And. Hi, everyone.
Welcome
to a new episode of Prideful Connections
where we have conversations
without judgment.
My name is Tony Farrell.
I'm so proud to be co-hosting
with Sara Salado.
Sara, I want to say hi. Hi.
That's me, Sara Salado.
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So we thought it'd be cool.
Since last episode,
you kind of got to know me a little bit
that maybe we get to know Sarah
a little bit.
So we're putting Sara in the hot seat
today with no judgment.
Of course. That. Of course not.
So when I was thinking about, you know,
what did I want to ask you?
What do we want to talk about?
I went back to the first
time we ever met over zoom,
and I was wondering if you
can, like, you know,
I like to rewrite history, so
that's what people tell me.
I don't know. But one.
Why don't you just, like,
tell everybody how that was for you?
Yeah.
So, I had a youngest son.
My youngest son,
while he was. He was transgender.
He came out transgender.
And I honestly, a lot of that time
when he came out to us is a fog to me.
I honestly don't remember it.
Somehow I found out about you,
and I don't know how.
I don't know.
Someone told me in the town that I lived.
Someone told me about you, and,
I remember reaching out to you,
and I thought, I.
Honest to God,
I thought I was going to be waiting weeks
before I got to speak to you.
And I think it was probably
a couple of days later you had time
and you said, let's zoom.
And I remember being in our kitchen,
my husband
and I, and I think my child
was actually in the room as well.
And we got on a zoom call with you and
my husband would not get on the zoom call.
And I remember
just almost be in a fog, like a daze of
what is going on.
What what
what had my child just said to me?
What does it mean?
What am I supposed to do?
You know, all these questions of things
that I just didn't
I didn't know, I didn't understand.
I like to say that I was the the parent,
the the ignorant parent.
Right?
Back in the day,
I didn't know anything about,
transgenderism, nevermind LGBTQ,
I grew up in a straight world.
So I not that
I had anything against LGBTQ,
but I didn't know anybody,
who was really part of the community.
I didn't know that I knew anybody
who was part of the community.
So when my youngest came out
as transgender,
that just completely rocked my world.
And, I wasn't quite sure
what we were going to do.
What that meant,
how to help him was my big concern.
Do you remember how
you introduced yourself to me?
No I do. Oh, gosh.
You said, were Republican
Catholic conservatives. Yes.
And I almost fell off my chair. Yeah. Yes.
And. Yeah.
And that's usually in my opening line
of when I talk about our story,
I say that
because, I grew up as Catholic.
I brought my kids up as Catholic.
I married a Catholic.
And when we were just Catholic,
all around Catholic, Catholic, Catholic
and went to church every week
at off at the, communion
and, con, confirmation confirmation.
I can't even think about
I left it, that's why I can't remember.
I left Catholicism.
But yeah, you're right.
And that's when I when I say that, it
immediately helps people
to figure out where to put me.
So when I say that I have
I grew up as a conservative,
Catholic Republican,
not only grew up that way,
but married into that. And
voted that way for many, many years.
It puts me in a situation
where people can say,
oh, wait, wait, wait,
maybe we can relate to her.
You talk about judgment.
You said you're going to have
this conversation without judgment.
I will say that that
I was very worried about being judged
as a parent
and how I was going to handle this
and how I was actually feeling
and the fears and how scared I was.
And how I didn't really understand
what all this meant.
I wanted to put that, I tried
to put that in the, in the back burner
so that I didn't have to deal with that.
I wanted to just deal with my child
and helping him
because he was engaging in self-harm,
suicidal ideation.
He had no will to live.
Couldn't see beyond 15 years of age.
16 years of. Age.
Yeah, that's
what I was wanted to say. Like
when when I remember that conversation
and when I ended that conversation
with you and your husband.
I remember having so much empathy for him
that he couldn't even get on the camera.
He went he was sitting in the room.
But he wouldn't get on the camera.
