Reactions to Embracing Your Femme(ness) - Page 5

mariamma · 08-31-2012, 01:01 PM

Holy hen shit that was so moving! We have a similar story with the public butch treating our friendly smiles as a hetero-woman being too forward. I too seek community with LGBT. It's frustrating because it's really about being friendly with my peeps, not as an amorous overture.
I hope you are surviving the weather and fire season well, Bleu. Thanks for sharing.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bleu

Thank you, spritzerJ for including this comment in your experience as it describes my state regularly these days.

I come from a long line of low-level military enlisted and garbage men. I relate to the men in my family much more than to the women. I was taught to survive in this world by a hand-to hand combat specialist. He was a Marine who was parceled out to Navy Seals and Army Rangers and Air Force pilots. He taught people how to kill face-to-face once all other options had been depleted. My body was raised by my mother, a sporty tennis player type, however, my spirit was raised by my father.

6’2” and chiseled he was man who could not embrace his own sexuality. He was remarkably strong yet simultaneously excruciatingly weak. As I look back on growing up and examine how I got to who/where I am today, I see that my father was the one who had the most impact on my psyche thus, I absorbed many of his traits. This sponging of my father was both good and bad. Mostly bad. I have fought his effects on me and ultimately had to find my true self on my own, as we all do. Still searching, by the way.

Okay, so sometimes I do curse like a longshoreman. I have found that this trait is usually a turn-off for many a butch and some of my femme sisters too. I love butches but I feel that butches are not attracted to me. Oh yeah, they are on the surface. I’m curvy, I look nice in a dress, wear heels on occasion (the right occasions) and wear make-up, blah blah blah. I like to do these things as I feel more comfortable in my own skin when I do. But, when it comes down to my need for intellectual conversation, or someone who likes my mind for what it is, someone who just “gets” me…nope. The butches run. Every single relationship I have ever had with a butch has failed miserably. This is not easy for me to reveal here on this website half-populated with butches, some who I think are attractive and whom I look forward to meeting in September or whenever. What I find ends up happening is that I sometimes clam up around people, butches and femmes alike, as when I allow myself to be just me, I feel I am rejected. I am so sick of feeling rejected by my members of my own culture. (I use the word feeling in the previous sentence because being may not actually be accurate and I can accept, and do recognize, that I am living in a world of my own perception.)

On the topic of the outside world and those who think I am straight by the way I look. I could give a f... (there I go again.) I don’t even feel accepted by my own culture, and I am way more concerned about that than whether or not some het at the grocery store sees me for who/what I am. What I don’t like at the grocery store is when I see a butch and try to catch their eye. They turn away and purposefully do not make eye contact with me…and this is a direct result of how I look. I am a femme stuck inside a soccer mom’s body and I am invisible to the people to whom I want to most be visible. I had one butch tell me it’s because I look so straight that I am shunned by the public butch. That too many butches-at-large have succumbed to a het woman’s experimental desires and melted at their deadly charms. Then they get hurt or feel duped and so they shy away from a public femme smile. Just a warm “I see you” smile. Holy hen shit, I don’t want to jump in your pants just because I smiled at you. But that is what it feels like to me, that I am shunned because I am femme. I am so presently, in my mind, femme that I find it hard to step outside myself at every moment and see myself the way the world might be seeing me at that given moment. Sheesh, it’s exhausting. So, I feel rejected every time. Wah wah, f’in wah…right? Shut up, Bleu, no one wants to hear your whiney shit…

I have lived 43 years mentally beaten about how I look. As a small girl, up to 12ish, I was androgynous. Most people thought my brother and I were brothers. I acted like a boy and I fought beside him with boys, as a boy. I was a transgendered child. Then by junior high school I was the girl who blossomed WAY too quickly, having to go with my mother to the ladies section of the department stores to purchase expensive foundation to “reign” them in. Coming out...an OMG! 27 year journey in a few sentences...I tried butch for a while as I somehow equated being a strong lesbian as presenting to the world as a “don’t f... with me” butch. Honestly, I liked how I was treated by folks in the het world as a butch, then realized I was not attracting to me the butches whom I wanted so much to like me. I slowly morphed into a femme and here I am today. I mostly like being femme. But I really just want to be liked and loved for who I am on the inside. Some friends on here have laughed with me about what percentage butch I am…2.5% is the consensus. One certain femme friend called me a futch…cute! On my profile I use the phrase, reluctant femme. I am asked about that on occasion and I have a fairly standard answer stemming around labels, but in writing this, I find I might be more accurate to just state that I acquiesce to myself.

NJFemmie · 08-31-2012, 01:01 PM

Originally Posted by spritzerJ

Assumptions that irritate me:
1. that I am straight. travel with a child and good luck ever being seen when standing without at another queer person around you to stimulate the question of is she?

That one really bugs me too. Mostly because it comes from LGBTQI people the most. I understand about being 'blah' and kind of inconspicuous. In my experience, it's more about not being seen by potential attackers or competitors (women and men).

This doesn't even bother me anymore. In a world where everything is basically take at face value, even I have a hard time figuring some people out.

I was at a bar once with my very butch poster child best friend. A guy came up to me and asked, "Okay, so I know she is, but are you?"

Bitch please. We were in a gay bar for God's sake.

It does come in handy at times though - i.e. attackers, etc.

Sachita · 08-31-2012, 01:02 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by princessbelle

Well, let's see.

I sure did think i was a freak, being girly and being gay. Never saw a femme or rather, didn't know you could be femme and be gay. All the gay peeps i had ever seen were butch.

THEN i came online. THEN i found the dash site. What a wonderful thing to find out you are....

not alone
not a freak
some gay people were actually attracted to femmes.

Oh and yeah, found out i had an ID...femme.

How truly wonderful it is to be a part of so many beautiful and strong women.

Just ...lovely.

OMG me too! I was this big hair, BIG breasted ultra fem in 4 inch heels. Bold an vivacious. My best friend talked me into wearing 501's and boots with a pull over. No matter how hard to tried to butch it up it just wasn't happened. I intimidated queers and I can't even tell you how many times I was asked if I was in drag.

mariamma · 08-31-2012, 05:14 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by The_Lady_Snow

Exactly, we get to learn from our experiences as young women who were not cookie cutter girls. We as parents (if you are a parent or a co parent) can prepare and tell our sons or daughters that they don't have to conform to gender assignments by other people and we can teach our sons that breasts are not just for manly/butch/guy entertainment nor should they deter women from physical activities!!

My 30's were defining moments for me in my Gender journey, as a Femme I grew more into the masculinity, sexual, soft, power yealding creature I was meant to be. It's incredibly emotional to share with others like you (general) because it becomes this A-HA moment and so defining that there are Tops/Masters/Femmes/Women/Girls/Lesbians just like you!

Just rode my bike to the store for tapioca. I passed 2 teen-aged boys who then passed a goth kid on a bike. You couldn't really tell if he was a boy or not because he visually appeared as a blend. The kids passed eachother with a head nod and no sneers or disparaging remarks. The last 30 years of punk, metal, alternative, goth and industrial music and culture has brought queer and alternative people up to the forefront WITH THE YOUTH. These differences are becoming less significant as people reject uncomfortable cookie cutter, binary versions of how to appear to others.

