The “What Is Gender” boards are one resource, but they do sometimes skew a certain direction. I like Genderfork for examples of different gender identities.

Also, if your patient is genderqueer, then it wouldn’t be “more confusing” for she or zie to embrace her/hir identity. Even if she/zie isn’t genderqueer, it’s probably best just to help her/hir explore her gender identity while you remain neutral. It’d most likely be more confusing to be told anything that frames the matter in absolutes – “You’re more likely female because…” or “You’re more likely genderqueer because…” Just let your patient explore her/hir identity without leaning toward one direction or the other. I’ve found that time is a really important part of coming to terms with one’s gender. Sometimes, it takes years to fully understand and form a vocabulary for your own identity. There’s no rush. She/Zie doesn’t have to make any decisions now. She/Zie can recover from her/hir substance abuse and have a strong sense of self without necessarily having a solid set of terms with which to describe her/hir gender identity. She/Zie should focus on feeling comfortable with her/hirself regardless of whether she/zie is trans, genderqueer, or a woman.

http://www.riotnrrdcomics.com/store/books-and-zines/

While helpful for someone who is actively questioning hir gender identity, it’s also aimed at family, friends, and other potential allies of genderqueer folks.

Particularly fabulous is The Great Big Marvelous Gender Machine that provides a nuanced way of looking at the whole spectrum of possibility with regards to gender.

Best of luck with to your patient in hir journey!

Note that not everyone has childhood moments of “feeling trans”, but I did. I was at the fresh young age of 8-ish, when I wondered whether my gender was a mistake, but I felt being “the other gender” would be a mistake too. Since I had no vocabulary for what I felt, no role models to follow, I spend the rest of my childhood reluctantly in my gender while secretly delighting in those moments when I could be publicly “the other gender” (such as the time I was cast in a different-gender role for a school play and I was happier than I had been for much of my youth).

Through high school I was convinced that I had one gender brain in a different gender body, since I socially feel like I’m closer to one role and physically feel closer to the other, and that self-definition comforted me for a while. Also, I was worried about “betraying” my gender by rejecting it wholly, and sadly now that I have done so in coming out as genderqueer, I’ve actually been accused of doing just that by my own mother among others.

If there’s one piece of advice I could give to anyone who is dealing with youth who question their genders: BELIEVE THEM. Please, be that one person who doesn’t ask “are you sure”, or “have you considered it might be this other cause”, etc. Because the whole world is already doing that. The whole world. If you show not even a flicker of doubt that she is the expert at her own identity and her own gender, she’ll work things out for herself much faster and with more accuracy than if you try to “help”, I promise.

I’m sorry your patient is going through such a difficult time, but the line above thrilled me. I’ve never met anyone else who felt “a little bit” trans. I’ve always felt like maybe I was kind of transgender, but I thought maybe it was just an odd expression of my bisexuality, or unhappiness at not fitting into what is thought of as feminine, or something like that. (And maybe that’s all true.)

But it seems ridiculous not to be sure–all the transgender people I’ve ever heard of seem to say that they always knew that they were in the wrong body, had the wrong sex, etc. Even if they didn’t get any treatment for it, they knew, for sure, that something was not right.

I’ve never felt that, and I won’t ever do any kind of transition, but I’ve always felt like maybe I somehow was just a bit trans. It’s nice to know that I’m not the only one.

One thing that can take things to quite a deep personal reflection is Donna Haraway’s “Cyborg Manifesto”, which looks at ways past a gendered world.

All this is just to say that identity is a personal journey; I was not particularly aided by outside resources, so I don’t have anything to recommend. Best of luck to Pat and others who are questioning.

At first, I thought I was just the wrong kind of woman, that I didn’t fit with other women, that I was weird or doing it wrong, or just… something.

But after I learned more about feminism and became a feminist, I realised there are endless ways to be a woman. Endless ways to express a female identity. And *after* I knew that, *after* I internalised that — I STILL realised there was something that didn’t fit.

And that’s when I realised I am part-guy. My gender-queerness is more than/different than being butch, being a tomboy, etc. And I’m really the only one who can see and identify that difference, because it exists within me, not in some outwardly discernable way.

I think it really hit me when I conceptualised my relationship with the cigender, somewhat hetero guy I’m with: sometimes I think of us as being in a gay relationship. It’s not just a “straight” relationship that defies gender roles. It’s something different than that. And that helped me realise that I just don’t see myself as entirely woman.

I wish I could offer something more, but I hope my experiences add to the conversation. I’m sending good vibes to both you and your client.