After shifting my understanding of gender to viewing it as a spectrum and not as a binary matter, I've grown more comfortable with my identity. But I'm having a tough time figuring out where I fit. I'm a dude, I guess. Like, I have a beard, my voice is on the deeper side, and I've always identified as one. But I've never liked having to fit a stereotypical male role. Living in a binary society, I've always been made fun of or ridiculed for being, "girly."
And that leads to the first part of my questions. How do I describe the masculine and feminine parts of my personality without being misogynistic? We want to break down gender stereotypes, but how do we talk about masculinity or femininity without being guilty of what we're trying to end?
I'm going to attempt to describe how I feel about my gender identity at the risk of reinforcing these ideas, but I'm coming from a place where I want to understand. So please correct me where appropriate.
I've had at least two dozen people in my life ask if I was or accuse me of being gay. I've had both men and women call me a little b**ch. My family has made fun of me because I don't like getting dirty or doing hard manual labor. This has caused a lot of pain for me over the years.
There's really nothing that masculine about me. I'm a petite and pretty delicate person. I don't have much arm or leg hair, and my hands are the size of a 13-year-old girl's. I have a strong sense of empathy and I'm very aware of my emotions.
I would much rather feel small and cute versus manly or handsome. When cuddling with someone, I like being the little spoon and feeling comforted and safe. I like more feminine body washes and deodorants. I'd like to take a stab at wearing mascara to accentuate my eyelashes, and foundation to have a more even-looking skintone.
Thinking about embracing my femininity makes me feel super cozy inside. I would LOVE to not have to live life as a "guy", where I'm expected to "man up", be tough, and crush down my emotions and sensitivity. After thinking about these things for the past few weeks, I've realized that I was at my most toxic behavior when I was trying to be what I thought a man was. Putting myself first at the expense of others, constantly having to find sexual conquests, trying to be the "man" in a hetero relationship. It just isn't me, and it's not a good way to live.
So, I don't know if I'm non-binary, or if I'm just a feminine man. I really don't think I fit into the male gender box, but I'm positive that I'm not a female. Am I NB, or am I just looking for a way to justify being a soft and gentle man? I could use some advice and I'd love to hear from other AMABs who've realized they were NB.
You've clearly put a lot of thought into this, which makes me think you might be, but you're the only one who can decide that. But it doesn't have to be a permanent decision, you can try changing your pronouns or presentation in places where you feel safe before committing to anything, and even if you decide it isn't for you you'll be more certain of who you really are.
That's really good advice, thank you. I don't think it's something I would ever need to "come out" for. But I could make small, gradual changes in my appearance and demeanor, then see how I feel.
Honestly, just the idea of allowing myself to make those changes brings a lot of peace and comfy feelings. I might be onto something here.
There's a lot of safe and easy ways to just experiment with that. As a trans woman, i can't offer that much help on the NB stuff, but i hope i can give a few useful tipps for experimenting with femininity later in this post. although i also see it as a huge part of my transition to understand in which regards i'm not a traditional girly girl and how to integrate that into my new life. everybody's understanding of their gender role is different, there's so many different ways of being a man, being a woman, being NB. i've found discovering that to be a beautiful and rewarding and incredibly liberating process. just go about this in an open-ended, curious way and see where it leads you. if it turns out you are indeed "just" a feminine man, it's still good and reassuring to know that, to own "being a little b*tch" and become comfortable with your personal way of being masc. And if you find out there's more sides to you than just the masc stuff, there's an entire new world opening up to you. and it's actually really easy nowadays to get into that. If you decide you want to (or even need to) live your new identity out in the open, that can obviously be more of a struggle in a lot of places, but these are questions you can and should ask yourself after you've figured out the basics about your gender identity.
