Transcript 04- Nik

These transcripts deal with themes of mental illness and trauma

Cassandra interviewed Nik over skype, Cassandra in Washington, Nik in Colorado. They went to the same middle school and met in fourth grade, 13 years ago

Okay, so please state your name, your age and your gender identity and presentation.

Awesome. The name I go by is Nik Chapleski. Um, I was assigned female at birth, but I now identify as nonbinary and I am 21 years old.

When did you start identifying as non binary?

Um, I guess I personally started kind of feeling it, um, probably three or four years ago, but I only came out like, on facebook a couple of months ago.

What was… um… I guess what… kind of led you to that realization?

That’s a good question. I guess I stopped identifying with the femme stuff more and more. I felt more forced when I would wear a dress. I hated wearing makeup. I shaved all my hair, um, I guess about three years ago and that just felt so good. That really kind of launched me into a track of feeling like… what else have I been doing to my body that doesn’t actually make me comfortable (Cassandra laughs) that I can give up, like, or that I could add, you know, like, I grew out my leg hair, it just felt so freeing and like, I don’t know, I guess it’s just been a transition of the hair (both laugh)

The gateway to further nonbinariness.So well like what was the response when you… when you came out in a more public way?

Yeah, I was blown away. It was like way better than I thought it was going to be. Even my… like Catholic grandparents texted me that they loved me. Like that was the most heartfelt, but like I just was so blown away. They didn’t understand it at all. They just still wanted me to know that they cared about me and I just thought that was so sweet. Like everyone started using my name way faster than I expected them to and I haven’t gotten any hate from my friends or anything. It’s been really, really good.

That’s so wholesome! We will talk more about gender and a little bit, but um… like the mental… the mental illness section is first. So like have you been officially diagnosed and if so, with what? And if not then like what sort of symptoms do you feel manifest?

Um, I was diagnosed with depression but I also feel a lot of anxiety. I was on, um, SSRIs… it was zoloft for like, middle school through… the beginning of college, so I got off those probably three years ago. Um, so I was treated for depression but I didn’t see a therapist or anything which, probably would have been more helpful than the medication was (Cassandra laughs). But I also have anxiety.

Okay. What was the diagnosis process like? It sounds like it was really early.

It was… it was way too young, so my mom was on antidepressants for pretty much her whole life, so she was pretty comfortable with them. Ironically, she just got off hers too, which is great. But um, she took me to see a doctor while I was in middle school because I was upset, you know, because I was a middle schooler (both laugh) and they put me on SSRIs right away and then um, since they didn’t work they just kept increasing the dosage. So by the time I was in college I was on like a couple hundred milligrams when the standard dosage is around 25, so it just… like they kept upping my dose and it wasn’t helping and getting off of it was really, really hard, but it just didn’t seem like, they talked to me as much as they maybe should have. It was just like, “here, take this, it’ll help” and it didn’t.

And it just kind of continued to not? Um, did you have to go through like a whole withdrawal period with the… with the getting off the antidepressants that… yeah, that seems really difficult.

There were all these brain zaps from the serotonin imbalance. And luckily my boyfriend at the time was super helpful. He was great at like, neurochemistry. So he gave me all kinds of like, little vitamins and stuff to help. So that helped. It was still like one of the hardest things I’ve had to do. It was brutal.

So you’re not going… you’re not going to therapy or anything right now.

I’m not, I am looking for one, but I am moving to the Springs so I want to find a gender therapist out there.

Yeah. That’s like… finding one who specializes in gender is a big… It’s a big feel (both laugh).

Definitely.

So, um, what… so as like a very broad general question, like what is your personal history with mental illness from the point that the symptoms started manifesting? Like you… like that was a brief history with treatment, but like, in terms of how it’s changed for you and how it’s manifested, like what are the key points in your history up until now?

Okay. Um, so I guess… you know, middle school was hard. You were there with me (Nik laughs) it was a weird place. So I just didn’t quite fit in. I didn’t really bond with my friend group that well, I just wasn’t having a great time so I was pretty depressed then. Um, and then we moved to evergreen and so I got more depressed and it was just sort of like, light things that got me down because I didn’t have the right chemistry. Um, and then in high school I got really depressed. That was when I like, understood that I should probably be on some kind of medication, but it wasn’t the right one, you know. Um, but high school I… it was the same thing. I just didn’t fit into all and um, I… you know, did some self harm and I just did… I don’t know, it was… it was not a good time at all.

And then CVA I… or sorry, uh, when I graduated and went to CU Denver, we lived in the campus village apartments, they were called– and that was the dorms there and it was CVA and that was the worst time of my life because I had moved there, I had no support system. My boyfriend and I broke up, I couldn’t make new friends. Um, I was just in a horrible, horrible place. So that was when I was suicidal. And then, um, I… stopped taking my antidepressants and that kind of seem to help, whether it was just feeling like I had control over something or whether it was actually making my brain chemistry go back to normal, I’m not sure.

But, um, then I dropped out of CU Denver and I told my parents I’m not going to school anymore. And they said, “yes you are”. And so I took a bunch of just like fun classes at Red Rocks Community College. And that really helped me find myself again. So I took like a dance class. And a painting class and I was like, fuck, I love painting… sorry I shouldn’t cuss on here (both laugh).

No, that’s totally fine, cuss away.

But, um, but I just sorta like started finding myself and… really doing the things that make people happy I guess. I don’t know. And so I found actual life finally and so I was able to kind of break out of all of the lies I told myself about what life is and… having supportive teachers and like, making friends there and being treated like a human, you know, it really helps me a lot. And so, uh, over the past couple of years I’ve just… I don’t, I wouldn’t say that I’m depressed anymore, I still have anxiety, but I would say that that has kind of left.

