The Trans•Parency Podcast Show
Mashup: Voices of Visibility in the Trans Community
Imagine a world where love adapts and holds strong through life's most profound transformations.
Join us for a mashup episode that celebrates the colorful mosaic of identities, the resilience of love, and the importance of carving out a space to be unapologetically you.
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Imagine a world where love adapts and holds strong through life's most profound transformations.
Join us for a mashup episode that celebrates the colorful mosaic of identities, the resilience of love, and the importance of carving out a space to be unapologetically you.
Did you know that podcasts are a great way to grow your personal and business brand voice?
Buzzsprout - Let's get your podcast launched!
Start for FREE
Disclaimer: This post contains affiliate links. If you make a purchase, I may receive a commission at no extra cost to you.
Download the podcasts on all your favorite platforms: https://bit.ly/3wOecFr
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▶︎ YOUTUBE | https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCozHvJj0NTeKtvC8P5gyxqA
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This is the Transparency.
Speaker 1:Podcast Show.
Speaker 2:That's how I kind of connect with her, and then she's very, she's very encouraged with her transition and she's just started it not too long ago and she decided to move forward to full-time growth and I feel this is a very good guess. That can also relate to many girls that they're not sure or they're kind of afraid or have fears to come out. So today Carrie is going to tell us her stories and her experience and also her experience at work as a trans person coming out, so welcome Carrie.
Speaker 2:Carrie James. Hi, hi, how are you? I'm doing wonderful, how are you? So, introduce yourself a little bit and, you know, tell us a little bit about your background.
Speaker 1:Okay, well, my name is Carrie James and you kind of set me up. I guess I'm probably on Facebook way too much.
Speaker 2:No no no. Yeah you're very how do I say very generous with your comments. I can see you comment with many, many girls.
Speaker 1:There's no like jealousy or diva situation going on, so that's good, I love that I can be as much as anyone else. No, I've you know. I've decided to move on with my transition. I can't like so many other girls. I consider myself more of a. I'm evolving, I'm becoming more.
Speaker 2:I really yeah, yes, so you can like kind of tell us where you like in the beginning, how you start like, how, like when do you feel, when you're a little different, and all that.
Speaker 1:You know, it's interesting because people ask like when did you think right? Right, and I think I, my thought process has always been the same. You know, it wasn't that I was feminine or anything like that. I just kind of felt that the way I was walking through life that connection wasn't happening Right, and I think that it was more of a you know, you look at clothes. I mean, that's what the biggest thing you're going to make up, and you know, and that just felt more natural to me and you know. So I kind of honestly say this is something I always kind of felt so.
Speaker 2:so do you start dressing in the closet or you start just right away like dressing and go out, go out right away.
Speaker 1:Child like I did. You know clothes and your sister stuff and you know, so you would try that and you know, and that's how it kind of grew.
Speaker 2:So do you steal your sisters underwear?
Speaker 1:Not my own, you know, I went out with these guys on my own and just felt natural and I just knew this was going to happen and I'd had relationships. I mean it's I think I was telling you one time, shelby, you know I had a relationship with other women and I'm going to be so bold to say it, you know it just felt that we were just two women going out.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and you know, and I kind of felt that you know, maybe three years ago, that I go OK, this is going to happen. Two and a half years ago I was probably 9010.
Speaker 3:Did something specific, did something specifically happen to start pushing in that direction?
Speaker 1:I just like the clothes you know, and.
Speaker 1:I like the makeup and I like doing it and I think the way the city had evolved a little bit was a little more accepting. I mean we do have, you know, the twice. I mean you know where it's different than you know you. And in LA, you know, it's still a little bit different. We have pockets where it's very much accepted. You know there's places I can go to not have it but and I go everywhere. I decided, you know, I said well, I'm not going to kind of pigeon my whole myself down, just those areas, you know, because this is what I'm going to be. Yeah, you want to live your life. Yeah, and I felt that you know. So that that's all kind of our start. It's when you act about. You know, I kind of joke that someday somebody's going to ask me you know what happened to pandemic with you?
Speaker 1:Yeah, you know it does really strange things it just kind of, yeah, you know, I mean, it was just the transition, it was happening.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so you, you provide us some pictures to show, you know the audience, so can you kind of let us know like what? Like this one, this picture? Yeah, this is like in the very, very beginning.
Speaker 1:Two pictures, yes, yes, all right, I'm going to tell you a story. Okay, I was driving and I did. With that moment I drove I was, I saw myself in the mirror in my car and I go, oh my gosh. And. But the problem was I actually drove through a stop sign and I got pulled over by the police. I took the two pictures and you know, my license had been changed. So that's what that is.
Speaker 2:Wait, wait, wait. What did the cop say to you? I want to know that. That's more important.
Speaker 1:Well God, there's a whole story going on with that. He, you know, he was very kind about it and I drove through it. He goes you understand what you did, and I go oh yeah, I know, and I'm not going to deny it, you know, I'm not going to kind of talk you out of it and I took the ticket and took off and I just thought it was just a funny moment. And so I and because that's what is I looked through a mirror of my drive you know my review mirror and so I pulled my camera out and take the one picture where my jaw was dropping and I went through it. It was stupid, I should not have been driving and taking selfies of myself.
Speaker 2:Is this your first selfie as Kerry?
Speaker 1:It wasn't my first one, but it's the first one driving.
Speaker 3:Excellent. How about this?
Speaker 2:How about this one? How about this picture? Do you? This is like we. How long ago, right after that first picture, I can't see it.
Speaker 3:Oh, she can't see the other pictures.
Speaker 1:You know, I can't, I don't know which one that is. So I'm thinking which one is that in like an apartment or something like that again?
Speaker 2:Looks like you know I'm almost at the same time. How about this one? What are you doing in the laundry shopping?
Speaker 1:I'm going to take one store here in Detroit called Janice Closet and it's like it's, you know, kind of a cross dresser trends place. And that was probably the first time I had somebody going to do me some speech, and so they've become just great friends. I see them all.
Speaker 2:I'm very curious besides those stockings, what else did they sell there?
Speaker 1:What they say clothes. They show shoes. You know that's everything you want. It just happens to be the wall that I think we always get our pictures taken by it because it's by the cash register and you know. So it sounds a lot of like you know it's. You're looking online. You know Janet probably thrilled if I mentioned it to the other one. Give her a plug. But Janet clauses and you know it's where. It's where I go and, like I said, I've become friends. I got a couple of friends there to just go.
Speaker 2:Are they sis, sis?
Speaker 1:Yes, they really are, you know, and in a way it's been kind of neat because I have been lucky and that I do have a lot of cisgender support.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's good.
Speaker 1:You know I'm here in Chicago with a friend.
Speaker 2:Yeah so what about your own family and friends? Or?
Speaker 3:when did you first come out? You know that's coming.
Speaker 2:Are they?
Speaker 1:supporting you. You know my folks kind of have a tough time, are having a tough time. I mean, you know and I get it. You know my it's ironic you know my sisters, children or teenagers, and they get there just fine. You know, but you know it's coming along, it's not going to. You know I understand big change for them, you know, and it's just that you know it's part of the process.
Speaker 2:Right, right.
Speaker 1:It's not as if they've knocked me out of their lives. It's not as if anybody has to get out of here. You know, such a husband is not that thrilled, but I think it's because he just misses me not watching football. You know, I don't like it. I don't do, but I just think that you know some little things like that.
Speaker 3:One thing that we don't talk about too much as a community is that when we transition, those around us also transition. You know, it took me 54 years to come to terms, and so it'll take other people a while as well, and I try to remember that.
Speaker 1:you know that it wasn't I mean, this was coming right and they could tell, and you know I could. You know my voice was kind of changing because I was working with that. You know I think one time, you know, there was a skatbasker still left in my eyes one time, right, you know, and and so I just you know, from that end, you know I got to remember. You know that this is a big change for them and you know it's just what we have and it's not as if you know I've lost some friends, you know, and that's okay. They just have to recognize that. You know this is me.
Speaker 3:Right, how was it coming out at work?
Speaker 1:This is a this is an ongoing thing, and she'll win those little books about it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, how did you come out? I worked during COVID. That's the headline for you.
Speaker 1:Well, yeah, the day that I was Michelle and you know I was here today that I was supposed to come out, I was going to meet my management and I figured the time was right because I was up for a job that would have been less client facing or, you know, chief operations officer or whatever. But the day that I went with the data, basically the country shut down and our global HR director had to fly back to London and she goes listen, I can't be with you, I'm out of here, okay, because I won't be able to get back. So I continued and it's been a bit of a balancing act and so, you know, it has been kind of coming out, you know, because we are getting ready to go back to the office.
Speaker 2:So before we go back, before you go back to the office and you just do zoom meeting, right, do you tell us about that funny story that you told?
Speaker 1:me, I would just, you know, I would maybe wipe my lipstick off, I'd make myself, you know you don't show.
Speaker 2:You don't show video, or sorry.
Speaker 1:Yes, I go really close, you know, and I work backer classes and and the darker in the room and I didn't really change my voice thinking back on it, but we didn't die or anything. We didn't have as many zoom calls I think we have a client to come do it as well and. But there had been moments. You know where I laugh about this. One time I was presenting, and it was more of a conference call, my slides were up on the zoom and I tend to walk around a bit when I present and it kept asking about what's this clicking sound going on Right and I'm like, and then after meeting I'm walking around and go oh, wait a minute, that's my heels. You know I love it.
