This was a comment that I posted in response to the "Ellen" post on the front page today. Ask me anything. Your questions will only help me better understand myself and to better tell my story, so that I will be able to gain strength and really strengthen my feeling of comfort in my own body.
I identify with Ellen, actually. I am nonbinary, and I just reached this realization over the past 48 hours. Here is the thing that you have to understand about me. I am a woman with a mental illness, and a very serious one at that. I want to be able to tell my story honestly and powerfully without needing to memorize everything about the DSM5. I understand that it is important for me to get therapy, and I am doing just that. But then, my story and the arch of my life is just so painful and so inexplicable due to my mental illness. I just hate myself, and I just feel inadequate in all contexts. I am a Christian, and I was baptized. But my baptism never prevented me from doing all of the horrible things that I did during the course of my mental illness. I want to take responsibility for myself, and I am just a college student. But I've been hospitalized five times already, and after each time, I just see more and more very sick people with my same mental illness taking tons of medication, and they are all older than me. So now I really am in a big crisis of confidence, and I don't know what the future holds for me. I myself am taking a little medication, and I am in the process of learning to live with a mental illness. I just want to be normal, but my story already marks me as someone who can never be normal due to my personal history. And when I am actually honest with myself, I know that I will never ever be able to be normal. And the gender binary just forces me to go into hiding. I am a woman at birth, but then again, I know zero women in my family and in my immediate community (people of the same background as me from my high school years) who are of my race and going through the same stuff that I am going through. In fact, the women in my family believe that downplaying the significance that the mental illness and my past indiscretions and misadventures would have on my life trajectory is the best way to move forward. I agree with them that in terms of the actions that I do, I can definitely make a new life for myself. But then you also have to understand that I am dealing with intense emptiness and worthlessness on the inside, no matter what I do. And I feel that way especially when I do something positive and good for others, since I know that on the inside I will never truly love myself for that. And my family and the people in my immediate community (those people of the same background as me) will never truly understand what I am going through, since they believe that there is no reason for me to feel this way. What hurts me the most is that my family can't truly relate to me in a way that makes sense to me, and that I cannot truly communicate with my family without mistakenly assuming the worst intentions from them, even though they intend the best for me. I guess when I was younger, I was even worse mentally and emotionally than I am right now as a college student who is seeking help. And I guess old habits are hard to break. Anyway it almost feels as if the only way for my family and for people to recognize the extent of my shame, insecurity, and self-loathing would be for me to be nonbinary. Otherwise, definitely nobody will understand, but if I am nonbinary and truly making a statement, then maybe people will understand the emptiness inside of me. And additionally, now I can incorporate my mental health journey more seamlessly into my identity. Having my identity reflect my mental health journey is so important because all of the stuff started to unravel right after I graduated high school, and my five hospitalizations over the past 4 or so years has definitely battered my sense of self. I feel like I need to be nonbinary as opposed to a woman because I feel like that's the only way that would allow others to truly know me, since I myself am deeply aware of what harms and ruins will befall me if I feel as if I am living a life in hiding from my true self.
I dont understand what i just read
Yeah, I was overthinking it, and it does read like a rant. Basically, I am saying that I have a serious mental illness, that it came way before I decided to become nonbinary, that my mental illness afflicted me during the formative years of my life (right after high school graduation), that I understand that I can do a lot of things to compensate for my past and be more than my past, and that my parents believe that downplaying my mental illness will be the most beneficial for me. However, because the mental afflicted me during the most formative years of my life - right when I was about to begin college - I cannot help but to realize that my mental health journey is the most constitutive component of my identity. And yet, during the course of my mental illness before I first got treatment, I did so much embarrassing, horrible, and negative stuff. Up until I came out as nonbinary, I literally dissociated from my childhood and my own personal memories for so long. I just so hated myself, and I felt trapped by my misadventures and indiscretions. I was filled with shame, insecurity, and self-loathing. I knew that I couldn't be adequately Christian or adequately a woman because of the stuff that I put my body through. So now, to put the past behind, I am coming out as nonbinary. My family and my parents have already move on, but for me, it will take identifying as a different gender to actually move on. Plus, I really think my family and my parents fail to realize just how much of a blow the mental illness is to my sense of self and personal perception of my life trajectory. All of this happened during my college years. I feel like it will take a different gender identity for my family and my parents to truly know how I am doing on the inside. I want to be true to myself and to be honest with myself. Being honest with myself means that I accept my struggles with mental illness for what they are, being honest with myself means that I create my identity so that it validates my never-ending quest to find escape, and being honest with myself means that I will be able to truly be authentic and transparent with people from the very beginning. I feel that a nontraditional gender identity allows me to fulfill all of these goals.
Nice!
Sounds like you are what used to be called "asexual".
There is nothing wrong with being asexual, and people have been asexual since time immemorial.
It is not something you "fix" or "cure". It is just a point on the sexual spectrum.
Not so sure it is truly a mental illness. Today, seems like medical professionals have to compartmentalize everyone. That's not realistic and not healthy. People are different. You are likely a little more unique than most.
But being asexual or nonbinary should not be the defining factor in your life. It is a characteristic and part of you. But certainly not all of you.
Hundreds of years ago, people did not have to firmly define themselves. Maybe because life was quite difficult and even procuring food and shelter was a constant problem for most.
You express yourself beautifully; I am sorry you have experienced so much pain.
Understand that people have no right to label or judge you. I wish you happiness and peace.
Thanks so much for your positive feedback. I knew that I would reap rewards by being honest and expecting the best from others. Especially considering that some users happen to feel concerned about the impact that LGBTQ would have on the social order (especially on children and the process of socializing kids, having community values, and seeing that children develop normally), that straight-ness and heterosexual-ness would gradually disappear, that families could be threatened by LGBTQ, that society is devoting too much unnecessary political and public attention to what would best be personal and private, and that the world is so unfriendly to straight people today (since our media culture really prioritizes difference and diversity above all else so the people who just hold their heads down and to the right thing feel like they are being ignored and getting no recognition, and since we are all confused why the media would recognize those who play to the whims of difference and diversity to such an extreme degree). I felt that way in the past as well, until I realized that the language of transgender/asexual/whatever you want to call it gives me a language to truly make sense of my mental health journey and incorporate that into my personal story. Now I am able to explain what I went through without needing to memorize the DSM5. I agree that this transgender/asexual/whatever you want to call it is just a characteristic of mine and not all of me. For that reason alone, it was very important for me to journal about this and get it out, since keeping it all in will only trigger more dysphoria and depression.
You have judged yourself quite harshly without real reason. Figure that there are many people who are "different" but lived interesting and rich lives.
Take a break and look at others who lived life differently:
James Gray/Hannah Snell; Petter Hagberg/Britter Nilsdotter; Albert Cashier/Irene Hodgers; Marinus; Denis Smith/Dorothy Lawrence; Malinda Blalock; James Barry/Margaret Ann Bulkley; Chevalier d'Eon; Billy Tipton.
All born female but lived their lives as something different at certain times.
Everyone has a story. Especially you.
Thanks so much for that great advice. I will take a look at these people’s life stories.
My advice would be to not worry so much about gender identity or any other identity. Craving for identity is unnecessarily stressful.