What Is Citi Kittie's Gender?

I've never felt like the other boys. I've always felt different from them, from as far back as I can remember. But I've never had an overwhelming feeling of having the wrong body. I read about transsexuals and how many or most felt like they had the wrong body, but their stories didn't resonate for me. And for years I thought the only options were male or female and some people were transsexuals, meaning, in my mind, that they transitioned physically from one to the other.

Because of my limited view on the topic of gender I tried to ignore it. I identified my sexuality as bisexual and let it go at that.

Then, in the last couple of years, I started learning about transgender and that transgender could mean more than just feeling like a girl in a boy's body, or vice versa. It could mean you're a boy who's a boy in a different way from most of the other boys. Or a girl but in a way that's different from most of the other girls. Or it could be a boy in a girls body, or vice versa.

So I started exploring my gender more.

Sometimes I see gender very biologically. And I think that I'm a guy because I have a penis. And just because my personality traits are different from most men in my culture doesn't detract from the fact that I'm a guy. Because I have a penis, by definition, guys also have the personality traits that I have. From this perspective, I'm a guy, just not like most of the other guys in my culture.

But other times I see it more culturally. That there are a set of traits that define male and female and I have more traits like a female than a male, so therefore, I'm female. I know I feel more at home with most women. From this perspective I feel like a girl with penis.

I know I still don't want to transition. I really salute the people who have done that. I'm not sure I could handle it. And I'm not sure I still wouldn't feel different. I think I'd be a pretty queer girl.

Then I learned about GenderQueer, which Wikipedia defines as, "a catchall term for gender identities other than man or woman. People who identify as genderqueer may think of themselves as being both a man and a woman, as being neither a man nor a woman, or as falling completely outside the gender binary."

I was like AH HA! I'm GenderQueer. I really enjoy playing with gender, gender bending, and exploring various other genders. One thing I really like about the Dark Odyssey group is that it's a safe place to not only explore my sexuality, but also my gender.

And I generally say that I'm 'out' as being GenderQueer because I see it as such an integral part of my personality. Most people who get to know me learn pretty quickly that I'm not like most other guys. And even at work, I'll make jokes or what not that let people know I'm different.

Like one of my female coworkers was trying to open a beer bottle and couldn't get it. I said, "Do you need a man to help you with that? Because I can call Alex, I think he's here today." Hee hee. It really amuses me.

And there have been times where I've been basically accepted as a woman. I worked at a Girl Scout camp and was one of just two guys on staff. The other counselors, and the campers, all accepted me as a girl. The campers even called me "she" and "her" and sometimes even "mom." I wasn't trying to present as a woman, and sometimes didn't shave and had a bit of a beard. And I know some of the campers were just used to calling everyone "she" since there were so few guys. But I know some of them say me as a woman.

So I say I'm GenderQueer and Transgender and sometimes I'll say I'm a girl with a penis. Sometimes I appropriate the term BOI, which more usually refers to a queer woman presenting more as a man. And lately I've been reading about MTFTM. A man who is really a woman, who presents more as a man. It's all really fascinating.

In my triad we sometimes joke that my Mistress is the girl with the looks, my Miss is the girl with the smarts, and I'm the girl with the penis. Obviously my Miss is beautiful, and my Mistress is very smart, but it's amusing to us and makes us feel like super heroes.