Long way to myself

by bree witt, 29

When I think about my style, and the history of it…it makes me cringe & smile at the same time. I like to break it down in decades. I feel like every ten years, I managed to find a new way to represent myself. Not because “I wanted to fit in” or because I liked trends, but because I was finding WHO I was! Little did I know, the first 20 years would consist of me trying to just feel comfortable. As a kid, a twin to be exact, you find yourself morphed into another persons identity almost. Everyone dresses you the same, whether it’s the same outfit exactly, or just different colors of the same thing. You get called” the twins” People confuse you and mix you up. I feel like we were just considered as ONE for 18 years. To our coaches, friends, & teammates mainly. After so long, you start to find ways to become known as an individual and not a pair and that’s how my journey began.

Of course as kid, we tend to care less about how we look so that was the norm for me up until 8th grade. Middle school was a weird time for me. I stayed in skinny jeans, hoodies, and sneakers. I didn’t know who I “wanted” to be, or what I wanted to look like, I just knew I had to wear something appropriate for school. Whatever was comfortable that day I put on. Didn’t care what anyone thought. I changed into shorts and a t shirt the second I got home every day. I did that from 6-7th grade. In 8th grade, a guy in my class FINALLY acknowledged something I wore, by giving me a thumbs up and saying good job to the sneakers I had on that day. The fact that it was a guy didn’t really matter to me, but it was more about who it was! A guy who was known for having “swag” in my school. Obviously that made me happy, so from that day on I started to care about what I wore. Sounds silly to me typing it now, but at the time, when a boy like him liked my shoes, it was an accomplishment!

When I got to high school, I was now so focused on mainly my sneaker game and finding matching shirts that I just wanted to get as many new shoes as possible. I wanted people to recognize me for my swag a little bit! I played basketball, so I wore a lot of basketball shorts and t shirts or hoodies almost everyday, trying to hide the fact that I thought I was gay and wanted to dress differently. If it wasn’t shorts and hoodies and sweats, then it was skinny jeans, plaid button ups of different colors and sneakers. My sneakers and my shirt always had to match, Or my shorts and my shoes always matched. Everyone said I dressed like a little boy or a gay girl(stud), and I was some what okay with that for the time being cause I was still figuring that out. This was all of high school!

Anyways, Fast forward to college, I KNEW the first year going in, I wanted to completely changed who I was and how people saw me. I spent the last 12 years dressing how other people thought was cool, and not being true to what I was feeling inside all those years. Which was uncomfortable. If I wasn’t in basketball shorts and a t shirt or a sweat suit, I was uncomfortable the whole day, couldn’t wait to change! In 2012 I started buying a whole new wardrobe behind my moms back. I didn’t want her to know yet, but I wanted everyone else to never see me in an uncomfortable outfit again. I didn’t wanna be uncomfortable going into college, so from that day on, I started dressing in boys clothes. No particular style, just stuff that I could afford on my own, and that matched with the era we were in lol.

Now the last 10 years, I’ve been experimenting with my hair, and wardrobe. I’ve tried every style from business to business casual, from new age streetwear, to big & baggy old school, from preppy, to bright and loud, from unique and bold, to whatever else! I LOVE trying new things and seeing what I can put together that most people would never think of doing. I like to say I “push the boundaries I feel the most comfortable and myself when I’m in my Business & Streetwear clothes though. I feel comfortable, free, & stylish, in my streetwear clothes, but I feel more respected, and taken seriously in my business style clothes. In my streetwear clothes, I feel like I get mistaken for a young teenage boy, so people don’t even give me the respect of an adult in certain places. That really changed once I cut my hair off. It was like all of a sudden I just became a man. People started seeing the way I dressed plus I had short hair and now going to the bathroom was an issue, being called sir all day was an issue, and looking like a little boy became an issue. It blew my mind how a simple ponytail being cut off, made all the difference in my style and how the world viewed me now. It wasn’t the clothes that got people, it was the hair!

Being able to dress so freely and not have to worry about being something I’m not has given me such an outlet. A way to speak to so many people without having to say a word. It’s brought in a lot of self confidence, and a lot of fun & happiness & opportunities for me. It’s influenced me to keep being me and doing what I do despite what other people think cause I’m the only one who has to care about what I wear and look like. It’s not always easy to walk into certain places being me, but I will chose that over anything else every time. There’s been so many challenges over the course of my style, I could write an essay, however one of the biggest struggles was just staying true to myself and how I want people to see me. Another struggle was allowing myself to let go of the fear that people will judge me once I changed how I started dressing. I was able to pick my own clothes since elementary school. I was allowed to dress myself without mom picking something out, but I didn’t start dressing how I actually wanted to dress until 19 ish. Don’t have the option of dressing yourself from elementary school, and waiting until college to take complete advantage of that. That’s my only regret! I wish I dressed how I do now, in high school.

My style now is 100% authentically me, even though I still find ways to break my own barriers and test new styles. I could never pick one look and just stay with that forever. Everywhere I go, I wanna feel like I just walked in the room playing “pretty boy swag” on blast!

I seriously I feel like the best version of myself nowadays. Some days I feel like I wanna step out and see what reactions ima get by trying something new, but I always feel good generally speaking.

My style is part of who I am and how I want the world to see me. It speaks for me, and I just hope that when people see me, they see that I’m being true to myself and do the same for themselves if they weren’t before.