Speaker 1:So they all thought there was something wrong. So they're all checking her. You know what's going on because I was talking and presenting and you know I use the hand walk around. But it has been a bit of, you know. I mean I don't think it's ever going to be a big surprise. You know there's some people that haven't. I have come out with some coworkers. One didn't really take it very well, but most of them have. You know we are getting ready for, unfortunately, a big, massive downsizing and I'm going to negotiate how I'm going to work my way through. You know they want to.
Speaker 3:Is the company supportive overall? Do they have insurance plans? Yeah?
Speaker 1:well, yeah, I'm not going to tell you much where I'm at or group. They talk a lot about it. You know our clients talk about diversity, right, the I yeah, but to put it in action is a whole different. Totally Right, they'll do their. I mean, I'm going to be blunt. You know they'll do their little dinners and you know, bring out the former president, the company, who's gay, and they'll bring him out. But you know they pay him. He's retired and they'll pay him the you know, and so it's a little bit of you know, troop you out. You know, and I've gone to those before. I had and like, okay, I know this, you know not, you know, not naive, and so you know, you just talked your way through it. I think that the decision needs to be made. I mean, you know.
Speaker 1:I mean you know myself and others, you know salaries of you know, somebody that used to play golf with, walk around the clubhouse, right you know showers and all of a sudden like oh, wait a minute, you know what happened and so yeah.
Speaker 3:So would you anticipate when you go back to the office? Sounds like that will be soon.
Speaker 1:I did have a. I did have my first meeting, my finally was able to. I'd had some zoom calls with my management and my the board and less Tuesday I got a call and I learned, you know, I learned to meet with me in the morning, you know, and I kind of got okay, this could go two ways, anybody went well.
Speaker 1:It was a good night for the session. We'll see. I, I, you know, I think, like I said, so much has changed from a corporate standpoint to stuff that's going on. You know, in your crazy, you know we basically had to walk away from our, you know our investments in, you know, in Russia and shut those things down and that's a significant amount, right, and just like everybody else. So well, you know it's a. I guess you could say this, Michelle, I'm sorry, it's in process, Gotcha.
Speaker 2:Okay, yeah. So now on your Facebook I'm going to switch gear to to more back to your personal life. So on your Facebook I see you go out a lot Like with different girls and clubs. So how's the house Michigan like when you go out? Is it? Do you feel safe and like? How about like bathroom? Or pronouns what, what do they?
Speaker 1:are they understanding? You or there are some places that are kind of hard. Nobody's ever yelled at me when I've had to use, you know, the right restroom. Nobody's got to hear. But you know not, as though I'm going to certain places. I mean, I'm going to places that I know are going to be safe. This would be the accepting. But I do try, as I was saying earlier, I do try that I want to live a normal life and this is my normal life.
Speaker 3:Right.
Speaker 1:And so I didn't want to be pigeonholed of only going to trans clubs or gay clubs or whatever and don't get me wrong, I love them, you know which one. Meet your friends and everything else. At the same time, I do have a regular life and I tried to to live that and you know, I mean there's a couple places you kind of go, okay, do I need to walk in there, you know, and you just kind of do it, you know, and it's like that. You try to go and I think I'm like I said I'm lucky because I have friends that are transitioning as well. Okay, but I also have cisgender friends and you know, I guess there's comfort in a pack.
Speaker 3:Yeah, how has has therapy been a part of your process? Have you been counseling, or how's that work for you?
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's been great. I think that I tried, without doing it, and I realized I couldn't. I knew that I had to give a little help and there's that stigma, right, you know, and especially when you kind of get into this easier, I mean I can't stand, I can't say. I haven't had my moments where I've had to have that, oh my gosh, I got to see her right away, you know, and so you go in, yeah, but it's been good, good, and I think it's just me. I think it's helped me, me becoming who I am. I would hope that I become a better person, because I think there's so many other things in my life that just make more sense. Right, you know, just sit here and I'd like to think I'm a better person. I do know I smile way too much. I love it.
Speaker 3:I love it.
Speaker 1:I catch myself and I'll be walking by and like I'll look in a mirror. Not that I'm vain, because, believe me, I know my limitations of how I look, you know, I know that and but I can see myself and I can. Yes, I'm happy. I mean, I've noticed that literally I've been walked down the streets and I'm always wondering if you must look at her and what the hell is going on. Who's she smiling to?
Speaker 2:You know, you're by herself, you know and how about those pictures that you post?
Speaker 1:It's because of people like you. Excuse me.
Speaker 2:I say the pictures and like the recent pictures that you also send us, I was always wondering who teach you to post like the.
Speaker 1:See, look at that smile. I have a friend and she just thinks it's so she you see me in some locations you're like wondering why are you, why are in the middle of this ghetto, or why are you in the inner city or whatever, and she'll just drive and she'll go care. Let's get out. We got to take some pictures of you.
Speaker 2:So she she helped you how to pose and everything.
Speaker 1:I think I kind of she's helped me because she was kind of a model, but she goes. I don't really have anything to teach. I mean I just kind of do it. I just try not to fall down, you know, if I do cross legs a certain way. So the fact that you would even say that, thank you very much, because I didn't.
Speaker 2:How about? How about your fashion? Did your sister's girlfriend? Do you have?
Speaker 1:any advice and stuff. I've always been into fashion, you know. I've always been in the clothes and I think that was probably part of it is. I always love women's clothes and even as my former self, I probably you know I like clothes. You know, matter of fact, one of the things I did was just get rid of all of them. But I've got to admit there's two suits I didn't want to get rid of. I've paid a lot of money for me. I'm tailored, they're high end. I'm never gonna wear these. Okay, I mean, I'm never gonna do anything. They look good on a hanger, you know, and. But I've always been into clothes and dresses and skirts and I so I want to ask you, yeah, I want to ask you.
Speaker 2:So do you shop in person, try it on, or are you shop online?
Speaker 3:I think we may have frozen up a little bit, do we last? You.
Speaker 1:I try to, but you know I'm kind of large. You know I try to but it's hard because I mean I would go to a store and I have just my size, you know, and you know my size. My shoes are going to be stored carries, those you know, and you know especially heels and all that. So challenging, you know. So that's a bit of a challenge.
Speaker 2:So like. So when you shop in person in Michigan, did they anyone give you any problems?
Speaker 1:Do you?
Speaker 2:have any issues.
Speaker 1:I've had some, you know I, mostly about clothes in person there has been, you know I, no one has ever said anything, but you can see, and I'm not trying to make it up, but you can see, and it's just kind of like, you know, here I am, you know, I mean I have to. You know I mean my clothes. I have to get kind of taking me in or out or whatever. I'm not going to my skirts way too short, but you know. But I have a seamstress that helps me out, you know, and puts me together.
Speaker 1:Awesome, so I'll buy something and make it work for me. Awesome, and actually I just bought a dress and I was going to wear that today, but it was just like way too much. Save it for next time. They're falling off the top.
Speaker 3:You can tell just the joy that you have when that that inner matches the outer and authenticity is there, and just you can see it. You know, especially in that first picture in the car, your eyes tell the story and so it's amazing. It's amazing to see, it's amazing to experience and it's amazing to see in others as well.
Speaker 2:I've been lucky.
Speaker 1:I mean you cross paths with like a, you know Shelby, you know, and she's always and you know, we all have our battles, we all have our wars, we all have our cut times, but I've, I've got the, but I've been lucky, you know, I've had great support and the support I have has been great and wonderful, and I think that that's kind of added on to the happiness and I'm I'm seeing things through a different lens right now, you know, not because I've got to wear glasses, but no, I can see. You know, things just are much more crisper in my life and I'd like to think that we're better, exactly, and I think that's the one thing that we talked earlier about, you know, about therapy. It was kind of recognizing that, and then I had victories I didn't even know about.
Speaker 2:Right.
Speaker 1:You know, like you know, okay, you've got this and so. I just tried to you know, I just go live my life, you know, and whether it's you know, my own, however I mean.
Speaker 2:So is there anyone that give you a like, a big impact or influence when you first started?
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Any other girl, not me, but anybody else.
Speaker 1:Well, I was going to say it was you. No, no, no, but no, there has been, but it was more. You know, seeing how they kind of lived, you know how they were negotiating it through. I mean, I think that I know there's some people that are having a really tough time. Yes, and they, they, and they think they, I tell this, what I've told people and I, you know, is go on your own pace. And you know, yeah, maybe some people it's a little longer, right, you know, you know. You know somebody says no, you got to go do your shots, you got to go take, you know you got to do this. You're not living, you're not, you're not out entirely. You know I've had people say you know, because you're kind of negotiating and you're not totally out at work, there's not, and I'm hiding anything, it just hasn't happened, but it was more of a you know. Well, then you're not out.
Speaker 1:Well, okay, I'm out to me, you know, and so I think that when you find yourself spot, you know you take your victories and you move on and you try to go on. But I think of those things I've always told people it's like you go on your own pace, it's just like you know what it feel different than if I wasn't doing this right, you know, there's no heart. We all have our lives, and you know you. Shouldn't you know you?
