Queer or questioning? You’ve come to the right place! Welcome to Queeries, a guide to figuring out your identity, created by a non-cishet, first-year college student. As a useful source to explore all of your identity-related questions, Queeries is like the queer cousin of Neil deGrasse Tyson’s Cosmic Queries. By all means, feel free to read Tyson’s novel too because, well, space is rad, but this blog will hopefully be more helpful for you to better understand yourself and be more comfortable with who you are. 

If you’ve stumbled onto this page, you’re most likely part of the LGBTQIA+ community or questioning your identity. Coming from a person who has been through the whole questioning process twice recently (once for sexuality and once for gender, without necessarily “completing” either), it can be confusing, overwhelming, and emotionally draining, especially if you’ve just started questioning and don’t really know where to begin with figuring things out.   

In time, this blog will cover topics from identity crises, compulsory heterosexuality, and gender expression to representation in media, helpful online spaces for the LGBTQIA+ community, and a general overview of various labels for your identity. 

 Please note that you don’t need a label for yourself if you either don’t want one or can’t find one that falls in that Goldilocks zone of feeling just right. Some people find that having a specific word to describe who they are helps them feel more content and be more comfortable with their identity, but others don’t feel the same way.  

 Fully understanding yourself and your identity isn’t easy, and it doesn’t happen at the same rate for everyone. It’s important to understand that gender and sexuality are fluid and may change over time. It’s perfectly okay if you feel that one label best fits you at this moment, but come to connect more with a different label in the future. You don’t owe anyone an explanation about your identity.  

I had a rough time with my whole journey of self-discovery. It started with me questioning my sexuality, but once I had reached a better understanding of what I was feeling, it snowballed into a combination of questioning my sexuality and gender all at once. It has been one heck of a ride trying to figure everything out. Given the chance of connecting with at least one of my readers, I currently identify as simply “not straight” and “not cisgender,” and I use she/they pronouns. I haven’t found my perfect labels yet, but I’ve come to be generally comfortable with who I am despite that.  

I want to take this opportunity to do what I can to help anyone else out there who may be struggling with their identity, since I’ve done my fair share of research over the past several years (and I’ve had my fair share of identity crises to accompany it). Ultimately, I just want to create a safe space on the internet to share what I have learned, connect with my readers, and make everyone feel less alone in figuring out who they are. Hopefully, I can at least make you feel welcome, accepted, and validated, while potentially minimizing the number of identity crises you experience along the way. 

Buckle up for the ride. I hope you stay awhile or come back to visit soon. Queeries will be here waiting for you whenever you need it, or whenever you’re ready.  

With love, 

PJ  <3