I've always felt that the anger about LGBTQI people is because some don't know how to react. Some don't know if they are seeing someone they need to compete with or try to have sex with, as if those were the only choices.

Love the passion in your words Lady.

mariamma · 08-31-2012, 05:32 PM

Big love and hugs to you Leigh for sharing your story. One thing is true, you are strong.

Leigh · 08-31-2012, 06:03 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by mariamma

Big love and hugs to you Leigh for sharing your story. One thing is true, you are strong.

I've never been someone to see myself as strong before, but I've noticed that alot more over the last two years or so. Thank you for noticing and acknowledging it mariamma, its nice to know others see it also

CherylNYC · 09-01-2012, 12:56 AM

Embracing my Femmeness? Well, I suppose I have, but it's been a journey. Some of my experiences might sound familiar to other femmes, but one significant part of my life is about as alien as an ET abduction to most.

I was born in 1962, and I learned early that being female, feminine, and/or physically small meant being weak and vulnerable. I remember the moment when I decided to be none of the above. Though it may sound like a contradiction, my experiences turned me into an ardent feminist by age 6. That was a year after my sister and I started working as professional models/dancers/singers/actors. If you watched TV, went out to the theatre or the Metropolitan Opera in NYC, listened to the radio, or looked at a magazine or catalogue from the mid 60s through the early-mid 70s, you would have seen or heard me. My mother and sister seemed to looove it, (particularly my mother), but no one bothered to ask me how I felt about it. The often sexualized attention from mostly male people with the power to hire me, made me deeply uncomfortable. Line the girls up. Choose the prettiest girl to get the job/money. To be honest, it didn't feel much better to be the one that got hired than the one that didn't. Adult women don't usually have good tools to deal with that kind of bald objectification, and no child's psyche is equipped to process it. Any child WILL become seriously fucked up in that environment. Since I had already been sexually abused at home, I was even more deeply traumatised by all that unwholesome body judgement.

I had always liked to rough house and get dirty, but once we stopped working in the entertainment industry, I self consciously became a tomboy. I studied the boys and tried to walk the way they walked, carry my books as they did, and be tougher, faster, smarter and meaner. I played football with them, even when they didn't welcome me. I refused to take Home Ec and demanded to be allowed to take shop classes. I refused to wear dresses. I rejected anything feminine and female because that was clearly less good than everything male. For years, I actively chose to reject femininity because my femaleness had, thus far, been the source of nothing good.

I gleaned the rest of my lessons on how to be a woman from my grandfather's huge collection of Playboy magazines that had somehow ended up in the basement of my parent's house. Yup. I devoured them. My mother was not equipped to give me much reliable information on the subject of womanhood, but those magazines provided a wealth of information about sexual passivity and the proper place of women in the world. I took it all in, along with my strong, combative feminist consciousness. I was a mess by the time I started to dress in tight, very revealing clothing as a teenager. Did I become promiscuous with boys? You bet. I had been the object of overwhelming male sexual attention from my earliest memories, but by my mid teens I had become a magnet for the kind of relentless male sexual attention that would have frightened a Navy Seal.

During all this time, I alternately projected and supressed my femininity. I always had a very ambiguous relationship with my feminine body. The sexual attention it brought always freaked me out, but I had learned early that it was the only measure of my worth. My hips naturally swivel no matter how hard I tried to tame them in the past. I have a slim but curvy body type that's very much fetishized in our culture. I've spent a lifetime fending off unwanted male sexual attention that has ALWAYS felt threatening.

I left my parent's house early and eventually got my own damned apartment when I was 17. Unfortunately, I followed myself there. I was soooo ill equipped to deal with the relentless street harrassment all young women without a male escort were forced to endure in the very poor neighbourhoods where I could afford to live. At least I thought all the women experienced what I did. Nope. All these years later, I've learned that other women simply didn't catch the same volume of hungry hands, catcalls, crotch grabing, disgusting sucking noises, and daily verbal rape that I did. I ran the gauntlet every day, even in better neighbourhoods. Even on the job. Everywhere. I projected the kind of toughness that was designed to repel the wankers, but I now know that it wasn't anything I was doing or not doing. The men were the ones doing it, and I had a target on my forehead. I was much safer when I rode my motorcycle, but that brought a whole new level of alarming attention.

Like other femmes, I got the loud, clear message from other lesbians that I didn't look right. I also IDed as bisexual until my early 20s. Yikes! I was NOT welcomed into the sisterhood. There was simply no safe place for me.

One day in my mid 20s, a beard magically sprouted on my chin. I swear it seemed to grow overnight. Just as magically, the sexual attention stopped. A few near sighted men still made lonely cat calls, but for the first time in my life, I was mostly free of male sexual attention! My body had provided me with effective man repellent, and it was glorious. I'm a 70's era lesbian feminist, deeply influenced by Germaine Greer's The Female Eunuch. Of course I let my beard grow. Whenever anyone questioned me I would belligerently snarl, "This is what a woman looks like". Sprouting a beard was one of the most positive things that could have happened to me at that time. I could wear the beautiful vintage clothes and heels that I loved, and I could just walk out in the world like anyone else. It felt like breathing fresh air after being locked in a stifling box for years.

During this time I had stopped working as a scenic designer and began to earn all my money as a carpenter/stage hand with a sideline doing some general contracting work. I look at the single surviving picture of myself at work during that time, and I'm astounded at the angry face glaring back at me. I had a huge chip on my shoulder born from working with the same horrible men that liked to harrass and humiliate women like me whenever they could get away with it. I was working with the same men who grabbed their crotches as I passed by, and who would have grabbed mine if given half a chance. I was half their size, but they were wary of my smart, angry mouth. They were all quite sure that I was the butchest thing they ever laid eyes on.

I didn't ID as femme back then, but I was very much a femme outside of work situations. And I sought out butch women. I had been wearing my beard for long enough to have recovered some of my personhood by the time I met my long-ago ex. Unfortunately she wasn't nearly as accepting as my previous hippie-feminist girlfriends, and I found out that she really hated my beard. I was 30 when I decided to start shaving. By then I was much better at dealing with the attention, and the volume of street harrassment was slightly diminished from its peak in my early 20s. I had also stopped working as a carpenter and was making a living as an artist. Artists are far less likely to say something crude, or to make a grab for some T and A, than carpenters and stagehands. What a relief. It started to feel more and more safe to be a femme, and to claim it fully. By the time I left my ex, I didn't really feel like letting my beard grow back in. Dick-head men still hounded me until last year, but I'm far better centered now. I just don't need to wear man repellent on my face anymore.

I still don't feel perfectly safe expressing my femme nature in any work situation, but my ID is far better integrated in my life now. My co-workers are far less likely to react with shock when they hear me self ID as femme, but I still confuse many. I don't care at all, but I do sometimes have irrational fears that I'm simply not femme enough to attract butch women. Don't bother telling me how crazy that is. I already know it, but it doesn't stop me from thinking it.

