Daphne Scholinski’s memoir The Last Time I Wore A Dress is a touching narrative of a girl who was misunderstood. Throughout her childhood and young adulthood, Daphne struggled with identifying with her feelings. Daphne was constantly searching for an answer to why she felt different. Daphne wanted to “fit in” but she knew she was unconventional. The different labels she was given through out her psychiatric stay stuck with her and left a scar of how she was once perceived. Daphne had very low self esteem through out her childhood. This is because her parents ignored her and gave her little affection. “She didn’t even notice when I walked out of her apartment, ran down the stairs,” (Scholinski 4). Her self esteem was worse at her dads …show more content…

The Dr.’s viewed her gender non-conformity as a bad habit and wanted Daphne to change her appearance. Daphne new that if she changed her appearance the Doctors wouldn’t bother her about it anymore. However Daphne couldn’t do this because its not how she felt. The Doctor’s viewed Daphne as choosing to act this way not Daphne needing to act this way. Each culture establishes gender ideals and the people within that culture follow them. The non-conformist in some cases, like Daphne, are prosecuted for not complying. I feel that this is wrong, To make everyone fit into a type is not necessary because not everyone likes those choices. Daphne was only doing what felt best for her and their is nothing wrong with wanting to feel comfortable. Making Daphne wear makeup for points didn’t do anything in the long run because Daphne didn’t change her ways. Rules like these are the essentialist beliefs that ruled all of the institutions. The essentialist beliefs in the institutions was boys should act and dress like “boys” and girls needed to act and dress like “girl”. Michael Reese facility wanted Daphne to wear tighter fitting clothes, nicer shirts, and act girly. Daphne conformed and like the extra attention from boys but I feel like this confused her and led to why she didn’t like being there. During her entire stay at Michael Reese she wasn’t fully