firecat

You agree it was knee-jerk and probably misogynist? It's been a long road to get to where i could see that in myself.

I frequently appreciate how my parents blessedly did not gift me with weight issues and appearance issues. I did get a great deal of pressure to take middle class responsibility to be secure and professional. In a number of ways, i think i had a bit more male socialization than average for a daughter (and my mother did as well). My internalized pressures have a great deal to do with being strong (Have pneumonia? Ignore it and attend those meetings! Is the kitchen not clean at midnight? Get up and clean it at 4 am!) and presenting professionally (including "housewife" as a profession). I suspect those internalized pressures are just as much class and culture driven as gender driven. There's a strong thread of expectations that i'm pretty sure is Scandinavian (some of the strength and stoicism); and i think of "depression babies" and their recognizable adaptations. (I might need this tenth butter tub, better save it.)

I'm reminded of those young coming of age novels about the artist youths living in a Jewish culture and the struggle of breaking free of those cultural demands. Similarly, there's that memoir of the woman who has left a restrictive Jewish community when she realized she was dooming her child to the same confines she rebelled against.