So you’ve kind of stabilized out in terms of the depression.

Yeah, yeah. And my anxiety has gotten so much better too. Um, I had really bad anxiety, especially oriented around driving and um, I saw a couple of therapists for that, but no one really helped. I ended up talking to my philosophy teacher and he helped a lot. Um, I don’t know how that worked out, but it was great (Nik laughs). Um, and like it’s gotten to the point where I was actually t boned and my car was totaled about a week or two ago and I didn’t even have a panic attack, so I was able to really, really… (both laugh).

Wow, I would’ve had a panic attack.

I had my inhaler and that helps. But… mentally I just was so much less anxious about the whole thing than I guess I thought I had been or I just worked through it well enough with my philosophy teacher that it just wasn’t that bad, you know?

Was there any reason that the anxiety was surrounding around… manifesting around driving?

Yeah, when I had my driver’s Ed classes, they were like… you had to watch all these videos about like people who have killed their friends, like the… defensive driving date that I went to where they’re supposed to like raze the road and then teach you how to skid, the teachers were so bad. So basically all I took away from that day was like, I would not know what to do if I were trying to skid. Like they had this cone and they taped a Kenny doll from south park to it and you had to like drive up really fast up to it and swerve. They would tell you which direction to swerve, but every single time I hit that doll, every time I killed Kenny. And so that was so traumatic to like… hit it over and over again. I don’t know, it was just not a good experience when I was learning how to drive. So it just gave me some anxiety about it.

Yeah, that’s fair. That seems really, really stressful (Both laugh). So like… it seemed like… you talked a lot about your depression in terms of your personal history and you did have anxiety about driving, but was the depression more prevalent for most of that time?

Yeah, definitely. Yeah. And I guess it had more impact on my life, you know, I was doing self harm and I uh, had relationships that were sort of like, you know, “you’re sad, I don’t really want to talk to you anymore”. And that sucked, you know, it was more impactful on my life. Like anxiety, um, I would have a lot of panic attacks and I’d kind of get like flushed in the face and sort of sweaty, but I could still sort of function like it wasn’t ideal but I was still able to be in class. Whereas depression I would stay home and cry.

Yeah. It does do that (both laugh). This is obviously.. you can choose not to answer any questions that you want, but so in terms of self harm, people oftentimes point to a lot of different roles that it fills for them. So do you want to talk about like what kind of role it filled for you?

I had the simultaneous fear that someone would see it and then this hope that someone would see it and help. So it was sort of… asking for attention in a way, but it also just made me… feel at a time when I was so numb, like even the pain was something, it reminded me that I was like, alive, whether it was a bad feeling or not, I don’t know. Um, and then it was just something that… could be mine alone. Like I felt like I didn’t have a whole lot of privacy or anything in that time, so it was just something that I could just kind of have to myself.

Was that because you were moving around a bit and like, there wasn’t too much control over that, like what was the… what was the lack of control or lack… of privacy based off of.

That’s a good question. I guess I was just getting more into like, social media and stuff and that was surprisingly revealing. Um, and then just at my high school, like people just peered, I dunno and not in a kind way. It was always searching for something to judge you for and I just always felt watched and not in a supportive way at all (both laugh).

Yeah, that’s fair. Um, were there any like… specific kind of loops that you felt yourself getting stuck in… because like, it seems like you made a major breakthrough in the past few years. Like in the years before that, what were kind of like… I guess that is really tied to, um, you getting off your medication and also like, taking these painting classes and actually doing things that made you happy. But like… were the loops you were stuck in, doing things that you felt like you had to or like, what would you say that they were? Sorry, that was a very rambling question.

No, I think I understand. Um, I guess so like the… the times that I found myself most sad and like, would self harm is that, okay… when I felt isolated. Isolation was the biggest one for me. Um like, just feeling like I didn’t have any friends, I never would, like I wasn’t worthy of friends. Um, and the biggest one was always that it wouldn’t change, like, feeling that this moment was going to be forever and this feeling was never going to… like I would never make friends, you know? And that was the biggest, like I just got to do something. So I feel because all I feel right now is just like isolation right now. So I got to do something to myself that makes me feel myself. I don’t know.

Yeah, that makes sense. Um, what would… what would you say that you’re proudest of in all this time?

Oh, that’s a… (Cassandra laughs)

I try to ask not just negative questions. I’m like, this really hard thing to talk about for some people, but there are like… there are a lot of positives. Like these are really strong people I’m talking to.

I guess my painting, like it’s just been so hard to develop that skill on days when I just don’t want to get out of bed or like… days where I’m in class and I’m having a panic attack or like, my teacher’s, so understanding. I’ll go into class sometimes and I’ll just lay on the floor and like, talk to people and not do any art at all. He’s like, “you having a bad day, Nik?”. I’m like, yeah, can I just hang out here? He’s like, “yeah, you got it”. (Both laugh) So just… pushing through all of the bad to really keep developing that technique and talent and I don’t know, I just feel like it’s paid off, you know? Um, the other year on Halloween I was just like, looking back on all of my art, I was like, I’ve like… actually accomplished something in this life and that was such a good feeling because, you know, back when I was so depressed I just felt like I was this worthless blob, I’m never going to contribute anything to society. Now I look back like, I’ve added some beauty to the world and that’s a pretty cool feeling.

Were you… did you go… because remember you did art in middle school a little bit in the way that middle schoolers do art. Did you stop doing it for awhile or was it just something that you kind of sidelined until you… you dropped out of CU Denver?

