I am an educated, strong, African-American, Christian, heterosexual, liberal woman with a unique personality. I am not a mere girl, but a woman of quality.  This is what makes my gender and the standards of contemporary society has created a system that can oppress women which does not and will not be applied to me since I have socially constructed a system for myself.  The school institution, the media, nor the misrepresentation of the female demographic in others affairs of my community will not stop me in pursuing something that I want to do.  My upbringing plays a significant role in defining what my gender is, and it has helped me develop into a person that does not follow societal standards regarding appearance, attitude, and predicted actions, or what I consider, being an individual. 
	My mother is feminist. Starting before my birth she made the decision of wanting to be surprised of what my sex was which resulted in her choosing colors such as yellow, teal, and green for her baby shower.  Since the beginning, my mother did not want to categorize me in a particular group which became an effective tactic as she continued to raise me.  She went against the gender role which left a great impression for my young mind.  Her and my father divided the chores equally in the household with my father being the primary cook and dishwasher.  I unconsciously established that men and women perform the same amount of chores.  She allowed me to choose what toys I could play with. Instead of distinctively giving me a Barbie, or an Easy Bake Oven she gave me a Gameboy, a plethora of stuff animals, and building sets such as Legos and K’nex.  I learned that I was capable of playing with any type of toy whether or not something as small as the color was intended toward my demographic.  She exposed me to many forms of media such as watching Batman and My Little Pony which helped me to adapt and enjoy any genre of media whether it was geared towards boys or girls.  She always said I was beautiful, intelligent, and had a great personality and I personally believed in all those comments.  My mother was a “feminist without mak[ing] it a life’s work”.  She raised me to be an individual by letting me do what I enjoyed doing which is not a difficult act.  My gender is not composed of Barbie’s, and flowers, it is who I am and who I want to be, and if my mother is able to enjoy herself and pass on her experiences to me with her gender being a woman, than a woman such as myself should be able to do the same thing. 
	My mother’s upbringing did clash with my experience in the school institution, particularly my peers in the system.  I did make great friends, had a great social life, and received an excellent education but my attempts to reach such goals were difficult in the beginning.  In a socially constructed environment that I did not follow, trying to seek people with a similar background was challenging.  Many of the young girls always discussed about princesses, hair and make-up, but when I added into the conversation about a concept that personally interested me such as dragons and tigers, they would look at me as if I was weird.  Their social institution was limited to what society deems as normal for their gender. Princesses, princes, and dresses are supposed to be instilled into the mindset of girls to follow only fairytale aspects.  The market they were exposed to “limited [their] imagination” making the mindset of their gender less versatile than mine.  They considered me the deviant to their group so I had to find friends who would not mind my different imagination.  It got worst as we got older since many girls “put more value on boys than anything else”.  I do find many boys cute and attractive but I did not make it my life’s work. The issue about their appearance became worst, and education did not matter to many girls.  In fact competition regarding who looked the best “became an intrinsic part of the girl culture”.  Their gender may have gone through an internal crisis and mine did as well since I considered that if I did not go through a similar turmoil something was wrong with me.  That was until I made the friends I still have now and had the support of my family, especially my mother.  We all valued individuality and how we considered ourselves which is what I considered a major aspect of my gender as woman with personal and unique qualities. 
