They showed me what a woman was supposed to look like. Quiet. Soft. Feminine. Acceptable. I studied it. Tried to find myself in it. I thought maybe if I adjusted enough, I would fit. But something in me resisted.

So I stood in the tension between what I was and what was expected. I questioned myself before I questioned the standard. I thought something was wrong with me. It wasn’t.

I don’t fit the dress. And I’m learning that I was never supposed to.