I have closets and dressers full of sexy, high femme outfits and high heels. I may have been a professional model/performer, but I stopped modeling and became a strident feminist before I was of an age to wear make-up. I sometimes wore eyeliner eye liner over the years, but I had NO IDEA how to properly wear make-up until a few years ago. The idea of going into a bastion of femininity such as a giant make-up store really freaked me out. A wonderful femme friend accompanied me into Sephora to hold my hand while I got good make-up advice. I still clench a little, but I'm comfortable enough to go to Sephora by myself now. I can still get totally freaked out sitting in the chair and looking at the mirror while the hairdresser talks to my image from behind me. Especially of the hairdresser is a dude. (I'm never going back to THAT place.) It would be nice to no longer battle with myself about my own femininity, but this will probably be one of my life-long struggles.

Kätzchen · 09-02-2012, 08:53 PM

I think, for me, I cannot condense or distill my life experience into simple sets of events… concerning ways that I embrace my Femme identity or how others perceive me as Femme or maybe not even recognize my Femme being. It feels very complicated to me, when I think of my own life and how often fragile I feel about myself but yet simultaneously, I feel incredibly strong, confident, unrepentantly Femme – all in the same breath.

I am 53 years old now. It seems as though it was just the other day when I was in my 20s and 30s. Time does fly, and fast. I have talked about my own journey on occasion in our community and wanted to add toward what I have already shared.

I was aware of my own identity before I ever had a way to name it or own it. Who I am is who I am and I couldn’t renounce one ounce of who I am as I have grown over the years because at heart, I do believe I was born into my own skin of thought, my own skin of identity and my own skin of anything – like a huge genetic marker that cannot be altered by the best of scientific discovery or process, as if it could be dissected that way.

I think what my life looks like to me is one very slow progression of how I bloomed into being me. I seem to remember hearing a well known catch-phrase that goes something along the lines of: A person is the product of their environment. Cliché or not, I sometimes want to believe this strand of thought but find myself rejecting it on a consistent basis because in some ways I might be a product of my former environments and in some ways I might even be the product of my present environment. I want to say that for me, I am the product of the skin of thought I choose to try on or discard or toss into the wash with some dye or see if it survives a fiery furnace and still seems to fit who I feel I am or how I am just as I am (if that makes sense at all).

I grew up second eldest of four siblings, but later on in years mom and dad gave us two other siblings – increasing our familial arrangement to a household of 8 (minus a sister who died shortly after birth). My formative years were spent growing up with two brothers and one other sister. We lived in a rural area on a dairy farm. Our lives were dominated by farm life, church, school and if there was time (which there was little of), we each had our own hobbies and sets of friends. I had the least amount of time to myself but I loved music, piano studies, my very small set of girl friends from school or church and cousins I wrote to who lived very far away. It didn’t matter what kind of clothes I wore. I had and always have had a very large wardrobe. Dresses, skirts, coats, shawls, stockings, socks, all types of shoes, pants, sweaters, boots, trinkets, jewelry, but never really wore makeup until I was almost a young lady of 17 years of age – I love makeup and have to have the best I can afford but I don’t wear it daily. I save it for when I go special places or want to get all dolled up for work or sometimes just because – for no reason. I wasn’t allowed to have makeup or pants when I was young, due to sets of religious practices my family abided by or social customs of the day that my family valued more over other social customs people practiced who were not anywhere remotely like my own family or people we went to church with or went to school with.

I’d say I was a slow bloomer. It’s taken the better part of my own adult life to grow into who I consistently am – minus a few adjustments along the way: Like raising my two sons or earning two formal education degrees or a lifetime career that spanned 20 years of my adult life.

Speaking of which: Embracing my Femme identity.

I was rather quiet growing up and rather quiet in my early work life and even rather quiet as a mother raising her two sons. People knew there was something entirely different about me but they just couldn’t pinpoint what was different. As engaging as I can be socially and publicly on our forum boards, I am rather quiet and private as a woman, but not quite as private these days about the Femme in me. Over the years as I grew up, it was not entirely a safe thing to be out loud and proud. People were locked up for what society thought people like us were: social outcasts because we did not fit the parameter of what current day society back then sought to enforce (heterosexuality). Even as I grew into my adulthood, depending on where a person lived (in the continental US), you could lose your ability to earn a living, be socially discredited to the point that no one would hire you in your community, much less let you live a peaceful life. But my life was a set of complications from the start of motherhood: due in part to my sons being Black and being of a multicultural background which was peppered and salted lightly with characteristics that set me apart socially from groups available to me. My life has never been a cake walk but I do make a nice cake!

So, where was I going with all this??? Oh. To give a current day example of how invisible I am as a Femme, still to this day, I will tell you about an experience I had this summer working on my former job. The job market is a tight one out here and all I could find for a job over the past six months was working at a gas station. How I even got the job, I still wonder about today but I feel probably my unmistakable femininity is probably what helped me to get that job. Anyway, loyal customers of both corporate gas stations I worked at would at times comment to corporate offices and field supervisors about who the “lovely woman was who worked at the station.” People who frequented both places were from a cross section of everyday people to upper-level executives to travelers in our region and other parts of the US and even a small sampling of international guests. I can’t tell you how many times I heard customers say: “What are you doing here? We never see women doing this job, much less look as beautiful as you or smell as pretty as you. You are not the run of the mill worker.” And of course to me, their comments were classic: classic for those who enjoy seats of entitlement, power, privilege and a whole host of other things colliding daily on my tiny little job that was probably more of an education for people who worked with me or came to know me at the gas station and certainly for my superiors. People came to know the Femme in me in a diverse set of situations and I know they will never forget me (they miss me, clients and coworkers do: I miss them too).

I am strong. I am highly qualified to be me. I am Femme.

princessbelle · 09-02-2012, 09:27 PM

Les Femmes Jolies
Momo Flint

To see as I see,

release thoughts of superficial beauty.

See past the mask of society, ’

and mark individual standards.

For, as a woman,

I see beauty in all shapes and sizes.

Whether it be,

in the sway of robust hips,

the brush of rounded thighs,

the swell of full breasts,

or the calm,

self assured look,

every woman comes to know.

It takes an open mind to accept all,

but a kind heart to embrace.

rustedrims · 09-03-2012, 04:59 PM

I am sneaking around in here reading.The stories are so different but yet similar.I can see the struggles you have all gone through and came out stronger than ever.I appreciate you all!

S.

thedivahrrrself · 09-03-2012, 05:04 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sachita

OMG me too! I was this big hair, BIG breasted ultra fem in 4 inch heels. Bold an vivacious. My best friend talked me into wearing 501's and boots with a pull over. No matter how hard to tried to butch it up it just wasn't happened. I intimidated queers and I can't even tell you how many times I was asked if I was in drag.

LMAO this cracked me up because I went through a (very short) phase where I tried to "butch it up" to stop being invisible. I felt (and looked) pretty stupid with my slicked back hair and button up shirt... ROFL I'd almost forgotten about that summer!

Going to dig through old pics and see if I can find any of my ridiculousness!

lettertodaddy · 09-03-2012, 05:12 PM

I had a brief moment where I tried being butch - wearing Queer Nation t-shirts, cut off denim shorts, and Doc Martens - but even then, I wore lots of makeup and had very girly mannerisms. It just wasn't meant to be.

princessbelle · 09-03-2012, 05:25 PM

I remember my first girlfriend and i still didn't know about femmes. I remember apologizing to her about being girly. I told her if she would help me try and be more butch i would try. Thinking i was a disappointment to her.

