It always depends but tbh I hope you feel free to use whatever terminology you find useful to describe yourself! and I think there’s no valor that can be stolen, identity is what you make for yourself. It’s always a joy to learn someone I know is queer in any form. Lots of us have had times where we’ve doubted how we describe ourselves too and gatekeeping labels doesn’t tend to help anyone. You will come across people who do here and there, I did myself, but in my super objective opinion they’re annoying, smell bad, and stifle people just trying to figure themselves out. Labels are just tools for further conversation and more people using queer labels is a good thing.

+1 to this for sure. Applies for gender identity too. Speaking just for myself, the longer it’s been since I transitioned the less my actual labeled identity has mattered, to the point that these days I just say “nonbinary” and move on. It’s what makes a lot of the “what is a woman” rhetoric baffling, given the label and definition matters so little in day to day life.

My bf comes off pretty much straight, but he describes himself as pansexual and attracted to feminine people. It’s cool to see him engage with the queer community despite being more or less able to “pass” as cishet if he wanted to, and his nebulous labeling was really helpful in settling my nerves as a newly-out trans woman. Less worrying about whether or not I was woman enough, more just hearing him say he likes me and that’s that.

Was just about to post IDLES here myself. It goes and it goes and it goes

Yep absolutely!

For me, it felt like my life was quickly progressing away from a youth I was not ready to leave for inexplicable reasons. In the end I ended up taking a nuclear option once I realized how uncomfortable I was with my future, and while it’s not been easy it’s been absolutely worth it.

Even though you may be stuck in the same habits and mistakes, they can be rewritten and you’ll be surprised how quickly life changes once you find what makes you authentically happy. A lot can happen in 3 years and I guarantee you’ll still be young at 24. You can still be young at twice that. There’s a lot of life ahead of you, especially once you take calculated risks to improve your future and make the most of the youth you still have. You may not know what exactly will make you happy, but trust in yourself and your judgement to find it as you go.

Wasn’t really allowed to harbor or express anger as a kid. Now I can’t summon an ounce of rage, even when it’s appropriate and helpful. It’s not ideal, so I spend a lot of time meditating, dropping away other emotions in hopes of finding a spark of something in there. Nothing yet, but I’ve found a number of other useful things in the process.

Mindfulness is a great skill to build to debug issues like this. It’s slow, painful sometimes, and doesn’t always feel worthwhile, but it’s definitely worth taking the time to try meditating to get closer to your base emotions and how they appear.

Worth remembering too that what you’re looking for probably isn’t a huge shift in thinking, at least in the short term. Incremental progress over time is all it takes. Some people are shades of tightly wound and that’s okay. You’re who you are for a reason and it’s worth being kind to yourself when unhelpful thoughts appear. Not to excuse yourself of behavior you don’t want to maintain, but to care for and guide yourself toward a simple step in the right direction.

Escapism is a valid reason to enjoy music, but catharsis is a thing for some too. Sometimes it’s helpful to hear someone artfully articulate something I feel but haven’t put words to. When I’m frustrated with the world I put on some Against Me, rage about things for a bit, and then feel better.

It really depends on the sport imo. Trans women may retain some more muscle and some parts of the skeleton are largely unaffected, but muscle elasticity, hip rotation, flexibility, and endurance all end up being more dependent on hormones than birth sex in the long term. How much these things matter varies a lot from sport to sport, and the current system is not sufficient to balance these traits even among people of the same sex. Multiple leagues based on broad body types sounds reasonable, but I have no idea how complicated the rules would have to be to make it completely fair, given we already accept a great deal of unfairness currently.

Yeah, I think that’s pretty much all that is generally needed. I’ve had people assume but ask me first, just asking “she/her?” as a question, I respond yes, we go about our business. If you don’t want to assume, you can also pretty much universally use they/them in passing, or if it’s someone you interact with more frequently, people really don’t tend to mind if you ask.

I mean I’m trans, I get around quite a bit in queer spaces, I haven’t met anyone who would get super mad about initially assuming pronouns rather than just saying “hey I prefer XYZ” and moving on. Generally when people react strongly to being misgendered, it’s due to ongoing conflict over their identities, having to deal with people who use pronouns to casually disregard your Identity, familial abandonment, etc. It is often a response to complex trauma from elsewhere. That’s not really your responsibility, but I’ve been there and if you can offer them any grace in those moments, it’s extremely helpful.

Borderlands?

I love spicier ginger beers and sarsaparilla, they’re so much less sweet and have a lot more flavor

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