#((heyo!!))

Not to sound like companies in June, but it’s a spectrum. There’s hundreds of identities—not just amongst the multigender label, but that’s what I’m focusing on—that aren’t represented amongst the media, and it’s because they aren’t simple. They aren’t understandable enough as trans, or nonbinary, or gay or bisexual, and it’s not like those are widely understood either. Peoples reaction to multigender folks is usually an instinctual, “that’s not real”, and sure, to people who don’t experience the things that multigender people do, it does sound far fetched. It doesn’t make sense. Trust me, buddy, not making sense is my whole fucking existence at this point.

I’m a little something called abrogender.

Abrogender is a gender identity with two definitions: A form of genderfluidity that changes more erratically and in a less defined way. A gender that is so intricate, and changes so quickly, that it is nearly impossible to nail down. Again, at least that’s what the wiki says.

With “micro labels” like these, it’s easy for people to say, “well, that’s just genderfluid” and yeah, it’s similar, but you can’t make that call. You don’t know what I experience and how it differs, and sure, to some people the “millions of labels under the LGBTQ+ identity” are annoying and hard to understand, but they’re there for a reason, because it isn’t as simple as labeling myself as genderfluid as it is for most people, which is another reason why you won’t see bigender, pangender, genderfaun/genderfaunet etc people being represented in media because the media doesn’t know how to represent us, or they take something as complicated as our identities—something they can’t make sense of in a blink of an eye, and call it not real.

Can you imagine how fucking frustrating that is?

I can’t describe to people who are comfortable with their gender, in the body they were born with, the type of feeling that looking in the mirror and seeing the wrong thing is. It’s hard to describe it if you haven’t experienced it, as much of this will be, but I remember I was getting more and more uncomfortable, for reasons I didn’t understand—I didn’t have access to all these millions of different labels as a kid.

I never really felt connected to being a girl. You know, it wasn’t instinctive revulsion, I didn’t “feel trapped in my body” most days, like some trans representation will have you believe. I’m not Kalvin Garrah, I’m not going to say you have to have dysphoria to be trans. I didn’t feel connected to any gender, really, but I didn’t feel without one either. If somebody were to assume I was a boy, I wouldn’t get offended, because sure! It’s not like I wasn’t a boy. Most people don’t experience that shit.

And then quarantine hit. I was on the internet more than I ever had been, because it’s not like there was much else to do, and I was allowed access to things I barely understood before. AKA, I was dipping my toes into the trans label.

Demigirl was what I started with, because at the time it felt accurate. A label where you still identify as a girl but also somewhere outside the binary? That’s exactly what I thought it was. This isn’t me shaming demigirls, you guys are so hot, sexy etc, it just wouldn’t be that simple for me. And then, as the years went on, I felt more and more disconnected from being a girl, and I picked up nonbinary like a golden star and stuck it to my shirt for a couple years, without fully reading the contract that came with it. Again, at the time, that’s what I thought it was. The idea of being a boy wouldn’t come to me for a couple years, but once I started doubting my gender again I sort of.. hid from it? The last couple weeks of identifying as nonbinary weren’t honest, and it was more so me clinging to the surface level of the trans identity just so I wouldn’t have to come out a second time. I slapped transmasc onto the nonbinary label and was hoping to god I wouldn’t fuck around and find out.

And then.. after a while, I allowed myself to look further. Bigender, and then trigender, and then pangender—none of them stuck.

One thing I did know, was that now that I was allowing myself to identify as such, I loved being a boy. I loved it. I wanted to have a flat chest, and a big, bushy beard, and for people to look at me in the store and call me sir, and to be somebody’s husband in the future—I wanted all of it. And with this, I strayed further and further away from being a girl, if that was even possible, and adopted the trans man label in 2022.

Most people would think; well, you’re a trans man. You’re not multigender. And that’s what I thought. I really did think so, I thought my gender crisis was over, I felt content, and I didn’t think much into it because it’s not like I could be wrong again, right?

Well. Some fucking god must have had it ought for me, because after a happy year of identifying as a trans man, in early 2023, I had yet another patented moment of wait.

I have been relatively open about my gender struggles here. Relatively is an understatement, I’m sure you can find a post about each label I identified as at the time I identified as it if you just search it on my account, so you can imagine how frustrating this was. I was finally content with being a trans man, and that year was really, really good. My friends were all insanely supportive, were using my correct pronouns and everything, and then I would have to do the walk of shame to tell them, again, that yeah.. I wasn’t right about this, guys :/

Out of everything, the number one thing I was worried about was annoying people. Amongst my own thoughts of faking it, of trying to be different, I really did think my close friends would get tired of me constantly saying something else. I wanted so badly to just be normal, to be simple, to be like the thousands of cis people in the world who are born with the gender they’re assigned as and don’t have a moment of questioning it—of feeling unsure, but at the same time whenever I thought about being just a girl for the rest of my life I got this sick, awful feeling in my stomach. But just being a man didn’t feel right, either.

So, what? What was I?

I still don’t know. If you assume I’m a girl, you won’t be wrong, but you won’t be entirely right, either. If you assume I’m a man, you won’t be wrong, but you won’t be right either. If you assume I’m neither, something that exists outside the binary, you won’t be wrong and you won’t be right.

I tried to be content with just being me. With saying, I don’t need a label, I am who I am! But that wasn’t true. I wanted so badly to have a label, something to explain this, something to prove that there wasn’t something wrong with me—that I wasn’t alone. That I wasn’t faking it after all.

Abrogender is the closest definition to what I’m feeling.

The definition isn’t in my own words, so it isn’t exactly what I’m feeling—hell if I’ll ever be able to explain that to people without sounding insane—but when I found that label I breathed out the biggest fucking sigh of relief. It’s the closest thing to unlabeled as I can allow myself to have, but at the same time it’s still a label. It’s still a sign that people feel how I feel, enough for there to be a definition for it. After years of switching, of nothing sticking, of feeling crazy, like I was making the whole thing up and trying to stick to one thing just to please other people, I finally, finally could breathe. And it’s not something I can explain to somebody who never has to doubt any of these things to begin with. I’m not going to force myself to tone down what I am just so it appeals to a mass of people who wouldn’t have loved me anyways. I’m not going to do that. I was miserable doing that.

So, if you think it’s not real, what I feel and how I identify, and if you think the millions of people who identify as multigender, or some label on the LGBT spectrum that isn’t easy for you to grasp are all faking it, just know that you have the privilege of never feeling a stranger in your own body, in your own mind. You have the privilege of getting up and getting ready in the morning and loving your body, never feeling like an imposter, like you have to put on a performance to please. Of course you couldn’t understand what we go through, and you know what? I am happy for you.

There's a part of me that’s bitter, that’s envious, because I’ve wanted that experience for myself for years. I can't tell you how much. But I’m learning to let things like that go. If you’re one of the millions of people who are truly, entirely happy with how you identify, then I’m happy for you.

If you asked me why I posted this, I would tell you don’t fucking know. Is it because I wanted people to understand the complexities of gender, of the vast labels and how they’re overlooked, as a person who has a lesser known label? Yeah, sure. Is it also because I wanted to just talk my shit for no apparent reason? Yes.