LGBTQ+ Advice

Part 8- Being non-binary

Inspired by QueerLockHolmes (obviously) also read his book because it's really insightful and interesting. It's aimed towards pansexual people & people questioning whether they identify as any non-binary gender. Mostly just a good book that's worth reading if you want to widen your knowledge of the lgbt community 💜

Okay so I know that this is a lesbian advice book but I want to talk about being non-binary and how I decided/discovered it and the struggles and so on so here we go. I would like to just say that at the time of the events described I was suffering with depression.

I discovered that I was nonbinary about a year ago now. I remember the run up to it pretty well. As well as feeling depressed and very self conscious of my body, we were studying JB Priestley's An Inspector Calls in my English class. If you don't know the play, it's about a girl named Eva Smith who is bullied and has her life ruined by four members of the same family and their daughter's finacé. The play is based in England, 1912 and had themes such as capitalism, socialism, equality, sexism running throughout it. In order for people to notice that the play is based in a sexist society, my English teacher made sexist comments about the female characters, trying to get people to respond but nobody did. Eventually this got annoying so I stood up for me and all the other girls in my class (other girls because I identified as cisgender/female back then). This happened several times in class. I would get really riled up (or "triggered") by a comment and all the people in my class would be shocked because I got into really deep debates with my teacher in front of everyone about gender and sexism and the ethics of prostitution. Eventually people realised that the term for being anti-sexism is a feminist. So it went around school that I was a feminist and people made fun of me for being a one. Although in my English class we never mentioned any non-binary gender, the popular bully asshole kids all started saying things like "there are only two genders" "if I had a pound for every gender there was then I'd be a millionaire". When they said this and even more insulting things involving swearing, I realised that it offended me more than it should have. Why was I so passionate about genders that at the time didn't apply to me and that I didn't know much about? So I researched it, and it all clicked in my head. Maybe this was why I felt self conscious of my body, maybe I though I was just self conscious but I actually had gender dysphoria? As I delved deeper into the ethics and meanings behind being non-binary, I realised that I connected with more and more points that were shown to me.

I decided not to tell people for a while, but until I got counselling for my depression, the bullying got worse. Everyday the popular group at school would ask why I'm a feminist? How I could be so stupid as to think there were more than two genders? I couldn't bring myself to answer. It made me so upset and angry and I didn't want to lash out and give them something more to laugh at.

When I eventually did tell people, I thought that it was necessary for me to change my name and to lose weight. I changed to "Skye" for a while and I yo-yo dieted for a few weeks. I had changed my pronouns to they/them but I still didn't feel right though. The freedom I had first felt was gone and I felt alone and confused again. So I stopped being Skye, stopped using they/them pronouns, stopped my diet and went back to being Sarah. A girl.

It's now Christmas and my friends and I had put my "phase" in the back of our minds. I thought it was a phase too, which is the sad thing. At least now the bullying had died down. I'd decided to be quiet in English. Mainly because I'd be bullied if I didn't, and also because I felt judged and hurt and upset. I hadn't recently been to a doctor at the time but I had finished my counselling and presumably had stopped having depression. I was just as sad as I had been before.

Move on seven months. I've discovered that I'm a lesbian, I've finished my exams, I've had my sixteenth birthday, I've had an extended holiday due to study leave. I should be over the moon. But no, something's still not right. Instead of wikepedia I went to YouTube this time. On BBC Three's channel, I happened upon a video called "What not to say to a non-binary person" (here's the link>>> https://youtu.be/8b4MZjMVgdk) and I watched it and I saw that not all of the people in it "looked" androgynous. Some looked feminine, some looked masculine, some had large boobs, some had none at all, some had long hair, some had short hair... But they were all non-binary.  And it made me realise that I don't have to change my name, my weight or my style to be nonbinary. I realised that gender is a feeling. It's an emotion. It's a something deep down that you can't explain but you can feel it. It doesn't matter whether anyone else does or doesn't agree with you, you feel it. It's there. And it's valid. You're valid.

It was then that I went back to using they/them pronouns. I went back to being non-binary, back to where I belong.

I'm sorry if this made no sense, it's been difficult to write and it's brought back bad memories. Thank you for reading though. Remember weight, genitals and breast size do not equal gender, but they can if you want them too! 💜

Love Saz 💜💜