Sexual Identity Alphabet Soup: How I Stopped Worrying and Embraced the Entire Damn Alphabet

Sexual Identity Alphabet Soup: How I Stopped Worrying and Embraced the Entire Damn Alphabet

Back in 2016, while writing a book about a bisexual prostitute in Barcelona (as one does), I fell face-first into the swirling, alphabet-heavy world of sexual identity. What started as basic research became a full-blown existential identity crisis. Not because I didn’t know who I was, but because I suddenly wasn’t sure what box I was supposed to tick.

At the time, we were going from LGBT to LGBTQ to LGBTQA faster than I could update my Word doc. Then came IA, then P, then NB, then CIS , not to be confused with the spy agency , and before long, I was knee-deep in a bowl of identity soup trying to remember if Demigender was a Marvel villain or an actual thing (spoiler: it’s real).

Now, let me be clear. I wasn’t mocking the identities. I was mocking my own confusion. Because let’s be honest, if you’re a well-meaning human with a decent attention span and even you can’t keep up, imagine what your Uncle Barry thinks.

Let’s Break This Down (Without Breaking Down)

Labels can be powerful. They can give people clarity, community, protection, and language for their experience. But sometimes, those same labels can become so niche, so rapidly evolving, that it feels like you’re trying to enter a secret club with a password that changes hourly.

I found myself scribbling down terms like:

• Demigender: partially identifies with one gender
• Vaguegender: a gender identity influenced by neurodivergence
• Intergender: somewhere between the binary
• Enby: nonbinary slang equivalent of “boy” or “girl”
• Polygender: multiple genders at once (mood)

Then there’s X-gender (Japanese), Yinyang ren (Chinese), and my personal favourite: straight. Yes, let’s not forget our heterosexual cousins who are, understandably, baffled but trying.

By the time I finished that research session, I had rewritten the acronym to something like:

IPCLGGGEPBTNQDA… possibly more?

And even that felt outdated by lunch.

The Acronym Explosion and What It Says About Us

Looking back, the rapidly growing acronym isn’t just about being politically correct. It’s about how language is trying, often desperately, to keep up with the complexity of human identity. We’re evolving. What once fit in four letters now spills across a Scrabble board, because people finally have the freedom to say, “Hey, this is who I am. And it’s valid.”

Is it messy? Absolutely. But that messiness is a symptom of growth. It’s what happens when people who were once silenced suddenly have a voice. And sure, those voices sometimes talk over each other or invent new words faster than you can Google them, but isn’t that better than silence?

My Solution: The Entire Alphabet

So, in a moment of spiritual clarity (aka 3 a.m. insomnia), I solved it. I stopped trying to keep up. I stopped worrying about misplacing an acronym or offending someone by omission. I respectfully bowed out of the race for precision and created my own universal, all-inclusive, non-exclusionary identity label:

ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ

That’s it. That’s the label. Pick your letter. Or don’t. Be B today, Z tomorrow, or float between M and Q like a fabulous breeze.

It was never about making fun of the movement , quite the opposite. It was about showing up, trying to respect everyone, and realising that maybe the best way to include everyone… is to stop trying to alphabetise our humanity like a spice rack.

The Beauty and the Breakdown

There’s something oddly beautiful about the chaos of it all. The fact that we’re still trying to put words to something as abstract as who we are. That even now, we’re inventing new language not to divide, but to be seen more clearly. Some people see this and roll their eyes. Others see it and exhale for the first time in years. Maybe that’s the point. To keep evolving until everyone can finally just exist without a bloody footnote. See my more recent post on Sexual Fluidity.

Final Thoughts From 2016 Me

I still believe labels are useful, for those who want them. But we also need space for those who don’t. And while my 2016 self may have been overwhelmed by the tidal wave of sexual identity terms, he was also learning. Trying. Evolving.

And honestly, I still stand by my A–Z.

Toby, the character I mentioned back then? He never did disclose his identity because he didn’t need to. He simply lived, loved, and existed in whatever letter he felt like that day.

And maybe… that’s enough.

This post is written with a humorous tone and a whole lot of love. If you’re somewhere in this alphabet, I see you. I may not know your letter by heart, but I’m damn glad you’re here.

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