I was raised to be an athlete, I played soccer, basketball and I ran cross country. I was one of the happiest kids I knew, and to top it all off, I was pretty good. Lucky for me, the people in my life all encouraged me to play competitive sports.

You see, I was raised to believe in myself, to do what made me happy and for me that was basketball. But I learned quickly that my dreams were so minuscule in comparison to the oh-so- important opinions of boys. I was happy, I was confident and I loved basketball. Then. one sunny day in seventh grade, an insignificant boy told me that doing what I loved made me masculine, it made me less of a woman and it made me gay.

This pre-pubescent and clearly immature boy tried to take something that gave me such joy and ruin it.

I didn't let that stop me because his comments were and still are a joke to me. I know who I am and what I stand for, and one person’s opinions weren't going to stop me from being who I was and doing what I loved. Puberty just isn't that easy. People don't just make one comment and then go about their day, and it's never just one person.

So I grew up, and I went to a high school where I got those same comments made, and I was still called a lesbian because I was a woman playing a man's sport. Because for some odd reason, some reason I know I will never understand, men don't like the idea of a woman being able to do what they can do.

Instead of doing what all the people in my life did, these new voices came at me with their opinions of what they thought I should be. They claimed that I was too strong, my arms and legs were a little too big and all the sports I played made my womanly features lesser.

Luckily for me, I was able to stay relatively strong through this all, but I have my days where I look in the mirror and all I see are the words I've heard over the years. No one likes to admit it, but what those people were saying to me is what causes body image issues for women.

So I just want it to be well known that I am a woman, I may be flat chested, I may have muscles and I may not be your ideal looking woman, but that does not make me less of a person. I might play sports, watch football and hang out with my guy friends but that does not make me gay.

And I might be a female athlete but that, in no way, shape or form gives you the right to see me as less of a woman because of it. As a woman, I'm tired of being put down for growing up and doing what I love, and I'm sure as hell am done allowing this misogynistic society dictate how I should live.

At the end of the day, this is my life, and if you can't accept me for exactly who I am you don't deserve to be a part of it.