But I also thought
they're going to be okay.
Yeah.
And I thought that you were going to be
okay because you reached out
and you were willing to help your kid
no matter what your beliefs were.
Yeah.
What were the biggest fears for your son
at that time?
I didn't understand him,
and I didn't understand what he was going.
And I didn't know how to help.
So before he came out as transgender,
he, was anorexic.
That was a very first issue,
a real, real issue that we had.
And that was when he was 12.
And you had to help him with that.
I knew there was places
that I could have him go to
that were going to help them have to
relearn
how to eat, put some weight back on.
I could fix that,
but I couldn't fix this.
It took me a while to realize it's
not something I needed to fix.
Right?
It's something that I needed to accept,
and it's something that I needed to
help him get to be who he needed to be.
But I was so scared
from what I didn't know.
And then I.
And then I was scared
for how our family was going to react.
I was scared for him as far as what
his future was going to look like.
What did this all mean?
I just it was all the unknown.
You know, share it.
Share as much as you want.
When I ask you this question,
how dark did it get for your son?
How dark? Then again.
He had a plan. In fact,
I was reading through
some of his medical records the other day.
Happened to be looking through
because there's a lot of medical.
Records.
And,
I saw that he had a plan to hang himself.
It was the first time I saw that,
and I didn't realize that.
And that was what
he must have told the doctors.
And so they put it in there.
So that, that's how dark it got for him.
I didn't want to be here.
I have to tell you that I've worked
with thousands of families.
And you, you and and your husband
really shifted very quickly.
And that warms my heart.
Because I knew
that your son was going to be okay.
Because you really went from where?
Catholic conservative Republicans to.
Let's talk about how
how much
you're involved in the like
how did you end?
This is really a question
that I've always wanted to ask you.
I'm glad I'm saving it for this moment.
How did you get from even your husband
sitting in this space?
When you first met me?
Not really
being able to talk about this, him
not being able to be on camera
to everything that you're doing.
I want you to talk about.
You started a pride in your own town.
Yeah.
You got on stage.
I remember your husband getting on stage
and saying out loud to the crowd, I'm
sobbing, by the way.
I have a transgender son.
How did your family get so far
in such a short period of time?
It's the love of your child.
There was no other option for us.
We adored our child.
We love, love, love him.
Not accepting them? Absolutely.
But getting so engrossed in this community
and doing such wonderful things
for the entire community,
LGBTQ plus community.
How did how did
how did you go down that path?
Because that's well,
that's kind of who I am as a person.
I get involved in things, especially
when I become passionate about them.
But the more my child would bring home
friends and I would see that
they were hiding themselves
from their families
and that they couldn't be their true,
authentic selves with their families.
The more I realized
how lucky our family was and how lucky
my child was to be in a supportive family,
and then I realized that that wasn't
the case and it made me really sad.
It made me sad for the youth,
and it made me sad for people, these kids
who would be in our home in wearing
whatever clothes they wanted to go and buy
whatever pronoun a name they wanted to.
But then if the parents came to pick them
up, my child would say to me,
we'll make sure you don't
call them by this name.
I'll make sure you use the right pronoun.
And I was like, wait, what?
I know stuff about this child
that the family didn't know,
and that says a lot.
And I realize that as much as we thought
we lived
in a really inclusive LGBTQ
plus community, we don't.
And there was a lot more negativity
out there than I thought.
And I didn't realize it
because I never looked for it before.
I never saw it before.
So I realized
that other towns around us
were doing these pride events,
and I thought we should have
one ourselves, and we should have one,
because we need to show our youth
that we love them regardless of anything.
And there's a place for them
in our little town and,
that they can be whoever they want to be
because
it's difficult for these kids.
These kids are where we live.
It is cut and paste.
The girls look like the girls.
The boys look all like the boys.
And anybody who has a child that does
not fit that mold will tell you that.
That's what it is.
