What does it mean to be a woman?

[Michelle789]

@Kathryn and Erin

You two hit something spot on. There is much truth to the biological, psychological, and social aspects of being a woman, and how women are treated in society.

@Kelly

Your response talks about what femininity truly is. Although there is the social, biological, and psychological aspects of being a woman, femininity is a force. It lies at the core of all women, regardless of what body you were born in.

It is subliminal. You will not be able to fake it. It is a type of knowing without knowing.


It is a type of deep knowing that another is like you.

I can totally relate to your this. I had a friend who told me when I came out how she felt a certain level of comfort with me that she only feels around women. Another female friend said that she just knew I was a woman inside a man's body all along and she was just waiting for me to come out. She just felt that I was so feminine. No other words could explain it. These two women picked up on that force of femininity radiating from within side of me. That same force that creates my gender identity. That force that others were able to pick up on.

It is that force that even when I was pretending to be a man all these years, triggered a lot of people to suspect something feminine about me, and often they thought I was gay. Even though my behavior was nothing like a gay man, and even though I passed well as a nerdy, shy man. There were a couple of personality traits that helped as well - not chasing after women and not being terribly aggressive - helped people to suspect something feminine about me. But it goes deeper. I'm not a gay man. I'm not a nerdy, shy, straight man. I passed as a nerdy, shy, straight man. But I am a woman on the inside and always have been. I am now making my outside match my inside.

It's a great feeling to have people see that woman being reflected back visually. Before I transitioned, the mismatch of my inner feminine core and my male body not only created great conflict in my life, but created conflict in how others perceive me. Now as my outside changes to match my inner feminine core, people see that and it affects how they treat me - for both good and bad.

But I believe aside from any social constructs around gender, being a woman is ultimately about being feminine at your core. It is about possessing that core female energy, your soul, your very essence of being.

[Jenn A116]

A very good question. Also one that doesn't have a "right" answer. What is important to some of us is wasted on others. Just like in real life. Some women want to be fashion plates, others could care less. Some want nice nails, others bite them to the quick.

For the OP, would it be worth while pointing out to your daughter that there is a huge range of what it means to be a woman and that not everybody sees it the same? Just because she feels the need to "tone it down" to be taken seriously at the office doesn't mean that all other women should be doing that too. Does it?

[ReineD]

While it has done a lot of good, the feminism movement has also cheated women out of being themselves. (Dons asbestos suit!)

To the contrary, the feminism movement has enabled us to be all we can be. We do have minds: we can reason well enough to be able to vote, make financial decisions, obtain college degrees, have careers other than secretarial, teaching or nursing, and do research and add to the repository of human knowledge. And with all this independence comes the freedom to extract ourselves out from restrictive and sexually objectifying clothing ... if we so choose.

To the OP, I think that most cis-gender people would answer the question, "What does it mean to be the gender you are" with, "I don't know, I just am who I am". Speaking for myself, I feel in the same camp as other women just based fundamentally on how they look and sound. I've no idea what the women or the men I meet are really like unless I get to know them. I don't know their interests, their likes and dislikes. Regardless of gender, there is a wide array of personality types and we can no longer classify people based on stereotypical career choices or character traits. To me, the question of being a man or a woman (specifically with cis-genders) is a physical thing. Note this does not apply to TSs, who obviously are the gender they feel they are despite their birth-sex origins.

My SO and I are currently on a trip, staying with a young couple for a few days. We don't know them. They are both in the restaurant business. I'm finding I have a lot more in common with the male partner, mostly due to our mutual interest in cooking. He is a chef, very talkative, and extroverted like me. But I know that the female partner is my gender. Why? Likely because we both have vaginas, breasts, and softer voices, and neither one of us would feel comfortable walking the streets alone at night due to our inferior physical strength compared to men.

[Kathryn Martin]

But I know that the female partner is my gender. Why? Likely because we both have vaginas, breasts, and softer voices, and neither one of us would feel comfortable walking the streets alone at night due to our inferior physical strength compared to men.

Reine, I would have phrased this slightly differently. The examples you raise are all sex markers to which gender is secondary as a social construct.

