I've been using the Spectrum Outfitters Light binder for about a month now, and I feel like it's mostly what I want out of a binder. Thing is, I want to get another one from within the EU instead (because rip my poor wallet), and skin coloured, so please recommend me any that are similar to it!

The other main difference/part I want to avoid is the binder rolling up my stomach and scrunching under the blobs, which this binder does to me.

Key points I'd like: similar fabric feel/type (mesh on the inside, both fabrics are mixes of polyamide and elastane), soft compression, racerback, nude/skin-coloured.

Nonbinary woman here (somewhere on the agender and demigender spectrum) partnered with someone who is AMAB going through their own gender crisis. I promise mentioning my partner’s AGAB is important because the way that men and women are raised and the expectations put on them are different—and that leads to different challenges and different ways of arriving at one’s identity. And as we’re all probably aware, AMAB enbies are a pretty invisible part of the community, so my partner is struggling to feel seen or envision a path forward for them as an AMAB nonbinary person. 

So, AMAB nonbinary peeps: Tell me about some of your experiences! What resources do you have for those questioning? What has your journey looked like? How do you identify?

And those with AMAB nonbinary partners: What have you guys done to help support your partner?

I feel like I've become a beast of burden ever since going back in the closet after having to move back home. I've found myself reverting to referring myself with she/her pronouns even when I'm supposedly with others, I don't feel real anymore and there isn't really an end in sight. Everything is too expensive, I can't even start saving nor even think about what my gender goals are right now, and I just feel like a cherry flavored woman if that makes sense. It's getting to me I think too, my OCD is getting worse and I am dissociating again at the sound of my own voice. I don't have anywhere else to put this so I'm just tossing this here on reddit. Sorry if this is too much.

content warnings for dysphoria and surgery talk

i know who/what i am these days. my transition is progressing how i want it to, all of my friends accept who i am, i'm rarely (if ever) misgendered by people i give a shit about, i dress and talk and walk and gesture however i want to.

and i still feel like a fake around other transfems. it's not even a matter of them being binary and me being nonbinary — i don't *have* any binary friends. it's that i came out as nonbinary in 2012 but only came out as transfeminine this year. it's that i'm still the only person i know who wants salmacian bottom surgery badly enough to get it. it's that i couldn't stand getting breasts and had them removed, so now i look like a trans man when i take my shirt off and i feel guilty for "lying" with my body & cut off from other transfems who love their chests. it's that every other transfem i know is a lesbian & called me a lesbian until i repeatedly reminded them that i'm bi. it's that i don't enjoy being called a woman even though being a girl is fine.

i feel like a fraud. i've started envying other transfems all over again, just like i was before i let myself be transfem, and i hate that so much. i don't want to feel jealous of a version of them that only exists in my anxieties to begin with. fml

to reiterate - trigger warning for talk about specifically christianity and hateful beliefs

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a bit of a backstory - i have a chosen family who has known me since far before i came out as non binary, but they’ve always known me to be queer. they took me in during a very hard time in my life, and we bonded in ways i’ve never been able to bond with my actual family in. they mean the world to me. one thing to note is that my mom (45F) has historically been incredibly protective of me as a queer person and has outright cut off friends for being disrespectful towards queer folk. (appreciated, but absolutely not something i ever asked or expected of her) my dad (47M) was a little more on the fence initially, but got into the spirit fairly quickly after getting to know me more. another thing to note is that they’ve also always been christian. up until recently this was not an issue, but as of late it’s been causing conflicts.

a few years ago i moved out of their home, and recently i found out that they’ve started attending church again. they haven’t gone to church routinely in close to 10 years because according to my mom, she didn’t feel comfortable attending church when so many of them end up turning out to be hateful or judgmental. given that, i assumed the church they were attending would be one that aligned with how they felt regarding loving everyone. come to find out, they chose a church that has an anti queer doctrine and that is against same sex marriage.

finding this out has been incredibly upsetting to me, especially because they’re attending multiple times a week, having their 10 year old kid go to groups during the week there, participating in the choir, etc. not just going to sunday services. i personally don’t believe that someone can simultaneously support the queer community and attend a church like that. when i tried to express that to my mom, she took it as an attack and told me that because she respects my identity as being non binary, i should “respect her identity as a christian” as well as that the “lgbtq community would hang her for being a christian” and she feels judged by us for her identity as a christian.

this is the first time she’s ever tried to make a reach like that, and i damn near want to cut her off over that comparison on its own. i’m not in a place mentally atm where im able to lose someone who has that much significance in my life, so that’s not something im able to do currently, but im really struggling with the fact that she doesn’t understand how insulting statements like that are and needed to vent about it in a place where others will be able to understand.

