In the previous text, I introduced how my current visual identity came to be. What I didn’t fully realize at the beginning of that process was that the need to present myself visually in a certain way stemmed from an inner need to discover who I really am and to build my gender identity. If you visit my profile on FetLife, you’ll see it says “33NB.” The NB stands for non-binary. Even though this topic is discussed a lot today, I still encounter questions about what it actually means to be non-binary, because people who identify this way often can’t explain it properly. I hope that I can do so now, from my perspective.

I mentioned in the previous text that it was clear to me from a young age that I wasn’t like other boys. I had no problem with that—until puberty. That’s when real chaos began in my head, as male characteristics appeared on my body that I didn’t like at all and immediately started to fight against. Unfortunately, laser hair removal didn’t exist back then, so I spent countless hours in the bathroom with a razor.

During high school, when you can already research things online, I came across articles and videos about transgender people. At first, I thought maybe that’s what I was, because I didn’t want to be a man. However, in their stories, one sentence dominated: they “felt like they were in the wrong body.” That’s where we started to diverge, because I didn’t want to change certain characteristics of my body (at least not my sex), but I did want to adjust my body so that it would feel comfortable to me.

When I moved to Novi Sad for studies, that adjustment began. That was roughly the first time I realized that I didn’t want to be either a man or a woman, but something in between, because that’s how I actually felt. At that time, I didn’t feel the need to define it—I took it step by step, borrowing elements from women that I liked, fully aware that this didn’t mean I had to adopt a complete female identity.

At that point, I didn’t even know what it was called, nor did I care to define myself. I was simply following my inner feeling, building myself step by step, and that was enough. The problem arose when people around me wanted to define me, and I didn’t know how to help them. From today’s perspective, I understand that their intention wasn’t bad—they wanted to define me only to understand me better. But at that time, it was exhausting for me because I didn’t want to define myself; I just wanted to be Filip.

However, in 2017, I came across an English text about non-binary people, and for the first time, reading something on the subject, I found myself. I realized that I had always been this way; I just didn’t know what it was. I accepted that it was okay that all those previous years I couldn’t decide if I was a man or a woman, because I was more or less both.

Today, I can define it like this: if we take men as black and women as white, I am gray. And that shade of gray has changed over the years. In the beginning, it was closer to black; over time, it gradually became lighter. It will never become completely white, and there are periods when it darkens a little again, but it always remains gray.

Now that I am deeper into this topic, I realize that no man is completely black on that scale, nor is every woman completely white. Each of us has a bit of the other, it’s just that they are closer to their innate identity. I am not, which is why I have gone much further on that scale.

I used to think that life would be more complicated for me because of this. And it is, but I’ve also realized it’s more interesting. I’m happy that it’s this way, and that there are many people around me who understand and accept me exactly as I am. And I know that on this site there are people who don’t fully understand me, but they are afraid to ask questions for fear of offending me. I appreciate their consideration, and I hope this text will help them get to know me better and experience me as I truly am.