#I get misgenderd I’m work quite a lot

[seagull-scribbles]

I don’t want wholesome non binary characters, give them a bomb

Me and my friend are having a debate

[nickiswithoutidea]

The Gender Tag, an update

1. How do you self-identify your gender, and what does that definition mean to you?

I’m a guy. I’ve known that for sure for a long time now, I just never had the courage to admit it to myself. I liked the label non-binary too, one because I had an excuse to stop thinkingt about how I really feel, and two because it made me feel safe. There were people who could just be non-binary and didn’t „have to decide“ between male or female, and that idea was honestly so comforting.

But yeah, time to stop lying to myself,  I’m trans, I’m a man, and in the near future I want to start living my „real“ life by being perceived and treated as a man by other people too. I’m sick of self-doubting and wasting time hating myself.

I only said it out loud three times by now, but every time I did it was honestly so empowering and liberating and I’m starting to feel pride in being myself. I like how the word feels when I say it, I like thinking of myself as a guy, and I can’t wait to finally completely feel like myself.

2.What pronouns honor you?

Although my parents and sister know they still use she/her pronouns for me and though it doesn’t feel right at all we agreed on not changing pronouns to he/him or  change my name until I start transitioning because my appearance, voice and behaviour crash with their image of a man and I don’t want to stress them out. It still sucks, though.

I’ve been telling some friends to try their best to avoid pronouns at all and instead use my name since I id'ed as non-binary and I’ll just keep it that way for now, which works a lot better for me than she/her.

In group chats for other trans* folks I already use he/him pronouns and it’s like the best feeling ever.

Online I’ve been using they/them for quite a while now, but I think I’ll put he/him in my blog description soon, just because I can and it makes me feel better.

3. Describe the style of clothing that you most often wear.

I’m a jeans and t-shirt/sweatshirt person and usually wear dark colours, sometimes a button-down shirt and I love all kinds of jackets. What I own is mostly out of the men’s section, except for jeans, they just don’t fit me. I try to present either as masculine as I can without looking like a little boy or just kinda androgynous so that people that don’t know me at least don’t put me into the female box as soon as they see me. Skirts or dresses have long been eliminated from my closet.

I’m still very convinced that clothes don’t have a gender and everybody can wear what they want without having the clothes define their identity. And as soon as I start looking more like I’m supposed to I’ll work on my style, I’m actually really into fashion and I want to try out a lot of different aesthetics.

Right now I just don’t feel confident enough with my body, I rarely fit into regular men’s clothes and it’s always a disappointment when I try on something that looked great on the tall, very masculine cis male model and pretty terrible on super short, chubby me.

4.Talk about your choices with body hair. How do you style your hair? Do you have facial hair? Why do you choose to shave or choose not to shave?

I like my hair short, even shorter than my brother’s, shaved on the sides and longer on the top. My hairdresser calls it a unisex cut and he never complains about me having to still look female, and I honestly love him a little for that.

When I go out I put some wax into the top part to create the illusion of an actual hairstyle without having to actually style it properly because honestly, I have no idea how hair styling works.

My hair is very important to me and how I express myself, it makes me nervous when it grows out and looks like some weird pixie cut, so I get it cut regularly.

When I’m taking hormones and they start showing effects I’ll bleach my hair blonde, until then I’m too scared it’ll make me look even more feminine.

I don’t have any facial hair, yet. Beards are awesome.

My legs haven’t seen a razor in probably years, I avoid shorts and anything that requires hairless legs in order to not make people freak out and ask me about it.

Actually, I’ve never been bothered by my body hair at all, never felt an obligation to shave anything but my armpits in summer just because society expects some people to. I can’t wait until I can wear shorts in public without getting any weird looks though, jeans aren’t the best summer wear.

5. Talk about cosmetics. Do you choose to wear makeup? Do you paint your nails? What type of soaps and perfumes do you use if any?

