My Situationship With Labels
The label conundrum: on identity and the paradox of labels.
A Notes From The In-between Substack post by Denise Sivasubramaniam
At the moment I have a Netflix-and-chill sitch with labels. We’re not in a committed relationship, but I keep hitting that shit anyway. Sometimes labels bring comfort — they arrive with clarity, community, even a bit of relief. Other times, they overstay their welcome, expecting me to cook them breakfast when I’ve got stuff to do.
There’s an argument out there that says: ditch the labels. Just be yourself. Don’t reduce your life to diagnostic categories or identity tags. I get the appeal — it means you’re more than a diagnosis, more than a box on a form.
But here’s the flip side: without labels, I started gaslighting myself. Why do I process the world differently? Why do I feel so “other”? Without the right words, I had no map. Labels might be annoying, but at least they give you directions to the next episode.
When Labels Get Clingy
The peril of labels is that they can swallow you whole. Suddenly, every bad day becomes “my autism,” every mood swing “my bipolar.” Labels sprawl across your couch and take over the remote.
Culturally, they can be just as clingy. You’re cast as the “smart brown girl,” the “woman who lives with disability,” the “quirky autistic.” You don’t always get to choose your character role. Sometimes society assigns you one and refuses to let you skip to the next season.
And, for example, doctors can often reduce you to a set of labels in your file, treating the condition rather than the person. Useful for diagnosis, less useful for being seen in full colour.
When Labels Are Handy
But labels can also be lifelines. They give language to experiences that once felt like moral failings. “Lazy” turnd out to be “executive dysfunction.” “Too emotional” turned out to be “autistic burnout.” Without labels, I’d still be blaming myself for glitches that are simply part of who I am.
They also help you find your people. Try explaining your quirks without them: “Girl who loves sci-fi and superhero movies but gets triggered by supermarkets.” Not exactly the smoothest way to make friends. Labels are shorthand for “me too.”
Most importantly, labels help you find the right answers. Without them, you can end up chasing the wrong explanations for years. With them, you can finally land on support, strategies, and language that actually fit.
Intersectionality Complicates the Plot
Here’s the twist: for every place on the spectrum, there’s a different relationship to labels. Some people need them in black and white. Labels anchor them. For me, they need to be fluid — tools I can pick up and put down, not tattoos I can never remove.
And it’s going to be different for everyone. Some people love their labels. They wear them proudly, like a superhero cape. Others despise them, feeling boxed in or pathologised. And each approach can work, depending on who you are and your circumstances.
Then there are the people who say: “I don’t see colour.” It’s meant kindly, but it erases something real.
Labels, in this sense, aren’t about reduction. They’re about recognition. They’re the subtitles that make the show legible. As the UN Women Intersectionality Resource Guide and Toolkit puts it,
“Labels can illuminate aspects of who we are, but they can never contain the whole story.”
That line feels like a mirror to everything I’ve written here — the reason intersectionality matters at all. It reminds me that identity isn’t a static file of traits; it’s a living collage of contexts. You can read the toolkit here.
The Paradox
Here’s the paradox: labels can both confine and liberate. They can box you in and set you free. They can limit you to a diagnosis and teach you to celebrate the parts of yourself that diagnosis makes visible.
That’s the real trick of self-acceptance: holding both truths. To celebrate your identity while knowing it’s never the whole story. To learn to love yourself not despite the labels, but in relationship with them.
Closing Credits
Writing this Substack is its own compromise. I can’t really explore these issues without flashing around my labels — autism, bipolar, disability, culture — because they shape the ground I’m standing on. But what matters most isn’t the labels themselves. It’s how I relate to them, how I hold them, how I allow them to guide but not define me.
This is how I feel today. Tomorrow, I might contradict myself — and that’s okay. That’s the point of this Substack: lived experience, not universal rules.
For today, I’ll say this: I’m intersectional. I’m neurodivergent. I live with disability. I’m culturally marked. Labels have helped me not just claim that, but celebrate it — to see myself with more love, not less.
For me right now, that’s the healthiest way to live with labels: treat them like a situationship. Not forever, not nothing — just complicated, different for everyone, and still teaching you something before you hit play next episode.
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Intersectionality is a Bra That Doesn’t Fit
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Denise this article about the paradox is so cool 😎 next time I see you I'd love to talk more about this!
Well articulated. I believe the general problem is we look for absolute positions and perspectives, and also fall into that trap with our language.
So, 'Labels are good' and 'Labels are bad' are equally unhelpful statements or positions.
Really, it's possible for things to have merit in certain situations, times, or stages. I've found labels bringing relief at times - then harm once turned to something to cling to and hide behind.
Labels are dangerous... but also, important.
Thanks for sharing
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