#i know it sounds lame but i read percy jackson as a young kid (7-8) and just... got percy

[boopjuice]

Labels aren't a be all end all, but they're still important. If I'd had the words to explain myself as a kid I could have avoided so much frustration and confusion and pain.

If I knew the term gender fluid and what it meant, or hells, just the term nonbinary, I could have been a happier kid. I wouldn't have spent so much time trying to get people to not see me as a girl. I wouldn't have felt like being a girl was something I couldn't escape if I didn't want it. I wouldn't have felt like I needed to escape being a girl because I wouldn't have felt trapped.

If I knew the term asexual, I wouldn't have spent weeks in my bedroom terrified of getting married because marriage meant needing to have sex. I wouldn't have panicked and been hurt over the idea that no one would want me if they couldn't touch me like that. I wouldn't have just decided not to have relationships so I wouldn't have to explain to my partner that I didn't want sex. I wouldn't have felt broken for hating the idea of something supposed to be wonderful so very, very much.

If I had known what it meant to be ADHD, because I did know that term (thanks Riordan), if not what it meant, I could have pointed out my problems so much earlier. I could have asked for help instead of spending years thinking that it was normal to feel like you couldn't do anything you wanted, like it was normal to forget what was going on as it happened.

A label isn't just a little sticker saying "I'm this!" A label is access. To a community, to help, to resources. A label isn't sticking you in a box, it isn't limiting you down to being only this one thing. It's screaming into the void, begging not to be alone, and hearing hundreds of voices call back from the dark that you aren't.

And sometimes that's all it takes to make things a little better.