I don’t wear make up, my skills are non existent and I envy everyone who has the patience to learn how to put it on well. But I do love a man in eyeliner and guys who rock lipstick and eyeshadow and everything else.

Make up is also a thing I wanna explore more when I’m taking hormones and my masculinity is official in documents so that people can’t take it away from me by calling me a girl.

Same thing with nail polish, lack of skills, admiration of people who posess those skills, and plans to try it out some time later in my transition.

Perfume isn’t my thing, especially not fruity and this seductive stuff that’s aimed at women.

As for shampoo and other cosmetics I just use whatever smells good to me. Sometimes I buy things that say „for men“ on it on purpose just for the feeling of using a product that’s expected to be used by a man, which is a bit silly but also makes me feel validated.

So, in conclusion, nothing has a gender until it says of itself so, and only the fear of not being taken seriously by a society controlled by the gender binary is stopping me from expressing myself freely.

6. Have you ever experieced being misgenderd, if so how often?

Well, nobody would believe me to be a cis guy if they saw or heard me, so yeah, being misgendered is my everyday life, but that’s not really something I can blame people for.

What I do take personally is that my family still doesn’t even try to stop using words like sister or daughter, my sister even started to misgender me more than she did before by using my full name (which barely anyone does), if intentionally or not.

It’s very hard for them to understand that I already am man, regardless of how my body looks like and what my papers say, instead of a woman that is going to be a man some time in the far away future. Sucks, but things like that take time.

7. Do you experience dysphoria? How does that affect you?

I do, it started years ago with mild body dysphoria, and now it’s grown into this mess of body and social dysphoria that heavily affects my life.

However, I didn’t start to really hate my body because of being trans or my weight or anything considering my appearance, it developed from how others treated me and what they expected me to be just from what I look like.

I never liked my big chest, not because it’s a big chest but because people, and especially my mother (which is so weird), commented on and talked about it. Today I can’t wait to finally, finally get top surgery and be free of these body parts people seem so focused on. I try to wear my binder outside as often as possible and love how it makes my body look just that little bit more like I want it to so badly.

For me social dysphoria can be worse than body dysphoria, there’s no way to casually correct pronouns or call myself a man without starting a discussion and making things awkward.

I feel forced to act more feminine, giggly and submissive than I actually am just so that people don’t think I’m a rude woman and stop liking me. And when people have this false image of me it’s even harder to convince them of my real gender. Gender roles suck.                                                                       I’m not in the mood to apply for jobs and I don’t feel like making new friends outside the queer community, just because I’d have to use a name and gender that isn’t mine and act like the young woman everybody expects me to be. It’s exhausting and depressing.

8. Talk about children. Are you interested in having children? Would you want to carry a child if that were an option for you? Do you want to be the primary caretaker for any children you may have?

Since like forever I’ve been sure that I never want to be pregnant and carry a child, though I do would want children, if my future partner is okay with that.

As for now I really can’t say who will be taking care of it mostly, I’m just not in that situation right now, who knows, I think that depends on careers and income.

9. Talk about money. Is it important to you to provide for your family financially? Is it important for you that you earn more than any partner you may have? Do you prefer to pay for things like dates? Are you uncomfortable when others pay or offer to pay for you?

It’s stupid but sometimes I enjoy doing things that are considered to be „the man’s thing“ like opening doors and paying, for me it’s reassuring and one of the few ways I can fit into the stereotypical male gender role. I still think gender roles suck and people should be how they want to be, but you know, there’s something comforting about doing something that’s associated with the gender you identify with, no matter how cliché.

On the other side, I’m uncomfortable when people spent a bigger amount of money on me in general, no matter what gender they are or I am. For future dates I think I’ll stick with paying my part of the bill or taking turns in paying for smaller things like drinks or whatever.

Having more income than my partner isn’t what I’d put a lot of importance on, all I’m hoping for is that we’re financially stable, but those are all problems for the future and not now.

10. Anything else you want to share about your gender?

Nope! Pretty sure that’s it for now.