'Why I'll never be the chick in the 'Sexy Getting Ready Song'.'

Okay. This clip from the new musical-comedy-drama, Crazy Ex-Girlfriend, which premiered this month on US television, is kind of cute. It’s kind of funny. It’s called The Sexy Getting Ready Song and I can totally see the humour in a single woman chasing her ex-boyfriend torturing herself for beauty. Who doesn’t love a bit of hot wax hair removal that ends in blood splattering the bathroom?

Watch the video below. Post continues after video.

All the effort. The pruning and softening and washing and glossing and plucking. The control undies and curling tongs that burn scalp. The makeup-strewn bathroom.

When a rapper comes into the bathroom, sees it all and has a new respect for women? Again, kind of cute. Kind of funny.

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The idea that women want to dress sexy sells a lot of stuff  (don’t even mention that it is based around unrealistic, patriarchal markers because that might upset the people who make music video clips and sell, I don’t know, everything).

But what if you don’t want to dress like that?

I don't need the male gaze that says 'I-want-to-sleep-with-you'. I need the male gaze that says 'I'll-fix-that-squeaky-front-door-I've-been-saying-I'm-going-to-fix-for-three-months'.

Dressing to have sex appeal is not the kind of thing that makes me feel better about myself or makes me feel like a worthwhile woman. I get more satisfaction about my overall place in the world from slotting in one hard-fought for piece of the 2000 piece puzzle that's currently sitting on my dining table unfinished or beating that know-it-all, patient, hovering Honda Jazz to a car park. I have accomplished something for myself, not something for others.

I understand wanting to dress in a way that makes you feel good about yourself, that makes you feel beautiful, but - call me crazy - feeling good about myself doesn't involve some bloke thinking I've got a good arse.

I have tried the whole 'sexy dressing' thing before. In my late teens and early 20s my whole fashion sense came from copying my best friend, who had a completely different body type to me. And then there was that time, a while back, when push-up bras were big and I thought why not?

Every woman, I think, has at least one thing that is 'hers' when she dresses. It can be anything. For some it's their legs. Others their skin, their eyes, their arms, their hair, their smile. One standout they can rely on. They're sporty or feminine or edgy and it works. Funnily enough, it's usually something that comes completely naturally.

One night I decided that a push-up bra and low cut top were a great idea. I may as well have been naked. I felt like I was walking around in one of those dreams where you've gone to school and are wearing only a very, very short towel and no clothes underneath, and you have to walk to biology in your very, very short towel that, for some strange reason, no-one is mentioning and you're kicking yourself for, you know, not wearing your school uniform. (Why is the towel always apricot?)

I can't remember what people said at the dinner I decided to wear a push-up bra and low-cut top. At the same time. It was a desert to a flood situation below my neck. I can't remember what we ate, because I had this cleavage on my chest which may as well have been the Loch Ness Monster having a fag outside Maccas. It was a surprise to everyone and looked completely out of place. It was obviously not a good choice.

Friends commented and complimented and I was so self-conscious I ended up borrowing a coat and wearing it for most of the evening. Lessons were learnt as I sat at a dinner wearing a too-small jacket and trying to work out how early was too early to leave.

The end result was kind of funny, just like the Crazy Ex-Girlfriend song. It was also kind of ridiculous. I had "dressed sexy" ... and all I wanted to do was go home.

The thing about 'dressing sexy' is that it's exhausting and uncomfortable ... and it's usually for someone else.

And if that's what sexy is, it just isn't for me.