#nonbinary confusion

It's really strange because I feel like such a large part of my identity has been associated with being a feminist and even though I know that my gender doesn't change that, it's still very complicated for me. I feel like I'm not allowed to relate to issues that directly affect women, even though I am still affected by those very same issues. I want to read authors like Simone de Beuvoir and Sylvia Plath, but I fear that my interest in the issues they discuss somehow invalidates my gender. I have been so intertwined with these issues, that it feels like if I come out, I will have to give all of that up.

youtube recced me a video discussing genderbending and i figured i'd give a listen to try to understand better, but i just came away more confused. gender isn't sex, right? gender isn't tied to the physical body, right? so when people do gender bent designs (for binary genders anyway), why do they always change the physical body? why does the everything change instead of just the gender? and the video and comments brought up that genderbending a trans character should keep them trans in some way, which like, fine, but in the case of binary that means you're still swapping the sex at birth. right?? so it's still tied to more than gender.

I know I'm non binary. I know I'm fem leaning. I know I want to use they/them pronouns. I know I'm allowed to feel girly or masc without that changing my gender.

Go!

So Im non-binary, have that in my first post so no surprise there. Specifically demigirl (again nothing new) so I prefer the pronouns she/them.

The confusion is coming in because lately, at work, whenever I'm refered to with female pronouns it rubs me the wrong way. Now thankfully my workplace is super accepting, in fact in the interview process I was like "look I'm queer and I'm not gonna hide it". All my coworkers have treated my identities as a normal thing. No "when did you decide..." "Why are you..." Nothing even vaguely queerphobic. It's been great. So it's not that I'm afraid of saying "hey can you use they/them pronouns for me?" Because I know they would change their pronoun use without hesitation.

It's more of a, "am I lying to myself?" Thing. Or..... Ugh it's a bit confusing to even try to explain. I think it's more of a relationship dependant thing. Like, with my close friends and people I care about, I have no issue if they use female pronouns with me. Sometimes yes, I do prefer they/them, but if the use she/her it never insults me or makes me feel bad. But with people I'm not really close to, I feel like more of a they than a she.

I'm going to tell my coworkers that I prefer they/them because that would make me more comfortable at work.

I think I want the end goal to be the people in my life using she/them interchangeably. But I don't know if that's going to happen. And I don't want to just stick to one "set" of pronouns (she/her or they/them) because that's not who I am. I'm both. It just fluctuates. It's all just so confusing....