The transgender community

(NEWSCHANNEL 3) – Since the Kalamazoo City Council introduced an anti-discrimination ordinance designed to bring fair housing and employment practices to the LGBT community, it has been a hotly contested issue, with the ordinance passed on repealed several times before landing on the November ballot.

The transgender community has been the most closely scrutinized as the debate roars on. Starting back in May, Newschannel 3 began working with health care professionals, as well as a number of people in the transgender community around West Michigan in an attempt to gain a better understanding of their largely unknown way of life.

“Transgenderism is a unique concept, even in the field of mental health,” said psychotherapist Jen Emmerich, “there's a growing awareness of it.”

Emmerich is a private practice psychologist, and she says sex and gender aren't synonymous.

“Gender is what's between your ears,” said Meghan Fenner, a transgender woman, “sex is what's between your legs.”

That is a key to understanding transgender people.

“A person can change their sex, they can't change their gender,” said Fenner. “I was a pretty child, I got a lot of comments like, 'should have been a girl.'”

One person Newschannel 3 spoke to, who we'll call Steve for the sake of anonymity, began his transition from female to male at the age of 17.

“I always knew something wasn't quite right, this wasn't the body I was supposed to be in,” said Steve.

“Someone who is transgendered will typically, not always, report early awareness of it in childhood,” said Emmerich. “Typically has a difficult adolescence when puberty hits.”

“People used to ask me what I wanted to be when I grow up and I just remember certain occasions, I would just go, 'I want to be a boy,'” said Steve. “No one really know how to label me, I didn't even know how to label me.

“When I first really understood it, I got into the terminology of everything, I could assign a name to what was going on,” said Steve. “That's when I could finally talk to someone about it and I was able to bring it up to my mom.

“It was hard at first,” said Steve, “I think she sort of brushed it off as a phase or something, I don't know if it was denial of her own or what.”

Emmerich says taking that step can be the difference between life and death.

“Many reach a breaking point where it's not a day longer can I continue, regardless of the cost,” said Emmerich.

“I really felt forced to live in a male role,” said Meghan, “it wasn't what I chose for my life, it wasn't how I would feel comfortable living.”

While still living as a man, Meghan married her wife, Brittany, but she says the stress of her gender issues continued to build.

“This sort of reached a head, a couple of years into our marriage, and I was literally on the brink of suicide,” said Meghan. “I knew that as a husband, I was failing. I told her that night, in the middle of the night.”

“At first, honestly, I was pissed, I was really pissed,” said Brittany. “It was just mass confusion and fear, because you know, here's your life-partner coming out and expressing something you've never seen coming.”

The next morning, the two found out that Brittany was pregnant.

“I think we decided to try to work it out for the sake of the first daughter, and the second daughter came along,” said Brittany. “It's been tough, I mean we had some knock-out, drag-out fights and there's been times since then we've come millimeters close to divorcing, but then we both step back and take a look at those two little angels and saw, 'well I don't know.'”

Despite having no natural attraction to women, Brittany has found comfort in her marriage.

“We love each other, ya know what, and when it comes right down to it, we're peas and carrots really,” said Brittany, “we fight, we love, we're normal.”

“It's a process,” said Meghan, “it's a process of getting used to it, it's a process of finding our place in the world.”

“People may not always understand it, but you know, I'm still who I was, I'm just becoming who I need to be,” said Steve. “If you're ever in a situation like this I just hope that you can find help and find support like I did. At first it was really hard, but things get better, they always do.”

The statistics on how many people identify themselves as transgendered or transexual are contested, some experts believe it's as few as one in 30,000, others say it could be as many as one in 250, and no two people deal with the condition the same way.