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?

@MillieChant I know that feeling. It’s shit. We were waiting for ivf but got a fluke positive before we got there (think clomid was still in system) so feel incredibly lucky there. Wishing you all the best with the ivf.

When we were going through infertility investigations/treatment etc I was very aware of the disparity in Male/female experience. The invasive tests, need to take hormones which for me caused huge mood swings and horrendous night sweats among other things, the constant toing and froing to the hospital for the next blood test or transvaginal ultrasound. DH had to wank into a cup a few times and that was about it. Granted that may be very different depending on the particular issues facing that couple but that was our experience. Plus the fact that not being able to conceive felt like a very personal failure on my part. Because womanhood = motherhood is such a strong narrative, it was particularly hard not to feel like I was failing at being a woman and wasn’t womaning right. Not helped by the sort of ‘tsk tsk well what do you women expect leaving it so late’ tone that feels pretty pervasive in the media. I left it late because the person I’d spent all my 20s with accidentally got someone else pregnant instead, and the breakup left me pretty screwed emotionally and financially, then just when I was getting to a point where I could maybe start to think about looking for a new partner to start a family with, my mum was dying and I put everything on hold to care for her. So I didn’t meet DH till late 30s. But I still very much felt the message that I’d been a selfish, crap woman who put frivolous things like a career and travel first and so now would have to pay with infertility. Not saying it was overt all the time or that I had those thoughts every day, but it was there in lower moments. From talking to DH he never felt like if we didn’t have children he’d have failed as a man or that it would somehow be his fault for not trying sooner. He wanted a child very much and would have been very sad had it not worked out, and I think he would have felt some kind of failure to make me happy or give me what I wanted, but I’m not sure it felt as deeply personal to him somehow? I don’t know - maybe I’m doing him a disservice there.

I feel tired. So fucking tired. And not just in the lack of sleep sense.

It is fucking soul destroying.

I could elaborate, but there is just so much shit that it's difficult to know where to begin.

But there is no doubt that the causes behind this soul sucking tiredness are exclusive to my sex.

When I thought about googling how much caffeine is in a mug of cocoa because I’m 7 months pregnant and trying to limit caffeine intake. Plus Asda exchanged my caffeine free Diet Coke order for regular Diet Coke yesterday and I don’t want it to go to waste.

@EinsteinsArousedSausagesHCB I hope you're ok and things start to get better soon. That soul sucking exhaustion from life is the worst

Have a water infection at 33 weeks pregnant which is pretty horrible.
Also had an argument with a man about what type of trees are in my own garden, which actually featured him asking me "are you confused as you're pregnant"

The joys.

I'm not sure what makes me feel like a woman today, but I will be painting the kitchen later (after I've done the ironing) so maybe I'll feel like man when I've done that!
My DS,when he was younger, told me he didn't really like girly girls but he liked me because I was more of a 'man girl'
Not sure what in his 6 year old mind made me a 'man girl' though!

Sure I'll feel very womanly later having an uncomfortable internal scan to look at my ovaries to prepare for ivf, which as @AliasGrape says is a burden that falls disproportionately on women.

Though I felt a lot of womanly guilt that DH had to go through the indignity of the wank in a cup. I doubt anyone has spent much time thinking of my pain and indignity through every other part of the process

thekindyoufind I had an argument yesterday with a man about whether a duck was male or female. I asked him if he had ever kept ducks himself (no) but he was sure he knew the difference, despite me telling him that not only had I kept ducks myself but I volunteer at a Wildlife sanctuary where we are currently looking after over 30 ducklings!
But no, he knew what he was talking about

When I creaked down the stairs first thing like someone who’s 150. Side effect of the chemo I finished a couple of months ago for the breast cancer I developed thanks to my BRCA1 gene fault.

I'm 41+6 weeks pregnant and dealing with all kinds of pressure from consultants to ignore my own instincts about my own body and baby in favour of their aggressive interventions that carry their own risks. Previous birth trauma and history of sexual assault not helping matters. My silly lady brain obviously can't be trusted to do her own research about all of this. My femaleness is currently inescapable, both biologically and in the way a patriarchal health system has been set up to bully and gaslight me.

If, however, I was a male who insisted he was female, they'd believe me.

Thank you @PurpleButterflyAway. I cannot express how much that means to me.

Menopausal brain like a sieve.

Apart from that who knows 🤷‍♀️, went for a run (thrashed my teen), working at my desk, put the bins out, watered the veg. Is that "womanly" enough?

Feeling womanly as I have raging PMT, and feeling outraged and impotent at the furore surrounding JKR, and the entitled attitude of so called 'woke' individuals who seem to think its not only women who menstruate. I am fucking livid. And also worried about the kind of society my DD will grow up in where its clearly not ok to be proud to be female. Or maybe i am overthinking it. Who knows 🤷‍♀️

I have to remember to take my "mini-pill" later because I left to go to work at 5am and who has time for all that when I have a bus to catch? I also have to ring the surgery later and ask htf am I going to have a cervical screening test when the nurse won't see anyone unless they are near death? Cancer is a "thing" in my family, btw.

I work in a male-dominated industry and so if one more contractor asks me to speak to the person in charge and then express surprise that I am, in fact, the boss, then he'd better move quick! Also customers asking me questions, not believing me, then asking the same question to a male colleague. Piss off!