She laughed and told me i was just perfect the way i was. I was so naive. She went on to tell me there are gay women like me, i wasn't by myself. I felt relieved, not sure i believed her though lol.

Had no clue about the butch/femme dynamic.

Femme is how i was born and i am so glad i never had to change. I am so thankful there are others like me.

Belonging somewhere feels beautiful!!!

Bleu · 09-03-2012, 05:48 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by princessbelle

Belonging somewhere feels beautiful!!!

Amen!

Ms. Meander · 09-09-2012, 10:02 AM

What an awesome thread! Thanks for starting it, Medusa - and thanks to all for sharing your stories.

There are times in my life when I seem more surrounded by other queers, in real time, but it has been less-so lately. So I have regular opportunities to come out. It is less of a "Femme" issue than a "Gay" thing, except to the extent that I am not recognized as queer by the average straight person.

When people discover who I am (and who I associate with) they are often keen to question me about trans issues. Which is somewhat ridiculous because I am not trans. But I am and have been close to many trans people, and perhaps have a little insight. I at least have enough insight to open the door of understanding to a previously clueless soul. I have great and frequent opportunities to spread awareness and dispel myths and fear. I know I do it imperfectly, but you have to start somewhere.

I have had a few occasions when people have been disturbed and distressed to find that I am a Queer Femme -- something along the lines of, "but you look so normal", "you're such a pretty girl, you could be normal if you wanted to." Yeah. Thanks. I tried that. No thanks. Get used to it!

deb0670 · 11-02-2012, 03:56 AM

I have read a few posts in this forum, and, finally decided to try to share my story..
I have always had a very hard time feeling or thinking of myself as a Femme.. even tho that is what i truly wanted to be..
I was born 10 lbs 7 oz. and was the baby and only girl out of 3 kids. My brothers are 2 and 3 yrs older than me. I was not one of the spoiled lil girls that a lot of people know about, i did without a lot of things that my brothers were privileged to get.. My oldest brother always did Karate, my other brother was in Football, but when it got time for me to join dance or gymnastics, there never was enough money. I grew up watching my mom get a new dress every week, while us kids got new school clothes from K-Mart, once a year.
Due to my size,( i was skinny from ages 1-5 and then again between 15 and 16) but the majority of my life i was heavy set), i never got to have the pretty lil dresses or skirts like my mom did.. most of the time i had to wear my brothers hand me downs. I would see the other girls at school wearing the latest fashions and trend setters, while i was inwardly drooling over them, i was outwardly shunned and cast away, never made to feel "pretty".
I had a few dresses for church, but i was told that if i wore them i could not go out and play or wrestle with my brothers, but sit like a lady, and that got boring.
I was raised in a strict Pentecostal home, where they honestly believe that homosexuals are demon possessed and need to be delivered.. thus the reason why i stayed in the closet most of my life. I went thru the motions of getting married.. more than once.. having my kids, trying to live "right" all the while never feeling comfortable and knowing there was another way for me.
I never really had many friends that were girls growing up, so i never did the makeup and hair thing.. i didn't know how and my mom was too much into herself to see that she had a daughter who needed her.
In my last marriage, i gained a heck of a lot of weight.. mainly due to my ex not wanting me to be flirted with and also having a sit down job for almost 6 yrs.. but i had pretty clothes.. a few dresses, feminine blouses, etc.. When i finally had the nerve to leave that very abusive marriage, and got a job at Walmart as a cashier and got active.. i kid you not.. i dropped 8 pant sizes in less than 6 months. That was wonderful!! None of my clothes fit anymore! Only problem was, i had no clothes to replace all the too big for me clothes, and definitely did not have the same income i did before.. so i had to settle with what i could find.
I finally came out of the closet in May of 2009. Moved away from Illinois and moved to Oklahoma/Arkansas area. Met some gay people and started going to the first and only gay bar i have ever been to. i was still trying to figure myself out, so i started dressing like a soft butch.. but not really feeling comfortable.
I still had/have this stigma about myself that i am not feminine enough.. i don't look sexy enough, i don't know how to even begin to be sexy..
Ethan will say otherwise.. and i thank Him for that. but.. i have never ever been really accepted by women and never had close women friends who could show me how to do my makeup, or what to or not to wear.. sighs..
I first found the other BF site back in late May 2009, and thought it was awesome being able to be a part of so many awesome people.. when it.. well.. i felt lost.. then i discovered the Planet.. and for quite a while i would just observe.. cause i was worried i would not be accepted for whatever reason... like most things in my life.. and i just hid.
Today, i don't hide so much anymore.. i am starting to branch out more..
I know that i am a Femme.. i am not always in dresses and heels and do not always wear makeup.. but i am Femme..
i just wish i knew what it felt like to be sexy.. Never have i thought that i could be sexy and be heavy at the same time.. and since i do not think i will ever see skinny again.. maybe there is hope for me to be the other? shrugs..

I know i have went way left field and back again a few times in my story.. and for that i apologize.. sometimes i get alittle carried away.
i am still searching inside to find the true and real Debbie.. and.. maybe someday i will find her. But i do know one thing about her.. she is Femme.

Sarafemme · 11-30-2012, 02:18 PM

On some level I have always known I was femme but didn't have the word for it.

Growing up, I was a girly-girl, played with Barbies, wore lots of pink, and it felt right to me. Meanwhile, I had massive emotional crushes on other women (not usually my peers, but teachers, adults I knew, etc.). I was a very lonely teenager; I was introverted and bookish and had no friends and didn't date anyone, even in college. (I had crushes on various guys, too, but they weren't nearly as intense as my feelings for women).

I considered the possibility of my attractions to women for the first time when I was a junior in college. I snuck to the sexuality section of the library and read books on lesbianism. I didn't dare check anything out. I felt guilty. What further frustrated me is that I didn't often feel like I related to many of the women's stories of feeling 'different': I wasn't a tomboy, I didn't want to be a boy, I didn't dream of marrying another girl. Instead, I was girly, I loved it, and figured I'd marry a man someday and forget all about these persistent and highly-charged crushes on women.

After graduation, I stayed in my hometown. I finally met a man who I thought was the one for me. We were both each other's first significant relationship (I was 27, he was 32). He proposed after only 2 months of dating. I accepted on the condition we wait a year to get married so we could get to know each other better, so that's what we did.

We had problems right from the start of our honeymoon. We couldn't achieve having sex (we both had waited; not for particularly religious reasons, though he was Catholic --just because that's how it had happened). My husband displayed a scary temper and yelled at me for not being able to relax enough. The resentment in our marriage started with that. It took us four years (yes, you read that correctly) for us to achieve that. Obviously, resentment had built throughout that time.

I suppose this all should have been a clue about my sexuality issues, but I was still deeply in denial. I took all of the blame for our problems; I was somehow 'faulty' as a woman. Further, while we were in marriage counseling, I came to the realization that I didn't want to have biological children (pregnancy/birth phobia). This reality hurt my husband a great deal, because he always had wanted to be a dad. He wasn't all that interested in adoption either (he actually thought to adopt would 'take away' children from people who couldn't have them biologically).