Speaker 3:that's just how I live. Right, there's no one right way to be cis and there's no one right way to be trans, and so what you think is our journeys are so similar and so different at the same time. I find always find that fascinating. I was talking on social media this week about that, about how they're so similar, similarities, but then they're entirely different contexts.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you know, yeah, and I agree. I mean, you know, the first time was a girl, a friend of mine, and she she cisgendered and she was realizing she was a bit of a lipstick lesbian and we were having drinks and it happened to be in a bar that all of a sudden was a happy hour for several trans girls and you know, we were getting ready to go. She had to go and I said I'm going to pay the bill and she goes take a look, because that's your life, because she knew what was going on, and two weeks later I was taking that picture. You know earlier.
Speaker 1:All right you know, and so you know, that's kind of excellent.
Speaker 2:Okay, so do you want to give some other girls that who's still in the closet or maybe not sure, or afraid to go forward or come out? Do you have any advice? Or even people who's maybe working and they're not. They are not sure if they should come out. Yeah, you know, based on your experience. Do you have any advice?
Speaker 1:for I think you know what you said before everybody has their own pace.
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 1:And I think that if you're not ready, you know you decide, you know when will you be ready. And if you don't think you're ever going, I just this is not for to paint hard. I mean, you guys are going, you know, you notice like this is not an easy trial, you know, and no one chooses this. And I try, you know, I choose to be very positive, but you know, I understand, you know the world's not bright and you know sunshiny every day. I know there's some girls out there that you know they've lost jobs, they've lost families, they've been on the street, you know, and God bless them for, you know, still continuing on.
Speaker 1:But at the end of the day, we, you know, we all deserve to be living with dignity. You know we all deserve to be living as our true selves. And I think that's the one thing I would say is like, if, find your level of dignity, find your area, don't let anybody push you. You know, because if you, if you're doing this, because someone's and I've had this conversation, they're saying well, you know, carrie, you got to do this, you got to do that. You know, okay, I'm not or I'm going to say okay, let's do it.
Speaker 1:You know, and you know it's where that fits into your life.
Speaker 2:Right.
Speaker 1:Exactly, and like I've been lucky right, I've got these neighbors on both sides me and they they noticed, I mean, you know, when we were talking earlier, when I first started living full time, it was during the during early part of the pandemic, and they knew what was happening, you know, and you know, out here in Michigan, you know people, you know at first, when they would get together they'd sit on their driveway, you'd sit on their sidewalk and I'm like, okay, I'm going to do this, and I came walking out and heels and a pair of, you know, leather leggings and I was great, you know, and so I said and I do this.
Speaker 1:It's an area that has a lot of diversity in it. You know mostly gay, but it's a lot of diversity.
Speaker 2:Yeah, okay. So, michelle, do you have any last question for Carrie today?
Speaker 3:Well, I just it's really good to know you and it's really fun to see you walk in your authenticity and it sounds like community has been really important to you, both in your sis and in trans friends, and so I think that's a a kind of a lesson for all of us that we've been given a lot and now we have a lot to give, and so it's exciting.
Speaker 1:I don't try to, you know I figured you know I can. There are people I can talk to and I guess you know Shelby, you know things and just seeing how people live their lives and how they progress right, you know Shelby had changed careers, you know, and I've had to. You know I'm thinking I might ever do that, you know um.
Speaker 2:Come join me to become a realtor.
Speaker 3:Shelby will probably be a real estate agent in California you know and she was a great example of you know someone that was involved in church and had family, and so it's kind of following in her wake as she transitioned and I was able to learn and glean a lot from her. So I appreciate her. So I'm excited to have people meet Nia and her wife, katie. That has been an amazing example of what a marriage can do and stay together in spite of transition or even thrive in transition, and so I'm very excited to be able to share their stories with everybody today. So welcome Nia and Katie.
Speaker 4:Hi, thank you for having us. Yeah, absolutely, we're so excited to be here.
Speaker 3:They are coming in from Iowa today, where they have weather probably better than we do today. We're a little bit hotter here and so we're very excited to have you guys. Thank you for taking the time, absolutely. So tell us a little bit about I know you guys met a long time ago. You guys were kind of high school sweethearts and even before that. So tell us a little about your relationship before you're married.
Speaker 1:Do you?
Speaker 6:want to start.
Speaker 4:Do I want to start? Well, we're actually like elementary school.
Speaker 3:Oh, wow.
Speaker 4:But I don't know, sweetheart, that's what our parents would say that we were elementary school sweethearts.
Speaker 6:We met, we met.
Speaker 4:That's when we met and then we became best friends in junior high school and we had like a product experiment of if maybe we had a band, what instruments would we play? Nice, we did not play any instruments. Nia played the trumpet, and this was not a good band. So our imaginary band just became a really good friendship.
Speaker 3:Oh, nice, nice.
Speaker 4:I think it was just like a ploy, you know, to talk to each other. So our whole relationship kind of developed, you know, on like basketball bleachers and landline telephones you know, Landlines, yes. And so then we started dating our junior year of high school, our junior prom.
Speaker 3:So we're that adorable, oh of course you are Look at you now, yeah.
Speaker 6:So we started dating in high school and then went to college the same college in Iowa and then got married our senior year of college. So we've been married for 18 years. Nice yeah, 18 years and five kids later. Five kids.
Speaker 3:Tell us about your children.
Speaker 6:Yeah, so we are currently in what we call super month, which is where we can remember most of their ages, because it goes 12, 11, 10, 9, and 4. Next month our oldest will turn 13 and ruin that super month. But they are their amazing crew of kids. They just are really fun.
Speaker 4:Yeah, they're so goofy and silly and also, I think, just really caring. We're like gushy parents. We're very proud of our children. They're kind of amazing in every way. All of them, all, five of them.
Speaker 3:Awesome. I love that. That's what parents should be, and so you guys are so fun to watch on social media. I've never met Katie or your children in person, but it's fun to kind of know you vocariously through that and watch everybody grow up and getting big already, so very good. So tell us, nia, a little bit about when you knew you were different, when you knew that the gender that you were assigned to at birth didn't quite fit. So how did that play out for you?
Speaker 6:Yeah, I think, you know, looking back, I didn't really feel a whole lot of anything gender-wise until puberty. You know, I grew up kind of not thinking about gender as a lot of kids do. You know, just kind of before you had a certain age the world was kind of genderless and it was for me until I hit puberty and you know, there were activities divided by gender and things, but that didn't bother me until I hit puberty and my body started to change and hit that, oh, this is not right, this is not what I want, and so I didn't have the language transgender. I grew up in a really evangelical, christian conservative home and that kind of community. You know that was seen as a bad thing number one, but also that language just wasn't even in that sphere.
Speaker 6:So it wasn't until only five years ago that I really probably six that I really started to explore more what was going on inside of me and started going to therapy. I mean, really that's what it took, Also through therapy, you know, then realized well, I am transgender and that's what this is and that's what this has been the whole time, even though it's kind of, you know, looks different and had some different iterations. But yeah, so that's in a nutshell. You know kind of started in puberty and then the last 30 years it took me to kind of figure out what was going on.
Speaker 6:And so therapy played a big role in that and helping you discover and kind of flesh out that Definitely and I got to a point where I was doing some discovery on my own and just kind of hitting a roadblock and you know, katie graciously kept saying over and over well, maybe you should see a therapist, maybe you should see a therapist. And so finally we have a lot of good LGBTQ therapists in town, and so I found one and I've seen a couple in town now and they've both been great people and have really helped me understand who I am and then also build boundaries as I come out and, you know, meet the world Right Very good.
Speaker 3:That's something we try to talk about. A lot is therapy and how that's played for both of us.
Speaker 2:I'm curious when did you mention to Katie about?
Speaker 3:yourself.
Speaker 2:Did you start from when you're? Like you say, you discovering your when you're you have puberty?
Speaker 6:No, no, no, no, definitely not. So I think it was probably. I mean, when I actually literally came out and said I'm transgender. It wasn't until 2018. So not that long ago.
Speaker 6:You know, we had had some discussions a couple of years prior to that, as I had started to explore some more of myself. And the day that I went to therapy, I went to therapy and realized that I was trans. And I was driving home thinking, okay, how am I going to talk to Katie about this, because this is a hard conversation? So I, you know, in my mind, was like what if I just kind of test the waters and, you know, hedge a little bit to see if she's okay with it before I kind of, you know, blurred out that I'm transgender? But in that kind of thought experiment, I realized it wasn't fair to either one of us If I, you know, if I didn't say who I was, and we ended up staying, or, you know, because of me or because of her. So I just came home and I said I'm transgender. And when we had the opportunity to sit down and talk and she turned to me and said I know, how do you know?
Speaker 2:I'm curious, yeah.
Speaker 4:Well, I mean, nia always talks about this moment as the moment that she came out to me, but that, to me, is not the moment that she came out.
Speaker 4:Like she said, we had had a few years of conversation, a couple few years of conversation around gender, around, I mean, centered a lot on clothing and just like feeling feeling.
