Gender reassignment: 'I always wanted to be a girl...'
Kim Petras is a model and an aspiring pop star. She is also the youngest person in the world to undergo gender reassignment.
By Jonathan Brown and Tony Paterson
Monday, 21 September 2009
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/people/news/gender-reassignment-i-always-wanted-to-be-a-girl-1790731.html (http://www.independent.co.uk/news/people/news/gender-reassignment-i-always-wanted-to-be-a-girl-1790731.html)
She may be just 16 yet Kim Petras exudes a confidence and articulacy that belies her years. Whether discussing her new record deal, the latest modelling contract or plans to become a top fashion designer, the girl with the pretty blond hair and penchant for pink is clearly riding high, a bright young talent seemingly on the verge of a glittering career.
But though she can now look forward with confidence to future success, the young singer's adolescent life has been anything but straightforward. As the fallout continues over the news that a 12-year-old British boy was seeking to become the world's youngest person to undergo gender reassignment – particularly traumatic for the child apparently because of his school's clumsy handling of the matter – in Germany, Kim Petras is quietly moving on from the issue which defined her adolescent years. For Kim began life as Tim, a little boy growing up with two older sisters in the German city of Bonn.