How Does One Feel One’s Gender?

I don’t know what it means to feel “masculine.”

Ever since I discovered that I’m nonbinary, I’ve been reflecting on what gender is supposed to be, and I’m just ending up confused. Some people talk about feeling “masculine” or “feminine” but I don’t really know what it means, other than acting in accordance with the way that society decides that “men” and “women” should act.

People are born with a certain set of genitals, on the basis of this, society says “male” or “female.” This is already problematic. If you think that the biological sex binary is a given, I invite you to listen to this TED talk:

https://youtu.be/stUl_OapUso?si=DizHKNWPUynGjMZ_

I already knew that the biological basis for the binary is on shaky ground. However, there is nothing like someone speaking from actual lived experience to sharpen your understanding.

I’ve mentioned above that on top of biological sex, society imposes a series of behavioral conventions that define what men and women are. Men should act this way. Women should act that way. This is the gender binary. When a man acts in the way a woman should, it is deemed unnatural. Same when a woman acts in the way a man should.

I used to think that if I declared myself nonbinary, it was from an ideological standpoint more than anything else, but I don’t think this is the case. I’m just puzzled when people talk about feeling their gender, because this is something I don’t experience, or that I experience only faintly.

The gender binary is a complete fabrication from society. It is mere convention. It is not nature itself that compels those we call men to be competitive, or to be the provider in a couple, but society. It used to be that women couldn’t get credit without their husband’s approval. It is not nature that dictated this, but society. This restriction disappeared, not because of any change in nature, but because of changes in how society sees the gender binary.

Thus, it is that when I talk about my nonbinary nature, I talk about behavior. This is only because society itself distinguishes one side of the binary from the other in terms of behavior. It happens from time to time that someone interjects that gender identity is not the same as gender expression. Yes, this is true, but it has no bearing on what I am saying.

Let me make this clear. I’m not the gender police. You absolutely can be a feminine man, or a masculine woman, or any other variation. I won’t get on your case for it, and may even give you romantic love. However, as far as I am concerned, when it comes to evaluating whether I am man, woman, or nonbinary, my behavior is a critical component of the analysis.

So society, just like it has made me think that I was neurotypical by treating me like a neurotypical person, has also made me think that I am a man by treating me like a man. This is where gender dysphoria sets in. Yes, I am well versed in looking the part. Yes, I’ve been encultured in manhood, and, usually, I role-play a man. However, there are some behaviors that are required of me, as a man, that I don’t want to engage in. Hence, the gender dysphoria that occurs when I’m pushed to engage in those behaviors.

Still, I don’t feel the male gender in my life. I don’t feel special enjoyment when I do manly things. The notion of whether an act is manly or not does not figure in my decisions. For instance, my relationship with sports has been quite tepid. I used to watch racing, and that was it, as far as sports were concerned. I don’t anymore. I don’t think I’m missing anything important. I’m not pining after sports. It is not somehow missing from my life as a man.

It is only because society insisted that I am a man, and I believed society, that I thought that I was a man. Since I do not feel my gender, where does this lead me, but to the conclusion that I am in fact nonbinary?

#AutisticWriters #behavior #enby #gender #GenderBinary #GenderDysphoria #GenderExpression #GenderIdentity #nonbinary #SocialConvention #YourAutisticLife

https://www.yourautisticlife.com/2024/07/08/how-does-one-feel-ones-gender/

I’ve been thinking about gender again. Someone happened to include “If you want to be a [gender], you can just be a [gender]” in an article earlier, which planted the seed of tonight’s thoughts. I was also thinking about my wonderfully close friendship with my best friend. A week ago, she confessed that she couldn’t quite think of me as a woman. I immediately responded, “You think of me however you want to think of me.”

So tonight, as these thoughts ran together, I started thinking that I’m a pretty great guy who also happens to be a pretty awesome woman. 

Before the advent of highlighters or enhancing copy-pasted text, the way to call attention to something particularly important in a written work was to write the abbreviation for “nota bene,” a Latin phrase that means “Hey! Pay attention to this!” Of course, margin notes are always abbreviated, so it’s written as NB.

