chaotic gender identities?

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i have so much trouble with this because while there are a lot of options to define gender expressions, it just becomes so complex and simplifying it into a catch-all term can be both helpful and aggravating. does anyone else feel this way?

i've been told by a few close friends over the years that from their outside perspective they consider me gender queer, and i had considered the possibility of being mildly gender queer before anyone even said anything to me, but i'm not sure if i feel comfortable with this because i am and always have been a female woman. i'm just not very feminine, quite masculine really, mentally, physically, and sexually (i am comfortable with this). I've always felt like a masculine female manly woman, not a feminine female womanly woman, if that makes sense. but i'm still a female woman, and i know this to be true. is it possible to be a female woman and also be gender queer? idk these questions and no one else can answer them for me but if anyone has personal experiences or anything else to share please do!

You could be a demigirl, partly female but partly not.

You are you. That's a pretty catch-all term, eh?

^I second the notion! --Except that I'm also a kitty.

You seem to like yourself as you are; and your boyfriend doesn't seem to mind, either. Whether it's "queer" or whatever, it doesn't really matter. You are you.

I've known many women, attractive women, who have some masculine traits. It doesn't really bother me.

As far as sex is concerned, I like a woman to "look like a woman." Androgyny doesn't turn me on, though I feel people have a right to be whatever they want to be. It just doesn't arouse me.

I also like a woman who has opinions and speaks up for herself. Saying this, I once went out with a woman who dressed in torn up jeans and t-shirts all the time. She was gorgeous, though!

Sometimes, when a woman is extremely feminine, and spends all her time on makeup and stuff, it can irritate me. It's like she faints at every little thing. And that phony laugh irritates me, too.

What's wrong with just being plain old butch? Butch girls can be fabulous, and no less women because they're more masculine in appearance or interests. I suppose people think butch girls somehow have to be queer by default, possibly because many lesbians are I guess (or at least visibly) but I've known butch girls who were more masculine than their rugby mates, and still identified as straight women. A high percentage of female feminists I've known have been butch, too, and they're all over women's rights and identifying as straight out women.
Some genderqueers can be gender fluid and more male one day, female the next, not particular anything another day, but it looks as if you're strong in your female identity as a woman. My 2c would be to resist others telling you how you get to express being a woman. So you're masculine, so what. If you identify as a woman, that's what you are, and you can glory in that however you choose to.

it's not really an internal dilemma for me it has more to do with understanding myself from outside myself. i'm lowkey involved in the kink community and everyone in it seems to have such a clear understanding of their oftentimes complex identities and are able to accurately express those to others, so that's how this question arose. i am queer in who i'm attracted to but the gender thing has never been clear to me.

C2V, thanks so much for your 2 cents, you're a smart cookie i hadn't thought of the possibility of being butchy outside of a lesbian context.

I've found that often, other people will grab onto an identity to feel grounded. In reality though, they turn out to be very much more complex but don't want to question the label or category they've given themselves. Also, it takes...time, experience and well, making mistakes to find a category that fits. And sometimes you have to craft your own or modify existing ones to make a good fit. Some people end up sounding like a complex Starbucks drink order, but only when they have to sum themselves in fifteen words or less.

You can be female-identified but gender queer / fluid /andro expressive, or as C2V said, butch (or soft butch) expressive. Or, you can just express yourself as you feel most comfortable and let others try to figure you out if they really feel the need to put a label on you. Soon enough, they'll let you know what they've decided.

Most of the butches I've known were *not* gay, btw.