November 8, 2012
Gender Autobiography
I was raised by and grew up in a house hold with both my father and mother. I think this had a great influence on how I came about discovering whether I was a boy or girl. Having the opportunity of seeing and interacting with my parents on a daily basis allowed me to compare them to each other and notice the differences between the two of them. I noticed I was more like my mother than I was like my father. When seeing these differences between the two it allowed me to establish the existence of gender.

I have one sibling, my older brother Allan. I think us being so close in age (less than a year apart) allowed me to really notice the difference of gender. I noticed I had long hair just like my mom and wore pretty bows in my hair while my brother didn’t and had short hair like my dad. Also, I wore dresses, skirts and pants, as did my mom; my brother and my dad only wore pants. I always wanted to play with dolls and dress up but my brother wanted to play with trucks and cars. I can remember when I was younger I asked my parents why my brother didn’t wear dresses, and they explained to me I was a girl like my mom and my brother was a boy like my dad.

Growing up my parents gave me and my brother different chores and responsibilities around the house. My mom took care of the inside of the house, while my dad took care of the outside duties. My mom did things like wash the dishes, the laundry, cooked, and cleaned. My dad washed the cars, took care of the yard work, and did repairs around the house. When my brother and I were old enough my parents started to pass some of their responsibilities down to us. I started helping my mom with things like the dishes and laundry. My brother helped my dad take out the trash, water the grass, and wash the cars.

I think growing up as a girl did have some influence on my goals and career. Since I spent a lot of time with my mother and worked closely with her one of my goals in life is now to start my own family someday and be a great working mother like she is.