Speaker 4:So to me, the first time that she said anything like that to me well, you did say something really early in our marriage, but it was like that was in the past and so when it dropped up again later in our married life, I knew then and weirdly, I had been really drawn to trans stories. It was like a big part of my own journey because we have boys and I think that there was a lot of talk around like will you let your boys wear nail polish? Will you let their let's grow their hair long? Can they wear dresses? And so as a mom, I was already thinking about that and then I started getting interested in trans stories. So when she she doesn't think she came out to me, but when she kind of opened the rocks, I was like this is a road we're starting down whether it was a road towards, you know, non-binary or it was a road towards trans.
Speaker 4:I knew then. So when, when she came home and said I know, and she said I'm trans, and I said I know, I really did I was like okay, I'm glad that you caught up.
Speaker 3:So how was that for you, that process? Because it would seem like through your, your youth and your guys time to go to even in college before you got married, there was nothing there, right, and so that had to be a journey for you to kind of wrap your mind around this.
Speaker 4:Well, I think for me, Nia had always loved me, so, so, so well, I live with a lot of depression and anxiety and Nia has seen me in some of my deepest, darkest holes and just met me there. So, as much as I said, I see you, when she came out to me she had said the same thing to me our whole marriage. But I really had felt almost our entire marriage that I there was one roadblock, that I just could never love her quite the same as she could love me. I always knew that there was some sort of imbalance, like there was just something I wasn't seeing, because I always thought, oh my God, you're so much better than me because you can love me like this and I don't, I don't think I'm giving you that same kind of love. And so when she came out, of course it was like what? And there was a lot of like internally, I'm like, externally I'm like okay, okay.
Speaker 4:It's really I'm like oh, my God.
Speaker 3:Yes, certainly.
Speaker 4:But you know you deal with that feeling because, coupled with that like chaotic, what am I going to do? Feeling was also this feeling of that's the thing, that's the thing that has been in the way, that's the reason why I haven't been able to reach her as much as I want to. That's it, that's the blockage, and so it was like a key that unlocked a deeper relationship for me with her. And while I do think you're really amazing and great, I don't think you're better than me anymore. I love it.
Speaker 3:I think it's pretty quality in this relationship. I love that. That's so beautiful because I know there's many of us that have stories like mine, where we had a great marriage and our but our spouse was just not able to be on this journey with us, and which is confusing, because if you're a good friend and someone that unconditionally loves someone, and someone that is committed, and then you know to death do his part, and then this comes up, certainly this rocks everybody's world that we're associated with. But I love the fact that you're able to see that as kind of the what was missing and there was something there that I couldn't put my finger on. But now this is it, and then you allow that in your openness and in your love for Nia, you allow that to blossom into the relationship you have now. That's beautiful.
Speaker 4:Yeah, I don't think there was resistance was futile. Yeah Right, I really have a choice. But I do want to say too, I think, that what helped me also is that I did not have a good idea of my own sexuality. Nia was is the only person I've ever kissed. She's the only person I've ever been with, and so I got to really discover my own sexuality, which at the front was terrifying and now is so liberating. I would say that Nia gifted me my queerness, because I didn't know that I was queer, because I hadn't had the experience, and I this is one stroke of luck I would say inside of a relationship is that I am queer, and so I think that that really helped the process. A lot is I didn't look into my own sexuality and say, oh, I am strictly straight. I looked into my own sexuality and said, oh, there's more here.
Speaker 3:Right Exactly, which is amazing, and that that open mindedness is a beautiful thing.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so I'm. I want to ask, like cause, after Nia transition, when you guys go out, is there any fun stories or any different from prior? Like, let's say, you go on a date or or take kids out? Oh Lord yeah.
Speaker 6:So when we first started going out, you know we, we live in a community, that's it's. It's a city, it's, you know, half my people but it's small feel to it. And so when I first started to transition before I was, she knew, but not everybody knew. I mean, I think it was kind of scary to go out together. I won't speak for you, but I know for me, even running into somebody not being out, it's terrifying.
Speaker 4:You mean like just when you were fully dressed as yourself.
Speaker 6:Yeah, Just out. I'm out, not out to other people, so that there was like that stage in between and I think for me now going out on dates we went out last night and it's just so freeing, I don't know, I don't know. I only know what I knew before, which was not not freedom, but going out now is just so much more fun. I feel like I'm much more loose when we we go out on dates and I mean we've always had good dates, so that's true.
Speaker 4:But there was a time in transition where Nia's transition was a public transition. She didn't go through like a lot of I mean there was privacy and more androgyny in the, in the private moment. But then Nia did go through a transition period where, you know, it was clear she was transitioning. You know, there was for me a lot of fear in those like what, like year maybe. Then it was clear you were transitioning because anywhere you go you're told to be afraid really, but for good reason. You know trans people are targeted and they're harmed. And I thought to myself what am I going to do? Like, am I?
Speaker 4:just going to bystand this, what am I going to do? And then it turns out in our community, everywhere we go, I mean, we get the occasional looks which is kind of like yeah, yeah, take us in. But overwhelmingly we have such positive response from people Like in. Like last night we were out at a bar and the kid was so great, the waiter brought us an extra drink. We met like exchange names and talked a little bit, which before that would not have been something that we would have done on a date engaged with people outside of the two of us.
Speaker 6:Yeah, I will say too. Shall we to answer your question? You know, weirdly, we did have a lot of fun and not weirdly, we, we there's not a lot of weirdly. There was not a lot of change, you know, to your question, because we still have a lot of fun. And you know, the kids, I feel like our relationship, my relationship with the kids, didn't really change. So we, we get to go out and have fun and be a family and it kind of is as it was before. There was that period where it wasn't and it was hard, but now it kind of is as it was before.
Speaker 2:That's awesome.
Speaker 3:That's amazing. Congrats, yes, and I love that, even because we, especially here in California, we think we are blessed for sure by the acceptance that we have in in general day to day life and but other places don't have that. But but go Iowa, it sounds like. Yeah, I've heard you mentioned before that there is a great community in Des Moines and you live just outside of that, and so that's really great to hear.
Speaker 6:Yeah, it's, you know, we, we also there's a thing called Iowa nice, so no one's going to be like real mean to you but behind your back. But yeah, it's, you know, especially in the city it's. It's really nice to be in a community that is accepting.
Speaker 3:Excellent, Very good, Very good. Tell us a little bit about me. I know that you you have a job that you are very open with and kind of the nature of your position you had to be in certain ways. So tell us a little bit about what you do and and how transition was for that In that role.
Speaker 6:Yeah, so I'm a director of human resources for an education agency here in Iowa and it's a you know, it's a 750 person organization. So I mean I really had high visibility in my role before I came out. So the coming out process meant that I had to communicate with almost everybody. I mean I really did have to communicate with everybody in the organization, because you don't want an employee coming to you for something and being like what, what I don't understand. So so, yeah, my organization was amazing and I know a lot of people don't have this experience, but I think, because I was an HR, I was able to say, like this would be my role to walk, you know, if somebody came to me to help walk the organization through that. So I was able to say to our executive team, like this is what I need and they said that's great, you lead the way, which I think is key in organizational acceptance. You know work or church.
Speaker 6:Letting the person who's transitioning lead the way is key, and my organization did that, and so I was able to write letters and, you know, write a memo and you know, have the our, our agency had kind of sign off on it, like you know, with his name and say, like this is what's happening. I, you know, I support this person and everybody else better support this person too, and so it really was just a really positive experience.
Speaker 3:That's great. I think that's that's a great point to underscore is that the person that is coming out owns their story and even if it's an organization or a religious group or a nonprofit, anything that if they're allowed to communicate to their their story on their own of course there's going to be structural policy and things to fit in that, but if they can own their story it makes it so much more valuable for them and much a rewarding and full experience, and so that's a good point to to be sure that people hear.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so talk about story. I also heard from Michelle that you had, you wrote a book about yourself. Yes, yeah, can you tell us a little bit about that one?
Speaker 6:Yeah, I think it's called the story of nib, and really this was born out of my own processing, and so I do a form of therapy called EMDR therapy, which is I've movement, desensitization, and rapid distance. I don't know, I'm DMDR.
Speaker 2:Desensitization and reprocessing. Oh, desensitization yeah.
Speaker 6:So desensitization and reprocessing.
Speaker 6:So essentially what it is is you're looking at your own memories and you are reprocessing some of those in a more positive way to kind of close the loop on potentially trauma that you have in the past.
Speaker 6:And through that process I was, I was doing some of that and I was processing some of my memories from you know, before puberty and up to puberty and then kind of what, what would life have been like if I would have, you know, been born, who I am, and kind of just doing processing.
Speaker 6:And I got to you know where I met Katie and in some of those memories, because we met when we were 12 really and became friends early and I kind of kept going through that junior high processing and then all of a sudden there was nothing like no memories for me to look at and so I started to look at why, why was that happening? And just in my mind I'm looking around and I found this character in this wooden box that was is a part of my story, obviously, and that's where the story of Nib was born, and so I then I had a daily processing session of what, who is this character? What do they want? Why are they here, and that really is what the story of Nib is about. It's about finding a piece of me and and integrating that into the rest of my, my personhood.
Speaker 3:Yes, I love that, and it is a deep, beautiful, meaningful, insightful journey, and so where could someone find that book?