[Brooklyn]

Doesn't being a woman simply mean experiencing life as female? Not all women can bear children, not all women are XX, not all are nurturing, and so on. But if you feel female, your society reads you as female, and people treat you as female, then you are on your way to understanding what it means in your case.

[Eringirl]

Being a woman means you better have dinner on the table when your S.O. gets home.

So that would be me. For 30 years while we were married, I did all the cooking, she would come home from work, sit down with a glass of wine and watch the news while I got dinner ready.....every night, 30 years. So, that will not change for me.....just same old, same old in that respect. So I am more than ready for that !!

[Dana44]

H'm, sadly I have been with a lot of women through my life. Must say that they do not know either. I would say that if you identify as a female, you are one. Another thing is that women are emotional. We may not be as emotional and more stable mentally. Yet feminine attributes are indeed female. Me being a mix of male/female. I know about these emotions and have had to keep them in check as a male. I often wonder when a female looks at me questioning the logic that has come from the male pecking order and conforming that we had to endure. Yet, on this common sense logic of human interaction, we have a learned and programmed environment that may have made us a bit more stable. Although I have met many stable and beautiful GG's. We are indeed girls and women in a sense that we identify ourselves. If you ever well up and cry you are definitely in tune with womanhood.

[ReineD]

Reine, I would have phrased this slightly differently. The examples you raise are all sex markers to which gender is secondary as a social construct.

Gender roles are a social construct (they do change according to culture and historical era), but sex markers are not constructs for cis-gender people. Sex markers do indicate most people's gender identification.

I was careful to say that generally, the way I know a person is a woman is by her sex markers (I have no other cues if I don't know her) but this does not apply to the transwomen who are not finished transitioning. I respect that transwomen are women based on their gender ID and they indicate their gender ID to me by their presentation.

If I meet a MtF who is presenting as a woman, I have no way of knowing whether this person is a part-time CD or a full-time TS and in this case, I assume they identify as a woman and I define them as such unless they tell me they identify as a male or as trans.

I have met only one TS whom I took to be a GG and I was gobsmacked when she told me she was born a male. She had transitioned at age 18. My SO (while dressed) and I were having a meal at a restaurant and this TS had been sitting with a group of friends at the table next to us. She must have read my SO and was intrigued by her, so she made a point to follow me into the ladies room where she then engaged in a conversation and told me, out of the blue, that she was born male and had transitioned at age 18 (she was in her late 20s). I think she knew that I would be open-minded just based on having been there with my SO and she was looking for affirmation by seeing if I would be surprised at the news, which I was.

So in a nutshell, although a person's appearance informs me whether they are female or male, as I said this does not apply in the case of TSs for whom it is obvious they were born male because I do respect their gender ID based on their presentation. I don't know if I am conveying my gut reactions accurately, but if a person who looks and dresses like a male tells me they are a woman, although I will be polite and will accept what they say, my gut reaction will not tell me they are women like it does when I am in the presence of GGs. If this makes sense. I hope I am not offending anyone, but what else do we have to go on when we encounter people on the street other than their appearance?

[kimdl93]

Getting back to the OP, this is really about self identification. We...and I mean that in the most collective sense, cannot know what 'being' means to anyone. For all I know Labron James feels more like a woman than I do...there's no way to know.

Mel's comment bears repeating:

"Maybe even after all of this work I am still a man after all?

All I can say is that I now feel much more comfortable on the female side of the aisle than I ever did as a dude. I sympathize with those that can't understand it because I don't understand it either. Maybe there is no 'man' or 'woman' beyond society's constructs? Maybe men and women have the capacity to be everything the other is? "

Like Mel, I don't know if I can say I feel like a woman. I'm just happier here.

[Marcelle]

Hi Erin,

When I am cycling through male/female and identify as a woman I have often thought about this questions "What does that mean . . . identify as a woman?" or in your original question "What does it mean to be a woman?" For me it means that while the world may see an outward presentation of a woman the person within (me) is still the same with the same wants, accomplishments, skills, competence and so on. Now I will state this is what it means to me to be a woman the same way it means to me to be a man, neither of which is truly quantifiable IMHO. I will say that on those days I strongly identify as a woman and present accordingly, I feel an overwhelming sense of completeness which I would not feel if I presented male during that time.

Cheers

Isha