Not male, female, or transgender...what am I supposed to be?

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Hi. Sort of new here. Right now, I am questioning and going through a serious identity crisis related to my gender. I grew up as male, then stopped thinking I was male with the feeling I had no gender, then felt I was transgender, often identifying as transgender, a transwoman, or a female interchangeably. This process included being accepted for and regularly taking hormones, which I'm still on. Since the start of October, however, I've stopped thinking I was transgender and female, so now I just think I'm a freak.

Defining my gender is important in my life. I know that my gender is not a scarlet letter that everybody sees, but I don't know how to deal with people that aren't health professionals because I don't know who I am; who I am distinguishes how I deal with certain people. Because I'm just a freak, I have no idea which role I'm supposed to take in the rare occurrences I socialize with people. It greatly effects my ability to enjoy the company of others, even the Asperger group I had to go 30 miles by bus to attend (since my city of 200,000+ has done a great job in making me feel like there is no one else who lives here that is on the spectrum and around my age), because I'm restrained in what I can talk about. I left the AS group because the identity crisis was the only thing on my mind, and I couldn't talk about it with anyone there, except for the health professional running the group. It greatly impaired my ability to get anything out of it.

I don't want to go on too long with this, so the point is I have lost my identity and I've become this freak...and I don't know how to be anything but a freak at this point because neither of the main genders appeals to me. Basically, I've completely fallen off the gender spectrum.

So...what now? Where do I go from here?

Maybe this isn't the most descriptive post but I don't know how else to put it without taking up ten pages or so.

Anyway, that's all. Thanks for reading...

Sorry, can I just clarify, do you mean that you feel like you are neither gender, and so where does that leave you? There is a lot of discussion of this here on WP. It seems that for some reason their are a lot of people with AS that feel the same way as you.

I agree it is very confusing. I have only ever spoken to my psychologist about it, she is generally very good at understanding most things about me, but was unsure how to guide me on this issue. She tried to encourage the idea, like you mentioned, that gender isn't usually something that people need to think about, and so to just let it be and let me be whoever I am without a label. This is tough though.

For me, it really is that I don't feel that I am either gender. So in this way I can feel like I'm in the wrong body, but if I were to change my body then I would most likely feel the same way still.

I'm sure that, since you've already been on hormones, that you have been in touch with a specialist in the area. I have never spoken to anyone that specializes in the area of gender. But I imagine that there are services out there to talk you through exactly this. I've thought about contacting my local service... But (although I often feel like I need some kind of support to sort this out) I scared that they won't know what to do with me. I think that maybe within the gender dysphoric community there is probably a spectrum quite similar to our own within the AS community. With lots of different combinations and levels of issues.

I hope that you can find some answers. For me the distress with the issue come in waves. Usually when I am understimulated in some other area. I'm having a rough time coping with it at the moment, but I also have a new interest that I am throwing myself into intensely to try to fill my mind with something other than my own confusion and the feeling that I am going around in circles. Goodluck.

That's correct; I don't feel like I'm male, female, or transgender...I'm just a freak right now. And I feel like I can't be any of those genders either because I don't fit in with them. Of course, I just can't keep feeling this way because I've gone a month with this identity crisis and it's been very stressful to me. It effects my ability to socialize with anybody that isn't a mental health professional or is represented by pixels on a computer screen (although the latter is a little nerve-wracking) because this question of "Who am I?" or "What am I?" is too prevalent in my mind.

I can't socialize in the real world if the first thing I want to talk about is my identity crisis, quite simply. I mean, I have computers and video games in my life, but none of those things really matter compared to the real issues in my life.

I have talked to quite a few mental health professionals about it, and two of them suggested that it's not an issue and that I should focus on my lack of a social life. When I devolved into feeling like a freak, however, one of them told me to essentially put my social life on hold; she knew that trying to be social in my current state would be too stressful for me.

I don't know...basically, I'm just wondering how I'm supposed to deal with this...hopefully, something I just wrote made sense...

Hi, I just recently went through a similar identity crisis. I totally understand what you're saying about not knowing how to relate to people without having a clear identity. I wish I had some good advice, but I just did a lot of thinking and some reading (reading assignments for my women's studies class for the section on LGBT and queer theory). I now identify as genderqueer. Basically I don't fit in either standard category, so genderqueer is a non-category label. That's how I see it anyway. I'm still pretty new to this and I'm still figuring stuff out, but I'm a lot happier with myself now that I have a gender identity. I hope you find the answers you're looking for, good luck

You may be genderqueer! Check it out. I think it describes you pretty well.

The same question boggled my mind, but after a few years of wondering, and questioning -- at some point, I asked myself the question that would eventually result in my conclusion -
Why do I have to identify with any gender group?

I'm not a she...
I'm not a he...
I'm not both...

I'm just me.

And I have, over time, become rather comfortable with that. :)

People can call me a she, or a he, or an 'it' if that makes them more at ease. And I don't mind that they do.
For in the English language, I don’t think there is a mainstream word for socially referring to someone as being 'none of the above' - and that is where I think a lot of the social problems are.


You're not a freak - your just another human being, of flesh and blood. :)
I wish you the best of luck - should such wishes be of value. Sometimes, we just have to make our own paths.