Speaker 6:Yeah, you can. You can Google it and get it from any bookseller probably in local book sellers, obviously, if they have it, if they don't try to request it through them, because it loves supporting local booksellers. So, yeah, just Google. Story of Nib. And a shout out to the illustrator Beautiful. Yeah, I mean this was not really meant for public consumption, but I had this illustrator, this trans woman in South America, do a an illustration for one of these scenes for me and I loved it so much and I just kept having her do more and more until I was like you know what? We just do all of them and we're going to, we're just going to put this together. So, yeah, it's beautiful, great.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I would definitely recommend it as part of someone's own process of coming out, but also sharing with a child or someone else that you're relating to that is going through some type of self self-search, internal dialogue of what authenticity means for me. So it's a powerful tool. So thank you for writing it, thank you for telling us about it. Now, tell us a little bit about you. Have so many things that you guys are involved in, so I wish we had all day to talk, but love in the face is an organization that you guys kind of. You guys created, not kind of, but you guys created kind of out of what was already happening and you kind of formalized it. And so tell us a little bit about love in the face.
Speaker 6:Yeah, I mean I can tell you how it started initially, you know, as a public person in human resources in my company. Once I came out, I had employees who said, oh, my neighbor's kid is trans, do you have resources? And my, you know, my daughter has a trans kid. My granddaughter, you know, I think at first start it was a grand kid who was trans. And so I started talking to these families and kind of just one-on-one you know chatting, and then we thought why don't we just formalize this where we can like let people know that we're here for support? So it kind of morphed into a lot of different things which you can talk more about, what it is now. But I started with just like mentoring, support, one-on-one you know, doing name change ceremonies and marking the time for people as they go through a transition and a lot of stuff like that.
Speaker 4:Yeah, I think what we really seek to do is support trans individuals and their loved ones and their communities. So we're very open people, so we're like do you need a thing? We'll do that thing, I love it.
Speaker 4:So you know, we kind of just go what we can, mentor, where we're very good speakers, so we're like we could speak to that. We've done some workshops for transmission ministry collective, and then we also offer support for spouses or parents, which is hard, I mean. That's difficult and it's a difficult step for a lot of spouses and parents to take and it's taken a long time to gain enough trust and traction in the community for spouses to want to reach out. But we're getting there too. So but what we want is a place where people know that they're loved, no matter what you can feel. What you feel you can be who you are.
Speaker 4:You don't have to be like over the moon that your spouse or your child or your loved one is trained. You could be figuring it out. We can help with that. We know what that feels like and you can be going through it from. You know the trans, individual side and needing support, and what we found when we were in the middle of this is where do we go? Where do I go? In particular, I didn't know where I was supposed to go because it's.
Speaker 4:I mean it feels like a secret world when you're in it and really it is.
Speaker 3:Yeah especially as a spouse I had to mention.
Speaker 4:Yes, and we're trying. Part of what love in the face wants to do is make it not so secret, because having a trans spouse being a queer family is something we should absolutely celebrate, but we need a bridge from shame to celebration. And so that's what we want to do. We want to provide that bridge.
Speaker 3:I love that. Now how can people find you and see what all the services you have and what could be beneficial for them?
Speaker 6:Yeah, they can go to lovingthefacecom. We're also on Instagram at love in the face but yeah, loveinthefacecom you can look at. So mentoring, support services really is kind of conversational. We try to do that for free as much as we can, because that's what we know we needed when we were there. So we don't charge for that, but we do. Speaking at corporations and churches Katie has the background in the church, she can talk more about that. So we have kind of the HR side, the religious organization side, so happy to do those kind of things. And, like Katie said, we've done some workshops with Transmission Ministry Collective, talking about grief inside transition and just even partnership inside transition. So we can kind of come in and help in whatever way that an organization or a family or an individual would like us to Amazing.
Speaker 2:So we can do that with our resources. Yeah, katie, I want to ask you because, like what Michelle mentioned, there's a lot of spouse I have like few close friends. At first their spouse kind of supported and somehow I don't know, I didn't ask, but somehow down the line they kind of just you know, doesn't accept this and end up divorcing. So I want to ask you if you can give advice to a trans-spel, what can you give advice to them if their spouse decided to transition?
Speaker 4:Yeah, well, the thing that helped me the most that I ran across and just discovered well, I don't even know what I was doing early in Nia's transition was something called the ring theory, and it's how it was developed for people going through grief, and what it is is. It kind of shows you how to develop boundaries around what's happening to you. So you put the person who's experiencing what they're going through in the middle and then from there you have concentric circles that kind of surround that person. That's what ring theory does. And then what ring theory says is that all, because it's grief, all the grief can go out. So you can be like as grief as you want. The person who's in the middle gets to grieve to the person to the outside. That person gets to grieve to the other person on the outside of that, but then stress cannot come in. So what happens is you end up creating these barriers around a person that stress should get absorbed before it hits that person in the middle. So when Nia was going through her transition, I thought, okay, nia is in the middle of this, this is happening to her, and I'm her surrounding circle. So my job is to make sure that Nia stays safe and is able to transition in a safe environment. And then my next job is to boundary myself, so I'm not taking on everybody else's stress.
Speaker 4:The most difficult part was figuring out who was in my outer circles, who was safe, who could I talk to, who was going to give me good advice and not shake their finger at me. And here's the thing the pressure when your spouse is transitioning is immense. It's huge, and I'm sure you know this is a transitioning person. You know that pressure, and for a spouse, especially a spouse who's wanting to kind of hold that pressure back and not let their spouse feel the whole weight of it, you can end up getting crushed by that and I think you just get tired, and when you're tired you do give up and sometimes that's all you can do. So I think my best advice and what I experienced was that, in order to protect the relationship between me and Nia, I had to surround myself with people who could shoulder my grief and give me encouragement and love. That's what I needed.
Speaker 6:Can you talk about the constant two, because I think the rebel thing that to me you came across this thing and set you up for being able to do all that other stuff.
Speaker 4:So I was a pastor, was a lay minister, and so I would listen to podcasts all the time. And I was listening to a Rob Bell podcast, who is like. I love Rob Bell. If you're not familiar with him, he is a great gateway. If you have been a Christian and have deconstructed and need you know a little tie back in. He's fantastic.
Speaker 4:But he was just spitballing some ideas for a book and he was throwing out this idea that our deepest desires lead us to who we truly are, and so we can be afraid of our desires or we can listen to them and let them take us to the root of who we are. And so I just I'm driving in my car I probably had a sleeping kid in the back and I was thinking, what do I really want from my life? And I was like I know it was not even a question. I want Nia, I want this family and I want the life that we're building, and so, hands down, I'm going to do whatever it takes to keep this, and that became my constant. It was so clear to me nope, this love is worth fighting for, this life is worth fighting for, and by God, I'm going to die trying to hold on to this. So finding that constant and knowing why I was doing this, why I was standing up to this, made all the difference.
Speaker 6:Just from my observation, that was super key because Katie got more dumped on than I did, because she was protecting me in those moments from outside sources, and so she absorbed a lot, a lot of garbage and I think that it seems like, looking back, that was a big key.
Speaker 3:And that came largely from the church. Am I right?
Speaker 6:Yeah it did, yeah, a lot of places, but yes, yeah, I would say our community.
Speaker 4:We had a really beautiful community of people. Our systematic religion did not like what was happening, and so, you know, I kind of like to say that our love outgrew the system that we were in, which is tragic because we grew up Christian. We follow the way of Jesus. That was what Jesus preached, and to me it was like asinine that this was shutting us down, when that's all that Jesus said is like love, Exactly.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3:Well, you guys are such powerful examples and let me just put this I know that your story is not everybody's story and it's okay if you have a spouse much maybe like more my story that cannot participate in this journey with you, and that's okay and that's valid.
Speaker 3:That's where you are. But the reason I love Nia and Katie's story is because it is a story of using the difficulty and the turmoil and even trauma that a transition like this could cause, but showing how redemptive that can be and how beautiful it can be and how healing that can be, not only for you two as a couple but for us as a community and for people that can use you and your experiences. And so thank you, for it would be so easy, especially with some of the things that you've faced there, just to kind of be internal and self focused and just caring for your family, but you guys hadn't done that. You guys have continued to live openly and out front and creating organizations and support for people that have gone through that, and that's amazing. So thank you so much for that, thank you.
Speaker 4:Yeah, Absolutely yes. You know, we believe in. You know in optimism and in hope and as many tragic stories as there are, we've discovered there are so many beautiful stories, so the more we can tell our story, the more people can see this is possible.
Speaker 2:There's reality.
Speaker 4:I think that creates hope and joy inside of our community. At least, that's true.
Speaker 3:Absolutely, absolutely, 100%, and so.
Speaker 2:So, Lena, do you have any last words for our listener and audience?
Speaker 6:I guess the one thing I would say is have your support around you. So if you are unsure that your spouse will be supportive of your family, there are other people out there. I found a good trans support group even here in Des Moines, Iowa, when I was coming out. And having really good friends that you can talk to about this stuff and kind of those circles of safety as you go out to is super key as you come out, especially to a spouse, if you're unsure of how they're going to react. Find somebody you can talk to if not a therapist, hopefully also a friend and reach out to us, you know this is how I don't even know where to start.
