Being A Girl Child Was By Observation

My life started with my long and hard birth on July 14, 1993. I came into the world with a large scream and was immediately placed into some sort of category. The doctors and nurses took a quick look at me, and pronounced me as a girl. This social label of being a girl was now my gender, which is something I had no say in. Every since that very moment in time where my parents were told I was a girl, I have been treated according to my gender. This meant that my parents automatically dressed me in pink, bought me dollhouses and kitchen sets and threw me Barbie themed birthday parties. Since I was surrounded my whole entire life by these things, it was almost like second nature to think and act the way that I did and still do. My

The determination of my gender identity was preset by my parents giving me the chromosomes XY, gave me an anatomic appearance of a female. Also being reared in a hetero environment had an influence in becoming a female as well. So the relation to the masculinity-femininity continuum is that I posses both traits feminine and masculine. In some situations I tend to carry myself as a caring and soft-spoken female, is typical for feminine behavior. On the other hand I express more masculine attributes like aggressiveness and self-reliance, which is typical for masculine behavior. Both add in the development in determining and sustaining my gender identity. The biological perspective by the way was inherited from my parents and aided in the development of the characteristics in becoming a woman, gender role of nurturing and caring individual, and maternal tendencies in taking care of my child. Then the psychological perspective according to my mother to which she insists that I was a normal girl with particular behaviors toward feminine toys and clothes. As a final point, the social environment offers an insight into the typical social role of an American woman, which was predetermined at birth by my social surroundings (Rathus, Nevid &

HI, Mireya I enjoyed how you described the things you had to wear and not do as a child in detail, reminds me of what I would go through as well. My mother would also instill me to play with dolls when I only wanted to play with the “rollie pollies” on the side of the house. I agree with your last statement of what you wear on the outside cannot explain what’s going on inside. I saw this documentary of children as young as 7 telling their parents they wanted to become boys, one little girls was open at a very young age with her parents about feeling like a boy inside so they supported her all the way they let her cut her hair and dress like a boy and eventually talked hormones to become more masculine. The other child was afraid to tell her

I knew it would be a challenging for my family to accept me being gay. Being the only gay male in the family was not as easy as it sounded in my head. I decided to wait for the “right time”. As years passed, it took a toll out of

I grew up surrounded by strong women who fulfilled both male and female gender roles. I attended an all-female high school where girls took on the positions traditionally reserved for boys. All my friends were girls and I did not have male friends until I reached college. For most of my childhood I took on neither masculine or feminine gender norms. I was not a traditional tomboy or girly girl, over all I identified as a nerd more than anything else. I looked up to both men and women, but not because of their gender performances. I never questioned my gender or even thought much about it and so; I fell within a strange limbo of identifying as a female but not participating in female gender roles. It was not until later in life where I encountered terms such as non-binary, androgynous, and gender non-conforming. After talking to people who identified with these terms, and learning more about what they mean; it made me question where I fall on the gender spectrum. Many of my mannerisms are traditionally masculine yet I fulfill mostly female gender roles. Today I still identify as female and occasionally chose to actively participate in my gender

Growing up I was different from all the other boys; for example, during recess in elementary school most boys would elect to go play “Power Rangers”, but I would always choose to play house with the girls. If we had a free day during Physical Education the boys would generally chose to play some sport that requires a ball, and I would choose to go play double Dutch with the girls, pretty much anyone I chose to hang out was a girl. At the time I didn’t think it was weird that I generally enjoyed doing things that were traditionally considered girly, It was just an aspect of who I was, But once I went to middle school I learned that meant people would call me gay. It would later take me over eight years to have the courage the courage to come out of my closet, and admit that I was gay.

The first experience that I forced me to think about my gender occurred when I was fairly young. I was playing tag with my best friend Matt and his sister Melissa. At one particular moment, it was my turn to attempt to “tag” them. When I was chasing Melissa, I pushed her slightly too hard and she tumbled to the ground. Neither of us thought anything about it, and we continued to play until dusk. After they left to return home, my mother came up to me and told me that I shouldn’t be so physical with Melissa the next time we play. I failed to understand her point. She did not seem to have a problem with the fact that I played with Matt the same way, but she began to explain to me that it is seen as inappropriate to push girls down in that manner. I apologized to my mother and told her that I would not do it again. Although she may have meant to teach me about

Previously on my Theory of Me paper I discussed how important respect is in my family and zero tolerance for disrespect. The only discussion I had growing up regarding age was respect towards adults and the elder. Sexual health or sexual orientation was the last thing my parents did not talk to me about. It may have been influenced from embarrassment and boundaries of what not to talk about.

