Robin
PRONOUNS: THEY/THEM | TOWN SIZE: UNDER 1,000
“Pride means everything to me because I grew up without any. I hated myself for years until I woke up. I never want to go back to sleep.”
Pride means everything to me because I grew up without any. I hated myself for years until I woke up. I never want to go back to sleep.
Since childhood, I have never felt completely male or female. My identity was always an unanswered question. It felt kind of like having a pop quiz but not knowing what to expect. I kept trying to tell myself happiness comes from within, but I kept trying to people-please to be accepted.
I felt like a liar or a flake because I kept trying so hard to figure out what my gender was. My name changed several times, and I was never sure who I was.
I always felt like an outsider and was bullied. I grew up in a small town, and a rumor started that I was a lesbian, and it affected my best friend. She was really bothered by it, and I ended up losing her as a friend. It was a hard time but thankfully a history teacher I really liked had my back and had a meeting with students and addressed the bullying. The history teachers were the best teachers, and I still love history today.
What terrified me was embracing the truth that my gender changed within me on a daily basis. I thought that even though gender-fluidity existed, not a single soul could possibly understand.
I had heard the term “gender fluid” before, but I kept thinking I was transgender. I had been going in and out of the closet. I wanted to make people happy, so I thought it was easier in one regard to just pick “masculine.” People made assumptions, so I just went with it.
I realize now I was doing this because, to me, being genderfluid was scarier in one major aspect- it wasn’t a clear-cut definition. I was scared I would always feel lost in the unknown and uncertainty. I like certainty, so the uncertainty was bad!
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