I’m fairly new to all of this. I started questioning 3-4 weeks ago and feel like I’m kind of figuring some things out in my mind, but also like I’m at a roadblock or a fork in the road. I feel like to see where I need/want to go next, I need to explore, but I don’t know how. I’ve heard about playing a game or whatever online and use a different identity, but it’d be hard to cram another game in enough for that to feel useful. I could try on some clothes, but that feels so limited in what it tells me. I’m sure it could be related to the fact that over time I have been convincing myself there’s not boy/girl clothes, they’re just fabric anyone can buy. (I think some of this came to be when my first child was conceived and we specifically avoided gendering kids things) Maybe I’m just looking for a way to get confirmation about what I think I’m feeling?
When you were discovering yourself, what did your journey look like? What do I do? Do you have any advice?
I’m open (and less panicked) about the ideas of some identity possibilities, but still when I think deeply, “how do I really feel about myself?” I just feel kind of empty, or a void. Any advice or guidance at all would be super helpful and much appreciated!
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Let yourself explore in a way that feels safe to you! Try clothes, try names, try pronouns, try presenting yourself differently in person or online, look at yourself in ways you haven’t before. Do new things, and try your best not to hold yourself back out of discomfort. In the first months after discovering my identity I tried on so many clothes. I shaved my legs, my underarms. I havent done so in years nowadays but at the time it was some of my first experiences with my own femininity.
Spend time with people you feel comfortable tlaking about this with. Be that in person, online, on voice chat, in games, whatever it may be. Ask them who they think you are, ask them who you are to them. Say it’s a mental health exercise or something. But even if that’s not possible, think of how other people perceive you. Consider how you feel about how other people perceive you. Write all the things people say you are or perceive you to be in one column, and then in the next column write how those perceptions make you feel. Maybe even write down some of the ways you want people to perceive you. Those feelings can tell you something about who you are, about who you want to be.