An Introduction

Withteeth and I have decided to officially introduce ourselves. We’ve kind of done so in the past, but, with so many followers, we’ve decided that it would be a good idea for us to each write our own posts telling you about ourselves. I guess I’ll start.

I’m Hessian. My name comes from my family name. I am a 25 year old university student from Canada. I’m studying History of Religion and Philosophy as a double major. I am also the President of the Freethinkers Club and the Interfaith Club. I started the Interfaith Club with 4 other students. And I am the Student Lead of the Faith and Spirituality Student Team. I have been very involved in the university since I started, and have taken a number of leadership roles. I am hoping to use my experiences in the future.

Now, that covers the most boring bit about who I am. Now for the most interesting bit. At least I think it’s the most interesting bit. I’m genderqueer. This means that, while I’m biologically female, I don’t identify as either a woman or a man. Instead, I find myself somewhere in the middle. As a kid, I was always quite masculine. I loved sports from a young age. I loved going to hockey and football games with my dad, and, when he was old enough, my brother. And I loved playing sports too. My dad often took my brother and I out to play hockey in the winter and football in the summer. And he was always impressed with my athletic ability. My parents put in in soccer when I was 5 and had me in some type of sport from that age on. Speed skating was my favorite. And I developed an obsession with martial arts.

As a young kid I played with dolls and collected stuffed animals. It was the 90’s, so I had as many beanie babies as my parents would buy me. I loved animals and was very nurturing from a young age. It’s pretty much the most feminine thing about me. But I was never girly like my friends. I didn’t care for dress-up, I only played house when my friends wanted me to, and I didn’t like makeup. I loved rodents though. My brother and I got a lot of joy out of chasing our aunts around the house with them. My dad has also said that I couldn’t go outside without needing a bath. I was definitely a tomboy.

My parents accepted my being a tomboy in certain regards, but fought me on it in others. I was allowed to play sports, get dirty, and have rodents. But I was expected to have long hair and wear girl clothes. I was also given a pink room when I wanted a green one. I was given girly nicknames and girly presents. The push back on my identity had a deep effect on me that I’ve never really gotten over. I learned from a young age that there was something wrong with me. I learned that part of me had to be repressed and kept secret. It wasn’t until adulthood that I was able to find my identity as a result.

As early as I can remember, around kindergarten, I was happy being female so long as I could do what I wanted. But as I neared adolescence I became increasingly unhappy with my sex. As my parents pushed back against me more and more, I became more and more desperate to turn into a boy. I no longer liked being female because I wasn’t able to be me. My parents divorced when I was 12 and my mom wasn’t concerned with my clothes or hairstyle, so I immediately changed them. I cut my hair short and began getting my clothes from the boys section. I was thrilled. I felt free. But I still had notions about gender instilled so deeply in me that I thought I needed to change sex to be okay. I thought I was in the wrong body and I thought that there was something wrong with being a girl.

I no longer want to change my sex. I’m fine with being female. But I’ve also learned enough about sex and gender to determine what I do want and who I am. I’m genderqueer. I’m neither a man or a woman. I’m more masculine than I am feminine. I prefer to dress androgynously, and am fine with being taken as male. I have no preference when it comes to pronouns either.

I’m also demisexual. Basically, I can develop sexual attraction, but only when I’ve developed a personal relationship with them first. Some people take this as part of a sexuality rather than as a sexuality in itself because it says nothing about who I’m attracted to. But I take it more as the persons gender doesn’t matter, their personality does. I can be sexually attracted to anyone so long as I can develop the romantic attraction to them first. Right now I’m in a relationship with a cis man. I plan to marry him and have children with him (which has caused some identity crises already due to my gender), and he’s my first real relationship, but that doesn’t make me straight.

When I was a teenager I never really felt the need to date or have sex like my peers did. I also didn’t know who I was attracted to because I was only moderately attracted to anyone, and I felt those attractions towards both boys and girls. And of course I never learned about bisexuality or asexuality in school, so I thought that there was something very wrong with me on that front too. And of course that was another thing that I learned to keep secret.

As I’m sure you all know by now, I’m also an atheist. I believe that there are no gods. I also don’t believe in ghosts, the afterlife, prophecy, or anything else supernatural. I believe that evidence is required before something should be believed in. I believe that saying “I don’t know” is better than making up an answer. And I believe that we will get our answers about the universe from science. I also believe that critical thinking is a better way to develop a moral code and belief system than religion is.

That is who I am, for the most part. But I’d also like to talk about what I want in the future. I want to become a published author and make my living writing. I want to become a public speaker for various activist causes, namely atheism and lgbt issues. I want to be able to travel a good portion of the world. I want to have 6 kids, and I want to adopt some of them. I’m also considering getting my PhD eventually, but I’m not completely sure about that yet. That is what I want for my future.