Meet Kelly (she/her)

What follows is a transcript from Kelly's video, which you can watch here: https://youtu.be/yqWPlKvYnEs

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Hi, I’m Kelly. 

I’m part of the Trans Canada project, and this is my story.

I’m not the kind of girl that wants to be on the shiny side of the camera.

I was born prince albert Saskatchewan way out west, and north, and a while ago. Not telling how long ago; it's a girl's secret!

I’ve kind of known that I was not really a boy since I was about four or five. I didn't have the vocabulary to describe it. I had no idea what it was I just felt wrong. I didn't feel like I fit in.

I’m not really sure how to describe it. It wasn't until puberty that I really noticed I was developing in a way that really wasn't what I was expecting and I kind of expected to grow up to be a girl and I didn't. And honestly, I was devastated. High school was a bit of a blur I kind of forgot and kind of dozed my way through high school. I could have done substantially better, but I was quite upset with my lot in life.

I had a great childhood, great parents, a brother who still adores me, and loves me, and counts me as his sister now, which is absolutely precious to me. He's a wonderful human being, and my parents are actually coming around. I didn't go through a really hyper masculine phase like some people do but I did find a girl that I connected with really well, and we got married and we had six children (one at a time) and I loved being a parent. I really, really wanted to be the mom. I really wanted to carry those kids inside me, and I was jealous of my wife and a little jealous of the daughters that we had.

Again, for the longest time I wished I was a girl, prayed that I was gonna be a girl, went to bed crying and praying that I would be you know instantly a girl, the next morning everything would be fixed. I was miserable but I didn't have a bad childhood and I didn't have a bad life. I had a decent career. I had a great family, had a great wife. I had great parents. Like I said, my brother was awesome. My in-laws were great. I had some really good friends that I made at church and at work that have stuck with me to this day, a long, long time later, but I had this horrible secret in the back of my head and it eventually started gnawing away in a way that made it more and more difficult over time to function. It was stealing bandwidth. It was stealing space, processing power, time. It was consuming more time, until I got so consumed with it and so upset with it that I really lost track of everything else in reality and I wasn't a good parent. I wasn't present. I was so consumed by this I ultimately tried to commit suicide. It scared me. It kind of woke me up.

This was 2008, and I sought help.

I went to my doctor and told him that I was suicidal, and he prescribed anti-depressants and we talked to a psychiatrist. I started talking about getting involved with a counselor of some sort to talk about it, but I never told anybody I was trans.

After doing some research on the internet I discovered that there was such a thing as transgender and it blew me away, because that was me. I didn't know what it was before. I had no language for it. I just knew that I should have been a girl. I didn't know there was such a thing as transgender and there was a way out, but it didn't feel like there was a way out for me.

I eventually went to see a specialist, a gender therapist, and we talked for months and they concluded yes, I am indeed transgender. I do indeed suffer from gender dysphoria and there was actually a way of treating it in a way that would be positive for me in the future, with hormones. I suppressed that for a number of years and the depression got worse not better. I tried various different types of therapy, but I never told any of the medical professionals in my life that I was transgender. I didn't think it was possible for me to come out, for me to transition.

There are stories of all kinds of transgender women living wonderful lives and having come out and having achieved what I never thought was possible for me. I eventually, after a lot of soul searching and a couple of other brushes with suicidal thoughts, came out to my mother, who hugged me and said welcome to womanhood. And yet I was still not going to do anything about it. I told her that I came out to my wife and she said that explained so much. I’m glad you told me. And I promised her that I wouldn't do anything, and we stayed married three years after that.

Our marriage wasn't doing particularly well at that point and a lot of it had to do with my depression and my inability to function well as a parent and as a marriage partner. My transness was consuming so much of my mental bandwidth. There wasn't enough left over for all the other things I had to do as a parent and as a marriage partner, as a friend, as a sibling, as a child of my parents. I let a lot of people down, including myself.

I finally told my doctor that I was transgender, and he said thank you for trusting me with that. I still wasn't going to do anything about it. I talked to my endocrinologist about it, who had discovered my cancer and helped me get past my thyroid cancer, and she basically said no, I will not prescribe hormones for you, I don't treat people like you. I was devastated. I actually wasn't even asking for hormones. I just wanted to tell her that I was transgender.

