I have a strong sense of self, of who I am – but I often lack the vocabulary to convey it to others who might ask. To make it easier, I simply say that I am a trans man. Yet I feel that this is not completely correct. Yes, I am ftm trans, my pronouns are he/him and I want to be perceived as masculine so to be gendered correctly. Yet the designation „trans man“ doesn’t sit with my 100%, and neither does non-binary or genderfluid.

I am not confused.

But I’m having a hard time explaining it. FtM trans would be the most fitting, since male is what I am – even though my body, my gender appeared to be female at birth. I was not born in the wrong body; I am just aligning my appearance with my inner sense of self so as to live in the most harmonious way as possible, being able to recognise myself in the mirror for who and what I am.

My spirit, my soul, my innermost self is male; but within me, there also exist parts of female, and it is good. I wouldn’t want to change that, nor deny it, or be ashamed of it. Both are there yet I know that I am male.

But I also know that at the same time that I want to appear as unmistakingly male, I don’t need to conform to all the occidental western male stereotypes abounding around me.

I don’t find myself in the western binary system, neither in the „counter system“ that also, in some ways, builds and depends on the binary since it was constructed in reaction to it. What I need is a whole new system. My roots are not in the white western „christian“ society with which I have never been able to identify, and therefore I need to look elsewhere for identification.

My sense of self will not change.

But being able to extend hands to those who know what I talk about and feel the same makes you feel less alone and less weird, less crazy. On the other hand, who says that being weird is a bad thing?