On being non-binary and bigender and the fear of coming out to the family

Bigender people sometimes feel male, other times female. (Illustration photo. Original photo: Nadofotos, gender switch in Faceapp).

In this guest post Jemimah writes about being non-binary and bigender and the fear of coming out to their family. Jemimah is assigned male at birth, but they may switch between a male and a female gender identity.

By Jemimah

I was recently asked whether writing help me deal with my gender complications.  The answer is possibly.

A follow-up might be to ask about reading. I do a lot of reading; I am, for instance,  about to go and follow the Silk Road to China. But while the Chinese situation in Xinjiang is interesting,  it is not directly relevant to the topic of this blog post.

Non-binary and bigender identities

I have read lots of books on transgender issues recently, though. One book in particular did provide some relief. It was Trans Britain: Our Journey from the Shadows, a collection of essays arranged by Christine Burns.

It is a complete history of all modern activities in the non-straight world in Britain and has, for instance,  some surprisingly encouraging accounts of straight politicians helping the LGBT community.

The book probably caught my eye because included in it is an essay on non-binary identity, by Meg-John Barker, Ben Vincent and Jos Twist. Non-binary is, as they point out, the most common umbrella term for people who experience their gender as neither male nor female:

"Non-binary people can have a fluid experience of gender, experiencing themselves as more male, more female, both or neither, at different times. Other non-binary people experience themselves as somewhere between male and female, or as a separate third category, for example."

Their main focus is on the area somewhere in between male and female. This may be the more common condition. They think that about one in 250 identify themselves as other than male or female.

The non-binary identities they are discussing are not necessarily bigender in the sense that I, Rick/Ria [a 26 year old British bigender person] and the neuroscientists V.S. Ramachandran and L.K. Case understand it, though.  I believe myself to have, one at a time, a male and a female gender.

Crossdresser, Transgender, Bigender: In Search of an Explanation

A gender variant person explores their gender identity, their sexuality and what has made them who they are, with a special emphasis on being bigender.

By Guest Author Jemimah/Jeremy

Recently I bought my first reasonably lifelike wig. This, together with some good concealer I bought a little earlier, are my first steps towards creating an ‘en femme’ persona which is not laughable. Good – but is it taking me into a different world.

Two or three years ago, when I first realised that I was at least attracted by the idea of crossdressing, I wrote a rather wild note entitled ‘why me, why now’.

I now feel the need to do something more rational and try to work over the ideas which relate to where I am – which I think for the moment is bigender. Lots of wandering the web and reading books has provided lots of theories and opinions and probably most of it is covered somewhere on the Crossdreamers web site but I wanted to work it out myself.

Brain types

Also I wanted my understanding to be based on academic, or at least unemotional, sources.

The bigender sex switchers

A new study by Vilayanur S Ramachandran and Laura Case covers a transgender group that has gotten little if no coverage: the bigendered. These are people who experience a blending or alteration of gender states.

A new understanding of sex and gender

The variety of gender-challenging conditions seems to be growing day by day. Maybe it is the fact that scientists are finally beginning to realize that nature thrives on diversity and does not really care about our cultural stereotypes, or maybe it is caused by a morbid curiosity for new "perversions".

Regardless: The new concepts may make it easier for transgender people to gain respect for their humanity and unique abilities.

By the way: Vilayanur S. Ramachandran and Laura Case do not consider gender variants perverts or paraphilicas, and treat transgender with respect.

The study is based on a questionnaire sent out to members of a bigender internet forum. The researchers excluded individuals with personality and identity disorders.

Bigender 

The authors point out that sex and gender are most commonly considered a single entity, but dissociations between external morphology, gender identity, body image sex, and sexual orientation demonstrate that at least four components interact together create a consistent - or less consistent- sex and gender identity for any given individual:

" Bigender individuals who alternate gender present a unique case where single components of sex and gender may vary within an individual."

That is: one day the person may feel like a woman, the next as a man.  A majority of the respondents reported that their gender switches at least weekly.