Speaker 6:Well, you know, we go tell me about yourself and let's talk about what we are not there. So I mean that's the other thing is you need to have a therapist Right?
Speaker 3:Yes, we definitely underscore that as well.
Speaker 3:And the community we've talked about community and community building here a lot, and our community has issues and there is things that we need to continue to work through.
Speaker 3:But one thing that has even, I would say, helped save my life and Nia as part of that is there are people that are there that you can talk to and you can reach out to them and maybe not everybody would respond or maybe you know they get bombarded with different responses, but you know, feel free to contact Shelby or I or Nia Katie. That's why we're here, because you need a place to start. You need someplace to that safe, that you can be able to, to verbalize and walk through your journey and unpack things, and so definitely that does not replace a therapist, for sure, and we don't want to say that. But the community is there and communities out there for you, because you are doing so many different things and all of that is underlined by trans awareness, trans advocacy, trans activism, and so I'm so thankful that you are out there in so many ways because you're really pushing the envelope for so many of us. So thank you.
Speaker 5:You're welcome, of course it's. It's. It's nothing at all. It's it's. You know they're. They're all passion projects. You know it's. I would do it regardless. So I'm really loving my life and that I have the opportunity to do that, and so yeah we would like to learn about your story.
Speaker 2:How do you shape yourself to today? You know like, do you, do you? When did you realize you're not living in your true self, like your gender?
Speaker 5:Well, a lot has happened in the just the last few years. I've only been out since 2017, around August. Actually, august 10, 2017 is when I started to tell everyone, and by October, everyone in the world hasn't knew even my mom and stuff, but it began for me back in 2015, spring in 2015. I just I came to the realization that this was in my future, and I didn't know what it looked like at the time. It was just going to be something whatever. You know, transition looks different to each one of us. I think Right, and I didn't get the opportunity to really start doing it until 2017 when, when I was like I had enough.
Speaker 5:You know, lots of us have this moment, transition or die, true, right, so yeah, so I've had enough of this and I'm ready to move on.
Speaker 3:Did you fill the incongruity as like from child is a more late onset or?
Speaker 5:yeah, well, I think you know I've had other trans women say that my, my gender disability, my gender dysphoria was, is even worse than theirs. But I thought I kind of got off easy back then, you know. But yeah, I mean, I felt it K through 12 and my whole life. It really became an issue when I had to go to kindergarten actually, and you have to, you're forced to relate to these other kids that you don't know and that sort of thing. So being social with them was wrong. When when you're, when you're presenting wrong and they see you as not the person you are, and that was minimal bike by kindergarten. Really I was uncomfortable, I was nervous. All my girlfriends and K through you know in elementary at that point, where all girls you know not, not boys, yeah, right, of course, yeah.
Speaker 2:So did you get any bully at school K to 12.
Speaker 5:Not really. No, I was okay. I mean I was, you know, the shy kid and you know I was liked, but I wasn't ridiculed back then. I wasn't really, you know, I wasn't dressing a certain way or anything like that. My mom saw to that, unfortunately, you know. Yeah, she was making sure I, you know, sort of presented like a boy to some degree, not harshly, but you know, quote, unquote for my own good you know, so I wouldn't get enough and stuff like that.
Speaker 2:So by fourth grade, by fourth grade.
Speaker 5:It became an issue by fourth grade because I was actually the first kid in my class to for my voice to get deep. And yeah, in fourth grade is terrible.
Speaker 3:Oh my God, I can imagine.
Speaker 5:And I can still remember, I can still see the scene, this boy, angela Delcore, who were I'm still friends with on Facebook, and he just had to tell a whole class that my voice got the before anyone else's and you know, I think a boy would have loved to lure that over to boys. No, and I was mortified.
Speaker 2:Exactly. So, in your adulthood, like we fast forward a little bit in your adulthood did you like maybe high school or college, did you try to act more mainly to cover your identity, like that I did.
Speaker 5:Well, I did teams in high school. I dress. Maybe that would be something that would be considered non binary intermittently through high school. Okay, you know, it's like sort of Michael Jackson back in the day.
Speaker 2:Okay, I had like.
Speaker 5:I had, like I had lots of bling all over my outfit, you know, but I never looked female. But by the time I was 20 or so, it really became an issue and I had moved, I had I felt like I had to move my move out of my own hometown to to be closer to myself, and I moved 300 miles away to live with my, my cousin, in Virginia. I was living in Central Jersey at the time.
Speaker 2:Okay.
Speaker 5:And so I have this cousin in Richmond, Virginia, and she's a lesbian and we moved in together. And it was perfect, you know yeah it was good but but I still was hiding who I was for the most part, like I was telling her and you know their friends and stuff like that that I'm female. There was there were no words for me that to describe my trans at the time.
Speaker 2:Right.
Speaker 5:Right, I grew up with these terrible words that I don't even want to say Exactly.
Speaker 2:Yeah, like human monster for Chinese.
Speaker 5:Yeah, yeah. Well, some of the words you know, that's where we're the tea. They don't bother me, but I know they really hurt a lot of my sisters. So you know, right, I avoid using them exactly, you know, for that reason. But but ultimately I think we need to take a lot of those words back and and own them and say they don't hurt us.
Speaker 3:Right, exactly Reclaim. Yeah, it was your family supportive as you came out beside your cousin. How did that work for you, my mom.
Speaker 5:Actually my dad was more than my mom, which is kind of, you know, probably opposite of what most people experience.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 5:But you know, again, my mom was just worried. I think that I would get beaten up and stuff like that. But I remember I remember watching some TV show and you know, crossing my leg like the girl on the show. You know, while I'm watching it I'm like seven or eight years old and she would, and I was in the living room, she'd come running out of the kitchen and say, you know, don't do that. And uncross my leg. And you know, don't do that. And so that's it. It sends a bad message.
Speaker 2:Yes, and I also read about your story. You also have a kid, right your mother now.
Speaker 5:Well, I was for a long time. Five kids actually three girls, two boys. Wow, yeah, I don't do anything halfway Exactly so it weren't my biological children, but you know, I met this single mother of five a long time ago and overnight became you know, the stay at home mother of five children were basically two months after we met. I was, I was at home and I was picking them up at school and doing all the afterschool stuff with them and everything.
Speaker 3:Yeah, talk about zero to 100 miles an hour.
Speaker 5:Yeah Well, it's kind of like a typical lesbian thing. Right, there's a joke with lesbians where, like, the second date involves a U-Haul right, exactly. And so she didn't know I was, you know, female and I just came across as the stepdad for a long time Okay.
Speaker 5:And when I finally did come out, as you know, the mom, the stay at home mom, and they were like the go to work nine to five sort of accountant, office manager kind of person, so it didn't go too well. We often trans people, trans women especially get get hurt by our family, whether it's blood or in laws or otherwise.
Speaker 3:Right.
Speaker 5:So yeah, it eventually didn't work out really badly.
Speaker 2:Sort of yeah, okay, so listen to your background story. I don't hear anything like related to what you're doing right now, like, for example, like modeling actress. How did you get into that?
Speaker 5:business yeah.
Speaker 2:I'm very curious.
Speaker 5:None of that at all was in my past lives. You know I've done a lot of things as far as my work world in the past, but coming out, you know it is nothing less than a clean slate and an opportunity to chase the teams he had as a kid. And you know from when I was nine, I had a camera in my hand and we're shooting all the time, and by the time I was 14, I had one step down from a pro camera in my hand, and so it was that, and by 14, I really wanted to be a runway model.
Speaker 2:Oh nice.
Speaker 5:So I'm like checking off those boxes. You know, I chased the dream and I caught it and I got to do a bunch of fashion weeks already and I'm signed up for half a dozen more between now and September.
Speaker 2:Okay, so how's your experience working with? It's called what trends the trans clothing company. How did you get into that?
Speaker 5:That was my first experience, and actually all of this should have been starting to happen two years ago or more. Ashley, my first show was supposed to be Los Angeles in August of 2019, believe it or not, but I had committed to being on a movie set for an anti-suicide public service announcement, like a 30 minute movie, like it was a cycle thriller.
Speaker 5:It's coming out this year. It's called Charlie's Demons. Okay, so I couldn't do fashion week that at that moment, and then they gave me an opportunity for October and that fell through and then, and then that February is when COVID happened.
Speaker 5:So they were them, and at the time lots of other designers, including some in Japan, invited me to Tokyo and I'm like, yes, that's awesome, but but COVID kept taking them. So I was supposed to do New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, Tokyo at that point and I'll fall through. And so I kept up with that. I kept in touch with everyone, I kept you know doing my workouts.
Speaker 1:Yes.
Speaker 5:I'm starving a little bit, you know eating lots of stuff. I don't starve at all, but and please don't do that. If you know for anything, don't try this. Yeah, I got an A in nutrition in college. It's totally not good for you, I promise.
Speaker 2:You look great. I remember I saw one of your photo you were like in a wedding kind of sort of dress. Oh yeah, that was that was the modeling gig.
