#being butch

[celebrate-lesbianism]

Being Butch

Being butch is embracing the bushy eyebrows my mother used to hold me down to pluck. Thick and dark, they're one of my favourite things about my face.

Being butch is wearing comfortable clothing in my favourite earth-toned colours. Wearing boxers, long ones, and feeling secure and covered even in vulnerable moments. 

Being butch is being practical and helpful. It’s having extra time to sleep in the morning and not being afraid to run, move, or get my hands dirty.

Being butch is making peace with the colour pink, forced on me as a kid, implicitly and explicitly. Now I pair my pink dress shirt with a tie, if and when I feel like it. 

Being butch is taking up space, doing as I please. Dirty looks from men mean nothing when I have all the power. 

Being butch is reclaiming my favourite parts of myself and letting them truly be mine.

[kneellittlekitten]

I give all praise to femmes, always, absolutely. With that said, there is something sublime in being a butch and relishing in one’s own masculinity. The feeling of a fresh haircut, especially after taking a shower afterwards (or better yet, having a femme wash my hair with her using her nails for a head massage). Walking alongside a femme, her hand in mine while I take the side closest to the road. When the waiter brings the check and directly hands it to you without question or hesitation while her eyes sparkle over her wine glass in appreciation, even though you’ve always got it. When you’ve put in the work in the gym and in your body and her hands always seem to find your biceps for a squeeze. Going to undo your belt after a long day when she stops you to do it for you, sometimes by lowering herself to her knees. When you come home, loosen your tie, and then roll up your sleeves to help with the dishes as it’s only fair since she made dinner, while you catch a glimpse of her eyes darkening and tongue wetting her lips. Being looked at to take the lead, to have her faith in you that you’ll take her best interests, needs, wants, dreams, desires, and goals as a sacred responsibility. When she sees you as a protector not only of her body, but of her mind and heart. Being able to be a source of comfort, joy, strength, and love for her. Both identities being so interlinked and finding balance and peace in one another. I just…really love being butch and loving femmes.

[tigriivy]

I made this out of the rage I felt from seeing transphobic, butchphobic and enbyphobic comments in my tl.

Being a lesbian is part of my identity too and I refuse to let other people tell me I am not a lesbian just because I don't fit their binary perception of things. It's so sad to see other lesbians shitting on butches and gender non-conforming or non-binary lesbians.

But hey, we are here and we're not going anywhere, I am not going anywhere. I've always been a loud lesbian and I'll always be.

Keep being loud, proud and gentle with other lesbians and be fierce with the ones who try to erase us.

[spitblaze]

I don't see people gas up gnc and butch transfems nearly enough, can we get a fuckin round of applause for gnc and butch transfems

[andstuffsketches]

um, can you play a song with a beat?

[kingworm]

thanks

[redrosefemme]

The laziest femme you know with the messiest bedroom is daydreaming about being a housewife to a butch rn

[femmefruit]

femme as in, “what can i bring to the party?”

femme as in, “yes i’ll hold your baby so you can shower.”

femme as in, “let me host this time!”

femme as in, “of course i’ll help you clean your room.”

femme as in, “it’s cold, do you want to borrow a sweater?”

femme as in, “i can give you a ride to your doctor’s appointment.”

femme as in, “i brought you a snack from the place you like!”

femme as in, “how’s your family?”

femme as in, “yeah, i have time to talk!”

femme as in, “i heard you were sick, i’m bringing medicine and soup.”

femme as in, “it’s no problem, i love to help!”

femme as in, “i love you, please let me take care of you.”

[celebrate-lesbianism]

8?

8. can you share the story of you coming out? 

Coming out as a lesbian and coming out as a butch lesbian felt like two different experiences so I'll address both. Either way, it was a really difficult process for me made worse by the fact that I grew up in an insulated rural community with unsupportive family. 

I officially came out as a lesbian at age 19/20 but knew I was attracted to the same sex since age 10/11. I went to a culty af high school where we had classes on gender roles and traditional marriage, and like I mentioned in my last response, the progressive teacher I looked up to said that women can't be fully homosexual so I spent my teen years thinking I was bisexual by default. I started identifying that way at age 13, which did not feel right, but it was the only language I thought I could use.

Fast forward about 6 years, and it was actually my mother who brought up the fact that I might be a lesbian. This was shocking to me because we had a terrible relationship, she REFUSED to let me have short hair growing up because it "looked dykey," and she worked so hard to bully the tomboy out of me when I was a kid. I don't really remember why she brought it up but I think it let us both process the inevitable, and from there I could finally put the pieces together and start working on self-acceptance. 

I dated a little bit at 20, cut my hair, and started presenting more masculine. For the most part, I liked how women reacted to me, and I loved how I felt. I didn't love being compared to a man so much though, or how hard it was to find clothes, or the way that I started getting treated as suspect in a lot of LGBT spaces. All that plus backlash at work and from my family ultimately made me conform to femininity again for a while. 

When I was 21, I started dating my now wife. She was the first woman who I felt was actually dating me for me and there was a lot of freedom in that. I wasn't being sized up against a man and I didn't have to look or act a certain way for her approval. I could just be myself, and so I started figuring out what "being myself" meant for me, and it turns out that it meant what it has always meant deep down: being a butch woman. 

I embraced my butch identity in recent years with my wife's support and she has found that she has a connection to the femme identity. I moved to a bigger city that is more accepting of gender non-conformity and I cut ties with a lot of family members that were holding me back. I know what I like and don't like, and I'm at an age where I don't care as much about what others think about my appearance or my life. I can just live and focus on what's important to me.

It took a while to develop the confidence and the self-esteem to be open and honest about who I am and what I want, but here I am at age 27, happy, married, and butch. 🙂

[souphamsters]

I've been hopelessly fixated on drawing one (1) sweetheart butchfemme couple ... they're all I think abt ... HELP !!!

(silly lesbian ocs that I love , chae🍓and lucky🍋!!!)

[undeadbutch]

do you actually love transfem butches or are we, to you, just handsome faces with a built in strap? do you see us for anything beyond our penetrative capability? are you disappointed when our boundaries include a lack of genital penetration? would you respect a transfem butch's he/him pronouns in the same way you would a transmasc's or otherwise he/him'ed sapphic?

[mysticfemme]

Getting railed to the point I go nonverbal, the only noise I'm making are little whimpered uh uh uh's. They notice and in between rough thrusts gently ask me if I'm doing okay, so I reach my hand up to tap their arm twice. They smile at me in recognition and praise me before pulling my hips into their lap and going even harder.

men dni

[athlast]

there's something about butches reclaiming protectiveness and chivalry from an imposed "caring, nurturing" character associated and often forced upon women. something about how while straight men often try to present as careless as possible, masculinity and care are not only not conflicting in the butch identity, but inherent to it. there's something there.

[mike-png]

Miku in Jewish Menswear

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

MDZS x Brazil (1985)

(Yes. Real movie dialogue)

[technically-human]

Hey, don't cry. Ghost yuri, okay?

(Now that you know the girls, they need to meet the boys!)