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Labels, labels, labels everywhere (part three)

Posted on May 26, 2026 by Minna Hong • 0 Comments

I want to talk more about gender identity, sexual orientation, and dating. And labels. Maybe. It’s been at the forefront of my mind for several reasons. I mentioned in the last post a few times when it was helpful to have labels (mostly with health issues), and I am not going to muse whether or not it’s helpful in dating.

I will say I don’t like the labels I’ve chosen for my sexual and gender identities. They are both the least worst of the bad, and I’m not satisfied with either. Bisexual and agender, by the way. I’ve had the former label for over thirty years, and it has never sat right with me. I like queer the best, but it now is synonymous with gay. I’m not happy about it, but it’s not a fight I’m up for fighting.

Same with genderqueer. I really like it as a descriptor for not being on the binary in the fullest sense of the term. But now it means nonbinary in the same way queer means gay.

Sigh.

I’m irritated with myself for always making life so difficult. This is part of being neurodivergent, too, though. I’ve read that people who are neurodivergent often feel the need to be really explicit and on point with their words. I can attest that this is me, and it’s annoying as fuck. Even to me when it’s me doing it.

I overexplain things and belabor the point until the other person is ready to scream. I can see the shift on their face (or hear it in their message), and yet, it takes a Herculean effort for me to shut the fuck up. The person I’m talking to doesn’t need a twenty-page backstory to every idea I want to present. When I found out this was a thing with autistic people, I felt validated.

Another thing is that everything is related in my brain. I can’t tell a story without bringing in what others would consider extraneous information and tidbits. When I talked to my autistic friend about it, she was in enthusiastic agreement that her brain worked that way, too. It’s one reason we can have comfortable conversations (in messages). We can pepper in as many non sequiturs as we want without worrying. And if one of us goes really far down a weird road, the other will bring the first person back again.

Or not. Sometimes, I join her on the side path to nowhere (and vice-versa), which can lead to some wild journeys. And once in a great while, I don’t know where she’s going. I can usually figure it out, but if I can’t, I just ask questions until I get the gist of what she was trying to say.

Knowing that this is a thing for neurodivergent people is such a relief to me. It doesn’t mean that I just let myself ramble all I want whenever I want, but it does mean that I can be a bit kinder to myself when I can’t seem to stop utter nonsense from coming out of my mouth.

Invisibility is my superpower

Posted on January 20, 2023 by Minna Hong • 0 Comments

I’m used to being ignored. It’s a fact of life that people tend to think in the binary. It’s one reason it’s been so difficult to broaden the public consciousness on gender diversity. It’s also a fact that people are territorial. Us and them is pretty much innate (we can argue whether it’s more nature or nurture, but most people feel it to some extent).

I belong to several groups that are outside the binary. I am not black or white. I’m Asian (Taiwanese), so I get ignored when the question of race arises. I’m bisexual, so again, neither gay nor straight. It’s interesting because in the post about trans and gender-diverse people that I wrote about yesterday (at Ask A Manager), there were several bis in the comments (including me) who have said that we’ve gotten shit from gays and lesbians, and it hurts more than the shit we get from hets.

Side note: I am not happy with the term bisexual, but I don’t like pansexual or omnisexual, either. If I had my druthers, I would call myself sexual and leave it at that. I reall ydon’t like labels (and not in that smarmy ‘no labels’ way), but it’s because I find them constraining. I’m a sloppy, messy person who doesn’t fit into any one category. That’s why I’ll default to the broadest category possible, but still not be satisfied with it.

I’m also areligious/agnostic, rather than an atheist–and I’m certainly not a Christian, I don’t know if there is a god (though I don’t think there is is a Christian God), but at this point, I don’t care. Not in a negative way, but in a ‘I don’t want to think about it any longer’ way.

I have a similar feeling about gender. I just don’t care about it. I had been chewing it over before I ended up in the hospital, and my brain went in many different directions. The reason I started stepping away from ‘woman’ was because of other women. All my life, I had been told that I was not acting properly as a woman.

This included, but was not limited to–not having children (the big one); not wanting children (a bigger one); not wanting to get married; not wearing makeup; not caring about fashion, cooking, or cleaning; liking to climb trees; dislkiking dolls; picturing strangers on the street naked and how they’d be in bed; liking sports; and that’s just the short list. I’m sure some people would put Taiji weapons and video games on that list, too.