Finally, my best friend, after realizing I had an emotional crush on her in the midst of all of my marriage problems, called me out on my bisexuality and promised we would still be best friends (and she wasn't freaked out by my crush, either, though she didn't return my feelings). It was with her help that I not only admitted my attractions to women and called it what it was, but that I also began to embrace the inherent 'femmeness' I had always felt: Though I loved the 'trappings' of femininity, I wasn't passive or doing it to please men, not even my husband. That's why I felt so different from feminine-presenting straight women and why I could never fully relate to them: I had always felt like it was an authentic expression of my gender.

girl_dee · 04-28-2017, 03:30 AM

OMG i have enjoyed reading in this thread.

i love hearing stories from others. i don't feel so alone in my journey.

i knew i was a femme from very young, chasing the tomboys around. Only i was one too, just not as much. i was never into dolls. i rather pretend to be a pilot or a teacher.

i am not a girly girl at all. i can be, for short spurts. Once when i a butch was chatting me up, asked me if i have *nails*... because it was a requirement. Pfft.

it was very very hard to find my way, as the other queer women i knew didn't dress or act like me. i didn't know what i was. i loved masculine energy, and tied it to male. i tried to fix my gay way too many times. i am so glad i found out about butch women. Masculine energy with a female brain.

i am very mechanically inclined and am bold. i fixed my own garbage disposal the other day. i know tools and lawn equipment. i don't wear make up much and i don't have a clue as to how to really.

When my femme sisters are talking about beauty secrets and the best purses to have, i feel so out of place.

However if they ever want to know how to run a chainsaw, i'm their girl.

08-31-2012, 01:01 PM	#82
NJFemmie Senior Member How Do You Identify?: The original lime-twisted femme Preferred Pronoun?: I answer to most things, especially lesbian. Relationship Status: Still loving my Mare ;) Join Date: Nov 2009 Location: New Jersey Posts: 4,683 My Photo Gallery Thanks: 1,343 Thanked 11,425 Times in 2,978 Posts Rep Power: 21474854	Originally Posted by spritzerJ Assumptions that irritate me: 1. that I am straight. travel with a child and good luck ever being seen when standing without at another queer person around you to stimulate the question of is she? That one really bugs me too. Mostly because it comes from LGBTQI people the most. I understand about being 'blah' and kind of inconspicuous. In my experience, it's more about not being seen by potential attackers or competitors (women and men). This doesn't even bother me anymore. In a world where everything is basically take at face value, even I have a hard time figuring some people out. I was at a bar once with my very butch poster child best friend. A guy came up to me and asked, "Okay, so I know she is, but are you?" Bitch please. We were in a gay bar for God's sake. It does come in handy at times though - i.e. attackers, etc. __________________

09-01-2012, 12:56 AM	#87
CherylNYC Member How Do You Identify?: Stonefemme lesbian Preferred Pronoun?: I'm a woman. Behave accordingly. Relationship Status: Single, not looking. Join Date: Jan 2010 Location: NYC Posts: 1,467 My Photo Gallery Thanks: 9,474 Thanked 7,150 Times in 1,206 Posts Rep Power: 21474852	Embracing my Femmeness? Well, I suppose I have, but it's been a journey. Some of my experiences might sound familiar to other femmes, but one significant part of my life is about as alien as an ET abduction to most. I was born in 1962, and I learned early that being female, feminine, and/or physically small meant being weak and vulnerable. I remember the moment when I decided to be none of the above. Though it may sound like a contradiction, my experiences turned me into an ardent feminist by age 6. That was a year after my sister and I started working as professional models/dancers/singers/actors. If you watched TV, went out to the theatre or the Metropolitan Opera in NYC, listened to the radio, or looked at a magazine or catalogue from the mid 60s through the early-mid 70s, you would have seen or heard me. My mother and sister seemed to looove it, (particularly my mother), but no one bothered to ask me how I felt about it. The often sexualized attention from mostly male people with the power to hire me, made me deeply uncomfortable. Line the girls up. Choose the prettiest girl to get the job/money. To be honest, it didn't feel much better to be the one that got hired than the one that didn't. Adult women don't usually have good tools to deal with that kind of bald objectification, and no child's psyche is equipped to process it. Any child WILL become seriously fucked up in that environment. Since I had already been sexually abused at home, I was even more deeply traumatised by all that unwholesome body judgement. I had always liked to rough house and get dirty, but once we stopped working in the entertainment industry, I self consciously became a tomboy. I studied the boys and tried to walk the way they walked, carry my books as they did, and be tougher, faster, smarter and meaner. I played football with them, even when they didn't welcome me. I refused to take Home Ec and demanded to be allowed to take shop classes. I refused to wear dresses. I rejected anything feminine and female because that was clearly less good than everything male. For years, I actively chose to reject femininity because my femaleness had, thus far, been the source of nothing good. I gleaned the rest of my lessons on how to be a woman from my grandfather's huge collection of Playboy magazines that had somehow ended up in the basement of my parent's house. Yup. I devoured them. My mother was not equipped to give me much reliable information on the subject of womanhood, but those magazines provided a wealth of information about sexual passivity and the proper place of women in the world. I took it all in, along with my strong, combative feminist consciousness. I was a mess by the time I started to dress in tight, very revealing clothing as a teenager. Did I become promiscuous with boys? You bet. I had been the object of overwhelming male sexual attention from my earliest memories, but by my mid teens I had become a magnet for the kind of relentless male sexual attention that would have frightened a Navy Seal. During all this time, I alternately projected and supressed my femininity. I always had a very ambiguous relationship with my feminine body. The sexual attention it brought always freaked me out, but I had learned early that it was the only measure of my worth. My hips naturally swivel no matter how hard I tried to tame them in the past. I have a slim but curvy body type that's very much fetishized in our culture. I've spent a lifetime fending off unwanted male sexual attention that has ALWAYS felt threatening. I left my parent's house early and eventually got my own damned apartment when I was 17. Unfortunately, I followed myself there. I was soooo ill equipped to deal with the relentless street harrassment all young women without a male escort were forced to endure in the very poor neighbourhoods where I could afford to live. At least I thought all the women experienced what I did. Nope. All these years later, I've learned that other women simply didn't catch the same volume of hungry hands, catcalls, crotch grabing, disgusting sucking noises, and daily verbal rape that I did. I ran the gauntlet every day, even in better neighbourhoods. Even on the job. Everywhere. I projected the kind of toughness that was designed to repel the wankers, but I now know that it wasn't anything I was doing or not doing. The men were the ones doing it, and I had a target on my forehead. I was much safer when I rode my motorcycle, but that brought a whole new level of alarming attention. Like other femmes, I got the loud, clear message from other lesbians that I didn't look right. I also IDed as bisexual until my early 20s. Yikes! I was NOT welcomed into the sisterhood. There was simply no safe place for me. One day in my mid 20s, a beard magically sprouted on my chin. I swear it seemed to grow overnight. Just as magically, the sexual attention stopped. A few near sighted men still made lonely cat calls, but for the first time in my life, I was mostly free of male sexual attention! My body had provided me with effective man repellent, and it was glorious. I'm a 70's era lesbian feminist, deeply influenced by Germaine Greer's The Female Eunuch. Of course I let my beard grow. Whenever anyone questioned me I would belligerently snarl, "This is what a woman looks like". Sprouting a beard was one of the most positive things that could have happened to me at that time. I could wear the beautiful vintage clothes and heels that I loved, and I could just walk out in the world like anyone else. It felt like breathing fresh air after being locked in a stifling box for years. During this time I had stopped working as a scenic designer and began to earn all my money as a carpenter/stage hand with a sideline doing some general contracting work. I look at the single surviving picture of myself at work during that time, and I'm astounded at the angry face glaring back at me. I had a huge chip on my shoulder born from working with the same horrible men that liked to harrass and humiliate women like me whenever they could get away with it. I was working with the same men who grabbed their crotches as I passed by, and who would have grabbed mine if given half a chance. I was half their size, but they were wary of my smart, angry mouth. They were all quite sure that I was the butchest thing they ever laid eyes on. I didn't ID as femme back then, but I was very much a femme outside of work situations. And I sought out butch women. I had been wearing my beard for long enough to have recovered some of my personhood by the time I met my long-ago ex. Unfortunately she wasn't nearly as accepting as my previous hippie-feminist girlfriends, and I found out that she really hated my beard. I was 30 when I decided to start shaving. By then I was much better at dealing with the attention, and the volume of street harrassment was slightly diminished from its peak in my early 20s. I had also stopped working as a carpenter and was making a living as an artist. Artists are far less likely to say something crude, or to make a grab for some T and A, than carpenters and stagehands. What a relief. It started to feel more and more safe to be a femme, and to claim it fully. By the time I left my ex, I didn't really feel like letting my beard grow back in. Dick-head men still hounded me until last year, but I'm far better centered now. I just don't need to wear man repellent on my face anymore. I still don't feel perfectly safe expressing my femme nature in any work situation, but my ID is far better integrated in my life now. My co-workers are far less likely to react with shock when they hear me self ID as femme, but I still confuse many. I don't care at all, but I do sometimes have irrational fears that I'm simply not femme enough to attract butch women. Don't bother telling me how crazy that is. I already know it, but it doesn't stop me from thinking it. I have closets and dressers full of sexy, high femme outfits and high heels. I may have been a professional model/performer, but I stopped modeling and became a strident feminist before I was of an age to wear make-up. I sometimes wore eyeliner eye liner over the years, but I had NO IDEA how to properly wear make-up until a few years ago. The idea of going into a bastion of femininity such as a giant make-up store really freaked me out. A wonderful femme friend accompanied me into Sephora to hold my hand while I got good make-up advice. I still clench a little, but I'm comfortable enough to go to Sephora by myself now. I can still get totally freaked out sitting in the chair and looking at the mirror while the hairdresser talks to my image from behind me. Especially of the hairdresser is a dude. (I'm never going back to THAT place.) It would be nice to no longer battle with myself about my own femininity, but this will probably be one of my life-long struggles. __________________ Cheryl