And my two older sons fit right into that
cut and paste.
They had no issues from elementary school
onward through high school.
They both played sports.
They both wore their hair the same way.
Every other boy wore their hair,
and they wore the clothes
that every other boy.
So they had no issues. No problems.
But when my youngest came up
and all of a sudden he realized that he.
He couldn't live how he was living
as a more and as a girl anymore.
He just couldn't do it.
And he needed to change
and he needed to, to,
to to figure out who he was
and be that, but that person,
all of a sudden
there wasn't a place for him.
He now was just different.
And as far as we've come,
we haven't come far enough.
We have so much further
to go with these kids.
And so I was like,
why wouldn't we do a pride event?
And so that's how I started the pride
event in our town.
And the first one
was incredibly successful and successful.
He went about 3000 people.
That was a beautiful day.
It was just so, so perfect.
Everything about it was perfect.
It was. I could make for a better day.
I was curious of this because
there was a time
that you actually witnessed firsthand
the shift
in your child just by being acknowledged
by somebody else.
Did that drive you to say
I can be that person?
Well talk about that
incident in the hospital.
And I just I've always been curious
to wonder if, because you really witnessed
that firsthand
and a lot of parents don't by the way.
I wonder if that drove you
to give that to other kids type of thing.
So maybe it did.
It was after after
my son had come out to us as transgender.
They still were feeling really down and.
He was cutting still,
and I needed to bring him
back to the hospital.
And he was supposed to be speaking
with you
on a Thursday FaceTime.
And it was Thursday,
and I brought him into the hospital.
And I said to the nurse,
he has a FaceTime call that he has to be
on at, like, I think it was 630 or 7 p.m.
or something.
And she's like, oh, I don't know. I said,
oh no, no, no.
No, no, no, no, you don't understand.
He needs to speak with this person
because that is probably the only person
that could save him right now.
And you I don't really
I don't know what you said.
It was like. A ten minute,
not even a ten minute conversation.
But basically, you saw him.
You gave him hope.
You said, okay,
this is what we can do x, y, and z.
And so when he got off the call,
he was like, okay.
He felt like he could now have a future.
And somebody was able to say it to him.
Somebody who was him was like him.
I wasn't like him. I'm not like. Him.
Can I tell you what I said? Yeah.
I said, okay, so you're trans, right?
And he was like,
yes, okay. What do you need?
What do you mean?
I said, what do you mean?
You need testosterone? What?
You need top surgery. What?
I said, well, you'll get it.
Yeah. Let's start living
like start living.
Take your power back
and just start living.
Yeah. Is.
Everything's going to be okay.
I got your back. Yeah.
And I remember the look on his face.
If I think about it too much,
I'll start crying.
Yeah. He was just like.
Like really like. Like really?
And I had to tell you, your son
is now a little advocate.
And I love that.
I love that in you.
You're an advocate. You're.
And you can really at a parent level.
This is why I like that
we're doing this podcast together
is that I'm in the community
and you're a parent of somebody
who's in the community.
Two totally different views on stuff
that's happening right?
Oh, yeah.
Because let me be honest.
And I and when I do my my talks
and you're getting into that little world
myself of public speaking, it is not easy
as a parent of a transgender child. And
when your child comes out to you,
you go through a morning and I, I will
you grieve the loss.
And I'll say this.
And I know so many people get annoyed
when I say this, but this is our journey.
This is our story.
So I'm able to say this, this is not
everybody's story, but this is our story.
I grieved the loss of who
I thought my daughter would be.
I grieve the loss of being in a hospital
when she had a baby.
I grieve the loss of walking her
down the aisle.
I grieve.
We were, we still are.
But we were like, joined at the hip.
Best friends did everything together.
And more than anything
in my world,
I wanted a girl more than anything.
Yeah.
And that comes from when I was younger.
It comes from being adopted.
It comes from having three older brothers.