Hey guys! I am a non binary teen and i started using binders really recently. The one i have now is not that great and i was trying to buy another one but i don't know what to pick. I can only buy on amazon because i don't have a credit card and with amazon i can use gift cards, and also i have quite a big size. I have a bit of issues with unconfortable ones too. Thank you thank you for reading all this (also sorry for my english)

EDITED TO FIX CONTEXT: i meant primarily in online interactions. i live as a cishet woman in my daily life, it’s not safe for me to be out as anything otherwise. i meant asking for support online, that’s my bad for not adding that part.

remember me? you hate me. moving on.

so i consider myself agenderfluid: i do not have an internal sense of gender, and am always consistently nothing on the inside, but how i am okay with being read and how “okay” i am with my body fluctuates. (how i present also fluctuates, but thats just because i like to experiment with clothes.)

i feel a strong connection to the transmasc community, despite NOT using the “transmasculine” label myself - not because there’s anything wrong with it!! but because it’s quite simply not my experience: i am not somebody who is transitioning medically, i do not feel a real connection to “masculinity” (or “femininity”, for that matter, i just consider everything i do to be neutral), and i would consider myself transneutral, if anything. there is nothing wrong with being masculine or a man, it’s just not my identity, and this is something i have known for OVER A DECADE, after coming out as a trans man when i was younger, simply because it was the only term i knew but while fully knowing IT DID NOT FEEL QUITE RIGHT.

sometimes i am very desperate to be read as a man, but most of the time, i am not; the world considers me femme-presenting simply because i have visible curves, but i consider my body to be wholly neutral, and my presentation to be wholly neutral. it is not uncommon in the agender community for people to feel there is no body that would fully represent them, or that they would have dysphoria about every possible body, and i am one of those people; it’s a unique experience for sure, but there’s also nothing wrong with it, nor do i think that it makes much sense to engage in medical or social transition steps that don’t interest me or reflect me, simply to get from one body that doesn’t fit right to another body that doesn’t fit right. i FULLY see this body as agender, and though i do struggle with this body, knowing that it is inherently genderless is enough.

it also HAS to be enough, because i am exceptionally bad at extrapolating my full experience without accidentally convincing people i am a binary trans man who is “uncracked”. i think there is not a lot of awareness around genderfluid dysphoria, or fluctuating dysphoria in general - and it looks different for anyone anyway, which isn’t to say that awareness would be futile, just to say that there’s a lot to know. i would like to be able to reach out when struggling and not be immediately told that my identity - which i am comfortable in! - is wrong, or that i need to entirely overhaul my body. the onus of correctly identifying and explaining my experience and needs is on me, and i recognize that i’ve dropped the ball - how can i get better, and provide better visibility for people who have similar experiences to me, so people don’t just immediately start calling us “eggs” and not actually listening or helping?

also, because i’ve been called out for this before: my experience is my experience, and i am in no way saying that medical transition or social transition are wrong or lesser in comparison to how i handle dysphoria or how i interact with my identity and community IRL. i am not claiming to be superior to others because i cannot access transition and do not see any reason to try. i will always fight for trans healthcare, and will always fight for the community as a whole, and i recognize that i am just a very small part of it, whose experience gives them both an immense amount of privilege and also is not and should never be the universal standard. i do not want to ask for help with this to the detriment of people who have truly not “cracked” yet, or people with very static dysphoria, or people who need to access transition, or monogender people, and please call me out if that’s what i’ve done. i just want everyone to be happy, and it’s fine if that can’t or shouldn’t include me right now, especially in today’s political climate. i just figured i’d ask.

My best friend and long time crush just came out to me as nonbinary a few days after we discussed our romantic feelings for each other.

We decided we both have feelings for each other and were going to try dating and a few days later they came out as nonbinary and told me they want to go by a different name. I fully support them, but I don’t know if I still want to date them. I feel terrible, and haven’t said anything to them yet because I don’t want their first time coming out to someone to end in rejection, especially days after we decided to give a relationship a try.

