimes it would look entirely pink or blue, or sometimes sort of purplish over the yellow, or sometimes just yellow if they were both off!
     
  10. Thirteenly

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    It's... weird. For me, personally, it's like I have... I just have something inside of me. I feel like that doesn't explain it well because I don't have two genders, I know some others do. I don't. Nonbinary to me just feels... androgynous, like I'm neutral. But I like to present as feminine. And that makes it really difficult. I'm still figuring it out for myself and I have good days and bad days.