So -
Hi there. I'm Sal, from Austria, twenty years old, and only figured out what I'm most likely
not only... maybe one and a half months ago, thereabouts? - that is, a cis girl/woman (doubts about that, without necessarily having the words to describe it or putting everything together, went on for a couple of years). Whether I'm male or not - well, that's the part I'm less sure about
- don't quite know, for now tending towards "probably not (only or fully) but maybe? I don't know?"
Part of the reason I figured things out was... well, the way I felt disconnected from and uncomfortable with the concept "female" as applied to me, ranging from being called a girl or woman, my first name, my hair when I let it grow out the one time during my whole life when somebody else talked me into it, my chest, and... well, the list actually goes on a bit, and degrees of disconnect and uncomfort differ quite a bit with different items on it.
Just having short hair, wearing a chestbinder, and deliberately not wearing the girlier clothes my mother somehow talked me into sometimes and wearing things I actually like instead left me way more comfortable than I remember since... probably since puberty started; I'm also out to my parents, although trying to talk about anything to do with my gender with my parents is hard. Part of it might be the fact that they didn't actually learn about what non-binary was until I came out to them and that twenty years of a different name and gender assumption are hard to erase. Part of it is hopefully that they'll just take time getting used to having a child and no daughter...
I'm pretty new on this forum, just joined a couple of days ago, in fact - I've already introduced myself over in the Introductions board.
Non-binary is probably the best word I have to describe myself currently (it's also the one I found first, and the one I accepted first), although I'm starting to warm up to genderqueer and would like to find other words that fit me. I'm probably going to go on people's nerves with asking them how they feel about their (a)gender(s) pretty soon in a new thread unless anybody points me to an existing one with that purpose - in fact, if anyone wants to tell me now, I'd be happy(- just also unsure whether you're allowed/supposed to do that in this thread...)!
As an aside - even if there are some bits about not telling people how to identify in the site rules, am I still allowed to ask other people whether they know any existing terms that fit my experience and how I could identify, as long as it's treated as a suggestion and I explicitely asked?
It
should be, but... asking for permission is better than asking for forgiveness as long as you're reasonably sure you might get it.
