vent below:gender & species dysphoria, some violent appearing language. possible triggers, lmk.
I want to be a boy. Until I don't.
I almost never want to be a girl.
Nothing ever stays still long enough for me to understand it, and I'm so tired of trying to explain something I barely understand myself.
Like somebody ripped me out of the body I was supposed to have and shoved me into this one because it was convenient. Every time I look in the mirror I just want to scream. That's not me. It never has been. It's a face people recognize, a body people call mine, but it feels like a stranger following me around.
They're too small. Too dull. They should be sharp enough to tear through something. I keep running my tongue over them like maybe if I do it enough they'll finally become what they're supposed to be.
I should have ears that twitch when I'm angry and pin back when I'm scared.
Instead I have hands that don't feel like mine and feet that feel clumsy and wrong and a body that keeps insisting it's human when every part of me is screaming that it isn't.
It's like my bones are lying.
Like they're bent into a shape they were never meant to hold.
I don't know what I did to deserve feeling like this all the time. I don't know why I got stuck in a body that feels like a mistake. Everyone else walks around acting like this is normal, like skin is supposed to fit, like mirrors are supposed to make sense.
I'm angry that I have to wake up every morning in a body that feels borrowed.
I'm angry that I can't claw my way out of it.
I'm angry that no matter how loudly my brain insists, this isn't me, nothing changes.
I just have to keep pretending.
And every day it feels like pretending is killing me a little more.
The version of me that only exists behind my ribs, underneath the skin that keeps lying for me. I want her to look at me and see a boy when I am one. Something wild when I'm not. Something that isn't trapped inside this body.
I want her to understand without me having to tear myself open just to explain it.
What if I tell her that my skin feels wrong, that my teeth ache because they aren't sharp enough, that I swear I can feel a tail that isn't there?
What if I tell her my reflection feels like a cruel joke?
And I don't think I could survive watching someone I care about look at me like I'm broken.
Keep pretending I'm just... me.
It keeps twisting everything.
Some days I can almost remember what I was supposed to look like. Then it slips away before I can hold onto it. I catch shadows in the corner of my eye and, for a second, they feel more like me than the person in the mirror ever has.
I don't know what's happening to me.
I don't know if my brain is trying to tell me something or if it's tearing itself apart.
I just know that every day it gets louder.
The certainty that this isn't right.
That these bones aren't mine.
That this skin isn't mine.
That I'm trapped somewhere just beneath it, clawing at the inside, hoping someone—her—might see through all of it before I disappear into pretending.
There's something inside me that wants things I can't say out loud.
Not because they're evil.
Wrong in the way people look at you differently once they know. Wrong in the way that makes them take a step back. Wrong in the way that makes them stop seeing you and start seeing a problem.
So I bite my tongue until it hurts. I swallow the words before they can exist. I smile when I'm supposed to smile. I laugh when I'm supposed to laugh. I keep the thoughts locked behind my teeth because if they escaped, I don't know if she'd still look at me the same way.
My mind keeps reaching for things normal people don't seem to want.
It keeps pulling me somewhere I can't explain.
Sometimes it feels like the only honest thing about me.
I don't know which is worse.
I just know I can't let her see all of it.
She deserves someone uncomplicated.
Someone whose reflection doesn't feel like a stranger.
Someone whose mind doesn't keep folding in on itself until every thought comes out warped.
So I keep building walls around the parts of me that don't make sense.
Because if she saw everything
Every ugly, impossible, aching part of me
I'm terrified she'd walk away.
if she did I think the silence after would be louder than all the noise in my head.
Sometimes my brain slips somewhere I can't control.
It's like everything gets smaller. Simpler.
Words get harder. I want comfort more than conversation. I want to curl up somewhere safe and not have to think so much. Sometimes it feels so young it scares me. Sometimes it feels more like a puppy than a person—wanting warmth, wanting to be close, wanting someone to tell me I'm okay without having to explain why. I don't choose it.
And all I can think about is her.
What if she sees me like that?
What if she thinks I'm weird?
What if she looks at me differently after that?
So I try to hide it. I force myself to act older than I feel. I rehearse normal in my head until it hurts. I wait for it to pass without letting anyone notice.
And somehow that feels bad too.
When it's over, everything feels heavy again. Embarrassing. Like I've just woken up from a dream I wasn't supposed to have. I feel icky. Ashamed. I replay every little thing I said, every movement, every sound, wondering if someone noticed something was off.
I wish my mind would just stay the same.
I wish I didn't have to be afraid of myself.
More than anything, I wish I believed she could see every version of me—the scared one, the quiet one, the confused one—and still decide to stay.
But I'm terrified that if she saw the parts of me I hide the hardest, she'd stop seeing me at all.