It comes from not like having a strange
ish relationship with my mother,
just it comes from wanting
someone who was truly
blood related to me, who was a girl
and who was, you know, so.
But those are all my issues.
And when I realized that and I said
to myself, okay, I'm grieving the loss.
Everything I'm grieving
the loss of is what I put on my child.
That's not fair.
He needs to live his life.
It doesn't have to be the
he lives his life.
For me. That's not fair on me. So
I do believe as a
parent
you go through all these different stages.
And I did go.
My husband will always say, I'm
just like a truck.
I just just go.
I just just drive and just just go.
And it is the flight or fight, right?
Yeah. Fight or flight.
Yeah. And I am always the fight.
Fight fight fight fight fight.
Go go go go go go go go go.
That's what I did.
And then when things began to slow down,
it hit me hard
and I needed to go for therapy.
I needed to talk to somebody.
I needed to put myself in a space
where I could say whatever I wanted
and feel like I wasn't going to be judged,
because a lot of times I'm in spaces where
a parent of a transgender child
would be like,
I knew my kid was transgender
and I was okay with them.
We brought them up in a home
where there was no gender toys,
and there was no this and the and and
and my child didn't come up in that home.
So I felt bad about that.
Like, that just wasn't how I was raised.
It wasn't how I raised my children.
There was gendered toys, right?
And there was, pink for boys
and pink for girls and blue for boys.
That's just how it was.
So my whole mindset had to shift,
but I also had to allow myself
to to be okay with that.
But that was okay. I felt that way.
I needed to change and I changed
and I educated myself and that was huge.
It was as soon as I as soon as he told me,
and as soon as he said those words to me,
which I remember exactly where we were,
where one of his programs that he went to,
one of the many, were in the car,
and he turned to me
and he said, mom, I'm in the wrong body.
And I. Went,
did you were you surprised?
Well,
he said no, because he had alluded to that
many times before,
including that weekend.
But he
I still didn't think it was the case
because
because he had come
he was in residential for a month,
and when he came out of residential,
he came out as non-binary.
She they pronouns and a different name.
So we had to get adjusted for that.
And God love them.
He went into she they pronouns to help us.
Everything that he did,
the small steps that he took Will
because he was gently trying to help us.
Yeah.
And it was very selfless of him
and wonderful of him to do it that way.
But I tried to put myself in his situation
now and it's like five years
now where he's just like,
I gotta just do this myself.
I've got I can't cater, I can't,
I can't care so much anymore
what you all think
and what my grandparents think.
If I have to just do what I need to do.
You know, a lot of kids,
a lot of lots of kids will tell me that,
you know, I gotta do this because
I don't want to disappoint my parents.
I don't want to disappoint my parents.
And I love the fact that you said
this is your journey,
because I get that a lot, too.
Like if people hear me say, well,
sometimes in the documentary, I say,
sometimes parents have to mourn the loss
before they can embrace,
and it's really not a
death. It's a rebirth.
Yeah.
But what do you feel
has been the most rewarding part
of this journey so far?
The look on his face when we would be out
in public at a restaurant or something
and somebody say,
oh, what can I get for you, young man?
That's never going to get old.
I'm telling you right now.
So it's it's never to get old for him.
You'd think someone just handed him
$1 million.
Pronouns.
Yeah.
It hurt me.
Cut me deep
when someone would miss gender him.
Because I knew how hard that hit
and how hard that was for him.
He passes pretty well now, but
there's still times when he's misgendered,
which I'm like, really?
When mean,
I think he's really looks like a guy. But,
but those little things.
And he kept saying to me, he's like, mom,
what if what if somebody was saying hi to
you all the time referring to you was he?
And I was like, oh, okay.
So like, how did that feel? Like he'd
be like, I'm out of here.
Why do you keep climbing here?
And it's so simple, right?
I remember saying to once day
sitting on our bed and I said to him,
how do you know?
It's like, how do I know what I'm like?
How do you know?
