The Ideal Human

For the most part, the female body was made for one job: childbirth. It's why our hips our wide, our chests aren't flat, and why once a month things aren't so ideal. Biologically we are not made to be the attacker, the defender, the muscly, bacon bringer.

My body was made to be a mother which is why I hate it. I don't want children and so these parts of me have become my weaknesses.

There is not just one person I would become if I had the choice. I would become a mixture of people, the ideal human.

As a teenager, I would exercise every day or nearly so. I was desperate to have visible muscles and it made my youthful temper boil to know that no matter what I did my barely ever moving brother would still be stronger than me. In my head, I associated strength with masculinity.

I cut my waist-length hair into a pixie cut. I threw my dresses out of my closet and replaced them with more shorts and button-ups. Anything pink, frilly, anything feminine had to go.

People told me that women could be anyone. They said we could be doctors or lawyers or actors and yet when discussing reproduction they did not even wave past the idea that some people may not want to have biological children.

I won't use this as an opportunity to rant about the school system or give a feminist lecture.

If I could be anyone in the world, I would take my female name and face and past it onto a body that bypassed reproductive parts for practical features, testosterone, muscles, a flat chest. If you're being generous I wouldn't say no to a nicer face too.

I don't think I am the only girl that feels this way but I'm curious to hear about your views. Do men hate their bodies for such weaknesses? Do they ever feel a need to reject masculinity to prove themselves? Or not prove themselves but become a stronger person in the eye of society and your own mind.

I know there are surgeries that I could take to reduce this feeling of bearing a body not made for my purposes but if you overlook the fact that I'm a broke college kid with parents who aren't exactly progressive, it seems overkill somehow. Every woman has to live like this, is this strive to reduce my weaknesses a weakness in itself? And how could I explain something like breast removal surgery to future partners or family?

"Oh, you're wondering why I did this. Yeah, they were just annoying me."

I think I am ranting now. I've kind of wanted to get this off my chest, pun not intended.

If I had a choice, I would have the ideal body, made to be strong, made to endure, made to be the head of the household without judgment. I would combine the best parts of being female and being male.

The sad part is there's not much about being female, that I would want to keep.