Genderfluid: “Now I know who I am”

Carla Hernando, 26, has never felt like she fit into a particular genre. Then, when covid-19 took hold in March 2020, she had plenty of time alone to reflect on her identity.

The journey continued during Pride month in June, when Hernando found an article and a documentary about non-binary gender identities, from the publication Time Out Barcelonawhich further opened her mind to the possibilities that exist beyond the gender binary of “woman” or “man”.

“[España] it is far behind in terms of gender”, believes Hernando, who lives in Barcelona, ​​and uses the pronouns “they” and “she”.

“I didn’t know what non-binary meant. I’ve felt completely different all my life”. But the more education she received about the range of possibilities outside of the gender binary of “woman” or “man,” the more she felt she related to it.

That experience was the gateway to another discovery: the term “fluid gender.” Hernando felt that it was an even more apt description for his gender identity.

“One day I wake up and I feel more feminine, and I might want to wear a crop top and put on earrings. And then there are times when I think, ‘I need my (chest) girdle to minimize (the appearance of my breasts)’, because I feel that way”, they say.

The lived experience of gender fluidity—wearing a shapewear one day and a more feminine outfit the next—is what ultimately helped Hernando discover that the term applied to them.

The concept “gender fluidity” manages to better describe the way where some people feel they fit outside of the gender binary.

The term acknowledges that gender does not have to be fixed and de-emphasizes the need to align with a specific genre, a concept that more and more people are moving away from, as conversations about alternative ways of expressing and experiencing gender proliferate. .

Gender fluidity has become even more visible as celebrities like Miley Cyrus, Ruby Rose, and Cara Delevingne embrace it in the public eye.

The term is difficult to define precisely because it describes a wide variety of people and experiences, experts say.

“There are as many ways to navigate gender fluidity as there are gender fluid people,” says Liz Powell, a gender fluid psychologist in Philadelphia who works with many gender fluid clients.

But at its core, she explains, gender fluidity allows people to embrace their identity and expression one day at a time, rather than feeling tied to a single overarching gender label.

For many people who are gender fluid, the discovery of the term has been liberating, helping them understand themselves and the way they live.

Gender “is not a fixed point”

The origin of gender fluidity is rooted in the notion of sexual fluidity: the idea that sexual orientations beyond straight, bisexual, or gay exist, and can change throughout a person’s lifetime.

“In many ways, our definitions of gender fluidity that we use now are taken from the language that helped us understand sexual fluidity,” says Lisa Diamond, Professor of Psychology and Gender Studies at the University of Utah, USA. who began studying the subject in the 1990s.

“We used to think that people came in two forms, straight and gay… then we realized that there are some people who feel they do not fit into either category”.

That gave rise to the term bisexual, but as Diamond explains, it didn’t work for everyone either.

“Others said, ‘That doesn’t suit me because I don’t tend to stay in a category completely consistently over time,’” Diamond says.

“Sexual fluidity was a way of trying to describe and explain that phenomenon of change, development, oscillation, growth, and sensitivity to environmental contexts… We quickly discovered that the same problem applies to gender.”

Everyone BBC Worklife spoke to for this article described gender fluidity in slightly different ways, but they all came up with the same idea: that gender is “not a fixed point”, as Powell puts it, but rather flexible and capable of changing depending on various factors, both within a person’s inner self and his external environment.

For example, certain environments can dictate how a gender fluid person expresses themselvessays Erin Davis, professor of sociology at Cornell College in Iowa, USA.

Perhaps a traditional work environment can cause a gender-fluid person to present themselves as more feminine or masculine to fit in with their colleagues, she suggests.

Like Hernando, Powell dresses differently depending on how he feels on any given day or time.

At the same time, however, Powell says that social gender norms also influence how they choose to dress to best present their gender identity.

“For me personally, because I have a very curvaceous body…if I wear clothes that are feminine, people will just see me as a woman and not put me out of the category of a woman,” Powell explains.

To better portray that they are not simply a woman, Powell tends to dress in more masculine outfits so that others are more likely to recognize her gender fluidity.

However, Davos says it’s important to note that someone’s gender expression on any given day doesn’t necessarily have to reflect how they perceive their own gender identity in general.

