Are you a good witch, or a bad witch?

Today I read an interesting post about not fitting the transgender mold. It struck a chord with me, since I am also someone whose physical sex does not comfortably match their mental gender, but I also don't fit into a nice mold hat somebody else has pre-shaped for transgendered people.

I looked at the DSM-IV-TR definition for gender identity disorder, the see the criteria that must be met for a diagnosis of GID or gender dysphoria to be given. They are as follows:

1. Long-standing and strong identification with another gender
2. Long-standing disquiet about the sex assigned or a sense of incongruity in the gender-assigned role of that sex
3. The diagnosis is not made if the individual also has physical intersex characteristics.
4. Significant clinical discomfort or impairment at work, social situations, or other important life areas.

I'm not intersexed, so far as I know, so that cuts out the issue of number 3. The feeling that I don't identify with my physical sex has been recognised for years, and signs potentially relating to it can be traced back to childhood, so I believe I fit number 2. I do get profoundly uncomfortable when somebody addresses me as "lady" or "woman" or "girl", because in a single word they are fitting me with all kinds of qualities that I don't have and don't agree with. I fit number 4.

I don't fit number 1. Why? Because the "other gender" that it needs me to identify with doesn't technically exist.

I consider myself agendered, which roughly means I don't associate with being male, female, or even androgyny or third-gender. Third-gender is closer to what I feel than male or female, but it still doesn't quite fit. When I think of myself as having no gender, it's like a sense of peace comes over me, comfort with the definition and the realization that yes, this is right for me.

How does one transition into nothing? How does one find a doctor willing to help somebody become neuter?

I tried to tell a therapist about my gender identity problems in the past. I tried to explain that I was certain that I wasn't internally male, but I didn't feel female either, and disliked everything about myself that made me female. Her response was to encourage me to spend time in the local gay and lesbian community, assuming that my gender problems came from a lack of connection to my sexual orientation.

I'm fine with my sexual orientation, by the way. I'm asexual. I do not have much of a sex drive. I can become aroused, I am capable of orgasm, but the thought of having sex or engaging in sexual activity leaves me cold and uncomfortable.

I've met plenty of people who don't believe me when I say these things. They believe that I'm repressing my gender and sexuality, or that my lack of connection to a gender or sexual identity means that there's something wrong with me.

I tried, when I was younger, to be a good girl. I tried to be interested in makeup and boys and fashion. Oh sure, I found some boys cute, and had the usual teenage crushes on a few male celebrities, but that was about as far as my femininity seemed capable of going. I bought a single tube of lipstick in my teenage years, and I used it so little that I still have it. My first boyfriend was somebody whom I was more interested in fantasy RP with than any actual romance. He told me he loved me and I told him he was too young to know what love was.

Younger still, I was accused by male friends of being a boy, because I had sports toys and outdoor games more than I had girl toys. I denied it. I wasn't a boy. I didn't know then that I wasn't a girl, but I was sure enough that I wasn't a boy. I played equally with Barbies and Lego, with Polly Pocket and my soccer ball. My Barbies were often escaping from wartorn countries or on the USS Enterprise, and with Lego blocks I built up towers and then threw crude planes at them to see how many planes it would take to bring the building down. (Few children could get away with that now, I bet.)

In high school, I tried to explain to friends what I wanted in a relationships, that I wanted "the perks but to avoid the responsibility." They insisted that what I thus wanted was a fuckbuddy. I didn't have the courage or words to tell them that the responsibility I wanted to avoid was sex and the drama surrounding it, and the perks I wanted were the nonsexual parts of a romantic relationship.

I didn't know the words then to describe what I know now. Asexuality. Genderqueer. Neuter. Nonsexual. I know them now, and I know they apply now, and I suspect they applied even then.

But no matter how many years I know the words and recognize the signs, that means nothing to a lot of people because I don't fit the mold. I don't fit into the F or the FTM boxes, and so my story isn't worth much and will probably never be given due notice.