Yeah, it’s actually always been a pretty big part of my life. Or in middle school I was really into computer stuff is. So my dad taught me, that’s what Mr Riggs was into, you know? Um, and then I… in high school I got really into photography so I was doing all kinds of photo shoots. So that was one of the main ways that I found people to hang out with and friends and stuff like that and they weren’t ever really close friends, but we got to interact for that couple of hours when I was making them feel pretty and that was a great feeling. And uh, so I got really into photography, film and digital and then also stayed with my graphic design stuff. I wanted to be a graphic designer, so I went to Warren Tech for that in high school. That’s like the… you know, technical school and um, I… didn’t like my teacher and I didn’t like the concept of working with clients so I lost touch with graphic design and then I went to CU Denver for animation and then that was all computer stuff and I hated that.

And animation’s so labor intensive… like it’s so tedious.

Yeah, it’s horrible and everything takes so long to like, process and render. It’s not enjoyable.

Yeah, I’ve done some animation. I was like, ah, I hate this so much. So was it like going back to painting specifically that was like a really positive step for you?

Yeah, definitely.

Okay. Um, how much do you… I’ve seen like some of your art, but how much like, in terms of content do you feel it… it relates to… to your experience, mental illness and like, um, aside from the act itself being a really positive thing?

Yeah, it’s… I’m getting more into it. I, for a long time wanted it to be really pretty and kind of hide how the world really is. I guess like, I wanted to beautify everything, but my more recent stuff has been getting really dark. Like I haven’t posted a lot of it, but um, I have one where, like I’m tearing my chest open and that one was like, the feeling of panic attacks and gender dysphoria. And so once that one’s finished it’s gonna be cool. But I also have like a couple where I’m just like laying naked in the field. Um, I posted one of them. It’s the disgruntled one where the girls kind of like, sad and like it’s all rainbowy on a black background. But bringing the light out of a dark background was supposed to be really symbolic and like, I have a whole series of those people….  like, people just looking really like sad and defeated. And so that one will be really fun too. But um, I think it starting to influence me more and more. I’ve got one that’s like a nonbinary person in a black bathtub and they’re just kinda like drowning in the bathtub and that’s pretty sweet. But like, I don’t know, I’ve got some… some darker stuff coming up for sure. I think that it would be helpful to actually think through the darkness instead of just feeling it and then painting this beautiful shit and I don’t know, just the reactions have been so genuine and people relate to it so much, it’s really cool.

What’s caused the shift in wanting to beautify things to now kind of wanting to more process it through art. Was there any… was it just like, “okay, now I feel ready to do this” or like was there any specific thing?

I think it was mainly just feeling ready. Yeah. Um, I’ve always had interest in dark stuff but it wasn’t what my classmates were painting and when I was still being really femme, it just didn’t feel like how I was presenting would paint that way. I don’t know. And um, so as I shaved my hair and like, stop wearing makeup and uh, have come out, it just feels more like, yeah, this is Nik’s art, like I can see this coming from this person. And so that’s been great. And also just like feeling like I have the technique to actually pull off my ideas, whereas before I was just still learning how to paint.

Yeah, that’s fair. Um, so you talked about what you’re proudest, like if you had to point to something that you’re struggling most with like right now, um, what…what would it be?

Uh… (both laugh)  yeah, I guess like… change overall. Like I’m just in such a transitional period, like my… five year old boyfriend and I just split up and we’re still really good friends and everything and that’s great. But it was like about the transition. So that’s really hard. And then my parents got a divorce and moving and selling the house, I’m starting a new school and leaving red rocks, which I’d been at for three years. I… uh, like my grandma died yesterday. Like there’s just so many things in my life that are like, changing. So I would say that that’s the biggest, like… overwhelming factor.

Yeah, that’s a big…. how do you… how do you… what generally helps you process change?

Painting helps, um… talking it out with people, just hanging out with people and I’ve been a lot more open to like, physical touch with my friends lately and I’ve felt or noticed that it just helps so much just like, put my head on their shoulder and let them hug me, which I’d never let them do before.

What caused that shift of like, being more comfortable with physical touch?

I had one friend who just broke me out of my shell. I don’t know how he did it, but we met uh, earlier this year. He was in my painting classes and um, he’s just like the most open person and we just talked a lot and we got to be really, really close and I would hang out with him and my other friend and like, we would all just like sit on the couch together and just like, cuddle and it wasn’t weird and it was super platonic and just great. And it was the first time I ever actually experienced that. And I guess just like having that friend group that is down for that for the first time is what allowed that.

That’s so good! (Nik laughs) Um, so a lot of people come up with kind of like, metaphors for their mental illness. So there’s like the… like the black dog and different things like that. So how do you… how do you conceive of your…and like it can be different for depression and anxiety. You don’t have to come up with a… like a unifying statements for both of them. But like, yeah. How do you conceive of yours? Like, how do you contextualize it in relationship to you?

That’s a good… I gotta think about that one. Well I guess the best depression one that I’ve heard that I relate to the most is like, sitting in a bathtub, like a warm bath tub and then like, draining it and like not fighting the cold and just kind of sitting there and feeling like, this is shitty (both laugh). I guess that’s how the depression feels to me. But then also realizing that you can like, get out of the bathtub. Like of course that’s a really hard thing to do. I’m not just saying like, get over your depression, don’t take me wrong (both laugh). But I’m just… I don’t know, knowing that for me, like I was able to fight out of it. So, um, that’s, that’s cool. And then anxiety is just like, pressure everywhere. It’s just like this vacuum of space. But the opposite is just this expanding, like tightness. Um, I dunno, it’s like a suffocating thickness to the air.

Yeah, that makes sense. All of these metaphors make sense. Um, so what… so you… you talk about kind of like change being difficult for you. On like a… like a very day to day basis in kind of the way that it fluctuates, would you say that change is like one of the number one things that kind of makes it go worse? Like what are some of the other sorts of situations that tend to trigger the worsening of it?