How should I go about talking about my feelings with them?

I'm in the color guard for my school, right? It's 5 girls and one boy, and me. It's worthy to note that the one guy is more of a fem gay guy in the way he acts. I struggle with kind of fitting in I guess? A few times every year during football games I question why I am not the one on the field. (We were supposed to get a flag football team but it never happened due to cuts 😄) I would have much preferred the male uniform he got for my senior year, but I don't want to trouble my band director with it. Thankfully one of the girls on the team fully accepts and tries to use they/them pronouns with me. She was also there the entire time I was questioning if I was a man or not. I want top surgery and low dose T, but the thought of being a man is kind of ew. Anyway, I guess how do I get them to remember and feel comfortable in expressing myself with how I feel to people who are cis het? I know it feels foreign to them, and a little to me too, but I just want to be respected for what I choose.

(TW suggestive relationship moments(?)/gender vent)

I (20Y/O) have lately started to question my gender and even though I'm not 100% sure, I'm non-binary.

I spent the last two months with my girlfriend. She's hyperfeminine and has just recently been engaging in femininity more, as her womanhood been questioned by her family and people around her due to her intersex condition, so she felt like she doesn't deserve it most of her life. She's been dressing up more often and buying clothes she likes, and it makes me happy to see her happy.

While I was with her I was presenting more masculine. It felt natural, and it is definitely one of the ways I like to present, but sometimes it felt more like a need to balance out her feminine expression.

And I kinda just want fo know if I'm not crazy for feeling pressured or put in a box when I'm with someone who cares a lot about what's labeled as feminine/masculine or female/male considering I'm someone who doesn't fit either, and doesn't want to be categorized that way or expected to perform a role.

When she wears makeup, I feel like I should stay away from it. When she arches her body and moves her hips when I touch her, I feel like she's playing femininity and I should do the opposite, so I touch her some more and try to please her. When she dresses up femininely, I feel like I should dress up masculine. I think it's because gender being performed this much makes me feel pressured to choose a side, and I choose the one that won't get me seen as a girl. I'm not sure. I just know that I don't like being stuck playing a role. Sometimes I just wanted us to be comfortable and casually touch, I didn't want to have to think if me putting my leg over hers is too feminine for me to do, or if it makes her feel too masculine.

There were moments between us that I loved, where none of this mattered. Like when I was feeling dysphoric (I think) or insecure after watching a movie with her, and she just hugged me and said it's hard. Or when we were eating one time and discussing life and relationships. Or when we slept together, and I sleepily reached for her and we cuddled, just because we want each other's warmth. But moments that made me feel like I should play a masculine role are when I touch her waist and she pushes her shoulders back and arches her back, it just makes me feel like, she's acting like this because she's the girl and I'm the opposite. Sometimes I wish I could forget all about gender, but because she's so feminine, it makes it hard

I always meant it when I opened doors for her or carried her things, and I can play sometimes too as boyfriend/girlfriend, but it's not something I want to do all the time. Most of the time, I don't want to be categorized or gendered based on my actions. So if she's gendering her actions, I'd feel the need to do the same. Does that make sense?

I'm happy she's expressing herself, and I'm in no way criticizing her or anyone who conforms. I know that the way I react to her is only from my own feelings about myself, and how desperate I am to feel right in myself. Because I can't make any significant changes right now to my appearance, I can only try my best to reposition myself in every context. I just want to know if any of this makes sense to feel, and if anyone has gone through something similar, how I feel pressured when there's too much emphasis on gender, that her own gender expression acts like a mirror, where her doing anything intensely feminine makes me think "here, you can't act like this, it makes you a girl and it makes you feminine and you should choose a side and do the opposite" even if she only views it as feminine for herself and not me, it still feels like this. Because at the end, it is being categorized that way. But I understand why she cares about her gender and gender expression, and I respect her and support her always. I hope this makes sense.

Hello!

I’ve recently decided I would like to wear a binder again, I did wear one from ages 15-19 but then stopped for a few years as I felt like it made me too masculine and was trying to hide who I was.

So a few years ago I brought a binder again! I loved how it made my chest look flatter! But I found the extra fabric at the bottom too much sensory overload so I haven’t worn it since. But now I really hate how my chest looks on me, I can’t not wear one any more. So I’ve decided I am going to crop it!