09-02-2012, 09:27 PM	#89
princessbelle Infamous Member How Do You Identify?: femme Preferred Pronoun?: femme ones Join Date: Nov 2009 Location: Tennessee Posts: 6,100 My Photo Gallery Thanks: 29,380 Thanked 30,503 Times in 5,201 Posts Rep Power: 21474857	Les Femmes Jolies Momo Flint To see as I see, release thoughts of superficial beauty. See past the mask of society, ’ and mark individual standards. For, as a woman, I see beauty in all shapes and sizes. Whether it be, in the sway of robust hips, the brush of rounded thighs, the swell of full breasts, or the calm, self assured look, every woman comes to know. It takes an open mind to accept all, but a kind heart to embrace. __________________ ~ I've learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel. ~ Maya Angelou

09-03-2012, 04:59 PM	#90
rustedrims Member How Do You Identify?: Butch Preferred Pronoun?: she/her Join Date: Mar 2011 Location: Northern Ohio close to Lake Erie and ice-cream places Posts: 444 My Photo Gallery Thanks: 3,123 Thanked 2,553 Times in 367 Posts Rep Power: 21474850	Thank you very much Ladies, I am sneaking around in here reading.The stories are so different but yet similar.I can see the struggles you have all gone through and came out stronger than ever.I appreciate you all! S. __________________ I don't want to be perfect because if I was then I will loose the ability to learn.

09-03-2012, 05:12 PM	#92
lettertodaddy Member How Do You Identify?: dorky queer femme bottom Preferred Pronoun?: feminine ones Relationship Status: single, dammit. Join Date: Aug 2011 Location: vancouver, bc Posts: 240 My Photo Gallery Thanks: 157 Thanked 716 Times in 158 Posts Rep Power: 8075872	I had a brief moment where I tried being butch - wearing Queer Nation t-shirts, cut off denim shorts, and Doc Martens - but even then, I wore lots of makeup and had very girly mannerisms. It just wasn't meant to be. __________________ "If I'm in a room full of cookies, the cookies ain't got no damn chance." - Charles Barkley The meaning behind my screen name:

08-31-2012, 05:32 PM	#85
mariamma Member How Do You Identify?: femme Preferred Pronoun?: she Relationship Status: single Join Date: May 2011 Location: Oregon Posts: 352 My Photo Gallery Thanks: 1,458 Thanked 1,116 Times in 281 Posts Rep Power: 9628889	Big love and hugs to you Leigh for sharing your story. One thing is true, you are strong.