I guess change. It’s really just change and isolation. It’s… that’s whenever I feel like I’ve hurt my friends or I’ve done anything wrong with my friends. Um, now that I have friends. Before it was feeling like I never would have friends. And just change. I don’t know. I guess so yeah. Like I have this tattoo, I don’t know how to show it to you with angle that the cameras at, but it’s like a triangle and that’s change in scientific formula, so that’s why I got that, to try and embrace change more and then this little dude’s upside down, but he’s a bird and he’s just for evergreen.

Are you trying to like internalize the… like what was the… what was the significance of like, putting change on your body for you?

Yeah, I just wanted to recognize it. It can be a beautiful thing. Like, it’s not this negative thing that I make it out to be. Everything changes constantly. It’s not bad, it’s just what it is.

So just kind of trying to like accept it in that way?

Yeah.

Um, what are the… painting it sounds like, definitely, but… what are the… what are the actionable things that you do on the day to day that… that help you feel better?

Um, I started Jiu jitsu and that was awesome. Like actually getting exercise, like putting myself in such an uncomfortable situation. Like, oh my God, so we’re (Nik laughs) just learning self defense and like, that has upped my confidence so much, like knowing that I can walk down the street and if someone tries to like, fuck with me, I could break their arm. Like that is huge. It’s huge. Especially being identified female at birth, like it’s… I’m scared of walking down the street alone and I’m less scared now and so that’s been hugely empowering in so many ways and that helps with my day to day life way more than I anticipated. I thought that it would just be when I’m alone that I feel better, but I feel better all the time. And then I just do like yoga, smoke some weed (both laugh), walk around with my puppy, hang out outside.

Yeah, all good things. The jiu jitsu is very… very real in terms of like things that make you feel strong in a very physical sense of how much. So how much do the people… you talked about how you’re getting like, closer to people. How much do people around you know about your mental illness. If you talk to them, what do those conversations look like?

That was one of the great things about (insert name of friend)– that’s my friend who got me out of all my funks, um, but he just like, was so open and wanted to hear about it and not to like, I don’t know, not to fuck with me for it, just to understand it and to help you the best he could. And that was just so great. Um, so he really, really understands it. Um, my other friend [name] was to actually sort of damaging because she also has really bad mental health issues and she was just normalizing it to the point where… I felt myself falling back into that pit and it was really hard to like, ask her to like not send me suicidal ideation memes anymore because like, it would help her cope in a way. But it was just making me so sad and I dunno, like it was an interesting conversation with her. She understood where I was coming from luckily. But it was like, it’s… it’s hard when you have friends that you want to help so badly, but they’re hurting you in the process.

Um, so I would say that I’m generally very open about it with my friends. Um, one of my other friends, um, has been going through a really hard time and he was posting some really scary stuff on instagram and so that was when I opened up to him and I told him all my history and he was like, “yeah, okay, like, I’m in the same place. I got to do what you did”. So it was just so great to be able to help him. But I think that being open about it is really validating to a lot of people who aren’t or who can’t be open about it. And um, even in painting class I would try and talk about it openly. Like I… one time casually mentioned brain zaps and like three or four people were like, “that’s what’s happening?” and it was just so great to be able to like explain like, yeah, you can take five htp and that’ll help that. And like that’s…that’s an anti depressant side effect here. Um, so I don’t know, I really do try and deal with about it.

How much, um… so in general, how do you think… uh, how do you interact with other people with mental illness? So your friend was one example. Like, is that…yeah, how do you approach that?

I guess that’s the first time I’ve actually experienced it where it was like that, like typically like with my friend [name] who was really upset and was posting on Instagram, like, he had like some real family stuff going on. So it was like talking and taking the time to talk through that with him and like, I don’t know therapists, but just talking about it helps and then taking the time to help him research the five htp and like different stuff that could possibly help him. So when it’s… when I usually hear about it, I just do everything I can to help and just like, be there for them as a friend. But when it starts to be toxic to me, like, I just had to take a step back and be like, man, like I’m here for you. I’ll come hang out with you, I’ll come, you know, I’ve got my shoulder for you. But, um, you can’t be texting me this memes that like, normalize it in this way.

Yeah. And I mean good on you for having that conversation. That’s a really hard conversation.

It was really awkward, but she understood.

Um, so what… how would you say that it colors your interactions with other people? And so that’s kind of a two part question of like… how people treat you, knowing about it, but also like internally, how do depression and anxiety affect the way that you approach interactions?

Okay, I guess I’ll do the internal part first. It used to just completely shut me down from any social interaction. I was so scared and so just… numb that I didn’t have friends, I was upset about it, but I didn’t have any effort in me to go make friends. Um, so that really just like, closed the world to me. But since I’ve sort of fought out of it, it’s actually made it something that I can bond with people over and that I can feel like I can help them with. Um, and so… I don’t know, I’ve never been like… since high school I should say, I haven’t been like, looked down on for having mental illness, like in high school they used to be like, “what’s wrong with this chick? Like why is she crying in the corner every day?” (Nik laughs)

High schoolers suck (both laugh).

But since then it’s been actually a much more positive things since I sort of conquered it, that now I’ve been able to help other people feel like they can too. And then what was the other part of it?

It was internally, but then also how people treat you.

Yeah. Um, I guess that it used to be that they would look down on me for being weak and since I’ve stopped seeing myself that way, stopped letting them let me see myself… make myself feel that way, um, it’s been a much more empowering thing where even if they look down on me, I know that they’ve probably got something going on too, you know. Um, so I just tried to be kind to everyone because of that.