The first transgendered person I ever met was an mtf lesbian. I didn't even know then that there was a mold she broke.

I find it painfully funny sometimes that although good work has been done to break down the gender binary, we're still stuck in it. Women can transition to men and vice versa, but only that. Women can transition to men and be given therapy for it, given hormones and surgery to make their bodies fit what their mind tells them should be. Men can transition to neuter, to androgyne, and only "make lifestyle choices", and are pretty much left to deal with it on their own, or at best are encouraged to further explore their gender and sexual identities until they finally decide on one or the other.

It can only be one or the other. It can never be in between or outside, or else it isn't real.

It's little wonder, then, that I used to joke about my gender and sexuality making me a nonentity. To many people, I am not real. I am not valid. I do not exist.

TL;DR - I am sarasvati, and I am a "bad trans person."

Updates

I now have an account on Archive of Our Own, and so now have incentive to revamp a few things I've written over the past few years so that I can upload them and re-establish myself in fandom. The challenges I've accepted over the past few weeks will also help with that, undoubtedly.

I've been grinding in DreameRO for a few days and have improved Jazriyah (my Swordie), but she's still got a way to go. I'm finding it difficult to find a good place to level-build right now. I can find plenty of places that are too tough, plenty that don't offer much experience to speak of, and it seems that dungeons that are best suited to me at the moment offer piddly loot, so I can't even console myself by thinking I'm working hard to save zeny for better equipment. I think I have enough for some decent armour, though. My defense stat is low, because Jazriyah's focus is on dodging rather than taking hits, so I haven't had much of a chance to build up the stat. Same thing with my Strength stat. It's only 30 right now (at base level 50), since the guide I've been following has been advising me to dump a lot of points into AGI instead.

Admittedly, this keeps me alive in tough fights, since things have a hard time hitting me, but the comparatively small amount of damage I do in return means that I'm there longer and giving them more chances to get a hit in.

Still, it's good stress relief.

My EI claim should be going through soon, which is good. Less good is the fact that I'll only be getting about $36 a week. While that's something, it's only barely enough to buy a month's groceries if I'm extremely careful, and so most of the burden is still falling on Rei to make up the rest of the money I normally would have paid to our expenses.

Still unemployed, obviously. I ended up quite pissed yesterday when I found out that my mother was hired for a job that I was turned down for, despite the fact that I have better experience in the field. (Also I'm not an avoidant twit with a habit of lying to get out of trouble, but that never seems to come up in interviews.) If I had $10 to bet, I'd wager it on ageism once again. My mother's in her 40s, well past the age range where one tends to do stupid things. I'm in my 20s, which is still in the age range that prefers partying every weekend and getting piss drunk as often as possible. She's deemed more responsible than I am by the sole virtue of her age.

In objective reality, however, I haven't driven home drunk and then bragged about it to my friends. She has. She bragged to Rei and I and then was dismayed that we were far from impressed.

I appear to have lost a few pounds lately, according to the bathroom scales. I've been walking more often and drinking more water, which is probably the cause. I'm pleased about this, since I weigh far too much and have health problems that are exacerbated by carrying around all this excess weight.

In cleaning the kitchen two days ago, I found my old Latin textbook, and I plan to review some of the lessons to see how much I remember. Just another tool for independent study until I can go to university. It's a shame my Italian, Spanish, and German textbooks are buried somewhere in the back room, but I'll probably have an easier time with the Italian and Spanish, at least, after a Latin refresher. I remember taking Latin for the first time in high school, and I was amazed at just how much it helped me improve my French.

I had planned to go out today and pick up some groceries and rent money, but I'm feeling a bit let down by finding out the EI news, so I think I'll put that off until tomorrow. I can charge my iPod tonight and enjoy a long walk tomorrow, since I'll have to walk uptown, then to the north end, then home again in order to get everything done. That'll be about 2 hours of non-stop walking, so bringing some entertainment with me will make it less tiresome.

Now that all that's said and done, I do believe it's time for another cup of tea. You can take the Brit out of England...