My Story

2000

I was born in 1948 under the sign of Libra. Like other Transgender persons I started out when I was in pre-school, I don't remember much of my early days, but I do remember playing with the girl next door and always wishing I could dress like her and be a girl. I remember also people asking my mother that "didn't she wish she had a girl instead of another boy." I know I use to cry myself to sleep sometimes wishing that I would wake up as a girl.

My first chance to dress up was in the seventh grade. I just started going to a parochial school and for the initiation the boys had to wear skirts and blouses with saddle shoes and the girls had to wear jackets and ties. I know this sounds made up, but it's not. Back in the mid - sixties they had freshmen initiations. We had to wear costumes that the ninth graders picked for us. ( As an example the next freshmen class had to dress up as a framers with a bib coveralls, rubber boots, a straw hat and had to have a piece of grass in his mouth all the time when they were out of class.)

From that time on I always crossdressed. It was always secret and hidden away. Back in the late sixties and early seventies transgenderism was never discussed. I didn't know anybody else ever did it, until the Kink's song "Lola", and then my ears perked up and I knew I wasn't alone. Like most of us I had my purges where I threw away all my stash, but I always acquired a new one. I also grew a beard and tried to stop, but that didn't stop me either. It wasn't until the internet that I really found out what was out there and so with in that mind I wanted to create my little corner of the net.

In October 1999 I finally came somewhat out of the closet in that I joined the Connecticut Outreach Society and started to go to their sponsored events. I'm still not out to my family and friends, so you wouldn't find any pictures of me here. But, now after fifty some years I am making new friends as Diana. Where this new path will lead I do not know, will Diana take the main path or will my old self lead, I do not know. Every day is a new adventure and I look forward to conquering it and seeing where it will lead.

At a meeting of COS we were sitting around talking about how we picked our names and I thought I'll share with you how I picked mine. While in high school the only time I got to dress up was when my mother had to go to the doctor's office for her monthly allergy shots, so.... I would crossdress while she was gone. It was during one of those times that I was doing my homework and I had to look up a word in the dictionary and I came across Diana. The definition that it gave went something like this, "Roman god ( I forget the actual god that they named ) of the hunt who became a women and the goddess of love". Right then and there I knew what I wanted to call myself. The first time I got to use it was when I went to my first meeting at COS and signed in at the door and I thought back to some thirty years earlier when I picked that name.

Now through the years since I came out of the closet, I have grown in self-awareness and understanding. Some of my family have found out my little secret and most do not have a problem. None of my friends outside the community know it, but some day I expect I will goof up and make a mistake or accidentally bump into them when I am out in public. That is something I am now prepared to come to grips with, it is something that I don't live in fear with anymore. I have learned that if they can't deal with my transgenderism than they were never really my friends.

Updated March 18, 2006

When I wrote this page back in May 2000 little did I know that in just under six years I would be where I am now, a political activist and educator. I have spoken to state legislators, lobbied in favor of the Anti-Discrimination bill, volunteer at True Colors LGBT Youth conference, sat on panels at colleges and university, became Executive Director of the support group Connecticut Outreach Society and sit on the Board of Directors of a transactivist group Connecticut TransAdvocacy Coalition.

How did I get from there to where I am now? I never made a conscious decision to do all these things; it was always a small step at a time. I joined COS when I first came out and started attending Board meetings because it gave me an excuse to dress up for another night. Then I started getting involved in the Board activity, became the Program Director and when the Executive Director resigned all of a sudden all the heads around the table were looking at me, so I said I would give it a try. Being the Executive Director I had to start interface with other groups and it broadened my horizons, I met other people from other GLBT groups and made friends.

One day I was invited to fill in on a panel discussion at a local college; I found I had a story to tell that was worth while. Then one day I was standing in line a restaurant and this young woman came up to me and said that I talked in a class she had, that now she was a social worker and she has a transgender client. Because of that class that I spoke in, she was more aware of what that individual was going through. That made me feel very good inside know I had made some transperson's life a little bit better.

As I attended support groups I started to hear stories of discrimination at the meeting, it started to get to me and I wanted to do something to help. A friend came up to me one day and asked if I would be willing to get involved getting legislation pasted to add gender and gender expression to the Anti-Discrimination law, I saw it as a chance to help and said yes.