You can create online accounts where you try out gender roles that are more femme and see how it feels to be adressed with different pronouns than he/him. Dudes growing their hair out have become popular again during the pandemic, and while that ofc takes a lot of time, i also find it incredibly fun to have long, fluffy hair i can shake and play around with. Shaving off body hair is another thing worth trying out - if you do this for the first time, make sure to trim the hair in advance, shaving off hair that's fully grown out is a massive pain in the ass. If you want to get into women's clothes, cosmetics and the like, this is also easier than ever now, thanks to online shopping and stores with self checkout. ofc makeup is complete rocket science if you've been socialized as a man in our society, and understanding measurements for the stuff from the women's section is ... quite something, too, so don't be surprised if that's a bit daunting and overwhelming at first.
That's something I was unsure of. I'm not very androgynous, so I thought identifying as NB would be strange.
Nope, there are plenty of non-androgynous NB folk! It’s cool and there’s a lot of support for it in the trans community. A common line is “nonbinary people don’t owe you androgyny”. :trans-heart:
That's cool to know! I made a new friend recently who identifies as NB, and they are about as masculine-presenting as you can get. They've told me that they don't see being misgendered as a huge issue because of that, but they don't like it when someone continues using hard masculine pronouns after being corrected.
For some reason, I just struggle with applying this same standard for myself. I think because this is a recent development for me.
I totally get that. Leaning into queerness is incredibly freeing, but for me required working through my own internalized transphobia and fear. I had to learn to love myself and claim it.
Many of us spend years being told we should be ashamed or that we’re “not enough”. That’s bullshit and there is beauty and power in queerness, in just being yourself however you want to call it.
Also it’s wonderful you have a trans person in your life you can talk to IRL. That helps a lot with sorting through things.
I took some sleep medicine because I have to get up kind of early tomorrow. So I might fall asleep before anybody responds, but I'll reply as soon as I can!
gender is how you feel on the inside, not what you look like or how you interact with the world
Note that the way you want to look or the way you want to interact with the world can be an indication to help you understand what your feelings really are.
I'm trans fem but I always kind of questioned my identity in regards to whether something like nb or agender would fit me better. I remember when I first came out, one of the biggest motivators for me was I hated the "male social role" people would try to force on me, which sounds similar to what you wrote. That's was more of a motivator than even a lot of body dysphoria stuff, I just hated all the expectations forced on me as a "man".
I would suggest, as others have, experiment with all the things you want to try, try wearing make-up, find safe spaces where you can lean into more fem social roles, etc. There's no harm or shame in figuring things out, most queer spaces are very open and accepting about this kind of stuff. Find what makes you happy and worry about specific labels later, that's what I did and I think it worked out for me. I still don't know where exactly I fall on a nonbinary spectrum, but I know that I'm much happier with my presentation now and much more confident now than I ever was living as a "man".
You can be whatever you want. You can even be whatever's convenient. There are no gender rules worth following.
I would lean towards being a feminine man, but I'm also not you
There's an old pamphlet (that's name escapes me right now) that provided advice for trans folks navigating the UK's infamously opaque gender services.
It opened with a FAQ, one question stood out to me more than any other: "How do I know I'm trans?" To which the reply was something along the lines of, "If you've got to the point of reading this, you already know the answer."
If you're seriously contemplating whether or not you're non-binary, then I don't know how to put this but you probably ain't cis. All you have to do now is decide what that means to you.
My advice is simple. Don't concern yourself with labels just yet, experiment with how you feel comfortable presenting yourself, what pronouns you want to be referred by, etc.
Good luck, whatever you choose. :cat-trans:
As always my ethos with anything 'gender' is
fuck around and find out- labels are just useful descriptors, not the entirety of your being; if you find it doesn't suit you it's okay to hang it back up and use a different one. It's also cool to keep the labels and descriptors you currently have until they no longer seem relevant or accurateThat being said, using a new label or descriptor can open up space in your brain to think about yourself differently in my experience.
Ultimately you sound like a sweet and thoughtful person and I wish you the best of luck on your fun adventure and further personal experimentation and I'm glad to be surrounded with so many lovely comrades here.