09-02-2012, 08:53 PM	#88
Kätzchen Senior Member How Do You Identify?: Femme Preferred Pronoun?: She Relationship Status: Monogamously Attached to my boyfriend and future husband. Join Date: May 2010 Location: He’s usually with me unless I am with Him. Posts: 15,084 My Photo Gallery Thanks: 35,991 Thanked 31,994 Times in 9,939 Posts Rep Power: 21474865	I think, for me, I cannot condense or distill my life experience into simple sets of events… concerning ways that I embrace my Femme identity or how others perceive me as Femme or maybe not even recognize my Femme being. It feels very complicated to me, when I think of my own life and how often fragile I feel about myself but yet simultaneously, I feel incredibly strong, confident, unrepentantly Femme – all in the same breath. I am 53 years old now. It seems as though it was just the other day when I was in my 20s and 30s. Time does fly, and fast. I have talked about my own journey on occasion in our community and wanted to add toward what I have already shared. I was aware of my own identity before I ever had a way to name it or own it. Who I am is who I am and I couldn’t renounce one ounce of who I am as I have grown over the years because at heart, I do believe I was born into my own skin of thought, my own skin of identity and my own skin of anything – like a huge genetic marker that cannot be altered by the best of scientific discovery or process, as if it could be dissected that way. I think what my life looks like to me is one very slow progression of how I bloomed into being me. I seem to remember hearing a well known catch-phrase that goes something along the lines of: A person is the product of their environment. Cliché or not, I sometimes want to believe this strand of thought but find myself rejecting it on a consistent basis because in some ways I might be a product of my former environments and in some ways I might even be the product of my present environment. I want to say that for me, I am the product of the skin of thought I choose to try on or discard or toss into the wash with some dye or see if it survives a fiery furnace and still seems to fit who I feel I am or how I am just as I am (if that makes sense at all). I grew up second eldest of four siblings, but later on in years mom and dad gave us two other siblings – increasing our familial arrangement to a household of 8 (minus a sister who died shortly after birth). My formative years were spent growing up with two brothers and one other sister. We lived in a rural area on a dairy farm. Our lives were dominated by farm life, church, school and if there was time (which there was little of), we each had our own hobbies and sets of friends. I had the least amount of time to myself but I loved music, piano studies, my very small set of girl friends from school or church and cousins I wrote to who lived very far away. It didn’t matter what kind of clothes I wore. I had and always have had a very large wardrobe. Dresses, skirts, coats, shawls, stockings, socks, all types of shoes, pants, sweaters, boots, trinkets, jewelry, but never really wore makeup until I was almost a young lady of 17 years of age – I love makeup and have to have the best I can afford but I don’t wear it daily. I save it for when I go special places or want to get all dolled up for work or sometimes just because – for no reason. I wasn’t allowed to have makeup or pants when I was young, due to sets of religious practices my family abided by or social customs of the day that my family valued more over other social customs people practiced who were not anywhere remotely like my own family or people we went to church with or went to school with. I’d say I was a slow bloomer. It’s taken the better part of my own adult life to grow into who I consistently am – minus a few adjustments along the way: Like raising my two sons or earning two formal education degrees or a lifetime career that spanned 20 years of my adult life. Speaking of which: Embracing my Femme identity. I was rather quiet growing up and rather quiet in my early work life and even rather quiet as a mother raising her two sons. People knew there was something entirely different about me but they just couldn’t pinpoint what was different. As engaging as I can be socially and publicly on our forum boards, I am rather quiet and private as a woman, but not quite as private these days about the Femme in me. Over the years as I grew up, it was not entirely a safe thing to be out loud and proud. People were locked up for what society thought people like us were: social outcasts because we did not fit the parameter of what current day society back then sought to enforce (heterosexuality). Even as I grew into my adulthood, depending on where a person lived (in the continental US), you could lose your ability to earn a living, be socially discredited to the point that no one would hire you in your community, much less let you live a peaceful life. But my life was a set of complications from the start of motherhood: due in part to my sons being Black and being of a multicultural background which was peppered and salted lightly with characteristics that set me apart socially from groups available to me. My life has never been a cake walk but I do make a nice cake! So, where was I going with all this??? Oh. To give a current day example of how invisible I am as a Femme, still to this day, I will tell you about an experience I had this summer working on my former job. The job market is a tight one out here and all I could find for a job over the past six months was working at a gas station. How I even got the job, I still wonder about today but I feel probably my unmistakable femininity is probably what helped me to get that job. Anyway, loyal customers of both corporate gas stations I worked at would at times comment to corporate offices and field supervisors about who the “lovely woman was who worked at the station.” People who frequented both places were from a cross section of everyday people to upper-level executives to travelers in our region and other parts of the US and even a small sampling of international guests. I can’t tell you how many times I heard customers say: “What are you doing here? We never see women doing this job, much less look as beautiful as you or smell as pretty as you. You are not the run of the mill worker.” And of course to me, their comments were classic: classic for those who enjoy seats of entitlement, power, privilege and a whole host of other things colliding daily on my tiny little job that was probably more of an education for people who worked with me or came to know me at the gas station and certainly for my superiors. People came to know the Femme in me in a diverse set of situations and I know they will never forget me (they miss me, clients and coworkers do: I miss them too). I am strong. I am highly qualified to be me. I am Femme.

09-03-2012, 05:25 PM	#93
princessbelle Infamous Member How Do You Identify?: femme Preferred Pronoun?: femme ones Join Date: Nov 2009 Location: Tennessee Posts: 6,100 My Photo Gallery Thanks: 29,380 Thanked 30,503 Times in 5,201 Posts Rep Power: 21474857	I remember my first girlfriend and i still didn't know about femmes. I remember apologizing to her about being girly. I told her if she would help me try and be more butch i would try. Thinking i was a disappointment to her. She laughed and told me i was just perfect the way i was. I was so naive. She went on to tell me there are gay women like me, i wasn't by myself. I felt relieved, not sure i believed her though lol. Had no clue about the butch/femme dynamic. Femme is how i was born and i am so glad i never had to change. I am so thankful there are others like me. Belonging somewhere feels beautiful!!! __________________ ~ I've learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel. ~ Maya Angelou

09-09-2012, 10:02 AM	#95
Ms. Meander Senior Member How Do You Identify?: Queer Femme Relationship Status: Ethical Nonmonogamist Join Date: Dec 2009 Location: The Mountains Posts: 1,520 My Photo Gallery Thanks: 4,706 Thanked 5,223 Times in 1,150 Posts Rep Power: 21474851	Never judge a book by its cover What an awesome thread! Thanks for starting it, Medusa - and thanks to all for sharing your stories. There are times in my life when I seem more surrounded by other queers, in real time, but it has been less-so lately. So I have regular opportunities to come out. It is less of a "Femme" issue than a "Gay" thing, except to the extent that I am not recognized as queer by the average straight person. When people discover who I am (and who I associate with) they are often keen to question me about trans issues. Which is somewhat ridiculous because I am not trans. But I am and have been close to many trans people, and perhaps have a little insight. I at least have enough insight to open the door of understanding to a previously clueless soul. I have great and frequent opportunities to spread awareness and dispel myths and fear. I know I do it imperfectly, but you have to start somewhere. I have had a few occasions when people have been disturbed and distressed to find that I am a Queer Femme -- something along the lines of, "but you look so normal", "you're such a pretty girl, you could be normal if you wanted to." Yeah. Thanks. I tried that. No thanks. Get used to it! __________________ My wish for you is that you continue. Continue to be who and how you are, to astonish a mean world with your acts of kindness. Continue to allow humor to lighten the burden of your tender heart. - Maya Angelou

