I have been struggling with having a male body for a long time.

Around the same time I realized I was queer, I discovered that being a boy just doesn’t fit me. The biggest reason I could think of is this weird segregation between a male body and beauty. The first compliment people think to give to a guy is “handsome” or “manly” or “rugged,” even if that guy doesn’t really fit the textbook definition of those compliments. Meanwhile, words like “pretty” and “beautiful” act more like insults toward masculine people. There are plenty of male-bodied people who fit the definition of beautiful, but there’s always a hesitation to call them that for fear of ticking them off. But a compliment is a compliment, isn’t it?

Even when wearing makeup and clearly trying to present as a more feminine person, the typical go-to compliment is handsome. Of course, I’m not upset when someone compliments my appearance, and I’m not expecting everyone to magically know that I’d rather be called pretty. But there’s still something weird about how I can’t seem to break free from that default description of myself.

Then there’s the classic stigma of “men can’t do girly things because they’re men” that was hammered into me as a kid. I remember wanting my female friends to invite me to hang out when they did their makeup or went dress shopping. I was afraid to ask because I felt like I wasn’t supposed to.

I figured that the solution laid somewhere in androgyny. If I made my gender ambiguous, maybe it would be easier for me to escape the rugged, handsome connotations associated with my body that clung to everyone’s image of me. By blurring the line between the typical boy and girl, I thought I could at least avoid others’ instinctive impulse to refer to me as “one of the guys.” But when I looked up tips on how to present myself as more androgynous, I noticed a lack of people who looked like me. Hours of searching for tips on how to present as androgynous mostly resulted in articles targeted towards female-bodied people. I’m glad that there’s at least some group who can rally around their attempt to express their bodies the way they really want to, but it still bothers me that there are so many others who simply don’t have that kind of support.

And yet I can’t say I’m surprised. There’s still a severe stigma against men who wear women’s clothing. Words like “girly” and “gay” still act as insults towards men who don’t act masculine enough. Maybe male-bodied androgyny is just another taboo in a world where men are only allowed to be men. I know society is becoming a lot more progressive and gender ambiguity is becoming more common, but I can’t shake this weird feeling that not all members of the spectrum are treated the same way.

I don’t know if I’m overreacting or undervaluing the progress that’s already been made for the sake of queer male-bodied expression. I don’t know if I’m simply stuck in a cage of my own self-consciousness and constructing an unavoidable image of manliness for myself that others don’t actually see, but I do know I want to feel pretty like my female friends when they get dressed up for special events and I want to feel comfortable enough to wear a skirt in public without constantly thinking that I should run back to my room to change before more people see me. And I know that, for one reason or another, all of that is surprisingly hard for me to do.

But I don’t want this article to sound that hopeless. If you are a male-bodied person who wants to wear makeup and pretty skirts and feel like a princess, you should do it.

That’s probably a lot easier said than done (trust me, I know it is), but like I said, society is changing. Maybe if more of us dress the way we want to, the stigmas will go away. Maybe words like “beautiful” and “handsome” will stop having gender-specific implications. Even if they still do, that shouldn’t stop you from expressing yourself in whatever way makes you feel good in your own body. You are beautiful, and you deserve to feel that way.