I'm still working out the details of my gender identity, now about four months after figuring out that I'm trans. I'm afab, but I've never quite completely identified as female, I always felt there was a piece missing that was integral to my being completely the girl I always wanted to be. When I finally figured that missing piece was a male identity within me that displaced part of my girl identity, most of the difficulty with my female side eased - it was dysphoria from my male side, not being acknowledged and mostly suppressed. Once I figured this out I finally felt much closer to the female as I wanted to be when in total girl mode. I wish I could truely feel I'm a complete cis female, but as long as my guy is there, she's never going to be totally in control. But she's happier now. I'm still trying to figure out my guy side. I don't feel like I could ever be male forever, or even b try to pass as male for a while. However, he's very definitely a part of me that won't be denied, and he's demanding genitals of his own via occasional but intense dysphoria over missing parts. I've been identifying as bi-gender female/male, but I'm starting to think it's more bi-gender female/demiguy. My connection to my male side simply isn't as deep, and I'm not sure I would be happy living as a guy. I just feel like I need to have the option available as needed, especially when he's restless. I read over the definition of demiguy/demigirl at several sites, and they all say part of the definition of demi includes a lack of dysphoria. Then I hear from others in the non-binary world that the articles are just straight up wrong. So, what do you think the definition of demi___ is, and is dysphoria part of it? I'm not going to ask if you think I'm female/demiguy, because I know I'll be told that's for me to figure out. I'm also going to bring this up with my gender therapist.
As I see it, it's really about subjective feeling. You choose a gender identity, give it meaning and that is your identity. Dysphoria has very little to do with any of the terms that are a part of the gender identity spectrum. Identity relates to a number of schematic rules through which we define ourselves to others, it is fluid and can change throughout our lives. On the other hand, as far as I can understand, gender dysphoria is not socially constructed, it is a rejection of our body by our mind which seems to be caused by irregularities in prenatal hormones. For example, many people who suffer from gender dysphoria and transition, choose to adopt a gender identity of simply male or female because they stop feeling trans once they do so. So for them the trans identity was a temporary identity that they used to make sense of their world while they transitioned. In this case, their identity of female serves the same role as your bigender identity, both help us define ourself using socially constructed schemata. I hope this makes sense to you. (*hug*)
One thing I wanted to add is that what I described is the socially constructed part of our identity. I do believe that we also have an internal sense of identity that is biologically based. The socially constructed identities are supposed to be reflections of the internal identity and the various gender identity terms are supposed to describe that internal innate sense of self. However, as every person has their own subjective experience of gender, the best we can do is use words that best describe how we feel. So that's why terms such as demigirl are mostly about projecting your own innate feeling of gender on the term, giving it meaning. Socially, it is usually a good idea to define your expectations of others concerning your identity and accepting that others need to develop over time the needed schemata of how to respond to you.