Getting back to the point, tonight I’m paying attention to that margin note in my own personal gender identity textbook. NB. 

In December, I was starting to think of myself as a non-binary trans woman. Then came my Christmas lunch with the production crew at work. Thirty guys–and me. Not another woman in the group. I felt so awkward and out of place, I couldn’t wait to get out of there. When I got home that evening, I stripped the enby symbol from my moniker on Mastodon and deleted my they/them pronouns. There was no way I could think of myself as even partially male if I practically ran away from lunch with the guys because I was squirming so badly.

But even then, I didn’t remove all semblance of masculinity from my identity. I was, for all practical purposes, a man for half a century, even if I didn’t like it. That goes way back. I remember an instance when, after expressing my distaste for my outward appearance, my first wife told me that I was a very good-looking man. I had a conflicted reaction to that compliment. On the one hand, it was confidence boosting to have someone compliment my appearance. On the other hand, I didn’t quite believe her; I thought she was partly just boosting my mood. On the other hand, my strongest mental reaction was to the word “man,” and it was a negative reaction. That really struck me–even more than apparently having three hands. That was about twenty years before I hatched. Yeah, it was a very long river. 

Back to the near-present. I ran away from that manly lunch, and more recently–actually, just tonight–I’ve realized that I’ve been running away from masculinity in general. I hate destructive hypermasculinity. I always have, even when I lived as a man. In a highly blue-collar, male-exclusive group like my crew at work, guys tend to be, well, guys, even if they might be a little less ‘testosterony’ when they’re with the women they know. 

I know other men, of course, and most of them aren’t poster boys for male toxicity. They’re people who do their best to treat everyone the same, and overall, try to be good men. I get along with them just fine in conversation with no awkwardness–although I’m still more animated and effervescent if there are other women in the group.

During my hatching week, I gave my existential uncertainty a persona. I called him Mr. Doubt. I needed him to be there, to express any uncertainty about the road I had just turned onto. This was the most significant life change I had ever embarked on, so if I had any doubts, I could not squash them or evict them from my mind. I had to face them head-on and examine every one of them in detail, just in case I might be wrong about the fundamental shift in my gender identity, which up to that point I had referred to as “pretty much male.” Even before hatching, I was embracing my femininity. I thought of myself as a feminine man who wanted desperately to be accepted as one of the girls–even if I still didn’t like the word “man.”

I know. That wasn’t just a sign. It was an illuminated billboard with flashing blue, pink, and white lights all around it. 

Back to Mr. Doubt. Every question he brought up, every physical attribute he pointed to, every modicum of doubt fell on close examination. He still lives with me, somewhere in the back of my mind. He doesn’t speak up very often, but when he does, I need to pay attention. 

After running, screaming, away from the masculine side of nonbinary, I still didn’t eliminate it from my personality. I thought of myself as semi-genderfluid, justifying it because I would always retain some masculine attributes. I was never cis-normative as a man (ugh, there’s that word again), and I would never be cis-normative as a woman. I would continue to develop my own unique gender identity, along with my own unique brand of sheer hotness. 

Then, two weeks ago, “You think of me however you want to think of me.” I didn’t think about that response. It just came, as naturally as my smile. A week later, my son brought up the fact that he already had two people he called Mom, so having a third might be a little confusing. I told him he could call me whatever he wanted. He still calls me Dad, and I’m perfectly okay with that. I’m even keeping my old name (which I don’t think of as a deadname) as one of my middle names. 

Halfway through my hatching week, way back, six months ago, I told a very awesome person that my interpretation of my version of the last comic in Mae Dean’s hatching series was that both halves of me would merge, creating a perfect balance. It was several days after that when my existential panic resolved with the realization that I don’t have two halves; I’m the same person I’ve always been; I simply know myself better now, and can express myself more authentically. 

Genderfluid. Nonbinary. Trans-feminine. The last term describes me the best, but the other two definitely have their place in my identity. Male or female. Male and female. No. Masculine and feminine–well, in my case, more like FEMININE and (masculine). 