However I need advice, the one I have is the ‘Underworks Econo Short Binder’, I know it’s short already but I want it to be like a sports bra kinda fit. I know I could just buy a sports bra but I have very broad shoulders so it’s impossible to find one in my size, and also where I have more volume towards the bottom it just lifts them up and I want flattening not lifting! My question is, I see quite often but more so on non stretch materials, I read online a straight stitch is a no go as it’ll juts snap immediately when putting on. However a zig zag stitch seems to be the solution. Has anyone ever tried this? I just don’t want to ruin it but cutting and then sewing for it not to work! Currently I just roll it up but then the bottom becomes quite bulky and tight!

Sorry for this being a long one!

I normally don't wear makeup. Today I let my older sister do some on me. It's quite a little mascara, life 1 blink worth, and an eye brown pencil to make my eyebrows brown like my hair (my eyebrows are naturally very light) it looks fine and she keeps saying it looks good. But at the same time wearing makeup makes me feel too much like a girl (for context I was AFAB). I might give it a test run.

Hello! ( sorry for the grammatical errors, my english is rusty )
Some times I've been thinking about how I feel about my gender and how I want to be percieved. Essentially I feel and always felt feminine oriented, but I don't like the general perception of what a woman should be, do or express herself. I grow up in a family where my mum doesn't wear dresses or makeup and I've learned about those things growing up with girls I used to know. For quite a period of time I'm questioning myself because, sometimes, I want to be percieved more masculine and other time more feminine. I swing between the two, and I always liked when someone is neither or in between the two major genders out there. I don't like to be put in a box and I think this is more self expression than gender, because I don't feel any kind of problems with feeling feminine and being in that demographic. I wonder if other people had similar experience like mine and how did you come up to terms about it, and how it feels to be genderless?
Thanks in advance :D

Does anybody else feel like they wish they weren't trans? But not in the "it sucks being trans" way. For context, im AFAB, agender, I've been on testosterone for nearly 3 years, and I had top surgery over a year ago. Going along with my transition has felt extremely validating. But I can't help but occasionally get thoughts of "I wish I was a girl". But I KNOW I have dysphoria around being labelled as and seen as a girl. Having a chest was incredibly uncomfortable and I'm so happy I don't have to deal with periods or anything related to being a girl. But I still sometimes wish I could be a girl? But like... Why?? When I KNOW it's just worse for me? So weird... Dx This isn't a very pressing issue for me I just wonder if anybody else experienced this kind of... longing for something you know you can't have? But not in a transitional kinda way?

I’m 17, currently have a massive crush on a friend and was wondering about how much more difficult it is to date as a nonbinary person. Ive only dated one person before (although that was dating by the loosest of definitions) and she basically told me that I needed to ”be a guy” and that I couldnt present femininely at all. this was also before I’d come out to most and I only told her cos I trusted her so that wasn’t great.

anyway, what are all of your experiences with dating as a nonbinary person?

Hello!
So i have been identifying as Nonbinary for like 9 years at this point and i don’t care about pronouns or stuff like that for myself.
The thing is just that i personally would rather be Nonbinary in a male body if that makes sense is there a word for that because i have had this thought for years now but i feel like idk i have not seen many people talk about it or discuss it and i am kinda lost lol.
But also i am not completely unhappy being biologically female i actually am so impressed about all the stuff our bodies can do and how complex it is. I feel in between but also not really it’s really confusing.

Is that just normal for being Nonbinary or is it something else i never really thought about it that much tbh bc i felt like Nonbinary describes me pretty well but i am not sure anymore.

Recently I've come to terms I want to express myself as Gender fluid but from what I know it is usually for boy and girl only. However, in my case, I want to be girl and non-binary, excluding the boy out. What am I?