How do you know you're a guy?
He goes, how do you know you're a girl?
Like, how know I just am.
He goes, well, there you go.
With so. Simple. It's very simple.
But that's a good point you make because
I always ask that when I'm training some,
I always ask one person
and they're always struggling.
And, I just know.
Then why do we expect trans children
to be able to tell us in words
how they know who they are? Right.
So, you know, that's something
that people should realize
is that an adult
can't explain how they know.
Right?
We can't expect children to do it
too. Right?
But I'll tell you what I love about
your son is his smile.
Yeah, I'm being honest.
Like, I am so happy
that he has put himself into a role now.
Maybe now, maybe not forever,
but to show other kids.
Look, because he's super cool.
Yeah, he dresses cool.
You know? He really is. He's super cool.
We might have him as a guest,
so who knows? Yeah.
But for him to put
himself out there like that,
with that smile and that positivity and.
Yeah, you know what?
Look where I look, where I was,
and now look where I am solutely.
And it really all is from acceptance
and and thank you
from my heart for being,
you know, a parent that not only said,
we accept you,
but we're going to affirm you.
Can you talk a little bit
about for the people out there
that don't know the difference
between accepting and affirming?
Well, accepting. Was that okay?
Accepting that, you're transgender
and kind of that's really it.
But affirming was was accepting that
but also doing something about it.
Right.
So we needed to make sure that I will.
Now we need to affirm you and help you.
And what can we do to help you
be who you need to be.
And that meant
going down avenues that were
terrifying for us.
If I may be honest, the first time
I took him to the doctor's office,
not the first time, the first,
but probably second or third time,
I took him to the doctor's office
for gender clinic,
and they were like, we could do
the testosterone shot right now.
I was like, what?
And he was giving it again.
I just got $1 million.
And I was like, hold on, hold on a second,
because that meant to me
that I was beginning to truly
say goodbye to my daughter.
Yeah. Yeah.
And so
that was hard.
But I had to get out of my own way,
and I had to realize this wasn't about me.
And that's one of the hard truths
we learn as parents, right?
It's not about I.
Think that I always tell parents this is
when unconditional love is challenged.
Yeah, as a parent.
So but affirming,
accepting versus affirming, affirming
them is calling by the name and pronoun
that they choose, making sure
they have access to medical care,
making sure they have access to bathrooms
that they need, especially in school.
So you did all of that?
Yeah.
I will say that our school, even though
he's not in the school anymore,
that was for reasons
because he grew up one gender.
Yeah.
And so all the kids knew him up to fresh
freshman year is one gender
that that's different.
But our school, they were
they were they were fantastic with him.
I mean, they were calling him
pronouns and names before we were.
Yeah, right.
But to me, the
the harder part was, the pronouns,
the name was a little easier,
but how many times we messed up
and we be consistently
fixing it like,
oh my gosh, my gosh, you know?
And we learned from him
and I've learned from you.
When you use the wrong
pronoun, don't be like, come on, how
was I supposed to make a big deal of it?
No, because then you're you're
looking for them to make you feel better.
I can't stand that.
When somebody does that, I when I'm like.
And then it draws
attention to you. Right. So.
And it makes you feel small.
My child just did a TikTok.
I'm that exact thing still at the stage
where
he's trying to teach people,
listen, don't make it be a big deal.
Just don't make it about you, right?
Don't make you messing up my pronouns
about you.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
It's not about, you. Know, and the some.
But the pronouns were hard
for some reason that that those were hard.
In fact, his parent,
his grandparents still messed up
constantly with the problem.
My parents still mess up.
I know it's also my mother. Yeah.
And you have to have I do feel like,
particularly for the grandparents,
that you have to have some grace for them,
particularly our, my family
and my husband's family were all
for the most part,
pretty good and accepting,
maybe not so affirming all the time,
but definitely accepting.
Nobody stop talking to us.
