By Ben Wheeler
MEET the inspirational transgender man who has finally been able to embrace his new body thanks to his understanding girlfriend who previously dated women but now enjoys their heterosexual relationship.
Christopher Rhodes, 25, from Austin, Texas first realised he was male at the age of 19 but didn’t come out to everyone in his life until he was 22.
He described how his fiancé, Anna helped him during his transition.
“I first met Anna when we worked together and was masculine presenting but not out as being trans,” Chris said.
“After about a month of dating I told her that I prefer male pronouns and wanted to be called Chris, she basically said that she kind of knew, she didn’t skip a beat and wasn’t fazed at all.
“I couldn’t ask for a more supportive partner, I’ve dated people in the past who were not supportive and really held me back as far as being true to myself.
“Anna is unbelievably accepting and incredible, I can’t imagine going through this without her.”
Christopher went on to talk about how he felt living his previous life, as a girl called Chloe, and how he came to the realisation that he was not female.
“I wasn’t miserable pre-transition, but looking back I certainly wasn’t happy,” he said.
“The way I feel now explains so much as to how I felt before, like I was in a haze prior to transitioning and I just wasn’t really wholly myself.
“I experienced a lot of dysphoria around my body, gender and identity, even though I didn’t always realise that’s what it was.
“I first realised I was male when I was 19. There was a moment when I was speaking to my friend and we were talking about strong women.
“I realised that I was talking about women in a different way than I spoke about myself and that I didn’t identify with being a woman, so I needed to re-evaluate and figure out how I did identify and where I did belong.”
Once the decision to transition was made, however, Christopher had to break the news to his nearest and dearest.
“At first my family weren’t super on board with things,” he recalled.
“But my twin sister made it known that if anyone wanted to cut ties with me they’d lose her too, so I can honestly thank her for tough-loving everyone into being on board.
“We now run a clothing line together called FLAVNT Streetwear that gives back to the LQBTQ community by donating 15% of sales to trans people fundraising for surgeries, we’ve donated about $20k in the last three years.”
Christopher also detailed the moment he decided to make the change and spoke about his transition journey since then.
“I decided to stop dragging my feet and worrying about what everyone else around me thought because 22 years was a long time to live a life that you were unsure about and to not be completely true to yourself, so I wanted to give myself a chance to be happy,” he said.
“I moved to New York City after college and that gave me the chance to start over away from family and friends. I had access to a big support system in NYC with a lot of LGBTQ friends and there was a really great clinic where I started hormones fairly quickly and easily.
“I’ve only had top surgery so far, a double mastectomy which lasted about two hours and I’m currently in the process of scheduling a hysterectomy this spring and have plans for a phalloplasty probably in 2019 or 2020.
“I feel a lot more at ease now, it’s like the puzzle pieces are finally fitting together. Not every day is easy, and I still have a lot of obstacles to overcome and dysphoria to face, but I feel a lot more like myself and that makes life so much better.
“Transitioning is difficult, expensive and tiring. The hardest part is that a lot of people don’t understand, and they also don’t care to understand.
“Nobody likes to explain themselves all the time, and in a world as judgemental as ours having to prove you are who you say you are, whether that be by jumping through legal hoops, having to deal with the current political climate in the United States or just dealing with trolls on the internet is hard.”
Finally, Christopher had a message for everyday members of the public about the experiences and perception of transgender in society today.
“Trans people are just like you, they’re living their lives trying to be the best they can be, and that’s not something that should be seen as taboo,” he said.
“I know just as many successful trans people as I know successful cis people. I know trans military veterans, trans firefighters, trans teachers, trans models, trans husbands, wives, parents are children, they are all just people.
“Just because something is different or new to you, it doesn’t mean it’s wrong or weird, and you’ve honestly probably interacted with a trans person before you just might not have known it.”
