When I was in fourth grade, a boy told me he could hold off going to the bathroom longer than me.

The bet was foolish, and all I would win was the knowledge that he was wrong. Yet I took him up on it. I sat on the bus as we rode the forty minutes home, a scowl on my lips, and told him that wasn’t true. Jennifer, a long-faced, skinny girl next to me, insisted he was right. Boys could hold it longer than girls. They were just better at this.

At this. At science. At math.

I took him up on his bet. I had to pee – I had to pee badly. But I would hold it for the entire ride home, all forty-five minutes, and I wouldn’t complain once.

It’s a miracle I didn’t get more urinary tract infections. So determined was I to prove that I was not less than a boy. That I was equal. That I was better.

Growing up, I learned that women were teachers, but never scientists. We were the damsel in distress on all my favorite shows. We were the mothers, the wives, the love interests. But we were nothing more. Were good at watching children, we were good at having them, but we were not the leaders of the world. No, we were the supports.

The bets started off as mundane, as holding it through a bus ride. But they grew without prompts. If boys could pee standing up, so could I. If boys could run around shirtless, so should I. If boys got to rough-house and play in the dirt, so would I. Anything they could do, I could do. Anything.

Religion told me only men could be leaders. Religion told me only men could make family decisions. Religion told me only men could marry women.

It took me years to realize that religion was wrong.