Um, so now we’re gonna we’re gonna switch gears again to… to gender. Um, so what… I guess the same way you gave a personal history for mental illness, what has been your personal history being AFAB and so like, especially since you aren’t someone who identifies as a cis woman, so like that… that is kind of a two part question of like… this transition of like, determining your true identity but also like, the experience of being someone that people in the past have perceived as femme and like how you were treated as such because of that. So yeah, like what would… what would that personal history be?

Okay. Um… (Nik sighs) I don’t know where to start with this (both laugh). So I guess that for… a long time I was fine being perceived as a female. Um, I don’t know if you remember me in middle school that well, but like I would wear a lot more pants than the skirts and like ,when we went to the pool party things I would wear like a one piece with a boy’s swimsuit over it. So like, there were definitely signs early on. I never had long hair. I was never like… really into the girly stuff. I wanted to be, you know, I wanted to love to do my makeup, I wanted to love the hair, I wanted to love to go to the mall with my friends, but it just wasn’t that fun. I liked the friends part of it, but not the mall so much. Um, and so I just never, like… I tried really hard and I was pretty good at it and so I was okay with it.

Throughout high school I wear makeup and dresses and stuff and I think that I started to really see how people saw that female identity and realizing that that perception doesn’t fit with me… at all (Nik laughs). And um, I don’t know, it would just be like, I would go to a party and like a girl would see me and be like, “oh a girl” and like come up to me, like start talking about girl things and like, I just couldn’t relate and like, that sounds like internalized misogyny and maybe to an extent it is, but I just couldn’t… I just couldn’t do it. So, um, I uh, chopped off all my hair and that helped a lot. People started to see that like, “even if she is a female, like she is a weird one” (Nik laughs) and um, I don’t know, I think that definitely it has been… very important to me… to see myself the right way. But it also is about outward perception. Um, I just don’t like… I don’t know how to phrase this because it just sounds so misogynistic, like I’m sure that a lot of it is internalized misogyny unfortunately. Um, I just couldn’t… couldn’t deal with the, with the female… all the baggage. Um, I don’t know, as I left more and more of it, I… felt better in myself for sure. And I think that that made me present with more confidence and people came to me more and it just felt so much better and so much more genuine and authentic and like, I was hiding. I don’t remember if I’m answering your question at all, but yeah, there’s some words.

Well, yeah. And then the second part of the question is then… how… how were… how were people treating you as, um, as they were perceiving you as femme so that… that goes in some more like the femme experience because it’s very hard to like, yeah… I guess I always consider there to be two parts of the… of the femme experience and like, one part is… is applicable to people who don’t identify as femme anymore, which is like the way they were treated. And the other part is the internal part, which is obviously very different.

Interesting. Okay. I guess like… it was just a lot more limiting when everyone saw me as femme. I mentioned to one of my guy friends that I wanted to start Jiu jitsu and he goes, like, “Nik, I care about you. You can’t do that”. I was like, what? He’s like, “I’m just trying to like watch out for you, like you’ll get hurt, you’ll be uncomfortable, you can’t do it”. And so that just lit my fucking fire. And I went and I signed up for Jiu jitsu classes. (Nik laughs)

Excellent! The proper response!

But even at the place, like, they make a big deal out of it because I haven’t come out to them there. It’s just an awkward… like there’s too much physical contact. I don’t to make anyone feel weird. No one understands nonbinary stuff. It’s just… so I’m a girl there, um, but they always make a huge deal about me being a “girl” in Jiu jitsu classes and like, it’s just something that society doesn’t think can happen. And so I’m like, breaking all these rules doing it, and it just is so silly to me because I don’t know… it’s just silly (Nik laughs). So I guess the perception thing is really just like what I can and can’t do and who I am and I’m not supposed to be. And like… I felt a lot of forced shame on my body, um, from everyone, like always being told to cover up and like, I never felt comfortable going out without a bra because like (stage whisper) people would see my nipples, you know? And just things like that where I just… am not allowed to exist comfortably as this female body. And now that I have kind of gotten rid of all of that, it’s just, I don’t know, so freeing. Like I don’t have to shave my legs before I go out, like it’s not this scary thing to be seen as who I am anymore.

So what… so this question is, I’m going to warn you, is the question that people struggle with the most. Not necessarily in like an emotional way, but just like formulating an answer is what does femmeness mean to you and I guess for you specifically, like not necessarily like… it’s not a femmeness that you contain, like maybe something that you eschew. So like how… how would you define it in the way in… in terms of your relationship to it? And don’t worry, I’m not asking you to come up with like a universal definition for femmeness because I know that that is like an impossible task.

Aw geez, well I guess we’ll just start it at what people know, which is just that people are equal. Um, I don’t know. I guess it’s just like not giving so much weight to what’s in your pants? Like not paying attention so much to the… genetics of it. And putting you in a box based on that, but like actually learning who you are and like, treating you based on an individual basis rather than just… you’re male or female. And obviously like there’s so much wrong with that statement, there’s like biological in-betweens as well, but like just putting them in these like either/or categories doesn’t… doesn’t work. Um, so for me… it’s… it’s pretty gender oriented, but it’s just like not… not judging based on one part of the label. Um, and being inclusive and supportive of everybody. I don’t know (both laugh). I think it’s important to have feminism still because of the history of humanity just being so patriarchial, I think that it’s part of the pendulum swing where, you know, it was everything was very, very man run. And uh, I’m not saying that, you know… I don’t like the whole, like “the future is female” signs. Um, this kinda bothered me. I think that the future is nonbinary or open to… gotta be less labeled, but maybe that is part of a pendulum swing. But I just think that it’s important to recognize still that  equality hasn’t been achieved. And that we’re still fighting for it. And social equality is different from the laws (Nik laughs).

Do you think I said feminism? (Cassandra laughs)

I did. What did you say?

F E M M E N E S S.

