Happy Pride Month to everyone within the LGBTQIA+ community!
This is my 6th year officially celebrating it, but this year, too, is the 8th year anniversary of me realizing I wasn't cisgender, so I wanna talk a bit abt it, just to share my experience for anyone who might benefit from reading it to realize that sexuality and gender identity aren't binary and can come in many, many shapes and forms.
So, growing up, I was always somewhat tomboyish; as in, I didn't really like being percieved as a girl (because, yes, I am afab).
I liked wearing baggy clothes and styling my hair in ways that made it look shorter, and in turn, made me look more androgynous.
I liked being called by male names that resembled my real one and I remember feeling so, so happy when my dad would tell me I acted like "the son he never had".
Growing up, when I was like 12 or 13, I found out about different types of sexualities (because until then, I thought only gay and straight existed), and it happened because I started feeling romantic attraction toward my female best friend at the time.
It wasn't necessarily a physical attraction, because I liked her as a person, not because she was a woman. She made me feel cherished and understood in a way my family never did, and so we became girlfriends.
We didn't break up on a positive note, but that did remain was the knowledge that I could actually date a girl and, most importantly, feel attraction toward a girl.
At the time, too, I remember I took ok the more traditionally "masculine" role in the relationship, as in I was the more courteous one, like carrying her bag for her or holding doors open for her when we did get to see each other (bc this all happened during lockdown).
And a few months after that, I started realizing I liked being percieved as a man, too. So I cut my hair short and started secretly binding. I'd wear very loose fitting clothes to conceal my silhouette and such and started using he/him pronouns with my friends, who, thankfully, respected them.
Dysphoria started at that time, too, and I remember it being one of the worst feelings I've ever had the misfortune of experiencing.
It was so awful just hearing myself talk and realizing something felt off, like my voice was too whiny and too high-pitched. I'd look at myself in the mirror and my body felt more like a cage than it did a tool I could use to navigate and experience life.
I wanted to tear all my hair out and rip my chest so I could tear my boobs away.
And I used to cry so much then, because there was no one in my ultrarreligious family whom I could openly talk about this with. So I coped with being and doing what felt most comfortable at the time online, and it worked for the best part of five years.
Quick side note, my parents were both goth before their conversion, so I've always been surrounded by goth culture and its aesthetics. So like 2 years ago, I started getting really invested in gothic literature and the origins of the subculture, and all that led me to the makeup, because it's always been an important part of it.
So I found out that it mostly started in the 80's, and one of the core beliefs of it was to defy social norms, which included traditional gender roles; that's why long hair, skirts, veils, makeup and painted nails are frequent imagery you see in early goths, even those who are amab.
At the time, there had also been a rise in drag culture and artists like Divine started gaining more importance.
Goth coexisted with drag culture and took influence from it, which is clearly reflected in the bold makeup and gender representation sometimes depicted in goth looks, as well as the belief that gender is moreso a concept to be interpreted and impersonated, rather than a defined idea.
So I also started looking into drag and found out that drag kings existed, which was like a whole 180° in my life. Because I knew drag queens existed, but to find out about drag kings did too? As in, you could embody either gender without necessarily being either? That just struck a chord with me.
Because for the longest time, I didn't mind being referred to by he/him, but it just felt too encompassing, or like it didn't fully capture me as a person — same for she/her.
When I asked myself "Well, what gender are you?", I'd always respond the same way: "...I don't know, I'm just me".
That was it, the statement that made me realize I'm neither a male nor a female.
In my experience, cosplay and artistic makeup helped me reach this conclusion, because I realized I felt perfectly comfortable embodying both hyperfemenine and hypermasculine personas (which is drag, simplified).
To me, gender is moreso an artistic concept to be embodied, not a reality that you have to live, and it's something you can switch between, be either or neither, and that's the beauty in it.
After doing some research, I found that the definition of gender I had aligned mostly with the genderqueer label, so I've defined myself as such.
On another topic, during the time in which I identified as transmasc, I thought I was gay because I didn't feel romantically attracted to women. Sexually, yeah, but not romantically, and I thought that was the end of it, which, of course, wasn't.
Then I realized exactly that: I couldn't be gay if I felt sexual attraction toward women, right? So I did more research.
Bisexuality sounded decent, but it didn't feel right and same with pansexuality, because as much as I didn't care for gender, I started feeling more and more attraction toward women than men.
Unfortunately, we live in a world where marriage, children and traditional gender roles are still very strict and heavily imposed, so to me, the figure of a male lover implies a traditional marriage, children and being the stay at home spouse (because, again, I live in an ultrarreligious household).
And I think my rejection of being with a man stems from there — though I'm not closed to the idea, and I know not all men are assholes.
I've come to terms with the fact that, while I do not care about my partner's gender, I feel more attraction toward females than I do males. And omnisexuality feels right with me.
I'm still very young and I know my gender identity and sexuality may change overtime, as they already have, which is totally okay.
Experiences, bodily changes, hormones and even trauma affect the way we percieve the world and other people, so growing up also means you might stop liking or start liking certain things. And, again, that is okay!
And, as my personal conclusion, just because you live a reality that doesn't allow you to fully express yourself and be who you are and with whom you want to be, doesn't make your identity any less valid.
It's a hard path, I know. It's so painful to have to lie and feel judged by the people who should support you inconditionally; it's heart-shattering when love feels conditioned to fitting into a certain mold that makes you sick to your stomach; it's terrifying to feel forced to be someone you dread, but, trust me, there are ways to still be true to yourself while trying to mantain peace.
One day, hopefully, we'll be able to move out and go far, far away from the negativity. Then, in another city, under a different social context, we may very well meet the love of our lives, or go to a drag show without fear of being found out, we'll be able to go to a pride parade and scream to the world that we are happy and that we are free.
Because love is love, in whatever shape it may come.
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