JamieAnn Meyers
Transgender representative and board member, ReconcilingWorks: Lutherans for Full Participation
Marriage: It's About Love and Commitment (A Transgender Perspective)
Posted: 10/23/2012 2:27 pm
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jamieann-meyers/marriage-its-about-love-and-commitment-a-transgender-perspective_b_1998860.htmlMy wife and I met one another as seventh graders in 1957 and began "going steady" the summer before our senior year. In 1966 we were married in a traditional ceremony that my dad conducted as pastor of our church. In our vows we promised "to have and to hold from this day forward, for better for worse, for richer for poorer, in sickness and in health, to love and to cherish, till death us do part."
We became parents to two loving and wonderful children, and we now have three wonderful grandchildren. Our life together has been blessed with joy and happiness, but like any other couple, we've also struggled with difficulties and times of doubt and sorrow. Throughout my life, a ghost lurked in the furthest corners of my mind, This ghost was my true self, my identity that I could never reveal to anyone, not even to myself. I was paralyzed by fears that were I to reveal my true self, I would most certainly lose everything, including my very life. You see, I'm a transgender woman. When I finally came out to my wife as female in 2004, we both feared that our marriage would end on the rocks of gender transition, and we counted our time together in days instead of years.
Now that I'm finally whole in body and spirit, we've found new strength, individually and together. We've found new ways of expressing our love, new ways of walking through life as two women in a stronger and ongoing committed relationship that has changed in so many ways, and yet hasn't changed at all.
