What are the tyrannies you swallow day by day and attempt to make your own, until you will sicken and die of them, still in silence?
I have lived most of my life by the tyranny of the bra. I donned my first one when I was 8 or 9, well before there were boobs attached to this chest. Straps dug into my skin. Straps visible on either side of my tank top. For one full year in middle school, I spent the entirety of every second period English class worried about the hot boy who sat behind me.
Then there is the tyranny of hair removal. Around 8th grade, I started to shave my forearms because I thought it was the feminine thing to do. No one taught me how to shave, I was using my mother’s disposable razors in secret, doing my best to hide the evidence after my inexperience left the shower bloodied in the name of beauty. One day, I gazed down past the nicks and scabs that decorated my legs and thought, “Fuck, I guess I should start shaving my big toe too.”
Makeup. What the fuck is it? How the fuck do I do it? Highlighter? Concealer? Wings?? On my face???? I understand I am supposed to be putting makeup inside of my eyebrows? Where does one place the bronzer? At 27 years old, I continue to rock the same look I taught myself when I was 16. I don’t know what sucks worse- the utter lack of self confidence that creeps up inside me when I venture into the world without all this shit, or the fact that I need to put a face on top of my face to even consider myself a person worthy of being looked at.
Gym class. IYKYK.
Likability. I don’t have it. But I sure was raised to believe it was among the most important traits a young lady could strive for. In my upbringing, there was not a lot of space for sad girls who told the truth. I had not even gotten my period yet the first time an adult told me I was intimidating. What a strange way to describe a child.
Yes, I’m including it- the tyranny of dat ass. This eventually became my superpower, but when I was still younger and more insecure in this body, my backside felt an awful lot like a tool that allowed others to practice power over. Grown men catcalled me as I walked in the doors to school. In the same day, I’d catch male teachers watching as I walked back out them.