And neutral. There are a lot of aspects of anyone’s personality that don’t have to be gendered. Strength. Integrity. Kindness and compassion. They’re not somewhere in the middle of the spectrum of gender attributes; they’re not related to that dipole at all. 

Damn the binary! I’m more feminine than masculine, but I’m really not a hundred percent man or woman. Well, I’m a lot closer to woman than man, mainly because I want more feminine attributes. Testosterone? I’m happy it’s gone. Estrogen? I want more! As I see my face becoming more feminine, and as others comment on it, I feel a happiness I never knew before my transition started. There are a couple of “pain points” that I can’t stop touching, stimulating more pain, because of what that pain foreshadows. But there’s another point I frequently bring up because I don’t want it going anywhere. 

“If you want to be a [gender], you can just be a [gender].” Or, if you don’t want to be a [gender], you don’t have to be one. 

I’m a chaotic, genderfluid lioness. I spend most of my time near one pole, simply because I love those attributes. But, as I told my best friend several months ago, I got tired of squeezing myself into other people’s boxes, so I decided to make my own. 

I am Violet.

I say that frequently. It’s my username on a number of online spaces, and of course it’s the name of this blog. It’s my identity, more so than any conventional term. My pronouns are she/her. But how I express myself on any given day… Well, you’ll have to wait and find out when I decide!

https://iamviolet.ca/2024/02/19/if-you-want-to-be-or-not-to-be/

In the six months I’ve been in transition, I’ve had many significant affirmations, from inside and outside. But none can compare to my night at the opera. The opera itself was very good. It wasn’t a traditional performance of Don Giovanni. It was presented in English, without sets, and with a heavily modified, localized libretto including references to Tim Horton’s and various locations in Edmonton. After discovering Il Commendatore motionless on the floor, Don Ottavio pulls out a cell phone to call an ambulance… I wish I could have seen the whole thing. 

But I’m getting ahead of myself. Before I could go to the opera, I had to find something to wear. At that point, I owned several women’s tops and a few ill-fitting bras I had bought online. And my purple boots, of course. I had arranged for my friend Megan, who was taking me to the opera, to take me shopping that morning. It was two hours of alternating anxiety and affirmation. 

Get the mall done

First we went to a shoe store. The salesperson didn’t know if they had many size 10 shoes. They had a pair I loved in size 9½. I tried them on…and they fit perfectly! I couldn’t believe it because the work boots I wear almost constantly are a men’s size 9½. The uppers of the new shoes are stretchy fabric, and I could almost go down another half size. “Well,” Megan said, “Welcome to women’s sizing.”

The next stop was a lingerie shop. I already own a few bras that I ordered online, but none of them fit properly, so Megan took me to La Vie en Rose to be fitted. I was so anxious as I entered the store, wearing jeans and a T-shirt, with no makeup. I thought I looked like a man intruding in a women’s space, as I felt so often before I hatched. One employee led us to the back and handed us over to another for my fitting. She asked me something about specific bra types, or what size I wore. I nervously said, “I’m fifty-four years old and I’ve never been fitted for a bra before.” She nodded and took me into the fitting room. I brought out the pads I’d be wearing, and she sized me at a 38 B or C with the pads, or an A without. 

We went out into the store and looked at bras. I wanted black because I figured that was the most likely color of the formal wear I’d be buying next. We selected three styles, and I took B and C cups of all of them to the fitting room. I was nervous as I tried them on, so much so that I tightened the shoulder straps of the first one when I thought I was loosening them. “Are you doing okay, hon?” asked Megan. I stammered something that told her I wasn’t doing so great. “Do you want me to come in with you?” “Yes,” I replied. This was a very small fitting room, and Megan is a big girl, but it was comforting to have her so close as she helped me adjust the straps and try on each bra. “We’re going with a C,” she said confidently after I tried on the first one. 