It wasn't until my wife and I separated and I moved in with my parents that I really got serious help with a psychologist, and got into some intense therapy to deal with the depression and my psychology with my psychiatrist dealing with the medication and me being away from the toxic environment at home and my kids being away from me who was being toxic at the time as well.

I was able to start healing I wouldn't have been able to do that at home. My wife started healing as well, from the relationship that we had that wasn't good for us. I lived with my parents for two years and I finally told my parents that I was trans and that I wanted to do something about it, which is different from what I said four or five years before when I talked to my mom the first time. I finally found the courage to talk to my psychologist about being trans and then finding a transgender therapist that I could talk to about gender-specific items, things, and found a doctor that was specializing in transgender patients and hormone therapy and an endocrinologist that actually supported that.

Ultimately in December of 2020 I moved to my own apartment back here, near my kids and my wife. My wife and I got legally separated. We dealt with that and very shortly after, within a week or so of moving into my own place, I transitioned fully, full time. I ripped the band-aid off. There was no reason to wait. There was no reason to hold back. I was absolutely desperate to be myself. I was holding back, and holding back, and it was painful, and it was destructive, and I finally had the courage and the opportunity to do it, and when I came out to my brother, he basically said okay so you're my sister.

I told my wife that I was going to transition, and she was actually supportive. I told my kids and they said “okay”. So I told a number of friends that were quite supportive and I told my clients and one of them basically said “I don't really care what you wear. I just hire you to solve problems”. So I was in a position where I could transition and I did and I did aggressively and completely and after being on anti-antidepressants for so many years, and they helped regulate my mood; they helped soften the roller coaster - emotional rollercoaster I was on.

The anti-androgens really calmed me down. They so totally got rid of - the only way I could describe it is a kind of an angry little buzz in the back of my head that I never knew was there until it was gone - and the blessed peace that came from that! Oh, I do not miss testosterone at all! The estrogen took a little longer to do stuff.

I live almost daily in a state of joy. I don't remember ever being joyful before. Happy, certainly. Content, absolutely. And you know … but actual joy? I didn't know that was possible! I didn't know that was a thing, and to feel so completely myself for the first time in my life, I didn't know that was possible. I didn't know that was a thing. I didn't know I could have that. I hated what I looked like. I couldn't stand looking in the mirror my entire life. I didn't take care of my appearance. I didn't look in the mirror. I did not want to have anything to do myself with myself.

I didn't really know why. I never really was able to put my finger on it. I didn't have the vocabulary to describe it until I found out that I was trans, and even then, I was just unhappy with who I turned out to be. Now I wake up in the morning, my hair is all frizzled, I have no makeup on, and I look like crap, and I go look in the mirror, and I smile! It makes me happy. I never had that before my entire life.

I get up early in the morning now. My brother said, “I’m more surprised that you get up in the morning early than I am that you're a girl”. I used to stay up till three four o'clock in the morning and then sleep until two in the afternoon I was completely useless around the house. I was losing business. I was losing friends. I was losing my family. I was so depressed I couldn't function. Now I get up early in the morning, put on some music, dance, and then communicate with a bunch of people - network with a bunch of people. I was such an introvert before. Now I’m joining women's groups and networking with people for business and for pleasure, just to meet people. Just to be part of something. I’m happy with myself. I’m actually happy, and I can say that and it's true. I’m content with myself and I find joy in life. Not many people get to say that.

And I’m lucky that I survived my depression long enough to be able to get here. I have a future. I actually have a future now.

I wish I’d done it earlier. But I didn't. But I’m so glad that I transitioned, because for me the alternative… the alternative was not being around at all.

This is so much better.

This is my life. This is my story.

And I smile now. I’m happy with myself. I’m happy with my friends. I’m happy with my family. I’m happy with me.

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Introductions - Kelly (she/her)

Hello, my name is Kelly.

I was lucky enough to have been assigned the name Kelly Schwab at birth in Prince Albert, Saskatchewan. Unfortunately, although the name fits my female gender perfectly, I was not given the gender assignment to match at the time. This was lost on me until about the age of four when it began to dawn on me that things were not the way they were supposed to be. 

 

Image by _Alicja_ from Pixabay 

In those early years, the world was very different in regards to being transgender. I was bullied in school for not conforming to the social standards of my assigned male gender and have struggled with it all my life. I did my best to fill the expectations of all those around me and be what they wanted me to be, but it was constantly a burden I carried in secret.

