Struggling with Gender Identity and Trauma

Hi Anya - When someone goes through a trauma, they often dissociate as a coping mechanism (go somewhere else in their head to escape their body) because the pain is beyond what can be processed in that moment & it helps to survive the event. Shamans call this soul loss and believe for healing to occur, when one is ready they must find/reclaim these lost soul fragments. This is challenging, because there are still residual and painful emotions attached to those bits of soul that still need to be processed. If sexual violence has occurred, it might be uncomfortable to identify with your gender. Things like therapy, yoga and meditation can help put you back in your body. The reason this is important is because mind, body and spirit are connected. Something unaddressed in the mind can lead to disease in the body or in the spirit (like depression). I think gender is also confusing because we are all blends of both male and female energies and sometimes the dominant energy doesn’t correspond with our assigned gender at birth or fit the gender stereotypes. Wish you the best, sorry you are going through this. I’ve gone through this process and still going through it - coincidentally once I began healing this my Crohns began healing also.

i relate to that. i wish i was just energy, being in a body is frustrating and confusing

I've had a weird experience where my stacks and stacks of trauma have made me so adaptable that I no longer feel comfortable with concrete labels. People ask what my sexuality is, I tell them I'm dating a man. What's my gender? Whatever it needs to be. No, but what's in your pants? Incontinence wear, is that personal enough? I hate when people try to get a set answer from me. It's not their business and it's more complicated than Do I Feel Male Or Female