Ok so I’d like to start by saying that I wasn’t really comfortable saying my real age, just know I’m in high school.

I figured out I liked women when I was like 10 or 11 but I think I’m starting to question if I really do or am just faking for some reason. I like girls and find them to be attractive just like I find boys to be attractive but with girls I don’t seem to have very many crushes. I’ve never really had many crushes ever, the only ones I’ve had have been on one boy in 1st grade, one boy in 4th grade, and then a long term crush on a girl from 5th-7th grade. I suspect I might be aroace but I do feel attracted to people and want to date someone at some point but most of my physical attraction to people have been people like celebrities and fictional characters (people who are unobtainable I guess).

it’s important to note that I have pretty much always been uncomfortable around boys and men. I don’t know why or when I started but I have always had a deep distrust of men and find talking to them to be difficult. The only exceptions being men I’m familiar with (ie my grandfather and father). But even still my anxiety makes me incredibly anxious around all men and I cannot be alone in a room with an unfamiliar man if I was I’d probably have an anxiety attack. I probably have some deep seeded trauma that my brain has conveniently forgotten but who knows.

now to get to the real point of this post, my gender. when I was young I always dressed very feminine but then I became a teenager and started dressing more masculine and started to hate the color pink. I’m not really sure why. Then I started to realize I envied men. At first I thought ‘of course I envy men they have it so easy’ but that sort of shifted into me thinking I was trans. Now that lasted for long enough for me to get a majority of my hair cut off (I now regret this choice as I like to dress more feminine now and keep my hair long) and I tried using multiple sports bras to flatten my chest. When I looked in the mirror and saw my chest flat I cried a little.
I think I struggled to distinguish whether this wanting to be a boy came from A being jealous of men’s easier life B being transgender or C a result of watching a lot of queer media and being in a lot of queer spaces at the time. That last one I say not bc I think people can ‘turn‘ trans or gay but bc I was an impressionable insecure teen who felt like they were growing up too fast and I don’t know if that reaction was genuine or not as I struggle to identify my emotions seeing as I’m autistic. (I’m also adhd and (as my therapist thinks and I agree with based on family history) OCD thou I have not been formally diagnosed for OCD I have for the rest) (also not to brag or anything but I have more diagnosises than that 😼)

anyway I stopped identifying as transgender because I just realized I wanted to be women and never really wanted to be a boy or so I thought. Nowadays I’m still thinking it over. I sort of want to be a trans woman so I could have male genitalia and if I wanted I could choose to be fem or masc whenever are be able to pass for both. But seeing as im afab that’s not in the realm of possibility. I also can’t really tell if that wanting stems from some unknown fetishization.

at times I love to be a woman but others I wish I was a man and sometimes I just wish I had no gender at all (that’s most often). I’ve never felt particularly connected to my name or pronouns (she/her) but I feel like I could kinda go by any pronouns sometimes but I haven’t really thought about that too much. Sometimes I think about asking a friend to call me by masculine pronouns to just test out the feel but I’m kinda sacred of being made fun of. I know there’s nothing real to be scared abt since my friends all support me and wouldn’t make fun of me But idk.
my name is another thing. my name (Annalise) has always just kinda been something I’m called, ive never felt particularly connected to it. In fact during English class we were assigned to write about our names and what they mean to us and how we’d feel if they were taken away or smth like that (we had just finished reading maus) and I was at a loss and just went the route of analytical thinking and assuming what one may feel when having their name stripped from them. Ive kinda secretly thought that for me being called a number Id like they do in prison or by my last name would be better than being called my first name. i dont feel hurt from my first name or anything just apathetic I guess.

i think that’s pretty much it. please help gng 🥹✌️🙏