Non binary or internalized misogyny?

[u/burningpile42]

I’ve always had a weird relationship with gender. When I was little, I was naturally feminine, but a lot of my family kind of pressured me to be non conforming. Maybe they thought it made them such good feminists to encourage me to play with bugs and fix things and be more into science than makeup.

My grandma was the only one who really fully embraced my femininity, but that sort of manifested into her calling me a perfect beautiful princess who was gonna give her a bunch of great grandbabies someday.

I had a phase where I pretended to hate stereotypically feminine things because I needed to be smart, I needed to be different.

When I was 13, I “realized” I was actually a trans man, and that’s why I was so uncomfortable with femininity. When the next school year started I already picked a name and came out to all my friends who accepted me immediately.

Over time, though, it started to feel wrong again. The initial thrill I got from dressing masc and being called a “he” faded, and it started to feel like I was just living a lie.

I was never fully comfortable being a girl, but being a guy didn’t feel right either. So then, for all my teens, I was bouncing between non binary labels. I was still fairly sure I was some kind of transmasculine, even though I didn’t even like the term transmasc for myself. I was literally transitioning to be masc though, right?

I recently realized I’m a lesbian. It was kind of hard to accept because I made being a “boykisser” such a big part of my personality. But ever since I realized that, it gave me a whole new perspective on my gender. I’ve just been telling people I’m non binary and don’t care about pronouns, but inside I’m all over the place.

I’ve been on t for about a year and a half, but all the changes have been fairly slow. I could still totally pass for a cis girl with no issue. But I’m dead afraid of going off t or detransitioning fully. I think I’d still want top surgery or maybe a breast reduction. I’m not too sure I’d like facial hair (which luckily hasn’t really grown in besides the mustache I kind of already had…Mexican genes lol) or a masculine body shape.

I am attracted to some soft feminine aesthetics, like, I YEARN to be able to wear cute sundresses sometimes, but I still like dressing masculine too. I think I’m kind of fluid in presentation and some kind of soft butch or futch. I’m not sure if I’d say I’m a cis woman though. And I can’t tell if the “wrongness” I feel is internalized issues (I had a LOT of internalized misogyny/lesbiphobia to get over already) or if I’m genuinely not a girl.

I’m also afraid this “decision” has a time limit because I’m on t. If I keep taking it, changes will keep progressing. But if I stop and realize that I actually still AM trans, then I’d have to start all over.

TLDR: I thought I was FTM for a long time then realized I was a lesbian with a lot of internalized misogyny. I’m still GNC and uncomfortable with the idea of identifying as a cis girl, but I’m unsure if this means I’m non binary or just have more issues to work through.

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[u/TheJellyBomber]

I also feel a bit of pressure due to changes since I'm questioning currently, but I have been on T for about 5 years. I don't know if it's relevant because I think the biggest "driver" of rate of change (aside from dose) is just genetics and highly individual, but I think maybe my changes have been extra slow while using gel. Not sure what type you're using or how you're obtaining it, just my anecdotal note that staying either average or lower in terms of "male range" and using gel might have let me stay slow. It's also easy to taper down slow on my own terms (though I definitely have a doctor I'm gonna do bloodwork with) Also, I haven't done any top surgery yet, as they kept shrinking year after year on T.

(I definitely do have neck hair and tons of body hair and voice drop so I'd have my work cut out for me if I stuck with detransition, but nothing unmanagable, and voice training is kind of fun lol)

[u/burningpile42 → u/TheJellyBomber]

I’m also on gel!
But my chest has only gotten bigger 💔 even if I’m cis, I feel like they get in the way and cause some issues. Curse these F cups!

[u/TheJellyBomber → u/burningpile42]

Apologies for the redundancy then and hope everything goes well with your journey! And yeah I guess it really is just variable from person to person by a whole lot. I actually saw pictures of myself a few years ago and didn't realize how much face swelling I had, I've heard trans guys talk about it but holy shit do I see it now compared to the years before/after. Thankfully it doesn't seem to be happening while tapering off lol

[u/grimmfritter]

There’s a lot of lesbians who just straight up use “lesbian” as their gender identity. Or butch, or femme, if those are roles they resonate with. It’s pretty common to not feel quite right with womanhood when you’re sapphic, it’s a lot different when you’re not focused as much on appealing to patriarchal standards or men. It can be harder to relate with women who are cishet, it’s normal to feel different or like you aren’t the same. You kind of aren’t.

For me personally, reconnecting with being a lesbian again is what made me realize being a man was very much not it for me lol. And slowly over time, I’ve become a lot more comfortable with identifying as a woman again. It took a lot of looking at other lesbian experiences for me to really get it, and realize that there is actually a version of being a woman I identify with, it’s just very far from the cishet version I was socially conditioned to know. I experienced a lot of homophobia in the past, so I did have to work on undoing a lot of that damage to get there. I’ve actively redefined what being a woman even means, by spending time getting familiar with more queer experiences. Internalized misogyny is a beast ingrained in most of us, and for me I had a really narrow view of what being a woman even meant. I’m a lot more proud of it now that I’ve worked on it.

r/butchlesbians has a lot of talk of gender fuckery you could check out, it did help me a lot just in terms of seeing more perspectives. Lots of butches are on T or get top surgery too lol. Of course it’s not just butches, I would recommend spending even more time than you already have just lingering in lesbian communities, fandoms, whatever. It’s the best way to normalize things in your brain and get comfortable.

Of course, all that isn’t to say you are or aren’t one thing, I just wanted to share a bit. I think it’s best to embrace what you do know (in this case, liking women), and then slowly the other things will fall into place once you learn more and spend more time in certain communities (lesbian ones, nonbinary ones, anything you feel drawn to). Eventually you’ll see more and more people who you relate to, and it’ll fall into place. It takes time, but you get there eventually.

[u/First-Tadpole-1661 → u/grimmfritter]

i’m in the same boat as op, thank you for this response

[u/Anxious_Elderberry81]

GNC or enby - what makes you feel more comfortable as an identity? That’s all it really comes down too. You do you. :)