I have some friends whose family literally
stopped talking to them.
Just awful.
But it happens. Happens?
Did not happen in our family.
No issues, problems,
nobody fighting with each other.
So I was proud of that.
I was proud of them.
My child doesn't necessarily see it
that way, and I wish that they would.
But I was proud of the family for
stepping up because I feel like they did.
So the family, if you want to talk about
this, just how about the siblings?
He he has two siblings.
Did each one of them
have a different reaction to like.
Can you do your so ridiculous.
So they were they were.
I'll tell you why.
Because they're older, older,
older brothers at two years.
One is two years
older than one is four years older.
My kids have always been close to each
other, which is nice.
And I.
He'll tell you that I made him come out,
and maybe I did.
But the reason why I did it at this point,
Tony, was because if he didn't do it,
he was just continuously going to be
in this dark space.
He was going to continue to be Lyons.
Everybody else in there
for having to lie to himself.
So got to a point where I was like,
you can't just tell me and end it there.
And his brothers were also seeing that
on some of his social media.
He was changing that too,
he they pronouns.
And it was the
everything was beginning to change.
So I had a my oldest was in college,
so I had him on zoom.
So I made like a family meeting.
It was about 530.
And I saw a camera.
Come on.
I said, you know, you need to
you need to let let's just talk them.
And, his oldest brother said,
it's better to be a guy anyway. Okay.
And then the middle one was like,
I got to go to a hockey game.
Can we can we get this going?
You know, you're good. Great.
You're good. Let's go.
Oh that's amazing. It was amazing.
Later conversation was
that they definitely miss having a sister.
Yeah right.
They were the older brothers
to the little sister.
A lot of their friends had that
and they liked being the older brother.
So the little sister again
things that they would have to deal with
that wasn't
that I wasn't my youngest fault,
but things that they would have to deal
with and came through.
And I love how they were,
how they showed up for him.
Completely showed up for him the. Next.
Yeah,
I think the best thing that ever happened
to me when somebody realized I was trans,
I was it was my orthopedic surgeon.
And I said to his staff, listen,
I haven't seen him for years.
I'm coming in.
I'm a dude now, you know,
and he has a goatee.
He's a tall guy. He's really cool guy.
So he walks into the exam room
and he says,
I always knew
you wanted to be me when you grew up.
That's perfect.
But the reactions that we get from people
can either empower us
or really, really cripple us.
Yeah.
So I was just super happy to hear that.
That's that I mean, I'm not surprised.
No, it was a great reaction.
I mean, these kids are learning
and that this is why I feel
it's so important to,
I'm not saying that you don't just add
just bring it into schools
a little bit, right?
Just educate the kids
a little bit on the fact
that this is something
that's out there and it's okay.
It's not going to make a child
transgender.
It's not going to make your child gay
or transgender.
Just talk about you can't
you can't teach this
because if you could,
you would be able to teach your kids
to clean their room every day
and do their homework. Yeah, exactly. But.
You know, I don't a lot of times
I don't feel
the kids,
the students really have an issue with it.
It's what's their hearing at home?
Yeah for. Sure.
And hopefully,
you know, things will shift there too.
But I well can I say one thing,
one other thing.
The other day
he went to the doctors and, you know,
because it's going to be a doctor
that we're having on our show. Yeah.
Fantastic guy. Right. Amazing.
Good friend of mine.
And he was talking to him
about how he's feeling and like,
what are the changes that he's seen.
And Cameron has a
lot of facial hair now. Yeah.
The doctor was like, I'm not at all
a little jealous about that.
Yeah. How the heck did you get that?
Like it was so funny
between the two of them watching this
between the two of them. Right.
This doctor who was, like,
making him feel like affirming him so much
and making him feel and then saying, like,
I'm so jealous of the fact that you're,
you know, you at 17 years of age,
you're going to say, yeah, I can't.
I can't do either.
Yeah, yeah.