11-02-2012, 03:56 AM	#96
deb0670 Member How Do You Identify?: femme/ baby girl Preferred Pronoun?: she,her Relationship Status: Single Join Date: May 2010 Location: Illinois Posts: 1,348 My Photo Gallery Thanks: 24,520 Thanked 6,027 Times in 1,189 Posts Rep Power: 21474851	I have read a few posts in this forum, and, finally decided to try to share my story.. I have always had a very hard time feeling or thinking of myself as a Femme.. even tho that is what i truly wanted to be.. I was born 10 lbs 7 oz. and was the baby and only girl out of 3 kids. My brothers are 2 and 3 yrs older than me. I was not one of the spoiled lil girls that a lot of people know about, i did without a lot of things that my brothers were privileged to get.. My oldest brother always did Karate, my other brother was in Football, but when it got time for me to join dance or gymnastics, there never was enough money. I grew up watching my mom get a new dress every week, while us kids got new school clothes from K-Mart, once a year. Due to my size,( i was skinny from ages 1-5 and then again between 15 and 16) but the majority of my life i was heavy set), i never got to have the pretty lil dresses or skirts like my mom did.. most of the time i had to wear my brothers hand me downs. I would see the other girls at school wearing the latest fashions and trend setters, while i was inwardly drooling over them, i was outwardly shunned and cast away, never made to feel "pretty". I had a few dresses for church, but i was told that if i wore them i could not go out and play or wrestle with my brothers, but sit like a lady, and that got boring. I was raised in a strict Pentecostal home, where they honestly believe that homosexuals are demon possessed and need to be delivered.. thus the reason why i stayed in the closet most of my life. I went thru the motions of getting married.. more than once.. having my kids, trying to live "right" all the while never feeling comfortable and knowing there was another way for me. I never really had many friends that were girls growing up, so i never did the makeup and hair thing.. i didn't know how and my mom was too much into herself to see that she had a daughter who needed her. In my last marriage, i gained a heck of a lot of weight.. mainly due to my ex not wanting me to be flirted with and also having a sit down job for almost 6 yrs.. but i had pretty clothes.. a few dresses, feminine blouses, etc.. When i finally had the nerve to leave that very abusive marriage, and got a job at Walmart as a cashier and got active.. i kid you not.. i dropped 8 pant sizes in less than 6 months. That was wonderful!! None of my clothes fit anymore! Only problem was, i had no clothes to replace all the too big for me clothes, and definitely did not have the same income i did before.. so i had to settle with what i could find. I finally came out of the closet in May of 2009. Moved away from Illinois and moved to Oklahoma/Arkansas area. Met some gay people and started going to the first and only gay bar i have ever been to. i was still trying to figure myself out, so i started dressing like a soft butch.. but not really feeling comfortable. I still had/have this stigma about myself that i am not feminine enough.. i don't look sexy enough, i don't know how to even begin to be sexy.. Ethan will say otherwise.. and i thank Him for that. but.. i have never ever been really accepted by women and never had close women friends who could show me how to do my makeup, or what to or not to wear.. sighs.. I first found the other BF site back in late May 2009, and thought it was awesome being able to be a part of so many awesome people.. when it.. well.. i felt lost.. then i discovered the Planet.. and for quite a while i would just observe.. cause i was worried i would not be accepted for whatever reason... like most things in my life.. and i just hid. Today, i don't hide so much anymore.. i am starting to branch out more.. I know that i am a Femme.. i am not always in dresses and heels and do not always wear makeup.. but i am Femme.. i just wish i knew what it felt like to be sexy.. Never have i thought that i could be sexy and be heavy at the same time.. and since i do not think i will ever see skinny again.. maybe there is hope for me to be the other? shrugs.. I know i have went way left field and back again a few times in my story.. and for that i apologize.. sometimes i get alittle carried away. i am still searching inside to find the true and real Debbie.. and.. maybe someday i will find her. But i do know one thing about her.. she is Femme. __________________ Remember the lessons, forget the details. Use the stumbling blocks of the past as stepping stones to help build the future.

11-30-2012, 02:18 PM	#97
Sarafemme Junior Member How Do You Identify?: Bisexual Femme Preferred Pronoun?: She Relationship Status: Married but confused Join Date: Nov 2012 Location: United States Posts: 14 My Photo Gallery Thanks: 0 Thanked 65 Times in 10 Posts Rep Power: 1521265	On some level I have always known I was femme but didn't have the word for it. Growing up, I was a girly-girl, played with Barbies, wore lots of pink, and it felt right to me. Meanwhile, I had massive emotional crushes on other women (not usually my peers, but teachers, adults I knew, etc.). I was a very lonely teenager; I was introverted and bookish and had no friends and didn't date anyone, even in college. (I had crushes on various guys, too, but they weren't nearly as intense as my feelings for women). I considered the possibility of my attractions to women for the first time when I was a junior in college. I snuck to the sexuality section of the library and read books on lesbianism. I didn't dare check anything out. I felt guilty. What further frustrated me is that I didn't often feel like I related to many of the women's stories of feeling 'different': I wasn't a tomboy, I didn't want to be a boy, I didn't dream of marrying another girl. Instead, I was girly, I loved it, and figured I'd marry a man someday and forget all about these persistent and highly-charged crushes on women. After graduation, I stayed in my hometown. I finally met a man who I thought was the one for me. We were both each other's first significant relationship (I was 27, he was 32). He proposed after only 2 months of dating. I accepted on the condition we wait a year to get married so we could get to know each other better, so that's what we did. We had problems right from the start of our honeymoon. We couldn't achieve having sex (we both had waited; not for particularly religious reasons, though he was Catholic --just because that's how it had happened). My husband displayed a scary temper and yelled at me for not being able to relax enough. The resentment in our marriage started with that. It took us four years (yes, you read that correctly) for us to achieve that. Obviously, resentment had built throughout that time. I suppose this all should have been a clue about my sexuality issues, but I was still deeply in denial. I took all of the blame for our problems; I was somehow 'faulty' as a woman. Further, while we were in marriage counseling, I came to the realization that I didn't want to have biological children (pregnancy/birth phobia). This reality hurt my husband a great deal, because he always had wanted to be a dad. He wasn't all that interested in adoption either (he actually thought to adopt would 'take away' children from people who couldn't have them biologically). Finally, my best friend, after realizing I had an emotional crush on her in the midst of all of my marriage problems, called me out on my bisexuality and promised we would still be best friends (and she wasn't freaked out by my crush, either, though she didn't return my feelings). It was with her help that I not only admitted my attractions to women and called it what it was, but that I also began to embrace the inherent 'femmeness' I had always felt: Though I loved the 'trappings' of femininity, I wasn't passive or doing it to please men, not even my husband. That's why I felt so different from feminine-presenting straight women and why I could never fully relate to them: I had always felt like it was an authentic expression of my gender.

04-28-2017, 03:30 AM	#98
girl_dee Practically Lives Here How Do You Identify?: Femme Preferred Pronoun?: dee Relationship Status: Hitched up Join Date: Nov 2009 Location: Livin’ the Dream Posts: 24,079 My Photo Gallery Thanks: 30,560 Thanked 54,956 Times in 13,922 Posts Rep Power: 21474873	Feeling out of place among femme sisters OMG i have enjoyed reading in this thread. i love hearing stories from others. i don't feel so alone in my journey. i knew i was a femme from very young, chasing the tomboys around. Only i was one too, just not as much. i was never into dolls. i rather pretend to be a pilot or a teacher. i am not a girly girl at all. i can be, for short spurts. Once when i a butch was chatting me up, asked me if i have nails... because it was a requirement. Pfft. it was very very hard to find my way, as the other queer women i knew didn't dress or act like me. i didn't know what i was. i loved masculine energy, and tied it to male. i tried to fix my gay way too many times. i am so glad i found out about butch women. Masculine energy with a female brain. i am very mechanically inclined and am bold. i fixed my own garbage disposal the other day. i know tools and lawn equipment. i don't wear make up much and i don't have a clue as to how to really. When my femme sisters are talking about beauty secrets and the best purses to have, i feel so out of place. However if they ever want to know how to run a chainsaw, i'm their girl.