Identity Series: Rethinking Femininity

Crafting a personal, spacious definition of what it means to be female

How gender rules take hold in childhood and teen years

From picture books to beauty ads and TikTok trends, a single storyline about “how to be a woman” appears on repeat: look pleasing, stay kind, achieve without intimidating. If that plot stays flexible, it can nurture warmth and connection. When it hardens into an unspoken rulebook, it compresses self-esteem, fuels guilt, and raises the risk of anxiety or depression.

Researchers describe three interlocking strands that shape identity long before adulthood:

• Expressive traits , such as empathy and tenderness, are praised yet often framed as a woman’s primary source of value (Shea & Wong, 2012).

• Gender-role beliefs set rules for how women “should” act and look; stronger endorsement predicts higher body dissatisfaction and low mood (Shea & Wong, 2012).

• Gender-role stress emerges when daily life clashes with those beliefs; high stress levels track closely with anxiety and psychological distress (Aguilera et al., 2024).

  
  

By adolescence, many girls already judge their bodies against carefully edited images. The 2025 National Youth Mental Health Study reported that one in four girls (25.7%) showed moderate-to-marked concern about body shape, compared with one in seven boys (14.8%). These concerns travelled alongside lower self-esteem and higher depressive symptoms (Institute of Mental Health, 2025).

Performance pressure and the rise of the inner critic

Public scripts soon become inner narration. Qualitative interviews describe a persistent inner critic that whispers “not enough” even after real success, driving perfectionism, self-doubt, and a reluctance to rest (Woodward & Kong, 2013).

Similar patterns emerge when a woman’s gender expression deviates from convention in terms of dress, voice, or assertiveness. A longitudinal study found that such divergence invites frequent discrimination, which predicts higher depression and even suicidal thoughts (Tabler et al., 2021). The pain comes less from how a woman expresses herself and more from how others treat her, and soon her inner voice takes on their criticism.

Role overload adds yet another twist. Workplaces reward professional achievement, while social settings still place the majority of emotional and practical labour on women. Balancing deadlines with caretaking stretches energy thin; asking for help risks criticism. What appears as high functioning may mask resentment, exhaustion, and the hidden belief that rest must be earned.

Mental-health costs of strict femininity scripts

When rigid gender stories collide with daily demands, body and mind respond. Thoughts race around imagined failures, muscles tighten, and sleep fragments. Some women restrict eating, exercise compulsively, or relentless people-pleasing for relief.  Depression may arrive as numbness, irritability, or the sense of living behind glass. Viewing these reactions as products of a social narrative rather than personal weakness removes a layer of shame and opens space for change.

Counselling strategies to rewrite the femininity narrative

Therapists often help clients move through three practical steps that translate across various counselling styles:

1. Recognition brings inherited messages, such as “good women never disappoint”, into awareness. Seeing the script reduces its power.

2. Re-authoring Test alternative lines, such as “caring includes caring for myself”, and rehearse them in daily life until they feel plausible.

3. Self-compassion and community. Speak to yourself with the same kindness you would offer to a friend. Seek relationships that respect many ways of being a woman; community evidence that the old script is optional helps new chapters take root.

   
   

Although counselling models use different language, they share one goal: moving from inherited prescriptions to personally chosen values.

Living a wider story of womanhood

Tight gender rules shrink the space in which a woman can breathe, think, and grow. Expanding or discarding the old script does not erase empathy or grace; it places them beside confidence, pleasure, and rest. Therapy cannot rewrite society overnight, yet it equips each person to ask, “Whose story is steering my life, and do I want to keep following it?” From that question, a more spacious narrative begins.

Restoring Peace is a private mental health centre offering counselling and psychotherapy for individuals, couples, families, and groups facing challenges such as trauma, anxiety, depression, grief, and relational issues. Learn more at www.restoringpeace.com.sg or WhatsApp +65 8889 1848. For updates and resources, join our Telegram group: https://t.me/restoringpeace

Additional Read:

Why Early Mental Health Intervention is Crucial

Early Intervention is Critical in Preventing Mental Health Challenges from Worsening

Understanding and Managing Health Anxiety

References

Institute of Mental Health. (2025). Body image concerns and mental health symptoms among Singaporean adolescents: Findings from a national study. Asian Journal of Psychiatry, 91, 103108. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1876201825000486

Cordoneanu, F. (2014). Identitary character and social hypostases of Christian-Orthodox femininity. Procedia – Social and Behavioral Sciences, 137, 205–210. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1877042814039068

Hagan, T. L., & Cohen, S. M. (2014). A narrative analysis of global female identity, health and equity. Advances in Nursing Science, 37(3), 235–248. https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC4127644/

Shea, M., & Wong, Y. J. (2012). Femininity and women’s psychological well-being. In P. K. Lundberg-Love, K. L. Nadal, & M. A. Paludi (Eds.), Women and mental disorders (Vol. 1, pp. 17–36). Praeger. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/281559724_Femininity_and_women%27s_psychological_well-being

Tabler, J., Schmitz, R. M., Nagata, J. M., & Geist, C. (2021). Self-perceived gender expression, discrimination and mental-health disparities in adulthood. SSM – Mental Health, 1, 100020. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2666560321000207

Woodward, D., & Kong, S. (2016). Gendering Women: Identity and Mental Wellbeing through the Lifecourse [Manuscript]. Retrieved from https://www.researchgate.net/publication/307589106_Gendering_Women_Identity_and_Mental_Wellbeing_through_the_Lifecourse

Keywords

femininity and mental health, gender role stress, female body image Singapore, inner critic women, perfectionism in women, self compassion counselling, role overload burnout, discrimination depression women, therapy for women Singapore, gender expression mental health