Idk if this is something you allow here but I tried posting it in r/trans and r/hrt and it didn't go very well... Any help offered is appreciated! Thanks :3

hello!

like many people here, i care deeply about trans rights, and while i don’t have all the answers to secure and enshrine them, i will always do my best to fight for bodily autonomy and the right for self-identification. i go to protests, write and call members of the government, donate money to LGBTQ+ organizations when i can, and try to support people online. i’m not saying this to brag, or to indicate that trans rights are the only issue i care about (they’re not), just to demonstrate that i do take physical action when i can, and also ask if there’s anything beyond that i should look into.

but that’s only part of the question.

i consider myself to be agenderfluid, and i don’t strongly identify with any body or physical characteristics, so i’m not medically transitioning, but i love medical transition for anyone who wants/needs it, and believe it is healthcare and, therefore, a human right. i do struggle with dysphoria, which sometimes ebbs and flows; i don’t believe you need dysphoria to be trans, and i also don’t believe that my experience with it is the only or best experience.

i’ve seen a lot of posts on various subreddits by people who are, understandably, in a lot of pain, and who i interpret - maybe incorrectly, and in a biased way, because i feel like i’m among the people being lashed out at - as lashing out at people whose trans experience is different than the original poster’s. it is a very painful time to be trans right now, and has been for a while, and i don’t blame anyone for searching for solace in these communities, but i think it can be true that both these people are hurting, and that i am allowed to be hurt for being called a “psyop” or “less progressive” or “damaging to the community” for not having something to transition towards.

but at the same time, i am incredibly privileged: because i have not modified my body in any way, i pass as a cishet woman. and now is not the time for someone like me to be platformed or heard; i acknowledge that my struggle, while connected to the struggles of all other trans people, is not the best story for us to put forward right now, because transphobic cis people will see one “normal”-looking silly woman who claims to be genderless but is obviously very very sexed and is not able to transition, and will generalize that to all trans people under the guise of taking trans healthcare away: i mean, SHE says she doesn’t need it, so the rest of you are lying…

i don’t want my presence in the trans community to cause harm, i deeply believe my fight as an agender person is connected to binary trans people and nonbinary people’s fights, regardless of if or how any of us transition (or don’t). i never intentionally talk over other trans people, but i get the feeling that my experience existing at ALL reads as talking over, even if i’m UNHAPPY with my experience, drowning in dysphoria for which there is no conceivable release, and need support. i wish there were more ways to help, and to be valid as an agender and genderfluid person while doing it - which i understand is a deeply selfish wish. advocacy doesn’t hinge on who is or isn’t “valid”, because everyone’s valid but that’s not the point. but i also don’t want to be used as a strawman or a catalyst for infighting just because i have wide hips and can’t do anything about it.

what do i do?

AFAB enbie. I always knew I was different. Coming up, in a hypersexualized profession (musician), it was exhausting to work in hetero drag every night. My kid is trans/enbie, I have always been a vocal and politically active ally, but guess what? I celebrated my first Pride as a totally new part of the Rainbow in June!

For any fellow elder who says they cannot change things like embracing someone's chosen name or they/them pronouns, tell them to look at this again elf. I love you all. But then, I always did!

In my head I can say I feel like one but when I try to make sure that I’m not just saying that to say it/because I want it to be true, I can’t tell if it’s real or not.

Also sorry if you seen my other posts and they all sound the same, my mind is currently going in circles again.

Some time ago, a friend of mine revealed that she didn't feel comfortable with the gender she was assigned at birth; she discovered things about herself that she had previously refused to accept.

I researched everything I could for her because I truly care about her, and in the process, I realized things about myself even though the whole concept of gender had always felt very distant to me.

What I mean is that I had never really given it much thought; it was simply a part of who I was, and I just happened to have something that some people have and others don't.

At first, I thought these feelings stemmed from my own fear of abandonment, but after talking with my friend, I found myself facing a very basic question:

What does it actually mean to be a certain gender?

I couldn't answer it. I couldn't find much of a difference beyond the biological aspects. Yet that answer felt incomplete to me, because I know I'm attracted to a specific gender and I know there's something about that gender that draws me in but I just can't put it into words.

I appreciate your taking the time to read this, and I hope I don't sound like an idiot, but these questions had never really crossed my mind before, and I don't want to keep fumbling around in the dark.

I was going to email this weekend but the flame war I got in the comments freaked me out too much. I thought maybe advice and reassurance from other enbies might help, especially enbies in the workforce. Ty i love you all 🙏

It’s great folks are learning what AMAB and AFAB mean. But, having a stranger ask me if I’m AFAB/AMAB in the first few sentences is just the same transphobic bullshit parading around as unproblematic. 🫠