For example, on days when Hernando appears outwardly more feminine, she does not necessarily identify with being a woman.

Living as gender fluid

Long before learning about gender fluidity, Hernando, who was assigned female at birth, felt different from those who identified as male or female.

Even in childhood, they say, his mother remembered that Hernando “wanted to be a boy.”

However, as Hernando got older, they realized that his gender was not as simple as “wanting to be a boy”.

But without a name to describe how they felt, they stuck with the default option: female.

“I felt like it was supposed to be a woman, but maybe that meant it was a more masculine woman,” they say. “I wasn’t comfortable with that either, so she was a constant that didn’t fit anywhere.”

Now, Hernando feels “freedom” in “not giving shape to the genre,” they say. They express that freedom both in the way they dress and in the way they interact with others.

Hernando has noticed that there are fewer automatic assumptions that he should play a certain gender role among acquaintances, and they are better able to communicate what they want or need.

In the past, for example, if a cisgender man addressed them as a “very pretty girl,” Hernando says they could have played along and even tried to act more feminine.

Today, Hernando responds to such comments by stating his gender identity and preferred pronouns. If the person doesn’t respect that, it’s a red flag for Hernando and they stay away.

But there are also challenges. Although él’s parents eventually accepted él’s gender identity, Hernando still had trouble explaining to él’s mother the concept of using genderless pronouns. And friends sometimes ask intrusive questions, like “What kind of bathroom do you use?”

Besides, there are still places where Hernando are not as comfortable publicly identifying as gender fluid.

For example, many medical offices still require patients to identify themselves as “male or female” on intake forms. “If I go to the gynecologist and I want to talk to her about [identidad de género]Receiving this form is starting to make me a little anxious,” says Hernando, “because I think, will he understand what I need to tell him?”

Overall, though, Hernando says that understanding themselves as gender fluid has been a blessing.

“Because I know who I am, I can set very clear limits when I relate to certain people, limits that I didn’t set before because I felt like I had to please everyone all the time to be accepted,” says Hernando.

For example, they have been able to be more explicit with others about what is comfortable for them sexually. “I have made the pleasure of this body a priority, whatever the aspect of that pleasure,” they say, a priority that has made it easier to find partners who show respect for Hernando and make them feel safe.

More youth expressing gender fluidity

Some data indicates that experiences like Hernando’s may be on the rise.

According to Diamond’s 2020 research, the number of children and adolescents reporting gender identities or expressions that differ from what they were assigned at birth is growing.

In a 2018 study of more than 80,000 Minnesota 9th and 11th graders, 3% said they viewed themselves as “transgender, queer, genderfluid, or unsure of their gender identity.”

In a magazine survey Splinter Cited in Diamond’s 2015 article, in which researchers surveyed more than 1,000 young adults, more than half of millennials said they “believe that gender exists on a spectrum and should not be limited to male and female categories.” .

However, Diamond believes that this does not indicate that gender fluidity is a new phenomenon.

“The increase in expressions of gender fluidity does not mean that a new experience is taking place in the world,” she notes.

“There is a new vocabulary available to describe what has been happening in the world.”

That vocabulary, he suggests, has been widely disseminated via the internet. “[Internet] gave to people in their basements who had never heard of transgender or queer or nothing, from Mozambique to France and Nebraska, [la capacidad] to find instantly and without financial cost their experiences reflected in the voices of others”, he says.

“That was unthinkable for those of us coming of age… in the pre-internet era.”

Since Hernando says they haven’t seen extensive conversations about gender fluidity in Barcelona, ​​and Spain in general, they have relied heavily on the internet for information.

In particular, they have turned to the social media accounts of non-binary or gender fluid people in the US and UK, where they see these conversations happening more widely and openly.

“It seems that there is more awareness about this than here”, they say, and add, about Spain, that “we are on the right track”.

Although they feel there is still work to be done, Hernando is in a positive placeparticularly because they no longer feel the need to please people who assign gender characteristics to them, such as those who call them “pretty girl”.

As Hernando says, “something really powerful happens when…you don’t need that validation anymore [de otros sobre tu identidad]Because you’re really happy with who you are.”