Speaker 5:Yeah, yeah, that was Los Angeles Fashion Week just at the end of March, and so I got to go to LA. You know, after New York New York was February and then March we went to Los Angeles and did the runway there and did some photo shoots the day after, and Beverly Hills, which was really fun. I guess we're four different outfits and a bunch of accessories from from three different companies and, yeah, the wedding dress is from a quadro clothing company.
Speaker 2:I love it. You look very sexy in it.
Speaker 5:Thank you, yeah, and I'm getting, I'm getting. I don't know if you know, but I'm getting married by the end of, well before October, wow really. So yeah, I think that's why they put me in a wedding dress. They're like yeah, yeah, you prevent manifest.
Speaker 3:Right, exactly so how did you get involved with the trans clothing company?
Speaker 5:That's, you know, any aspiring model or actress or or just influencer of any kind. Really, I think you should spend a lot of time on Instagram. People are more serious about work related things there compared to Facebook instance, and I have gotten so much work.
Speaker 2:You have an agent right now that I will go Sort of, I'm not signed anywhere.
Speaker 5:I don't have a contract, but Electra models is has helped me a lot in just really since Los Angeles, and they hooked me up with some designers that I'll be walking for at Miami swim week in July, and then New York again and Los Angeles and San Francisco, so I'll be doing multiple designers at each of those, each of those fashion weeks.
Speaker 2:So if some, if, if our audience or listener are curious about your work, and stop, we can they find you Like the best place yeah, the best place to find me right now.
Speaker 5:You know I have a calm and just livey wolf calm, but don't go there yet. Go there soon. It's, it's under construction Again. I don't get to sleep.
Speaker 2:So we have a website design. Yeah, so she can help anyone please? I'm begging so website is not, then.
Speaker 5:I need like tabs for each of the things I do.
Speaker 2:Yes, many tabs, many times. Yeah, so not website, but where should we?
Speaker 5:but yeah, my, my main presence, where you can get to everything in one location, is on Linktree and I think most of us have probably heard of that, and I think we'll put up my link tree link at the End of this video and click on it, and that's pretty simple. It's just link tree. You know, with my name, libby Wolf, Right and it has. It has links to, for instance, articles that have come out, including me and Forbes magazine. Yeah, that was a big one, I'm like yeah.
Speaker 3:She has a very long link tree and so we encourage you to go look at it from the interviews and the her tone are storing various places and the Forbes with other trans models, which is very amazing and exciting to see.
Speaker 5:Yeah, and that and please add at this interview to your link tree to yeah, I absolutely will, of course, thank you, yeah, and with TCC trans clothing company, it's it's. It's an important company, regardless, because you know everyone involved is either trans or non-binary gender, not Conforming. Yeah, it's, it's beautiful. So, and we made it all the way to New York Fashion Week at Sony Hall, which To me, was just a dream come true, really, of course.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I love, I love that it's of course. The name is trans clothing company. There's not, yeah, anything created, just it's there, it's bold, is in front of you and here we are and we're not going anywhere.
Speaker 5:Exactly, it's in your face to let everyone know. Exactly trans, specific the things are designed to, to fit us, of course, which we, I know we have lots of trouble with. Yes, right upper body for the most part, anyway, fitting certain things, but, yeah, I really love it. The designer, her name, actually their name they're non-binary is Melissa K Atkinson.
Speaker 2:Okay, do they have a online stores? Or wait, people can find, you know.
Speaker 5:Yeah, you can. You can just look up trans clothing company. I think it's net or dot shop. I apologize.
Speaker 2:Yeah, all right. Yeah, maybe it's that cold, yeah, so look, I Listen to you that you are very enjoying in front of camera, and I also read that you also a photographer. So do you enjoy more behind the scenes or being a center of the?
Speaker 5:you know, modeling Well you know, pre-transition, I was absolutely, you know, the the wall flower really like Quietly, you know, she's out of it behind the camera. Yeah, which is why photography was was good for me, because because I was always behind the camera. But but now, simply because I've chosen this life. You know, for instance, I came out in 2017, I started hormones in 2018 and in spring of 2019, I became this public figure to speak out for, you know, for things that we need, and so I started doing a lot of public events and red carpets and then Got into the movie industry. Sort of by luck, I had a Director approached me to be in that anti-suicide PSA, culturally, seems. I mentioned that. I'm like, oh well, I kind of got the bug for this. Now, nice, to pursue this. It'll help me give me a platform from which to you know, to speak. Yes and and at. Simultaneously, I was planning this trip to Washington DC to go for one. Go and experience the first ever trans visibility March on Washington DC. Yeah, I'm like, how could I not?
Speaker 3:And that was before, right before COVID, wasn't it yeah?
Speaker 5:Yeah, it was the September before COVID 2019, and so I did that and I broadcast that lots of footage To to all my fans on Facebook live and I have the full 5000. You were out at that time on my on that particular profile and and before I got there, I was like, well, I need to do something else while I'm there. Yeah, and it's. You know, it's Washington DC, let's go see some politics. So so I made a few minutes, but I I lobbied, I actually got to go to the offices and and with appointments and sit at the tables and talk to the, to the staff of Then Senator Kamala Harris, okay, which was really awesome. You know, you don't get that senator, unless it's just random that they happen to be there and then you get them, and maybe that's a security protocol.
Speaker 3:Yeah where you don't actually get to see staff, right?
Speaker 5:Yeah, you're lucky to get in a building, basically, you know. But so I got to talk with them and give them a lot of information about multiple causes actually, and I did the same with Diane Feinstein and my own house representative here in California, amoebara, and so, yeah, I encourage everyone that even if you can't travel, you can still, you know, talk with your representatives, either by email or get on the phone. Look at their phone, whatever state you are right, it's, it's very important, you know it's.
Speaker 5:it's really the only thing that changes the future is is Small amounts, relatively small amount of committed individuals. Yeah, I, that's part of a quote from Margaret. Mead back in the day.
Speaker 3:Love her yeah exactly the only thing that has made a difference. Right? Yeah, it is right. And if we don't speak up, who will? Right?
Speaker 5:Yeah, yeah, since I came out, you know, I just have this in me that I can't let one of my sisters have to live the life that I had to live. You know, my, my, my siblings that are younger than myself. I'm ready to stand up and and be counted for all of us, exactly, it's time. It's well past time, right.
Speaker 3:Exactly, yeah, like from probably most people that do transition their old lives, aren't very aware of what this community, or other communities that are different, look like, and so if we don't speak out, you know we're for not visible or creating awareness. How will other people know? And so we talked about that a lot here and with each other yeah, that it needs to be out in there. We understand that some people can't, it's not safe, and it's right, maybe a time, not to be so visible, to time to Protect yourself and do what you need to do, but, but when you can, your voice is needed.
Speaker 2:So we, we living in California, I think it's uh, it's a lot of possible, a lot of opportunity to, to, to speak up and be visible.
Speaker 3:We're not florida or texas, right, yeah, yeah, yeah it's a california is as safe as it gets really for for trans people trans women specifically, but you know it's a lot of people who are not able to speak up.
Speaker 5:But even here I have experienced discrimination and and neo nazis contacting me to tell me they have my picture on your dartboard and and you know the sacramona area and northern california has their own Neo nazi groups, proud boys, all that sort of thing that roll in and and even Locally it made it to the news that kids, teenagers in high school, were posting pictures with like swastika's painted on their body and stuff. And yeah, that's not okay to imagine. I'm writing that exactly.
Speaker 2:And okay, so um you mentioned that you also uh participate in the um sacramental departments of health campaign, right?
Speaker 5:um, yeah. Uh yeah, they have the. It's the sacramental county department of health has, you know, their mental health department, which has a campaign. It's um stock stops stigma, sacramento, and that's a hashtag and there's there's other ones to go along with it. You can find um. You can find them on instagram and all social media. Um, and since it is uh may is uh, mental health awareness month right.
Speaker 5:It's awesome. So, uh, at the end of last month we filmed, um, uh, a 30 second tv commercial for the county to Uh well, my part in it was transgender specific to get you know trans people in for care to not be, you know, ashamed of it that they need help with anxiety because of the way society treats us. I mean, look, not, I know nazis are after me, right, right, that that can cause some anxiety a little bit right, exactly right, yeah.
Speaker 3:So yeah, yeah, it is time we talk about that and within our community, and Results can be devastating. And so I know for me. I've been on medication for many years and have struggled with Anxiety, depression, probably since very young, but of course, not me too? But um, the difference that it has made in my life and then ultimately, um After hrt was able to go off some Antidepressants, because the the effect that hrt had, I mean it's so amazing.
Speaker 5:Yeah, I did the same thing.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and so it is something that we always need to put in front that we do still do struggle. I still go through depression. Now, um, I live an amazing life compared to the, the inauthenticity I had before, but yet it's still difficult. You know life. We still live in this country where many people don't like us and there are people passing laws that will restrict us and Right try every, yeah, every bit of that hurts our mental health as well as our physical health.
Speaker 5:They want to stop us from getting care. It's crazy, exactly, and um, yeah, before I came out, I had, you know, solid 15 years of depression and anxiety, and Even before I started on hormones, just knowing, back in 2015, 2016, really, it started for me to hit home and definitely 2017, that were, um, I'm free, and that weight that came off my shoulders was enough To have me, in three weeks, wean off of years of antidepressants.