Gender and gender roles are a somewhat complicated idea to understand. Contrary to popular belief, gender and sex are two different things in that “gender is not inherently nor solely connected to one’s physical anatomy” (“Understanding Gender”). When parents automatically assign their child a gender based on their sex organs, it leaves very little room for change later in the child’s life, because children born with female sex organs are not necessarily girls, just as children born with male sex organs are not necessarily boys. Rather, gender is based on mindset, personal identity, outward presentations, and behavior of the individual. Binary genders, or the broadly

A highly debated issue concerning homosexuality is whether sexual-orientation is biologically determined or if it is a socially learned behavior. One case study done about this topic gathered that “the homosexual desire seems in most cases to be implanted in those who develop an unusually strong attachment for one parent” (Cory 1951:67). This seems to suggest that homosexuality can be influenced by family structure or other sociological elements. On the other side of this argument, there is the belief that people are born either gay or straight. Even though there is no scientific or genetic evidence to prove this, there have been many studies done and most homosexuals interviewed take this view-point. McIntosh states, “[homosexuality] is still commonly seen as a condition characterizing certain persons in the way that birthplace or deformity might characterize them” (1968:182). To support their cause and to fight for acceptance in society, it would be beneficial to convince people that sexual orientation is biologically determined. “Research indicates that people who believe that homosexuality is a choice are more likely to condemn it than are those who believe gays and lesbians are born that way”

The gay personality may be determined during a child’s early years of development or throughout the individual’s life. A lesbian or gay individual like heterosexual individuals are influenced by family, peers, and society. Family structure, social factors, and cognition and conditioning help the development of sexual identity (Kwiatkowski, 2010). The child while living with the parents, adopt many of the customs and values the parents emphasize. The parents may stress the importance of gender roles in the household which the child may learn to

Luckily I stood my ground and raised a beautiful daughter with no “help” from my parents. Today we live in a world where girls are pregnant by 16 and have a reality show on TV about it and nobody seems to care or think this is wrong, and by 20, they have 2 or 3 children and the majority of the time they all have a different father. Gender and sexuality can be defined within our anatomy as in the differences of orgasms; most men can have one or two while women are able to have many more in just one session of lovemaking as well as our physical age when we are having it. Gender and sexual behavior are also more open now, last fall I had the pleasure of one of my grandsons coming “out of the closet” and declaring he was gay. All-star quarterback and girls all over him but we all knew something was different about him. He is happy and well-adjusted now and he is who he is, we love him no less. He hurts just as we all do with a breakup and sadly it all gets posted on Facebook (my least favorite place to be). Some cultures expect a girl to

Many use their middle and high school years as a path of self-discovery, whether they know it or not. Like most people, I spent most of my life feeling I was like everyone else that was around me: cisgender and heterosexual. In middle school, I began to learn that there was even such a thing as having a different sexuality, though at that age it was all being ridiculed in front of me, and I shrugged the whole ordeal off as being something that had never and would

How did your parents influence the development of your gender role? In what ways did you model yourself after your same gender parent? In what ways are your conceptions of appropriate gender roles similar to or different from those of your parents? During high school, what influences did your peers have on your gender role development? How important were your boyfriends or girlfriends in developing your sense of yourself as a woman or man? Who are the people who most influence your gender-role concepts today? As a parent, what gender roles will you model for your children?

When I was younger, I honestly have no memories of being told, “only boys play with that,” or “girls wear dresses.” I come from a very open minded family who accepts me for who I am. According to the traditional ways in society, girls like pink and purple, and boys like blue and green. I do remember playing with a lot of Barbie dolls and wearing my pink skirt, but my favorite color was orange and I played football out in the yard with the rest of the neighborhood kids. When I was in the fourth grade I only wore jeans and long sleeved shirts, I would not even wear capris all the way up until I graduated high school. That was the year I first became self conscious about myself and learned what