None of the first batch fit well. They all squeezed my outer pecs and under my shoulders. I know that’s not completely avoidable, but this felt very uncomfortable, so Megan went to find more options. I stood in the fitting room, feeling exposed even though I was behind a curtain, and I had been out in public with my “boobs” showing many times during my lengthy man phase. Is it indecent exposure if a woman who is very convincingly pretending to be a man shows her boobs in public? 

Megan returned with some more bras. She handed me the first one and said “I think this is the one.” I tried it on and she helped me adjust it. Then I put my pads in. It wasn’t completely comfortable, but it fit. I looked at myself in the mirror. The bra perfectly covered my pads. I didn’t have cleavage because my pecs don’t move that way, but it looked almost like I had breasts. I put my T-shirt on. I thought the bra rode a little high. I’m over fifty; I shouldn’t have perky teen breasts. But Megan said it was perfect for what I’d be wearing. I took it off and put my T-shirt back on over my not-so-curvy chest. 

Could I actually pull this off?

Next we drove to the Laura liquidation center. I was even more anxious as we drove into the parking lot. Would I be able to find anything that looked okay on me? “If you’re too anxious, we can stop whenever you want,” Megan told me. “No,” I said. “We’re doing this.” Nerves or no nerves, I was going to find something. I had a nice black sweater in my backpack, so the worst case was that I’d just have to find a pair of dress pants. 

We chose a couple of dresses and a pantsuit and walked to the fitting rooms. I put on my bra with my pads. The first dress I tried on was a dark purple (of course). I stepped out into the fitting lounge. “I don’t think this one…” I said. Megan chuckled. “I’m sorry, but you look like you’re going to a funeral.” Scratch dress number one. The second dress was no better, so I tried the pantsuit. It wasn’t bad, but when I stepped out to show Megan, she pointed out something that interfered with the line of the suit. Specifically the lower part. I went back into the fitting room and Megan went to find more clothes. I was getting discouraged. It’s going to be some time before one particular obstacle is taken care of, and that would eliminate quite a few outfits.

Megan returned with a whole pile of dresses and one pantsuit. Only one of them was purple. The dress on top of the pile was bright red. “I know these aren’t your color, but I want you to trust my judgment.” I was staring at the red dress as Megan said this. It made me think of the Matrix, of the woman in the red dress who distracts Neo during one of Morpheus’ tests. Could I pull off being the woman in the red dress? I tried it on first. It looked good. Then Megan zipped it up. The fabric moved into its intended position–and it looked gorgeous! I stared at myself, up and down. I moved. There was a slit that exposed my left knee. I spun around. The dress flowed as I moved. “This is number one,” I said. But I was going to try on everything Megan brought. 

I tried on a light purple flowery summer dress. It wouldn’t work with my bra, but it could be an option for another time. “It’s ten bucks,” Megan said. I looked at the price tag. Marked down ninety percent! There was a rip from where the belt had been pulled too hard, but I hadn’t noticed it because the belt covered it perfectly. That dress went onto the “yes” hook. The next dress was a light green that totally did not suit me, but the cut was very nice, which is why Megan wanted me to try it on. Then I tried the pantsuit. The top of this suit flowed into the bottom with two strips of fabric in a diagonal crossing pattern. It hid what it needed to hide. I stepped out to look in the three-way mirror. I looked amazing! The way the top came together, my padded curves looked perfectly natural. “Want me to go get your shoes?” Megan asked. I nodded, then kept looking at myself while she ran back to the car. She returned with my new shoes and a wide deep maroon belt. “Trust me,” she said. I put on the belt and my shoes. I looked fantastic! Wearing this suit, I would own any room I stepped into. But for tonight, I wanted the red dress. 

I bought the pantsuit as well as the two dresses. The total bill came up to $250. Not bad considering the red dress was marked down from $450. There is supposedly a stain on one strap, but I can’t find it. 

I had been planning to find a hat of some kind to hide my balding spot, which estrogen has not magically filled in yet. But after seeing myself in those clothes, I decided I wanted people to see me wearing them, and not see me hiding myself. 