 

I am a huge Apple nerd; my first earrings were of the Apple Logo. After attending Sheridan College for graphic design, I sold Apple computers and trained designers on graphic design equipment. After spending time as a Systems Manager at a large design company, I headed off to start my own business in 2001, helping others to use Apple equipment effectively in their businesses, eventually developing that into a Media production business in 2009.

 

I married in 1985 and my wife and I built a life together, raising six children. All this time, being transgender never left me, and the pressure of denying and suppressing who I was continued to grow until I became suicidal and was clinically diagnosed with depression in 2010. On top of that, I became ill in 2016 with cancer, only adding more weight to my already difficult burden. But I am a survivor and eventually I beat the cancer. Unfortunately the gender issues continued to cause me difficulties and eventually resulted in the breakup of my marriage in 2019.

 

While recovering from the breakup and living with my parents for two years, I came to terms with my trans identity, and have begun to find peace about it. By the fall of 2020 I reached a point where I decided to transition full time. I found my own place to live and began HRT treatment, which was not well accepted by my parents initially.

 

Image by Karolina Grabowska from Pixabay 

Since then, though I have lost many friends and even some family members who choose not to understand, I have found many new friends who can accept me for who I am, and support me, along with an incredibly loving brother who instantly accepted my transition.

 

Although I am still a "baby Trans" in many ways, I am finding that the community has been amazingly supportive and I want to give back. I am excited about the Trans Canada Project, and believe my background in Graphic Design and my organizational skills will help to make it a success. I look forward to telling the stories of Trans people from across our country so that others like myself can see that there are many more out there like us - living their lives, authentically and happy.

 

This is my life, and this is my story.

 

Hugs,

Kelly

Introductions - Cary (they/them)

Hello! My name is Cary.

Image by lisa runnels from Pixabay 

I didn't always go by the name Cary. Not that my original name was horrible, just that because I am Trans (Trans* Non-Binary - they/them) it didn't really fit. I needed a name that was more neutral and fit better who I am. So here I am. Cary.

I am still on a journey of discovery of what that really means, and wow, has it been a journey. One that is not complete yet, and likely will never be. 

I was born in the mid 60's, growing up in a time and in a community that didn't understand what it meant to be queer. That community was (and still is to a large extent) hostile toward the very idea of being queer. That community taught me things that I have had to unlearn so that I could accept myself and who I am. So much so that I have lived my life the way I was told to, rather than a way that honoured who I really was. Underlying a generally positive, happy exterior, lay a piece of me locked away, ridiculed and beaten down. 

Occasionally that part of me would escape and try to express itself, but humiliation and hate were not far behind. Not having had the chance to mature, that feminine part did not understand itself well enough to assert itself and was quickly corralled back into it's cell of shame.

I have always been a person of faith, and about three years ago, at one of those moments where all of me was struggling to know what to do with that secluded little femme, I felt God's grace on my life telling me that they loved me and that the part of me I had tried to rid myself of was OK. In fact, God loved that part of me just as much as the rest. From that moment on, I began to let the queer part of me out more and more and as I have, I have come to understand that this part of me so long reviled is actually one of the most beautiful parts of who I am.

My life has not been a bad one. In fact, things have turned out pretty well, in spite of the conflict going on within me. I am now the proud parent to four children - three of them biological, and have a wonderful partner who is doing their best to learn to understand me. My journey has taken me through many experiences and careers that have also informed who I am as a person and have form my identity as much as the queerness I now claim proudly. I have been a church pastor, a network administrator, and now a photographer. I have enjoyed all three and although they may seem a very eclectic mix, they actually blend nicely. As a pastor, I learned to be and share with others. In IT, I learned skills useful to a digital world. And as a photographer, I have developed my creativity and means to express it.

Image by Dariusz Sankowski from Pixabay 

As the originator of the idea of the Trans Canada Project, I am proud to be a part of what it is becoming, and look forward to applying all of who I am to telling the stories of other queer folk who just want to be themselves. Much of the world still does not know who we are. We are still separate and alien to their experiences, and I hope that telling our stories will show that we too are human. Real people with real lives. 

I look forward to working with other queer, trans and non-binary people as we share our stories with each other and with the world at large.

This is my life, and this is my story.

Cary