4.27.20, Devon Smith

4. 27. 2020 By Devon Smith

For the majority of my life, even now, I have struggled with the idea of gender expression. I am a cis-gender female and when I was a child, I always felt over sexualized and uncomfortable being femme and girly. I felt that being feminine was dangerous and weak and something that men would take advantage of me for as a woman.

When I came out to myself at 16, and finally realized I was attracted to women (as well as men), there was a time in my life where I briefly thought I was transgender. This could be partly due to internalized homophobia in thinking that I must really be a man if I am attracted to women.

Now I know that gender and sexuality are two completely different ideas; one can be attracted to whomever they want and it has nothing to do with how they express themselves and their gender.

I will say that even today, I still find myself having trouble expressing my gender in general. I just feel that my gender expression isn’t super consistent and it is still something that is still very unclear to me. Some days I feel compelled to wear heavy makeup and a dress and generally look like a “stereotypical female”. Other days I feel like looking like a tomboy or more androgynous. In general I guess I just don’t understand why I don’t have a more “fixed” sense of gender identity. Will it always be like this, one day I’m femme and the next I’m masc?

I will say that as I get older I find myself to be more comfortable with a more femme exterior. I think that this has to do with the fact that I become more confident as an adult woman and have reprogrammed my brain from thinking that one has to be masculine in order to be strong and protect myself from men.

It’s funny how deeply all of the “isms” are ingrained in us.