Oh! I was like, hasn’t this been defined? (Cassandra)

Yeah, I was like, I’m not sure if that’s answering the question. Now I understand the miscommunication.

Okay. I’m sorry. I totally misheard you. Okay, well I’m glad that we got on the same page there (both laugh). My bad. Okay. Femmeness. That’s so much harder. I was like, why is this the question that people struggle with the most? Okay.

What does feminism really mean? (Said jokingly)

Okay. Femmeness So it’s… it’s the… it’s… (Pause)

Yeah. You see why this has been an issue.

That’s hilarious (both laughing). Um, I guess it is what society perceives as….soft… and female. Okay. So let’s… let’s change how I’m answering this. Let’s look at it from an evolutionary standpoint, what it means to be female in nature and how that has transcribed to how society perceives femininity. How about that? So back when we were monkey… (both laugh)

Going all the way back.

Yeah, because that’s an evolution works (said jokingly). But, uh, you know, historically I think that females were very bound by childbirth and so they were kind of… not able to participate in tribal life while they were pregnant as much. Um, so they couldn’t be these hunter people that the men were and um, they… you know, historically were meant to be the… the children part of the side of it also, um, all of those traits kind of are still perceived as very female, um, just because of, you know, tribal life I… in my opinion, um, so things like compassion and softness and caring for others and just that tenderness of communication and society stuff. Whereas males are… anti-femme is perceived more as a… the sort of strong, violent, protective source. So I’d say that femme is… is the softest.

Are there, are there parts of it that you… you still identify with and then specific parts of it you choose to eschew or like…?

Yes. Um, I reject all that childness and that’s the main thing (both laugh). One of the main things that made me realize that I… I do identify as nonbinary was just my absolute rejection of pregnancy and every single part of that just… doesn’t work for me at all. Um, so that… that’s the main part that I’ve sort of pushed away is the recreation side. Um, but I do still identify with the softness and the compassion and the social side and just wanting to interact with other people in a kind way.

Yeah. There’s like… the more I’m conducting these interviews, the more I’m like, you know, like, ascribing more gender roles-y traits to femmeness and mascness aren’t necessarily an issue. It’s the… it’s… it’s when you then look at a person and you’re like, “oh, you are this” it’s like putting the person inside the category instead of saying the person contains these categories in different amounts. Like that’s been what I really found throughout these interviews.

That’s so great. I saw a meme the other day. It was like, any cat owner will tell you that putting a cat in a box is way different than letting a cat climb into a box, talking about labels. Thought that was the greatest metaphor (both laugh)

That’s my gender, is that cat.

I love it.

So how… how, um, has a mental illness kind of affected intimacy for you? And so that’s like… you can answer that in any way that you feel comfortable. So that’s like emotional or platonic or physical or sexual or romantic. I’m like… I’m trying to list all the forms of intimacy. So yeah, like any way that you feel comfortable answering that.

Cool. Um, well, like we talked about… it kind of just made me shut down and like hide from society a lot for a long time. Um, then like on a sexual level, like while I was on antidepressants, I had no sex drive and so that… for a long time I thought I was gay and I wasn’t into my boyfriend and that the reason was something wrong with me. And um, once I got off the antidepressants I was like, oh, I’m pan, I like everybody (Nik laughs). So like having that, which was really interesting. Going from not wanting to be touched, really kind of recoiling when people hugged me to being really affectionate and like this, uh, James, my friend who started to cuddle with me and stuff, it’s just been so opening and like that has been so much more nurturing to my mental health than I expected it to be. So just kind of allowing… openness has been beneficial, but it wasn’t possible because of mental illness in the beginning. So it’s just such a hard balance.

Yeah, I… yeah, I’m… I’m a very big advocate for like physical, like obviously physical touch and very specific contexts. But like I think physical touch is so good. Um, so the same question for like… how has your experience being afab affected, um, intimacy for you?

Um, I… I don’t know how to answer that one (both laugh). I guess that… that is part of why I didn’t like to be touched until somewhat recently. Um, once I got my binder I was so much more comfortable giving hugs, it was such a strange, unexpected switch. It was really, really weird, but I just felt like it wasn’t the strange part of my body that would be sexualized in that context anymore. Um, so it’s been really freeing, sort of stepping away from the AFAB body. I feel like the AFAB body is so… objectified and just looked at in this kind of gross way. It’s really sad, but at the same time, coming out has um… you know, my boyfriend and I broke up cause I’m… I’m going to be making some changes to my body that he doesn’t know if he’s going to be comfortable with and he doesn’t want to like, ruin my excitement about it, you know, and I’m like, oh my gosh, like I’m getting really hairy and just like, all of those things that are going to be changing that he’s not going to necessarily be on board with since he’s a cis straight guy. He’s just like, it’s been hard. He’s like, “I… I… I care about you, but I am straight. I don’t know how I’m gonna feel when you look like a guy”. So it’s super fair. It’s just a really hard aspect to it I guess.

Yeah. But congratulations on starting starting T soon.

Thanks, I’m super excited about it. I’ve got some… some steps to go still, but it’s on my checklist.

I have a bunch of friends who are transitioning both ways and there was one of them that is… is f to m and they… I didn’t see them over the entire summer and when I saw them, their voice had just dropped (Cassandra laughs). It was like, oh my God, such a radical change and they’re so much happier now.

That’s the change I’m looking forward to the most. Because oftentimes now I’ll be referred to as a guy until I speak, and then they correct their pronouns. Like, oh man. Okay. Well, once my voice changes it’s going to be great.

Um, so… so the question here is… is there anything about being… at one point femme presenting or mental illness that you struggled with the most? So I think you’ve answered that, but if you want to, like, if there’s anything else that you want to talk more about… I don’t want to make you repeat yourself though.