So you'll see when he's on it. Yeah.
When he's against.
Yeah. Yeah. He's wonderful.
He's wonderful.
I remember when I met this doctor,
when he was a med student,
and I would sit on panels with him.
Yeah.
And I just knew that he was going
into opioids and that he was into work
with trans and non-binary kids.
And I was like, thank you.
Whoever has anything
to do with this happening.
Yeah. Thank you.
Because he's such a compassionate,
kind human being.
Oh, he was wonderful.
He's just wonderful, sweetheart. Yeah.
So we'll wrap things up a question.
You know, what are your hopes?
For the future?
I just don't want my child to be.
Want a political pawn anymore.
I don't understand that. And to.
He just wants to live his life
and be left alone.
And I just want that for him.
I just want that for him.
He just. He just wants.
He doesn't
want to be known as a trans kid,
which is why he wants to be out of where
the town that he grew up in.
And I understand that he wants to go
somewhere where nobody knows him,
nobody knows who he was previously,
and he could just be who he is.
And he doesn't like right now.
He's worried about what state he can go to
in this country,
which is just as you are, so ridiculous.
So let's talk about that for a second,
because
your son is going to be speaking places
and stuff like that.
And if he's on TikTok doing TikTok,
people are going to know who he is.
So that might be like,
I have to have conversations with kids
about this all the time.
They're like, yeah, I'm
going to come out to my teacher,
but I want to tell anybody,
yeah, okay, that's fine.
I'm glad you trust her enough.
Yeah, but I want him to start calling me
by my name and pronouns in class.
Well, if you want to do that,
then everybody's going to know.
Yeah.
So if your son really doesn't want anybody
to know
about their trans status,
I would rethink being public.
I mean, you know what I mean?
I think that what it is
is that if he moved to say,
Washington or something, right?
Whatever little town
he may end up in there.
Oh, yeah. They wouldn't,
they wouldn't know, right.
Unless they looked him up.
And then all of a sudden
they're going to see X, Y and Z.
But how many times?
I mean, sometimes I guess people are nosy
and look someone up.
But he he has such an amazing story
and you have told him that.
And I have told him that, that it can
help, help people can really help kids.
And in the beginning,
he didn't want to do it.
And we left him alone to go, to do
whatever you. Want us to do.
It's up to him.
And now we know he's
going to be doing this talk,
in a couple of weeks, or, sorry,
the speech and next week and next one.
And I said to him numerous of times,
are you sure?
Particularly
after the results of this election?
And he goes, yeah, it's important.
I want to do it. Yeah.
I said, well, do you feel safe? He's like,
are you going to be there?
I said, yeah, he's like,
as long as you're there, I'm okay.
Yeah.
His story reminds me of my story. Yes.
And that's why I connect so much with him
and so proud of him that,
you know, he's really
he's found his way out of the darkness.
Oh my gosh. Yes for sure.
Yeah. For sure. And such a young age.
And his artwork was very much like yours
I remember he is really good artist.
I remember
before I knew anything about his, gender,
his gender journey.
Yeah, I remember his artwork.
Some of it was so dark, Tony.
Like, I would look at it.
Oh, my God, you could see the pain.
The pain.
And this is through all the treatments
that we were getting for him, right
through all the, therapy sessions,
through all the medication.
That reason he was still drawing
these things that showed him in such pain.
Yeah.
And then that that doesn't happen
so much anymore.
But that's good that he was expressing it
artistically for sure.
Yeah.
Well, listen,
I just want to thank you, number one,
for really sharing
a lot of your personal journey.
We are so super excited to be able
to share our thoughts and have guests on,
thanks for joining us.
For this episode.
And stay tuned for the next one.
Chao. For now.
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by Alex Incorporated.
Alex is a nonprofit organization
dedicated to creating
a safe, compassionate community
while empowering LGBTQ plus youth,
families, and allies through educational,
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We hold annual events to raise funds
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