#snailogy

Last year, after experiencing days where I just didn’t feel like a girl, I started questioning my gender. It started as something fun, but soon, I was nervous and afraid. What would my mom think? Would she be disappointed if my gender wasn’t that of a girl? I grew depressed (well, more so). I’m still anxious and depressed to this day, but I kept pursuing answers.

After a few months, there was a good week where I wasn’t a girl. I didn’t know what, but not a girl. One day, after noticing my behavior and body movements, I realized why. I wasn’t a girl, but a full-blown guy. I wanted to be called a guy. I acted like a guy. I was a guy.

Calling myself and being referred to as a girl felt wrong. Wearing dresses felt wrong. Makeup, wrong. Anything ‘feminine’ was wrong. I was uncomfortable. Seeing myself in the mirror with my big hips and curvy body left me wondering who it was in the mirror. I felt dull, empty, unrecognizable. I knew it was me I was seeing, but it didn’t feel like it was. I would constantly wonder why that is.

I was hesitant at first, but I eventually started calling myself genderfluid (I first learned about the term from a great comic called Snailogy--you should check it out!). I was a boy some days, and a girl some days. Sometimes neither, and sometimes both. Made sense to call myself genderfluid, and for the time being (a couple of months), it felt the most right.

But, I still had questions. My journey to self discovery wasn’t complete. I needed answers. Genderfluid is the best answer, right? So, why did it feel like there was something missing.

Well, one day, I stumbled across the term ‘fluidflux’. I had seen it once before when I was first questioning, but it didn’t make sense. I was so confused on what it meant exactly. And when I rediscovered it? Still didn’t make sense. But, I couldn’t get it out of my head. I looked it up for a few days, reading everything I found on it, which was next to nothing, until one day, It. Made. Sense. I don’t think any of the information I found helped this new clarity. It just happened. It clicked.

To me, fluidflux means that someone might feel like a boy 100%, sometimes a boy but not completely (partly boy), neither girl nor boy, sometimes a girl but not completely (partly girl), sometimes a girl 100%, and sometimes both. Hope that makes sense. The ‘partly’ part was confusing me, but I realized something. All the days where I didn’t feel 100% a guy or girl, where I couldn’t tell if I felt like a guy or not (but was definitely feeling masculine), I was only feeling partly that gender. That’s why genderfluid didn’t fit me. I don’t feel 100% one gender all the time, and lately, I’ve been feeling partly boyish a lot.

Fluidflux isn’t well known, but calling myself it and being called it, even if it’s only me saying it, makes me happy. I am happy. Discovering the term and calling myself it is like winning the championship game you played so hard on, or finally winning that boss battle you’ve struggled to beat for DAYS. That’s how happy it made me.

Kreyul from Snailords Nightmare Factory on webtoon. It’s and amazing story and I love the character! I hope you enjoy.(also you should totally check out the webcomic, because it’s amazing)