Yeah. Um, I guess a lot of it has just been in my head, like I was so worried about people’s reactions before I came out. It kept me from doing it for years and when I came out it was nothing (Nik laughs). Um, so I guess that it’s just sort of like heavy to be alone in it. Um, I recently met the first… like transitioned non binary person that I’ve ever met and that has been so validating and so much less isolating. I would say that the isolation is really, really hard.

Yeah. Yeah, that’s fair. Do you not have a lot of people in your community that are a nonbinary?

Um, I have a couple of trans friends who are going from one binary to the other, but um, I have, I only have two nonbinary friends and only one of them is medically transitioned.

Okay. Yeah, that’s like a very specific experience. Um, so do you… the core of the entire interview. So this is going to be a leading question and I’m preparing you for that (Cassandra laughs), but do you feel like um, mental illness and being someone who was at one point femme presenting, like do you feel like those two pieces have interacted? And so there’s several… I can give you examples of several ways that that could have been the case. I don’t want to put words into your mouth.

I would say that it does or did or I don’t know. Yes (Nik laughs). I guess that… the first thing that came to mind when you were asking that was the way that I… coped with my mental illness in high school and stuff like I, um, started dating way too young. I got into like one serious relationship so that I wouldn’t feel that isolation, that everything caused me and that of course made the whole thing worse, um, but I guess that the… coping methods were very feminine based. I guess, you know, I did the sort of curl into myself instead of lashing out like a masculine depressed person might do or, um… I don’t know. I guess just the way that I was told to react to how I was feeling probably would have been different if I were a guy. Um, I’m trying to think of more examples for that, but I don’t have any.

That’s fair. Um, do you… so obviously being nonbinary has had a huge impact on both of these things, but are there any other identities of yours that you feel have interacted with these… identities?

What do you mean by that?

So like, this is, I… I can never like create like a default question to ask people because people’s identities are all over the place, but it’s like… and I can’t ascribe them identities, but it’s um… like if you were to list off like the… the identities that have played the most… had the most impact on your life, like um, do you think any of those have interacted with mental illness or… or… or being someone who was socialized as femme?

So are you saying things like, I’m a student, I’m a… I go to jiu jitsu, like those are my identities?

Yeah. If those are things that you want to talk about.

Okay. Um, so I guess we touched on how being perceived as femme there is really weird. Um, I always have to like partner up with the other females and that’s not what real world application would be and I’m there for self defense. So that’s kind of frustrating sometimes that I’m put in this box where… I want to experience the uncomfortable and I would rather be partnered with a guy a lot of the time. So there’s… there’s one… as a student with female perception and mental health. Okay. So there I got a lot of support. I got a lot of, um, like hugs. People would come in like, make sure I was okay if I was crying, um, if I were a guy, I don’t know if that would happen. So there’s… there’s a difference though too. They were just softer to me, I guess more understanding of the mental health. Um, what other roles do I have? As a daughter I would say it’s probably the same thing being perceived female of by my parents and being depressed. Um, they were just very helpful. Um, you know, they did their best. You know, the things that they did weren’t necessarily helpful (Nik laughs), but they’ve definitely tried to be there for me, were very understanding of it. Whereas if I were a guy, I might have been just told to toughen up. Um, so in a way it’s been beneficial, in a way It’s been harder.

Always pros and cons. Um, is there anything that you want to talk about that there hasn’t been space for it in these questions?

I guess I’d like to touch a little bit more on the internal misogynism stuff because that’s just something that I’ve been really struggling with personally. I don’t know if I’m rejecting this female label because I’ve been told that what being female is… Like for a long time I fought with, should I just try to expand this definition of what a woman is or should I just reject it and become non binary? And it was so many other things that led me to believe that I was actually nonbinary. Um, it was just… just different experiences where I felt like, this is not me, this is not okay. You know, things like that. Um, but I think that the whole way that society treats women and labels women and put them in these boxes is really damaging and it’s just so limiting and hard. And I think that if I had had more room to be a masculine female growing up then maybe this nonbinary label wouldn’t have to exist, but I think that’s what nonbinary means too. So it’s just this really hard, kind of like semantics of it all where I really want to be a good feminist and support all my women, like all my friends and all of these people who are just doing such great things to expand the definition and to just be this positive light in this role. But at the same time I can’t. I can’t have that label on myself. And so that’s just a hard, weird space to be.

Yeah. I remember a few years ago when I was trying to figure out my own gender things. I had a lot of conversations with my trans friends where it’s like, okay, like in the world where these gender role did not exist, what would be… what would be the thing that you would feel? And I just… eventually I was like, this is kind of like a useless question for me to ask because it’s like, we don’t live in that world. Like, we’re not going to live in that world… maybe someday like in centuries (Cassandra laughs). But like that’s not the world that we live in. So at some point it’s like… it doesn’t, it’s like people feel what they feel. And they should just do what makes them comfortable and if that’s still identifying as a like, as the gender that they were assigned at birth and it’s just like, kind of bending the role, like the stereotypes with that, great. If it’s more Ilike a, “I fundamentally feel like a different gender” also great. It’s like, cool. And it’s like… it’s like I would be interested if there are like scientific studies on that distinction, but it’s like, it’s, yeah. I don’t know if anyone necessarily has the answer.

No, no one’s been raised in a society where they don’t see gender, it just hasn’t happened yet. Yeah, that’s really interesting.

I guess alienation from the body is like… one of the big things, but that’s like even that, like that’s not necessarily a part of the narrative. Yeah, very complicated.