I have a weak bladder too. And post-pregnancy heart arrhythmia. Having a bad heart is a thing in my family. I also have a lot of fat in my tummy, bottom and hips. I have a tough time with my weight.

My daughter is nearly 14 and asks me about adult female clothes sizing and things like if her dress goes with her flowery hi-tops. (They do) She's moody on her period. Her dad takes her moods the wrong way. I say to him, when your abdomen feels like your insides are about to drop out and cause a mess, come back to me with a smile.

I don't feel like a woman, just am one.

I feel like a woman because I am one ...... is the best way I can put it.

Actually, I feel like a man ...... but bloody social distancing is preventing me from going out and finding one

How i feel like a woman today, my breasts are sore and my period is late. I go through this every month and i hate it. I had to explain to my daughter when fucking jml and their facial hair removal gyzmo that men can and do use eyebrows grooming some even waxing nostrils and excessive cheek hair for a neat beard definition but this isnt advertised. That was after the fuxking tampax advert. Absolutely bombarded with shit marketing for shit products as women.

I had a sneezing fit (hayfever) and peed my pants.

I am menopausing all over the place.

I shaved my legs so I am deemed acceptable by society. Same for armpits.

I waxed my lip and chip. See above.

I

My period is due, but my boobs are feeling normal, so it's likely to be late.
My womanly feeling is annoyance that my periods, that have been very regular for over 30 years have been on the blink for the last six months.

I understand this is a very exclusory, transphobic feeling and therefore not a true womanly feeling.

I have milk blisters on both nipples so breastfeeding my 7.5mo DS is agony right now. He’s still having two night feeds and doesn’t go back to sleep without a fight so I’m pretty exhausted too.

Trying to find lightweight summer tops which will work with my deeply unsexy nursing bras and not show the outline of the re-usable breast pads I bought because the nice slimline disposable ones were bankrupting me.

Planning to walk into town in the pouring rain later because even though DH did the supermarket trip earlier and had DS right there in front of him in the pram, it didn’t occur to him to buy DS some baby food.

So I guess my womanly feelings today are pain, fatigue and annoyance.

Today I womanned by getting up first and ensuring my kid was up for school, dealing with the dogs, fretting about school work, making sure I looked tidy enough for my conference calls, organised family filing, finances, household work men, cleaned the bath room, all whilst felt emotional due to the hormones and second guessing how everyone else is feeling.

Watching my mother basically taught me that women do everything, all the 'pink' jobs and all the 'blue' jobs and that equality = you can have the job and responsibility but you can't put down all the household work too.

I'm working on trying to unlearn that and now occasionally manage to ask other householders to pick up tasks. Although I have yet to get anyone to absorb the mental load of actually noticing that a jobs needs to be done.

My womanly feeling is tired. Was up
in the night breastfeeding my 4 month old. DH is an equal parent who totally pulls his weight but he cannot Bf so nights are on me.

@Wishforanishwishdiash

I am obsessed with 7 pounds of weight.

I am peri-menopausal and get rage. Real, unrestricted rage that is bad for my career and my family. Mothers and women in caring professions don't have rage. The rage is just at the surface as this government fucks over working mothers. I am in Wales, which is fucking us over worse that England.

The best way to manage the rage is with a combined pill, but you see I am 45 and my doctor doesn't want me to have it because of stroke risk. She she weighs me every 3 months and takes my blood pressure. I have gained a half stone in lockdown, and am terrified she will take away my pills, and I will have to parent two teenagers, a toddler, and do a full time job from home with rage.

That is what it feels like to be a woman today. Counting calories to hold off the rage. If you don't have my blend of hormones and cultural mandate to be gentle, then you won't get it.

Are you me? I really could have written this word for word.

I’ve got dressed in comfy clothes but had to wear a bra to stop the nipples making my outfit look obscene. I’ve also recently come off the pill and today learnt about ovulation pains. Another thing for the list!

I've got random abdominal pain that I'm sure is womanly but I can't work out if it's ovulation or I'm going to come on (my cycles are weird).

I had a bath (that's womanly right?) and wore towels in the traditional feminine fashion.

Erm, I dunno. DH took DD to nursery even though I'm wfh. We both had a crap nights sleep because she was in our bed. So either both or neither were womanly there.

I don't feel womanly most of the time, maybe I'm a man?

I have no idea what feeling like a woman is supposed to feel like.

I am me, sometimes I don't feel like myself which is hormonal but other than that.

if I really really think what being a woman is it becomes all about biology and the little daily sexism stuff we all deal with.

Feeling like a woman means nothing to me now.
Stages I felt like a woman in my life could have been needing my first bra, getting my first period, becoming a mum.

I can see in my teenage daughter there are days she looks at her growing body and feels more grown up and womanly over child like. So if I'm feeling very ferrous I could see that some men might feel like a woman putting on a bra and a dress.

What I would like is a world where anyone can dress how they want, wear their hair how they want and if the mood take put on makeup without needing to label themselves.
What I don't want is sex based protections to be ignored.
Why oh why can't the TRA lobby go after male violence and breaking down those walls rather than demand we make room.
Make male spaces and mix spaces safe for all rather than unsafe for all.