Off to the ball

We went back to Megan’s apartment, ordered dinner, then started doing our makeup. Megan is a makeup artist, and she has given me some bold new looks, but that night I wanted to do my own eyes. I used Megan’s earth tone palette because my usual purple wouldn’t work with that dress. I carefully applied a two-way gradient pattern: very light to somewhat dark coming down from my eyebrows, then not quite as light to darker from the inner corners of my eyes moving outward, with a slightly more subtle gradient below my eyes. A little mascara and my eyes were done. I loved the effect. I asked Megan what she thought. She paused, her eyes widening, before telling me I looked amazing. This was the best compliment I could have received from my makeup teacher. 

It was time to get ready. I put on my dress and my shoes. I added a shoulder cloak Megan had previously given me to fend off the chilly wind. Megan asked which of three dresses she should wear. There was really only one choice. Two of the dresses were quite informal, and I needed her to match me, even if her style is a significant contrast. She wore a dark gothic dress with a pair of bright rhinestone platform boots. Getting into Megan’s car gave me a new experience: carefully pulling in all the folds of my dress before closing the door. 

We arrived early; we were one of the first people inside. There was a balloon arch set up for photos. We took a few pictures of each other, and had someone take a pic of both of us. 

I look like I’m tensing my arms in this pic, but I was actually feeling quite relaxed by this point. Relaxed isn’t the right term. Somehow, I felt powerful. A few other people had entered the lobby. Some were dressed casually, some more formally. None matched the elegance of my dress. You can see the confidence in my smile in this picture.

As more people came into the lobby, there were quite a few more people dressed formally. A few women complimented my dress. “You look gorgeous!” “That dress is amazing!” I knew some of the stares wouldn’t be as friendly, but I wasn’t paying attention. I kept my chin up and walked as if I were walking through my own personal ballroom. I felt like Cinderella! I told Megan I never dreamed I would be one of the most noticeably well-dressed women at the opera. “Top five,” she said.

It’s all pumpkins now

Unfortunately, my perfect day did not have a perfect ending. I was enjoying the performance–during the overture, the sound of the orchestra completely masked my tinnitus! But between a painful tooth choosing that time to flare up and the piercing resonance of two of the performers, I felt a migraine coming on. I resisted. I hadn’t had a migraine since I started hormone therapy! But before long, my head felt like it was collapsing from the left side. When the lights went up for the intermission, I told Megan I needed to find a quiet, dark room. Unfortunately, the Northern Alberta Jubilee Auditorium does not have a room of refuge. This is not a venue for anyone prone to migraines, or with an aversion to noise, crowds, or a similar condition, to push their limits. Even so, as we walked through the crowd, I held my head up and walked like the Queen of the ball.

Megan took me back to her place. By the time we were halfway there, I could barely keep my eyes open. Brake lights in front of us were painfully bright. I got into bed. With the lights off, the bedroom was the refuge I needed. Megan went to make me some food; I was extremely hungry, which I’m sure contributed to the migraine.

That’s when something strange happened. I started crying. I rolled onto my side and cried into the pillow, sobbing powerfully. I wasn’t upset, except that Megan was missing the rest of the opera (even though she told me she wasn’t really impressed with the interpretation). The migraine wasn’t painful enough to have such a strong effect. But there I was, sobbing into the pillow until I heard Megan open the bedroom door. I took a couple of deep, stabilizing breaths. In the darkness, she couldn’t see my eyes. It’s not that I’m embarrassed about crying in front of Megan; she’s one of my best friends, and I’d trust her with almost anything. But I didn’t want her to think that I was upset about anything about that day, especially when I couldn’t explain my reaction. 

In retrospect, I think it was the sum total of the alternating stress and euphoria of the day. I’ve never experienced anything like that day, and I probably never will again. All in all, it’s one of the best days I can remember. It may have ended in a hail of pumpkins, but while I was there, I was the lady in red, the Queen of the ball.

I may have been wearing red, but I am Violet. That may not mean anything to anyone who doesn’t know me, but it’s my confident affirmation that I have achieved the ultimate goal of truly being myself.

https://iamviolet.ca/2024/02/05/a-night-at-the-opera/