Yup. It’s so interesting. Like I don’t know if this is too personal for me to get into, but like the main things that made me realize like I am nonbinary and not just a masculine female were like, my periods started to just make me die inside. And then I realized that a lot of the emotional swings aren’t just hormones, it’s that I… get really upset with everything that’s happening. And similarly when I went and got my first pap smear, it was the worst experience of my life. I got into my car and I cried for 10 minutes. I was fucked up in the head for like, two weeks. I was like, this is just not an okay thing that just happened to me. I’m never ever doing this again. So that was what I started looking into surgeries and stuff and I decided like… I’ve wanted a hysterectomy since I was 16 because I’m just not into the childhood side of it. I do not like having a period. It’s just been so hard. And so that’s when everything really clicked. Like this is all a very related thing. I’m not female, this isn’t my organs. Like, get these out of me (both laugh). That was what I started doing more research on all of it and recognized that you could like, do a halfway transition on testosterone, which I never realized before. You can take really low dose testosterone and it’ll still drop your voice and like, you might get some facial hair but it won’t do all the changes. And so that was just amazing to realize and I don’t know… I think that um, a lot of the really uncomfortable sides have led to a lot more research into things that’ll alleviate those and that has made me realize who I am and what my identity really is and how it’s defined by the Internet and things like that.

Yeah, I’m glad you had that realization. It sounds like it’s been super, super positive.

It was just hard to get there.

Um, so it’s very important to me that these are more like conversations than straight up interviews. So like I’ve… I’ve asked you all these questions and you’ve done me a huge favor by sitting and being vulnerable with me,  so I want to extend the offer, if you want to ask me any questions, whether it’s like, turning these questions background on me or if you want to ask me about the project or… or anything. So like if you have any questions now would be a time. You can also ask me later if you want, but…

I’d love to hear more. So you said that you are Sam and Sarah, do you have days that kind of feel like one or the other or how does that fluctuation work for you?

Yeah. Yeah. So it’s… I never feel masc but there are definitely days that I feel more androgynous. Um, and it’s been… I think I always kind of felt that way, but it was kind of weird for me to pick up exactly what was happening. It was like, ahhh, some days I just feel awful when I’m dressed this way and I’m presenting this way. And then other days I’m like, cool, this is my favorite outfit. And it’s like, why, why? (Cassandra laughs) Like why is this? And eventually I was like, oh, like the way that I’m perceiving myself within my body is fundamentally changing on a day to day basis. Interesting. Okay. Um, and it’s been like… because I don’t feel like, I think that was a bit of Dysphoria, but since I’ve kind of figured that out and have learned to dress accordingly, I don’t feel much dysphoria anymore. So it’s been kind of weird for me in terms of like, this is not the typical like, trans or nonbinary narrative. And so I’ve been like, where do I… but I think… I think just… I don’t feel like cis is the right label for me. And so I always am like, femme non binary, I think is like the sort of space that I exist in. Like… like woman or whatever is not… is not necessarily an inaccurate term, but it is not the entirety of the gender for me.

That’s a great way to phrase it. Very nice.

Yeah, that I… if you ever, if you ever need more nonbinary friends, um, that is my entire friend group in Chicago (Cassandra laughs).

I would love to come visit or something sometimes. That sounds like so much fun.

Yeah! When you actually said… when we were talking about the possibility of interviewing, you were like, “oh, I’m, I’m someone who is AFAB and identify as nonbinary and I’m sure that’ll be like, a very unique perspective” and I was like, how many… like how many non cis people do I have? And I went and counted and I think out of like… 60 people that I’m interviewing, it’s something… it’s like over 20 of them are not cis (Cassandra laughs).

That’s amazing! Oh my gosh, good for you. That’s so cool!

I just exist in a very like, queer and gender queer space. I think that made it a lot easier to be like, yup, okay, this is just what I… how I feel right now. And people are like, “cool, all right, we’re going to alternate calling you Sarah and Sam”. And I’m like, yes, that’s great.

Oh, I love that. Where did you find that group? People who went to school with or…?

Yeah. Well, so in high school I had one of those friend groups that just like, everyone turned out to be gay eventually. Like there were very few of us that identified as such in high school. I was one of them and then I had another friend but most people didn’t really come out in high school but like, over time it’s just been like, a lot of people have come out and then I… I joined like a… like a support group, I guess in high school for… for the Queer Youths (Cassandra laughs) and I made a lot of friends through that. So I’m always someone who’s had, like… I’ve been very much in queer culture since high school and… I don’t really know what happened in college. In my first year I was… I had like three friends and one of them was the guy that was dating and the other two were the people that I now live with and they were all straight. And then I went through a breakup with that guy and I was very aggressively like, oh, I need to make more friends. Like, I’m sad and lonely (Cassandra laughs) so I’m going to aggressively pursue friendships. And then all of a sudden, within a few months I’m like, oh, I just have all queer friends again (both laugh).

I guess it all worked out great then. That’s so funny.

It was like, I don’t really know exactly… but I feel like it’s like, a vibe that you kind of get… you’re just like, “you’re a gay. I’m also gay”.

It was so funny. When I toured Colorado College, I was there with high schoolers because it was just like how the tour works out. Like I was the only transfer students and like all these little baby queers flocked to me. They picked up on my queer energy. They’re like,” I’ll be safe with them” (Nik laughs). Was so cute.

That’s so good!

Like all of these introverted little gay guys were just like, talking to each other by the end and like joking around and we were the loudest in the class by the end of it all, it was so cute to watch like, how the strength in numbers, just like let them be free. It was just so cute.

The number of friendships that form around like, “you are also queer? I am queer” like, that is such a bonding point.

Definitely. It’s so funny like this, uh, the first….  the transitioned nonbinary person that I referenced– the only reason that we talked to each other and is like painting class, but it was like, “you’re queer? Yes, let’s be friends” and that was like, the launching point of our friendship. It’s just so funny how often that happens.