In a recent lecture I was asked to reflect on how gender affected me when I was a child.

When I was a child gender was very Black and White. I was terrified of men, especially those with any sort of facial hair. I was scared of men to the extent I would hide in my buggy and cry if I came in contact with them. It took me a couple of years to grow out of this but I soon began to realise that there was a difference between the two sexes. I grew up believing girls behaved better than boys, although this was simply based on my behaviour compared to my brothers. My ideas on this changed however when I began Primary School and the most mis-behaved child in my class was a girl. I started to see that both genders can behave the same.

I started to notice that the men in my life all had ‘jobs for men’ like Builders, Engineers and Mechanics. Similarly, the woman had ‘jobs for woman’, backed up by my mum being a Beauty Therapist. It took me quite a few years until I realised that occupations shouldn’t be based on gender or sex.

When I started school all of my classes were significantly outnumbered by girls than boys. All the boys seemed to flock together and not communicate with girls unless they were required to by the teacher. This created a barrier between the two genders. For this reason, I believe I grew up thinking boys were too different to be friends with. It was as if they were another species. It wasn’t until later school life near Primary 6 that I began to see a more gender neutral side to life. I began to realise that gender isn’t something that should be compared and we certainly should not be judged on our gender.