How do you 'feel like a woman' today?

[hypernormal]

The question of how it's possible for someone to 'feel like a woman' is usually answered by those who 'identify as female' with sexist stereotypes - things such as liking barbie as a child, playing with girls, liking makeup and dresses etc. I'm interested to hear how biological women would answer this question.

This morning I woke up early with period pains, so I took some paracetamol. Then, when I changed my menstrual cup it was so full that it spilled on my trousers that I'd just put on, so I had to wash them and find something else to wear that will fit my massively, hormonally bloated stomach. This is not something that happens to transwomen, yet this is the only way in which I 'feel like a woman' so far today.

How do you 'feel like a woman' today?

Menstrual cramps. So glamorous.

My phone charger is playing up so to keep it at the right angle I have shoved it in between my boobs.

I feel so womanly!

Plus I'm wearing a flowery top. Must be a girl.

I’ve had heavy, sore boobs, period pains and a tiny amount of spotting for 3 days but no actual period 😡(not pregnant).

Woke up with such extreme PMS bloat that I couldn't button up three different pairs of trousers and was almost late for work. Oh, and then I had to make an appointment for a pill check, only for the new receptionist to try and make it with the patronising, inept male doctor I always avoid

Interesting how so many of you are feeling womanly due to pregnancy or period.

I don't think there is anything else.

I do not have my period at the moment. I can't think of anything I have done today that has made me feel like a woman.

Mainly I just feel human.

I'm breastfeeding a 12 week old whose sleep is all over the once, so quite often wake up in a puddle of milk or with lumpy painful boobs. Is that womanly?

Of course if I had left the house somebody could have treated me in a particular way because they observed me to be female. However, that would have nothing to do with my feelings.

My appointment to remove and replace my copper coil had to be cancelled because of Covid. So I'm having to take the pill despite hating taking hormones because of the side effects. The only silver lining was that my periods would stop, except no they didn't!

One of the side effects is irregular bleeding, so now I keep getting caught short as have no warning and can't predict when I'm going to be bleeding.Had to run to the loo as had blood streaming down my legs today. That's how I feel like a woman today.

I'm feeling womanly because today I got all soppy over a picture of a kitten. My husband did as well, incidentally.

Yesterday I felt like a woman because some builders did some mock/jeery cheering me on while I was jogging. This has never once happened to my husband. When I complained about it to a man I know, they explained that I actually secretly enjoyed the attention. I'm such a woman!

Hmm.

I'm sat here r in DHs avengers pyjamas. With my shaved head. No make up.

I've not done any baking today, or tidying! I totally forgot to sing to the bluebirds when I woke up and the mice are still waiting for me to help them do some sewing.

I guess my cramping uterus is the only indication I have that I'm a woman.. But I don't think that counts anymore does it?

Maybe I should do some over exaggerated makeup, throw on a wig and take some lingerie shots withban erection on display then ill feel super girly again??

This thread has really made me think. It really does encapsulate for me that the things that make me feel like a woman are pretty much wholly biological in origin.

@Aposterhasnoname

Dealing with peri menopausal flooding at work, doubling up on pad and tampon, and needing to change hourly. A three hour meeting scheduled with mostly men, so will have to leave several times during that, and no doubt he office fuckwit will make some hilarious comment about the frequency of my toilet trips just to be certain everyone notices.

Wouldn’t it be great to be able to call them out on it: “well, the options are an hourly toilet break and I can stick around for the full working day/shift or I stay put and bleed through my clothes so this chair is ruined and I have to go home early to shower and change my clothes. Which is it to be?” Fuckwits. 🙄

Tired. 15+ years of undiagnosed chronic illness where fatigue is the main complaint, that I'm likely more predisposed to as a woman. Years of vague hormonal issues and no real answers. Patronised and fobbed off by mostly male doctors for years.

Stressed from being plagued by thoughts stemming from my biological clock ticking (no kids) - a concept I didn't really believe in until a few years ago when I started to feel it, and now it feels all pervading, and so intrinsically linked to my biology in its unshakeability. But due to the above, I don't feel like I can consider kids and may not even be able to.

That's a bloody good point Mascotte and it applies equally to the things our bodies sometimes can't do, infertility, hysterectomy, - they are not things a man will ever ever physically be able to experience, uniquely female.

Woman thoughts I have had today: how best to get my kids to do home school stuff, headache from listening to singing I wonder if there’s a nice way to get them to stop, do I need to wash my bra or can I get another day out of it, when will I stop breastfeeding, am I ever going to get back into paid workforce having left job to homeschool.

Breastfeeding. And weeing sitting down (but my DP sometimes does that). That's it.

Although.. on musing some more, that's if I'm at home.

Lived experience comes into it when I'm out and about. Such as men talking over me at work; usual stuff.

I feel like a woman today because I'm pregnant. This is only possible because I am a woman. Men cannot become pregnant.

I got paid less than a man.

Being a woman is a biological, body 'thing' and the experiences that result from that, on whatever level. That's it.

Once it becomes extracted from physical/biological reality then it is merely a symbolic expression of the outer form of 'something'. A performance cut off from its deeper roots.

Well, I made an appointment for a surgical procedure for next week and it's not one that any man would ever need.

Once it becomes extracted from physical/biological reality then it is merely a symbolic expression of the outer form of 'something'. A performance cut off from its deeper roots

So even though I no longer have periods, or am able to gestate a child, I still retain have that bodily memory and experience.

In fact last night, I had the most vivid, full-on dream of giving birth. The sensations that accompanied that dream brought back to me in full colour and sensation, just how giving birth felt.

Hmm, I got up, had my morning wee, fed the dog, made myself and DH a cup of tea, had a shower, got dressed (jeans and T shirt if anyone cares) Went to minimum wage paying job (animal care) Popped to corner shop to grab some milk on way home. Currently peeling potatoes, while (clearly) taking sneaky peek at MN. DH is out playing golf, but did make his own dinner before he left, so I'm no stepford wife though. Will eat alone at dining room table with my nose in a book, because I have no class.
That's about it really; my very womanly day.

I could have been describing a man's day I think. So I know I'm a woman only because I'm peri menopausal and had a couple of hot flushes

Turns out my pain was, in fact, my period.

The joy.