Having a Nonhuman Gender While Being Partially Human

every once in a while, someone in the community talks about how much they hate being nonhuman, or otherkin, or whathaveyou. it's undeniable to them that they are nonhuman, but either they dont like their type, they hate being nonhuman in general, and/or just want to live their human life unmarred by nonhuman feelings.

but i've never seen anyone (within the alterhuman nor queer communities) truly talk about how much they hate what their their gender is. and i dont mean like, internalized transphobia; i mean, has done the work, figured out their gender, knows it and can describe it, and still at the end of the day hates it--hates that their gender is that specific gender, hates the expected presentation of that gender, hates that the gender feels correct.

i do, and im going to talk about it.

i was raised a human girl. i've always hated being seen and treated as a girl. i've always been a tomboy, drawn to boyish likes and habits, and as long as i can remember i've stated "i'm not a girl." my favorite color is blue, i like cargo pants and t-shirts and short hair, but have always been emotionally bullied into long hair, skirts, and feminine cut shirts.

but no matter how many times i've stated "i wish i'd been born a boy", there's still a part of me that is feminine--not in the frilly, high voice, dresses in all pink way that humans have assigned femininity. i'm deisgender--i'm a goddess, and that is very much tied to being river deity. i wouldnt be myself, nor my gender without my nurturing instincts and nature, nor the duality of calm fluidity versus explosive destruction.

femininity is at my core and yet i hate admitting it, even to myself. mentioning it feels wrong, painful even. in this human world, femininity doesnt fit my human identity; instead, it is tied to my deityhood, which is only a part of my current identity. my human gender presentation and identity is butch. it is as much a compromise as it is an identity i am actually comfortable in; it is the masculine i wish i had been born into, yet acknowledges the femininity of the nonhuman part of me that makes up part of my identity.

being on testosterone was a great time for my gender dysphoria, but considering that my nonhuman identity is a reptile, nothing short of animalizing HRT could ever give me the body that i truly would feel comfortable in, so passing as a butch woman gets as close to the body map as i can as a mammal. and it sucks. i feel like i have two genders, and honestly i could probably use the term bigenderfluid as the pain of calling myself female/feminine/woman can be dull or sharp depending on the day, but it's never zero.

it's not helped by the fact that all my alterhuman 'types except one are/were female--goddess, indoraptor, maned lioness, rapunzel, sypha, survivor/managarmr... all female. all identify as, with, or as previously. i think about them, and acknowledge them as me, but with that pang of loathing that the identity is female--that i am feminine. not that THEY are female, but that i, with that remnant, am again reminded of being female.

truly the one time that i feel comfortable being seen as feminine is when women/feminine individuals are able to take comfort in my femininity. it hits the nurturing/protective instinct square in the feels, but even then i lament living in a world where one feels safest with someone who doesnt even like being their gender.

it sucks. i hope there's no one else out there that feels like this. but if there is, know you're not alone.