Becoming a woman is experienced as shame compounded by remorse over that shame

Evidence

But in spite of all these repressions, she feels oppressed by the weight of unspeakable faults. Her metamorphosis into a woman takes place not only in shame but in remorse for suffering that shame. — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 777

Categorization

• DEEPTHINKING: The reflexive doubling — shame about feeling shame — is a dense description of how the girl’s own subjectivity becomes self-condemning, a paradigm-shifting framing of feminine development.
• STORYSTEM: A character formation scaffold: a young woman whose defining trait is remorse for her own shame, driving internal conflict years later.
• XREF: connects to: Menarche universally triggers shame that mothers transmit to daughters — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 744; Shame precedes reflection and arises from an opaque self-relation; Woman’s defining situation is being forced to assume herself as Other — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 64 (+1 more)

Broader Connections

• Woman’s defining situation is being forced to assume herself as Other #expands (0.82) — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 64
• Shame precedes reflection and arises from an opaque self-relation #expands (0.78)