Speaker 3:Is it amazing.
Speaker 5:Yeah and just yeah, I never went back, I had no doubt I was on Go ahead.
Speaker 3:I had read that that would be true, and so I was hoping that that's how my body would react as well, yeah within three days to be my true self.
Speaker 5:Right, exactly, it's really all it took. So there's and I'm not on any of that anymore ever since 2016.
Speaker 2:I reached off of everything.
Speaker 5:Had a couple seizures along the way during withdrawal, as it can cause that, oh right, so it was a harsh well with not not with the antidepressants, but with um, uh, anti-anxiety med specifically. They are um, um For people that have seizures often, and so if you're not taking it for seizures and you stop it, even if you withdraw it slowly, you're likely to have seizures for a while and it can be so bad that you can really get harmed or killed by them.
Speaker 2:So Highlines for people to reach out if they need you know.
Speaker 5:Well, specifically the one that's really the worst out of all of them.
Speaker 5:Uh, benzo diazepines are the worst category of that sort of drug, but um clonopin is the worst of that category and that's what I was on for a long time. So you know, the withdrawal of most drugs, even really hardened sort of street drugs, is only like Two and a half to three weeks or months, and this was three years with drive From clonopin actually two and a half years to get clonopin out of my system in in incredibly tiny increments, and then another six months on um Valium, because it's similar but the molecule's different enough to stagger it a little bit more. But in all it was about, uh, over five years of um, yeah, in addition to that, I had to be on a something called um gabapentin, which is really just a uh, oh, what do you call it? An amino acid that your body naturally everyone's body produces, but clonopin teaches your body to forget how to make it and um. So I had to supplement that for for about five and a half years to make sure I wouldn't have seizures. So I'm all good now.
Speaker 3:I'm all good, everything like that's it. Yeah, and that's a great, great story, because why don't we love in my life? Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 5:Yeah, yeah, we go through, you know. Hell, you know. I like to say that heaven and hell exists right here on earth, you know right.
Speaker 3:And if any of our listeners find yourself in those type of situations, you're not alone and we want you to reach out to us. That's one of the reasons that we we want to be so visible and so Assessable, because we know, and as libya is saying, these times can be very difficult and even exaggerate it even more so because of Our gender incongruence. And as we go there, you're not alone and I know it feels like you're alone and there may not be anyone in your city or county or even state that you know is Gender non-conforming, but you're not alone and reach out to any of us and any other person that's out and aware there. We're always willing to to talk to people.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and now. So we're gonna put it. I believe you.
Speaker 5:On your instagram there's a Hotline for people to call if they're like yeah, well, I think a great one for trans people is the trans trans lifeline it's. It's a phone number that you can call anytime. It's staffed by trans people for trans people.
Speaker 5:So, okay, you know you're gonna get some proper care and in fact I've had people write to me to say how useful it has been for them where, and you know I have nothing but the greatest respect for the people you know on those phones, because you know you can get ptsd just from listening to the stories of others repeatedly. Right, and I had someone recently tell me they're in the Bay Area of San Francisco and you know they had someone on the phone from that group and they were just crying on the phone with them.
Speaker 5:You know, because they really feel Part of it, because we are you know, we've we've walked the walk, so I think you're gonna get some good care if you. If you have to call them, please do reach out, yes.
Speaker 2:Yeah, okay. So now we're gonna shift our Show a little bit. Okay, we're gonna talk about your, your celebrity shift, because I'm Myself. I'm a foodie person many people know, so I'm very, very Surprised that you're also doing something like that. Okay, can you tell us a little bit about that?
Speaker 5:Sure, well, I do love my pretty food.
Speaker 3:And it is very pretty.
Speaker 2:It's very yummy too.
Speaker 5:Well, it kind of works out because I, you know, I have a background as being a photographer for a long, long time and my, when I was a kid, I was a teenager and my older brother was a chef at some high-end places back east, so I got to learn from him and so I sort of kept up that discipline over the years and, um, got kind of good. You know, a lot of people want me to cook for them already, yeah, and during lockdown I was posting enough of the you know the pretty food where people were like you have to have a show, you know. So I'm like, okay, yeah, at the time I don't. But um, I already, you know, have my my chef liviowulf instagram, uh, and I am either hunting for a show or I'm going to create my own shortly. Right, it's just a matter of you know, I sleep maybe five hours on average already.
Speaker 3:Yes, yes, I mean the time of the day.
Speaker 5:Yeah, someone wants to help. Hey, let me know please.
Speaker 3:So there you go, solomon, we can. That could be our first franchise.
Speaker 5:But, yeah, I have a couple great ideas for the approach to, for cooking shows that I think would go over really well. So, uh, we're going to pursue that. As far as, like, um, healthy alternatives, you know, pre transition I was, I was terribly overweight, like really terribly. I was in danger, uh, whereas my because my cholesterol was high and my liver enzymes were high and everything, and now everything is is really quite perfect, frankly, and you really can do that with just, uh, making your own good food and knowing what's in the food you make.
Speaker 3:So Reading labels and understanding yeah you have to.
Speaker 2:Yeah, maybe you can also come up with a book too, you know yeah, absolutely like you know regarding food.
Speaker 5:Regarding food, I think you know if you're not spending the money that you need to on On quality food and the way you cook it, you're going to spend it on medications.
Speaker 2:Oh, that's, right Very good point.
Speaker 5:Or surgeries, or copays, you don't want that, that's just equal. And Look at me Seriously, I got this fit. I lost 69 pounds. Be before my transition started. You know, as I was motivated, I lost 69 pounds? Um, basically just by eating properly. And you know I didn't belong to a gym, I just went hiking and dancing a lot and that's about it. So everyone can do it, you just have to want it.
Speaker 3:That's great. Can we, can we carbon copy you? Is that a thing yet, because you do so many things and so many things. Well, we need, we need you not to sleep. Take those extra five hours. I know I'm trying my best. That's amazing.
Speaker 5:It's amazing what you're involved in, so yeah, so, uh, you know, with my cooking I am like, um, starting to do Locally in Sacramento area doing cooking in person for people, small parties, that sort of thing, not not something massive. I just kind of want to keep personal, where someone just wants to hire a chef and usually it's people really like doctors, um, who See the need and don't have the time and or don't care about cooking. So you know, I could, I could make them a week's worth of meals in advance. They throw it in your freezer, they're done, or I look for them at a, you know, a dinner party for friends.
Speaker 3:Wow, amazing.
Speaker 5:I love. It's just another performance art I equate. I equate it to, uh, sidewalk chalk art. You know the artist drawing on the sidewalk and then people walk on it and it's gone in a day or two Food's the same way. It's beautiful, take some effort, take some pictures and then you eat it and it's gone.
Speaker 3:But then it's, it's also nourishing and builds, and that's who you are. Yeah, so I love that.
Speaker 5:Well, like like any other art is nourishing right.
Speaker 2:Exactly yeah, I always say food bring people together.
Speaker 5:Yep, it does. Yeah, really does it does.
Speaker 3:Okay, solomon, we're gonna need a kitchen Fly, live you down and we're gonna have a, a cooking show on our podcast.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I can have it cooking um stove.
Speaker 3:Exactly.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, okay, so, um, thank you. What we're we want to see, what else do you want to share with the audience? Any, any last thoughts, any, any last um you? Know, what if somebody want to come out and they want to, you know, pursue their career, do you? Have any advice for them.
Speaker 5:Well, you know, this hasn't changed for me since I was your child. I was feeling various degrees of needing to be the real me forever and again. Back then I didn't have the words that describe me, and now lots of young people do and they're finally coming forward. You know, I say to them, to all of you out there, this isn't going away. What you feel, it won't go away.
Speaker 5:You have to address this and you know, yeah, we often have to give up lots of things in life to be who we really are and in the end, at least for me, it's still worth it. It's totally still worth it. And and in my work life, you know, I've I'm in contact with lots of people that write to me that you know they haven't had Issues at work, they haven't been discriminated, they haven't been fired or anything like that, etc. And that's a beautiful thing and it depends where you are in, what your situation is and what sort of work you do.
Speaker 5:But, um, and I have been discriminated against, um, in, you know, in entertainment industries, specifically In in some modeling, where some groups were like, oh, we love you, and then I'm such the activist that I say that I tell them that I'm trans After we start talking, and then they would literally block me or some variation on that. Yeah, so yeah, you'd be prepared for that. But just, you know, walk up to the doors that are, that are open for you, and the others will be dragged into, uh, the correct side of history, and they will be, you know, when we choose it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you're very furious, fearless and very um Courage and confidence. I think that's the most important thing, because yeah, confidence is everything. Yes, if you are confidence, then they will not really. You know attack yeah, and you know don't have misplaced confidence.
Speaker 5:But you know, do your homework, like either no matter what you do your job or something you're you're striving for that you've never done, or going to Washington DC to talk to politicians, just like do your homework first and then you'll be comfortable enough to just own the room when you're there, exactly.
Speaker 3:Yeah, that's. You're such a great example for us to to live, live in our authenticity, but then use your voice to celebrate that and and keep pushing the boundaries. So thank you for all that you do and thank you for being so visible it would be. It's the easiest thing not to and just to hide. But um, thank you for your voice, yeah.