The other day I stopping and turned around, looking at how I got to where I am now. I saw that I have covered great distances one step at a time. I liked where I have been and where I am going. A student at one of the classes one day asked me why I was there talking to the class, it didn't take me long to come up with the answer. I said, "I was there so that the next generation wouldn't have to grow up the way I did. That I would do that through education, that I would teach compassion, understanding and tolerance."

Update November 2, 2009

A lot has happened in three years…

I started hormones

I came out to my family

I retired

I transitioned

I went back to college

When I wrote the last update, I had been on hormones for two years and I was planning to start my transition when I retired in 2008. I knew that I had to come out to my family because there is no hiding from the fact that I am transsexual, it would be kind of obvious. So I came out first to my brother in 2004 when I started hormones and then later to rest of my family two years later.

Work threw a monkey wrench into my plans by closing the shop in 2007, so I took early retirement and started my transition that day. I legally changed my name on July 2, 2007 and I have been living full time as a woman since then. When they announced the shop closing, they also announced that they would be giving us tuition reimbursement. I started taking classes at the University of Connecticut School of Social Work in West Hartford for a master’s in Social Work. My first year’s internship was with a women’s civil rights organization and I worked to help try and pass the anti-discrimination, however, the bill did not pass.

Update October 12, 2011

This year I graduated from the University Of Connecticut School Of Social Work with a Master’s Degree and my concentration is in Community Organizing. It was one of the best times in my life, I have never enjoyed school more, I was active in the Student Government and I actually made friends with the professors and staff, something I had never done before. Out of school I was on the steering committee of ctEQUALITY, an organization that worked to pass the gender inclusive Anti-Discrimination law in Connecticut in 2011 (The photo was taken the night that the anti-discrimination bill passed the Senate. Three out of the five people in the photo are UConn School of Social Works graduates.) . In addition, I was also one of the Project Coordinator for the Transgender Regional Area Network Survey (T.R.A.N.S.) a research project that studied the transgender population in the Greater Hartford area for AIDS/HIV.

I became active in the Connecticut chapter of the National Association of Social Workers (NASW) and I gave a workshop for their conference this past spring and I will be giving another one in November. In addition, I wrote The Struggle for Gender Identity as a Human Right an article that was published in their January/February 2011 newsletter. I am also a member of the World Professional Association for Transgender Health (WPATH).

Update November 17, 2014I am on a number of committees for the Connecticut TransAdvocacy Coalition (CTAC), some of the committees that I am on include the Safe School Coalition and the LGBT Aging Advocacy (I didn’t practically like the name because it sounds like we are a bunch of old advocates instead of helping LGBT seniors). I am also a board member for the UConn School of Social Work Alumni Association.

I have giving a number of workshops for the NASW both here in Connecticut and also in Massachusetts, and I continue to be on panels for college classes, including guest lecturer for a number of classes at the UConn SSW and at the main campus in Storrs.

Update August 11, 2016

I am still giving workshops and training around the northeast and I have worked to pass another law. Last year we reformed the coalition that passed the gender inclusive non-discrimination law, this time it was to pass a law that allows trans people to change their birth certificates without having surgery. For trans people there are many reasons why we don’t have surgery such as health problems like heart disease or diabetes, they cannot afford surgery even with insurance now covering it, or their gender dysphoria is diminished by living in their true gender and do not need surgery.

In 2015 we passed the Birth Certificate law allowing us to change our birth certificate without the need to have surgery, all we need now is a letter from

our doctor or therapist. What was amazing the bill passed with bipartisan support, what a change from when we passed the non-discrimination law where the vote was right down party lines. In August I was invited to the signing of the law in the governor's office and the governor gave me the signed bill which I turned over to the Elihu Burritt Library at Central CT State University as part of my collection.

I am working with a coalition to train homeless shelter staff about the laws that they have to follow and integrate their shelters. I have also done training at state prisons for their staff and wardens.

I have been interviewed by the news media when I attended a protest in front of DCF for their treatment of Jane Doe. I was interviewed on WTNH about Caitlyn Jenner and I was on the Sunday morning talk shows Face the State on WFSB and The Real Story on WTIC. I also gave a speech at Norwalk City Hall for their Human Rights Day.In addition, I volunteer two days a week at the Hartford Gay and Lesbian Health Collective as their trans advocate. So I have been keep busy in my retirement.

Updated February 2020

It has been a busy four years since my last update, where to start?